Rainbow & the Other: September 2010

Makeshift Migrants and Law: Gender, Belonging, and Postcolonial Anxieties by Ratna Kapur (Aug 25, 2010)

This book unmasks the cultural and gender stereotypes that inform the legal regulation of the migrant. It critiques the postcolonial perspective on how belonging and non-belonging are determined by the sexual, cultural, and familial norms on which law is based as well as the historical backdrop of the colonial encounter, which differentiated overtly between the legitimate and illegitimate subject.

The complexities and layering of the migrant’s existence are seen, in the book, to be obscured by the apparatus of the law. The author elaborates on how law can both advance and impede the rights of the migrant subject and how legal interventions are constructed around frameworks rooted in the boundaries of difference, protection of the sovereignty of the nation-state, and the myth of the all-embracing liberal subject. This produces the ‘Other’ and reinforces essentialised assumptions about gender and cultural difference.

The author foregrounds the perspective of the subaltern migrant subject, exposing the deeper issues implicated in the debates over migration and the rights claims of migrants, primarily in the context of women and religious minorities in India. About the Author

Ratna Kapur is Director, Centre for Feminist Legal Research, New Delhi and Faculty, Geneva School of Diplomacy and International Relations, Geneva. Erotic Justice: Law and the New Politics of Postcolonialism by Ratna Kapur (Feb 3, 2005), Secularism's Last Sigh?: Hindutva and the (Mis) Rule of Law by Brenda Cossman and Ratna Kapur (May 16, 2002)

The Making of a Modern Indian Artist-Craftsman: Devi Prasad by Naman Ahuja (Sep 11, 2010)

Militant and Migrant: The Politics and Social History of Punjab by Radhika Chopra (Dec 26, 2010)

Being Brahmin, Being Modern: Exploring the Lives of Caste Today by Ramesh Bairy (Aug 25, 2010)

Developmental State and the Dalit Question in Madhya Pradesh: Congress Response by Sudha Pai (Aug 25, 2010)

Indian Political Thought: A Reader by Aakash Singh and Silika Mohapatra (Aug 17, 2010)

The Gender Imperative: Human Security Vs State Security by Asha Hans and Betty A. Reardon (Jul 26, 2010)

Emerging Trends in Indian Politics: The Fifteenth General Election by Ajay K Mehra(Jul 22, 2010)

Theories of Value from Adam Smith to Piero Sraffa by Ajit Sinha (Jul 22, 2010)

Democracy, Development and Decentralisation in India: Continuing Debates by Chandan Sengupta and Stuart Corbridge (Jul 21, 2010)

Grounding Morality: Freedom, Knowledge and the Plurality of Cultures by Jyotirmaya Sharma and A. Raghuramaraju (Jul 21, 2010)

How Best Do We Survive?: A Modern Political History of the Tamil Muslims (South Asian History and Culture) by Kenneth McPherson (Jul 21, 2010)

The Warp and the Weft: Community and Gender Identity Among the Weavers of Banaras by Vasanthi Raman (Jul 1, 2010)