Author Description

This compilation of almost 100 maps is put together using date from the 1991 Census of India. The Atlas maps a regional geography of women and men, using indicators as diverse as literacy, education, voting patterns, cultural groupings, fertility rates, workforce participation etc. The aim is to provide information based on Census data which can help demonstrate the diversity of women s lives in India, and to provide it in such a way that readers/users can link one set of facts with another, to look at what kinds of patterns emerge. In foregrounding women, the Atlas poses implicitly some key questions: how are knowledge and information constructed and communicated? Why has geography, for example, been so silent on the contribution of women to society? What kinds of layers of knowledge and information do we need to unpeel before we arrive at some information about the silent contributors women. Supplemented by detailed appendices and tables, the Atlas throws light on missing or invisible facts and information in a graphic, readable and accessible form which makes them useful to a wide range of readers.