Gender Studies - Page 9

The New Face of Abuse?: Questioning the Fall of the Father and Assessing the Child Exploitation in Deborah Moggach’s Porky

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235 views

Poulomi Modak

Ph.D Scholar (JRF), Department of English, Cooch Behar Panchanan Barma University, West Bengal. Email: poulomimodak1992@gmail.com

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s9n3

Abstract

In contemporaneous world child sexual abuse is possibly the most heinous kind of child exploitation; therefore, continuous dialogue and discourse regarding the child sexual abuse should be given the primordial prominence in order to be well aware about and thereby engage with possible measures against this monster in the closet. It is in this context that the paper attempts through a detailed and critical analysis of Deborah Moggach’s controversial novel Porky to make a reading of the narratives of pain, sufferings, and trauma inflicted upon the ‘abject’ body. Further, the novelist has incorporated the havoc of non-consensual incest which concomitantly attributes the novel as a site for insightful discussion. The proposed article, therefore, interrogates family as a possible locus of sexual exploitation of the children. This reorientation of family as a disintegrated entity eventually brings forth the question of victim’s rehabilitation. Extending this, the paper finally argues any possible healing of the oppressed body.

Keywords: abusive father, body shaming, child molestation, non-consensual incest, psychological trauma

“When spotted deaths ran arm’d through every street”: Women-Healers and the Great Plague in Geraldine Brooks’ Year of Wonders

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260 views

Isha Biswas

PhD Scholar (English), Vidyasagar University, Faculty, Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis Mahavidyalaya. Email: yoshinokurosaki@gmail.com. Orcid ID: 0000-0001-8328-4579

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s26n4

Abstract

In the late 1600s, England was reeling under the recurrence of the pandemic that had swept continent-wide in the 14th century. However, it was not the only disease lurking around. At the heels of the scarlet-ringed Black Death, came the scarlet letter of witchcraft accusations, mostly geared towards Wise Women in the margins of society- women who exhibited knowledge and skill in medicine, herbal remedies and midwifery. Set in the time when religious fanaticism and Puritanical fear-mongering was at its height, Year of Wonders presents before us an opportunity to delve into the web of lies and life-threatening allegations that formed the bedrock of the English witch trials continuing in full swing since the incursion of Continental lore ever since James I came to power. Furthermore, with midwives and female herbalists in the area falling prey to targeted sexual and physical violence in the wake of the pandemic in the story, what needs to be inspected is the inescapable link between Church-backed patriarchy’s delusional fear, jealousy and consequent scapegoating of the economically and socio-sexually marginalized woman-healers in the countryside and the failure of the male-dominated medical field in effectively containing the spread of the virus. The paper investigates further the generational flow of biomedical wisdom in a female-oriented domain which becomes significant in the presentation of the two female leads inheriting the function of the Wise Women from the original holders of the position, thus solidifying the sense of found family and sisterhood standing against the mounting social pressure to bend to the will of the Church and the men in their lives.

Keywords: Witch, Wise Women, Black Death, Misogyny, Medicine, Women-healers

Economic and Psychosocial Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Badhai Hijras: A Qualitative Study

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376 views

Preeti1 & Shyamkiran Kaur2

1Dr. B.R. Ambedkar National Institute of Technology, Jalandhar, Punjab, India, email- preeti.hm.19@nitj.ac.in, https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2279-6532

2Dr. B.R. Ambedkar National Institute of Technology, Jalandhar, Punjab, India, email- kaursk@nitj.ac.in, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8182-361X

