ABSTRACT Much of the literature on sex ratio imbalances in India has focused on the North–South divide or exclusively on the North-western states of India. In this paper, we draw on ethnographic research on the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir, where the child sex ratio (0–6 years) plummeted in the 2011 census. We study two villages in the Hindu dominated district of Jammu and two in largely Buddhist Leh (in Ladakh) to understand how the gender preference for children is shaped in this culturally heterogeneous state. Our findings reiterate the importance of context in understanding sex ratio patterns and gender preferences for children, especially in the wake of declining fertility, which in some regions has led to intensified discrimination against girl children. We examine features such as the organization of kinship and marriage structures that entail diverse forms of post-marital residence, old-age support, workforce participation, household division of labor and political participation in the four villages. By engaging in detailed comparison, we propose that when underlying reasons for the devaluation of women in general, and daughters in particular, are absent (as in case of the Leh villages), the availability of sex-selective technologies does not have an adverse effect on demographic outcomes.

中文翻译：

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性别制度、生殖策略和儿童性别偏好：查谟和列城村庄的比较研究

摘要关于印度性别比例失衡的许多文献都集中在南北分歧上，或者只关注印度西北部的各州。在本文中，我们借鉴了对查谟和克什米尔昔日状态的民族志研究，那里的儿童性别比（0-6 岁）在 2011 年人口普查中急剧下降。我们研究了印度教占主导地位的查谟区的两个村庄和主要佛教徒列城（拉达克）的两个村庄，以了解在这个文化异质的国家中对儿童的性别偏好是如何形成的。我们的研究结果重申了背景在理解儿童性别比例模式和性别偏好方面的重要性，尤其是在生育率下降之后，这在某些地区导致对女童的歧视加剧。我们考察了四个村庄的亲属关系和婚姻结构等特征，这些特征涉及不同形式的婚后居住、养老、劳动力参与、家庭分工和政治参与。通过进行详细的比较，我们提出，当普遍认为女性，特别是女儿贬值的根本原因不存在时（如列城村的情况），性别选择技术的可用性不会产生不利影响关于人口统计结果。