Procida, Mary A., “Married to the Empire: British wives and British imperialism in India, 1883-1947”, Ph.D. thesis, University of Pennsylvania, 1997, AAT 9727278. Brief summary.

“This dissertation analyzes the role played by British wives of civil and military officers in India in creating and sustaining British imperialism in India from the late-nineteenth century through Indian independence in 1947. Wives' contributions to British imperialism started out in relatively "safe" and predictably "feminine" arenas, such as reimagining the home as the locus of imperial activity, imbuing quotidian interactions with Indian domestic servants with imperial significance and even reformulating the marital relationship itself to serve the empire better. Gradually, however, women began to assert themselves in less traditional ways, participating in public political debate about the aims and methods of British imperialism in India and, eventually, actively working to sustain the Raj. This dissertation examines in detail several significant events in Indian history (i.e., the Ilbert Bill controversy of 1883-1884, the 1919 Amritsar Massacre and nationalist violence of the interwar period, Indianisation of the imperial services in the 1920s and 1930s, and World War II) as jumping-off points to explore the different ways that women supported the empire and created their own view of British imperialism in India. Drawing on diverse sources …, the dissertation argues first, that British wives made significant contributions to British imperialism, some of which were encouraged and sanctioned by the government, some not, and second, that women became increasing aware of the importance of their contributions to the empire in India and committed to the continuation of imperial power.” From the abstract