This book is an exploration of how women across different geographies and socio-cultural settings navigate patriarchal forces that manifest in myriad forms—religious sects that police female agency, border controls that render women stateless or vulnerable, and even ideological constructs that define and confine their very humanity. Employing comparative approaches across different media and cultural contexts, the book explores a range of themes such as birth control, motherhood, gyno-criticism, gendered citizenship, marital rape and Cosmo-feminism, domestic violence, and consent across different milieux.

The volume will be of interest to scholars and researchers of South Asian studies, literature and gender studies.

Smita Jha (Dr.) is Professor of English at the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Roorkee. A Ph.D. and PGDTE from CIEFL, Hyderabad, she is a recipient of the Indo-Canadian Shastri Fellowship and UBC Fellowship. With 150+ publications in Routledge, SAGE and OUP journals, six books to her credit, and supervision of over 30 Ph.D.s, her research spans Indian Writing in English, Diaspora, Postcolonial Studies, Medical Humanities, and Gender and Cultural Studies.

Sheetal Yadav (Dr.) holds a PhD (2024) from IIT Roorkee and is Assistant Professor, Literature and Languages, SRM University AP. Her research examines gendered violence, rape culture, and South Asian fiction. She has recently published in Quarterly Review of Film and Video (2024), Feminist Theory (2026), and South Asia (2026), with a monograph forthcoming from Palgrave Macmillan.

Saumya Sharma (Dr.) is an Associate Professor at The English and Foreign Languages University, Regional Campus, Lucknow, India. Her research focusses on language, gender and psychology in her journal articles, and writings published by Routledge, Bloomsbury and Oxford University Press.

Aruni Mahapatra (Dr.) is currently Assistant Professor of English at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Roorkee. His research interests are Twentieth Century and Contemporary Anglophone Literature, Postcolonial Studies, and World Literature.