That phrase is something that has been ingrained in the minds of many people, in my case, since I was in kindergarten. For as long as I can remember, I would chant the phrase at the end of every morning assembly. I never questioned it at the time, of course, but over the years I’ve begun poking holes in that statement. IS my bharat mahan? Do I even know if I constitute the people who can call bharat theirs? I realized I wasn’t alone when thinking of these questions when I came across the article transcribing The Idea of India : Romila Thapar and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak in Conversation.
I found the main purpose of this article in the title itself– unearthing the idea of India. What makes India, India? What makes a person, Indian? Through an eye-opening conversation, Romila Thapar and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak attempt to pinpoint the meaning of an Indian identity and how one can be classified as such. Taking into consideration the educational, cultural, economic and historical factors on what has shaped people’s perspectives of what it means to be Indian, they manage to answer a few questions surrounding why the “Indian identity” is so ambiguous, whilst also forcing us to consider how existing definitions of it aren’t universal.
The question Ms. Spivak opens with is a simple one, directed at celebrated Indian historian and novelist Romila Thapar– how does one teach the idea of India? Although the question is simple, the answer is anything but. Considering how the independent nation we know today emerged very recently in contemporary history, Dr. Thapar begins with the very first ideas of individual identities that Indians had. They were Indians, simply because they weren’t the colonisers– the British. Being Indian, first and foremost, meant being a native, different from the Europeans, and now it meant being free.
For the Indian diaspora scattered across England and it’s colonies, this was all they had to claim as an identity. However, the migration of the middle class to European and American states allowed them to create their own version of an Indian identity, vastly different to many of those residing within its borders and thus creating an ‘Indian identity’ that exists more or less completely unaware of the happenings in the country. And as for those residing within it’s geographical borders, their sense of ‘Indian identity’ exists purely as a product of one’s own lived experience.
The emphasis on ‘development’ of India in the early days of independence was crucial in the eyes of the government in order to establish an Indian identity, as economic growth was considered the foundation of a concrete society. In doing so, culture, language, religion, and caste-based issues were ignored until they resurfaced, worse than imagined. Smaller Indian identities, those that didn’t fall in line with the larger narrative, risk being considered ‘non-Indian’, if not erased completely. Dr Thapar repeatedly emphasises on how the identity of a place changes with time and the influence of history on the idea of a country cannot be overlooked, which I believe to be the most important part of the article.
Ms. Spivak’s insistence on language as an area of concern unearths the lack of appropriate means to equip Indians– save for the upper middle class– with the ability to question the opinion and perspective of the majority, plunging them into a sense of ‘non-belonging’ as they too accepted the majority opinion. Education being funded and effectively controlled by the state means a strict control over what information gets taught, even if it disregards Nehru’s idea of Social Inclusion, ultimately leading to a hierarchical society based on wealth and caste.
In conclusion, attention is drawn to the interlinkages in society, transcending caste, language and religion, to which answers are needed to establish a holistic idea of what it means to be Indian. As Dr Thapar put it, “… Instead of looking at just the one strand, whether it be economic growth, whether it be caste, whether it be religion, one has to look at the totalities and the intermeshing of that totality which we have ceased to do now. “
Abortion. The removal of an embryo or foetus, thus terminating a pregnancy. That’s the definition of the word by Merriam-Webster, Oxford and Mayo Clinic. Not a baby. An embryo.
When it comes to the big ‘A’ word, people always have an opinion, even when they think they don’t. They’re either pro-life, which means they consider the embryo to be a sacred life form, deserving of the same respect as any other child or adult human being, or pro-choice, which means they support the right for individuals to get abortions. Now, at first glance, both sides seem equally appealing. Pro-life protests killing, so they can’t be all that bad, right?
Wrong.
As much as I would like to end the argument by stating that the life of an already-alive human being is more important than that of something that is yet to be considered a life-form, this topic deserves a more…sensitive hand when being dealt with. The root of the abortion debate lies in whether a male-dominated society thinks a woman is deserving of the right to do what she wants with her body. So let’s begin by examining another topic that makes people uncomfortable- misogyny.
“The abortion debate is more about power and control than the fate of a zygote.”
– Thor Benson, author
Ever since men discovered they could own land and animals, women and female bodies have always gotten the short end of the stick. The agricultural revolution relegated women to the position of property, to be bought and sold like cattle, used as breeders to strengthen one’s lineage. While society has made leaps and strides in women’s rights since then thanks to movements like feminism, bodily autonomy is still something available to only a privileged few.
As a person with a uterus, I’ve been very interested in my country’s legislation regarding the topic of abortion, in the case that– god forbid– I would find myself in a position to have to choose. While it isn’t perfect, Indian laws around medically terminated pregnancies aren’t all that oppressive. It’s legal and can be performed by a licensed professional at private and government hospitals up to 24 weeks post conception. Then why on earth are India’s maternal mortality rates so high?
