Photographer Candace Feit has spent the last year documenting the lives of a community of people who call themselves “Kothi” in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu.
Candace Feit
The term "Kothi" describes a wide swath of identities and relationships, including "married fathers who have male lovers, people born male who wear female dress and male-born people who wear traditional women's clothing only during religious festivals or celebrations" says photographer Candace Feit.
Candace Feit
"In December 2013, the judges of India's highest court overturned a 2009 lower court decision that decriminalized gay sex between consenting adults. While convictions on the law have been rare – none in the last 20 years - the law has been used to harass sexual minorities, particularly transgender people.The ruling underscores a longstanding tension in Indian society between western-style laws, inherited from British colonizers, and traditional practices that have allowed gay and transgender communities across to negotiate a panoply of sexual and gender identities within the confines of traditional values."