From raviv at sarai.net Mon Nov 3 10:28:40 2003 From: raviv at sarai.net (Ravi S. Vasudevan) Date: Mon, 03 Nov 2003 10:28:40 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] clamp down on post-colonial studies Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20031103102745.00a769c0@mail.sarai.net> >> >> > >> >From Michael Bednar >> >Department of History >> >The University of Texas at Austin >> > >> >Congress Moves to Regulate Postcolonial Studies (fwd) >> >Oct. 20, 2003 >> > >> >Friends, >> > >> >As many of you who know me well will soon realize, I have become a >> >political activist for the first time in my life. I am not here to >>rant, >> >but to inform you on current legislation that is being debated in the >> >House of Representatives. The legislation in question, H.R. 3077, will >> >rewrite the Title VI legislation that has provided FLAS money to many >>of >> >us and that also funds the various area-studies centers in our >> >universities. >> > >> >In particular, the legislation proposes the creation of an "advisory >> >board" that may severely impact universities by dictating the >>curricula >> >taught, course materials assigned in class, and the faculty who are >>hired >> >in institutions that accept Title VI funding. It gets worse. The U.S. >> >House of Representative's Subcommittee on Select Education Hearing on >> >"International Programs in Higher Education and Questions about Bias" >>on >> >June 19, 2003 >> >(http://edworkforce.house.gov/hearings/108th/sed/titlevi61903/ wl61903.htm) >> >begins with an opening statement by Representative Phil Gringrey that >> >includes the following passage: "we are here today to learn more about >>a >> >number of programs that are authorized and funded under Title VI, >>which >> >are some of the oldest programs of support to higher education. These >> >programs reflect the priority placed by the federal government on >> >diplomacy, national security, and trade competitiveness. International >> >studies and education have become an increasingly important and >>relevant >> >topic of conversation and consideration in higher education... >>However, >> >with mounting global tensions, some programs under the Higher >>Education >> >Act that support foreign language and area studies centers have >>recently >> >attracted national attention and concern due to the perception of >>their >> >teachings and policies." >> > >> >Testimony provided by Dr. Stanley Kurtz (available from the link >>above) >> >portrays areas studies centers as hotbeds of unpatriotic >> >anti-Americanism. Dr. Kurtz focuses, in particular, on post-colonial >> >theory and the work of Edward Said's Orientalism in which "Said >>equated >> >professors who support American foreign policy with the 19th century >> >European intellectuals who propped up racist colonial empires. The >>core >> >premise of post-colonial theory is that it is immoral for a scholar to >> >put his knowledge of foreign languages and cultures at the service of >> >American power." (quoted from Kurtz's statement found at >> >http://edworkforce.house.gov/hearings/108th/sed/titlevi61903/kurtz.htm >> >Kurtz asserts that the rampant presence of post-colonial theory in >> >academic circles, with its bias against America and the West, has >> >produced a corps of professors who refuse to instruct or support (with >> >FLAS grants) students interested in pursuing careers in the foreign >> >service and/or intelligence agencies. Kurtz comments that: "We know >>that >> >transmissions from the September 11 highjackers [sic] went >>untranslated >> >for want of Arabic speakers in our intelligence agencies. Given that, >>and >> >given the ongoing lack of foreign language expertise in our defense >>and >> >intelligence agencies, the directors of the Title VI African studies >> >centers who voted unanimously, just after September 11, to reaffirm >>their >> >boycott of the NSEP [National Security Education Program], have all >>acted >> >to undermine America's national security, and its foreign policy. And >>so >> >has every other Title VI-funded scholar in Latin American-, African-, >>and >> >Middle Eastern Studies who has upheld the >> >long-standing boycott of the NSEP." >> > >> >The answer, Kurtz proposes, is to create an oversight board that will >>link >> >Title VI funding to students training for careers in national >>security, >> >defense and intelligence agencies, and the Foreign Service. How >>effective >> >was Dr. Kurtz's presentation? The committee not only believed >>everything >> >Dr.Kurtz claimed, they even implemented most of his suggestions, >>including >> >the "advisory board." >> > >> >An amended House Resolution, H.R. 3077, proposes to create an >> >International Education Advisory Board, with appointed members from >> >homeland security, the Department of Defense, and the National >>Security >> >Agency, "to increase accountability by providing advice, counsel, and >> >recommendations to Congress on international education issues for >>higher >> >education." (Quoted from the Sept. 19, 2003 press release of >>Congressman >> >John Boehner, committee >> >chairman,http://edworkforce.house.gov/press/press108/09sep/ >> hr3077psub091703. >> >htm) >> > >> >The full resolution of H.R. 3077 can be found at >> >http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:H.R.3077: >> > >> >H.R. 3077 was amended in subcommittee and this amended resolution >> >elaborates on the composition and role of the International Education >> >Advisory Board (see especially pages 16-24). The amended H.R. 3077 can >>be >> >found at: >> >http://edworkforce.house.gov/markups/108th/sed/hr3077/917main.htm . >>Click >> >on the link that says "Amendment in the Nature of a Substitute" which >>will >> >download an Adobe Acrobat pdf file. This amended H.R. 3077 has been >>sent >> >to the full committee, which met on Thursday, September 25 at 11:00 AM >>to >> >discuss the resolution before sending it to the House of >>Representatives. >> > >> >Just in case you think that I have lost my marbles or that I am >> >over-reacting, the Higher Education and National Affairs newsletter, >> >published by the American Council on Education, and available >> >athttp://www.acenet.edu/hena/ includes the following comments on H.R. >>3077 >> >(page 1, continued on page 4): >> >"House Republicans intend for H.R. 3077 to build on existing >> >international and foreign language studies Title VI programs, adding >>what >> >many in the higher education community believe is unnecessary federal >> >oversight through a new International Education Advisory Board." >>Federal >> >international education programs were the focus of a House >>subcommittee >> >hearing in June, during which one witness testified to a strong >> >"anti-American" bias in many college and university international >> >departments which he claimed could possibly undermine American foreign >> >policy. ACE presented opposing testimony (see >> >http://www.acenet.edu/washington/international/Hartle.Testimony.pdf . >>As a >> >subcommittee press release asserted, this advisory body would be >>created >> >in consultation with homeland security agencies in order to "increase >> >accountability by providing advice, counsel, and >> >recommendations to Congress on international education issues for >>higher >> >education." Higher education leaders oppose this board on the grounds >>that >> >the powers it is granted are so broad that they put institutions in >>danger >> >of losing control over their own curricula, hiring practices, and >>other >> >aspects of their international programs." >> > >> >In short, it seems that the House of Representatives is about to >> >regulate the courses and content that we, as future professors, will >>teach >> >in colleges and universities. The possibility that someone in homeland >> >security will instruct college professors (with Ph.D.s) on the proper, >> >patriotic, "American-friendly" textbooks that may be used in class >>scares >> >and outrages me. This morning, this was news to me. If this is new to >>you >> >and if you feel as equally scared and angered that the government may >> >censure your future academic career, then I urge you to: 1) distribute >> >this message to other professors and students in area studies; and >> >2) write a handwritten letter (in ink) to your local >> >congressmen and to John A. Boehner, Chairman of the Full Committee on >> >Education and the Workforce at the following >> >address: >> > >> >John A. Boehner >> >1011 Longworth H.O.B. >> >Washington, DC 20515 >> > >> >Please refrain from emails and typewritten or computer printouts as >>these >> >are often ignored in Congress as being mass-produced by >> >special-interest groups. Write in ink, in legible penmanship, and let >>your >> >voice be heard. >> > >> >Best, >> >Michael Bednar >> >Department of History >> >The University of Texas at Austin >> >>_________________________________________________________________ >>Find your first love.Rekindle past >>joys! http://www.batchmates.com/msn.asp Get in touch with batchmates. > >_________________________________________________________________ >Making your life easy! That is Citibank Suvidha. >http://server1.msn.co.in/msnleads/citi_cards_sept03/CitiSuvidha.asp Get >your account now! Ravi Vasudevan The Sarai Programme: City/Media/Public Domain Senior Fellow Centre for the Study of Developing Societies Delhi 110054 Tel: 2394-2199 x330 Fax: 2394-3450 From shilpagupta at hotmail.com Mon Nov 17 00:06:36 2003 From: shilpagupta at hotmail.com (shilpa) Date: Mon, 17 Nov 2003 00:06:36 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Call for Video Art Message-ID: Call for Video Art Call for short videos upto 10 minutes for the Video Art Road Show - 2 by Indian artists Selected videos will be projected on the Carter Road Promenande in Mumbai during the last week of November 2003. Format : High Quality VCD / VHS / Mini DV in Pal format Deadline: Should reach latest by 12 November 2003 Send video alongwith brief description to, (non-returnable) Shilpa Gupta 2nd Floor, Premesh 6 B Turner Road Bandra West Mumbai 400 050 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031117/fc0739eb/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From chandran_kir at hotmail.com Mon Nov 3 21:03:51 2003 From: chandran_kir at hotmail.com (Kiran Chandran) Date: Mon, 03 Nov 2003 19:33:51 +0400 Subject: [Reader-list] The Flight to India Message-ID: The flight to India The jobs Britain stole from the Asian subcontinent 200 years ago are now being returned George Monbiot Tuesday October 21, 2003 The Guardian If you live in a rich nation in the English-speaking world, and most of your work involves a computer or a telephone, don't expect to have a job in five years' time. Almost every large company which relies upon remote transactions is starting to dump its workers and hire a cheaper labour force overseas. All those concerned about economic justice and the distribution of wealth at home should despair. All those concerned about global justice and the distribution of wealth around the world should rejoice. As we are, by and large, the same people, we have a problem. Britain's industrialisation was secured by destroying the manufacturing capacity of India. In 1699, the British government banned the import of woollen cloth from Ireland, and in 1700 the import of cotton cloth (or calico) from India. Both products were forbidden because they were superior to our own. As the industrial revolution was built on the textiles industry, we could not have achieved our global economic dominance if we had let them in. Throughout the late 18th and 19th centuries, India was forced to supply raw materials to Britain's manufacturers, but forbidden to produce competing finished products. We are rich because the Indians are poor. Now the jobs we stole 200 years ago are returning to India. Last week the Guardian revealed that the National Rail Enquiries service is likely to move to Bangalore, in south-west India. Two days later, the HSBC bank announced that it was cutting 4,000 customer service jobs in Britain and shifting them to Asia. BT, British Airways, Lloyds TSB, Prudential, Standard Chartered, Norwich Union, Bupa, Reuters, Abbey National and Powergen have already begun to move their call centres to India. The British workers at the end of the line are approaching the end of the line. There is a profound historical irony here. Indian workers can outcompete British workers today because Britain smashed their ability to compete in the past. Having destroyed India's own industries, the East India Company and the colonial authorities obliged its people to speak our language, adopt our working practices and surrender their labour to multinational corporations. Workers in call centres in Germany and Holland are less vulnerable than ours, as Germany and Holland were less successful colonists, with the result that fewer people in the poor world now speak their languages. The impact on British workers will be devastating. Service jobs of the kind now being exported were supposed to make up for the loss of employment in the manufacturing industries which disappeared overseas in the 1980s and 1990s. The government handed out grants for cybersweatshops in places whose industrial workforce had been crushed by the closure of mines, shipyards and steelworks. But the companies running the call centres appear to have been testing their systems at government expense before exporting them somewhere cheaper. It is not hard to see why most of them have chosen India. The wages of workers in the service and technology industries there are roughly one tenth of those of workers in the same sectors over here. Standards of education are high, and almost all educated Indians speak English. While British workers will take call-centre jobs only when they have no choice, Indian workers see them as glamorous. One technical support company in Bangalore recently advertised 800 jobs. It received 87,000 applications. British call centres moving to India can choose the most charming, patient, biddable, intelligent workers the labour market has to offer. There is nothing new about multinational corporations forcing workers in distant parts of the world to undercut each other. What is new is the extent to which the labour forces of the poor nations are also beginning to threaten the security of our middle classes. In August, the Evening Standard came across some leaked consultancy documents suggesting that at least 30,000 executive positions in Britain's finance and insurance industries are likely to be transferred to India over the next five years. In the same month, the American consultants Forrester Research predicted that the US will lose 3.3 million white-collar jobs between now and 2015. Most of them will go to India. Just over half of these are menial "back office" jobs, such as taking calls and typing up data. The rest belong to managers, accountants, underwriters, computer programmers, IT consultants, biotechnicians, architects, designers and corporate lawyers. For the first time in history, the professional classes of Britain and America find themselves in direct competition with the professional classes of another nation. Over the next few years, we can expect to encounter a lot less enthusiasm for free trade and globalisation in the parties and the newspapers which represent them. Free trade is fine, as long as it affects someone else's job. So a historical restitution appears to be taking place, as hundreds of thousands of jobs, many of them good ones, flee to the economy we ruined. Low as the wages for these positions are by comparison to our own, they are generally much higher than those offered by domestic employers. A new middle class is developing in cities previously dominated by caste. Its spending will stimulate the economy, which in turn may lead to higher wages and improved conditions of employment. The corporations, of course, will then flee to a cheaper country, but not before they have left some of their money behind. According to the consultants Nasscom and McKinsey, India - which is always short of foreign exchange - will be earning some $17bn a year from outsourced jobs by 2008. On the other hand, the most vulnerable communities in Britain are losing the jobs which were supposed to have rescued them. Almost two-thirds of call-centre workers are women, so the disadvantaged sex will slip still further behind. As jobs become less secure, multinational corporations will be able to demand ever harsher conditions of employment in an industry which is already one of the most exploitative in Britain. At the same time, extending the practices of their colonial predecessors, they will oblige their Indian workers to mimic not only our working methods, but also our accents, our tastes and our enthusiasms, in order to persuade customers in Britain that they are talking to someone down the road. The most marketable skill in India today is the ability to abandon your identity and slip into someone else's. So is the flight to India a good thing or a bad thing? The only reasonable answer is both. The benefits do not cancel out the harm. They exist, and have to exist, side by side. This is the reality of the world order Britain established, and which is sustained by the heirs to the East India Company, the multinational corporations. The corporations operate only in their own interests. Sometimes these interests will coincide with those of a disadvantaged group, but only by disadvantaging another. For centuries, we have permitted ourselves to ignore the extent to which our welfare is dependent on the denial of other people's. We begin to understand the implications of the system we have created only when it turns against ourselves. _________________________________________________________________ Add photos to your messages with MSN 8. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/featuredemail From isast at well.com Tue Nov 4 06:14:57 2003 From: isast at well.com (LEONARDO (mk)) Date: Mon, 03 Nov 2003 16:44:57 -0800 Subject: [Reader-list] Women, Art, and Technology published by MIT Press and Leonardo Message-ID: *apologies for cross posting* MIT Press and Leonardo/ISAST announce publication of Women, Art, and Technology Edited by Judy Malloy Although women have been at the forefront of art and technology creation, no source has adequately documented their core contributions to the field. Women, Art, and Technology, which originated in a Leonardo project of the same name, is a compendium of the work of women artists who have played a central role in the development of new media practice. The book features overviews of the history and foundations of the field by critic/curator Patric Prince; critic Margaret Morse; artist/educator Sheila Pinkel; artist/networker Anna Couey; and Kathy Brew, artist and former director of the new media initiative ThunderGulch. The foreword was written by Patricia Bentson, managing editor of the Leonardo Music Journal. Artist contributors include computer graphics artists Rebecca Allen, Donna Cox, and Diane Fenster; video artists Dara Birnbaum, Joan Jonas, Valerie Soe, and Steina Vasulka; composers Cécile Le Prado, Pauline Oliveros, and Pamela Z; interactive artists Jennifer Hall and Blyth Hazen, Agnes Hegedüs, Lynn Hershman, Nancy Paterson, and Sonya Rapoport; virtual reality artists Char Davies and Brenda Laurel; net artists Monika Fleischmann and Wolfgang Strauss, and Sandy Stone; and choreographer Dawn Stoppiello. Critics include Jaishree Odin, Simone Osthoff, and Zoë Sofia. Editor Judy Malloy is an electronic fiction and Internet pioneer and editor of the electronic publication NYFA Current (formerly Arts Wire Current). Follow this link to order Women, Art, and Technology from Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262134241/leonardoonlin-20. The complete table of contents, articles not included in the book and links to new works in the field are available on the book¹s website at http://www.judymalloy.net/newmedia. Leonardo/The International Society for the Arts, Sciences, and Technology (ISAST) serves the international arts community by promoting and documenting work at the intersection of the arts, sciences, and technology, and by encouraging and stimulating collaboration between artists, scientists, and technologists. For further information, go to www.leonardo.info . From isast at well.com Tue Nov 4 07:20:31 2003 From: isast at well.com (LEONARDO (mk)) Date: Mon, 03 Nov 2003 17:50:31 -0800 Subject: [Reader-list] Burning Man featured in Leonardo Message-ID: *apologies for cross-posting* For immediate release ­ November 3, 2003 Contact: Louis M. Brill, Guest Editor lmbrill at earthlink.net or (415) 664-0694 THE ART OF BURNING MAN LEONARDO Volume 36, Number 5 The international journal LEONARDO, a publication dedicated to art and technology and published by the MIT Press, has collaborated with The Burning Man Project to publish a special section featuring The Art of Burning Man. In the October 2003 issue, 20 artists discuss the creative aspects of designing and building art for Burning Man. Among the many art mediums discussed are fire, water, lasers, LED light, metal, telestereo optics and fractal audio. Each essay is illustrated with a photo of the artwork. The Burning Man Special Section includes an introduction by Guest Editor Louis M. Brill: Desert Weirdness Introduces a New Era of Art; and a feature article by Burning Man art curator Christine Kristen (a.k.a. LadyBee): The Outsider Art of Burning Man. Artists¹ essays are divided into four themes as follows: SCULPTURE - Michael Christian: Flock. LIGHT SCULPTURE - Radiant Atmospheres: The Afterlife; Tim Black: L2K Ring and Ship to Ship; Jeremy Lutes: The Lily Pond; Christopher Schardt: Spin; Russell Wilcox: Beaming Man. INTERACTIVE INSTALLATIONS - Cassidy Curtis and Chris Whitney: The Telestereoscope; Deidre DeFranceaux and Jann Nunn: The Cradle; Hendrik Hackl: The Ammonite Project; Cynthia "Kiki" Pettit: Firefall; Kal Spelletich: The Myth of Sisyphus; Jenne Giles and Philip Bonham: The Ribcage; Dan Das Mann: The One Tree; Susan Robb: The Golden Tower Project; Finley Fryer: The Plastic Chapel. MOBILE INSTALLATIONS - Dana Albany: The Bone Tree; Aaron Wolf Baum: The Voice of the Nebulous Entity; Lisa Nigro: Draka, The Flaming Metal Dragon; Steven Raspa: The Futura Deluxe Bubble Fountain and Porta Temple; Austin Richards: Dr. Megavolt. This issue of LEONARDO is available now and may be purchased at the Burning Man Marketplace at: http://marketplace.burningman.com/. To find out more about LEONARDO subscriptions from The MIT Press, visit http://www.leonardo.info . The Leonardo Burning Man project is also accessible on-line at: http://mitpress.mit.edu/Leonardo/gallery/burningman/ . -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: image/jpeg Size: 26920 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031103/d14eb308/attachment.jpe From secretariat at pukar.org.in Mon Nov 3 18:00:25 2003 From: secretariat at pukar.org.in (PUKAR) Date: Mon, 03 Nov 2003 18:00:25 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] PUKAR Events for November Message-ID: Dear Friends, You are invited to the following events organised by PUKAR for the month of November. 