Grandmother School

The grandmother/grandchild relationship is cleverly reversed in Grandmother School to provide stark contrast. Having raised a child who is literate, whose grandchild has just become literate, Aaji (the grandmother) is taken by her grandchild to the Asajibaichi Shala (Grandmother School) to finally learn the written word and arithmetic. Set in 2016 and told from the point-of-view of the young grandchild, she describes through words and pictures the transformation of her grandmother’s inner world when she finally experiences literacy. Words in Hindi decoratively plaster the pages more and more densely as Aaji learns more words. As Aaji becomes more literate, she ably navigates the commerce and literary worlds with much more power, thereby allowing her to be able to speak truth to the men in power with newfound confidence.

The grandfather thinks that his wife’s going to school at her age is an act of futility—or more appropriately an act of defiance (and self-reliance). The banker looks down upon those who must use their fingerprint as their signature—or more appropriately determines those without financial and traditional literacy as being people who cannot acclimate into the capitalist mode of power relations. Grandmother School underscores the relationship between women's literacy rates and the current economy of power, run by men, which results in the (still) disenfranchisement of women from society's inner workings. This picture book, however, carries a fresh air of delight, from its playful reversal of a grandchild acting as the adult figure, to endearing scenes of Aaji telling oral stories,

Grandmother School offers its readers a poignantly lively picture book that expressly reveals the power and freedom found in words for women across the world. How great a treat it will be to read this book in a grandmother’s lap at the library, the people’s university that grows with you and meets you wherever you happen to be.