Global Feminisms Project: Project Site: Cross-Site

Project Sites:

     › China
     › India
     › Poland
     › United States
     › Cross-Site

Project Description	Ruth Vanita and Urvashi Butalia are Indian feminists who were interviewed in the US at the University of Michigan. The opportunity to interview them arose unexpectedly (but fortunately) for the Global Feminisms project. Ruth Vanita is a Professor of Liberal Studies and Women's Studies at the University of Montana and resides in the US. She has written extensively on issues of women's inheritance, marriage, dowry practices, wife battering and wife murder, and against communal violence. Urvashi Butalia lives and works in Delhi and is a co-founder of Kali for Women, India's first feminist publishing house. She writes on issues relating to gender, communalism, fundamentalism and the media. Both women have been active in India's women's movement for more than three decades and have written significant original scholarship on sexuality and gender in India. Representative works include Ruth Vanita's Queering India: Same-Sex Love and Eroticism in Indian Culture and Society, which challenges notions of homosexuality as deviant by showing that same-sex relationships have been affirmed and celebrated in poetry, mythology, and literature throughout Indian history. Urvashi Butalia's "Mona, a Eunuch: A Sort of Life, a Life of Sorts " reconstructs notions of gender identity by the describing the experience of Mona (a eunuch), and demonstrates the possibilities for fluidity of identity. These interviews provide a compelling perspective on issues of sexuality and gender in the India context.

Interviews	Interviewee Transcripts and Contextual Materials Cross-Site Booklet (PDF) Cross-Site Booklet with DVD Chapter Markers & Time Codes (PDF) The transcripts and other materials on this Web site are intended for educational and research use. Any other use must be authorized. For such authorization, please contact the Cross-site contact.
Site Contacts	Desi Rios - Overall Project Intern

What's New

Global Feminisms DVDs are now available for purchase!

Quick Links

Interview Transcripts & Contextual Materials:

China | India | Poland U.S. | Cross-Site

Note: About the Transcripts

Search Site

University of Michigan | Institute for Research on Women and Gender | Rackham Graduate School | Women's Studies Program

University of Michigan Global Feminisms Project
Institute for Research on Women and Gender • University of Michigan • 1136 Lane Hall Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1290
Phone: (734)764-9537 • Fax: (734)764-9533 • E-mail: um.gfp@umich.edu

The transcripts and other materials on this Web site are intended for educational and research use. Any other use must be authorized. For such authorization, please contact the relevant site(s). When using material from the interview transcripts and/or other materials on this Web site, we expect that sources will be properly credited.