Putting Entertainment Education on Trial

Despite being a taboo subject, sex education has remained a fundamental part of international and local entertainment-education projects and a primary way through which development communication has shaped women’s roles in society. As development initiatives work to center women’s rights and freedoms over neocolonial or nationalist interests, it is essential to examine the mechanisms and storytelling modes designed to accomplish these goals. To contribute to our understanding of the changing approaches and ideologies that underlie contemporary development communication and its adaptation to the digital age, I analyze the entertainment educational web series Sex Ki Adalat (2017) or Court of Sex, created by the Population Foundation of India (PFI). I demonstrate how the series uses the genre elements of comedy and courtroom drama, as well as its online platform, to locate sexual and reproductive health within the public sphere and align it with notions of justice, human rights, and gender equality.