intimacy

Editorial: Representation and Sexuality
A photograph of two yellow flowers blooming amid grass. Dark green leaves are emerging from behind the flowers' petals.
Editorial: Representation and Sexuality

We are, all of us, trying to hold steady, and to hold space for each other and for ourselves. And so, instead of trying to put together a collection of ‘all new’ articles, this time we are republishing some ‘ever fresh’ ones on the theme of Sexuality and Representation.
By TARSHI
June 15, 2021
Editorial: Representation and Sexuality
Interview: Kripa Joshi
On a peach coloured background, a woman of colour jumping. She is wearing purple ballet shoes and a purple one-piece swimsuit with white-grey patterns scattered on it. Her eyes are wide open and her hands are stretched open on both sides. Her hair is brown and open. She is throwing multi-coloured confetti. Beneath her is a blue circle. In a semicircle to her right is the typography, in purple: Throw kindness around like confetti!
Interview: Kripa Joshi

There have been several recent examples of actors, movies and events being called out because of their lack of representation, like for the Oscars. With social media it is easier to create and distribute diverse art and also to voice the need for diversity. So it needs engagements and awareness in society. Change will happen once enough people demand that change.
By Shikha Aleya
June 15, 2021
Interview: Kripa Joshi
From Judy Blume To The Sexy Internet: What Counts As Erotica?
On a white background, digital art of lips: light pink, mauve, red, and magenta.
From Judy Blume To The Sexy Internet: What Counts As Erotica?

This question of appropriateness is, for me, at the heart of all questions around sexuality. Each of us carries within us our own private benchmarks for which expressions of sexuality we find appropriate, and which ones, in turn, have crossed an invisible line. The ones we believe belong across the border, in the land of the inappropriate, of the too much.
By Richa Kaul Padte
June 15, 2021
From Judy Blume To The Sexy Internet: What Counts As Erotica?
Following Aladdin’s Genie
A photograph of a white bedsheet with blots of maroon-burgundy lipstick stains smudged across it.
Following Aladdin’s Genie

The lip colour then enters into a rather queer state of existence as it refuses to stand by the label it is expected to conform to. It moves and escapes categorisation. In its queerness, it renders itself as a paradox. At the heart of paradoxes is the understanding that something is what it is also not. Similarly, the colour of this lipstick is nude, but it is also not. It is possible that it is because of this slippery nature of the paradox that my sexuality as my identity too remains slippery, in motion and fluid.
By Muskan Nagpal
June 15, 2021
Following Aladdin’s Genie
Probing the Screen: Pleasure in the Virtual World
Wall-art of a face till the bridge of the nose. The face is coloured in peach, grey, and shades of blue. The eyes, green, are lined in black and have spots of yellow, brown, and blue colour around them. Under the left eye, there are yellow dots. The hair is streaked with purple and blue.
Probing the Screen: Pleasure in the Virtual World

The virtual world allows me to challenge the hold of patriarchy on my ‘effeminate’ body; in a sense, it allows me to evade the policing of desire that my body shares with another, its flows and slippages, the messy and the unkempt. While virtual sex offers a window to revisit the sensual, it is also not immune to limitations and insecurities.
By Neel
June 15, 2021
Probing the Screen: Pleasure in the Virtual World
Review: I see you
A still from the film 'A Kid Like Jake'. In a city-background with houses to the right and a car to the left, three figures: a blonde woman wearing a black and white striped t-shirt, blue jeans, and a beige coat, carrying a brown bag on her shoulder is holding a child's hand from the left. The child is wearing a purple, glittery tutu and a blue shirt. Their arms are outstretched and on the right side, held by a man wearing a peach shirt, blue hoodie and blue jeans. He has black hair. Both the man and the woman are looking at the child.
Review: I see you

My friend’s son, too, likes wearing tutus and frilly skirts. Every time they go shopping for clothes, he heads to the girl’s section and picks out the frilliest outfit. At check out, invariably the cashier asks if the pretty outfit is for his sister and he confidently says it is for him. Often he wears these outfits to school. His confidence comes from his mother’s acceptance of him and her understanding of his gender expansiveness. It helps that she is a sociologist, but there is a constant pushback from society including from his peers at school who bully the little boy. But it is the constant support from his mother and family that allows him to remain confident and thrive whilst being different.

By ElsaMarie D'Silva
June 15, 2021
Review: I see you
On Sexuality, Representation, and Being a Lonely Brown Girl
The cover image of the article with the typography, in white, 'On Sexuality, Representation, and Being a Lonely Brown Girl' and under it in smaller font: September 12, 2017 / Nisha Eswaran' The background is a fade-effect illustration of a brown woman wearing a white-lilac top with black hair open. She is standing in a field of sunflowers, yellow and brown with green leaves and brown-black mountains far back. The woman's face has been made without any features.
On Sexuality, Representation, and Being a Lonely Brown Girl

I long for much more than a greater representation of brown women. I long for a complete overhaul of the racial, gendered, and economic systems that structure our suffering.

