Podcast Summary

Podcast: New Books Network – New Books in Psychoanalysis
Episode: Ashis Roy, "Intimacy in Alienation: A Psychoanalytic Study of Hindu-Muslim Relationships" (Yoda Press, 2024)
Date: October 12, 2025
Host: Tracy Morgan
Guest: Dr. Ashis Roy

Episode Overview

In this episode, host Tracy Morgan interviews psychoanalyst Dr. Ashis Roy about his new book, Intimacy in Alienation: A Psychoanalytic Study of Hindu-Muslim Relationships. The conversation explores Dr. Roy's motivations, research methods, and key psychoanalytic concepts applied to the unique experiences of Hindu-Muslim couples in India. The discussion dwells on themes of negative identity, social rejection, the intersection of cultural and familial alienation, and the search for new forms of togetherness against entrenched binaries and divisive histories.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Motivation and Genesis of the Book (05:29–09:49)

• Psychoanalysis as Lens: Dr. Roy positions psychoanalysis as a unique tool for exploring the often-unspoken psychic realities of interfaith couples, particularly in India, where such relationships are socially fraught.
• Historical and Personal Motivation: The book was inspired by both a longing for hope amidst fraught Hindu-Muslim relations and Dr. Roy's own confrontation with unconscious biases:

  "This book was a dream of hope... I was dreaming of the hope and the possibility of how Hindus and Muslims can coexist... It was also born out of a personal experience where I began to see that I had some notions of the other, or the Muslim other, which were not very kind, which were... completely surprised by it." (Dr. Ashis Roy, 05:59)

• Undreamt Entity: The Hindu-Muslim couple, Roy argues, is “an undreamt entity”—society struggles to recognize, represent, or emotionally place such couples.

2. The Couple as Microcosm of Partition and Social Sorrow (09:49–12:19)

• Parental and Social Rejection: The interview highlights how such couples are often cast out from their families, describing the pain and sorrow chronicled in the book.

  "This book is about parental rejection and its vicissitudes as well, the social and cultural rejection, but also that the families of, you know, the... couple are thrown back...and we have a couple that is sort of on their own." (Tracy Morgan, 09:49)

• Loss, Aggression, and Survival: The couples must metabolize external aggression and hatred, often with no communal support, raising questions about the psychological impact and survival methods.

3. Concept of Negative Identity (12:19–16:06)

• Erikson’s Theory: Roy draws heavily on Erik Erikson's concept of negative identity—an identity formed in opposition to community expectations, exemplified in controversies like 'love jihad.'

  "The negative identity is a drive towards becoming everything that your community doesn't want you to become... [it] gave me a framework to understand some of these things." (Dr. Ashis Roy, 12:19)

• Limits and Potentials: He notes that while this framework is powerful, the lived experience of these couples goes "beyond" negative identity, seeking new synthesis and possibilities.

4. Research Method: Psychoanalysis Beyond the Clinic (16:19–24:40)

• Psychoanalytic Interview as Method: Dr. Roy discusses conducting psychobiographical interviews with four couples, reflecting on the overlap and distinctions between being a psychoanalyst in the clinic and as a researcher.
• Opening Internal Worlds: The couples’ willingness to share deeply internal, fragmented, and painful material was enabled by Roy’s role as an “outsider-insider”—not quite a clinician, nor simply a researcher.

  "Somehow they had this inkling and there was a wavelength... where they started talking about parts of themselves which were fragmented, which were shattered, which were broken." (Dr. Ashis Roy, 18:45)

• Finding Participating Couples: Recruitment was challenging, as many feared exposure. Most interviewees were educated, from similar age brackets, and had processed their experiences independently for some time.

5. Transforming Negative Identity and the Search for ‘Thirdness’ (25:45–29:38)

• Life Beyond Outsider Status: Roy addresses the urgent question—can the negative identity that interfaith couples are forced into be transformed? Is it possible not just to be outsiders, but to create a new, generative third position (referencing Adam Phillips and André Green)?
• Yearning for Recognition: There is a “hunger to be heard,” a need for recognition and a place in the social imagination.

6. Gender, Femininity, and Double Marginalization (29:38–36:30)

• Intersection of Patriarchy: Tracy Morgan draws connections between negative identity and the condition of women in a patriarchal society—women’s sexuality is denied, and asserting it can lead to homelessness in every sense.

  "My body, myself, desires, wishes are not my own. They belong to my family. And when I begin to see them as mine, I'm often rendered homeless." (Tracy Morgan quoting the book, 31:47)

• Caretaking Muslim Partners: Roy notes the unexpected maternal qualities of the Muslim men in these stories, who often become the emotional caretakers for their Hindu wives—subverting dominant political narratives about Muslim masculinity.

