New Cultures of Intimacy and Togetherness in Asia
New Delhi, India, May 9-10, 2008
This conference seeks to bring together scholars working across areas such
as sociology, gender studies, film/media studies, anthropology, popular
culture, and urban studies in order to explore emerging cultures of
intimacy and friendship in contemporary non-Western contexts. We are
particularly interested in perspectives that relate the topic to the making
of social selves at a time great economic and cultural change in many Asian
societies. Socially, ‘non-Western’ has often been considered synonymous
with traditional, conservative, static and illiberal, particularly in
contexts of intimate/personal relationships that are expected to conform to
certain values, norms and expectations of heritage. However, following
modernity at large and specific influxes of change like economic
liberalization, globalization and the worldwide web, there is,
increasingly, a perception (if not a belief) that social structures and
networks have been affected, and “new” cultures of intimacy and
togetherness are emergent (if not already established). There is a decided
conviction that such new structures and networks are visible in day-to-day
contexts at work, home and leisure, and that they reflect political,
cultural, emotional and intellectual transitions and upheavals.
At this conference, we would like to explore this notion of emergent
cultures of “new” intimacies and togetherness in the contemporary non-
Western world, in as varied a social and cultural register as possible.
Some Possible Themes:
Televisual/Cinematic Intimacies
New/Changing Spaces of Intimacy
New Cultures of Marriage
Intimacy, Togetherness and Class
Non-heterosexual Cultures of Intimacy
Advice Columns and the Reading Public
Intimacies and Consumer Cultures
‘Youth’ Cultures and Intimacies
The ‘New Woman’ and the ‘New Man’
The Metrosexual/the Uber-sexual
‘Friends’ – Transformed Intimacies in Living Spaces
Sex and the City
Intimacies and New Urban Spaces
Changing Workplace Cultures
New Lexicons of Conversation/Communication
Inquiries and expressions of interest to:
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Abstracts (350 words) will be due by December 31, 2007.
Brinda Bose, Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, New Delhi, India
Sanjay Srivastava, Deakin University, Melbourne, Australia
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