AbstractThis paper explores social reform as hegemonic practice, as part of a general attempt to gain moral, cultural and political leadership (Gramsci). It also claims any hegemonic practice to be gendered. Examining magazine writings by Bengali middle class women at the turn of the 19th Century on Women's education, the article displays an internal struggle on the ground of gender and patriarch, as the women seek to gain agency in a substantive way. while co‐operating within the whole class's agenda. It particularly examines the concept of motherhood, in the context of moral education, and locates this concern in the changing forms in social reproduction, especially in the situation of a new home or private life in the middle classes of Benga