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s26n3

 Abstract

Human history has witnessed various natural upheavals, pandemics being one of them. These pandemics whether The Black Death, The Great Plague of London, Russian Flu, Spanish Flu, Asian Flu, HIV/AIDS, SARS, etc. struck down every sphere of human civilization. The devastating economic and psychosocial impact of COVID-19 has been experienced by every group of population whether privileged or marginalised. Hijras (a term used by Serena Nanda for the transgenders in Indian Subcontinent) especially badhai hijras (transgender performers) who are already living on the edges of society have been targeted worst by this pandemic as their livelihood is solely dependent upon their performances on various social gatherings that decreased significantly during the period. These people amidst poor finances are confronting more discrimination by the heteronormative set-up which results in their low physical, mental, and social well-being. The objective of the present paper is to study the economic and psychosocial impact of COVID-19 pandemic on hijras in general and badhai hijras in particular. The arguments are supported by various vis-a-vis interactions with hijras and an NGO working for their well-being in the district Jalandhar, Punjab (India). While using the interview technique, a structural questionnaire for a sample population of badhai hijras was used to collect data for the study. The findings of the research work highlighted the urgent need of providing financial assistance to the badhai hijras. The research work would assist the decision making agencies of government to frame policies for these marginalized individuals which will directly support them in the pandemic.

 [Keywords– LGBTQ, hijras, badhai hijras, pandemic, COVID-19, Transphobia, Heteronormative]

“There is No Home, Pig”: Examining the Dilemma of Northeast Queer in Time of Covid-19

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475 views

Lede E Miki Pohshna

Research Scholar, English Department, North-Eastern Hill University, Email- ledeemiki@gmail.com, ORCID- https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0434-9704

  Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s17n6

Abstract

While COVID-19 has unleashed waves of reverse-migration from the cities back to the hometowns due to economic and physical uncertainties that accompanied the pandemic, queer people from the North-Eastern Region of India choose to stay in the cities. Defying the reverse-migration trend, they choose the freedom that the city gives them over the prejudice of their hometown toward their sexuality. This paper will theorize how pandemic affects and at the same time affirms queer sexualities This paper will re-interpret metronormativity in the context of North-East queer people and will co-opt Judith Halberstam’s theory while at the same time reworking it to fit the local context of queer North-East. Unlike Halberstam’s theory that the metro offers a continuum of free existence to the queer people,  this paper will examine certain queer narratives both online and through  interviews in order to understand how the city offers not a “freer” existence ( in the sense that  freedom is given and implied upon) but rather a relatively anonymous existence which allows them to live freely in anonymity but never silent. It will problematize the concept of home and space and how queer subjectivities are (un)formed depending upon certain variables that the home offers which eventually affects queer existence. This existence will then juxtapose with Kosofsky’s “gesture of silence” of the home and the closet and in doing so, it will attempt to understand North East queer’s preference for the danger of COVID 19 and the “insecurities” of the city over the “security” of home.

 Keywords: Northeastern, Queer, Metronormativity, Reverse-Migration, COVID-19

Examining the Emergence of Feminist Consciousness in the Select Fiction of Contemporary North East Women Writers

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380 views

Adenuo Shirat Luikham

Assistant Professor, Department of English, Don Bosco College Kohima, Nagaland, India. Email: adenuo@gmail.com. ORCID: 0000-0003-4273-3117.

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s17n4

Abstract

An interesting development in the literary world in India in the last few decades is the emergence of writings in English from the North East. This development is simultaneously accompanied with a growing interest in the region’s writings and its people especially from mainland India. It is also noteworthy that many of the contemporary writers contributing to this nascent literary tradition are women. While the quality of any writing cannot be overshadowed or judged by gender, it is irrefutable that women write from a position where their gender often dictates their experiences. For contemporary women writers of the North East, their narratives, seated in the vehicle of fiction, become a revelation on the gendered experiences of women from the region whose issues, concerns and problems are often shrouded in a cloud of mystery and exoticized by the outside world. The paper seeks to examine the select fiction of women writers from the region and state that there is a discernible feminist consciousness that is emerging; identifying these feminist markers in their fiction allows the silenced voices of women to be heard and their growing boldness to claim a dignified existence in the midst of convoluted geo-politics that have irrevocably scarred the region.

