Masculinity, Respect, and the Tragic

Themes of Proletarian Humor in Contemporary Industrial Delhi

Bibliographic Data

ID9969412
AuthorsShankar Ramaswami (corresponding author)
Year2006
Volume51
IssueS14
Pages203-227
Publication date2006-11-03
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueInternational Review of Social History (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0020-8590 • E-ISSN: 1469-512X
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0020859006002665
OpenAlexW2098436665
LanguageEN
Citations received6

This essay will explore themes of proletarian masculinity (mardaangi) and humor (mazaak) arising from research amongst male migrant workers in a metalworking export factory in contemporary Delhi. The paper seeks to describe and critique metalworkers' vocabularies and practises of joking and horseplay, with particular reference to their homoerotic and heteroerotic imageries, as well as to their subtle auto-critiques. The paper attempts to view mazaak, despite its often vulgar, dualistic, and otherizing imageries, as an assertion of the erosic drive to affirm life, beyond the desire to merely survive, and contra the thanotic will to submit to the life-denying conditions of urban-proletarian existence. The paper probes the capacities and potentialities of certain styles of workers' mazaak, such as satirical and sarcastic humor (vyang), to critique exploitation, oppression, and associated dominant imageries of masculinity and work, and to suggest alternative visions and possibilities for proletarian inter-relations

Aesthetics · Art · Masculinity · Oppression · Political science · Politics · Proletariat · Sociology · Vision · Anthropology · Gender Studies · Law · South Asian Cinema and Culture

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