With Respect to Sex: Negotiating Hijra Identity in South India (Worlds of Desire: The Chicago Series on Sexuality, Gender, and Culture) [Paperback]

Gayatri Reddy (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 2005 | ISBN-10: 0226707563 | ISBN-13: 978-0226707563 | Edition: 1

With Respect to Sex is an intimate ethnography that offers a provocative account of sexual and social difference in India. The subjects of this study are hijras or the "third sex" of India, individuals who occupy a unique, liminal space between male and female, sacred and profane. Hijras are men who sacrifice their genitalia to a goddess in return for the power to confer fertility on newlyweds and newborn children, a ritual role they are respected for, at the same time as they are stigmatized for their ambiguous sexuality. By focusing on the hijra community, Reddy sheds new light on Indian society and the intricate negotiations of identity across various domains of everyday life. Further, by reframing hijra identity through the local economy of respect, this ethnography highlights the complex relationships between local and global, sexual and moral, economies.
This book will be regarded as the definitive work on hijras, one that will be of enormous interest to anthropologists, students of South Asian culture, and specialists in gender, queer, and sexuality studies.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"This book is an important and significant one. Not only does it add to the field of academic accounts of the hijira and anthropology, but it contributes to gender and sexuality studies."

(Shane Gannon Journal of the History of Sexuality ) --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From the Inside Flap

With Respect to Sex is an intimate ethnography that offers a provocative account of sexual and social difference in India. The subjects of this study are hijras or the "third sex" of India, individuals who occupy a unique, liminal space between male and female, sacred and profane. Hijras are men who sacrifice their genitalia to a goddess in return for the power to confer fertility on newlyweds and newborn children, a ritual role they are respected for, at the same time as they are stigmatized for their ambiguous sexuality. By focusing on the hijra community, Reddy sheds new light on Indian society and the intricate negotiations of identity across various domains of everyday life. Further, by reframing hijra identity through the local economy of respect, this ethnography highlights the complex relationships between local and global, sexual and moral, economies.
This book will be regarded as the definitive work on hijras, one that will be of enormous interest to anthropologists, students of South Asian culture, and specialists in gender, queer, and sexuality studies.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 312 pages
• Publisher: University Of Chicago Press; 1 edition (July 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0226707563
• ISBN-13: 978-0226707563
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #548,534 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars VERY interesting ethnography, April 5, 2011

By 

rachel Bodansky (CLAREMONT, CA, US) - See all my reviews

This review is from: With Respect to Sex: Negotiating Hijra Identity in South India (Worlds of Desire: The Chicago Series on Sexuality, Gender, and Culture) (Paperback)

I don't know why the previous reviewers are even taking an anthropology course, because they clearly lack the ability to think critically. This ethnography is very well written, and is a great example of how the binary gender system of the Western world is not an accurate description of the vast array of human experiences. Reddy shows how identity (in terms of gender, religion, sexuality, etc.) is created by negotiating the tensions between various socially constructed categories. In fact she is arguing AGAINST the notion of a third gender (so it seems like the previous reviewer didn't read the book carefully), and instead says that we need to look at human experience as just that - an experience. Each of us creates an identity through the way we live our life, and these various categories (male/female, gay/straight, hindu/muslim) are too restricting, and not an accurate portrayal of real human experience.

2 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Class assignment, April 19, 2010

By 

Matthew C. Halbe "Matt" - See all my reviews
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This review is from: With Respect to Sex: Negotiating Hijra Identity in South India (Worlds of Desire: The Chicago Series on Sexuality, Gender, and Culture) (Paperback)

I had to read this for class. It was a mostly painful experience of thinking abstractly about the "third gender". As far as gender studies go, which I have very little interest on the academic level, I can image worse books. This book at least has narrative portions. Excluding chapter 1 it is actually readable. the idea of respect or "izzat"as being a primary consideration animating life for the Hijra is interesting. But as far as the foundations of Reddy's ideas, it's mostly the post modern babble students today are used to.... Ie gender is an essentially unknowable matter of performance and desire rather than a unchangeable reality of the self.