Dr Sonia Ghalian, Visiting Assistant Professor of Literature at SIAS, Krea University presented a paper at the International Online Symposium on Queer Children’s Film and Television, co-organized by the University of Cambridge and the University of Glasgow on 1 March, 2024.
The paper titled (Im)Possibility of Queerness in Indian Children’s Films directs attention to a fundamental yet frequently overlooked connection between being queer and being a child. The talk focused on the ideological, economic as well as cultural contours of the Indian context to highlight the impossibility of the connection and its lack of adequate representation in Indian cinema. The paper strives to highlight certain children’s films that navigate these identities beyond societal norms to acknowledge such characters’ differences— their struggles for acceptance because of them—but just as importantly to acknowledge their sameness, their shared existences, and their mutual bonds with the larger community.
