Introduction
Going back to the antiquity, the commonplace understanding of the ancient times was characterized by an attitude of gross abhorrence towards sex, which was heavily tabooed, and still is, and the act was considered to be proper only for achieving salvation, at least in India, as the birth of a son was necessary in order to break ‘the chain of reincarnation in birth-death-rebirth’(kaustav, 252). This narrative of sex-for-reproduction was, however, challenged and lost its ground to the more seductive narrative of sexual intercourse being seen as the fruit of deeply felt love. However, the proposal seeks to examine the various emotions, other than those concerning love, that women articulate through their sexuality, looking at the themes of ‘dominitrix’, to explore the female urge to counter the phallus-centric conception of sex; ‘nymphomania’, to understand the questionable notion of the ‘harmful’ excess of female sexuality; and vengeful anger.
This shall be analyzed through Cinema, which remains the unchallenged medium of popular culture, representing a ‘synonymous interpretation of mass culture’(Kumar 2013, 451) that enables people to undergo a collective experience, unhindered by the otherwise deeply destructive cleavages of class, caste, religion, language and even nationalities. We cannot help, but ponder on the intricacies inherent in the relation between Cinema, as a universal medium of popular culture, on one hand, and the concrete social realities that make up Life, on the other hand. The characters, the plots, structure, scenes, dialogue, visuals and other crucial elements of cinema are, indeed, conceived, not in a social vacuum, but are highly influenced by, and to a certain modicum which is debatable, reflect the aspirations of the people situated in a particular time and space, and such an influence also happen the other way round.
Research Question
How has female sexuality been appropriated by the commercial Hindi Cinema of the new millennium, in such way that the trope of unorthodox female emotions has been articulated?
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Theoretical Framework
Locating the research question in a broader theoretical framework, would require us to explore the discourses on female sexuality, especially through the lenses of radical feminism and post-structural feminism, for whom domination-subordination and resistance occurs through the body and challenges the phallus-centric notion of sexuality.
The 1960s witnessed the beginning of, what can be called as the Second Wave of feminism, that successfully harnessed a productive view of anger, especially appropriated by the radical feminists, to question and understand the continuing gendered status quo that works to the disadvantage of women even after having achieved equal civil-political rights at par with men. Susan Brownmiller directed the feminist anger at the lack of recognition of and theorizing on the issue of rape, on part of the male theorist, like Marx and Engels, who otherwise are heralded for their anti-exploitation stance, for their theorization on the upliftment of the downtrodden class, but conveniently takes a backseat on the question of rape, because it did not pertain to the polity and the economy in an obvious manner?
Sexuality, relegated to the private domain of family, was seen as something not qualified to be discussed as a discourse, or something that has little or no impact at all on the organization of the body-politic. But sexual relations are indeed politicized and sex has a frequently neglected political aspect, which Kate millet emphasized frequently in Sexual Politics. Power relations exist and operate even at the level of the most basic and fundamental activity shared by all the living species, that is, copulation. The link between sex and politics is further emphasized by Carole Pateman when she argues that patriarchal construction of masculinity and femininity gets translated into political difference between freedom and subjection, respectively. Further, sexual mastery is used by men to affirm manhood, through means such as marriage, prostitution, graphic representation of female sexualized bodies, surrogacy and even inflatable dolls.
A widespread understanding of the conventional society as regards female sexuality is its (constructed) passivity. Anne Koedt, mockingly, regards Sigmund Freud as the father of Vaginal Orgasm, because of his theory on female sexuality that celebrates the shift of focus from clitoris to vagina, as signaling the peak of sexual maturity in women. Freud claims that masochism is an important stage in females, which signal the final stage of attaining sexual maturity, and it constitutes one of the three most distinguishing traits of femininity along with passivity and narcissism. Helene Deutsch, one of the prominent enunciators of Freudian theory, based her theory of female sexuality on masochism, emphasizing on the inadequacy of both the clitoris, when compared to penis on one hand, and on the passivity of vagina on the other hand. As quoted by Kate Millet, in Sexual Politics, Deutsch argue that:
In the light of psychoanalysis, the sexual act assumes an immense, dramatic, and profoundly cathartic significance for the woman-but only this under the condition that it is experienced in a feminine, dynamic way and is not transformed into an act of erotic play or sexual ‘equality.’
The pressure to emanate sexual maturity through the experience of vaginal orgasm, lest women be casted as frigid,, have led to numerous women faking orgasm, and has been seen as a pressure imposed on women by men. Such a pressure hugely has a negative consequence for women, ‘leading them to a path of self-hatred and insecurity’. Deconstructing vaginal orgasm and celebrating clitoral orgasm was a threat to heterosexual intercourse, as vaginal penetration wouldn’t be necessary upon the discovery of clitoral and as such, heterosexuality would lose its absolute essence, and would merely be an option. However, radical feminists’, in defying vaginal penetration, must not be interpreted as as ant-sex, but are simply stating that the act must have not political implications of sexual subordination-domination.
