From problem-centered to centering relationalities: Engagements with disability and sexuality in India

Abstract

This article analyses how the sites of disability activism, special education, and online-matchmaking approach the sexuality of disabled people in India. It argues that across these distinct yet overlapping sites, the sexuality of disabled people is engaged as a problem in need of a fix, which ultimately leads to the narrowing of disabled people's sexual choices, behaviors, and identities. The article suggests that when these field-sites move away from a problem-centered approach which focuses on looking for normative solutions and instead engage in the process of “problematization” by facilitating the sexuality of disabled people, they end up opening non-normative, uncertain, yet perhaps more fulfilling sexual opportunities for disabled people.