Heteronormativity, Passionate Aesthetics and Symbolic Subversion in Asia

This book examines life trajectories among three categories of women living beyond the bounds of heteronormativity in Jakarta and Delhi, two major cities with substantively different religious and social women who have lost their husbands, either through divorce or death; sex workers; and young, urban lesbians. Delhi has a large Hindu majority and a sizeable Muslim minority, amongst other religious and cultural pluralities. The Indian state is constitutionally committed to secularism and equal respect to all regions despite right-wing Hindu fundamentalism. Jakarta is the capital of a sprawling archipelago with a large variety of ethnic cultures, Indonesia having the largest Muslim population of the world, as well as sizeable ethnic and religious minorities comprising Christians, Hindus, Buddhists and others. The Indonesian state is constitutionally secular, but religion plays a large role in public life and is embedded in regulations that strongly impact people's private lives. Recently, the