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Article In: Journal of Language and Sexuality: Online-First Articles

Observing ‘one of our own’

Multimodal analysis of a queer lawyer’s opening statement at the 2023 equal marriage hearings in India

ORCiD logo with link | Georgetown University, USA
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Abstract
In April Supreme Court of India. 2023. Supreme court of India — court 1 [Video]. YouTube. 〈[URL]〉 (April 18, 2023), the Supreme Court of India heard opening statements on marriage equality. This study focuses on the statement made by one of the litigants, Menaka Guruswamy, a publicly gay advocate. Many queer anti-caste activists have pointed out the myopic scope of gay representation in Indian legal work, and the politics of respectability that permeate it. Here, I conduct a multimodal discourse analysis of two video segments of Guruswamy’s statement. The study shows four things. First, moves to homonormativity are made through verbal and embodied gestalts. Second, Guruswamy ‘manualizes’ a forward vector into a neoliberal future. Third, this future is linguistically expressed through demonstrations of closeness to power and resemblance to power. Fourth, by (re)presenting her body as an emblem of all gay experience, Guruswamy excludes those who cannot afford her prerogatives. Overall, the study presents an immediate historical critique of representation in South Asian LGBTQI+ legal discourse.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Embodied interaction in LGBTQI+ legal representation
  • 3.Data and method
  • 4.Analysis
    • 4.1Differentiable hand gestures and gaze work: “My lords will know”
    • 4.2Gestured shifts to LGBTQI+ (re)presentation: “I for instance, frankly…”
  • 5.Discussion
    • 5.1Presence and presentation in court: “Ms. Guruswamy?”
    • 5.2The closest to power: “These are the most respectable of us”
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
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