While abortion IS legal, it’s an unspeakable word in Indian society. Of course, this is to expect from a society that regards women’s sexuality as taboo and unholy. When broached, this subject evokes raised eyebrows and pursed lips. For many women, medical termination of pregnancy is too expensive a procedure, and because of the stigma surrounding the topic, they’re less likely to ask for help. This doesn’t in any way mean that they don’t go through with the abortion. Unsafe abortions end up killing 13 Indian women everyday. Some would argue the simple solution to this would be to just stop having them, which I find to be an incredibly privileged and ignorant view to have.
In a country where violence against women is rampant, thousands of victims of rape, abuse, child sexual assault and human trafficking are impregnated against their will. These women and girls most likely have no means to support the child and all the responsibility that come with being a mother. Forcing her to carry out the unwanted pregnancy to full term will have devastating consequences on her mental and physical health, and the resulting child will probably end up uncared for and neglected. This is something pro-lifers seem to conveniently overlook in their crusade aganst abortion.
“How can we talk about the rights of a fertilized egg when we don’t care enough to see that every child is born into a stable, safe, and nurturing environment?”
– Rebecca Warner, Moral Infidelity
To create a human from inside one’s own body is nothing short of a miracle, and having children is a dream millions of people share. However, not everyone who becomes a parent, wants to become one. Conversely, not everyone who wants to become a parent, can. People could try for years to get pregnant, only to have their pregnancies miscarry due to health complications. Medically terminating a pregnancy can cause immense trauma to expecting mothers. In many situations, an abortion is neccessary to keep the mother alive.
India having one of the highest rates of female infanticide in the world puts us in a unique position here. Due to archaic gender roles and customs, girl children are looked at as losses to the family, and boys as assets. Boys have better career opportunities; boys can carry on the family name; boys bring pride to the bloodline. Girls are expected to know how to flip rotis before they loose all their baby teeth. Girls are expensive, as the system of dowry requires the bride’s family to pay the groom’s family a hefty sum of money and valuables. Girls are unlikely to be sent to school or continue their education once they reach puberty because every second that they are unmarried dips into their father’s coffers. This is a social and cultural problem that requires levels of unlearning toxic bigotry, and in my opinion de-stigmatising abortion would do little to impact it.
It almost seems like abortions are procedures that will happen whether or not they are legalised and made accessible to the public, and the only thing that differs is whether millions of women die due to criminal negligence or have their safety taken into consideration.
And now, to address the elephant in the room. The question and subsequent implications every woman dreads when they enter the gynaecologist’s office. “Are you married?”
The assumption that single women live out lives devoid of sex until marriage is infantile and incredibly ignorant. Yes, women are sexually active and use contraceptives, and yes, sometimes contraceptives fail. And yes, these situations are extremely stressful for the people involved. Some people go ahead with the pregnancy, and end up with a child at the end of it. But for some, maybe a business woman at a pivotal moment in her career or a college student after an unfortunate one-night stand, having a child isn’t something they can or even want to afford. Either way, forcing your opinion on someone because of religious, moral or spiritual beliefs is problematic. Moral policing is something women have had to endure for centuries, having every choice of ours examined under the violating eyes of the patriarchy. The least we could get is control over our own bodies.
“Women deserve better than propaganda and lies to get into panties. Propaganda and lies to get into office, to get out of court, to get out of paying child support. Get out of our decisions and give us back our voice. Women deserve better; women deserve choice.”
– Sonya Lee Taylor, women’s rights activist and poet
“If we make it legal, people would have abortions all the time.” Well, abortions DO happen all the time, 15.6 million a year in India alone. Women don’t go through an incredibly personal, emotionally-scarring, expensive, dangerous and invasive procedure that they are shamed for every step of the way out of boredom. And even if they do, it really isn’t anybody else’s choice to make or judge.
Amidst all this chaos one has to ponder, if men could get pregnant too, would the abortion debate cease to exist?
October 18th, 1998. In the wee hours of the morning, gurgling cries echoed through the halls of the small run-down clinic in the old city of Chennai. Inside the patient ward, paint was chipping off the walls and small cracks webbed their way across the ceiling above the bed where a woman held a tiny raisin of a being in her arms. That shrivelled prune-looking thing was none other than yours truly, thrust into a world that I now had to make sense of for the next 60-70 years ( although let’s be realistic, the number’s probably way lower).
Like a lot of children, I lived my life for the most part without understanding why I did the things I did beyond a superficial level. Although I’d clean my room and eat my vegetables when my mother told me to, I never questioned her instructions– partly out of the fear of meeting the business end of her plastic ruler. I listened to bands that my friends told me were popular and wore clothes that magazines said I looked good in. I never had a problem with any of this, but that was because I’d never put any thought into any of the things I did.
