• ISBN13: 9780199454914
• Binding: Hardcover
• Subject: Sociology and Anthropology
• Publisher: Oxford UP
• Publisher Imprint: Oxford UP
• Publication Date: January 1, 2015
• Pages: 344
• Original Price: INR 875.0
• Language: English
• Edition: N/A
• Item Weight: 522 grams
• BISAC Subject(s): Anthropology / Cultural & Social, Gender Studies, and European / English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh

The female homosexual in South Asia is not always a visible lesbian person. She is often a figuration of an act that challenges hegemonic ideas of gender and female subjectivity. This lesbian femininity can be found in many socio-cultural conversations, defamiliarizing and subverting normative ideas of female monogamy, compulsory motherhood, asexuality, celibacy, and compliance.

A nuanced reading of contemporary literary and cinematic texts from India and its diaspora, this work traces the histories of the 'un(familiar)' lesbian in the homophobic realm around us. Focusing on representations and legacies of such femininities, the author shows how female same-sex socialities and female same-sex love straddle terrains both familiar and unfamiliar, arguing that homosexuality and heterosexuality are not in opposition but in a state of constant dialogue with each other.

Aneeta Rajendran teaches at the Department of English, Gargi College, University of Delhi.