[Reader-list] Taslima/Sanjib/Hungries

[Naeem Mohaiemen]

>>From: ARNAB CHATTERJEE <apnawritings at yahoo.co.in>

>Naeem here, "Taslima was the first to write in 1989/90 about how the
narrow confines and massive crowds of boi mela had given cover to
groups of eve teasers.

>>remind Naeem that it was not Taslima, Sanjib Chattopadhyaya was the
commercial first to talk about sexual groping in bengali buses and
puja crowds
>>the Hungries were the first avantgarde to do that in parallel magazines.

Arnab,

I was specifically talking about her being "the first" in the
Bangladesh context, and in the Ekushey Boi Mela (Bangla Academy,
Dhaka) context.  The Hungries and Sanjib were both writing about West
Bengal, not Bangladesh.

When the Prime Minister of Bangladesh visited Kolkata in 1990s, she
was introduced at a Boi Mela (over public loudspeaker) as the "Chief
Minister of Bangladesh" (this led to a huge diplomatic row, but as it
was the slightly India-leaning AL government in power, it did not
reach nuclear level as it would surely have done under BNP/JAMAAT of
last 5 years).  So while there are numerous synergies, learning,
common histories, conjoined fates, tragic mulatto being, 'separate but
equal' narratives, etc., something being written about in West Bengal
does not automatically make it across the border (there's a separate
discussion needed about the culture balance deficit between WB and BD,
i.e. BD culture space is far more aware of what's being written in
Kolkata than vice versa).

So in the sense of raising awareness about this in Bangladesh, Taslima
was the "first" I remember [I am sure some Bangladeshi reader on this
list will now remind me of some little magazine from Aziz Super Market
Dhaka that also talked about it, but certainly no one talked about it
with the velocity and public attention grabbing (in a positive sense
of that word) of Taslima.]

As for the analysis that women somehow discover their sexuality/object
of desire status through public groping, well I can only hope you were
taking the piss in citing those "studies".