That is until I was introduced to the life and works of a man named René Descartes.
René Descartes
It was then that I realised I was being a passive player in my own existence. If I wasn’t in control of any of my actions, how was I to be held accountable for them? If I couldn’t justify my reasons for having certain opinions and preferences, should even have them in the first place? Determined to find meaning in my meagre existence, I dipped my toes into the murky depths of philosophy and began by questioning every thought I had ever had.
“The first step toward philosophy is doubt.”
– Denis Diderot
Every individual seeks to live their life by a set of beliefs, thoughts and morals they call their philosophy, which in turn dictates their behaviours. In order to fully understand my actions and reasons for behaving as such, I needed to look deeper into what made me who I was and question the effects of my past experiences – and my expectations of the future – on my beliefs.
I think the core of my philosophy lies in building and exploring relationships with other people, and making a meaningful impact in their lives. I’ve always been an empath but once I took a step back and observed my actions, I came to realise I measured my success by the quality of relationships I had with people. Helping people and performing acts of service made me feel like I had a purpose, no matter how small. I truly believe that human connections and forming bonds are what make life worth living, and open doors to new experiences and learning opportunities.
I noticed a lot of my decisions were governed by a very strict set of morals I’ve imbibed growing up in a religious South Indian household. I was always taught that the ‘right’ thing to do would often mean doing something at your own expense. Naturally, this gave way to a lot of self-sacrificing, something I’ve since learned to regulate. No more do I give away my limited school supplies to my classmates at the drop of a hat, but I certainly offer up my seat in crowded buses. It’s an unspoken rule that, if I see someone in need of help or in a position that might call for some assistance, I would– with my limited emotional intelligence and progressively diminishing physical prowess– try to help in any way I can.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau said that human nature is inherently good, and that is certainly something I took into account when forming my own belief system. I am persistent that, if given the chance, even the most rotten human beings would find in themselves a seed of goodness, of charity, of kindness and virtue. Unfortunately, I’m not blind to the fact that in the modern world such chances are few and far between, and humans have historically been known to make morally questionable decisions. (A fine example would be the low-rise jeans trend that took the 2000’s by storm, otherwise known as the greatest crime in the history of sighted humanity).
On a serious note, I believe in giving people the benefit of doubt, because if to err is not human, then what is? Everyone deserves a fair shot at living a happy life, irrespective of the religion, political, economic and social class they were born into. An ideal justice system wouldn’t systemically oppress any one community of people, and I believe true justice takes into account all aspects of a person’s life before meting out judgements. For example, stealing is against the law and is a punishable offence, but stealing baby food to feed your child because the company you work for decided to cut some of the people on their payroll because the pandemic was affecting their profits exposes cracks in an unjust system and shouldn’t be met with a strictly black or white perspective.
As a child surrounded by a very religious family, I had the idea of karma drilled into my head from a very young age. Every action thought or intent would be either rewarded or punished by an omnipotent being in the sky. Surprisingly, this was one of the few things I actually questioned as a child. How did that being get to decide whether what I did was right or wrong? Did they know the whole story? Would I get a chance to explain before I was tossed into the fiery depths of hell? If God was supposed to be kind and forgiving, why was there so much suffering in the world?
Calvin & Hobbes – Bill Watterson
After years of trying to find reason in theism, I arrived at the conclusion that to me, the is no God. However, I do believe that the energy in the universe is constant and that there is a continuous effort to maintain a balance of positive and negative energy. The good energy one puts out into the world would be matched by positive energy directed towards them. Trying to live a good life, and putting more good into a world that seems to be so desperately in need of it, is what I strive to do. I certainly believe that having something to draw strength from is crucial in times of difficulty, and whether it is religion, spirituality or science, they all have the same effect on the resilience of the human spirit.
I am of the opinion that the choices I make today are mine, and while my experiences have shaped me greatly, it ultimately falls on me to act. Free will is a fire that’s burned bright in the heart of humanity since the beginning of time. I am aware that life tends to throw curveballs when we least expect it. However, I’ve read about and been witness to several incidents where people refused to be bested by their circumstances. My own mother, having lost her father at a very young age, managed to work two jobs while attending college and taking care of her young sister and ailing mother. She could have chosen to give up and do the bare minimum, or to get married instead of finishing her studies like most women did. If she had yielded and followed the path the world was obviously showing her towards, this blog wouldn’t exist.
To me, free will is a thing of beauty. To wake up every morning with the knowledge that your time on earth is finite and that in the grand scheme of things your existence is inconsequential, and still strive to create, connect find passion and something to believe in is beautiful. Nihilism is the philosophical view that life has no intrinsic value, and I agree. But I also believe that people find value in their own ways, and give meaning to their existence through intelligent choices to reach their full potential.
To me, being open-minded is a thing of beauty. To accept other systems of belief while I am firmly grounded in my own encourage me to critically analyse what I thought I knew. Unlearning old ways and constantly changing with the world and society is how I keep my philosophy relevant.
