SISA spaces
Each time a child or adolescent asks a question that may be (even indirectly) related to sexuality, many parents and teachers get squirmy and nervous. This may be because they themselves do not have the information required, but in most cases, it has more to do with the ‘hush-hush’ that surrounds sexuality.
I feel that parents, teachers and CSE can make room for these disparate realities of adolescents by first acknowledging the limits of formal sexuality education, that the curriculum imparted formally fails in providing the kind of learning that happens through other sources.
A child’s social environment in their foundational years plays a critical role in shaping their worldview and influences their responses and the way they communicate with their peers.
Despite the lack of a formal Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) curriculum in place in India, there has been a growing interest in providing CSE programmes in schools.
My mother’s openness gave me a profound glimpse into how deeply conversations – or their absence – shape our sense of self.
Aria walked into her school’s auditorium, giggling with the rest of the girls, because they were about to have their very first Sex Ed workshop.
It’s clear Ms. Nisha is not here to shame them or lecture them. She’s here to give them words when they have none.
Gender and sexuality are like constituent parts of a jigsaw puzzle that keeps morphing in such a way that nothing ever ‘fits’ for long, and the game begins anew each time.
चूँकि दुनिया हाशिये में जीने वाले लोगों के प्रति इतनी प्रतिकूल रही है, इसलिए वे लोग हमेशा से, हर जगह ‘सुरक्षित स्थान’ बनाने की कोशिश करते आ रहे हैं।
Safe spaces in the way that they often circulate are depoliticised and the assumption is that there won’t be any conflicts, but there can be no safe space without an exchange of ideas, which will create some bad feelings leading to conflict.
What does belonging, then, look like in urban India for people from different social, economic and political backgrounds?
अपनी परिभाषा, अर्थ और लांछन के आस-पास की अस्पष्टता के कारण यौनिकता एक अछूता, अनदेखा, और मनाही का क्षेत्र बना हुआ है।
Sexuality and the workplace are closely related, and a safe and healthy working environment is a fundamental human right.
The larger question is, who gets to bring all of themselves to the workplace, and who is either not allowed, or feels scared, or is bullied for doing so?
The bathroom stall becomes a sanctuary, a stage, a confession booth.