 Keywords: North East, Feminist Consciousness, Contemporary Women Writers, Fiction from the North East

Positioning the Gendered Subaltern: Body, Speech and Resistance in Mahasweta Devi’s Narratives

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441 views

Joe Philip,1 Renu Bhadola Dangwal2 & Vinod Balakrishnan3

 1Research Scholar, English, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences. National Institute of Technology, Uttarakhand, Srinagar, Garhwal, Uttarakhand-246174, Email id:joephilip.phd14@nituk.ac.in. ORCID: 0000-0002-7593-046X

2Assistant Professor, English, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences. National Institute of Technology, Uttarakhand, Srinagar, Garhwal, Uttarakhand-246174, Email id: rbdangwal@nituk.ac.in. ORCID: 0000-0002-7929-1570

3Professor, Department of Humanities, National Institute of Technology, Tiruchirappalli, Tamil Nadu-620015, Email id: vinod@nitt.edu

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s16n5

 Abstract

The postcolonial theory locates subaltern women as ‘doubly effaced’ and distanced from achieving agency to speak and participate in resistance. Due to her diversified colonized identity, much of the critical thought does not see any possibility for subaltern women participating in resistance. This line of argument implies a critical space in which the engagement with problematics inevitably leaves out subaltern women in the emergent resistance discourse. Moreover, such a position is suggestive of perceiving human activity and experience in closed terms and an intent to preserve subalternity. The present paper argues that, if perceived through a wider understanding of the concept of resistance, subaltern women may be seen to achieve agency as they communicate their plight vocally or silently and participate in resistance. Taking inferences from the literary narratives of Mahasweta Devi like Imaginary Maps, Breast Stories, the paper examines the strategies Devi employs to bring marginalized women into resistance and establishes that the ‘body’ emerges not only as a site of oppression but also as an important trope of power and resistance in her stories.

Keywords: gendered subaltern, doubly colonized, agency, hegemony and resistance.

Psychosocial Impacts of War and Trauma in Temsula Ao’s Laburnum for My Head

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220 views

Raam Kumar T.1 & B. Padmanabhan2

1PhD Research Scholar, Department of English and Foreign Languages, Bharathiar University, E-mail: raamkumar.efl@buc.edu.in. ORCID: 0000-0003-0694-8671
2Assistant Professor, Department of English and Foreign Languages, Bharathiar University, E-mail: padmanabhan@buc.edu.in. ORCID: 0000-0001-7395-126X

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s16n4

 Abstract

Violence constantly carries trauma and suffering to combatants as well as non- combatants identically. It also brings enmity and negativity to everyone both emotionally and physically. The cause for any conflict does not emerge from single motive but depends on multiple factors like socioeconomic conditions, marginalisation, discrimination, political power and sometimes even environmental elements. In recent times, the conflicts often emerge among various regional groups rather than states. North Eastern part of India is one of the hotspots for such ethnic conflicts and violence. The major motives for bloody conflict between Indian Army and the underground armed rebels are perceived political imbalance and desire for a separate nation. Even the common civilians are forced to join the rebel groups without knowing consequences. Temsula Ao is one of the prominent English writers from Nagaland who through her moving narratives brings out the existent misery of conflict in her native land. The aim of this paper is to study the psychological impact of domestic violence over the combatants as well as non-combatants whose lives are inseparably intertwined with violence and bloodshed. Though violence is considered as typical condition of human nature most of the time it leads to unbearable trauma and misery. This paper also attempts to interpret the representation of women from the marginalised Ao community who finds difficult to preserve the customs and moral values in spite of regional revolt.

Keywords: Psychological imbalance, Domestic violence, Aggression, North East India

Women and Agency in Bankim’s Rajmohan’s Wife and Tagore’s The Home and The World

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440 views

Manju Dhariwal

Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, The LNM Institute of Information Technology, Jaipur. ORCID: 0000-0002-1579-1218, Email: manju@lnmiit.ac.in

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s16n3

Abstract

Written almost half a century apart, Rajmohan’s Wife (1864) and The Home and the World (1916) can be read as women centric texts written in colonial India. The plot of both the texts is set in Bengal, the cultural and political centre of colonial India. Rajmohan’s Wife, arguably the first Indian English novel, is one of the first novels to realistically represent ‘Woman’ in the nineteenth century. Set in a newly emerging society of   India, it provides an insight into the status of women, their susceptibility and dependence on men. The Home and the World, written at the height of Swadeshi movement in Bengal, presents its woman protagonist in a much progressive space. The paper closely examines these two texts and argues that women enact their agency in relational spaces which leads to the process of their ‘becoming’. The paper analyses this journey of the progress of the self, which starts with Matangini and culminates in Bimala. The paper concludes that women’s journey to emancipation is symbolic of the journey of the nation to independence.