Karen Horney, gives us a fresh perspective, in her daring celebration of the vagina, in contradiction to the traditional Freudianism, defying masochism as the natural progression of female sexuality and that it is only culturally induced. However, as the saying goes ‘the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree’, Horney does not debunk the primacy attached by Freud to penis, but only tries to elevate vagina to equal status, and to this end, Horney resembles Deutsch in stripping clitoris of all agency. Taking a step further in challenging the means of male domination like penetration, the Barbara Mehrhof suggested that ‘if women were in charge of sex and the language, the same act could be called enclosure.’
Such a critique of the phallus-centric psychoanalysis of sexuality is shared by post-modernists such as Foucault, stressing that the ’sciences’ of sex (including psychoanalysis) is corrupt, and that they only work to naturalize the monogamous, heterosexual, nuclear family. Foucault, in analyzing how sexuality and the categories of masculinities and femininities came to be constructed as a discourse, argue that there is no scientific truth about sex , and the so-called ‘truth claims’ have themselves been responsible for the constitution of these categories as ‘given’. This Foucauldian approach has been appropriated by Judith Butler to argue that not only is gender constructed, but sex is too, by the process of reification, making use of language. Certain areas of the human anatomy are named and an association has been established between those parts and sexuality, thereby, making them the locations of sexuality (phallus in men and vagina in women, completely dismissing the clitoris, which actually is more sexually sensitive compared to vagina and penis, both) The presence of absence of such parts then decide the whether the individual is a male or a female. Freud had made a distinction between the female and the male sex on the basis of absence and presence of the penis, respectively. But Butler argues that this is even constructed. A person who was assigned a female sex at birth by the observance of the lack of the penis, may be considered a male in other instances, e.g., in the sex testing for the Olympics. Thus, the constructed nature of the binaries imply that there was an emphasis on heterosexuality and the consequent vaginal penetration, with a vested interest of course.
Literature Review
Hindi Cinema had its origins a little over a century ago, with the screening of the first full-length Hindi film, Raja Harishchandra (1913), that was directed and produced by Dadasaheb Phalke, who is revered as the father of Hindi Cinema and since its very inception, the female body and her sexuality almost immediately became a terrain of contestation, with their bodies replicating the surface onto which men inscribe the “dos and don’ts.”
Such an approach of disciplining the female sexuality through films of the 1950s and 1960s largely emphasized on the following qualities in order for a woman to be desirable as a wife and or deserving of being worshipped as a Mother— sacrificing nature, tenderness and a complete withdrawal of her sexuality. But the poetic songs, dance, ‘graceful body movements’, the costumes of the females, indeed, sexualized women, thus providing voyeuristic pleasure, though the women are more or less completely covered. (Virdi, 147, 146) The archetype of the ‘mother’, which comes second to the ‘male protagonist’, was exemplified by Mother India (1957) sacrificing everything for the sake of the family, especially for her sons and husband even though the husband may leave her.(Mishra, 1985, 140), and is also upholds and is dictated by ‘hermeneutical containment’ that does not allow transgressions of any kind, especially those that are sexual in nature.(EN leading to Radha killing her own son, Birju for abducting Sukhilala’s daughter (Mishra,book p. 85). Problematizing the celebration of Mother India as epitomizing women’s empowerment, Kazmi argues that being a wife and motherhood were the only markers of Radha(Nargis) thus negating any independent existence of her own. Even in the portrayal of Radha as a wife, she was completely de-sexualized, thus only perpetuating the status-quo.
The woman/wife, on the other hand is presented as a husband worshipper and an abla naari (Damsel in Distress, waiting to be rescued by the prince charming, or by the male protagonist, in our case) and Kazmi notes that several movies such as Awaara(1951), Mughal-e-Azam (1960), Guide (1965), Aradhana (1969) seem to be destabilizing the narrative, since they seem to disrupt the gendered dichotomy of rationality-emotional attached to masculinity-femininity, respectively, but this exception always end up being a mere facade as the gender roles are quickly reversed as the movie ends.
