Yasmin Nair


Yasmin Nair is a writer and activist based in Chicago. She is also a co-founder, with Ryan Conrad, of Against Equality.
Her work focuses on neoliberalism and inequality, sex, gender and queer issues and politics, the politics of rescue and affect, the immigration crisis, sex trafficking, the art world and state violence. It has been published in publications such as In These Times, Monthly Review, The Awl, The Chicago Reader, GLQ, The Progressive, make/shift, Time Out Chicago, The Bilerico Project, Windy City Times, Bitch, Maximum Rock'n'Roll, and No More Potlucks and most of her work is also archived on her personal website.

Background

Nair lived in her native Kolkata, then in Kathmandu and Mumbai before moving to the U.S. She obtained a PhD in English from Purdue University in 2000.

Critical work

In March 2013, Nico Lang wrote, "If you've heard of Yasmin Nair, you have an opinion about her. Her work doesn't evoke lukewarm reactions in people. Depending on who you ask, she's a leader, an icon, a teacher, a radical, a contrarian, a troll or all of the above." Some of her pieces have gone viral, such as "In Defense of Sluts", "White Chicks Behind Bars", "Gay Marriage IS A Conservative Cause", "'Undocumented': How an Identity Ended a Movement", and "Scabs: Academics and Others Who Write for Free".

Works

Books