Displaced Ornaments: Naiza Khan's Critique of Sexual Difference in Muslim South Asia

Abstract

This article brings together a Muslim theologian from colonial India and a contemporary artist from postcolonial Pakistan, namely Ashraf 'Alī Thānvī and Naiza Khan, respectively. In their different yet related ways, Thānvī and Khan both repurpose the idea of “ornamental femininity.” Khan's artworks further problematize some of the key assumptions about sexual difference in Thānvī's body of work, such as “women's ruination,” feminine fragility, and chastity. Khan eschews the reduction of the feminine to the ornamental, but also embraces the transcendental possibilities of the ornamental. She thus welcomes the mediating function of ornaments, which facilitate experiences of transcendence that are essential for becoming an aesthetic subject. Khan is able to achieve this because of an internal contradiction in the logic of ornamental femininity within Thānvī's moral theological tradition. By becoming attuned to her art objects, we are in a better position to analyze how traditionalist theologians construct the idea of sexual difference in Muslim South Asia. The article also comments on Khan's more general theoretical contribution to contemporary art, which consists of highlighting the ongoing tension between our named, sexed bodies and the potentialities of flesh.