In conclusion, I would admit that my philosophical beliefs are nowhere near as concrete as I would like them to be. I believe that the interactions I’ve had with people have shaped my understanding of the world and my attitude towards it, and these experiences continue to challenge my beliefs and change them. I’ve made several 180° changes in my beliefs, going from a devout Hindu to an agnostic, a guarded wallflower to an open-minded individual, and I’m sure I will find myself questioning these beliefs in the future too.
And I think that’s what makes it all the more fun.
I don’t know what it means to exist. I don’t know what the purpose of life is, why we were put here or how we will end up. I don’t know if we’re a part of a bigger plan set in motion by a higher being, or if we’re just insignificant animals on a spec of dust in a giant expanse of nothing. I don’t know why we do the things we do or why we say the things we say. Existing, to me, sounds brave. To be born on a rock floating through space was luck, to live on that rock is courage.
For a long time, I couldn’t feel. Mood altering medication does that to you– a fun little side effect doctors often forget to mention. Everything was a shade of grey. Those were some of the darkest years of my life, and the first time I began to question my existence. Why was I here? Why should I stay? Should I even want to? Like a drowning sailor clutching on to splinters of his sinking ship, I began grabbing at anything that helped take the grey away.
Instinctively, I turned to work, throwing myself into academics because I had been taught that I was a student. Students study, students work, students don’t have time for play. When I couldn’t be a student the way I was taught to be, I tried to be other things. A writer, a baker, an athlete, a daughter, a sister– all of which in my head were mutually exclusive. I found that I could never exist as a whole of any one thing because I couldn’t fulfil what the roles asked of me.
I realised that my reason to exist doesn’t have to be something that contributes to a collective good. I don’t need to be an irreplaceable cog in the giant machine of life to feel like I exist. I used to think I needed to explain why I had to audacity to exist as an individual. That I needed a ‘purpose’ which was the reason I hadn’t dropped dead yet. I believed that my usefulness–to a person, a company or a community– was a desideratum for me to simply be. Now, I know I don’t need to wager my existence on my worth.
Now, I think existing means to feel. It means to laugh so hard your lungs beg for air. It means anger, so fierce it could burn cities to a cinder. It means sadness, bottomless and darker than the sky on the night of a new moon. It means to love, unafraid and honest, bearing your heart out come what may.
I exist to watch the heavens open up as I sit in my balcony in the middle of a thunderstorm. I exist to smell metal as lightning electrifies the air around me. I exist to hear the windows rattle as thunder rolls across the sky. I exist to experience, wholly and unapologetically, every single waking moment.
Because if I don’t then what, pray tell, is the point of anything at all?
Coronavirus disease– or as it’s more commonly known, CoVid-19 – has brought life as we know it to a standstill. What began as a case of pneumonia of an unknown cause in the small city of Wuhan in China in December 2019, has now spread all over the world, bringing major governments to their knees. It feels like a dystopian scenario similar to that seen in books like Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel and movies like Contagion (2011) and 28 Days Later (2002).
While there are several conspiracy theories about the pandemic floating around, what we do know about the virus is that it causes respiratory problems, similar to the flu, with symptoms like cough, fever and difficulty breathing. It spreads through contact with an infected person, and the immunocompromised– namely the elderly and the sick– are the most vulnerable to the disease. However, with the number of infections and deaths skyrocketing in the last few weeks, it’s become clear that being a carrier is just as dangerous as being a patient.
It is for this reason that countries all over the world have issued quarantine orders for citizens. Beginning with China, countries like Italy, Spain, Germany, Iran, the Netherlands and India have enforced strict curfews on civilians. Governments all over the world closed their borders and declared lockdowns on its citizens, effectively trapping tourists, migrants and civilians inside the buildings they resided in. People began to panic, hoarding essentials like food and medicine, causing widespread lack of supplies for those unlucky few who waited too long.
On March 19th, 2020, the Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi called for a ‘Janta Curfew’ on the 22nd of March, urging civilians to stay indoors from 7 am to 9 pm. Little did we know that this was a precursor to a longer, more strict quarantine.
On the 22nd of March 2020, Prime Minister Modi in his second address concerning the virus declared a 21-day lockdown, far stricter than the curfew. Essential services like hospitals, ATMs and grocery stores would continue to function but all transport was forbidden until the 14th of April.
It is during this lockdown that I pen this post. Cooped up in my uncle’s house after being temporarily evicted from student housing– like a lot of my classmates– with no interaction with the outside world except to run to the store to buy essential groceries. Even then, on my way to the store, I see police vans parked every few hundred meters, stopping vehicles and pedestrians for questioning. “Where are you going?“, they ask, “What are you going to buy?”
