Gay Bombay: Globalization, Love and (Be)longing in Contemporary India (5 page)

In essence ultimately, this book is an attempt to map out the notion and locatedness of gayness in Bombay’s (and on a larger level, India’s) cultural geography. I am looking upon the online-offline Gay Bombay sphere as a ‘counter public’29 (Fraser, 1991) and studying its economic, institutional, cultural and social forces as a means of understanding core ideas about Indian citizenship at large. Counter publics like Gay Bombay serve as important sites of contestation—not just for their members, but also for the mainstream to work out some of their anxieties. I realize in this book, that within the various struggles in and around Gay Bombay, what is being negotiated is the very stability of the idea of Indianness.

When one studies what it means to be
gay
in India at a particular point in time, one also studies what it means to be a gay
Indian
at that time.

Thus at a macro level, beyond gayness, this is ultimately a book about Indianness—and how its core values are being constantly redefined and re-examined. As India re-imagines itself as a global superpower in the 21st century, it is vital that this re-imagination includes the presence of its diverse and marginalized populations—thus this book is an attempt to amplify the voices of one of these populations—its gay men.

Introduction
35

RESEARCH SCHEMA

Inspired by
Hop on Pop’s
(2002) ‘Manifesto for a New Cultural Studies’

(which declares that ‘the best writing in contemporary cultural studies mixes and matches different modes of cultural analysis, merging history, theory and criticism, or combin[es] ethnographic observation with larger historiographic frameworks, trying to place the details into the most meaningful context’),30 I appropriate Kim Christian Schroder’s notion of

‘triangulation’ (1999) for my research schema of studying the scapes listed above. Schroder draws on Silverman’s (1993) definition of the term, borrowed from navigation, ‘where different bearings give the correct position of an object’31 to suggest a cross-fertilization between qualitative and quantitative research. In my case, I use the term to indicate the complex combination of multi-sited ethnography, textual analysis, historical documentation analysis and memoir writing that I utilize as my research methodology. Obviously, I do not expect these different tools to all point to the same conclusions; indeed, ‘if a method is a lens, no one would expect two different lenses to produce the same visual representation of the object’32 (Schroder, 1999). I simply want my combination of methods to achieve a more nuanced, textured view of the terrain of my research, a view that I believe would be impossible to attain by only utilizing a single method.

To me, a ‘multi-sited ethnography’ (Marcus, 1998) seems to be the most appropriate approach ‘for studying spatially dispersed phenomena’33 (Gupta and Ferguson, 1997). Within this approach, I ‘choose sites that would afford me positionalities at varying points along a participant observer continuum’34 (Passaro, 1997). I, therefore, examine and utilize all the different manifestations of Gay Bombay, such as the website, the newsgroup message postings and the physical events in Bombay city. But these sites are not the only positions that I adopt and I do not spread my time equally among them. They are the skeleton upon which I build my body of research activities—archival media research, close studies of gay themed films and books, memoir writing, and in-depth interviews.

I am drawn to the immense potential of ethnography for intense evocation—to me, this is what makes it so distinct as a research method.

36
Gay

Bombay

Evocation is neither presentation nor representation…yet, it makes available through absence what can be conceived but not presented.

It is thus beyond truth and immune to the judgment of performance. It overcomes the separation of the sensible and the conceivable, of form and content, of self and the other, of language and the world.35 (Tyler, 1987) Following Markham (1998), I engage in ethnography
personally
as well as
interactively
, fracturing ‘the boundary between “subject” and “researcher”’

shifting my ‘position back and forth between auto-ethnographer and discourse analyst, between identifying with [my] participants and distancing [myself] from them’ and grounding the data I obtain in ‘personal, emotional and participatory experiences’.36

Since I am not a traditional ethnographer in the Malinowskian

mode, I am not studying
others
—but
natives
like myself. There is no tent that I peg in a faraway field. Although I write arrival and departure scenes (in Chapter 3), it is with the self-conscious knowledge that my field is equal to home and I am always in it—both online and off-line.

