International Journal For Multidisciplinary Research

E-ISSN: 2582-2160   •   Impact Factor: 9.24

A Widely Indexed Open Access Peer Reviewed Multidisciplinary Bi-monthly Scholarly International Journal

Call for Paper Volume 8, Issue 3 (May-June 2026) Submit your research before last 3 days of June to publish your research paper in the issue of May-June.
Submit Research Paper Join as a Reviewer

Plagiarism is checked by the leading plagiarism checker TurnItIn

Call for Paper

Volume 8 Issue 3
May-June 2026

Submit your research paper

Indexing Partners
Academia Advanced Sciences Index Bielefeld Academic Search Engine CiteSeer DRJI Google Scholar Independent Search Engine & Directory Network ISI (International Scientific Indexing) Issuu Mendeley Research Networks
RefSeek ResearcherId - Thomson Reuters ResearchGate Scirus Scribd Semantic Scholar UTeM - Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka Wiki for Call for Papers WorldCat Zenodo

Feminist Refusal as a Method of Reading Indian Women’s Fiction: From Silence to Ethical Resistance

Author(s) Dr. Devashish Kumar
Country India
Abstract In this paper, a feminist refusal is proposed as a critical approach to reading women’s fiction in Indian society and suggests that women’s "no" to care, marriage, obligation, respectability, and narrative confession operates as a positive and productive form of feminist ethics that has been wrongly characterised as a negativity and failure of feminism. Counter to dominant feminist approaches that conceptualise agency through empowerment and resolution as vision and presence, this paper highlights refusal as a form of feminist realism that attends to constraint and structural violence. From the perspectives of feminist ethics of narrative and intersectional feminisms, this paper will explore how refusal through silence and withdrawal in certain narratives of Indian feminisms has been mistakenly interpreted as a lack of activity and a failure of morality. However, this paper will contend that these texts represent an alternate form of feminist language that challenges the patriarchal codes of sacrifice, logic, and redemption. The feminist refusal makes visible how “care” and “duty” function as forced virtues imposed upon women as morality itself, while structural equality is papered over by culturally constructed feminine norms. Through the application of refusal as an optic of interpretation, this paper will enhance the scope of the feminist literary tradition in India from one of celebratory empowerment to one of resistance through the ethics of self-preservation.
Keywords feminist refusal, silence, ethical resistance, Indian women’s fiction, feminist realism, narrative ethics.
Field Arts
Published In Volume 8, Issue 1, January-February 2026
Published On 2026-01-20
DOI https://doi.org/10.36948/ijfmr.2026.v08i01.66972
View / Download PDF File

Share this



E-ISSN 2582-2160
CrossRef

CrossRef DOI is assigned to each research paper published in our journal.

IJFMR DOI prefix is
10.36948/ijfmr

Downloads
Research Paper Format Copyright Permission Form and Undertaking Form Cover Page Vol 8 Isu 3Cover Page Vol 8 Isu 2Cover Page Vol 8 Isu 2

All research papers published on this website are licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, and all rights belong to their respective authors/researchers.

CC-BY-SA Open Access

About IJFMR
Fees & Payment
Current Issue
Publication Archive 		Submit Research Paper
Track Submission Status
Publication Guidelines
Publication Ethics
Peer Review & Plagiarism 		Join as a Reviewer
Editors & Reviewers
Reviewer Referral Program
Get Reviewer Membership Certi. 		Website/Journal Policies
Usage Policy
Content Policies
Privacy Policy
Contact Us +91-9687-828-838 editor@ijfmr.com
Powered by Sky Research Publication and Journals