I answer their questions, my words muffled by the mask I wear and go on my way. Several days I’m tempted to take the long route to the store, just so I can feel the sun on my skin for a little longer, and take my mask off for a minute so I can breathe in the fresh air. But I don’t, I just hurry to the grocery shop and back, three times a week.
This is life now. Confined to the same four walls for hours on end. I do my best to stay busy– picking up a rigorous exercise regime, learning to cook, watching movies, reading books, trying to create something, anything to escape the clutches of inactivity. It’s lonely to be separated from friends and family, and the irrational fear of never seeing them again creeps up on me occasionally. But some days, when I sit in my uncle’s balcony next to his potted plants and look outside onto the empty streets and the rows of closed stores, I feel a calmness I’ve never felt before.
Without the noise of people outside, I can hear the birds again. With no cars on the street, the sky is a lot less hazy. I laugh as the pixels on my laptop screen momentarily arrange to form the face of my mother, sitting all the way in the Netherlands, as she calls me on Skype to tell me what my cats are up to. My mother and I end the call saying “I’ll see you soon,” and in that moment I truly believe it.
We hope that our grandparents stay indoors and protect themselves. We hope that our little cousins are getting the care they need. We hope that the healthcare workers all over the world who are fighting this virus stay strong. We hope that we survive this. This is life now, and we can only hope that it gets better.
“To state quite simply what we learn in time of pestilence: that there are more things to admire in men than to despise.”
Upstage was a 3-day theatre festival hosted by the Performing Art Society and Department of English of St. Joseph’s College, Bangalore. Theatre geeks flocked to Loyola hall, where on February 27th, 28th and 29th, colleges from all over the city competed in 6 events. As a complete newcomer to the world of drama, I had no idea what to expect when my college’s theatre group signed up for 3 of the major events.
As soon as our theatre group got wind of the theatre fest, we set into action, picking appropriate versions of three plays to perform. I was assigned the role of light tech for our college’s adaptation of Girish Karnad’s play Hayavadana. I’d never heard of this play before, but over the course of the two weeks we practised it over and over and by the end of it I had every line of dialogue committed to memory. I was comfortable working production and doing most of my work behind the scenes- I even helped assist the light tech for our other short adaptation- Sartre’s No Exit. Having spent more time than I’d like to admit cooped up in my room scrolling through Reddit, sitting in a small, dark room and pressing buttons was right up my alley.
While Hayavadana and No Exit were our entries for the two events with the longest time slots- 40 minutes and 25 minutes respectively, the third event we’d signed up for was called Scenematic, and it was a musical event. This was the one that intrigued me the most- as unaware as I may have been about the world of theatre, I sure knew more than my fair share of musicals. I’d driven my neighbours up the wall with my renditions of Hamilton and Hairspray in the shower. There was no question about the musical we were going to perform- with an all-girls team, it had to be a number from Chicago. While the other girls from our group went on chattering excitedly about the roles they wanted to audition for in Karnad’s and Sartre’s plays, I hoped I’d land a role in Chicago. And I did- Annie Young, one of the inmates of Cook County Jail.
And so began hours and hours of gruelling practice. Getting into our characters, learning our lines and choreographing the entire number ourselves was no easy task. However, despite the sweat dripping down our brows and pooling under our arms, we all had the same glint in our eyes- we’d never performed a musical before and we were determined to win.
On the 27th, we made our way to St Joseph’s in a huge SUV, the 12 of us packed in like sardines. When we got there, we registered and were shown to our green rooms. After a lot of haphazard draping, tripping over fabric and a whole lot of face paint, the actors were in their costumes. I hurried up to the light room and waited for the emcee to announce our act. Apart from a few snags in the timing of the dialogue and the lighting, the act went perfectly. Every joke landed and the audience seemed completely engaged during the entire 40-minute time slot. We received a roaring applause and returned home, exhausted but excited for round 2.
Our performance of No Exit was, admittedly, a little lacklustre- we had several technical difficulties with the mics which led to the dialogues not being heard at all. The audience clapped politely at the end of our act, but we didn’t let this slow us down. The next day was our final performance and we were all determined to make it our best.
Finally, the day of reckoning came. On the 29th, the smallest group of stagehands and actors showed up to college early in the morning in rickety autos and rapidos, yawning as we all took our places on the basketball court to begin our practice of the Cell Block Tango. Later in the afternoon, we all set off to St. Joseph’s for the third and final time. We got to our green room and hurriedly put on our makeup, the tension in the air palpable. Our mentor Ms Naureen showed up just before we were to go on stage and we all huddled in for a prayer. Although an atheist myself, I secretly prayed to any higher power that would listen to let our performance go smoothly. The buzzer sounded signalling our turn to get on stage and my heart leapt into my throat.
