Reorganisation of Desire

Discussions about violence and safety dominate public discourse about women in 21st century India. In urban spaces, this discourse appears to have specific characteristics--such as the focus on young women's occupation of globalised workplaces, their clothing, and their movements in the city. Drawing on recent research conducted in Bengaluru, this paper argues that the links between women and social transformation are being obscured by the intensified concern with safety, and suggests that redescribing women's experience may throw up a new set of issues with which feminist scholarship might productively engage.