SEXUALITY, GENDER AND RIGHTS: EXPLORING THEORY AND PRACTICE IN SOUTH AND SOUTHEAST ASIA

This book analytically documents the work of fifteen organizations in South and Southeast Asia working in the fields of sexuality, gender and human rights, and was published in September 2005 by SAGE Publications Ltd. in India, the U.K. and the U.S.A.

Edited by Geetanjali Misra (CREA) and Radhika Chandiramani (TARSHI), this book aims to:

• Define sexuality from a broad perspective rather than defer to narrow conceptions in relation to HIV or identity alone.

• Substantiate theoretical claims of the links between sexuality, gender and rights with practical examples / insights from South and Southeast Asia.

• Illustrate the personal insights and critical reflections by senior staff of organizations, activists, and researchers engaged in a range of efforts to link sexuality, gender and rights.

“Sexuality, Gender and Rights is a potpourri of essays from various parts of South and Southeast Asia. The articles address a diverse range of fields.”
- The Hindustan Times

“The right to make choices about sexuality, control over such rights and related issues are voiced regularly at international forums. The book throws light on some attempts made to recognize these rights and ensure their acceptance in society... The writers include social activists having immense experience in women-related issues, including reproductive health, rights and sexuality.”
- The Tribune

“For researchers working on sexuality and gender, this collection could provide food for thought and ideas for further
exploration.”
- The Deccan Herald

CONTENTS: Introduction GEETANJALI MISRA and RADHIKA CHANDIRAMANI / Looking in Horror and Fascination: Sex, Violence and Spectatorship in India SHOHINI GHOSH / The Stage, the Body: The Sites for Women’s Dissent – A Case of Engendering the Praxis of Theater in the Philippines LEA LASTRILLA ESPALLARDO / Some Notes towards Understanding the Construction of Middle-class Urban Women’s Sexuality in India SHILPA PHADKE / Through the Prism of Intersectionality: Same-Sex Sexualities in India JAYA SHARMA and DIPIKA NATH / The Struggle to be Ourselves, neither Men nor Women: Mak Nyahs in Malaysia KHARTINI SLAMAH / The Rights of People with Same Sex Sexual Behaviour: Recent Progress and Continuing Challenges in China ZHANG BEICHUAN and JOAN KAUFMAN / Unlearning and Learning: The Sexuality and Rights Institute in India RADHIKA CHANDIRAMANI and GEETANJALI MISRA / Raising Sexuality as a Political Issue in the Catholic Philippines JUNICE L DEMETERIO-MELGAR / Working from Within: Using the Legitimacy of Religion to Create Change in Indonesia MASRUCHAH and BRIDGET KEENAN / Speaking with a New Voice: Sisters in Islam in Malaysia RASHIDAH SHUIB / Challenging Moral Guardianship in Pakistan SHAZIA MOHAMED / Protecting the Rights of Sex Workers: The Indian Experience GEETANJALI MISRA, AJAY MAHAL and RIMA SHAH / Rest, Recreation, and Resistance: Advancing the Rights of Sex Workers in Thailand VERONICA MAGAR and CHANTAWIPA APISUK / Not A Sob Story Representing the Realities of Sex Work in India BISHAKHA DATTA / Communities beyond the Pale: Sex Workers’ Rights and Human Rights in Sri Lanka SUNILA ABEYSEKERA / Index
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Through its work with community-based groups based in the Hindi speaking areas of India, CREA has realized that there is a paucity of resource material on gender, sexuality, sexual rights and human rights in Hindi. Development practitioners are unable to access the debates and discussions on these issues available in English and therefore are unable to contribute to these processes. CREA in collaboration with the international journal, Reproductive Health Matters, has come out with the first Hindi edition of Reproductive Health Matters, on "Yaunikta evam Adhikar" (Sexuality and Rights). This edition is a compilation of 13 articles from existing editions of the journal, translated into Hindi. The articles discuss issues related to sexuality, sexual rights, gender and human rights and have looked at sexuality and sexual rights within the larger framework of human rights. The next two editions will focus on young people's sexual rights and health issues, and maternal health.

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BUILDING ALLIANCES FOR GLOBALIZING WOMEN’S HUMAN RIGHTS:
FOUR GLOBAL DIALOGUES ON WOMEN’S HUMAN RIGHTS

This initiative is founded on the understanding that social movements can connect globally, share strategies and learn from each other. Through a series of four global dialogues, social change makers working on diverse issues across the global South come together to discuss the intersections of women’s human rights with their field of work. A unique feature of these global dialogues is the fact that they bring to the fore perspectives from the global South and are facilitated by organizations from the global South.