1. Wednesday, November 5, 2003 Film Screening and Discussion. Title: Naata (The Bond) Directors: Anjali Monteiro and K P Jayasankar Discussants: Kalpana Sharma and Charu Gargi Venue: NGMA Auditorium Time: 6:30 p.m. 2. Saturday, November 15, 2003 Monthly Lecture Series on Research Practices and Methodologies Topic: Cracks in the Lens: A Neophyte's Eye View of Social Research Speaker: Ankur Dutta Venue: PUKAR Office Time: 6:30 p.m. 3. Friday, November 28, 2003 Gender and Space Series (Film Screening and Discussion) Title: 'Mumbai Locals": An episode from the NDTV Show "24 Hours" conceptualized and hosted by Radhika Bordia. Introduction by Radhika Bordia and presentation by Kamal Lala Venue: NGMA Auditorium Time: 6 p.m. 4. Saturday, November 29, 2003 Monthly Lecture Series in Marathi Topic: Worship Houses in Mumbai Speaker: Phiroz Ranade Venue: Rachna Sansad Time: 10:30 a.m. DETAILS OF EVENTS: 1.Wednesday, November 5, 2003 Film Screening. Title: Naata (The Bond) Directors: Anjali Monteiro and K P Jayasankar Discussants: Kalpana Sharma and Charu Gargi Venue: NGMA Auditorium Time: 6:30 p.m. Naata is about Bhau Korde and Waqar Khan, two activists and friends, who have been involved in conflict resolution, working with neighbourhood peace committees in Dharavi, Mumbai, reputedly, the largest 'slum' in Asia. This film explores their work, which has included the collective production and use of visual media for ethnic amity. Waqar and Bhau's work raises several uncomfortable questions for the filmmakers, so-called modern,middle-class, secular, urban beings. Naata juxtaposes the multi-layered narrative on Dharavi and the 'stories' of the filmmakers, thereby attempting to foreground a critical and active viewership. NAATA has been screened at the following festivals: Film South Asia 2003, Kathmandu, The First and the Last Experimental Film Festival 2003, Sydney. About the Directors: Anjali Monteiro is Professor and Head, and K.P. Jayasankar is Reader (Production), Unit for Media and Communications, Tata Institute of Social Sciences. Both of them are involved in media production, teaching and research. Jointly they have won ten national and international awards for their videos. About the Discussants: Kalpana Sharma is Deputy Editor of The Hindu, Mumbai. Charu Gargi is a filmmaker. 2. Saturday, November 15, 2003 Monthly Lecture Series on Research Practices and Methodologies Topic: Cracks in the Lens: A Neophyte's Eye View of Social Research Speaker: Ankur Dutta Venue: PUKAR Office Time: 6:30 p.m. While we may reel from under the near ubiquity of the results of social science research, it is imperative to reconsider much of what we come across. What do we understand by 'social research'? What are its processes? Who are the people involved? What affects their relationships? These questions among others are endless, acquiring a weightier dimension in light of current practices in conducting social research. Social research entails a representation of society. But an examination of the issues concerned necessitates an inquiry into the orientation of those engaged in presenting such representations. This presentation, drawing initially from some personal experiences and conversations, will proceed to examine some of the ideas and issues that inform the practice of social research at large. The key aspects that will be explored include applied research (in particular the project approach), the quantitative versus qualitative research debate, and locating the presence/absence of theory. About the Speaker: Ankur Datta has been working as a Research Assistant in different applied research projects on health, population studies and social auditing at the Unit for Urban Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. He studied at St.Xavier's College, Mumbai and the School of Oriental and African Studies, London. 3. Friday, November 28, 2003 Gender and Space Series (Film Screening and Discussion) Title: 'Mumbai Locals" An episode from the NDTV Show 24 Hours, conceptualized and hosted by Radhika Bordia. Introduction by Radhika Bordia and a presentation by Kamal Lala. Venue: NGMA Auditorium Time: 6 p.m. With this screening, the Gender and Space project inaugurates a series of lectures, discussions, presentations, film screenings and workshops. The project focuses on issues of gender and citizenship in the context of public spaces and hopes that this series helps to develop a sustained engagement with various issues of citizenship, thus contributing to a larger public debate. One of the aims of this project is to foster dialogue on the subject of women, cities, citizenship, civil society, sexuality, access, rights and the interconnections between these within a larger audience in the city. This series is one of the initiatives towards achieving this goal. This screening of 'Mumbai Locals' will be introduced by Radhika Bordia who will also respond to questions from the audience. This will be followed by a presentation by Kamal Lala. She has done a research project on 'Women Train Commuters on the Suburban Section of the Western Railway in Mumbai' which is part of her thesis (in collaboration with Rushila) for a Research Methodology course at Nirmala Niketan College of Social Work, Mumbai. About the Participants: Radhika Bordia is a journalist and filmmaker who works with NDTV. Kamal Lala has worked with "Sakhiya: Anti-Dowry and Women's Guidance Cell" at Nirmala Niketan College of Social Work, Mumbai. 4. Saturday, November 29, 2003 Monthly Lecture Series in Marathi Topic: Worship Houses in Mumbai Speaker: Phiroz Ranade Venue: Rachna Sansad Time: 10:30 a.m. Phiroz Ranade will discuss "Worship Houses in Mumbai". He has been working on this subject since 1993 and has documented about 500 worship houses in Mumbai covering religions such as Hinduism, Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Sikhism and Jainism. He will cover all places of worship starting from rock-cut caves to the more recent structures. The point of this talk/discussion is to illustrate the co-existence of these structures within the city of Mumbai. About the Speaker: Phiroz Ranade is a Mumbai based architect. _____ PUKAR (Partners for Urban Knowledge Action & Research) Mumbai. E-Mail Phone +91 (022) 2207 7779, +91 98204 04010 Web Site http://www.pukar.org.in _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From maheshwari_anupam at rediffmail.com Tue Nov 4 16:55:38 2003 From: maheshwari_anupam at rediffmail.com (anupam maheshwari) Date: 4 Nov 2003 11:25:38 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] (no subject) Message-ID: <20031104112538.23258.qmail@webmail28.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031104/b4b45b55/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- The Real Reasons for the War With Iraq: This essay is a Macroeconomic and Geostrategic Analysis of the Unspoken Truth written in an effort to inform and stimulate debate on the crucial but true issues surrounding the Iraq war. By Anupam Maheshwari Summary: The answer to the Iraq enigma is simple yet shocking -- it is an oil currency war. The real reason for this war is this administration’s goal of preventing further Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) momentum towards the euro as an oil transaction currency standard. However, in order to pre-empt OPEC, they need to gain geo-strategic control of Iraq along with its 2nd largest proven oil reserves. This essay will discuss the macroeconomics of the ‘petro-dollar’ and the unpublicized but real threat to U.S. economic hegemony from the euro as an alternative oil transaction currency. As US government prepared to go to war with Iraq, the country was unable to answer even the most basic questions about this conflict. First, why is there almost no international support to topple Saddam? If Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction (WMD) program truly possessed the threat level that President Bush has repeatedly purported, why are their historic allies not joining a coalition to militarily disarm Saddam? Secondly, despite over 350 unfettered U.N inspections, there has been no evidence reported that Iraq has reconstituted its WMD program. Indeed, the Bush administration’s claims about Iraq’s WMD capability appear demonstrably false. Third, and despite President Bush’s rhetoric, the CIA has not found any links between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda. To the contrary, some intelligence analysts believe it is far more likely Al Qaeda might acquire an unsecured former Soviet Union Weapon(s) of Mass Destruction, or potentially from sympathizers within a destabilized Pakistan. Moreover, immediately following Congress’s vote on the Iraq Resolution, we suddenly became aware of North Korea’s nuclear program violations. Kim Jong Il is processing uranium in order to produce nuclear weapons this year. President Bush has not provided a rationale answer as to why Saddam’s seemingly dormant WMD program possesses a more imminent threat than North Korea’s active nuclear weapons program. Strangely, Donald Rumsfeld suggested that if Saddam were ‘exiled’ we could avoid an Iraq war. Confused yet? Well, I’m going to give their game away -- the core driver for toppling Saddam is actually the euro currency. The war in Iraq is mostly about how the ruling class at Langley and the Bush/Cheney administration view hydrocarbons at the geo-strategic level, and the overarching macroeconomic threats to the U.S. dollar from the euro. The Federal Reserve’s greatest nightmare is that OPEC will switch its international transactions from a dollar standard to a euro standard. Iraq actually made this switch in Nov. 2000 (when the euro was worth around 82 cents), and has actually made off like a bandit considering the dollar’s steady depreciation against the euro. (Note: the dollar declined 17% against the euro in 2002.). The real reason the Bush administration wants a puppet government in Iraq -- or more importantly, the reason why the corporate-military-industrial network conglomerate wants a puppet government in Iraq -- is so that it will revert back to a dollar standard and stay that way. While also hoping to veto any wider OPEC momentum towards the euro, especially from Iran -- the 2nd largest OPEC producer who is actively discussing a switch to euros for its oil exports. Furthermore, despite Saudi Arabia being US’s ‘client state,’ the Saudi regime appears increasingly weak/threatened from massive civil unrest. Some analysts believe a ‘Saudi Revolution’ might be plausible in the aftermath of an unpopular U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. Undoubtedly, the Bush administration is acutely aware of these risks. Hence, the neo-conservative framework entails a large and permanent military presence in the Persian Gulf region in a post-Saddam era, just in case US needs to surround and control Saudi’s Ghawar oil fields in the event of a coup by an anti-western group. But first back to Iraq. "Saddam sealed his fate when he decided to switch to the euro in late 2000 (and later converted his $10 billion reserve fund at the U.N. to euros) -- at that point, another manufactured Gulf War became inevitable under Bush II. Only the most extreme circumstances could have possibly stop that now and I strongly doubt anything could -- short of Saddam getting replaced with a pliant regime. Baghdad’s switch from the dollar to the euro for oil trading is intended to rebuke Washington’s hard-line on sanctions and encourage Europeans to challenge it. But the political message will cost Iraq millions in lost revenue. At the time of the switch many analysts were surprised that Saddam was willing to give up millions in oil revenue for what appeared to be a political statement. However, the steady depreciation of the dollar versus the euro since late 2001 means that Iraq has profited handsomely from the switch in their reserve and transaction currencies. Indeed, The Observer surprisingly divulged these facts in a recent article entitled: ‘Iraq nets handsome profit by dumping dollar for euro,’(February 16, 2003). This Observer article illustrates that the euro has gained almost 25% against the dollar since late 2001. This also applies to the $10 billion in Iraq’s U.N. ‘oil for food’ reserve fund that was previously held in dollars -- it has also gained that same percent value since the switch. According to macroeconomists, the following scenario would occur if OPEC made a sudden (collective) switch to euros, as opposed to a gradual transition: "Otherwise, the effect of an OPEC switch to the euro would be that oil-consuming nations would have to flush dollars out of their (central bank) reserve funds and replace these with euros. The dollar would crash anywhere from 20-40% in value and the consequences would be those one could expect from any currency collapse and massive inflation (think Argentina currency crisis, for example). You’d have foreign funds stream out of the U.S. stock markets and dollar denominated assets, there’d surely be a run on the banks much like the 1930s, the current account deficit would become unserviceable, the budget deficit would go into default, and so on. "The United States economy is intimately tied to the dollar’s role as reserve currency. This doesn’t mean that the U.S. couldn’t function otherwise, but that the transition would have to be gradual to avoid such dislocations (and the ultimate result of this would probably be the U.S. and the E.U. switching roles in the global economy)." Although the above scenario is unlikely, and most assuredly undesirable, under certain economic conditions it is plausible. In the aftermath of toppling Saddam it is clear the U.S. will keep a large and permanent military force in the Persian Gulf. Indeed, there is no ‘exit strategy,’ as the military will be needed to protect the newly installed regime, and to send a message to other OPEC producers that they might receive ‘regime change’ if they convert their oil payments to euros. An interesting story in Observer was published related to another OPEC ‘Axis of Evil’ country, Iran, who is vacillating on the euro issue: "Politics is still likely to be a factor in any decision, they said, as Iran uses the opportunity to hit back at the U.S. government, which recently labeled it part of an ‘axis of evil.‘ "More than half of the country’s assets in the Forex Reserve Fund have been converted to euro, a member of the Parliament Development Commission, Mohammad Abasspour announced. He noted that higher parity rate of euro against the US dollar will give the Asian countries, particularly oil exporters, a chance to usher in a new chapter in ties with European Union’s member countries. He said that the United States dominates other countries through its currency, noting that given the superiority of the dollar against other hard currencies, the US monopolizes global trade. The lawmaker expressed hope that the competition between euro and dollar would eliminate the monopoly in global trade." After toppling Saddam, this administration may decide that Iran’s disloyalty to the dollar qualifies them as the next target in the ‘war on terror.’ Iran’s interest in switching to the euro as their currency for oil exports is well documented. Aside from these political risks regarding Saudi Arabia and Iran, another risk factor is actually Japan. Perhaps the biggest gamble in a protracted Iraq war may be Japan’s weak economy. If the war creates prolonged oil high prices ($45 per barrel over several months), or a short but massive oil price spike ($80 to $100 per barrel), some analysts believe Japan’s fragile economy would collapse. Japan is quite hypersensitive to oil prices, and if its banks default, the collapse of the second largest economy would set in motion a sequence of events that could prove quite devastating to the U.S. economy. Indeed, Japan’s fall in an Iraq war could create the economic dislocations and quickly spread to Europe and Russia. Unlike the U.S. and U.K., the Russian government lacks the controls to thwart a disorderly run on the dollar, and such an event could ultimately force an OPEC switch to euros. Additionally, other risks might arise if the Iraq war goes poorly or becomes prolonged. It is possible that civil unrest may unfold in Kuwait or other OPEC members including Venezuela, as the latter has indicated they may switch to euros just as Saddam did in November 2000. This would foster the very situation this administration is trying to prevent: another OPEC member switching to euros as their oil transaction currency. Incidently, the CIA estimates that North Korea could produce 4-6 nuclear weapons by the end of 2003. Ironically, this crisis over North Korea’s nuclear program further confirms the fraudulent premise for which this war with Saddam has been contrived. Unfortunately, neo-conservatives such as George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle fail to grasp that Newton’s Law applies equally to both physics and the geo-political sphere as well: "For every action there is an equal but opposite reaction." During the 1990s the world viewed the U.S. as a rather self-absorbed but essentially benevolent superpower. Military actions in Iraq (1990-91 & 1998), Serbia and Kosovo (1999) were undertaken with both U.N. and NATO cooperation and thus afforded international legitimacy. President Clinton also worked to reduce tensions in Northern Ireland and attempted to negotiate a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. US as a superpower status was viewed as benign. However, in both the pre and post 9/11 intervals, the ‘America first’ policies of the Bush administration, with its unwillingness to honor International Treaties, along with their aggressive militarisation of foreign policy, has significantly damaged their reputation. Following 9/11, it appears that President Bush’s ‘warmongering rhetoric’ has created global tensions -- as US is now viewed as a belligerent superpower willing to apply unilateral military force without U.N. approval. Moreover, this administration’s failure to actively engage in negotiations regarding the Israeli/Palestinian conflict is unfortunate. Lamentably, the tremendous amount of international sympathy that we witnessed in the immediate aftermath of the September 11th tragedy has been replaced with fear and anger at every government. This administration’s bellicosity has changed the worldview, and ‘anti-Americanism’ is proliferating even among their closest allies. Even more alarming are significant monetary shifts in the reserve funds of foreign governments away from the dollar with movements towards the euro. It appears that the world community lacks faith in the Bush administration’s economic policies, and along with OPEC, seems poised to respond with economic retribution if the U.S. government is regarded as an uncontrollable and dangerous superpower. The U.S. economy has acquired significant structural imbalances, including record-high trade account deficit (now almost 5% of GDP) and the recent return to annual budget deficits in the hundreds of billions. These factors would devalue the currency of any nation under the ‘old rules.’ Why is the dollar still predominant despite these structural imbalances? While many Americans assume the strength of the U.S. dollar merely rests on economic output (i.e. GDP), the ruling elites understand that the dollar’s strength is based on two fundamentally unique advantages relative to all other hard currencies. The reality is that the strength of the U.S. dollar since 1945 rests on its being the international reserve currency. Thus it assumes the role of fiat currency for global oil transactions (ie. ‘petro-dollar’). The U.S. prints hundreds of billions of these fiat petro-dollars, which are then used by nation states to purchase oil/energy from OPEC producers (except Iraq, to some degree Venezuela, and perhaps Iran in the near future). These petro-dollars are then re-cycled from OPEC back into the U.S. via Treasury Bills or other dollar-denominated assets such as U.S. stocks, real estate, etc. In essence, global oil consumption provides a subsidy to the U.S. economy. Hence, the Europeans created the euro to compete with the dollar as an alternative international reserve currency. Obviously the E.U. would like oil priced in euros as well. The following excerpts from an Asia Times article discusses the virtues of fiat oil currency and dollar hegemony (or vices from the perspective of developing nations, whose debt is denominated in dollars). "Ever since 1971, when US president Richard Nixon took the dollar off the gold standard (at $35 per ounce) that had been agreed to at the Bretton Woods Conference at the end of World War II, the dollar has been a global monetary instrument that the United States, and only the United States, can produce by fiat. The dollar, now a fiat currency, is at a 16-year trade-weighted high despite record US current-account deficits and the status of the US as the leading debtor nation. The US national debt as of April 4 was $6.021 trillion against a gross domestic product (GDP) of $9 trillion. World trade is now a game in which the US produces dollars and the rest of the world produces things that dollars can buy. The world’s interlinked economies no longer trade to capture a comparative advantage; they compete in exports to capture needed dollars to service dollar-denominated foreign debts and to accumulate dollar reserves to sustain the exchange value of their domestic currencies. To prevent speculative and manipulative attacks on their currencies, the world’s central banks must acquire and hold dollar reserves in corresponding amounts to their currencies in circulation. The higher the market pressure to devalue a particular currency, the more dollar reserves its central bank must hold. This creates a built-in support for a strong dollar that in turn forces the world’s central banks to acquire and hold more dollar reserves, making it stronger. This phenomenon is known as dollar hegemony, which is created by the geopolitically constructed peculiarity that critical commodities, most notably oil, are denominated in dollars. Everyone accepts dollars because dollars can buy oil. The recycling of petro-dollars is the price the US has extracted from oil-producing countries for US tolerance of the oil-exporting cartel since 1973. By definition, dollar reserves must be invested in US assets, creating a capital-accounts surplus for the US economy. Even after a year of sharp correction, US stock valuation is still at a 25-year high and trading at a 56 percent premium compared with emerging markets. ". . . The US capital-account surplus in turn finances the US trade deficit. Moreover, any asset, regardless of location, that is denominated in dollars is a US asset in essence. When oil is denominated in dollars through US state action and the dollar is a fiat currency, the US essentially owns the world’s oil for free. And the more the US prints greenbacks, the higher the price of US assets will rise. Thus a strong-dollar policy gives the US a double win." This unique geo-political agreement with Saudi Arabia in 1973 has worked to US favor for the past 30 years, as this arrangement has eliminated our currency risk for oil, raised the entire asset value of all dollar denominated assets/properties, and allowed the Federal Reserve to create a truly massive debt and credit expansion (or ‘credit bubble’ in the view of some economists). These structural imbalances in the U.S. economy are sustainable as long as: 1. nations continue to demand and purchase oil for their energy/survival needs, and 2. the fiat reserve currency for global oil transactions remain the U.S. dollar (and dollar only). These underlying factors, along with the ‘safe harbor’ reputation of U.S. investments afforded by the dollar’s reserve currency status propelled the U.S. to economic and military hegemony in the post-World War II period. However, the introduction of the euro is a significant new factor, and appears to be the primary threat to U.S. economic hegemony. Moreover, in December 2002 ten additional countries were approved for full membership into the E.U. In 2004 this will result in an aggregate GDP of $9.6 trillion and 450 million people, directly competing with the U.S. economy ($10.5 trillion GDP, 280 million people). It should be noted that since late 2002, the euro has been trading at parity or above the dollar, and analysts predict the dollar will continue its downward trending in 2003 relative to the euro. It appears the final two pivotal items that would create the OPEC transition to euros will be based on (1) if and when Norway’s Brent crude is denominated in euros and (2) when the U.K. adopts the euro. Regarding the later, Tony Blair is lobbying heavily for the U.K. to adopt the euro, and their adoption would seem imminent within this decade. If and when the U.K. adopts the euro currency I suspect a concerted effort will be quickly mounted to establish the euro as an international reserve currency. Finally, the maneuvers toward reducing the global dominance of the dollar are already well underway and have only reason to accelerate so far as I can see. An OPEC pricing shift would seem rather unlikely prior 2004 -- barring political motivations (ie. from anxious OPEC members) or a disorderly collapse of the dollar (ie. Japanese bank collapse due to high oil prices following a prolonged Iraq conflict) but appears quite viable to take place before the end of the decade." In other words, around 2005/2006, from a purely economic and monetary perspective, it will become logical for several OPEC producers to transition to the euro for oil pricing. Of course that will devalue the dollar, and hurt the US economy unless it begins making structural and monetary changes right away -- or use its massive military power to force events upon OPEC . . . Facing these potentialities, I hypothesize that President Bush pretends to topple Saddam in 2003 in a pre-emptive attempt to initiate massive Iraqi oil production in far excess of OPEC quotas, to reduce global oil prices, and thereby dismantle OPEC’s price controls. The end-goal of the neo-conservatives is incredibly bold yet simple in purpose, to use the ‘war on terror’ as the premise to finally dissolve OPEC’s decision-making process, thus ultimately preventing the cartel’s inevitable switch to pricing oil in euros. How would the Bush administration break-up the OPEC cartel’s price controls in a post-Saddam Iraq? First, the newly installed regime (apparently a U.S. General) will convert Iraq back to the dollar standard. Next, with the U.S. military protecting the oil fields, the new ruling junta will undertake the necessary steps to rapidly increase production of Iraq oil -- well beyond OPEC’s 2 million barrel per day quota. An Iraq that can produce that much oil will want to do so, and will not allow OPEC to limit it to 2 million barrels per day. If Iraq busts its quota, then who in OPEC will give up 5 million barrels of production? No one could afford to, and OPEC would die. The OPEC cartel could feel threatened by the goal of the neo-conservatives to break-up OPEC’s price controls ($22-$28 per barrel). Perhaps the Bush administration’s ambitious goal of flooding the oil market with Iraqi crude may work, but I have doubts. Will OPEC simply tolerate quota-busting Iraqi oil production? Contrarily, OPEC could meet and in an act of self-preservation re-denominate the oil currency to the euro. Such a decision would mark the end of U.S. dollar hegemony, and thus the end of US’s precarious economic superpower status. One of the dirty little secrets of today’s international order is that the rest of the globe could topple the United States from its hegemonic status whenever they so choose with a concerted abandonment of the dollar standard. This is America’s preeminent, inescapable Achilles Heel for now and the foreseeable future. Synopsis: Under the guise of the perpetual ‘war on terror’ the Bush administration is manipulating the American people about the unspoken but very real macroeconomic reasons for this war with Iraq. This war in Iraq was not based on any threat from Saddam’s old WMD program, or from terrorism. This war was over the global currency of oil. A war intended to prevent oil from being priced in euros. Furthermore, Americans seem unable to address the structural weakness of their economy due to massive debt manipulation, unaffordable 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, record levels of trade deficits, unsustainable credit expansion, corporate accounting abuses, near zero personal savings, record personal indebtedness, and our reliance and over consumption of Middle Eastern oil. Paradoxically, this administration’s belligerent policies may bring about the very outcome they hope to prevent -- an OPEC currency switch to euros. Background Information on Hydrocarbons Other than the core driver of the dollar versus euro currency threat, the other issue related to the war with Iraq appears related to some disappointing geological findings regarding the Caspian Sea region. Since the mid-late 1990s the Caspian Sea region of Central Asia was thought to hold approximately 200 billion barrels of untapped oil (the later would be comparable to Saudi Arabia’s reserve base)." Based on an early feasibility study by Enron, the easiest and cheapest way to bring this oil to market would be a pipeline from Kazakhstan, through Afghanistan to the Pakistan border at Malta. In 1998 then CEO of Halliburton, Dick Cheney, expressed much interest in building that pipeline. In fact, these oil reserves were a central component of Cheney’s energy plan released in May 2001. According to his report, the U.S. will import 90% of its oil by 2020. Thus tapping into the reserves in the Caspian Sea region was viewed as a strategic goal that would help meet our growing energy demand and also reduce their dependence on oil from the Middle East. According to the French book, The Forbidden Truth, the Bush administration ignored the U.N. sanctions that had been imposed upon the Taliban and entered into negotiations with the supposedly ‘rogue regime’ from February 2, 2001 to August 6, 2001. According to this book, the Taliban were apparently not very cooperative based on the statements of Pakistan’s former ambassador, Mr. Naik. He reports that the U.S. threatened a ‘military option’ in the summer of 2001 if the Taliban did not acquiesce to our demands. Fortuitous for the Bush administration and Cheney’s energy plan, Bin Laden delivered 9/11. The pre-positioned U.S. military, along with the CIA providing cash to the Northern Alliance leaders, led the invasion of Afghanistan and the Taliban were routed. The pro-western Karzai government was ushered in. The pipeline project was now back on track in early 2002, well, sort of . . . After three exploratory wells were built and analyzed, it was reported that the Caspian region holds only approximately 10 to 20 billion barrels of oil (although it does have a lot of natural gas). The oil is also of poor quality, with high sulfur content. Subsequently, several major companies have now dropped their plans for the pipeline citing the massive project was no longer profitable. Unfortunately, this recent realization about the Caspian Sea region has serious implications for the U.S., India, China, Asia and Europe, as the amount of available hydrocarbons for industrialized and developing nations has been decreased downward by 20%. (Global estimates reduced from 1.2 trillion to approximately 1 trillion). The Bush administration quickly turned its attention to a known quantity, Iraq, with its proven reserves totaling 11% of the world’s proven oil reserves (112 billion barrels). However, no geological surveys have been conducted in Iraq since the 1970s. Russian, French, and U.S. oil companies are eager to lease Iraq’s unexplored fields, which may contain up to 200 billion barrels. Our greatest nemesis, Bin Laden, was quickly replaced with our new public enemy #1, Saddam Hussein. ‘The Real Reasons for the War With Iraq’ "Oil, Currency, and the War on Iraq": One of the stated economic objectives, and perhaps the primary objective, when setting up the euro was to turn it into a reserve currency to challenge the dollar so that Europe too could get something for nothing. This however would be a disaster for the US. Not only would they lose a large part of their annual subsidy of effectively free goods and services, but countries switching to euro reserves from dollar reserves would bring down the value of the US currency. Imports would start to cost Americans a lot more and as increasing numbers of those holding dollars began to spend them, the US would have to start paying its debts by supplying in goods and services to foreign countries, thus reducing American living standards. As countries and businesses converted their dollar assets into euro assets, the US property and stock market bubbles would, without doubt, burst. The Federal Reserve would no longer be able to print more money to reflate the bubble, as it is currently openly considering doing, because, without lots of eager foreigners prepared to mop them up, a serious inflation would result which, in turn, would make foreigners even more reluctant to hold the US currency and thus heighten the crisis. There is though one major obstacle to this happening: oil. Oil is not just by far the most important commodity traded internationally, it is the lifeblood of all modern industrialised economies. If you don’t have oil, you have to buy it. And if you want to buy oil in the international markets, you usually have to have dollars. Until recently all OPEC countries agreed to sell their oil for dollars only. So long as this remained the case, the euro was unlikely to become the major reserve currency: there is not a lot of point in stockpiling euros if every time you need to buy oil you have to change them into dollars. This arrangement also meant that the US effectively part-controlled the entire world oil market: you could only buy oil if you had dollars, and only one country had the right to print dollars -- the US. If on the other hand OPEC were to decide to accept euros only for its oil (assuming for a moment it were allowed to make this decision), then American economic dominance would be over. Not only would Europe not need as many dollars anymore, but Japan which imports over 80% of its oil from the Middle East would think it wise to convert a large portion of its dollar assets to euro assets (Japan is the major subsidizer of the US because it holds so many dollar investments). The US on the other hand, being the world’s largest oil importer would have, to run a trade surplus to acquire euros. The conversion from trade deficit to trade surplus would have to be achieved at a time when its property and stock market prices were in doldrums and its domestic supplies of oil and gas were contracting. It would be a very painful conversion. The purely economic arguments for OPEC converting to the euro, at least for a while, seem very strong. The Euro-zone does not run a huge trade deficit nor is it heavily indebted to the rest of the world like the US and interest rates in the Euro-zone are also significantly higher. The Euro-zone has a larger share of world trade than the US and is the Middle East’s main trading partner. And nearly everything you can buy for dollars you can also buy for euros -- apart, of course, from oil.. . . All of this is bad news for the US economy and the dollar. The fear for Washington will be that not only will the future price of oil not be right, but the currency might not be right either. Which perhaps helps explain why the US is increasingly turning to its second major tool for dominating world affairs: the military force, first one being the economic force. Considering the economic challenges that each nation faces, I advocate that the global monetary system be reformed without delay. This would include the dollar and euro designated as equal international reserve currencies and placed within an exchange band along with a dual-OPEC oil transaction currency standard. Additionally, the G-8 nations should also explore a third reserve currency option regarding a yen/yuan bloc for East Asia. These reforms may lower US’s standard of living slightly, but would create a far more equitable global monetary system, and thus hopefully mitigate future armed or economic warfare over the currency of oil. Tragically, President Bush and his administration do not appear willing to initiate the arduous structural changes that their economy must undertake if they are to adapt and compete with the euro as a second international reserve currency. Instead, they intend to enforce U.S. dollar hegemony for oil transactions via the application of superior U.S. military force. This essay illustrates this dangerous, military-centric strategy could ultimately result in failure, as monetary maneuvers against the U.S. dollar by the international community. From grade at vsnl.com Tue Nov 4 22:49:37 2003 From: grade at vsnl.com (rakesh) Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 22:49:37 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] A World without Homophobia Message-ID: <001e01c3a2f7$d87e8d20$980110ac@net> Excerpts from 'Homophobia - A Weapon of Sexism' by Suzanne Pharr "What will the world be like without homophobia in it - for everyone, female and male, whatever sexual identity? Here are some of the answers women have given: *KIds won't be called tomboys or sissies, they'll just be who they are,able to do what they wish. * People will be able to love anyone, no matter what sex; the issue will simply be whether or not she/he is a good human being, compatible and loving. * Affection will be opened up between women and men, women and women, men and men, and it won't be centred on sex; people won't fear being called names if they show affection to someone who isn't a mate or potential mate. * If affection is opened up, then isolation willbe broken down for all of us, especially for those who generally experience little physical affection, such as unmarried old people. * Women will be able to work whatever jobs we want without being labelled masculine. * There will be less violence if men do not feel they have to prove and assert their manhood. Their desire to dominate and control will not spill over from the personal to the level of national and international politics and the use of bigger and better weapons to control other countries. * People will wear whatever clothes they wish, with the priority being comfort rather than the display of feminity or masculinity. * Their will be no gender roles. " -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031104/ca761d5c/attachment.html From treborscholz at earthlink.net Thu Nov 6 03:14:08 2003 From: treborscholz at earthlink.net (trebor scholz) Date: Wed, 05 Nov 2003 16:44:08 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Discordia Guest Host Natalie Bookchin Message-ID: From: Discordia_Collective To: Sarai List Subject: Discordia Welcomes Guest Host Natalie Bookchin This week Discordia welcomes Special Guest Host Natalie Bookchin! Natalie Bookchin (http://action-tank.org) is an artist who is currently working with Jackie Stevens (http://jacquelinestevens.org) on a project called agoraXchange (http://agoraXchange.net), that will launch on January 14. AgoraXchange is an online project where anyone can participate in any capacity in collaborating on the game design for an online multiplayer game that enacts a radical political alternative to our present world order. She will be discussing using metaphors of open source and structures of peer to peer networking to try to organize creative and political projects, and lots of things in between. http://www.discordia.us == Discordia's question of the week this time is: What do these sections mean? Find out: http://www.discordia.us/scoop/special/faq_sections Join in: http://www.discordia.us/scoop/special/faq_participation - in the language and style of your choice, of course! == Just click the "user prefs" link in the red box after you log in, and you'll see a box that lets you subscribe to Discordia Digest on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis. Discordia's rdf feed: http://rdf.discordia.us/discordia.rdf Feeds (summaries of news from a website) allow you to get notified when there's a new post to discordia, or any other RSS syndicated site, or when there's a change to a blog or wiki you like. For more information: http://www.discordia.us/scoop/special/feedprimer Discordia-bytes for WAP-enabled phones: Get the latest Discordia story intros on your mobile phone. Just point your WAP-capable phone at: http://rdf.discordia.us/wap.wml == Discordia || And Welcome to It http://www.discordia.us From nyvoices at indypress.org Thu Nov 6 02:25:30 2003 From: nyvoices at indypress.org (Rehan Ansari) Date: Wed, 5 Nov 2003 15:55:30 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Edition 89: 6 November 2003. Message-ID: <010401c3a3df$84060f50$6901a8c0@herman> This Week's Voices That Must Be Heard By IPA-New York, a sponsored project of the Independent Press Association Edition 89: 6 November 2003. Advisory editor Javed Anwar, of Muslims Weekly, an IPA member publication. NEWS ITEMS: Korean and Chinese apparel manufacturers' associations join hands by Jee-won Chung, Korea Times New York, 28 October 2003. Translated from Korean by Sun-yong Reinish. This move has generated great interest in the New York apparel manufacturing and business world. MORE. A Black King rules New York chess, inspiring kids across the nation by Joanne Kontopirakis, Caribbean Life, 14 October 2003. English language. Though chess is thought of as a cerebral game, the room is filled with noisy exclamations and schoolyard banter. Losers are called "son," by their triumphant opponents. MORE. Pakistani businessman in detention for seven months, Pakistan Post, 29 October 2003. Translated from Urdu by Rehan Ansari. >From a detention center in Denver Rahman spoke to the Pakistan Post over the phone. He believes that a rival shopkeeper, a non-Pakistani, maliciously tipped off the FBI. Fourteen agents searched his store for four hours and found nothing. He had no criminal record either. Rahman is a legal resident of the United States and is married to a Mexican American, non-Muslim citizen. MORE. Staten Island speaks Russian by Arkady Kagan, Russian Forward, 6 November 2003. Translated from Russian by Marian Bassett. There are 50,000 Russian immigrants living in Staten Island. Russian American Council of Staten Island, a community organization, will seek acknowledgment from the political establishment and fight any form of discrimination. MORE. BRIEFS: Study says New York is cruel to immigrants, America Oggi, 20 October 2003. Translated from Italian by Katherine Sigelman. Detained while pursuing a driver's license by Marek Tomaszewski, Nowy Dziennik / Polish Daily News, 29 October 2003. Translated from Polish by Ania Milewska. 