BOOK LAUNCH by New Text at Cafeteria, Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan, 3 Kasturba Gandhi Marg > 7pm on 4th August 2017

Time : 7:00 pm Add to Calendar 04/08/2017 19:00 04/08/2017 20:30 Asia/Kolkata BOOK LAUNCH by New Text Event Page : http://www.delhievents.com/2017/07/book-launch-by-new-text-at-cafeteria.html Siddhartha Hall, Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan, 3 Kasturba Gandhi Marg, New Delhi-110001 DD/MM/YYYY

Entry : Free (Seating on First-Come First-Served Basis)

Venue : Siddhartha Hall, Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan, 3 Kasturba Gandhi Marg, New Delhi-110001
Venue Info : Events | About | Map | Nearest Metro Station - 'Barakhamba(Blue Line)'

Area : Events at Kasturba Gandhi Marg

Event Description : BOOK LAUNCH by New Text

New Text and Zubaan come together for the launch of their co-published book, Amrita Nandy’s Motherhood and Choice: Uncommon Mothers, Childfree Women. New Text also launches the third book in its Firsthand series, Manjari Katju’s Hinduising Democracy: The Vishva Hindu Parishad in Contemporary India.

Zubaan is an independent feminist publishing house based in New Delhi with a strong academic and general list.

New Text is an independent academic publishing initiative committed to creating an “open access” publishing model to promote equitable and affordable access to qualitative academic material, and to encourage authors by implementing a fairer reward system.

Urvashi Butalia and Gautam Bhan will talk briefly about the idea of co-publishing. Aditya Nigam will introduce Manjari Katju and PK Datta who will then talk about Manjari’s book. Nivedita Menon will introduce Amrita Nandy and Rachana Johri who will then talk about Amrita’s book. Each conversation will be followed by an interaction with the audience.

About the books:

Hinduising Democracy: The Vishva Hindu Parishad in Contemporary India.
By Manjari Katju.

The Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) gained public recognition through its Ramjanmabhoomi campaigns in the 1980s. It continued to make headlines till the demolition of the Babri mosque in 1992 and the ban imposed on it, after which it was relatively quiet in public life except during elections. This move away from a career of high publicity to a more shadowed existence between the mid-1990s and 2013 was a strategic turn brought about by a change of political circumstances and weakening of support for its big campaigns. From lofty programmes that were not paying much dividends to hegemonise Hindu nationhood, the VHP moved its focus to the grass roots both in urban and rural areas, working with renewed energy on conversions, cow protection, primary education, collective festivities, etc.

The book discusses the VHP’s onward journey in India between 1995 and 2015 and its engagement with ideas of democracy, freedom and religion to take Hindu nationhood ahead. It examines how the VHP has drawn on the writings of V.D. Savarkar and M.S. Golwalkar to build an alternative conception of freedom and a critique of Indian democracy. These alternative ideas as articulated by the VHP are premised upon Hindu majoritarianism and exclusive conception of citizenship. Manjari Katju’s lucid and engaging book anchors the VHP in its ideological roots and increases our understanding of an organisation that has influenced and continues to influence Indian politics and social life.

Motherhood and Choice: Uncommon Mothers, Childfree Women.
By Amrita Nandy.

How can women live fully? If autonomy is critical for humans, why do women have little or no choice vis-à-vis motherhood? Do women know they have a choice, if they do? How ‘free’ are these choices in a context where the self is socially mired and deeply enmeshed into the familial? What are implications of motherhood on how human relatedness and belonging are defined?

These questions underlie Amrita Nandy’s remarkable research on motherhood as an institution, one that conflates ‘woman’ with ‘mother’ and ‘personal’ with ‘political’.

As the bedrock of human survival and an unchallenged norm of ‘normal’ female lives, motherhood expects and even compels women to be mothers—symbolic and corporeal. Even though the ideology of pronatalism and motherhood reinforce reproductive technology and vice versa, the care work of mothering suffers political neglect and economic devaluation. However, motherhood (and non-motherhood) is not just physiological. As the pivot to a web of heteronormative institutions (such as marriage and the family), motherhood bears an overwhelming and decisive influence on women’s lives. Against the weight of traditional and contemporary histories, socio-political discourse and policies, this study explores how women, as embodiments of multiple identities, could live stigma-free, ‘authentic’ lives without having to abandon reproductive ‘self’-determination.

For further information, please visit: www.newtext.in

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