This is an important study of domestic workers and their employers in Kolkata and within the Bengali community in New York. The study views the home as a site where relations of class, gender and caste/race are produced and reproduced via domestic labor practices. As Raka Ray and Seemin Qayum clearly demonstrate, domestic servitude confuses and complicates the conceptual divide between family and work, custom and contract, affection and duty, precisely because the hierarchy and emotional registers of “home and family” coexist and compete with “workplace and contract.” This book conceives of the relations within the household as a microcosm of the rules and comportment of societies, with the institution of domestic servitude providing a powerful lens through which to view social constitution and reconstitution over time (p. 2). The authors link this study, not only to cultural studies of Bengal and India, but to a number of studies of domestic workers in the United States.

Ray and Qayum devote chapters to, among other matters: 2) the transformation of ideology from “feudal” to “modern”; 3) the shift from retainer to employee; 5) the failure of the patriarchal ideology; 6) the creation of distinctions between master and servant; and 7) the transplantation of Bengali domestics to New York. The cultures of servitude are shaped by both employer and employed as individuals and classes, and this shaping occurs in the interactions of daily life that essentializes the each group's understanding of the other. There are three primary lenses the authors use: the servant as essential to any properly equipped household; the servant as “part of the family”; and the servant as distinct from the family. While they are seen as essential, the shift in relationships from patron/retainer to employer/employee is indicative of a shift from a “feudal” to a “modern” mindset. As Ray and Qayum effectively point out, this is intensely problematic in that, while there is still a mindset of relationship and obligation among employers, many employees are happy to have a contractual relationship to clarify the expectations employers have of them. Throughout, the authors present, sometimes subtly and sometimes not so subtly, a critique of modernity and capitalism, while at the same time not succumbing to the allure of giving primacy to an equally oppressive “feudal” mindset. In so doing, they clearly portray capitalism as the cause of the inequality inherent in domestic servitude.

Ray and Qayum also note the inherently gender-based understanding of domestic servitude. Within patriarchy, there is an expectation of menfolk to protect and provide for their womenfolk. However, when this fails, women often become domestic servants, thus taking on a masculine role as providers. This is seen as a failure of women to be mothers and child-rearers, but also as a failure of men to live up to their obligations as providers. There is a clear articulation of the subtleties of patriarchy and gender where work within the home is understood to be inherently “feminine.” Those who perform this work are “ideally suited” because of their gender to perform “demeaning” tasks such as washing dishes, or are somehow less than real “men” because of their performance of these tasks. Thus, there is an association of “women” with “the domestic” that runs throughout the book. While a whole chapter is devoted to the “failure of patriarchy” and the problematization of this association, I would like to have this section expanded. This would be difficult in an already cohesive works, so I am hoping a follow-up study will expand on the notions of gender identity within servant roles.

“Culture of servitude” is one in which social relations of domination/subordination are normalized and permeate both the domestic and public spheres such that domination and dependency are accepted by the superior and subordinate, as well as being reproduced through everyday activities. Thus, Ray and Qayum suggest that the key is that domestic workers perform menial and undesirable tasks considered “dirty” by Indian culture. This makes the performance of these tasks a “boundary making activity” (pp. 9–10), and so domestic servitude is as much about differentiation of personhood as it is about financial contracts. As with the gender issue, I would like to see the idea of boundaries and personal/group identities expanded.

This is an important study that links an element of Indian culture to cultures of servitude worldwide, and is especially timely given current issues of immigration and migration, transnationalism, and modernism and its continued use of traditional concepts. This work would be valuable, not only for scholars of India or of labor studies, but for those interested in gender and culture studies as well.