Author: Rajeshwar Mittapalli
Letizia Alterno/Several Contributors
Publisher: Atlantic Publishers
Year: 2009
Language: English
Pages: 226
ISBN/UPC (if available): 9788126910984
Description
During the post-Independence period Indian masculinity has undergone a major transformation. But this new psychological and social phenomenon has not been adequately analysed or intellectually accounted for. Postcolonial Indian discourses tend to bypass masculinity in spite of its enormous importance. Literary criticism too has been no exception.
Informed studies of Indian masculinity within the field of literature have been near totally absent despite masculinity occupying the centre stage in a large number of fictional works. This book makes an honest attempt to fill the lacuna to an extent by studying, from multiple perspectives, the depiction of Indian masculinity in Indian fiction in English of the postcolonial period.
Most of the novels studied in this volume faithfully reflect the new social mores, everyday ideology and popular psychology of the urban Indian middleclass and boldly address the unconventional issue of masculinity and its changing contours.
The writers considered here include G.V. Desani, Shashi Deshpande, Vikram Chandra, Amitav Ghosh, Kiran Nagarkar, Shobha Dé, Arundhati Roy, Kiran Desai and Mulk Raj Anand and some of the themes that have been explored are: queer autofiction, marriage, sexual violence, gender-power hierarchy, discontents of masculinity, sexual politics, masculinity vs. femininity, inferiority and cultural determinism. It is hoped that this book will significantly contribute to the discussion in India of masculinity as an academic subject and in the process prove useful to literary scholars as well as social scientists.
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS:
1. Alterno, Letizia Department of English and American Studies, The University of Manchester, M13 9PL, Manchester, UK.
2. Bedjaoui Fewzia Department for Foreign Languages, Universite de Sidi-Bel-Abbes (Djillali Liabes), BP 89 Sidi Bel Abbes 22000 Algerie (Algeria)
3. Chandra, N. Department of English, Pondicherry University R.V. Nagar, Kalapet,Puducherry-605014 India
4. Chatterjee, Purnendu Department of English, Rabindra Bharati University, 56A Barrackpore, Trunk Road
5. Da Silva, Stephen, Department of English, Brookhaven College, 3939 Valley View Lane, Farmer's Branch, Dallas, 75244 USA.
6. Ganapathy-Dore, Geetha, UFR de Droit, Sciences politiques et socials, Universite de Paris 13-99, avenue, Jean Baptiste Clement 93430 Villetaneuse Cedex, France
7. Gasparini, Adalinda, via Pratese, 56-50145 Firenze, Italy
8. Karekatti, Tripti, Department of English, Mekelle University
9. Mittapalli, Rajeshwar Department of English Kakatiya University, Warangal-506009, Andhra Pradesh, India
10. Roye, Susmita Department of English, University of Bristol, 3/5 Woodland Road, Clifton, Bristol BS8 1TB, UK.
11. Sundaram, Aparna Department of English, Ethiraj College for Women (Autonomous), Ethiraj Salai, Egmore
12. Viswamohan, Aysha.Department of Humanities & Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Madras
Contents
Preface
1. A Reading of G.V. Desani's All About H. Hatterr as Queer Auofiction/Geetha Ganapathy-Dore
2. Marriage, Sexual Violence and Indian Masculinity : A Study of Shashi Deshpande's The Dark Holds No Terrors and Anita Nair's Mistress/Aparna Sundaram
3. Beyond the Phallic Axis in Vikram Chandra's Sacred Games/Adalinda Gasparini
4. Reconsidering Gender-Power Hierarchy in a Post/Colonial Society : Masculinities Amitav Ghosh's The Hungry Tide/Susmita Roye
5. Kiran Nagarkar and the Discontents of Masculinity/Aysha Viswamohan
6. Mapping Masculinities in Mumbai : A Reading of Shobha De's Fiction/Tripti Karekatti
7. "Tridib's Gastric" : The Contradictory Sexual Politics of The Shadow Lines/Stephen da Silva
8. Masculinity vs. Femininity : Perpetuation and Transgression in Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things/Fewzia Bedjaoui
9. The Inheritance of Loss : Mapping Postcolonial Indian Masculinities/Purnendu Chatterjee
10. Reciprocal Relationship between Masculinity and Femininity in Thi.Ja.'s Mogamul and Mulk Raj Anand's Gauri/N. Chandra
11. Inferiority, Individual Psychology and Cultural Determinism: An 'Indian Complex' in Ra.Vi. Sastri's A Man of No Consequence/Rajeshwar Mittapalli
Contributors