Intersectionalism and Masculinity in Anjum Hasan's The Cosmopolitans

Abstract

Anjum Hasan’s The Cosmopolitans is a collection of humorous short stories that provides insights into the contemporary political, socio-economic, and cultural environments in India. The short stories pay special attention to how women interpret and position themselves in terms of gender, class, and other forms of cultural affiliations through the framework of intersectionality. This study offers a critical assessment of gendered experiences in Indian literature through a feminist reading of the short stories, and particularly, the female protagonists. The paper reflects on how interlocking systems of oppression, as reflected in the short stories, shape female characters’ lives by drawing on Kimberlé Crenshaw’s intersectionality theory. The discussion centres on selected short stories, such as Nostalgia, which sheds light on the challenges female artists face in Bangalore in the presence of patriarchal norms. The paper also analyses the financial insecurities of characters such as Qayenaat, who suffer from systemic forms of financial marginalisation. Art is Long, on the other hand, highlights the community’s conflict between art and cultural norms through the censure of artists, including Nur Jahan. Hegira, on the other hand, reflects on the feminised trauma marginalised women face in political violence. This study contextualises Hasan’s work within the larger context of feminist literary criticism and postcolonial studies by highlighting the importance of intersectionality in understanding the lived experiences of marginalised individuals. The paper, thus, shows how Hasan’s work complicates victimhood and resistance narratives by engaging with tradition and modernity. Therefore, The Cosmopolitans is a subversive narrative that challenges the dominant cultural discourses and, as a result, demands that the reader face systemic inequalities in the present-day Indian social milieu.