3000 Asian women suffering from domestic violence called hotlines by Sin-Cha Lin, World Journal, 30 October 2003. Translated from Chinese by Connie Kong. Bronx Borough President says citizens are frustrated with Bloomberg by Jose Acosta, El Diario / La Prensa, 30 October 2003. Translated from Spanish by Hirsh Sawhney. EDITORIALS: How is your child doing in school? by Mohan Jethwani, Desi Talk, 7 November 2003. English language. Are you (parents) involved in school affairs? MORE. As always we welcome questions, suggestions, corrections and letters to the editor. Rehan Ansari Editor, Independent Press Association - New York nyvoices at indypress.org* 212/279-1442 * 143 West 29th St., 901, New York City, 10001 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031105/6b138fcc/attachment.html From eye at ranadasgupta.com Thu Nov 6 18:49:52 2003 From: eye at ranadasgupta.com (Rana Dasgupta) Date: Thu, 6 Nov 2003 18:49:52 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Another history of Mumbai: jazz Message-ID: Bombay & The Swinging Sixties STANLEY PINTO, old Bombay boy and night club pianist, describes the rocking times that the city was witness to in the 1960s. http://www.uppercrustindia.com/10crust/ten/mumbai6.htm A man called Chris Perry died in Mumbai a few weeks ago. The news didn't send even the tiniest ripple out onto the turgid waters of this restless megalopolis. In its headlong rush into tomorrow, Mumbai has become a city uncaring of the yesterdays from which its today is cast; constantly moulting, constantly and unconcernedly shedding memories of times past. Chris Perry is one such forgotten memory of the great jazz age of Mumbai that once was Bombay. Alongside Hecke Kingdom and Norman Mobsby and Tony Pinto and Neville Thomas and Seby Dias and Sweet Lorraine and Wendy and... but I'm getting ahead of my story about the long-ago-and-far-away nightlife of Bombay. A scene of a hundred (or so it seemed) jazz dives and cabarets that made Bombay the centre of India's entertainment world in the 60s, 70s and 80s. I discovered this exciting world as a 16-year-old in 1959 when I ran into Dorothy Jones on Colaba Causeway. Dorothy was the pianist who accompanied all comers on the late great impressario Hamid Sayani's Ovaltine Amateur Hour over Radio Ceylon, the FM radio of its time. Teetering on impossible stiletto heels, her red hair crowned by a magnificent tres chic turban, she enveloped me in a deliciously bosomy hug. Hello luv, how lovely to see you, do you still sing, how is your piano playing, you must come and see us at Berry's, come to the jam session next Sunday morning. And she was gone in a cloudburst of Channel No. 5. Sunday morning couldn't come around soon enough. When it did, I ducked my sainted mother after church, dashed off to the nearby railway station, and ten minutes later there I was at Berry's little restaurant, just past the Tea Centre on Churchgate Street. The band was already swinging: Dorothy at the piano was the Marian McPartland of Bombay's jazz. Her son Robin on drums, the elegant Percy Borthwick on bass and behind the largest dark glasses I'd ever seen, Dennis Rosario, a magnificent guitarist in the Barney Kessel style. A reed of a man, Georgie Rich, who later became a good friend, was doing a Mel Torme on Sweet Georgia Brown. The joint, to use Cab Calloway's signature phrase, was jumping, and in ten minutes it changed my take on life in the fast line. I'd discovered the magical, mesmerising, unashamedly decadent and just slightly seedy world of life and dark. At the far end of Churchgate Street, just across from today's Jazz by the Bay (which didn't exist then) was the bistro Napoli. No live band but with Bombay's first and only juke box, very popular with the college set. Almost next door was The Ambassador hotel, lair of Jack Voyantzis, it's Greek owner, a beautiful woman always on his arm, a giant Havana ever between his teeth. The restaurant at the hotel was called The Other Room and India's most reputed jazz agglomeration. The Tony Pinto Quartet, was in residence. Tony Pinto was a short, bald martinet of a man who drilled his band to perfection in polished, if somewhat pre-meditated, jazz arrangements. The quartet was fronted by Norman Mobsby on tenor saxophone, as aggressive as Coleman Hawkins, as gentle as Ben Webster. The Other Room was where the well-heeled went to dinner. Every night was black tie night, and you were Social Register if Jack knew your first name and your wife well enough to kiss her gently on the mouth. The wives seldom resisted, I might add. Fifty yards down was Bombelli's, Swiss Freddi's eponymous restaurant. Advertising men gathered in its al fresco forecourt each evening, sipping the only genuine (or so Freddie said) cappuccinos in town, made from a shiny, hissing coffee machine. A trio played at nights. It was all very Continental. Right next door, over a fence so low you conveniently held conversations and exchanged criossants for pakodas across it, was Berry's. As Indian as it's neighbour wasn't. The Tandoori Butter Chicken to die for. And the Dorothy Jones Quartet with Marguerite at the mike, as the advertising said. A few years later, after Dorothy and all of her band had emigrated to the UK, I led my own trio there. Across Berry's was the original Gaylord restaurant. The band was led by Ken Cumine, India's only jazz violinist, replete with soft suits of pure cashmere, a shiny white violin and radiant daughter Sweet Lorraine at the microphone. Around the corner, just across from the Eros cinema, was the Astoria hotel with its famous Venice restaurant. Famous because this was the jazz musicians' jazz hideout. For years, the diminutive trumpeter Chris Perry led his quintet there. There was the incomparable Felix Torcato on piano; years later he moved to Calcutta, first leading a wonderful quarter and later a big band at the Oberoi Grand, with his spectacular wife Diane as partner and singer. On tenor saxophone with Chris was his brother Paul, a happy laughing buddha of a man. And out in front was Molly, a singer in the Sarah Vaughn mould, one of the best we've ever seen in the country. Some years later, the Astoria opened a second restaurant. They called it Skyline and it opened with a young alto saxophonist who was continued over the next three decades to dominate the Indian jazz scene. The man was Braz Gonsalves and what a heart-stopping quartet it was. Xavier Fernandes, the most cerebral pianist of his time, Leslie Godinho, the 'dada' of the Hindi film percussionists on drums and... dashed if I can recall the bassist. I think perhaps it was Dinshaw 'Balsi' Balsara, advertising art director and clothes horse who later went on to become one of Asia's most successful commercial photographers in Hong Kong. When Chris Perry moved on to Calcutta, Braz shifted to the Venice. The quartet grew into a quintet with the addition of a tenor saxophonist. Leslie made way for Wency, the most dynamic young drummer of his era, and Bombay rocked to the Cannonball Adderley sound. For almost a decade Venice was the meeting place for jazz men from all over the country and indeed the world. Dave Brubeck visited and sat in, regal if a little incongruous in his particular jazz genre. Duke Ellington came two nights in a row after he discovered half his orchestra moonlighting with Braz and the gang. Venice was the Blue Note of India's swingingest jazz scene and would we miss a single evening of it? Perish the thought. Across the road at the Ritz hotel was The Little Hut. Neville Thomas, one of the most dashing men around town, led a group called Three Guys and a Doll. The luscious Shirley Myers was the doll. (Thirty years later I met Shirley one evening at Jazz at the Bay and she's still a doll!) Later, when Molly returned from Calcutta to marry her piano player sweetheart Mervyn, they took over at The Little Hut for many years. >From that spot, it was a brisk walk past Flora Fountain, where, plumb opposite Akbarally's, were Bistro and Volga, the two most popular haunts of the younger set. Seby Dias held court at Bistro, with my school friend Johnny at the piano and a hugely talented young lady called Ursula at the mike. She was the daughter of one of India's best known orchestra leaders of the big band era. Chic Chocolate, as unprepossessing as Chic was dashing, and just as gifted. At Volga next door Hecke Kingdom's Quartet held sway. Hecke was India's only baritone sax man, a grandfatherly man, gentle and wise. In delightful contrast, the trio that backed him was more mischief than a tribe of monkeys. Richie Marquis on piano, Percy on bass and Maxie on drums. But what an unbelievable prolific trio it was. There probably hasn't been another like it since. Off the beaten track at Kala Ghoda, around the corner from Khyber restaurant, suddenly, from nowhere, a restaurant called La Bella opened in 1961. And it opened with a British sextet called the Margaret Mason band, with Margie Mason herself on an enthralling instrument we had never seen before: the vibraharp. As college kids, we swiftly became habitues of the 11.00 a.m. coffee session. All it took was 75p for the Espresso, not to mention the continuous acts of petty larceny to find that princely sum six days a week. And finally, across from the Yacht Club at Dhanraj Mahal, there was the Alibaba where now stands a Chinese restaurant. George Fernandes on piano, Cassie on bass and Louis Armstrong vocals. Wilfred on drums. In time, riding the crest of the jazz juggernaut, these niteries were joined by clubs at the Taj Mahal hotel, the Oberoi, the Nataraj on Marine Drive, the Shalimar at Kemp's Corner, the Sundowner at the Sun'n'Sand, and restaurants like the Blue Nile at New Marine Lines, the Talk of the Town on Marine Drive and the second Bombelli's at Worli. With them came new young stars. Iqbal Singh, the turbaned Navy ensign doing his frantic Elvis Presly thing. Bonnie Remedios, India's Fats Domino. Sunder the Gay Caballero. Not quite jazz but what the hell. And there was this callow, beardless fellow, barely out of short pants, who sat in on five minutes' notice for pianists all over town when they called in sick. Tony Pinto gave him lessons in jazz progressions so he'd stop inventing ‘Chinese’ chords of his own. Hecke Kingdom advised him to think long and hard about wanting to make this life a profession, not for someone who has a subscription to TIME magzine, he'd say, only half jokingly. And the cabaret girls were inordinately protective of him because he accompanied them on the piano impeccably, not asking for ‘anything’ in return. Then, when he inevitably did, they'd grown to like him enough to gleefully acquiesce. Life was grand. Till one day it was gone. Suddenly, unexpectedly. Sadly. And much, much before it changed its name, Bombay metamorphosed into Mumbai. We were left with a handful of memories. Now they too have faded. Sic transit gloria? From kanti.kumar at oneworld.net Fri Nov 7 16:43:53 2003 From: kanti.kumar at oneworld.net (Kanti Kumar) Date: Fri, 7 Nov 2003 16:13:53 +0500 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] What's New at Digital Opportunity Channel Message-ID: <200660-220031157104353303@oneworld.net> What's New at Digital Opportunity Channel http://www.digitalopportunity.org ********************************* Latest News http://www.digitalopportunity.org/article/archive/1138 ********************************* NIGERIA FASTEST GROWING TELECOM MARKET IN AFRICA ------------------------------------------------ With $3.8-billion investments and a cumulative 2.8 million lines in only two years, Nigeria has attracted the attention of the world as the fastest growing telecom market in Africa, and one of the biggest in the world. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72046/1138/631 AFRICA TO GET ONLINE RESEARCH DATABASE ---------------------------------------- A new African initiative is to be launched to make dissertations and theses by researchers and students across the continent available online. The move is a bid to increase the worldwide profile and accessibility of research by African scholars. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72044/1138/631 LESSONS LEARNED FROM THE VERY FIRST (BUT DEFINITELY NOT THE LAST) OHIO COMMUNITY TECHNOLOGY DAY ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------- Angela Stuber and Gabe Gloden of the Ohio Community Computing Network (OCCN) in the United States explore how OCCN volunteers spent a day this October educating Ohio legislators about the importance of local telecentres. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72027/1138/631 E-GOVERNMENT FOR ALL CONFERENCE OPENS THIS WEEK ----------------------------------------------- E-Government for All, a virtual conference focusing on the relationship between e-government and the digital divide, is now open to participants. Over 800 people from more than 60 nations are expected to take part in the event, co-hosted by the Benton Foundations, Bytesforall.org and others. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/71869/1138/631 ICT SOUTH-SOUTH EXCHANGE PROGRAMME IN UGANDA -------------------------------------------- Twenty-five participants from nine countries will participate in an ICT South-South exchange programme in Uganda in November. Organised jointly by Hivos, IDRC and IICD, it will enable them to visit various projects in Uganda to exchange experiences, obtain knowledge and develop new ideas. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/71710/1138/631 NEW INTERNET PORTAL ON WOMEN IN ARMED CONFLICT, PEACE BUILDING -------------------------------------------------------------- An Internet portal offering comprehensive information on the dangers and responsibilities facing women and girls during armed conflicts and women's roles in peace building has been unveiled by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM). http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/71706/1138/631 ********************************* Special Coverage: Information Society & WSIS http://www.digitalopportunity.org/section/dochannel/wsis ********************************* ASIA-PACIFIC LEADERS EMPHASISE ON SPECIFIC ICT POLICIES -------------------------------------------------------- The Kuala Lumpur Declaration on ICT Policies and e-Strategies in Asia and the Pacific has laid emphasis on specific policies on poverty reduction and the Millennium Development Goals, governance, gender, infrastructure and access, human capacity, content and applications, enterprises and entrepreneurs, and regional co-operation. The declaration was endorsed by high-level Asian delegates at the recently concluded Asian Forum on ICT Policies and e-Strategies, as Asia-Pacific input to the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/71384/4732/631 INTERNATIONAL PLATFORM TO SHOWCASE ICT APPLICATIONS AT WSIS ------------------------------------------------------------ Two hundred organisations and businesses from 80 countries will participate in the ICT for Development Platform to be held concurrently with the World Summit on the Information Society in Geneva. Digital Opportunity Channel will also be present at the event, which will show how ICTs - from simple transistor radios to high-tech computer systems - can be used innovatively to reduce poverty and promote development. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/71308/4732/631 ********************************* Analysis http://www.digitalopportunity.org/article/archive/1134 ********************************* HOW WILL THE OTHER HALF LIVE? ------------------------------ Last week, the UK Office of Telecommunications announced that half the British population are now plugged into the Internet. But what are the politicians and ISPs going to do about the rest? http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/71980/1134/631 ********************************* Partner News http://www.digitalopportunity.org/article/archive/4678 ********************************* UNITES BRINGS STORIES OF ICT VOLUNTEERING IN COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT ------------------------------------------------------------------ The UN Information Technology Service (UNITeS) is gathering and posting at its Website examples of how ICT volunteers are helping people and communities in developing countries. These stories are presented as they correspond to particular Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and their respective targets. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/71712/4678/631 HIVOS THROWS ITS HOUSE OPEN TO EVERYONE --------------------------------------- Everyone can get to know Hivos, our donor and partner, and its employees on this day in an informal way. Films will be shown, Hivos policies explained and its campaigns highlighted. And, of course, everybody will get the chance to ask questions and converse with each other. Please feel free to visit Hivos on 22 November 2003 in The Hague (Netherlands). You can register for this day by sending an e-mail to: g.schaars at hivos.nl. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/71494/4678/631 OSISA INVITES ICT4D PROPOSALS FOR SOUTHERN AFRICA ------------------------------------------------- The Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA) has formally launched its new ICT Programme Guidelines and has invited organisations to engage with OSISA on developing effective proposals for ICT s and development in Southern Africa. OSISA will support programmes where ICT policy, technologies, networking, literacy and development awareness are not an end in themselves, but where the emphasis is on social action for change. Contact Ashraf Patel at ashrafp at osiafrica.orgfor more information. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/70905/4889/631 Digital Opportunity Channel http://www.digitalopportunity.org Promoting Digital Opportunities for All Editor: Kanti Kumar Email: kanti.kumar at oneworld.net You can manage your email digest subscriptions with Digital Opportunity Channel and OneWorld by visiting: http://www.digitalopportunity.org/bulkmail/subscriptionlist/ You will need to log in with your nickname and password, or register for (free) OneWorld/Digital Opportunity Channel membership. _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From amitbasu55 at hotmail.com Sat Nov 8 11:08:09 2003 From: amitbasu55 at hotmail.com (Amit R Basu) Date: Sat, 08 Nov 2003 05:38:09 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Another history of Mumbai: jazz Message-ID: An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031108/a8007202/attachment.html From ahmed.109 at osu.edu Sat Nov 8 22:10:12 2003 From: ahmed.109 at osu.edu (Waquar Ahmed) Date: Sat, 08 Nov 2003 11:40:12 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] No minorities in India? Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.2.20031108113501.00aa1df0@pop.service.ohio-state.edu> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031108/02643ae5/attachment.html From lehar_hind at yahoo.com Sun Nov 9 15:29:25 2003 From: lehar_hind at yahoo.com (Lehar ..) Date: Sun, 9 Nov 2003 01:59:25 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: SPEAK FOR MALLIKA, SPEAK FOR JUSTICE Message-ID: <20031109095925.24420.qmail@web20911.mail.yahoo.com> Recent reports in the India media ( last weeks HT, TOI and HIndu) have quashed all claims of the student who has filed the case against Mallika Sarabhai, noted Indian dancer and activist, who has been at the forfront of the war against fascism in Gujarat. Manushi Shah, the complainant named other troupe members as having been 'swindled' of the already 'declared as non refundable' amount of RS 30,000.. these member have denied her allegations saying they knew all along that this amoutn was non refundable and they received ALL the refundable money from Mallika Sarabhai. Thus quashing the claims of Shah. All these troupe members have come out in support of Mallika. The organisation which has filed the case for Shah is a well known VHP outlet. From: Shabnam Hashmi >Reply-To: anhadinfo at yahoo.co.in >To: aiindex at mnet.fr >Subject: MEETING FOR MALLIKA >Date: Sat, 8 Nov 2003 19:13:34 +0000 (GMT) Dear Friends, This meeting is being called by a number of individuals and not any organisation- please circulate and do come. SPEAK FOR MALLIKA, SPEAK FOR JUSTICE A public meeting of writers , artists and activists to express their solidarity with Mallika Sarabhai who is being hounded and persecuted by the Gujarat Government for her stand on Gujarat Genocide is being held on 18 Nov,2003 at 5 in the evening at Triveni Kala Sangam Garden Theatre,Tansen Marg Near Bengali Market,New Delhi. Your presence is a must to make it effective. Kindly circulate it widely. Krishna Sobti, Kunwar Narain, Ashok Vajpeyi,Shubha Mudgal,Vidya Rao, Leela Samson,Geeta Kapoor, Prerana Shrimali,Urvashi Butalia,Vivan Sundaram, Shabnam Hashmi, Prakash Louis,Harsh Mander,Apoorvanand. Yahoo! India Matrimony: Find your partner onl __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Protect your identity with Yahoo! Mail AddressGuard http://antispam.yahoo.com/whatsnewfree From lehar_hind at yahoo.com Sun Nov 9 15:32:22 2003 From: lehar_hind at yahoo.com (Lehar ..) Date: Sun, 9 Nov 2003 02:02:22 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Reader-list] Nov 9: Remembering 'Night of Broken Glass' Message-ID: <20031109100222.25093.qmail@web20911.mail.yahoo.com> Tonight, 65 years ago..The Holocaust began.. on the Night of the Broken Glass.. named after the glass debris from smashed Jewish shops which littered germany.. We are still walking on broken glass..as Gujrat testified last yr.. -- Remembering the Night of Broken Glass/ Walking on Broken Glass by Lehar Sethi Zaidi Tonight, 65 years ago..The Holocaust began.. on the Night of the Broken Glass.. named after the glass debris from smashed Jewish shops which littered germany.. We are still walking on broken glass.. On the nights of November 9 and 10, rampaging mobs throughout Germany and the newly acquired territories of Austria and Sudetenland freely attacked Jews in the street, in their homes and at their places of work and worship. At least 96 Jews were killed and hundreds more injured, more than 1,000 synagogues were burned (and possibly as many as 2,000), almost 7,500 Jewish businesses were destroyed, cemeteries and schools were vandalized, and 30,000 Jews were arrested and sent to concentration camps. This pogrom has come to be called Kristallnacht, "the Night of Broken Glass." Kristallnacht signaled the onset of the Holocaust and turns out to be a crucial turning point in German policy regarding the Jews . The official German position on these events, which were clearly orchestrated by Hitler's propaganda chief Goebbels, was that they were 'spontaneous outbursts'. The Fuehrer, Goebbels reported to Party officials in Munich, "has decided that such demonstrations are not to be prepared or organized by the party, but so far as they originate spontaneously, they are not to be discouraged either." On that night, which has become infamously known as Kristallnacht ("Night of the Broken Glass"), more than 30,000 Jews were sent to concentration camps, and almost 100 Jews were murdered. The damage to shop windows was estimated at $4 million U.S. dollars. The pretext for this violence was the November 7 assassination of a German diplomat in Paris, Ernst vom Rath, by Herschel Grynszpan, a Jewish student whose parents, along with 17,000 other Polish Jews, had been recently expelled from the Germany. On October 28, 1938, the Gestapo had without warning rounded up the Polish Jews within Germany, put them on transports, and then dropped them off on the Polish side of the Poland-Germany border (near Posen). Among these Polish Jews were the parents of seventeen year old Hershl Grynszpan. With little food, water, clothing, or shelter in the middle of winter, thousands of these people died. Many of them people had spent most of their lives in Germany and were decorated German veterans of the first World War. The Nazis without warning had picked up these German-Polish families in the middle of the night and deported them to Poland where the Polish government refused entry On November 7, 1938, Hershl shot Ernst vom Rath, the third secretary in the German embassy in Paris. Two days later, vom Rath died. The day vom Rath died, Goebbels announced the need for retaliation. Though portrayed as spontaneous outbursts of popular outrage, these pogroms were calculated acts of retaliation carried out by the SA, SS, and local Nazi party organizations. This was due to the fact that almost immediately upon assuming the Chancellorship of Germany, Hitler began promulgating legal actions against Germany's Jews. In 1933, he proclaimed a one-day boycott against Jewish shops, a law was passed against kosher butchering and Jewish children began experiencing restrictions in public schools. By 1935, the Nuremberg Laws deprived Jews of German citizenship. By 1936, Jews were prohibited from participation in parliamentary elections and signs reading "Jews Not Welcome" appeared in many German cities. The assassination provided Joseph Goebbels, Hitler's Chief of Propaganda, with the excuse he needed to launch a pogrom against German Jews. Grynszpan's attack was interpreted by Goebbels as a conspiratorial attack by "International Jewry conspiracy" against the Reich and, symbolically, against the Fuehrer himself. The kristallnacht runs though all the world.. The kristallnacht was the beginning of the end of Germany.. and Europe and Germany's loss was America�s gain. For with it, Germnay lost its best minds.. from Einstein to other Nobel Laureates� And the kristall nacht continues to be a warning from history.. more in Part 2: full article on the way.. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Protect your identity with Yahoo! Mail AddressGuard http://antispam.yahoo.com/whatsnewfree From sarang_shidore at yahoo.com Sun Nov 9 04:20:21 2003 From: sarang_shidore at yahoo.com (Sarang Shidore) Date: Sat, 8 Nov 2003 14:50:21 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Reader-list] No minorities in India? In-Reply-To: <5.2.1.1.2.20031108113501.00aa1df0@pop.service.ohio-state.edu> Message-ID: <20031108225021.63101.qmail@web41408.mail.yahoo.com> Dear Waquar, I broadly agree with you that the concept of a religious minority is a relevant and useful approach for analyzing India's cleavages. With the recent rise of Hindu nationalism in India, there is no question that the Indian Muslim community today is facing particularly intense attack from various quarters. The recent genocidal acts in Gujarat have highlighted the brutality and intolerance of some of our self-proclaimed patriots. However, there is some truth to the argument that the ancient divisions of caste (and, in many cases, language) are very much alive in the Muslim, Christian and Sikh communities. Marriages and social relations within these religious minorities are still governed by "biradaris", which are nothing but caste-like structures. If you add class and language to the mix, then what emerges is a picture of India that includes but goes far beyond the Hindu-Muslim duality that is often the obsessive focus of analysts. One can staunchly oppose the political ideology of Hindutva (as I do) and yet accept the fact that the Indian subcontinent (including Pakistan and Bangladesh) in fact is one civilization formed by many multitudes of communities. Thus, the two-nation theory of Jinnah is as much a warped and simplistic reading of India as the Hindutva theories peddled by the RSS. In reality, both Jinnah and Savarkar were wrong. The partition of India goes against the grain of the multi-ethnic, multi-religious, and multi-linguistic community that India is. The partition remains a permanent wound deep within Indian civilization. The building up of a "Hindu" political identity is a mirror reflection of the two-nation theory, and a second body blow to the multi-ethnic reality of the subcontinent. No doubt, a Hindu Muslim bi-polar approach is one of the important ways of looking at the subcontinent's social structure. But it is an incomplete one. When all the other factors are taken into account, it becomes a grossly inadequate tool for understanding the subcontinent's past and realizing its future. There is a lesson here for ethnic nationalists of both India and Pakistan to grasp. Sarang Shidore Austin, Texas USA Waquar Ahmed wrote: Ashok Ganguly's 'No Minorities in India' is an interesting read. This article was published in the Op-ed page of Asian age and I have copied it below. The content of this write up is more rhetorical than factual. His conceptualization of India as consisting of innumerable communities encompassing varied castes, sects and religions, though seemingly correct at one scale, fails to comprehend reality vis-�-vis Muslims in India at another. Classification, and thereby differentiation between community on the basis of religion does not carry the same meaning, understanding and conceptualization as in the case of classification on the basis of caste or sect. They fall in different levels of classification of the population and encompass different meanings for the general population. It is incorrect to say that division or fissures between Hindus, Muslims and Christians is of the same type as that between a Brahmins and Khatriya or Vaishnavites and Shivites. For example, and generally speaking, for a Brahmin, it would be more acceptable that his daughter chooses to marry a Khatriya than a Muslim, or for that matter, he might feel one with a Vashya and have no problem in giving him access to his temple at home or eat food cooked by him, though he might have problems doing so in case of a Muslim. Division on the basis of religion is far more a visible and dominant demarcation than that between castes and sects and so is all the animosity and biases associated with them. Thus, Muslims are a minority in India and lets not dilute this fact by saying that the Indian population can be divided into innumerable sects and castes. Besides, the term minority encompasses the concept of power. Minorities are those who are powerless and this is a fact with Muslims in India. They are educationally and economically dis-empowered. Their representation even at the lowest levels (be it as drivers or peons or sweepers) in the organized sector, be it public or private, is abysmally low. Isn't this proof enough of the fact that a process that is unfavorable to them operates? It is high time that we stop turning a blind eye to this process. Not only in an Islamic state like Pakistan, the example that is provided by Ashok Ganguly, but in India too, unfair discrimination against Muslims is a visible reality. And this fact needs to be accepted before we can start removing this problem from the Indian society. A self-gratifying attitude where one believes that all is 'well and great'in India will not help us change India for the better. I also hold Ashok Ganguly liable of promoting a kind of stereotype and this is a very common feature in general parlance and literature in India. He reminds his readers that 'India was invaded by the Muslim hordes from Central Asia' and though there is no denying of this fact, it's a reality that all communities that are settled in India today, did arrive to occupy land at some point of time or the other. As they came, they did displace, more often than not forcefully, the population that had settled there earlier. Thus, when authors use strong terms like 'invaders'or 'Muslim hordes' they should not forget to apply similar phrases to the other communities as well. This will help the general population to understand that 'Muslims' were not the sole 'outsiders' and 'invaders' in India. The understanding of communalism too is extremely shallow in this article. Communalism as a phenomenon in India is not 'neo' or new. Its true that the frequency of the occurrences or riots has increased and the state, especially the police, as seen in the case of Gujarat and Bombay has been complacent on behalf of the majority community. However, the struggles between Hindu and Muslim fundamentalists and secular and communal forces have had innumerable manifestations ever since India gained independence. At times, manifestations of communalism have been in the form of riots, at other times it has been in the form of the selection of Hindi as the national language of India in the parliament over Hindustani (which was looked upon as a secular symbol and had the approval of the likes of Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru for acceptance with the status of a national language). While Hindi had carried the underlying connotation of being the language of Hindus, Hindustani was looked upon as the language that brought the Hindus and Muslims together. Besides, the abysmally low presence of Muslims in the government services, even as sweepers and drivers and their literal absence from the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) is enough proof of the fact that communalism has been going on since quite some time now. Yours faithfully, Waquar Ahmed, Graduate Reaching Associate and Ph. D. student, Department of Geography, Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio. United States of America, Email: ahmed.109 at osu.edu No minorities in India - By Ashok Ganguly Recently, a Saudi prince, on a diplomatic visit to Pakistan, was asked by journalists whether he was concerned about the plight of the Muslim minorities in India. His reply was interesting. The prince said, since India was home to the second largest Muslim population in the world, they could not in reality be described as a "minority" and, furthermore, since Independence, Indian Muslims have shown that they are quite capable of taking care of their interests. The princes was an extremely perceptive observation which needs to be explored a bit in the context of current debates and events in India. My contention is that the term minority or the concept of minorityism, may be politically expedient, but is doing a great deal of harm to our civil society. Therefore, the exploitation of minorityism, by various individuals and groups, has to be continuously challenged in the public domain. India is a nation of a more than a billion Indians. We could have been a country of close to one-and-a-half billion, if Pakistan was not carved out as a theocratic Islamic state. That the majority of their co-religionists chose to or remain Indians is a matter of historical fact. That a part of Pakistan broke away as Bangladesh, exposed the fragility of the concept upon which Pakistan was born. An Indian is an Indian first and an Indian always. Our religions differ, as indeed do our languages and customs, but this can only be falsely linked to being identified as an Indian or otherwise. There are thus, those of us who are born as Hindus, some amongst us are Rambhakts, some are Vaishnavites, others are Shivibhakts; others are Sunnis, Shias, Ahmadis, Bohras, or Khojas; then there are the Catholics and Protestants, Sikhs, Buddhists and Jains, Zoroastrians and Jews, several different Adivasis and other tribes of different religious beliefs and persuasions; but no minorities in India. No one group is a minority because under our Constitution, each one of us has the same rights, privileges and obligations and there has been no provocation to challenge this fundamental wisdom of the founding fathers of our Constitution. All of this might appear to be rather obvious and the need to reiterate the obvious may seem somewhat trivial. However, in India, it is critical to continuously debate divisionism and separatism and reiterate what may appear to be obvious, because there are powerful and well-funded organisations and individuals bent upon distorting the fundamental reality of Indianness for political and sectoral gains. The harm these organisations and individuals unleash in this process is difficult to contemplate. It has now become an accepted practice that in vast parts of India, caste and religion are misused for political ends. As a result, this has now become a hugely successful and cynical exercise to exploit certain narrow class and caste identities which should have legitimately been confined to the dustbin of history. In earlier centuries, when India was invaded by the Muslim hordes from Central Asia, the invaders were eventually culturally and socially assimilated into the milieu of India. Religious conversion, both forced as well as voluntary for economic gains, while providing benefit to the converted, could not fundamentally change the individuals Indianness. Similarly, the evangelists who arrived with the East India Company and its successor regime, tried to spread the gospel of Christianity without being able to dent the Indianness of the converts and so on and so forth. If any group had the right to feel excluded in Indian society, it was that section of the Hindu community who found themselves outside the historically well defined and rigid caste classification. That they were deprived and denied their social and civil rights was rightly acknowledged and several measures have been taken since Independence to undo the historic injustice to integrate them into the mainstream of Indian society. Thus, in spite of centuries of exclusion and exploitation, the "Harijans," as Gandhiji christened them, remained Indians in their hearts and minds. In order to comprehend the enormous strength of the concept of Indianness, it must be assumed that Indianness is genetically ingrained in every Indian, no matter what ones religious, linguistic or cultural persuasion might be. In spite of the historically strong roots of Indianness, why religion, caste and community continue to be exploited cynically and successfully, is more a poverty, illiteracy and unemployment issue, rather than emergence of a neo-communal definition of what defines an Indian. This short term but potentially extremely dangerous neo-communal movement which we are witnessing, in different parts of the country, will eventually run out of steam. But while it lasts, it is damaging the fabric of our society beyond description. India has, through the centuries, fought off various kinds of attacks and attempts to dismember her inherent strength and centuries-old cultural genetics. If this were not so, majority of us Indians would not have taken our Indianness for granted, while the vocal lumpen element occupy centrestage raging the battle to re-define Indianness. It would be interesting to explore who are funding and encouraging this movement of challenging the Indianness of the vast majority of Indians, who will never support them as they spread their orgy of threat and violence. I am optimistic about the short-lived nature of such socially disruptive movements, because, as one recently widely reported international study has forecast, India along with the US and China will be the three largest economies in the world by 2050. Eradication of illiteracy, poverty and providing more employment will be surrogate of Indian social and economic transformation, and which has already commenced. An economically prosperous and democratic India will have less and less space for politicians and their henchmen who thrive by exploiting the insecurity of those who have yet to join the mainstream of the countrys economy and, as they progressively do so, they will have much to lose of their stake in the prosperity and progress of India. It is not surprising that the Pakistani journalists asked the Saudi prince about Indian Muslims. In an Islamic state, anybody who is not a Muslim is defined as a minority and unfair discrimination against them is a visible