In sharp contradistinction to this pati-vrata, abla naari, was the vamp, who was the woman who unabashedly explored her sexuality, adopts the Western ways of living, and appropriates the phallic power is vilified and punished and in some cases, is made to change her ways. (Virdi,pp 168)(Butalia, 109)
A huge body of literature yet exists for the aftermath of the abla naari, which heralded as the period of the avenging woman, beginning with Insaaf ka Tarazu (1980), Pratighat (1987), Zakhmi Aurat (1988), Sherni (1988). A common storyline in these movies, is the absence of paternal figures, with the female protagonist being self-reliant, but is victimized by first, the act of rape, and then by the state, represented by the police and the judicial system, which ultimately compels the woman to take the law in her own hand and avenges the wrong done to her, often by murdering the accused. However, much of the literature argues that these films, though represented the feminist movement, reduced it to a grotesque rape-and-revenge formula, and thus was ‘hostile to female sexuality’(as quoted in Gopalan, pp, 43)(M.Rao, 40) and merely rejected rape because it dishonors the nation, as patriarchy considers the woman’s body to be the repository of the nation’s honor, and not for the violation of dignity and rights of the woman, per se.(Virdi 163)
Insaaf ka Tarazu often had to bear rage brunt of feminist anger as it is taken to be a mere cosmetic representation of the issue of rape, because it ‘treats the actual act [of rape] (which occurs three times, once in the introductory credit role, once with Bharati and once with her younger sister) in the most titillating manner possible.’ (Butalia, 109) (Karki,90) Butalia’s statement must not be taken out of context. It was the era of strict cinematic censorship, when even kissing scenes were censored, but it is a puzzle as to why the rape scenes were highlighted. Though the movie seems to be a break from a strong patriarchal presence, it starts with Dharmendra being protrayed as the killers of rapists, as if signaling that helplessness of a movie without at least a vision of a hero.(Karki, 90). However, Gopalan, even though admits the presence of sadistic voyeurstic pleasure in such movies, (Gopalan, 51, 47), believes that ‘they do stage the aggressive and contradictory contours in sexual identity and pleasures that in turn throw up aggressive strands of feminism’. (Gopalan, 54)
Patriarchy quickly re-asserts itself with movies such as such Hum Aapke Hain Kaun (1994), Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (1998), Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (1995), Pardes (1997), with the values of the Great Indian Family removing every ounce of individual agency, especially that of the female. (Kazmi, 2010)
But with the beginning of the new millennium, Bollywood’s obsession with the narrative of the avenging woman resurfaced, with films such as Kahaani, Angry Indian Goddesses, Pink, and yet again, the films became the object of academic, and especially of feminist, intervention. Yet again, these films like those of the 20th Century, were marked by an almost all female presence, and most importantly, they were applauded for the ‘absence of connection between women and sensuality’. Movies such as Pink and Kahaani, though appropriates the avenging woman genre, the point of departure is the almost negligible ‘onscreen violence against women’ (Gupta, 108) and thus they are far more emancipatory than their precursors of the previous century. Karki (p.94) notes how Pink appears to be patriarchal in the way that it resinstituted the state and had a male as a mouthpiece for feminism. While agreeing with Karki on casting of Amitabh Bachan as the spokesperson and centralizing his character, which in tune led to the trivialization of the three female characters, Karki seems to be too far-fetched in her argument on the reinstitutization of the state, merely based on the judicial judgement that convicted the accused. Karki seems to tilt more towards Angry Indian Goddesses for the women in the film channelized collective strength and responsibility to murder their friend’s rapists, thus taking law in their own hand, thereby rejecting the state.(Karki, 96).
What is obvious from the above discussion is that vengeful anger as projected in the Hindi cinema has been a theme that has been saturated by a huge body of literature, but these academic interventions often focus only on analyzing those movies where the the medium of taking revenge is the more conventional approach of murdering, judicial battles, or, in the other extreme end of the spectrum, some involving castration. However, the proposal seeks to look at the ways in which sexuality has been appropriated by the women, as a tool, and in the process not allowing to be mere objects of male gaze (Mulvey,), of achieving vengeance, among other things.
And such a theme where the women has used her sexuality to articulate vengeful anger has indeed been projected in films such as Hate Story and Raaz, but there is a huge literature gap, as these movies are often cast aside and toss into the bin of irrelevance and the reason for such a repulsive attitude in the academic domain towards these movies may be linked to how avenging women movies of the 21st Century are studied—often celebrating the complete desexualization of the avenging female protagonist (like in Kahaani). However, such a celebration must compel us to ask a question, no matter how problematic it may sound- Why must sexuality be alienated from the person in order for that person to become deserving of respect? Why must we villify woman who channelize or appropriates her sexuality to gain vengeance (like Kavya does in Hate Story), even after attempts in the academic world to deconstruct the patriarchal agenda of solely associating female sexuality with reproduction and satiation of male sex-desire?
Bhubhaneshwari’s reconstruction of the story of Tatri from a feminist perspective is of much importance, as far as my proposal is concerned, as Tatri plunges into prostitution to avenge all the numerous instances of sexual violation she had to endure at the hands of the Namboodiri men, and such unfolding of events was ‘unprecedented, scandalous’(Bhubhaneswari, 939) given the fact that it happened in the early decade of the 20th Century, in the obnoxiously patriachal setting of the Namboodiri community of Kerala. (EN the women were relegated to strict sexual discipline-observing purdah system, forever bounded by the four walls of the inner household, lest the sun rays pollute them, and destroyed by jealousy among the co-wives, and were even taught to worship their husband who returned after having visited prostitutes. See Tarti for more details.pp. 972) Some versions suggest that Tatri had a calculated move when she entertained her customers as a courtesan- keeping a list of the persons whom she wanted to get ostracized, seduce them and carried proof of intimacy to be used during the trials, and this revolt on her part had been responsible for many reforms in her community and especially in the traditional trial courts that often serve to excuse the male transgressors while allowing no merit to women for sexual aberrations. She had been dismissed as a worthless prostitute, seducing men for her whims and fancies, just as Hate Story has been seen as unworthy of any academic intervention.
