This study explores how "purdah", "suti" and "hareem" shape the lives of women and how they themselves cope with or resist these restrictions. The author"s interview with women in Delhi, in Karachi - where we meet women who work in a vast women-only mall,with its banks and shops - and in the north of England illustrate their attitudes to work, the management of family finances and the valuing of education as a way to liberation.