Introduction: Worlding postcolonial sexualities : archives, activism, and anterior counterpublics -- "Betta mus cum" : Jamaica as the 'problem-space' of gay and lesbian liberation -- "Rights a di plan" : Sistren and sexual solidarities in Jamaica -- Creating a locational counterpublic : Manushi and the articulation of human rights and sexuality from Delhi, India -- Outing Indian sexualities : Bombay Dost and the limits of queer intersectionality -- Worlding sexualities under apartheid : from gay liberation to a queer Afropolitanism -- Mediated sexualities : civic feminism and development critique in South Africa -- Coda: Digital counterpublics and intergenerational listening.
Summary:
"Worlding Postcolonial Sexualities demonstrates how late twentieth century postcolonial print cultures initiated a public discourse on sexual activism and contends that postcolonial feminist and queer archives offer alternative histories of sexual precarity, vulnerability, and resistance. The book's comparative focus on India, Jamaica, and South Africa extends the valences of postcolonial feminist and queer studies towards a historical examination of South-South interactions in the theory and praxis of sexual rights. Analyzing the circumstances of production and the contents of English-language and intermittently bilingual magazines and newsletters published between the late 1970s and the late 1990s, these sources offer a way to examine the convergences and divergences between postcolonial feminist, gay, lesbian activism. It charts a set of concerns common to feminist, gay, and lesbian activist literature: retrogressive colonial-era legislation impacting the status of women and sexual minorities; marked increase in sexual violence; piecemeal reproductive freedoms and sexual choice under neoliberalism; emergence and management of the HIV/AIDS crisis; precariousness of lesbian and transgender concerns within feminist and LGBTQ movements; Non-Governmental Organizations as major actors articulating sexual rights as human rights. This methodologically innovative work is based on archival historical research, analyses of national and international policy documents, close readings of activist publications, and conversations with activists and founding editors. This is an important intervention in the field of Gender and Sexuality Studies and is the winner of the 2020 Feminist Futures, Subversive Histories prize in partnership with the NWSA. The book is key reading for scholars and students in gender, sexuality, comparative literature and postcolonial studies"-- Provided by publisher.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.