But I also long for representation of all people, including brown women, who are in love, who are loveable, and who are — in the absence of love — lonely.
By Curated Content
June 15, 2021
On Sexuality, Representation, and Being a Lonely Brown Girl
Swipe me left, I’m Dalit
An abstractly made illustration of a landscape with mountains depicted in yellow, and below, a blend of green-blue to depict oceans. The texture of the colours evokes waves as well as ice. On the left is a paper boat, yellow-white with blue-green hues, carrying a red rose-like flower in the middle.
Swipe me left, I’m Dalit

Dalit women are primarily viewed as victims and survivors of various kinds of violence. Reification of the Dalit identity has led to the boxing of our existence whose dimensions are solely defined by the savarna (dominant caste) gaze. Our self-assertions of identity are commodified to create a warped limiting of our lives, creating an image that is voiceless in the minds of our potential suitors. We are not seen as being capable of desire, love or happiness; we don’t exist as individuals outside of violence.
By Curated Content
June 15, 2021
Swipe me left, I’m Dalit
Interview – #covid19 and conversations online: Listening in
On a black background, binary digits are displayed in white, as if on a screen. In the middle is a red heart shape, made from the binary digits.
Interview – #covid19 and conversations online: Listening in

We are plugged in to all kinds of data from a variety of sources, through technology, and even a window view of this space is like stepping into a global COVID control data centre. We are standing up to be counted, to be seen, to do, to contribute, to advocate, to remind, to rectify and restore, to strengthen a growing network of support and response to crisis on a scale we have neither been able to process or measure.
By Shikha Aleya
May 15, 2021
Interview – #covid19 and conversations online: Listening in
Brushstrokes: Digital security guide: How to protect yourself on dating apps
An illustration of a ruled sheet. The lines are orange in colour. In the middle is a smartphone with a woman's face and torso on the display. She has curly brown hair and is wearing a blue turtleneck. Underneath is written, Lu, 28, and the symbols of Swipe Yes or No and two other buttons as on a dating app interface. On either side of the smartphone are flowers with stems and leaves. The flowers are red, and two in each bouquet. Above, in big letters, outlined in black and coloured in bright green: How to Date Online Safely. And underneath the smartphone illustration, in black, "Online dating can be fun. But there are some risks. Malicious actors can use your profile to blackmail, hurt, or harass you. This guide contains helpful tips and resources to protect you'
Brushstrokes: Digital security guide: How to protect yourself on dating apps

Online dating can be great fun but it comes with some risks. This quirky and in-depth Digital Security Guide by Access Now on How to Date Online Safely tells us how we can engage with fellow dating-app users while making sure we are safe from harm.
By Curated Content
May 15, 2021
Brushstrokes: Digital security guide: How to protect yourself on dating apps
Tinderization of Feeling
Image of two dolls swaying their legs and arms. The doll on the left has long hair and is wearing a red coloured head scarf on its head and a white sweater and black pants. The doll also has makeup on its face. The doll on the rights has short hair and is wearing a white sweater with grey pants. The doll has a black woolen scarf around its neck
Tinderization of Feeling

To be without intricacies is to be without emotional boundaries, to disregard whoever whenever. Besties save you from your shit. They are your heart, and they transcend any efficiency that the Tinderization Bestie Robot attempts to offer you in its binary fantasy.
By Curated Content
April 19, 2021
Tinderization of Feeling
Why Don’t Indian Families Say “I Love You”?
A drawing of four people in a red background. Behind them are drawings of buildings and clouds. The four faces have different expressions on them- two can be seen smiling, the third person has a neutral expression and the fourth person has a sad expression. Three hearts are also drawn on the first, second and the fourth person.
Why Don’t Indian Families Say “I Love You”?

Indian families rarely say “I love you” to each other. Maybe it is an extension of the fact that parents are awkward while displaying any sign of affection to each other around their kids or elders.
By Curated Content
April 19, 2021
Why Don’t Indian Families Say “I Love You”?
Interview – Indu Harikumar
Interview – Indu Harikumar

I was watching something recently that said it was a bad thing to be vulnerable, but I don’t think it is a bad thing. I do see that there is a certain amount of power in vulnerability, it also needs courage, in my experience.
By Shikha Aleya
April 5, 2021
Interview – Indu Harikumar
STAY SINGLE. STAY SAFE.
Image of mannequins with orange and pink ductapes. On one of the mannequins ‘Your body belongs to you’ is written
STAY SINGLE. STAY SAFE.

The largest contingent of voiceless, lonely women with limited agency in the subcontinent must be its married women. If they’re fortunate enough to be born and reach adulthood, a woman’s parents and society make sure she becomes an adult brainwashed into self-alienation and self-loathing.

By Nighat Gandhi
April 5, 2021
STAY SINGLE. STAY SAFE.
Brushstrokes: The AVR Method
A comic strip where two purple coloured figures can be seen snuggling on bed. There is a table with a laptop, two mobile phones, a slice of pizza, and a water bottle next to them. Behind the figures are two plants, a window and a bookshelf. On top left, ‘Let’s snuggle and forget the cruel world outside’ is written
Brushstrokes: The AVR Method

From being comfortable doing nothing in someone’s company or cooking and laughing together, to confiding in them our hopes and fears, feeling safe letting someone seeing us at our best as well as through our not-so-good moments is like ‘coming home’ in the world.

By Curated Content
April 5, 2021
Brushstrokes: The AVR Method
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