Like Visweswaran, I conceive of my field or home as my ‘location in determining discourses and institutions…a locus of critical struggle that both empowers and limits me’.37 And like Campbell, I consider myself ‘less an academic gone native than a native gone academic’.38

Due to my
insider
status and 24/7 presence in the field or home, it is difficult to establish precise dates for when I begin my research and when I end it; the period I declare as my formal field or homework timeline is November 2003–June 2005; however I complete this book after a long break away—in January 2007.

In my role as a native researcher, I find myself in the position of having to make ‘the familiar strange’ for the audience that will read my work39

(Weston, 1997). I employ three strategies for this. The first is to conduct my research by moving from the components of my project that I am least familiar with towards those I am most familiar with—and to share experiences of this journey (novel and re-lived) with my readers as vividly as possible. The second is to follow Campbell’s practice of open-ended interviewing with my research subjects, constantly asking them to make

‘the implicit explicit’ in their answers, with the hope to ‘be surprised by the connotation of things I thought I already understood’.40 The third is to realize that I possess what Haraway (1988) has called ‘situated Introduction
37

knowledges’ and ‘partial perspectives’41 and to use these with efficacy.

I am acutely aware of my own positionality and shifting ‘locations’; I reflect on my background and experiences in the field or home—both past and present—and integrate these in my writing as a valid form of field or homework.42

I weave my personal narrative in and out of the rest of the text as a means of being ‘unabashedly subjective’ in exploring the ‘hybrid and positioned nature’ of my own identity along with that of my research subjects (Narayan, 1993). These are people with ‘voices, views, and dilemmas’

and to whom I am ‘bonded through ties of reciprocity’.43 Like Joseph, I can check data that I obtain ‘against my personal experiences’ and ‘the differences as well as similarities’ can become ‘points of departure for further inquiry’.44 I agree with Narayan when she writes that ‘compelling narrative’ and ‘rigorous analysis’ need not be ‘impermeable’.

Narrative and analysis are two categories that we tend to set up as opposites but a second look reveals that they are contiguous, with a border open to the most full-scale of crossovers…. A greater integration of narrative into written texts does not mean that analysis is to be abandoned but rather that it moves over, giving vivid experience an honored place besides it… When professional perspectives altogether efface situated and experiencing selves, this makes for misleading scholarship even as it does violence to the range of hybrid personal and professional identities we negotiate in our daily lives….45

By narrating various personal, intimate, significant details of my life evocatively, I hope to enrich my analysis by providing the readers a micro perspective of what it means to be a gay man
located
in Bombay.

My
coming out
is inevitable…

Conducting gay or lesbian research is tantamount to coming out, whether one is actually lesbian or gay or not. Although doing research in New Guinea for example, does not lead to the assumption that one must be a native of that region, studying gay or lesbian topics is imagined as only possible for a ‘native’. (Leap and Lewis, 2002)46

Instead of protesting this assumption and cloaking my own homo-

sexuality under the mirage of objective distance, I embrace it, full on.

But my reflexivity is not just for my readers—it is also an avenue for me
38
Gay

Bombay

to figure out my own self. As Schaap (2002) writes, in contemporary times, the ethnographer’s ‘journey is not just about getting to know a strange land and understanding the Other, it is also, and maybe more importantly, a way to better understand the Self, one’s own country and culture. The journey provides the traveller with the experiences and the context that allow him to regard himself as in a mirror, as if he were not himself, but an Other’.47 My reflexive turn is an attempt to discard essentializing ‘understandings of self or other’ and replace them with

‘more fluid ontologies of identity’48 (Campbell, 2004).

