>> Magazine Launch – The Gaysi Zine. A Contemporary Print Publication and Indian Queer Journal.
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A l’origine un blog, fondé en 2008, The Gaysi_Zine, le magazine des gays desi (c’est-à-dire d’Asie du Sud), sortira désormais en publication traditionnelle, deux fois par an.
Design soigné et contenu créatif… si lancer une version papier “peut sembler contre-intuitif”, dans un secteur où la tendance est plus “à l’aventure en ligne”, ce serait en fait le signe que la communauté LGBT indienne reprend confiance, note le quotidien The Hindu, quand bien même ébréchée depuis ce 11 décembre par la décision de la Cour suprême du pays de maintenir dans le code pénal l’article 377 qui criminalise l’homosexualité et prévoit des peines de prison allant jusqu’à la perpétuité.
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>> Not that there have not been queer magazines in India before, but The Gaysi Zine, that hit bookstores across India recently, is an unabashed and yet an impressionable account of what people with different sexual orientations feel.
With a smart and catchy design through the 60-odd pages and a price tag of `130, the periodical is a collection of no-fuss stories targeting not just the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) community, but beyond too. It aims to be a sensitive account of that alternate way of life.
In what started as a blog, ‘gaysifamily.com’, in 2008, has evolved into this colourful journal. The magazine is a collection of stories and illustrations by several desi writers and artists across the Indian diaspora.
Delhi-based Priya Gangwani, who has been writing on the Gaysi online blog for four years and edits the newly-launched journal, tells us, “Our effort is to try to understand on what it means to be a queer. There is a certain narrowness that the conservative Indian mind is possessed by. We try to capture that. But, it’s just sharing simple experiences. There is no activism from our side. It is just an account of what the occurrences are.”
In what is going to be a bi-annual magazine, it captures stories of both straight and gay people including noted writers such as Parvati Sharma and Arunava Sinha.
It has an ambition of great writing and wishes to cater to readers of different genres, despite its niche positioning.