<< PAST DIALOGUES

VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN: WORKING THROUGH CHASMS, DIFFERENCES AND BOUNDARIES
The first global dialogue was held in July 2004 at the Rockefeller Conference Center in Bellagio, Italy. The meeting brought together diverse activists who work on issues of violence against women, health and human rights. The documentation of the first dialogue is reflected in Building Alliances for Global Organizing on Violence Against Women: Working through Chasms, Differences and Boundaries, the first working paper of the Global Working Papers series.
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SEARCHING FOR SPACES: WOMEN’S HUMAN RIGHTS IN SOCIAL MOVEMENTS
“To live, to get the whole job done great movements must reinvent themselves. To sustain themselves, movements must not only grow; they must change.” – Bella Abzug

Co-hosted by AWID and CREA, the second dialogue followed the AWID International Forum, and took place in Bangkok from October 31 through November 1, 2005.
This dialogue brought together participants who represent diverse movements such as the labor, development, dalit, peoples’, women’s, health, sexuality, human rights, and indigenous peoples’ movements. The dialogue explored how different social movements understand and address women’s human rights, the challenges they face and the progress they have made in working on these issues. The documentation of this dialogue will result in the second working paper to be published soon.

LISTENING TO EACH OTHER: A MULTIGENERATIONAL DIALOGUE ON ACTIVISM AND WOMEN’S RIGHTS (2007)
A collaborative effort with the Center for Women’s Global Leadership and the Youth Coalition, the third dialogue was held in New Jersey from October 1 to 3, 2007. It brought together feminist activists from different generations to discuss and share experiences about intergenerational issues affecting feminist movements and organizations, alliance building, and future strategies. The documentation from this dialogue will result in the third working paper in the Global Working Paper series.

UPCOMING DIALOGUES >>

BETWEEN THE SHEETS AND ON THE STREETS: SEXUALITY AND HUMAN RIGHTS
The fourth dialogue aims to bring together activists and academicians working on issues of sexuality, sexual rights, sex workers’ rights, and women’s human rights to discuss, debate and strategize on effective ways to build alliances between movements and promote the rights of women in sex work and prostitution. Historically, mainstream women’s movements and movements to end violence against women have ignored the violence and multiple rights violations experienced by women in sex work and prostitution. Sex work in and of itself has been viewed by some as a form of violence and often the terms sex work and trafficking are conflated with each other. This does not take into consideration that some women choose to enter into prostitution and remain in the business/profession of their own volition. This unfair conflation of sex work with violence against women limits the scope of both movements.

The dialogue will seek to answer some of these questions: How can activists from these varied movements work together to ensure the promotion of the rights of sex workers as well as the sexual rights of all women? How can we ensure that campaigns to end violence against women are inclusive of violence against sex workers? How can we integrate issues of sexuality, pleasure and choice in our understandings of sex work and prostitution?

The dialogue will be held in India, in collaboration with SANGRAM’s Centre for Advocacy on Stigma and Marginalisation (CASAM), that advocates for the reduction of stigma, violence and harassment of marginalized communities.

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WORKING PAPER SERIES

CREA publishes working papers that document discourses and activism around sexuality and sexual rights. Two working papers published so far:

Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights in India
This working paper describes the factors and issues that impact the understanding of sexual and reproductive rights of young people in India and highlights examples from initiatives and policies that have contributed to the current engagement with young people.
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Sexual Rights and Social Movements in India
This working paper explores and analyses the emerging discourse of sexual rights in India through a documentation of the debates on and applications of sexual rights discourse by Indian activists and movements.
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THE GENDER AND REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH INITIATIVE: MAPPING A DECADE OF
REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH RESEARCH IN INDIA

Coordinated by CREA, this publication series evaluates a decade (1990 – 2000) of reproductive health research in India from a gender perspective. Findings were published in 2002 by CREA as a set of six annotated bibliographies and five critical review papers. The publications are also available on a compact disc format.

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHIES
Abortion in India by Deeksha Vasundhra, Rima Shah and Geetanjali Misra
HIV/AIDS in India by Anita Rego and Vimla Nadkarni
Reproductive Health Services in India by Sunita Bandewar and Shelley Saha
Sexuality and Sexual Behaviour by Renu Khanna, Sunita Gurbaxani, and Kasturi Sengupta
Women’s Morbidity in India by Meena Gopal
Women’s Reproductive Health in India by Surekha Garimella

CRITICAL REVIEWS
Gender Gaps in Research on Abortion in India by Dr. T.K. Sundari Ravindran
Gender Gaps in Research on Health Services in India by Shelley Saha and Dr. T.K. Sundari Ravindran
HIV/AIDS in India by Anita Rego, Vimla Nadkarni, and Deeksha Vasundhra
Sexuality and Sexual Behaviour by Radhika Chandiramani, Shagufa Kapadia, Renu Khanna, and Geetanjali Misra
Studies on Women’s Morbidity in India by Meena Gopal and Lakshmi Lingam
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The program features screenings and panel discussions combining the aesthetic pleasures of watching films and the intellectual stimulation of debates in a seminar format. The focus will be on works, ideas and cinema from South and Southeast Asia as well as global perspectives.

OBJECTIVES
Promote a more complex understanding of issues of representation of gender and sexuality. Strengthen advocacy strategies that might include visual representations. Expand the resource pool of people in South and Southeast Asia who work on issues of sexuality and representation.

Event: March 6 – 9, 2007

Collaboration: The South and Southeast Asia Resource Center on Sexuality

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To know more about the event, read blogs at blog.filmsofdesire.org