GWS 295-02 - Special Topic:Claiming the I: Gender, Nation, and Sexuality in South Asian Autobiographies.

1 credits (Fall)

Suddenly, autobiography is everywhere. In bookshelves, in filmic representation(biopics) and on television, in the form of reality shows and talk shows. Ranging from the lives of famous men and women, lifewritings of transgenders, oppressed, racial and caste groups and traumatised lives in war-torn zones, the emergence of lifewritings is closely tied up with issues of identity, identity politics, increasing visibility and agency of hitherto oppressed, suppressed and repressed individuals and groups. The course aims to demonstrate the close interlinkages of autobiographies and lifewritings with vectors of gender, nation, sexuality, caste and class, in order to indicate how vital autobiography is to the canon of Gender and Women’s Studies. It focuses on South Asia proposes to look at excerpts from the autobiographies of M.K. Gandhi, Malala Yusufzai and transgender lifenarratives, among other texts, in order to explore the politics and poetics of lifenarratives and the shaping of identities through gender, class and caste.

Prerequisite: None.
Note: Dates: October 29 to November 14. Short course deadlines apply.
Instructor: Staff