Sex is entwined with religion, tradition, gender and politics across Asia. It makes the perfect lens for examining the region’s complex social landscape. This evening, we take a serious but illuminating look at dating, love, marriage, divorce and LGBT culture in the Middle East, India and Pakistan.
Shereen El Feki works on issues related to health and social welfare in the Arab region — including intimate attitudes toward sexual (and political) freedoms, as explored in her book, Sex and the Citadel. She has a PhD in molecular immunology from the University of Cambridge, and later worked as healthcare correspondent at The Economist before joining Al Jazeera as a presenter. She also is a former vice chair of the United Nations’ Global Commission on HIV and Law.
Sally Howard is a travel and human-interest journalist who writes regularly on India for a variety of media, including The Sunday Times, the Telegraph, and Forbes. She spends at least six months of the year on the road, primarily in South and East Asia from where she has reported on such diverse issues as the re-emergence of concubines in booming Beijing to the rise of the Indian love marriage.
For the Pakistani perspective, they will be speaking with Moni Mohsin, author of two books, Duty Free,The Diary of a Social Butterfly both based on her hit column in Pakistan’s Friday Times) and another novel, The End of Innocence.
