Psychoanalytic Exploration of Motherhood among Brown’s The Dancing Girls of Lahore and Saeed’s Taboo! The Hidden Culture of a Red Light Area

Abstract

Motherhood is a bond, a link, an association filled with love, care and affection between a mother and her children specifically daughter. Motherhood is a bond in which a mother also nurtues the emotional needs of the children and the children feels secure and complete. The data for this article has been collected qualitatively with the help of two ethnographic studies namely Brown’s The Dancing girls of Lahore & Saeed’s Taboo! The Hidden Culture of a Red Light Area.  Keeping it in view, the two ethnographic studies have been examined through Lacanian theory of psychoanalysis to identity that how the prostitute mother and daughter relate to each other in terms of motherhood, how the red light area function as Lacanian real to sustain the patriarchal society as a socio-symbolic order and to identify the desire/lacks that this bond lead to in the life of prostitutes (mother and daughter). The findings of this article highlighted that the bond of mother and daughter between the prsotitutes is affected by the society where a woman when looses charms and beauty is not accepted by the society. The accepted bond of motherhood which is a bond of nurture and support from the both sides is severed badly due to the pressure of the society. This article highlighted that the daughter prostitutes are forced by the mother prostitutes to gives up their desires and dreams in order to fulfill the needs of the family as well as the demands of the mother prostitutes that strongly affected the lives of the young girls. The findings of this article highlighted that Lacanian real strongly functions as the society and business of prostitution that is considred to have no effect on the lives of the prostitutes is active here as the standards of the beauty and good lifestyle forced the mothers to keep themselves and their desires before the desires of the daughters.