The danger with this kind of intense reflexivity is that this work might be read as merely an insider’s view of things at best, or a foray into

‘narcissistic solipsism’ (Jenkins et al., 2002)49 or ‘egotistical indulgence’,50

at worse, ignoring the intellectual and academic rigour behind its production or the complex sweep of its coverage. I am also aware of Weston’s cautionary note, that ‘reflexivity does not automatically confer credibility…’.

[It] is not, in itself, an equalizing act…. But reflexivity has the advantage of calling attention to differences that make a difference…[It] reminds the reader to view the circumstances of the anthropologist in relation to the circumstances of the people studied. It also highlights the way in which the ethnographer’s hand, however light, shapes the presentation of data from the field. (Weston, 1997) 51

Overall, perhaps this book raises more questions than it answers. I would like to think of it more as a work in progress rather than a finished product, just like the gayness and Indianness it seeks to map out.

LOVE, ACTUALLY

Happiness is waking up next to Junri in the morning in your Cambridge
apartment, the blanket entangled between your four legs. Last night, before
going to bed, he serenaded you with Bach fugues on his violin. Now, you hear
his breath rise and fall, and see his face, serene and content, splayed across
half of your pillow and you know that you will do anything (fight battles,
climb mountains, watch as many episodes of
Revolutionary
Girl Utena

Introduction
39

as needed) that needs to be done to protect this angel. You slowly tiptoe out
of bed, put the kettle to boil and crawl back in for a cuddle. You smother
your sweetheart with kisses, hugs and bites, urging him to get up in time
for his early morning lecture. He yawns and stretches out his feline form;
his crusty eyes open unhurriedly and then the sun comes out as a smile
begins to form on his lips. I love you, he whispers and you feel unimaginably
invincible, powerful…alive.

You sing together to 106.7 Magic FM (‘Boston’s continuouuuuus soft
rock’) in the shower and subconsciously and silently, a harmonious routine
begins to develop—you soap while he shampoos; you shave while he brushes
his teeth; you smother on the body lotion while he applies lip balm. You
observe the same synchronization while cooking together, shopping for
groceries, or scouting for the good free food at the MIT graduate student
Sunday brunches. You begin to recognize his moods and tastes, preempt
his needs and give him his space when he needs it.

You come to know everyone well that is a part of his daily existence—the
professors he likes, the classmates he doesn’t, the homework that he can
never seem to finish on time, and the financial success of his mother’s clinic
in Tokyo. You hold hands and walk through the Infinite Corridor and do not
flinch when you see your crush from last year pass you by. You invite him to
your departmental, community and other social engagements and go to all
of his. You begin to plan a life together and argue over the holiday destinations you will go to, the colour of the house you plan to have, brand of the
car that you will buy and the race of the children you will have. You even
think of doing a PhD if that can keep you in Boston for the next few years
that he will need to complete his. You introduce him to Prada and
‘Kajra Re’

and the pleasures of 3-hour song and dance Bollywood spectacles and in
turn, learn about
Cowboy Bebop
, Kawai pianos, and umami. When he
goes to visit his family in Japan for a month, you count the days, hours and
then minutes until his return. When you are separated for months due to
living apart, you wait every morning religiously for him to appear on Skype
so that you can have your meals together—while video chatting. Now, all
your previous failures at love seem to have been worth it; you acknowledge
that happiness is really all that it’s made out to be.

∗ ∗ ∗

40
Gay

Bombay

Sadness is walking out of an airplane at Delhi airport, leaving a severely
asthmatic, cough racked, fever-ridden Junri behind, to make the solitary trip
back to Tokyo. His first visit to India has been a chronicle of various illnesses
and it is doubtful that he will ever return. He is so weak that he cannot lift
his head to acknowledge your exit; speaking is out of the question, every
word uttered brings forth a violent coughing fit that his inflamed lungs can
hardly withstand. So you say your goodbye silently and hate India with a
vengeance, for its noise, pollution, germs and everything else that has caused
the one you love, so much pain. Then you say a silent prayer for his safe
passage and start counting once again, the days, months and hours till
you meet again.