Voices
And quietly flow thoughts on being and not being…
In the uncertainty and volatility of the pandemic, Pramada Menon examines what has changed for herself, for the world, and for the various attributes of the workplace – mentorship, conversations, power, and purpose, among others.
By Pramada Menon
December 15, 2021
An ode to kimam wali raat: The erotic adventures of paan in Indian history
Paan is not only the bearer of stories but a medium through which these stories were told. And each ingredient that goes into the making of a paan has its own narrative.
By Annika Amber
An Invisible Diversity of Gaze
There are a number of different ways to approach this theme, Films and Sexuality. One way is through the eyes of the popcorn-eating, samosa-chomping, money-paying audience member who chooses to see or not see a film, who likes or dislikes it, who makes the film a box-office hit, or pans it.
By Shikha Aleya
January 5, 2017
An invisible disability: My partner for life
Fifteen percent of the global population lives with a disability1, and these are the recorded numbers only for officially recognized disabilities….
By Pooja Priyamvada
August 16, 2021
All the World’s a Stage
The ways I look at femininity have evolved as I have. Growing up in a space driven by dance and…
By Neel
December 15, 2020
All The Shades Of Grey
Language can be a limiting thing when it alone is considered to be the marker of success or failure in intimate spaces. Sometimes we get stuck on what is said and fail to notice what is done in relationships. At other times, denial of a need, request, or crossing of one boundary can make us feel like the entire relationship has lost its value.
By Reema Ahmad
March 17, 2025
AIDS, Melancholia & Queer memory
In this essay, I revisit my early struggles with AIDS diagnosis during the summer of 2003. The recollections allow me to rethink how the New York cityscape and coming out about my HIV status to my parents in India shapes a racialised experience with HIV and AIDS, family relations, and transnational migration. Such a racialised experience is erased within Tony Kushner’s Angels in America.
By Debanuj DasGupta
April 16, 2018
Age of Marriage: Rights not Protection
It is necessary to recognize and address the key role that sexuality plays when it comes to our efforts against EFM. What we need to remember is that EFM “doesn’t just lead to a set of restricted choices; it reflects and reinforces a set of restricted choices that already exist.”
By Stuti Tripathi
September 15, 2020
African Gathering Starts up Sex Disability Coalition -II
The Structure of the Coalition The second day promised to be one that focused more on the structure and process…
By Janet Price
August 15, 2014
African Gathering Starts up Sex Disability Coalition
In the first week of July, I travelled together with my partner (commonly known as ‘the DisObedient PA (DOPA)’ amongst…
By Janet Price
August 1, 2014
Adolescent Sexuality – Values And Conflicts In The Field
As development professionals, our tasks involve reflecting on the norms that service providers, colleagues and field staff engaging with communities hold on to so strongly. How can programmes create safe spaces to match up to service providers’ professional and personal beliefs so that they can challenge those norms in their own families and be non-judgmental?
By Suniti Neogy
December 2, 2019
Adolescence: A tumultuous time in my life
Experiences and learnings from the immediate surroundings such as the school and the family leave a deep impact on the…
By Arzoo
July 15, 2020
Accessing Safer Sex – what does it mean to have access to exploring and enjoying your sexuality safely?
The discourse on safer sex is usually couched in medical language– protection from STIs and unwanted pregnancies are what supposedly…
By Unnimaya Kurup
Abortion ‘Vacations’ and Other Complications – I
If I had a dollar every time I heard an opponent of abortion rights say something like “If you remove the option for abortions, women will stop getting them,” it’s safe to say I would go up a tax bracket or two. In many places today, Global South or North, I would need all of those dollars in order to travel a considerable distance for an abortion that may neither be legal nor safe.
By Kristin Francoeur
March 1, 2016
A ‘Peoples Self-Care’ In-the-Making: Perspectives on the Multiple Possibilities of Existence and Care
But self-care is not a clean and happy procedure, it is not definitively achievable when systematically explored. To understand the scope of self-care we need to see the ‘dark side’ of the landscape, and destroy the versions of self-care that denounce our plurality. In this fight, the only outcome can be a recognition of experiences beyond the wellness narrative structured around the neoliberal agenda. This article is an attempt at foregrounding some aspects of self-care that decentralise the prevalent commodification of it.
By Rukmini Banerjee