Jouissance as Ananda seeks to resolve the often-problematic Western concept of the ego by proposing a cross-cultural theory of consciousness that draws on Indian philosophy. Author Ashmita Khasnabish uses the Indian concept of ananda to advance Irigaray's theory of jouissance and offers a re-reading of jouissance from an Indian cross-cultural psychoanalytic point of view.

In Humanitarian Identity and the Political Sublime, Ashmita Khasnabish unites Amartya Sen's concept of pluralistic identity with Sri Aurobindo's philosophy of the "religion of human unity," where the European and Western philosophy of Enlightenment meets the East/India/Bengali intellectual and spiritual thought. The resulting neo-Enlightenment philosophy of identity incorporates Teresa Brennan's theory of the "transmission of affect" and the Relational Cultural Theory, culminating in a discussion of the postcolonial literary texts of Rushdie and Kincaid.

Negotiating Capability and Diaspora: A Philosophical Politics scrutinizes Indian economist cum philosopher Amartya Sen's theory of capability, which rose as a critique of the modern American philosopher John Rawls's theory of primary goods. Ashmita Khasnabish develops Sen's theory of capability as a leitmotif throughout the book. She focuses on the following themes: 1) how Amartya Sen's theory of capability offers strength to immigrants and underdogs; 2) the significance of John Rawls's theory for Sen's theory of capability; 3) two aspects of Sen's theory: on the one hand it exposes the...