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- Title
The Nation and its (non) Citizens: The Hijra in Mahesh Dattani's Seven Steps Around the Fire.
- Authors
Basu, Santanu
- Abstract
The paper shows how a masculinist heteronormative idea is perpetuated in the formation of nation. Such an idea not only deprives women from occupying the centre but also disallows sexual others from performing citizenship roles. The paper takes up Dattani's Seven Steps Around the Fire as a play that brings to our notice the derecognition of sexual minorities in the state and governmental apparatuses. Close textual analysis shows the internalization of sexual others as subalterns in the prevailing discourse. The paper concludes portraying the inherent difference between the western concept of nation and the understanding about nation as it has evolved in India. It is shown that the Indian nation raised in the pluralist ideas espoused by Jawaharlal Nehru is still capable of delivering democratic citizenship to its sexual others. A recent landmark Supreme Court judgement shows that, for all the voices of obscurantism and intolerance, sanity and good sense have not forsaken the nation.
- Subjects
INDIA; DATTANI, Mahesh; INDIC drama (English); LGBTQ+ people in literature; CONTENT analysis; CULTURAL pluralism; CITIZENSHIP; LEGAL judgments; TOLERATION
- Publication
Labyrinth: An International Refereed Journal of Postmodern Studies, 2015, Vol 6, Issue 2, p30
- ISSN
0976-0814
- Publication type
Article