Thaatchaayini Kananatu

Biographic Data

ID147836
NAMEThaatchaayini Kananatu
GIVEN NAMESThaatchaayini
FAMILY NAMEKananatu
SIGNATUREKANANATU T
AFFILIATIONSMonash University Malaysia
ORCID0000-0002-7532-5438
VERIFIEDYes
TOTAL WORKS6
TOTAL CITATIONS0
WORKS AS AUTHOR5
WORKS AS EDITOR1
FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR2018
LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR2026
H-INDEX0

  • The Ship of Theseus and prisons

    Open AccessNaveed Ismail, Thaatchaayini Kananatu et al.ARTICLEGlobal Social Challenges Journal2026

    This article uses the Ship of Theseus metaphor to propose a research agenda for examining how the COVID-19 pandemic reshaped prison governance in South-East Asia. Despite growing scholarship on the pandemic’s impact on vulnerable populations, the experiences of those living and working in prisons in this region remain critically underexplored. South-East Asia’s above-average incarceration rates, chronic overcrowding, and punitive penal character …

  • Race and Criminal Justice in Malaysia

    Open AccessThaatchaayini KananatuARTICLESociology Compass2025References: 2

    Race is a politically sensitive topic in Malaysia, as it is inextricably linked to partisan politics as well as contentious politics. The socio‐cultural composition and demographics of the state indicates Malays as the majority race, Chinese, Indians and “Others” as the minorities. Race and racialization of post‐colonial Malaysia, dominates the social, political and legal narratives in both scholarly and non‐scholarly writings. Despite the domina…

  • Minorities, Rights and the Law in Malaysia

    Thaatchaayini KananatuBOOKMinorities, Rights and the Law in…2020

    This book analyses the mobilisation of race, rights and the law in Malaysia. It examines the Indian community in Malaysia, a quiet minority which consists of the former Indian Tamil plantation labour community and the urban Indian middle-class. The first part of the book explores the role played by British colonial laws and policies during the British colonial period in Malaya, from the 1890s to 1956, in the construction of an Indian "race" in Ma…

  • Vulnerable Groups in Malaysia

    Koh May, Koh Sharon G M et al.EDITORBOOKVulnerable Groups in Malaysia2020

    Vulnerability is a term that can be studied from different dimensions – the social, legal, economic and political. This book explores these dimensions and captures the vulnerabilities of particular groups in Malaysia – the transgenders, women, children, aboriginal and indigenous people, the rural fisherfolk, the stateless and the economically disempowered. Mirroring the spectrum of »vulnerable groups« defined by the United Nations Global Compact …

  • Mak nyahs and the dismantling of dehumanisation

    Open AccessJoseph N Goh, Thaatchaayini KananatuARTICLESexualities2019

    The unrelenting ill-treatment suffered by mak nyahs, or Malaysian pre-operative and post-operative male-to-female transsexuals, indicates a steady process of dehumanisation that besieges mak nyahs in contemporary Malaysia. Nevertheless, the 2000s have seen a groundswell of strategies by mak nyahs to dismantle forces that seek to dehumanise them, and thus to embrace self-empowerment. By analysing online media resources, information from communicat…

  • The Politico-Legal Mobilisation of Ethnic Indians before Malaysia’s 2018 Election

    Thaatchaayini KananatuARTICLEThe Round Table2018

    The mobilisation of Indians in Malaysia’s 2018 general election can be understood using Michael W. McCann’s politico-legal mobilisation theoretical framework. The mobilisation was largely class-based when it started in the 1990s in response to the retrenchment and eviction of Indian Tamil plantation workers. The state agencies’ mishandling of the 2001 Kampung Medan Malay–Indian neighbourhood clash then led to the construction of ‘Indians’ as a mo…