7. Unpacking the Couples’ Demographics and Family Dynamics (36:30–44:03)

• All-Female Hindu, Male Muslim Couples: All four couples were Hindu women married to Muslim men. While not a sampling choice, it pointed to the complex social-perceptual asymmetries and available study participants.
• Risk and Alienation: Both partners in each couple must symbolically “kill” family ties to be together, risking not just familial but wider communal alienation.

8. The Politics of Desire and Sociocultural Strangeness (44:03–48:47)

• Forbidden Pleasure: The couples, by transgressing communal boundaries, embody a forbidden pleasure that arouses community envy, anxiety, and projection.
• Representation in Popular Culture: Roy highlights how even cinematic depictions of such couples are often met with censure and resistance in contemporary India.
• Desire for the Stranger: Psychoanalytic theory reflects that such couples may hold onto the fantasy of “the stranger within the couple,” maintaining difference as a resource for desire and vitality (Stephen Mitchell).

9. Generational Difference and Paranoia (48:47–50:39)

• Shifting Attitudes: Roy observes that older generations—those raised before partition—often express nostalgia for peaceful coexistence, in contrast to the paranoia and disavowal he encounters among younger people and in clinical work.

10. Internal Racism and the Necessity of the Other (51:13–53:10)

• Inescapable Interimplication: The discussion turns to Fakhry Davids’ work on internal racism and the paradox that communal identity depends on a fantasized, rejected other—mirrored in all deeply divided societies (including Ireland, Palestine/Israel).

11. The Necessity and Pain of Familial Recognition (53:10–60:07)

• Familial Embrace vs. Rejection: The episode’s emotional close juxtaposes the pain of not receiving recognition with moving musical and real-life examples of familial acceptance (a gay wedding, a supportive mother).

  "If the mother wasn’t there, how painful would that wedding be?... And your book describes the pain of, you know, what’s it like when you go without that." (Tracy Morgan, 58:53)

• Transforming the Forbidden: Roy and Morgan reflect on the importance of not only surviving in a position of forbiddenness, but eventually transforming and celebrating it.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Hope and Coexistence

  "This book was a dream of hope... to imagine a possibility that the couple brings something new to the relationship between the two communities."
  — Dr. Ashis Roy (05:59)

• On Negative Identity

  "The negative identity is a kind of drive toward becoming everything that your community doesn't want you to become."
  — Dr. Ashis Roy (12:19)

• On Feminine Homelessness

  "My body, myself, desires, wishes are not my own. They belong to my family. And when I begin to see them as mine, I'm often rendered homeless."
  — Quoted by Tracy Morgan (31:47)

• On the Parental Embrace

  "...the beauty of the mother embracing her gay son, who's wearing a leather harness... and I thought, this is as good as it gets. And this is what these couples in your book didn't get overall. And it's something that you gave to them, I think, in spending time with them and giving voice to their lives."
  — Tracy Morgan (57:03, 58:53)

• On Forbidden Desire and Celebration

  "Sexuality also celebrated—if it’s just forbidden, it can keep a negative identity or become something else. But I think the joy and the celebration is so important."
  — Dr. Ashis Roy (59:55)

Timestamps for Important Segments

• Introduction and Guest Background: 02:06–05:11
• Motivation for the Book: 05:29–09:49
• Partition, Sorrow, and Rejection: 09:49–12:19
• Theory of Negative Identity: 12:19–16:06
• Method and Conducting Interviews: 16:19–24:40
• Transforming Negative Identity and Thirdness: 25:45–29:38
• Gender and the Double Bind: 29:38–36:30
• Family Dynamics and Coupling: 36:30–44:03
• Politics of Desire and Strangeness: 44:03–48:47
• Generational and Societal Shifts: 48:47–50:39
• Internal Racism and the Other: 51:13–53:10
• Familial Embrace and Emotional Closing: 53:10–60:07
• Farewell and Book Recommendations: 60:56–End

Final Thoughts

This episode delivers a nuanced, emotionally resonant exploration of Dr. Ashis Roy’s Intimacy in Alienation, showing both the psychic and social complexities of Hindu-Muslim couples in contemporary India. The conversation bridges personal, clinical, and political registers, inviting listeners to reflect on how we hold—within ourselves and our societies—the possibility of love across boundaries. Dr. Roy’s work is presented as an act of recognition and hope, amplifying voices too often rendered invisible, and offering a powerful psychoanalytic study of intimacy forged in and against alienation.