Voicing Subjects: Public Intimacy and Mediation in Kathmandu

South Asia Across the Disciplines

by Laura Kunreuther

Voicing Subjects traces the relation between public speech and notions of personal interiority in Kathmandu.  It explores two seemingly distinct formations of voice that have emerged in the midst of the country’s recent political and economic a political voice associated with civic empowerment and collective agency, and an intimate voice associated with emotional proximity and authentic feeling.  Both are produced and circulated through the media, especially through interactive technologies. The author argues that these two formations of voice are mutually constitutive and aligned with modern ideologies of democracy and neoliberal economic projects.  This ethnography is set during an extraordinary period in Nepal’s history that has seen a relatively peaceful 1990 revolution that re-established democracy, a Maoist civil war, and the massacre of the royal family.  These dramatic changes have been accompanied by the proliferation of intimate and political discourse in the expanding public sphere, making the figure of voice ever more critical to an understanding of emerging subjectivity, structural change and cultural mediation.

328 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2014

Reviews

[lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Profound and deep, theoretically consistent and very well-written. Though the subject is exceptionally broad, the areas are examined thoroughly and consistently. Whereas there are places where it was difficult to follow the particular arguments and their link with the main thesis, it is still relatively easy to read. I want to underline the significance and actuality of the topic chosen by the author as well as the style. Purely academic, but vivid - you will undoubtedly feel what the author thinks about the political and social context, though she is not expressing it directly.