Sharif D Rangnekar

Writer | Curator | Inclusion consultant for workplaces

About: Sharif Rangnekar is a noted author; communications consultant, TEDx speaker, singer, songwriter and curator focused on diversity and inclusion in music and the arts. He is the Creator and Festival Director of the Rainbow Litfest- Queer and Exclusive. His memoir is one of the first queer memoirs published in India. Sharif uses talks, writing, event curation and music, to advocate change and garner support for the LGBTQ+ community.

BOOK

Name: Queersapien

Description:

Queersapien is neither an individual’s search for identity, nor is it a lamentation of societal prejudices. The book recognizes the fact that there are many ways to live. A queer mind sees itself as part of the extreme diversity nature offers. It is, therefore, aware that if we shed the veneers we wear and the blinkers we view life with, we’d know there isn’t a solitary kind of food or form to clothing,history, education and wisdom. There isn’t a singular structure to a family, a union or one way tolove or one normal.

In what is a searing and raw reflection on life, media, neoliberalism, politics and the inner self,Sharif D. Rangnekar, who identifies as a gay man, explores through lived experiences, the meaningsof love, freedom, identity and dignity in a society where family, religion, caste and class dictate howwe live our lives every day. This is a book that can’t be put in a thematic box, much like queerness.Becoming queersapien is not a revolution but an evolution of the self, a nation and its people.