Out of Time

Out of time stands out not only as a ground-breaking text in queer and postcolonial interrogations of international politics, but also as a testament to what can be achieved by research that embraces the personal as political. * Joseph Hills, Governance, law and ethics, International Affairs *
Recommended. * D.M. Jarrett, Morgan State University, CHOICE *
Out of Time is a breath of fresh air. In a field where many are retreating into certainties, Rao insists that the relationships between contexts, politics, and subjectivities remain radically open and thoroughly contextualized. The exploration of a range of queer sites challenges our understanding of comparative ethnography, exemplifying the best of interdisciplinary theorizing from fully grounded location. I loved his refusal to put 'decolonial' and 'queer' approaches against one another (politically and methodologically), and exploration of the roots of British, Ugandan, and Indian homophobias as both a problem of a Western gaze and as having specific histories (that also overlap). Rao's writing is beautiful too, weaving theory, ethnography, history, literature, and autobiography together in the best traditions of postcolonial queer scholarship. This is a brilliant, timely, important book that changes the field. * Clare Hemmings, London School of Economics and Political Science *
Rao offers a wonderfully untimely engagement with the temporalities of queer politics in the aftermath of colonialism. As always, his work is scholarly and combines impressive breadth of analysis with a fresh, sophisticated, and always generous approach to questions that all too easily prompt simplistic, ungenerous ethical and political answers. The book is rich in insights into the fractured political temporalities of contemporary international society and is a must-read for anyone interested in the current times of world politics. * Kimberly Hutchings, Queen Mary University of London *
Sitting at the intersection of anthropology, international relations, queer theory and postcolonial studies--but being not entirely within any field--this excellent and refreshing book throws up many new questions. Rahul Rao's voice is engaging without being hectoring, and he explores his topic with nuance, speaking to activist concerns. * Arvind Narrain, Alternative Law Forum *
This brilliantly-visioned book breaks open the now-stultified debates about sexuality and statecraft. Taking the temporal pulses from the postcolonies, Rao upends the presumed trajectories of normative queer theorizing. A tour de force. * Jasbir K. Puar, Rutgers University *
Timely and important, Rao's Out of Time will sit alongside the work of Jasbir Puar's Terrorist Assemblages and Lisa Duggan's The Twilight of Equality as one of those must-read texts on every queer studies syllabus. It is that good. * Cynthia Weber, University of Sussex *