Gender Issues and Educational Development an Overview from Asia

(Note : This paper is based primarily on the perception of the relationship between education and women’s status by the authors of papers prepared for the Mount Holyoke college, International Conference on Worldwide Education for Women : Progress, Prospects and Agenda for the Future; November 1987. References to statistical data are made only to substantiate an argument. The statistics appended at the end are from United Nations or governmental sources, and an unpublished paper by Prof. Swarna Jayaveera of the Centre for Women’s Research, Colombo, on Class and Gender in Education and Employment in South and South-East Asia, prepared for a comparative, collaborative research project on Women’s Work and Family Strategies in South and South-East Asia. The study was sponsored by the United Nations University and coordinated by Hanna Papanek (Boston University, Asian Studies Centre) and the author. The basic argument of the paper and comments on the country specific perceptions, however, represent the views of the author).