Author: Mary John
Janaki Nair/
Publisher: Kali/Zubaan
Year: 2000
Language: English
Pages: 412
ISBN/UPC (if available): 81 86706 32 1
Description
Now available in paperback edition a much talked about book which pulls together some of our best feminist scholars across several disciplines.
Has there been a conspiracy of silence regarding sexuality in India, be it within social movements or as a focus of scholarship? The essays in this volume use diverse perspectives to develop an understanding of the institutions, practices and forms of representation of sexual relations, and their boundaries of legitimacy.
From unraveling the Kamastura (the text) to investigating Kamasutra (the condom) the volume includes essays on how sexuality has been framed by the law, within social movements or has been the site for patrolled caste, ethnic or gender identities.
COMMENTS:
The volume pulls together some of our best feminist scholars, across several disciplines and it is a significant contribution to feminist debates on sexuality in India. - Indian Express
THE EDITORS:
Mary E John, Senior Fellow at the Center for Women's Development Studies, New Delhi is the author of Discrepant Dislocations: Feminism, Theory and Postcolonial Histories
Janaki Nair, Visiting Fellow at the Center for the Study of Culture and Society, Bangalore, is the author of Women and Laws in Colonial India and Miners and Millhands: Work, Culture and Politics in Princely Mysore.
Contents
Preface
Introduction : A QUESTION OF SILENCE ?
CHAPTER ONE
The Sexual Economies of modern India
Mary E. John and Janaki Nair
CHAPTER TWO
Unravelling the Kamasutra
Kumkum Roy
CHAPTER THREE
Offences against Marriage : Negotiating custom in Colonial Bengal
Samitra Sen
CHAPTER FOUR
"Left to the Imagination" : Indian nationalisms and female sexuality in Trinidad
Tejaswini Niranjana
CHAPTER FIVE
Reproductive Bodies and Regulated Sexuality : Birth control debates in early twentieth century Tamilnadu
Anandhi S.
CHAPTER SIX
Comrades-in-Arms : Sexuality and identity in the contemporary revolutionary movement in Andhra Pradesh and the legacy of Chalam
U. Vindhya
CHAPTER SEVEN
Sexuality and the Film Apparatus : Condinuity, non-continuity and discontinuity in Bombay cinema
Ravi Vasudevan
CHAPTER EIGHT
Citizenship and its Discontents
Susie Tharu
CHAPTER NINE
Inventing Saffron History : A celibate hero rescues an emasculated nation
Uma Chakravarti
CHAPTER TEN
Uneven Modernities and Ambivalent Sexualities : Women's constructions of Puberty in coastal Kanyakumari, Tamilnadu
Kalpana Ram
CHAPTER ELEVEN
On Bodily Love and Hurt
V. Geetha
CHAPTER TWELVE
Enforcing Cultural Codes : Gender and violence in northern India
Prem Chowdhry
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Globalisation, Sexuality and the Visual Field : Issues and non-issues for cultural critique
Mary E. John
Notes on Contributors
Index