Whatever higher being or cosmic energy I prayed to must have been feeling quite generous that day because it was one of the best performances out group had ever put up. As soon as the curtains were raised, the audience was captivated. We didn’t miss a single beat, we were in character and in tune. Learning from our technical mishaps over the previous two days, we’d decided to ditch the lapel mics and stick with floor mics, which proved to be genius because the audience caught even the slightest murmurs of witty dialogue and sniggered. As we ended, out of breath and with beads on sweat on our forehead, we got a standing ovation from the crowd, including the female judge in the first row.
We brought home several accolades that day. Hayavadana won the best adaptation, Chicago won first place in Scenematic, our teammate Parna won Best Supporting Actress, and Daya who played kali got a special mention for her acting. However, the best things to come out of the whole experience were the validation out little theatre group got, and the bonds that we built with each other. We’re just a bunch of theatre geeks after all, from science, commerce and arts background, connected by our passion for the performing arts. We trusted each other, believed in our abilities and never gave up on one another.
Boy, am I lucky to call these girls my partners in crime.
Second-wave feminism, a period of feminist activity beginning in the ’60s and spanning roughly two decades, was influential in kickstarting the fight against patriarchal institutions prevalent in broader sects of society. This included the treatment of women in cinema. Since the gender bias present in Hollywood cinema at the time involved portraying women as the subordinate and men as the superior, studying and critically analyzing patterns in films and elements of cinematic storytelling concerning the representation of women became an issue of great importance for feminists.
Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema is an essay written in 1973 by highly acclaimed British feminist film theorist Laura Mulvey and published in 1975 in the influential British film journal Screen and, later, other anthologies including a collection of her essays titled Visual and Other Pleasures. Highly influenced by the works and theories of Sigmund Freud and Jacques Lacan, in her essay, Mulvey steers the perspective of film theory towards a more psychoanalytic framework. She uses psychoanalytical theory to attack the male-dominated viewpoints deeply embedded within old Hollywood cinema. Her essay was the first to intersect the three concepts of film theory, feminism and psychoanalysis.
Although his essay was written in 1975 regarding misogyny in old Hollywood cinema, we can see the hegemonic continuation of male dominance in Hollywood and regional films today. Further in this article are cited several examples of films subservient to male-centric viewpoints. Mulvey’s essay was written to recognize and dismantle the filming strategies that exist to provide narrative pleasure to men alone.
Male Gaze
Mulvey intends to use psychoanalysis to make the argument that the visual and anthropomorphic components of film storytelling are dictated by a male-dominant viewpoint, exploiting the female form to provide the audience with a pleasurable experience. This is where the term Male Gaze comes into play. First introduced by Laura Mulvey in her essay, this key term in feminist film theory refers to a sexualized way of looking that objectifies women whilst simultaneously empowering men. In the male gaze, women are framed to appear as hypersexualized objects of the male desire. Her thoughts, emotions, ideas and needs are secondary to his, and her highest desire is to be ‘wanted’ by the male.
“In a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split between active/male and passive/female.”
Laura Mulvey
Mulvey’s ideas of male gaze and fascination with the female form are very closely tied to the Freudian concept of scopophilia. Scopophilia was defined by Freud as a deep-seated sexual pleasure derived from looking at others, subjecting them to a controlling and curious gaze. In extreme cases, scopophilic desires could manifest into voyeuristic behaviour, producing Peeping Toms who derive sexual pleasure from witnessing and actively controlling an objectified other. Essentially an active process, fetishistic scopophilia leads to women being erotically objectified in film, coding them so that they connote ‘to-be-looked-at-ness’. Moreover, the experience of watching a movie in the cinema nurtures this desire by providing an environment that allows the viewer to remain anonymous, shrouded in darkness, introducing a voyeuristic element in watching something that was created to be watched.
Jacques Lacan’s idea of the mirror stage, where infants identify themselves in the mirror, also influenced Mulvey’s theory. She claims that the narrative is manipulated in such a way that the audience finds themselves identifying with the main male character. They feel and see what he feels and sees. They empathize with him since he is the ego ideal or ideal self, evoking emotions of compassion, admiration and jealousy thus creating a love-hate relationship between viewer and character. For example, in John Hughes’ critically acclaimed 1985 American film The Breakfast Club, the main character John Bender (Judd Nelson) is the main character. The audience, although aware of his deviant behaviour, sympathizes with him since he is framed to appear likeable despite his flaws. Molly Ringwald’s character, Claire Standish, is the ‘princess’- unattainable, perfect and out of Bender’s league, and by extension, the audience’s as well. As the narrative progresses, she falls in love with Bender, and since the audience at this point identifies with him, they can possess this glamourized woman too.
