Publication:
Cyka

dc.contributor.authorPandey, Kritika
dc.contributor.departmentUniversity of Massachusetts Amherst
dc.contributor.departmentEnglish
dc.date2024-03-29T14:42:45.000
dc.date.accessioned2024-04-26T16:38:52Z
dc.date.available2025-05-08T00:00:00Z
dc.date.issued2020-01-01
dc.date.submittedMay
dc.description.abstractThe protagonists of the novel, Vedantika Ojha (12) and Cyka Ho (13), meet when the latter starts working as a domestic help in the former’s house. They live in a conflict-ridden town in India which is the site of one of the world’s longest ongoing guerilla rebellions, the Naxalite-Maoist insurgency. The girls seem to have little in common. Vedantika resides in a big house with razor spikes on the boundary walls. She is a queer neurodivergent 7th grader who has unstable relationships with everyone, including the reader. Cyka, who lives in the slums, is confident and charming. She stands up for herself because she knows that no one else will. She is all too familiar with the violent streets that Vedantika has so far been sheltered from. However, a closer look reveals that the girls share an absence. Cyka’s family was displaced from their village due to coal mining. She belongs to one of the indigenous tribes who have historically co-existed with nature without capitalizing on its resources. But their lands are now being taken over by the neoliberal government. Her people must revolt to survive. On the other hand, Vedantika’s mother has left her family to take up a job in Delhi. While Cyka pines for her village, Vedantika pines for her mother. Their respective losses become the basis of the bond that develops between them despite their dissimilar contexts.
dc.description.degreeMaster of Fine Arts (M.F.A.)
dc.identifier.doihttps://doi.org/10.7275/17190757
dc.identifier.orcidhttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-0334-6379
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14394/23352
dc.relation.urlhttps://scholarworks.umass.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1138&context=englmfa_theses&unstamped=1
dc.rights.urihttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
dc.source.statuspublished
dc.subjectFemale Friendships
dc.subjectJharkhand
dc.subjectIndia
dc.subjectComing of Age
dc.subjectQueer
dc.subjectIndigenous
dc.subjectOther English Language and Literature
dc.titleCyka
dc.typecampus
dc.typearticle
digcom.contributor.authorisAuthorOfPublication|email:kritikapande@umass.edu|institution:University of Massachusetts Amherst|Pandey, Kritika
digcom.date.embargo2025-05-08T00:00:00-07:00
digcom.identifierenglmfa_theses/123
digcom.identifier.contextkey17190757
digcom.identifier.submissionpathenglmfa_theses/123
dspace.entity.typePublication
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