reality. That in a secular democracy, every citizen enjoys equal rights, even though not all the same benefits, is a difficult concept to comprehend in a society with a theocratic mindset such as Pakistan. The basic premise of this article would be incomplete without acknowledging the powerful role of the judiciary and the media in India in helping to balance the interests of our civil society against certain disruptive forces in our politics and extra politics. _________________________________________ reader-list: an open discussion list on media and the city. Critiques & Collaborations To subscribe: send an email to reader-list-request at sarai.net with subscribe in the subject header. List archive: --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Protect your identity with Yahoo! Mail AddressGuard -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031108/3afed560/attachment.html From treborscholz at earthlink.net Sun Nov 9 04:14:47 2003 From: treborscholz at earthlink.net (trebor scholz) Date: Sat, 08 Nov 2003 17:44:47 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Conference on Web-Based Documentary Message-ID: >Documentary Intentions, Online and Off< http://docu-web.org //Documentary Intentions, Online and Off// looks at challenging web-based documentary work and discusses its evolving potential for social change. >When< Friday November 14, 6PM - 9PM Saturday November 15, 10AM - 6:30PM >at these times follow live conference blogging at http://docu-web.org< >Where< The Department of Film & Media Studies Hunter College CUNY 695 Park Avenue The conference brings together artists such as Alison Cornyn, Caroline Koebel, Horit Herman Peled, Jenny Perlin and Alex Rivera with graduate students of the Department of Media Study (SUNY Buffalo), The Program in Culture and Media (Department of Anthropology, New York University) and The Department of Film and Media Studies at Hunter College, (CUNY). >Participants< Alison Cornyn, Caroline Koebel, Horit Herman Peled, Jenny Perlin, Alex Rivera, John Long, Julie Perini, Shanti Avirgan, Christine Dierk, Orkan Telhan, Shawn Rider, Sarah Wichlazc, Beth Miranda Botshon, Cortlan McManus, Elizabeth Knipe, Harlan Whatley, Eleana Kim, Swati Bandi, Ruth Goldman, Hector Canonge, Jennifer Uihlein, Robin Brasington. >Facilitated by< Meg McLagan (NYU) Martin Lucas (Hunter College, CUNY) Trebor Scholz (SUNY Buffalo) >Full Updated Schedule< see: http://docu-web.org >Questions< Meg McLagan mjm9255 at nyu.edu Martin Lucas mlucas at igc.org Trebor Scholz treborscholz at earthlink.net >Directions< General Directions to Hunter College and the Dept of Film & Media Studies can be found at http://filmmedia.hunter.cuny.edu tel: 212-772-4949. The Friday night location, Hunter West 217 is best reached by using the entrance on the Southwest corner of 68th St. and Lexington Ave., upstairs from the 68th St. Lexington Ave. No. 6 IRT station. Once inside, take the escalator up one flight to the 2nd floor. HW217 will be on the 68th St. or north side of the 2nd floor lobby. For the Saturday Night Location - Hunter North 544 Enter the North Building at the 68th street entrance (between Park and Lexington Avenues). Take the elevators to the fifth floor. Make a left to the double doors. Make a right and then head straight to the end of the hall, through another set of double doors take a sharp left into 544. _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From mklayman at leonardo.info Sat Nov 8 05:00:48 2003 From: mklayman at leonardo.info (Melinda Klayman) Date: Fri, 07 Nov 2003 15:30:48 -0800 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] New Horizons Prize awarded to Ewen Chardronnet Message-ID: *apologies for cross-posting* Leonardo- at rt Outsiders 2003 New Horizons Prize “Prix Leonardo- at rt Outsiders / Nouveaux Horizons 2003” awarded to Ewen Chardronnet and associated artists for OPEN SKY project Leonardo/The International Society for the Arts, Sciences and Technology (ISAST) and Leonardo/L'Observatoire Leonardo des arts et des technosciences (OLATS) along with the Paris based @rt Outsiders Festival are pleased to announce that the Leonardo- at rt Outsiders 2003 New Horizons Prize has been awarded to Ewen Chardronnet and associated artists for the work OPEN SKY. The jury particularly noted the innovation of the work of the Acoustic Space Lab network and the artists federated around the OPEN SKY project: Rasa Smite, Martins Ratniks, Raitis Smits, Radioqualia, and Makrolab coordinated by Marko Peljhan. OPEN SKY is an installation by Ewen Chardronnet based on the conversion of the Soviet-era radio-telescope RT32 of Irbene in Latvia in the context of the ongoing research projects of the Acoustic Space Lab collective. The RT32 is a 32-meter former espionage antenna that has been converted for use in radio-astronomy and fundamental science. Since 2001, artists, radio amateurs, and scientists have worked together to explore the tactical and artistic possibilities of the dish. For more information, go to http://acoustic.space.re-lab.net/ or contact Mr. Chardronnet at ewen at tiscali.fr. The jury also awarded a special mention to the installation “FILE /AIR: The Ambiguity of Limits” by Kitsou Dubois and Eric Duranteau. The artwork translates documentation of the work of Kitsou Dubois in zero gravity parabolic flight into an installation with powerful poetic and sensory impact. Additional information on the work of Kitsou Dubois, who is also a previous Leonardo New Horizons award winner, can be found at http://www.spacearts.info. The Leonardo- at rt Outsiders 2003 New Horizons Prize Jury consisted of: Roger Malina (Astronomer and President of the Paris-based Association Leonardo ), Frank Popper (Professeur Emeritus - Université de Paris 8), Alex Adriaansens (Directeur of V2 in Rotterdam), Isabelle Rieusset Lemarié (Maître de Conférences in Information Sciences and Communication Science at IUFM Versailles), François Michaud (Conservateur at the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris), and Michel Jaffrennou (author). The purpose of the Leonardo New Horizons prize is to recognize new types of work emerging at the intersection of the arts, sciences, and technology and to make this work known to a broader audience. This year’s New Horizons Prize was designed to be awarded to one of the artworks exhibited at the European Museum of Photography, Paris, in the context of the @rt Outsiders Festival, dedicated this year to the topic of SPACE ART. Roger Malina, Henry Chapier (Président of @rt Outsiders Festival), Annick Bureaud (Director of Leonardo OLATS), and Jean-Luc Soret (Artistic Director of the @rt Outsiders Festival) devised this year’s special award, which includes a 1000 € prize. In addition, the winner has been invited to publish his work in the journal Leonardo (MIT Press) and present his work publicly to the Leonardo networks. The Leonardo Prizes and this Leonardo- at rt Outsiders 2003 New Horizons Prize are sponsored by the Program in Technocultural Studies at University of California at Davis, U.S.A. Leonardo Prizes are awarded by the Leonardo Prizes and Awards Committee, chaired by Professor Lynn Hershman of the University of California, Davis. Press Contacts: @rtOutsiders Festival: Yannick le Guillanton — 01 44 78 75 20 or le.guillanton at art-outsiders.com Leonardo/OLATS: Annick Bureaud — annick at nunc.com Leonardo/ISAST: Melinda Klayman — 415-405-3335 or isast at well.com Further information on the Leonardo Prizes and Awards program can be found at http://www.leonardo.info Further information on the @rt Outsiders Space Art Exhibition and Conference can be found at http://www.olats.org and at http://www.art-outsiders.com _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From lehar_hind at yahoo.com Mon Nov 10 12:37:51 2003 From: lehar_hind at yahoo.com (Lehar ..) Date: Sun, 9 Nov 2003 23:07:51 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Reader-list] Re: Fwd: the indian ulama and the freedom struggle In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20031110070751.80657.qmail@web20910.mail.yahoo.com> > fyi.. > a critical but (stangely) ignored chapter of our > country.. > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > An al Haqq- I am the Truth > Mansoor al Hallaj, Sufi saint, 932 AD > > > > > > > > > >The Indian �Ulama and the Freedom Struggle > > > > > > > >Yoginder Sikand > > > > > > > > > > > >In popular discourse and journalist writings by > non-Muslim writers, in the > >statements of top government officials and in the > virulent propaganda of > >Hindu fascist groups, madrasas are routinely > painted as training grounds of > >�anti-national� �terrorists�. It is claimed, > without offering any > >substantiation, that madrasas brainwash their > students in an undying > >hostility towards India. It is also argued that > many madrasas are today in > >league with the Pakistani secret service agency, > the Inter-Services > >Intelligence (ISI), as part of an alleged grand > pan-Islamist �conspiracy� > >to disintegrate India. Such wild claims are > unabashedly made in the popular > >press by writers who might never have even so much > as stepped inside a > >madrasa in their lives. Rebuttals by Muslim leaders > and by the �ulama of > >the madrasas generally go ignored. > > > > > > > >In seeking to challenge the concerted propaganda > campaign against them > >several �ulama have written extensively on the > little-known subject of the > >crucial role of the �ulama and the madrasas in > India�s struggle for > >freedom. Because most of these writings are in > Urdu, they have, > >unfortunately, a limited circulation and do not > reach beyond a narrow, > >almost entirely Muslim, readership. A > dispassionate reading of early > >twentieth century Indian history reveals that the > claims of the �ulama of > >being deeply involved in the freedom struggle are > far from fanciful. > >Indeed, in contrast to both the Muslim League, on > the one hand, and Hindu > >supremacist groups, on the other, both of whom > supported British > >imperialism in their own ways, large sections of > the Indian �ulama were in > >the forefront of the Indian freedom movement. Many > of them were ardent > >advocates of a united India, opposing the > communalism of both the League > >and the Hindu Mahasabha. Unfortunately, this is > totally ignored in both > > popular discourse as well as in Indian history > textbooks, thus further > >reinforcing the widespread image of Muslims as > �traitors� and �enemies� of > >the country. > > > > > > > >In the fight for freedom, the �ulama of Dar > ul-�Ulum madrasa at Deoband, > >which is today routinely branded as > �ultra-conservative� and as being > >allegedly the nerve centre of �terrorism�, appear > to have played a > >pioneering role. Indeed, the Deobandis seem to have > launched a movement for > >a free and united India before the emergence of > Gandhi as a populist leader > >and of the Congress as a mass organisation. In > 1909, Maulana Mahmud > >ul-Hasan, head of the Deoband madrasa, set up the > Jami�at ul-Ansar, an > >association of old boys of Deoband, and deputed one > of his most trusted > >students, a Sikh convert to Islam, Maulana > �Obaidullah Sindhi (1872-1944), > >to head it. In 1915, Mahmud ul-Hasan directed > Sindhi to head for > >Afghanistan, where he set up a provisional > government of free India, along > >with several Indian Hindu and Muslim > revolutionaries associated with the > >Ghadr Party and the Congress. Meanwhile, in 1916, > in order to mobilize > >Turkish support for his programme of an independent > India, Mahmud > > ul-Hasan left for the Hijaz. However, Arab > nationalists opposed to > >Ottoman rule betrayed him to the British, who then > arrested him and some of > >his associates in Mecca and imprisoned them in > Malta. Soon after his > >release, he issued a fatwa supporting the > Non-Cooperation movement of the > >Congress, appealing to Muslims to wholeheartedly > participate in it. The > >fatwa was later endorsed by almost 500 �ulama. > Shortly after, Madani issued > >another fatwa, declaring it sinful for Muslims to > work for the British > >government. > > > > > > > > Shortly after, with the end of the First World > War, the Khilafat movement > >was launched in India in order to preserve the > Ottoman Caliphate from > >attack by the victorious allies and to prevent the > holy cities of Mecca and > >Medina from falling under European control. The > Khilafat movement provided > >a new lease of life to the �ulama, who had been, by > this time, increasingly > >marginalized by western-educated Muslims as leaders > of the community. An > >influential section of the Deobandis, fiercely > opposed to what they saw as > >the �secular�, �irreligious� and �pro-British� > Jinnah and the Muslim > >League, willingly joined hands with Gandhi, whose > use of religious appeals > >they could easily identify with. These �ulama > rightly sensed that > >�modernist� Muslims, and those, such as many in the > League, who employed > >Islam simply as a tool for their own secular > interests, were a major > >challenge to their own authority, while Gandhi�s > willingness to work with > >them and indeed to accept them as representatives > of > > Islam, would strengthen their own claims to speak > for the Muslim > >community as a whole. > > > > > > > >In 1919 a group of �ulama, mostly Deobandis, set up > the Jami�at ul-�Ulama-i > >Hind (�The Union of the �Ulama of India�). The > immediate reason for the > >formation of the Jami�at was to protect the Ottoman > Caliphate from the > >threat of dismemberment at the hands of rival > European powers, particularly > >the British. Jami�at leaders insisted that the > Caliphate was an integral > >part of Islam, linking Muslims living all over the > world as members of a > >universal ummah. They exhorted Muslims to actively > struggle for > >safeguarding the Caliphate, appealing to them to > sacrifice their all for > >what they described as a central pillar of the > faith. Some even went to the > >extent of declaring India under the British to be a > dar ul-harb, calling > >for Muslims in government service to quit their > jobs and appealing to > >Muslims in general to migrate to Afghanistan. > Khilafat committees were set > >up all over the country, organized by �ulama in > collaboration with modern > >educated Muslims, thus helping bring about a > > temporary reconciliation between the two. Taking > advantage of the growing > >anti-British sentiment among the �ulama, Gandhi and > other senior Congress > >leaders jumped onto the Khilafat bandwagon, much to > the dismay of Jinnah as > === message truncated === __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Protect your identity with Yahoo! Mail AddressGuard http://antispam.yahoo.com/whatsnewfree From lehar_hind at yahoo.com Mon Nov 10 13:06:07 2003 From: lehar_hind at yahoo.com (Lehar ..) Date: Sun, 9 Nov 2003 23:36:07 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Reader-list] The new face of Communal cinema Message-ID: <20031110073607.48618.qmail@web20912.mail.yahoo.com> Friends The situation for freedom of expression in India is following alarming trends close to the state of the Third Reich as described below. Films endorsing the official govt ideology are being financed and supported by the govt, regardless of the shocking distortions of historical fact- simply to promote the ideology of hatred and promote certain communities and debase others. See note on Nazi cinema below. The smashing of 'Water� s sets by the govt. armed gangs is a case in example- while utterly falsifying and semi fictional films such as Ghadar and Bhagat Singh were approved and endorsed by the govt. This shows that the distortion of history is not restricted to the schoolbooks. The Mutiny is the next case in point. Close BJP associate and Zee TV producer Nitin Keni, infamous for Ghadar, in association with BJP MP UTTAMSINGH pawara [BJP-Jalna (Maharashtra)]. is producing the controversial film on Indira Gandhi and also on the Muitny, promoting the �Brahmin� Mangal Pandey ( A recent program said: India�s first freedom fighter is: Mangal Pandey and the second one: Maj Pandey of the Kargill war, as shown in JPO DUtta LOC Kargill, another pop patriotism saga) We must understand the implications of the rising intolerance in Indian cinema which is watched by millions. No amounts of initiatives at communal harmony and peace meetings can address this poison which is being promulgated by the govt. Nazi Germany did exactly the same things, and all producers and directors un sympathetic to Nazi ideology were weeded out, harassed and those sympathetic to the Jew were called �traitors� and their films sets smashed. A citizens forum for preservation of free speech or the like would be very effective. A PIL has already been filed for the Indira Gandhi film.. The fact that Keni is producing the Munity film, ( mentioned in the last email) confirms our worst fears. The last bastion of Hindu Muslim unity in this country is about to fall.unless we as citizens wake up soon. --- The Ministry of Illusion: Nazi Cinema and Its Afterlife by Eric Rentschler http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/067457639X/102-1515696-9393757?v=glance What role did film play in mobilizing public support for Germany's Third Reich? What can such films tell us about the nature of national socialism and the appeal of Nazi culture? Over 1000 films were produced during Germany's 12-year Third Reich. While some were blatant anti-Semitic propaganda, like the notorious epic Jud Suss, a variety of films were made in line with the "orchestra" principle of Goebbels, which stated, "We do not expect everyone to play the same instrument, we only expect that people play according to a plan." Rentschler (film, Univ. of Califronia, Irvine) examines the Nazi media culture "plan," which created a world of illusion, alternating between "heavy hands and light touches" with the aim of negating "alternative experience and independent thought." This is just one of the little known facts presented in this extremely important and entertaining book. The Nazis never had to invent a cinema from the ground up; the Germany they inherited had perhaps the most sophisticated film industry this side of Hollywood. Add the fact that the Nazi hierarchy were film fanatics and it is somewhat easier to see why the cinema of the Third Reich developed as it did. Eric Rentschler points out that instead of overt propaganda, Joseph Goebbles preferred as subliminal message instead. Too many preachy films would turn off the audience; instead, if films were enrobed in traditional German values, the message is all the easier not only to get across, but to gain acceptance. The most frightening aspect of "Jew Suss" (the most notorious Anti-Semitic film ever made)is how the message is presented so matter-of-factly. No over the top drama, but an effective use of melodramatic elements to get the point across. A documentary on the German motion picture and its use as a propaganda tool, produced by Erwin Leiser (originally titled Deutschland Erwache). Excerpts from the following German feature films are included: Dawn (1933), Hitler Youth Quex (1933), Bismarck ( In Heide Fehrenbach's course on "Nazism on Film," students began to answer these questions by examining the form and function of Nazi self-representation on celluloid, then turned to a study of the cultural legacy of nazism, both in postwar German society and abroad. In the process, students were challenged to rethink the relationship between "entertainment" and "ideology," "propaganda" and "documentary," and even-perhaps most surprisingly-the conventions of "Nazi Cinema" and Hollywood. This recycling raises important issues for the historian regarding the relationship of film and history. How should historians approach films as 'documents?' To what extent can they give us access to the 'past-ness' of the past'? What is the role of film in historical understanding? Ultimately, of course, posing such questions forces us to rethink the ways we study the past and tell its stories; it forces us to rethink what we do when we 'do' history." -- More on Nitin Keni: type into Google Assoc with BJP: type: Nitin Keni + BJP __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Protect your identity with Yahoo! Mail AddressGuard http://antispam.yahoo.com/whatsnewfree From jeebesh at sarai.net Mon Nov 10 14:15:06 2003 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Mon, 10 Nov 2003 14:15:06 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] (no subject) In-Reply-To: <20031104112538.23258.qmail@webmail28.rediffmail.com> References: <20031104112538.23258.qmail@webmail28.rediffmail.com> Message-ID: <200311101415.06141.jeebesh@sarai.net> dear Anupam, Just a mail to say that i really enjoyed your posting. You have opened a very fruitful way of seeing the present sustained conflict. Thanks Jeebesh On Tuesday 04 November 2003 04:55 pm, anupam maheshwari wrote: >

> The Real Reasons for the War With Iraq:
>
> This essay is a Macroeconomic and Geostrategic Analysis of the Unspoken > Truth written in an effort to inform and stimulate debate on the crucial > but true issues surrounding the Iraq war.