Bender and Claire in The Breakfast Club
Apart from being an extremely sexist representation of women in film and mainstream media, the male gaze has proven to be a significant contributor to sexism in the real world. By portraying women as the weaker, fairer and, in several ways, the inferior sex, the idea that their purpose is limited to becoming a supporting role in the life of a male is enforced. Impressionable young girls, exposed to this narrative from the very beginning, grow up being very aware of their potent sexuality, which is both demonized and deified by the male population. Male children too are raised with the notion that they are the more powerful sex, and these archaic gender roles and stereotypes are reinforced by the media. Not only is the male gaze prevalent in mainstream cinema, but it can also be seen in commercials, music videos, television shows and a host of other media where women have little to do with the subject matter. This sexualization, commercialization and objectification of female bodies exists due to the assumption that the male-centric viewpoint is the norm and that in order to sell a product, a movie or a song, one must visually appeal to the masculine audience.
The stories are always catered to the heterosexual male- forcing the audience to view the story from this perspective, regardless of their heterogeneity. By restricting itself to this rigid mise-en-scene reflecting the dominant ideological concept in cinema, Hollywood plays into the male fantasy that women are meant to be looked at and men are to do the looking.
“The determining Male Gaze projects its view onto the female form which is styled accordingly.”
Laura Mulvey
Every part of the woman- from her characterization, her personality, her clothes, her behaviour down to the smallest detail- is manufactured to imply and maximize her sex appeal and erotic nature. Women adopt a “traditionally exhibitionist role” in cinema and, function as passive erotic objects of desire for both the characters on screen as well as the audience. It is within this narrow narrative that her characterization takes place, and thus she is limited to remaining an evoker of response from the male lead. The seamless unification of the looks from either side of the screen allows for the story to continue ‘logically’ with no explanation needed for the convenient sexualization of the woman. While some filmmakers attempt to avoid characterizing women as mere sexual objects by providing them with a complex backstory, more often than not the writing pales in comparison to the portrayal of her sexuality.
For example, David Ayer’s 2016 American superhero film Suicide Squad introduces Harley Quinn, one of the only female members of the team, in a scene where she strips down to her underwear in front of a group of soldiers. This scene involves close-ups of her body and long shots of her revealing more skin, focusing on her breasts and genitalia. This scene offers nothing to the development of the storyline, neither does it provide any insight into other aspects of her character. It was put there to please the viewers. She is portrayed as a hypersexualized object, meant to elicit a response from the men onscreen and in the audience. None of her male counterparts had anything remotely close in terms of displays of sex appeal in their introductions.
Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) has personal motives influence her decisions- mainly her relationship with Jared Leto’s Joker (her actions being motivated by her ties to a man). However, her backstory is barely explained and so poorly written that it’s clear that she was put on screen to be looked at. The explanation offered for her overt sexuality- that she is ‘clinically insane’- makes it seem like it is okay to derive pleasure from her presence. Whilst her male teammates like Deadshot (Will Smith) and El Diablo (Jay Hernandez) are clothed in some form of protective clothing, Harley waltzes around in a skimpy torn T-shirt, a pair of booty shorts and high heels. Although Robbie’s performance received high praise, the movie was rightfully criticized for relying heavily on her characterization as a ditzy sexpot.
Suicide Squad isn’t the only superhero film guilty of perpetrating this narrative- most superhero blockbusters are rife with the objectification of female characters to cater to male fantasies. Catwoman (Anne Hathaway) in The Dark Night Rises (2016) and Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) in the Avengers movies are portrayed to be powerful, strong female superheroes…in skintight latex suits that cling to every curve. This creates an illusion of the ’self-actualized warrior female’ within the framework of the patriarchy. She has qualities that the male lead can respect like being skilled in combat or physical prowess, but she is also sexually desirable.
Anne Hathaway as catwoman in The Dark Knight Rises (2016)
Phallocentricism
Mulvey’s theory was also influenced by the concept of phallocentrism, i.e., the ideology that the phallus or the male sexual organ is the central element in the organization of society. Man exists first as a person of the world, and woman is then created and defined by her lack of a penis. Mulvey stated that the narrative intentions of the director, the interactions between the characters on screen and the experience of the audience are guided by an entirely phallocentric view. The audience is always provided with the option of fulfilling a pleasurable desire, albeit a male-centric one, since women on screen are coded for extreme erotic, sensual and visual impact.
“The meaning of a woman is sexual difference, the absence of a penis as visually ascertainable, the material evidence on which is based the castration complex..”
Laura Mulvey
Due to women’s lack of a penis, Mulvey stated that men saw them as strangers, and this led to castration anxiety, i.e. metaphorical and literal fear of emasculation. Therefore, women could never be looked at as equals lest they are considered dangerous, instead, they were deemed beautiful, mystical creatures, slaves to their own sexuality. According to the patriarchal rules, the male figure is the one forwarding the story and the one the spectator identifies with. The woman is subject to his actions and by extension to the audience.
