(Pseudo)Intellectualizing social conservatism: a critical account of anti-gender politics in Kerala, India.
Kerala, a Southern Indian state, has recently witnessed a new wave of religious and political opposition against 'gender politics', a term increasingly used to criticize progressive changes concerning gender and sexuality. This article positions the ongoing discursive shift around 'gender' in Kerala...
| Published in: | Journal of Gender Studies Vol. 34; no. 5; pp. 684 - 699 |
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| Format: | Article |
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Taylor & Francis Ltd
Jul2025
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| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ssf&AN=186130710&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ssf uiTerm: 186130710 longDbName: Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson) uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 09589236 JGS jtl: Journal of Gender Studies issn: 09589236 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Jul2025 vid: 34 iid: 5 pid: 377 pub: Taylor & Francis Ltd artinfo: ui: 186130710 10.1080/09589236.2025.2467883 ppf: 684 ppct: 15 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T db: hlh ui: 186130710 – @attributes: type: P db: hlh ui: 186130710 tig: atl: (Pseudo)Intellectualizing social conservatism: a critical account of anti-gender politics in Kerala, India. aug: au: Vadakka Chandran, Rahul affil: Centre for Studies in Gender and Sexuality (CSGS), Ashoka University, Sonepat, India su: Kerala (India) Conservatism Gender Religion Nationalism Anti-gender movements sug: subj: Conservatism Gender Religion Nationalism Anti-gender movements Kerala (India) keyword: conservatism Hindu-nationalism Kerala religion conservatism Hindu-nationalism Kerala religion ab: Kerala, a Southern Indian state, has recently witnessed a new wave of religious and political opposition against 'gender politics', a term increasingly used to criticize progressive changes concerning gender and sexuality. This article positions the ongoing discursive shift around 'gender' in Kerala's public sphere as a distinctive anti-gender mobilization, emerging partly through ideological reliance on Western anti-gender movements and partly diverging from them. Through a critical discourse analysis of major events from the past 6 years, this paper traces the manufacturing of anti-gender mobilization in Kerala and its role as a new (pseudo)intellectual framework and vocabulary of social conservatism, emphasizing how trans-queer bodies and gender-just initiatives in educational spaces have become sites of 'gender debates'. Texts produced around these occurrences are analysed alongside insights from interviews with queer-trans student activists. By examining the ongoing interaction between numerous local and global agents of anti-gender politics, which surprisingly align with both fascist and anti-fascist, liberal and illiberal, secular and religious formations in Kerala, this paper suggests the necessity of rethinking the geo-political nuances involved in imagining liberatory political discourse. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: N holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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