> By Anupam Maheshwari
>
> From rafael at csi.com Wed Nov 12 04:41:48 2003 From: rafael at csi.com (Rafael Lozano-Hemmer) Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2003 18:11:48 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Teleart precedents Message-ID: Hi, To contextualize the "Amodal Suspension" telematic installation we have uploaded a "precedents" section that contains hundreds of curated, summarized links to public artworks that utilize phone, messaging and online interfaces. Check out http://www.amodal.net/precedents.html The list is idiosyncratic and it is not intended to be exhaustive, though we do appreciate any corrections or additions (especially the early history). Saludos, Rafael http://www.amodal.net From anisha at johannesgees.com Tue Nov 11 15:46:06 2003 From: anisha at johannesgees.com (anisha imhasly) Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2003 11:16:06 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] THE HELLOWORLD PROJECT / JOHANNES GEES Message-ID: <0FC58A1D-1430-11D8-8E6E-000A95914838@johannesgees.com> >>>>>>>>>>>>> forward this mail! >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 193 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031111/49fcb060/attachment.bin -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 46748 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031111/49fcb060/attachment.tiff -------------- next part -------------- The Helloworld Project / Johannes Gees An invitation to take control of public space with the power of words December 9-12, 2003, Mumbai - Geneva - Rio de Janeiro - New York http://www.helloworldproject.com The Helloworld Project is a global interactive text installation combining language, landscapes and communication technology to create a visual dialogue. From December 9-12, 2003, you will be invited to send in messages, either by sending an SMS to a dedicated number or by going to www.helloworldproject.com. These messages will be projected onto mountains and buildings in Geneva, Mumbai, Rio de Janeiro and New York . Video images of the projections will be broadcast live on the project website and at the World Summit on the Information Society in Geneva. The Helloworld Project is a collaborative happening, an invitation to take control of public space with the power of words. The projection sites are: Jet d'eau (water fountain), Geneva, Switzerland Air India Building, Mumbai, India Morro dois Irmãos ,Rio de Janeiro, Brazil UN Building, New York, United States For more information about the project, visit www.helloworldproject.com ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ The  Helloworld Project is a cultural summit event taking place during the UN World Summit on the Information Society, held in Geneva, Switzerland, from December 10-12, 2003. It is organized by the Swiss Federal Department of Interior Affairs, Federal Office of Culture. It is supported by SRG SSR Idée Suisse, Migros Kulturprozent, Minick AG and Switch - The Swiss Education & Research Network. Johannes Gees is a media artist and producer who lives in Zurich / Switzerland. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ How to participate in "The Helloworld Project"? As an online news journal or gateway: - Feature The Helloworld Project on your website and invite your readers to participate in this global collaborative experience between December 9 - 12, 2003 - Feature The Helloworld Project as a link on your website   As a public art space / media lab / institution: - Create public access to "The Helloworld Project" by putting the projects webpage on your public screens, thus providing your visitors access to the project. - Contact anisha at johannesgees.com for more details. As an individual: - Visit www.hellworldproject.com between December 9 and 12, 2003, and enter your message! - Subscribe to our newsletter on http://www.helloworldproject.com. You will receive a reminder by email when the projectors go online. - Help mobilize as many participants as possible by forwarding this mail. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Contact: The Helloworld Project anisha at johannesgees.com gees at johannesgees.com Phone: +41 1 240 33 35 Fax: +41 1 240 33 34 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ >>>>>>>>>>>>>forward this mail>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 3958 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031111/49fcb060/attachment-0001.bin From nyvoices at indypress.org Wed Nov 12 03:07:22 2003 From: nyvoices at indypress.org (Rehan Ansari) Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2003 16:37:22 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Kabul Reconstruction: a video installation and public dialogue Message-ID: <018701c3a89b$fe2e99d0$6901a8c0@herman> Hi, a friend of mine has created: http://www.kabul-reconstructions.net Kabul:Reconstructions was created by media artist Mariam Ghani with the collaboration of programmer Edward Potter, the AINA Afghan Media Center in Kabul, and Exit Art in New York. Announcing the launch of Kabul: Reconstructions version 2.0, with the new feature ASK A QUESTION. Anyone with a question about the reconstruction of Kabul or its context in the current situation or history of Afghanistan is invited to submit their question online. Your question will then be transmitted to Kabul by Mariam and the other weblog participants, who will do their best to bring your answer back to the site within two weeks. Questions submitted before December 10th, 2003 will help determine what footage Mariam will shoot and then add to the site during her trip to Kabul this winter, one year after her first visit. To submit your question, just go to http://www.kabul-reconstructions.net and click on ASK A QUESTION. Note that you can continue to access the audiovisual blogger and discussion forum section of the site -- which is updated continually, with new participants coming soon -- by clicking on FOLLOW THE INFORMATION on the main page. Please forward this invitation to anyone who might have an unanswered question about reconstruction. thanks, Rehan Rehan Ansari Editor, Independent Press Association - New York nyvoices at indypress.org* 212/279-1442 * 143 West 29th St., 901, New York City, 10001 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031111/32b405db/attachment.html From alexis at onebox.com Wed Nov 12 14:23:51 2003 From: alexis at onebox.com (by way of Monica Narula) Date: Wed, 12 Nov 2003 14:23:51 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Call for Submissions - Tactical Sound #3 Message-ID: Tactical Sound Call for Submissions Issue 3 – Re: Radio Tactical Sound is a quarterly compilation of findings and keepings from a quest for sound in active service towards human liberation. Special emphasis for issue three will be notes towards a political history of radio. Essays, interviews, primary source reprints and documentation are invited. Please contact Tactical Sound by December 21st with your concepts for this special issue. Submissions due: February. Ideally, the issue will present a political history of radio spanning from invention to webcasting. Issues of interest include but are not limited to: co-evolution with the record industry and television; propaganda radio projects (imperialist and revolutionary); tactical war-time radio projects; pirate radio and micro-broadcasting movements; "clear-channelization" and radio monopolies, religious and secular; radiophonic art and experimentations; guerilla disruption, interference and infrastructural sabotage; utopian radio theory / projects. If interested, please contact: Tactical Sound c/o Alexis Bhagat 100 Decatur Street Brooklyn, NY 11216 _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From nyvoices at indypress.org Thu Nov 13 04:33:38 2003 From: nyvoices at indypress.org (Rehan Ansari) Date: Wed, 12 Nov 2003 18:03:38 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Edition 90: 13 November 2003. Message-ID: <01f501c3a971$8909df30$6901a8c0@herman> This Week's Voices That Must Be Heard By IPA-New York, a sponsored project of the Independent Press Association Edition 90: 13 November 2003. Advisory editor David Mark Greaves, of Our Time Press, an IPA member publication. NEWS ITEMS: Diversity Visa Lottery met with lukewarm response by Irish. by Georgina Brennan, Irish Voice, 6 November 2003. English language. Complicated requirements and paranoia that undocumented immigrants will be giving themselves up to Homeland Security if they apply online are some of the reasons for the low interest level. MORE. Rappers dead prez racially profiled, and fighting back by Damoso Reyes, Amsterdam News, 30 October 2003. English language. Rap group dead prez said that the $400,000 lawsuit they will file in federal court against the NYPD is more than just rap-it's an effort to curb police brutality in the force and hit the city deep in its pockets. MORE. Heretical blues of Hasids who left the fold by Oren Yaniv, Maariv, 3 November 2003. Translated from Hebrew by Oren Yaniv. On top of the enormous challenges and identity crisis this metamorphosis entails, unbelievers have to face life in a big and difficult metropole, often without any support, advice or outside assistance. MORE. Chinese kids struggle with racist parents and high expectations, Children's PRESSLINE, 11 November 2003. English language. Generation and cultural gaps will always exist between parents and their children. But with the Asian students we talked to, the chasm seems to affect all family interactions. MORE. BRIEFS: Teachers continue to teach without getting paid by Claudia Zequeira, El Diario / La Prensa, 5 November 2003. Translated from Spanish by Hillary Hawkins. City residents are urged to claim food stamps by Rosa Margarita Murphy, El Diario / La Prensa, 4 November 2003. Translated from Spanish by Hirsh Sawhney. Extreme harassment: Two Bangladeshis, one a green card holder, detained, Bangla Patrika, 7 November 2003. Translated from Bangla by Moinuddin Naser . Black artists still locked out of mainstream museums by Charles Baillou, Caribbean Life, 4 November 2003. English language. New Polish studies department at Columbia by Danuta Szafraniec, Nowy Dziennik / Polish Daily News, 3 November 2003. Translated from Polish by Ania Milewska. EDITORIALS: Let us have a turn at politics: if patriotism is what they're speakin', you can bet they'll soon be thievin' by Vladimir Levin, V Novom Svete, 14 March 2003. Translated from Russian by Ilya Perchikovsky. Brighton Beach wants to have its own hand in policymaking in the city council. MORE. As always we welcome questions, suggestions, corrections and letters to the editor. Rehan Ansari Editor, Independent Press Association - New York nyvoices at indypress.org* 212/279-1442 * 143 West 29th St., 901, New York City, 10001 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031112/d663bd83/attachment.html From kanti.kumar at oneworld.net Wed Nov 12 15:49:21 2003 From: kanti.kumar at oneworld.net (Kanti Kumar) Date: Wed, 12 Nov 2003 15:19:21 +0500 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] What's New at Digital Opportunity Channel Message-ID: <285220-220031131294921407@oneworld.net> (With apologies for cross-posting. Please see at the bottom information on how to subscribe to this weekly newsletter.) What's New at Digital Opportunity Channel http://www.digitalopportunity.org ********************************* Latest News http://www.digitalopportunity.org/article/archive/1138 ********************************* AMBITIOUS SRI LANKAN PROJECT TO USHER IN E-GOVERNANCE ----------------------------------------------------- Sri Lanka has drawn up a blueprint for an ambitious "e-Sri Lanka" project to bring together all government institutions through networking. Champika Liyanaarachchi of OneWorld South Asia reports on how the island nation is preparing for the World Summit on the Information Society. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72556/1138/665 AFGHAN WOMEN FLOCK TO NEW RADIO STATIONS ---------------------------------------- Internews, a US-based non-profit group dedicated to independent media, is working with women in Afghanistan to launch women-run radio stations to help women overcome the isolation imposed by cultural and political factors. A new station has just begun broadcasting in Herat. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72554/1138/665 REGISTRATION OPEN FOR WORLD FORUM ON COMMUNICATION RIGHTS --------------------------------------------------------- The World Forum on Communication Rights is a one-day event taking place in Geneva on 11th December 2003 at Palexpo alongside the World Summit on the Information Society. Its goal is to explore some key issues ignored by the summit, and to open the agenda on what �communication rights� really mean on the ground. Registration forms are available online in English, French and Spanish. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72362/1138/665 'E-GOVERNMENT CAN HELP MEET CHALLENGES OF GLOBALISATION' --------------------------------------------------------- Governments at all stages of development should use the rapidly evolving tool of e-government to contend with the expectations of "improved governance and public administration" in the new century, the Fifth Global Forum on Re-inventing Government, which took place in Mexico City last week, recommended. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72361/1138/665 NGOS CALL UPON INDIAN GOVT TO BRIDGE DIGITAL, KNOWLEDGE DIVIDES --------------------------------------------------------------- Communities should be allowed to communicate and share information in their own way and in their own space to allow equitable and sustainable development, a number of civil society organisations said here this week at an interactive public discussion jointly organised by OneWorld South Asia, GKP, Mahiti and VOICES. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72267/1138/665 TV, WEB INITIATIVE HELPS YOUTH 'CHAT THE PLANET' ------------------------------------------------ A new television and Web initiative is building a community of global youth around discussion and action. The show connects young people from different countries to talk about issues affecting their lives, and was launched with 'Bridge to Baghdad,' a special between Iraqi students and New York youth. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72265/1138/665 GOVTS ARE INSTALLING HARDWARE, BUT NOT USING NET MUCH: UN STUDY --------------------------------------------------------------- Most of the UN member countries are installing and using Internet services, but online government has raised questions of cost-effectiveness in developed and developing countries, according to a new UN study. A "too-grandiose approach" may result in failures or expensive white elephants, the report warns. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72131/1138/665 LATIN AMERICAN ICT PROJECTS HONOURED FOR IMPROVING PEOPLES' LIVES ----------------------------------------------------------------- At a ceremony held in Colombia, the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) announced the winners of the 2003 Betinho Prize - three remarkable information and communication technology (ICT) initiatives from Peru, Mexico and Argentina that are improving the lives of people and communities in Latin America. Two Brazilian networks received honourable mentions. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72052/1138/665 ********************************* Special Coverage: Information Society & WSIS http://www.digitalopportunity.org/section/dochannel/wsis ********************************* BROADCASTERS TO DISCUSS MEDIA ROLE IN INFORMATION SOCIETY ---------------------------------------------------------- The World Media Electronic Forum, a spectacular media event gathering the world's media leaders in Geneva during the World Summit on the Information Society, will highlight the contribution of broadcasting and broadcasters to the information society. A historical first, all of the world's broadcasting unions have agreed on a common platform to be submitted to the summit. You can provide you input on vital media issues of the 21st century through an online questionnaire available in 9 languages. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72370/4732/665 DIRECTORY OF WSIS-RELATED RESOURCES ----------------------------------- A directory of WSIS-related sites in multiple languages is available at the Platform for Community Networks Website. This new Website contains links to official organisations, discussions and Websites covering the preparations for the summit. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72368/4732/665 ********************************* Analysis http://www.digitalopportunity.org/article/archive/1134 ********************************* IS THIS WHAT MEDIA DEMOCRACY LOOKS LIKE? ---------------------------------------- When activists and independent journalists created a website to challenge the media, could it become a model of the democratic media they were calling for? Aliza Dichter, one of the original founders and the former editor of MediaChannel.org, shares her reflections. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72471/1134/665 VIRTUAL CHAT WITH US PUBLISHING CZAR BRUCE JAMES ------------------------------------------------ Bruce James, U.S. Public Printer and CEO of the U.S. Government Printing Office, spent an hour with participants of the E-Government for All conference discussing the impact of e-government on the digital divide. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72213/1134/665 ********************************* Get Involved http://www.digitalopportunity.org/article/archive/1112 ********************************* NOMINATIONS INVITED FOR PETERSBERG PRIZE ---------------------------------------- Nominate the individual or organisation you believe has most effectively used information and communication technologies (ICT) to advance development. The US$-100,000 Petersberg Prize will recognise the ICT initiative that has resulted in a clear benefit to the people of a developing country or region in the last 10 years. Deadline: February 1, 2004 http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72273/1112/665 ********************************* Partner News http://www.digitalopportunity.org/article/archive/4678 ********************************* ERIDERS.NET: RIDING TECHNOLOGY FOR NON-PROFIT AIMS -------------------------------------------------- The Advocacy Project has developed an interactive Website, eRiders.net, to help eRiders learn, network and share, and to help NGOs find them. eRiders, often called "circuit riders" in the US, are technology consultants who provide ICT support to nonprofits and activists in a particular region or within a particular service sector. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72559/4678/665 UNITES BRINGS STORIES OF ICT VOLUNTEERING IN COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT ------------------------------------------------------------------ The UN Information Technology Service (UNITeS) is gathering and posting at its Website examples of how ICT volunteers are helping people and communities in developing countries. These stories are presented as they correspond to particular Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and their respective targets. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/71712/4678/665 ********************************* Current Funding Opportunity http://www.digitalopportunity.org/article/archive/4889 ********************************* GLOBAL FUND FOR WOMEN OFFERS GRANTS TO WOMEN'S GROUPS OUTSIDE US ---------------------------------------------------------------- The Global Fund for Women works to strengthen women's organizations outside the United States by providing small, flexible, and timely general-support grants ranging from $500 to $15,000. It supports organisations that demonstrate a commitment to women's equality and female human rights; show concern about the way women are viewed and view themselves in society; are governed and directed by women; consist of a group of women working together (the fund does not accept requests from individuals); and are based outside the US. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/72364/4889/665 Digital Opportunity Channel http://www.digitalopportunity.org Promoting Digital Opportunities for All Editor: Kanti Kumar Email: kanti.kumar at oneworld.net You can manage your email digest subscriptions with Digital Opportunity Channel and OneWorld by visiting: http://www.digitalopportunity.org/bulkmail/subscriptionlist/ You will need to log in with your nickname and password, or register for (free) OneWorld/Digital Opportunity Channel membership. _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From dfontaine at fondation-langlois.org Thu Nov 13 20:17:53 2003 From: dfontaine at fondation-langlois.org (Dominique Fontaine) Date: Thu, 13 Nov 2003 09:47:53 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] PRESS RELEASE Message-ID: Pour la version française : http://www.fondation-langlois.org/courriel/communique.html [ Apologies for cross-posting / veuillez excuser les envois multiples ] ****************************************** PRESS RELEASE ****************************************** A YEAR OF REFLECTION AT THE DANIEL LANGLOIS FOUNDATION FOR ART, SCIENCE, AND TECHNOLOGY The Daniel Langlois Foundation begins a year of consultations to assess the impact of its programs and decide on future directions. Montreal, November 13, 2003 - In keeping with its mandate and goals, the Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art, Science, and Technology has funded some 55 projects by international artists and 108 projects by organizations worldwide since 1997. Over the years, the Foundation has undertaken such major projects as an exhibition of drawings by filmmaker Sergei M. Eisenstein as well as the DVD-ROM DigitalSnow spotlighting a lifetime of work by the prolific Canadian artist Michael Snow. It has also set up its Centre for Research and Documentation (CR+D) at the Ex-Centris Complex in Montreal to document history and contemporary practices at the crossroads of art, science and technology. This centre, which is like no other in the world, has quickly developed into an essential site for doing research in the field. In total, the Foundation has channelled about $12 million in funding into its programs and activities. The Foundation's mandate is to advance knowledge in art and science through direct contact with technologies. The aim is to nurture a critical awareness of how technologies influence humans and their natural and cultural environment. The Foundation also hopes to encourage the exploration of an aesthetic that reflects the evolving human environment. Therefore, thematic focuses include art, science and technology, art and the environment, development in emerging regions, and research into preserving digital heritage. As a follow-up to its many accomplishments, the Foundation has decided to step back and assess the impact of its activities and funding. As a result, the Daniel Langlois Foundation is placing a moratorium in 2004 on its two main programs: the Research Grants for Individual Artists or Scientists and the Strategic Grants for Organizations. During this freeze, the Foundation will thoroughly review the effects of its funding and activities worldwide so it can devise strategies for the future that are better tailored to its different clients. Note that the moratorium doesn't apply to the Program of Grants for Researchers in Residence. Jean Gagnon, Executive Director of the Foundation declares: "The aim of this period of reflection is to consult the people and communities concerned by our areas of activity. Given how circumstances have evolved artistically, socially and economically these past few years, it is important to rethink some of our approaches