Key Words: Swadeshi, Nationalism, Female agency, Patriarchy, Liminality

Unraveling the Social Position of Women in Late-Medieval Bengal: A Critical Analysis of Narrative Art on Baranagar Temple Facades

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280 views

Bikas Karmakar1 & Ila Gupta2

1Assistant Professor, Government College of Art & Craft Calcutta. bikaskarmakar@gmail.com

2Former Professor, Department of Architecture & Planning, IIT Roorkee. ilafap@gmail.com

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s16n2

Abstract

The genesis of the present study can be traced to an aspiration to work on the narratives of religious architecture. The Terracotta Temples of Baranagar in Murshidabad, West Bengal offer a very insightful vantage point in this regard. The elaborate works of terracotta on the facades of these temples patronized by Rani Bhabani during the mid-eighteenth century possess immense narrative potential to reconstruct the history of the area in the given time period. The portrayals on various facets of society, environment, culture, religion, mythology, and space and communication systems make these temples exemplary representatives for studying narrative art. While a significant portion of the temple facades depicts gods, goddesses, and mythological stories, the on-spot study also found a substantial number of plaques observed mainly on the base friezes representing the engagement of women in various mundane activities. This study explores the narrative intentions of such portrayals. The depictions incorporated are validated with various types of archival evidence facilitating cross-corroboration of the sources. The study sheds light on the crucial role played by women in domestic spheres and their engagement in social activities. The portrayals act as indispensable visual evidence for a holistic understanding of the life of women in Late Medieval Bengal. However, with the passage of time, the temples have been susceptible to the processes of decay necessitating the need for conservation and urgent restoration of this invaluable heritage site.

Keywords: Terracotta temples, Baranagar temple facades, women of Late Medieval Bengal, narrative art, Murshidabad temple architecture.

 

Understanding Women-Nature Dynamics: Eco-consciousness as a Quest for Identity in Selected Texts from Assam

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369 views

Paloma Chaterji

Research Coordinator in Organic Studies at M.G.gramudyog. E-mail: chaterjipaloma@yahoo.in, ORCID: 345382637

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s15n1

Abstract

My paper will explore the constantly changing dynamics of women-nature relationship through social and cultural history of Assam. I will gradually explore the eco-consciousness and the changing principles of my subjects as I shift my focus from the Shakti cult, to the Vaishnavite, to the modern urbanised subjects of the texts. The women characters in these texts will be the primary focus of this study as I begin to explore how they struggle to recognize their individual identity and how their association with nature comes as a response to accommodate what has been rendered passive by patriarchy. I will reflect on how the ever ideal and nurturing image of nature is problematic. The place-specific behavior of the characters in my study will offer a better vision of how women combat the ever presence patriarchal horrors through interaction with nature. Such an interaction reveals how nature actually makes women conscious of their individuality. This study will convey how free spirited nature helps these women overcome their limited space laced with patriarchal beliefs of selfless nurturing where the self is denied. Building on postcolonial critics like Chandra Mohanty, I would like to explore the discursive limits set by the processes of homogenization to which Assamese women have been subjected by a range of texts. This paper will explore the changing configurations of these limits and their implications, especially with regard to their interpellation in patriarchy. Through gendered readings of representative texts like Indira Goswami’s The Man from Chinnamasta and The Moth Eaten Howdah of the Tuskar and Mitra Phukan’s The Collector’s Wife, I will try to dismantle the essentialist binaries of nature/culture, men/women. Finally, this paper aims to dilute the ‘feminine’ and the ‘masculine’ principles and looks beyond the gynocentric essentialism of both nature and women.

Keywords: Nature, Gynocentrism, Eco Consciousness, Patriarchy, Postcolonialism

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