{"product_id":"gender-sex-and-the-city-urdu-rekhti-poetry-1780-1870-9788125045533","title":"Gender, Sex and the City: Urdu Rekhti Poetry, 1780-1870","description":"\u003cp\u003e • Author(s): Ruth Vanita\u003cbr\u003e • Publisher: Orient Blackswan\u003cbr\u003e • Publisher Imprint: Orient Blackswan\u003cbr\u003e • Subject: Sociology and Anthropology\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: justify\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eGender, Sex and the City \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003eexplores the cosmopolitan sensibilities of Urdu poetry written in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, especially in the city of Lucknow, which was the centre of a flourishing Indo-Persian culture. Through its ground-breaking analysis, it demonstrates how \u003cem\u003ere??ti \u003c\/em\u003e(a type of Urdu poetry whose distinguishing features are a female speaker and a focus on women’s lives) and to some degree, non-mystical \u003cem\u003ere??ta \u003c\/em\u003e(mainstream Urdu poetry with a male speaker)\u003cem\u003e,\u003c\/em\u003e for the first time in Urdu represent women (both of conventional families and courtesan households) as important shapers of urban culture, especially urban speech. \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eVanita analyses how \u003cem\u003ere??ti  \u003c\/em\u003ebecomes a catalyst for the transformation of the \u003cem\u003eg_?azal\u003c\/em\u003e, first, by focusing it not on love alone but on the practices, spaces and rituals of everyday life; second, by bringing subordinated figures, such as women as well as servants centre-stage; and, third, by challenging the \u003cem\u003eg_?azal\u003c\/em\u003e’s ideal of perfect love as framed by separation and suffering.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp style=\"text-align: justify\"\u003eWomen characters in \u003cem\u003ere??ti\u003c\/em\u003e  fall in love, but they also work, shop, dress, sing, dance, eat, fast, chat, quarrel, pray, invoke spirits, and voice opinions on many matters. The author explores the way \u003cem\u003ere??ti\u003c\/em\u003e reconfigures the city from women’s perspective, depicting a parallel world of urban women’s meeting places, networks and rituals. \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp style=\"text-align: justify\"\u003eThe first book-length study in English of \u003cem\u003ere??ti \u003c\/em\u003eand also of non-mystical \u003cem\u003ere??ta\u003c\/em\u003e, it demonstrates the interplay between the twoin language, form and content. Including many first-time translations and also analyses of neglected poems, such as Rangin’s \u003cem\u003eMas?nawi Dilpa\u003cspan style=\"text-decoration: underline\"\u003ez\u003c\/span\u003eir\u003c\/em\u003e and Jur’ at’s \u003cem\u003e???aja ?asan-o  Ba??shi  T?wa’ if\u003c\/em\u003e,  (a romance with a courtesan heroine), it also studies in detail the works of Insha and Nisbat, among others.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp style=\"text-align: justify\"\u003eWith several more transcribed poems than in its US edition, this book is a must-read for students and scholars of literature, history, sociology, gender and sexuality studies, South Asian studies and culture studies.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Orient Blackswan Pvt Ltd","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":45616465576087,"sku":"9788125045533","price":1678.0,"currency_code":"INR","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0666\/3471\/1191\/files\/9788125045533.webp?v=1769294864","url":"https:\/\/atlanticbooks.com\/products\/gender-sex-and-the-city-urdu-rekhti-poetry-1780-1870-9788125045533","provider":"Atlantic Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}