The essays in this study examine gender issues in South Asian literature, which have gained ground in this post-feminist era. Despite half a century of debate and rebellion, there is still an unevenness that disrupts smooth sailing in the area of literary criticism/gender studies. In many cultures, women still have not entirely come into their own. As well, oftentimes there's still a stigma attached to being born as female. What is the nature of the pressures and obstacles? How and where do the hurdles lie? In this book - where the space is the literary and the socio-political; and the time frame is contemporary - the analysis is topical.
Contents include:
How to Read - Or Rather, How Not to Read the Writing of Women
* Gender and Sexuality in Contemporary Indian English Women's Poetry
* Appropriating the Male Space: A Study of Krishna Sobti's Mitro Marjani
* The Pen that Defies the Sword: Taslima Nasreen's All About Women
* Re-defining Boundaries: Thinking Gender Roles in Dopdi, Chauth ka Joda, and Pinjar
* Women's Experience of Partition: A Study of Jyotirmoyee Devi's The River Churning
* Community Narratives as a Source of Empowerment: Bama's Sangati
* Centering the Marginality: The Poetry of Melanie Silgardo
* The Spilt-Self in the Poetry of Kamala Das
* Psycho-Dynamics of Women in the Postmodern Literature of the East and West
* Gender and Social Stratification in Contemporary India
* Bridging the Gap between Urban and Rural Women with Special Reference to Jharkhand
* Changing Patterns of Man-Woman Relationship: An Interview with Professor Yogendra Singh
* and more.