PEER REVIEWED
https://doi.org/10.51897/interalia/BBPG3581
The Indian Subaltern and Her Sexual Identity:
A Study of the Unspoken Intersectionality as seen in Maya Sharma’s Loving Women: Being a Lesbian in Unprivileged India
Audrey Correa
Abstract
Women in India are positioned at the axes of multiple marginalisations such as gender, class, religion and caste. For the feminist in India, these pluralities make the fight to express one’s sexual agency seem frivolous to say the least, especially one which does not fit within the hegemonical normative. Today, however, the queer body has become an important political vote bank. But is it only the male upper caste, upper class queer body that is visible? The study examines Maya Sharma’s documentation of the lived realities of women from un-privileged India, victims of multiple marginalisations, through the lens of queer theory, intersectionality theory and Spivak’s critique of the Subaltern. By applying these theories to the lived narratives in Maya Sharma’s book, the paper attempts to analyse how these real-life protagonists’ identity is moulded by multiple layers of systemic oppression and subjugation, and how their sexual identity is often erased. Indian culture’s proscriptive policies, especially with respect to women and sexuality, compel women in the margins to either repress, thereby erasing themselves, or create self-curated spaces which are not always safe. Even today, intersectional identities of caste, class and gender converge to create a unique and nuanced experience of oppression, especially for the woman ‘othered’ due to her sexual identity.
Keywords: homosocial, intersectionality, lesbian, queer, sexual identity, subaltern
