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gal-dem

How I'm trying to outgrow old narratives of women's sexuality in Pakistan

Varsity 

Malala and the Pressure on Pakistani Women to Marry

Poetry in a pandemic: speaking to Homerton's Poet-in-Residence Dr Mariah Whelan

Cultural Appropriation: a poem

Why I Write 

Popular posts from this blog

Reading: Kamila Shamsie's 'A God in Every Stone' (2014) + summer goals

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Photo my own This summer, the plan is to read through the oeuvres of a bunch of Pakistani writers (predominantly writing in English) and by the end of it, to do a reading wrap up. I have made myself an extensive reading list, one that doesn't curate themes and topics like those from my undergraduate times, but one whose goal is to be well-versed in Pakistan's literary output. I am trying to place myself in a tradition with my writing, and I think I need to reflect on where my voice fits in proceeding from what has already been done.  I recently read Kamila Shamsie's colonial era novel 'A God in Every Stone' which has left me with conflicted feelings. It's not a bad book by any means- it deals very expertly with the history of Peshawar as a city, its archeological significance. It also takes us through a slice of colonial history, culminating in the events of 23 April 1930, where a massacre of unarmed Pashtuns takes place at the hands of the British. As a Pakista...
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Reading: Avni Doshi's 'Burnt Sugar' (2020)

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  CN: food/eating disorder behaviours, abusive mothers, psychological abuse Photo my own 'If feeding is a form of love, eating is a kind of submission' Motherhood and nourishment usually form part of one thought. Biologically and socially we have internalized this connection to the point that its disruption disturbs. Reading Doshi made me realise this: we find it almost impossible to romanticise a distant mother. A mother who is abusive, dismissive, and selfish rarely goes unpunished in literature when she is depicted at all. On the other hand, we love our bad fathers. The more distant and troubled, the more romantic and bittersweet. Tara tastes all bitter, and because she is so inextricably bound to her daughter Antara ('Un-tara', the opposite of Tara, as Antara explains in the first person), the pair are consumed by each other, always poised on the brink of abandonment and the threat of emptiness.  Among many other things, Burnt Sugar is a novel obsessed with consum...
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Malala and the Pressure on Pakistani Women to Marry

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  Note: this was published later by Varsity Malala for Vogue. Photography: Nick Knight, Source: vogue.co.uk The first time my parents met each other was on their wedding night, after they had signed their marriage contract. My mother was 23 and my father 29. This was, and to an extent still is, not unusual in many communities in Pakistan. I have often questioned my mother on this: how could she have agreed to marry a man she had never even spoken to? For her, that is just how the world worked. I asked her whether she could have just said no. “Well, I didn’t know you could do that”.  In a recent  interview with Vogue , Pakistani activist and Nobel Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai was briefly quoted discussing marriage: “I still don’t understand why people have to get married. If you want to have a person in your life, why do you have to sign marriage papers, why can’t it just be a partnership?” Malala was speaking in the context of a conversation with her mother, who was ad...
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