Why Mumbai Feminist Library Founder aqui Thami’s Visionary Women-Centered Practice is So Important
Words: Kamana Rai
I grew up reading women. My most treasured copy is bell hooks’ visionary, ‘All about love’. The words of bell hooks, black feminist, writer, educator and theorist, guide me to reflect on and understand my emotional world holistically and critically, and embrace love's radical power through black feminist principles. Similarly, reading Assata Shakur’s autobiography of her astonishing life as a political activist and a revolutionary figure of Black liberation spoke to my spirit, despite completely opposite lived experiences. Assata taught me about identifying the enemy, the ’capitalistic, imperialist oppressors’ in order to work towards liberation. Engaging with the work of visionary women has taught me how language builds bridges and urges us to open our hearts, minds and spirits. Their work embraces the power of community, the importance of solidarity between communities and acts as interconnected sites of critique, spiritual joy and female celebration.
When I came across indigenous Himalayan artist, aqui Thami’s work, I immediately felt a deep sense of connection. Thami is a Thangmi woman from the indigenous Kiratimma people of the Himalayas, part of the Kirat ethnic group. We are kin, rooted in ancestral lineage of nature worship and rituals devoted to our ancestors. In a Dazed feature, Thami states how she has “read women exclusively”.
Naturally, her feminist principles gravitated me towards her work. Having founded Sister Library, South Asia’s first traveling, community-owned and community-run feminist library, Thami is a visionary woman. Self-funded and supported by dedicated volunteers and visitors globally, Sister Library, based in the Bandra neighbourhood of Mumbai is an embodiment of community labour and love. Engaging and reflecting on the ‘visual and reading culture of our times’, it houses a library with 600 works of literature by women including zines, graphic novels, fiction, non-fiction and poetry, a resource center and a welcoming space for creative endeavours and connections.
Sister Library acts as both a ‘political and activist’ space: a physical, communal space for women and girls from marginalised groups to reflect on, read and gather, as well providing access to books on feminist literature for everyone. “(In Indian society) knowledge production and sharing has always been historically restricted, so even if there are amazing works by women they are in universities and private libraries with no or limited access”, Thami states.
Education has always been political, influenced by a person's position in society. Social inequalities prevalent in India’s education system reveal how knowledge accessibility is a systemic problem, affecting those who are on the margins. It bears questions of, who gets to learn and who produces knowledge? From Britain to India, access to education has been weaponised historically against women as a form of patriarchal control, and still remains so today. UNICEF affirms how educating girls ‘transforms communities, countries and the entire world’ by reducing social inequalities and building healthier societies. Education is a right that has intergenerational consequences, particularly for women in the global South. Contextually, Indian and Nepali women have been denied and restricted access to education due to cultural expectations rooted in patriarchal values like marriage over education, so access to reading and literature has been systemically and intergenerationally restricted for such women. Further, the caste system, an ancient, rigid set of social hierarchies based on ‘traditional occupations fixed at birth', is unique to and permeates the social fabric of South Asian communities. Casteism politically, socially and culturally shapes such societies, leading to discrimination, ostracisation and even murder of those who are 'lower caste’. And this system does not function in isolation - gender, caste and class interlock, affecting for example, the lived experiences of highly discriminated Dalit women deemed ‘low caste’ who face compounding disadvantages.
“I believe what makes Thami’s work visionary is her enduring belief that ‘art is activism’, rooted in underground feminist culture and community building.”
By housing a wealth of feminist literature exclusively, irrespective of caste or class, reading women becomes a powerful form of political devotion that challenges a Brahmanical, hetero-patriarchal South Asian society which functions at the expense of women and the silencing of their voices. Fundamental to Thami’s own practice, reading women is a virtue within these contexts. Sister Library is rooted in grassroots community-led activism, and dismantles ‘knowledge elitism’ by carving a safe space for women and girls from marginalised groups to read, learn and find community within, beyond the barriers of traditional and academic spaces - whether to read women for pleasure, to enter alternative realities, to see versions of themselves mirrored, and to learn of the political realities women are and have been conditioned to. The library represents a virtuous space for women, girls and others to explore, meet and connect beyond these invisible, historically imposed borders.
In my personal life, I reflect on the lineage of women who have come before me. I go back to the question of, who gets to learn? In rural Nepal, my mother tells me stories of how education was not prioritised for girls due to a mix of cultural expectations and patriarchal norms, financial scarcity and domestic responsibilities fell largely on girls and women. My mother, who grew up during the 30-year-old Panchayat regime, was one of the only Kirati female students in the classroom. Her classmates were mainly male ‘middle caste’ students. She tells me marriage and raising a family was the goal, the social preference over education.
While marriage provided a sense of security, cultural belonging and social capital within Nepal's patriarchal society, these gendered expectations limited female autonomy to reproductive and domestic roles. I agree with Sharma, a migration researcher who argues that education was a ‘gift', rather than a ‘right’ among ‘Gurkha’ women post 1990 Nepal. As Sharma argues, ‘Gurkha’ women like my mother, women from British Gurkha soldier families from Nepal, who despite being restricted in education, later had the ‘agency’ of migration tied to their husband’s job which enabled them to be instrumental ‘agents’ in ensuring educational opportunities for their daughters. My education and love for feminist literature would not have been possible without the sacrifices of my parents.
I believe what makes Thami’s work visionary is her enduring belief that ‘art is activism’, rooted in underground feminist culture and community building. Part of Sister Library, Sister Press is a community-based risograph printing press which features a bi-monthly feminist newspaper, ‘Sister Times’, ‘Sister Radio’ and a monthly zine titled ‘Sister Zine’. These platforms and mediums celebrate the works of women and girls, providing avenues to explore creative expression, thought and debate. For example, Thami champions zine-making, an inherently political medium that aims to democratise knowledge. And with her own hand-made zines available to read in the library, this self-publishing culture of zines and DIY (do it yourself) allows women and girls to be agents of knowledge production and distribution, an empowering act, regardless of the barriers they may face in society. In addition, Thami collaboratively runs Bombay Underground, an artist collective hosting zine fests including South Asia’s first zine fest, Bombay zine fest. She also co-runs Dharavi art room, a community space in Dharavi, Mumbai dedicated to empowering children and women of marginalised communities through art including community-driven initiatives such as craft and photography workshops, reading rooms and play-based education.
Thami’s belief of ‘healing in community’ is a deep resonance of indigenous knowledge that is felt among artists dedicated towards liberation, and is desperately needed in our fragile world. Through the healing beauty of art, reading and the act of knowledge-sharing, Thami is unafraid to continuously challenge the sexist, classist, casteist attitudes within her society, creating ripples, waves and tides with her life work. Reading women has taught me about the power of my voice and the power of celebrating the works of women to inspire, educate and build for our communities and beyond.
Donate to Sister Library here | Learn more about Thami’s recent exhibition: ‘please touch gently (zines, comics, ephemera)’
