Resisting activism
The politics of apathy and disengagement in Difficult Daughters and Broken Verses
Abstract only
Log-in for full text

The first chapter focuses on the female protagonists of Difficult Daughters and Broken Verses who resist involvement in collectivist struggles against socio-political injustice. Set against the backdrop of two significant moments of female activism in pre-Partition India and in 1970s and 1980s Pakistan respectively, the two narratives bring to the fore the tensions that the idea and practice of protest politics can elicit, particularly for women. But precisely because the protagonists are shown to be in close proximity, emotional as well as physical, to women who are actively engaged in political affairs, the two texts resist being read as allegories of female political inaction. The protagonists’ rejection of protest politics and their ostensible distance from the notion of ‘the political’ appear to be deeply personal and invite an examination of the ways in which political apathy is intimately tied in not only with the concepts of freedom, choice and agency, but also with fundamental questions of self-identity.

  • Collapse
  • Expand

All of MUP's digital content including Open Access books and journals is now available on manchesterhive.

 

Editor:

Metrics

All Time Past Year Past 30 Days
Abstract Views 8952 2418 32
Full Text Views 50 32 0
PDF Downloads 46 30 0