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How Young People with Disabilities Conceptualize The Body, Sex and Marriage in Urban India: Four Case Studies

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Abstract

Historically in India as elsewhere in the world, there has been a deep-rooted cultural antipathy to persons with disabilities. They have been portrayed as medical anomalies, helpless victims and a lifelong burden for family and society. While today there is a general recognition in India of the need to enhance educational and employment opportunities for persons with disabilities in order to promote economic self-reliance and independent living, their sexual needs, dreams and aspirations are more or less invisible. Sexual and reproductive rights are considered irrelevant for persons with disabilities. Using qualitative data, this paper discusses notions of sexual identity among urban Indian youth through four case studies of college students in Delhi. Gender emerges as a key analytical category in perceptions of sexuality among young men and women with visual and loco-motor disabilities. The paper does not claim to capture the complex reality of disabled sexuality in India, but highlights some key issues in a hitherto largely under-research domain. But the author’s analysis carries added value, since she herself has low vision; thus conferring a reflexive angle to the research.

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Notes

  1. Onset of provocative poliomyelitis may occur due to intramuscular injection, surgery or other trauma, when the child is incubating polioviruses.

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Acknowledgements

The data for this paper was fathered as part of larger research project on youth, sexuality and disability supported by a grant from the MacArthur Foundation in India as part of their Program for Leadership Development between 2003–2005. I would like to also express my gratitude to the young people from Delhi University; without whose cooperation this paper would not have taken shape.

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  1. Centre for Women’s Development Studies, 25 Bhai Vir Singh Marg, New Delhi, 110001, India

    Renu Addlakha

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  1. Renu Addlakha
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Correspondence to Renu Addlakha.

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Addlakha, R. How Young People with Disabilities Conceptualize The Body, Sex and Marriage in Urban India: Four Case Studies. Sex Disabil 25, 111–123 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11195-007-9045-9

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