Fuck Bar to Fuck this Bar: Unravelling Pub-Feminism in India

Abstract

abstract Through a review of a recent Indian Amazon Prime series Four More Shots Please (FMSP), this essay makes three distinct points: first, shows like FMSP have to be seen in the context of growing celebritisation of feminist discourse and dominance of upper-caste and upper-class networks in feminist spaces in India, second, socio-spatial relations reinforced through the positioning of the show’s narrative in a posh South Mumbai pub are a marker of its exclusionary feminism and third, these exclusions have to be seen as integral components of a power-blind choice-based feminist discourse. The essay situates the series in the context of a women-oriented turn in Indian media and proceeds to analyse the spatiality of the plot-movement and argues for its analogous trajectory to the feminist discourse in India. The essay thus attempts to mark a contemporary pattern in the conversation around feminism in India which comfortably circulates within an upper-caste, upper-class nexus and thus mis/represents feminist histories, narratives and concerns that are integral to a feminist movement in India.