Considering it’s supposedly a depiction of a more advanced, technologically and intellectually superior society, sci-fi in Hollywood often fails dismally in its appropriate representation of women. Luc Besson’s 1997 cult classic sci-fi film The Fifth Element is the most quintessential example of this. In the film, Leeloo (Milla Jovovich) is constantly referred to as the saviour of the human race, due to her being a product of genetically engineered human cells that were spliced together in a lab along with the essences of four other classical elements. From her very creation in the lab, she is portrayed as a sexual object on display, isolated and glamourized. As her body is being manufactured, the camera slowly pans up her legs, while her genitalia remain hidden by conveniently positioned machinery. The scientists in the laboratory watch her body being created with their mouths agape, even exclaiming that she’s ‘perfect’- no doubt referring to her physical appearance. The camera’s focus on the men actively viewing her passive body is exactly what Mulvey examined in her essay.
Leeloo, although supposedly the all-powerful key to saving humanity, is depicted as naïve and innocent but simultaneously framed in a sexualized manner. Throughout the movie, there are several sequences where she is under the mercy of Korben Dallas (Bruce Willis) and he takes advantage of her naivety under the pretense of helping her. Since the movie explains that she was technically ‘born yesterday’ with no knowledge of human morals, rules and basic social interaction, her unawareness of her inherent sexuality can be brushed aside, and her actions are supposed to be considered whimsical rather than provocative. For example, the scene in which she undresses in front of two men- Cornelius and David, who are extremely flustered by her nudity- is completely unnecessary to the storyline, showing how “innocently oblivious” she is to her own physical attractiveness, and is present so the audience can derive pleasure from it.
Dallas with an unconscious Leeloo in The Fifth Element (1997)
Even though Leeloo is the one who saves humanity at the end of the movie, her actions are prompted by Dallas confessing his love for her, ultimately making him the main figure who progresses the plot. Along with more recent culprits in the sci-fi genre like Tron Legacy (2010) films reinforce the idea that no matter how powerful the female character is, she is still a woman and needs a man to save her, either from her overpowering emotions, a villain or unfortunate circumstances.
While it’s been made evident that egregious examples of the male-centric narrative are still present in Hollywood films, Bollywood is also full of similar culprits. Item numbers, ever so popular in Bollywood films, exist solely to cater to the male gaze. These songs check all the boxes outlined in Laura Mulvey’s definition of the male gaze- from framing the female character in a sexualized manner, limiting her characterization to that of an object of erotic desire, making her a passive player in her relationship with the male lead and providing extreme close-up, cut up shots of segments of her body namely her posterior, exposed belly and cleavage. The provocative lyrics further sexualize the woman. The word ‘item’ itself suggests that the woman isn’t a person, but an item being advertised and sold to the audience.
In the song Munni Badnaam Hui from the 2010 Bollywood film Dabanng, Malaika Arora’s character sings about her oozing sex appeal and how she was left powerless, captivated by the hero. She lists off her physical attributes in a way to make her seem desireable- her cheeks, her eyes, her figure and even her stride. She repeatedly says she’s unattainably sexy, yet she “turned from special to normal” for the hero.
A still from the song Munni Badnaam Hui from Dabanng (2010)
In the song, the lyrics directly address the audience. So to the viewer, it sounds like this extremely attractive, mature woman, who has so far been untamed and unattainable, is intoxicated by you, is in love with you, and wants to sleep with you. After the film’s release, the song was compared to Sheila ki jawaani from the movie Tees Maar Khan released in the same year, yet another provocative item number featuring actress Katrina Kaif. These comparisons saw a huge amount of online debates over which woman was sexier and which one people would rather sleep with, reducing both women to mere objects to be won and possessed.
Criticism
Although written over 40 years ago, Laura Mulvey’s essay continues to influence several discussion about film theory, and still provokes strong reactions. Most common of which is that both men and women are sexualized in cinema.
While this is true, the argument fails to note the regularity, intensity and normalization of the sexualization of women in cinema. While some theorists insist that men and women receive equal treatment in the media, a satirical Tumblr page called The Hawkeye Initiative was quick to debunk these claims. The Hawkeye Initiative involved replacing female superheroes in movie posters with Hawkeye, a male superhero from the Marvel Comics, in the same pose. This was done to highlight how the female characters were made to pose in highly sexualized ways, often to emphasize their buttocks, breasts and face. Although this yielded hilarious results, it also brought to light how female bodies were sexualized to such a degree that our society accepted it as normal.
Other theorists argue that, if a Male Gaze exist in cinema, surely so does a female gaze. As far as a direct equivalent goes, I don’t think there is a female gaze, nor do I think there ever will be. Since the power dynamics between the sexes are such that women have always been under the power and control of the patriarchy, a female gaze will not have the implications and consequences of the male gaze, since it would require heterosexual women to be considered the dominant sect of society.
The following post– completed for a creative writing assignment– by Roshni Anand and Yutika Pahuja is an abridged story of Lord of The Flies, originally written by William Golding in 1954
Rosh Writes 