How Young People with Disabilities Conceptualize The Body, Sex and Marriage in Urban India: Four Case Studies

Abstract

Historically in India as elsewhere in the world, there has been a deep-rooted cultural antipathy to persons with disabilities. They have been portrayed as medical anomalies, helpless victims and a lifelong burden for family and society. While today there is a general recognition in India of the need to enhance educational and employment opportunities for persons with disabilities in order to promote economic self-reliance and independent living, their sexual needs, dreams and aspirations are more or less invisible. Sexual and reproductive rights are considered irrelevant for persons with disabilities. Using qualitative data, this paper discusses notions of sexual identity among urban Indian youth through four case studies of college students in Delhi. Gender emerges as a key analytical category in perceptions of sexuality among young men and women with visual and locomotor disabilities. The paper does not claim to capture the complex reality of disabled sexuality in India, but highlights some key issues in a hitherto largely under-research domain. But the author's analysis carries added value, since she herself has low vision; thus conferring a reflexive angle to the research. Gender Subjectivity and Sexual IdentityInstead of giving rights to citizens with disabilities and empowering them, a culture of charity and welfare has been systematically promoted in India since the colonial period. The disability discourse has primarily focused on issues related to the medical management, education and employment of persons with disabilities.

Experienced and Anticipated Discrimination in Persons with Physical Disabilities in Serbia

“…They are twice as likely to be divorced ( Abu-Habib, 1997). Studies in other developing countries have found similar results (Addlakha, 2007). People with a disability are less likely than people without a disability, to be married ( Watson&Nolan, 2011).…”

“…Disabled men have been stereotyped and stigmatized as if they cannot fulfill traditional role of breadwinner (Lewis, 2000). As for disabled women there exists a conviction that they are not able to be mothers and housewives (Addlakha, 2007). They are twice as likely to be divorced ( Abu-Habib, 1997).…”

‘You’re disabled, why did you have sex in the first place?’ An intersectional analysis of experiences of disabled women with regard to their sexual and reproductive health and rights in Gujarat State, India

“…A study in north India with disabled women identified similar barriers in that context, though differences within the group of disabled women were underexplored [8]. The phenomenon of ‘desexualised subjectivity’ [43] has been linked by Indian social analysts to the long-established ‘moral’ construction of disability, in which impairment is perceived as retribution for the past and disabled bodies as dysfunctional [14,28,44,45]. A study conducted in Delhi with disabled adolescents emphasised the great variety in young people’s ability to express their sexuality in oppressive environments, highlighting that some disabled youth are able to challenge their ‘desexualised subjectivity’ by expressing their sexual needs and desires [43,44].…”

Interweaving Conceptualizations of Gender and Disability in the Context of Vulnerability to HIV/AIDS in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

“…All these initiatives, reports and research has largely been focused on improving access to prevention and treatment. Few studies concentrate on how PWD conceptualize their body and sexuality or explore sexual experience of PWD [1,21]. Very few studies focus on the link between the socio-cultural construction of disability, sexual abuse and the risk of HIV/AIDS [10].…”

“…Education about sexuality is therefore not considered as an option. That especially girls are often victims of abuse or that they are 'too sexually active' is known to the communities, as the resulting 1 Sisonke district is situated in the South-East of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. 2 The African concept of brother is broader than the European one.…”