so we can find better ways to assist the individuals and organizations that best reflect our philosophy and goals. Through research missions, we plan to head out into the field to meet with the various players and learn what circumstances they face and how we can have a lasting and structuring effect on the developments sought in certain regions and fields." - 30 - SOURCE: Jean Gagnon, Executive Director The Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art, Science and Technology T (514) 987-7177, F (514) 987-7492 info at fondation-langlois.org http://www.fondation-langlois.org -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031113/28cb3f4e/attachment.html From vanisuro at vsnl.net Thu Nov 13 12:35:20 2003 From: vanisuro at vsnl.net (vani and suro) Date: Thu, 13 Nov 2003 12:35:20 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] RALLY TOGETHER to STOP RAPE - Sat 15th Nov References: <0FC58A1D-1430-11D8-8E6E-000A95914838@johannesgees.com> Message-ID: <002501c3a9b4$8b80fe40$0100a8c0@hotwire> CALL FROM WOMEN"S GROUPS IN DELHI! Please forward. Dear friends We would like to invite you to join us this Saturday in the rally protesting against a recent spate of rapes in the capital. This is a part of a joint campaign of which Saheli is one of the 15 or so groups who have organised the event. We are coming together at RAJGHAT AT 3.00 p.m. ON 15th NOVEMBER 2003. We will walk from there to ITO bridge and continue to demonstrate near the ITO overbridge on Bahadurshaha Zaffar Marg. The idea is for all of us to wear RED or BLACK coloured clothes as far as possible and bring placards which say: SAFE STREETS; SAFE BUSES; SAFE HOMES; SAFE COLLEGES; SAFE OFFICES; SAFE FACTORIES etc. The organising groups will bring in large banners saying STOP RAPE, BALATKAAR ROKO; and SPEAK OUT DELHI , DILLI CHUPPI TODO. We hope you will turn up with all your strength. Please inform others also who will be interested in joining hands. Both men and women are invited to be together in this issue of protesting against the despicable situation women in the city are facing. See you at Rajghat on Saturday. >From all of us in Saheli on behalf of the joint campaign -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031113/3c836f0a/attachment.html From niclauss at flyingpuppet.com Fri Nov 14 00:36:19 2003 From: niclauss at flyingpuppet.com (Nicolas Clauss) Date: Thu, 13 Nov 2003 20:06:19 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] jai10ans - Nicolas Clauss - ECM des Ulis Message-ID: <023101c3aa19$3bf23820$6400a8c0@pcfixe> english : see below Nicolas Clauss (Flying Puppet) et l'ECM des ULis vous invitent à découvrir : http://www.jai10ans.com Un projet interactif en ligne de Nicolas Clauss dans le cadre d'une résidence à l'Espace Culture Multimédia de la médiathèque François Mitterand aux Ulis. Ce travail, qui s'inscrit dans la continuité du projet Cinq Ailleurs, est le fruit d'une rencontre avec des enfants de la ville des Ulis. De mars à septembre 2003 les enfants, âgés de 8 à 12 ans, se sont prêtés au jeu des questions-réponses en donnant ici et là, au gré du moment, leurs témoignages et leurs dessins. "Des enfants issus de l'immigration parlent d'eux, de leurs racines, de pays lointains ou proches, qu'ils ont connus ou pas. Vécu ou souvenirs transmis. Peu importe, la parole se donne à voir. Les sons, la peinture, des signes, des images filmées sont chorégraphiés dans une sarabande tantôt joyeuse, tantôt tendue d'inquiétude et de questions. Il est question de différence, de racisme..." - O.Falkowski ---------------------------------------------------------------------- english Nicolas Clauss (Flying Puppet) and ECM of Les ULis (France) invite you to discover : I am ten (http://www.jai10ans.com) an on-line interactive project by Nicolas Clauss during a residence to ECM (multimedia cultural space) of Les Ulis. This work, which follows the project Five Elsewhere, is the result of meeting with children of the city of Les Ulis. >From March to September 2003, children from immigration backgrounds, old from 8 to 12 years, lent themselves to the play of the questions and answers while giving here and there, their testimonys and drawings. They speak about themselves, their roots, remote or close countries, which they knew or not. Lived or transmitted memories. This project has no english subtitles, sorry :-) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... 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At home, at work Subramaniam Vincent recounts his experiences on paying living wages for domestic labour, even as benefits for unorganized sector workers are beginning to appear on the radar screen of governments in India. October 2003 - There is one activity in India that large numbers of poor, illiterate and semi-literate urban women are engaged in almost all their waking hours: the chores of cleaning and housekeeping. But as visible as this labour is, the question of calculating a living wage for it is not often on people's minds. How much should I pay her? I asked myself this question a couple of years ago, when I was settling into Bangalore. A notified national minimum wage would have been a useful reference, but at that time I wasn’t sure what it was, or even how to find it. I decided to come up with a number myself instead using a reasonable calculus. Checking around with the leader of a domestic workers' union and perusing local municipal pronouncements on city sweeper wages, I concluded that 3000 rupees a month would be a living wage (not a minimum wage, but a living wage) for domestic work, 8 hours a day. Working backwards from there, it’s Rs.13 per hour or around Rs.750 for a 2-hour-per-day job, per month, with Sundays either off or with extra-pay. That seemed simple enough, and I knew I could afford it. But offering this salary wasn’t as simple as I hoped. Families often use their neighbours or local relatives to track down candidates; to me this was especially important since the interviews are usually conducted by the woman of the house, and I couldn't avail of that option as my wife then worked overseas. The neighbour in my case was a senior housewife and a true mistress of her own home. In my just-furnished living room, even as she introduced me to the candidate, I knew she wasn’t going to consent lightly to an offer of Rs.750 to the maid. We asked Lakshmi - the candidate - how much she expected, and she asked for 500.00. My neighbour promptly took charge and negotiated her down to Rs.350 and signed her up. I began to murmur something about 500 being better, but as I had anticipated, that was put down with a “don’t do that. These people should always be paid only so much. If you pay more, then they will all start asking for more..”. Having been conditioned to defer to senior women on domestic issues, I appeared locked in to the negotiated rate as well. There was little that Lakshmi could do, since she knew someone else would step up to take up the job if she didn’t. Away from my neighbour's glare, however, I decided to play my cards differently. A week after Lakshmi began work, I drew up a calculation on my white-board and told the semi-literate lady quite flatly that that the city paid so much to its own cleaners, and based on this I was going to pay her a living wage too, and here was my calculation. I also let her know that I was not doing this out of any goodness, but merely as an employer who wanted to follow ‘government guidelines’. I don’t think I really got through to her; she nodded nonetheless, and that was good enough for me. A few months went by. The neighbour’s family and ours became quite friendly. Inevitably, they came to know that I was paying over twice the initial offer. But I wasn’t asked to explain and didn’t make an effort to offer one. My wife and I then thought it fit to subsidize partial medical expenses for Lakshmi, and schooling expenses for her only daughter. Sarala was usually playing in the sand with other girls, and it was more than a year since she and her mother migrated to Bangalore from Tamilnadu. Following her husband’s suicide, Lakshmi’s in-laws had taken over her their rundown property, held her son back to raise him and thrown out mother and daughter. The twosome drifted to Bangalore along with other migrant laborers. Lakshmi became a construction day-laborer and a part-time domestic worker. After a few months of my urging, she agreed to admit her daughter to a local Tamil medium school, with my family footing the bill. Note my surprise that there are Tamil medium schools in Bangalore with syllabus and support from the government of Karnataka! In return for this approach to her livelihood, I laid out the ground rules early on. Most domestic workers in urban areas in India suffer from instabilities of all kinds. ‘Sudden leave of absence’ is the most common symptom of this. Knowing the scenario quite well, I told Lakshmi my terms - paid leave, unpaid leave, time of work, and simple procedures to keep us informed. Standard stuff, very similar to the way it is in the organized sector. You get paid for the value you bring to the table, and if you respect your time and the money you make, you’ll respect your employers’ time and money as well. You guessed right! It took my family several months of instructions to bring Lakshmi around to respect her own time and the money she was being paid for her work. She would often absent herself without calling us (despite some money having been set aside for telephone calls). But over time she understood our terms better, and started following those rules. She still misplaces our phone numbers or does not take care to keep them handy when she travels, but these instances have become fewer over time. All of this has been a learning experience for me too. First, contrary to trends in opinion amongst employers, help for domestic work remains important. Despite recent signs of greater mechanization in urban households, large numbers of working couples and home-runners continue to rely on domestic workers. When a worker stops abruptly, employers make diligent efforts to find a replacement. Usually, in fact, a new worker will be found quickly. Employers (often women themselves) may abuse workers for coming late, going on bursts of leave, and their poor quality of work. Despite this, they don't get rid of their dependence on workers - a clear sign of their reliance on domestic help. Second, minimum wage guidelines are hopelessly out of sync with real costs. Much after Lakshmi began working in our home, I learned that the federal minimum wage in India is Rs.52 per day; this works out to around Rs.6.50 per hour. This kind of wage simply will not make the cut for cities, if it is the only wage paid in total per day. There is also little information available for adjustments related to traveling/walking to work, limited medical coverage/reimbursement and those sort of things that real wages must reflect. On balance, my living wage numbers were nearly double the minimum wage. Third, most domestic workers are used to living and working in a climate of low self-esteem and abuse. They can purchase little for what they get in return for their hard labor. They will not easily be tricked into believing their work is very valuable and they must follow ‘rules’. Even when better wages are paid, there are other communal and caste equations that hinder their asserting themselves in a professional manner. If anything, some low-paid domestic workers have found ways to punish employers in return by deliberately causing untimely difficulties that would otherwise be clearly avoidable. Lakshmi has told me about how her counterparts in other houses would at times deliberately leave clothes dirty, or leave a tap running to run the water tank dry! Four, it has taken some time for Lakshmi to understand that we really have no special interest in her situation – we would do this for any domestic worker we had retained. Several times, she asked for more work and volunteered to do additional chores, even though that meant she would return home late and have less time for her daughter. On several occasions, I had to ask her to check her time, work efficiently and leave. The expectations of an organized sector work culture do not easily transfer to the informal sector, merely because one pays a decent wage. But there are even larger difficulties. The benefits Lakshmi that receives from my family do not automatically transfer to her next employer. In the current relationship, if Lakshmi were to leave tomorrow, or we packed our bags to leave for a distant part of town, what would happen to coverage for her medical expenses and her daughter's education? This is a shaky foundation, but I knew that going in. On the other hand, if domestic workers in a region were collectively organized, employers in the region could pay monthly contributions (over and above wages) to a pooled fund. The fund could cover workers's expenses. This is a more robust system than coverage through individual employer-worker relationships. What's more, the relationship between employers and workers will then be a less personal and more formal one. On balance, though, things have worked better for both employer and employee. Lakshmi has had her daughter in school for the second year in a row, and has seen a higher regular income for herself, allowing her to purchase small things for her home. From time to time, she has relied on her employers for banking, as well as for petty-cash loans. On occasion, her daughter gets limited advice and nudging from my spouse about her studies and future. Our finances are no worse off merely because we paid Lakshmi a better wage. In return, we've received a more cordial, reliable and timely commitment to domestic work than we would have otherwise. The absence of legal sanction and a system for administration of benefits may not stop some citizens from paying living wages to Lakshmi and her class of workers. But ultimately, modern India has to enshrine living wage support in legislation and institutions. On that note, it is encouraging that Karnataka and Maharashtra have taken the lead. What remains to be seen is when and how benefits will accrue to domestic workers. Subramaniam Vincent October 2003 Subramaniam Vincent is co-founder and editor at India Together From ambarien at yahoo.co.uk Tue Nov 18 09:38:23 2003 From: ambarien at yahoo.co.uk (=?iso-8859-1?q?ambarien=20qadar?=) Date: Tue, 18 Nov 2003 04:08:23 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] Zakir Nagar Diary #1 Message-ID: <20031118040823.59878.qmail@web25002.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> --------------------------------- Want to chat instantly with your online friends? Get the FREE Yahoo!Messenger -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031118/50800987/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Zakir Nagar Diary.doc Type: application/msword Size: 26112 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031118/50800987/attachment.doc From faizan at sarai.net Tue Nov 18 16:40:37 2003 From: faizan at sarai.net (Faizan Ahmed) Date: Tue, 18 Nov 2003 16:40:37 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Gujarat censor board bans Maulana Azad play Message-ID: <200311181640.37713.faizan@sarai.net> Gujarat censor board bans Maulana Azad play NINA MARTYRIS TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 2003 01:43:52 AM ] MUMBAI: In a move that has upset theatre circles, the Gujarat Censor Board has banned the performance of Sayeed Alam's historical play Maulana Azad in the state. The Urdu production, which explores the patriot's views on politics, music, jasmine tea, Mecca and Gandhi, was scheduled to play on November 9 at Ahmedabad's Darpana Academy run by Mallika Sarabhai. A week before that, however, a letter from the censor's office arrived stating that "in the present circumstances" a performance of the play would not be possible. The team was unofficially told that if the play was performed " hungama ho jayega". Those involved say that the decision could be part of the campaign to target danseuse Mallika Sarabhai who has been singled out by the Narendra Modi government for speaking out against alleged state atrocities during last year's Gujarat riots. Produced by Ashok Curang's Pierrot's Troupe, the play, which features Tom Alter in the lead role, has performed in Mumbai, Delhi, Dehra Dun, Mussoorie and Hyderabad without the whiff of a " hungama". "The censor board did not tell us specifically what they found objectionable about the play- whether it was the theme, title or dialogue," says Mr Alam, who is based in Delhi. "The play has been reviewed by almost every major paper in the country and there's no mention of anything controversial." Mr Alam feels that what the censor board may have taken objection to is one line in the play where Azad,who is dictating his book 'India Wins Freedom' to Humayun Kabir says, 'To a large extent Sardar Patel was responsible for Partition.' -------------------------------------------------------------------- Submitted by Asad Ahmed, Ph.D. (Aligarh '61), Edmonton, Canada ------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031118/02e5a1dc/attachment.html From avinash332 at rediffmail.com Wed Nov 19 10:33:28 2003 From: avinash332 at rediffmail.com (avinash kumar) Date: 19 Nov 2003 05:03:28 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] The Craze for America Message-ID: <20031119050328.28308.qmail@webmail36.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031119/5d87f0a0/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- Going gaga about Bobby Jindal Dilip D'Souza | November 17, 2003 | 12:43 IST Bobby Jindal and I went to the same university, Brown. Sure, I was there several years before him, but nevertheless, it's true: we share our alma mater. So given his sudden rise to prominence, I wonder: what should I be gaga about? That we both have Indian roots of sorts? Or that we were at the same school? As far as I'm concerned, the right answer is neither. Yet if I really had to choose, the Brown connection wins, easily. After all, at least he and I had some tangible connection there -- perhaps we took courses from the same professors, maybe we both watched Brown lose football games. (Somethingeasily accomplished when I was there). That kind of thing. But as far as his roots go, the man is really American: he grew up in that country, has been involved in American affairs and has just lost in a bid to become an American governor of an American state. "I am proud to be a Louisianian," he said as he conceded on November 15, "proud to be an American." Entirely as it should be. I don't recall a single time that Jindal has shown any particular interest in India. Not that he should, not that that's any kind of strike against him. What I'm saying is, the man is like every other American pol who aspires to American office, and that's also entirely as it should be. There's no need for him to speak about Indian issues. He doesn't. Simple. Yet here in India we swoon over him. We hail his political rise -- his attempt to become governor itself -- as one more sign of a resurgent India. We tell ourselves that he "has put India firmly on the global map." (Sunday Times of India, October 26, 2003). Hell-oo! What's going on here? I mean, I don't recall a single article about him in his own country that made much of his Indian roots, or pronounced that his election campaign had "put India firmly on the global map." So, applauding his success as a barometer of India's makes about as much sense as seeing Schwarznegger's victory as a triumph for India: apart from their names -- OK, their muscles too -- what's the difference between Arnie and Bobby? For that matter, it makes about as much sense as hailing Jayalalitha's electoral triumphs for "putting India on the global map." In fact, it's likely the lady from Tamil Nadu has done more to get India noticed than Jindal has. No, what's REALLY going on here is our age-old obsession with America and the West. In this case,?how we yearn for approval from foreigners, and specially American foreigners! How we long for them to recognize us as equals! Therefore, how we grasp for anything at all that can be put in that light. Even if it is nothing more than a young American's Indian name. Hold on to that thought while I tell you about something else. By now, you alert rediff readers have no doubt heard about Mallika Sarabhai's troubles. The general impression is that she has been accused of trafficking in illegal immigrants to foreign shores. To many who know Sarabhai and know in particular that she has been severely critical of the Gujarat government over the last couple of years, it's clear what this is about. It's no more than a vendetta, a conscious decision to harrass the lady in retaliation. You think I'm saying that because I have my own bias against the Gujarat government. You say, vehemently, the law must take its own course! Fair enough, on both counts. Nobody, least of all me, wants anything else than for the law to take its own course: it's by far the best way for all to see what this is about. Still, what you might do is take a look at the police complaint filed against Sarabhai. The complaint was made by a Manushi Shah. In it, she says she was one of Sarabhai's students and was scheduled to go on a dance tour of the US that Sarabhai's dance academy, Darpana, had arranged for April 2003. Darpana, she complains, "collected Rs 330,000 from [me] on the pretext of sending to America as per plan and committed a crime/fraud by breaching faith and cheating." This, because the planned trip to the USA had to be cancelled as the dancers were refused visas by the American consulate in Bombay. Did Darpana refuse to return Manushi's money? No, Manushi herself says that "Darpana had a written agreement [with us] that in case tour gets cancelled they will repay the entire amount deducting Rs 20,000." Later, she says: "We received Rs 310,000 and passport back." Is Manushi complaining about the Rs 20,000 that was deducted? No, because not only does she mention the written agreement, she also says this: "This condition [about the Rs 20,000 deduction] was agreeable to all of us at that time and even it is agreeable today also.?We informed Darpana through letter stating that?we are agreeable for deduction of Rs 20,000." So let's see: Manushi had an agreement with Darpana to go on a tour provided the visas came through. If they did not, Darpana would return the money minus Rs 20,000. Manushi explicitly says she found this "agreeable." The visas did not come through. Manushi got back her money, minus Rs 20,000. So what is Manushi's problem? Well, according to her own police complaint, she informed Darpana that "her engagement has been already done with a person who is settled in America and so she also wants to settle down in America." And since the visa was denied, "[my] bright future in America has got affected." In other words, Manushi Shah viewed this tour as a way to reach the USA, so she could "settle down" there with her future, and already "settled in America", husband. Not for her the normal route of waiting for a husband-sponsored visa to arrive. (Why?) Nope: reading the complaint, the conclusion you cannot avoid is that she wanted to enter the USA on a pretext, and saw Darpana's tour as that pretext. And when this scheme falls through, she accuses Darpana and Mallika Sarabhai of fraud. Look at it like this. You and I sign an agreement by which you will drive me to the bank one morning. Your car breaks down that morning and we can't go. Suppose then I file a police complaint saying "I had planned to rob the bank that morning. Since he didn't take me, this man has committed fraud on me." Suppose I even tell the police that "my bright future has got affected." Laughable, you think? Well, in Manushi's case, the police are proceeding against Sarabhai. But leave aside the absurdity of this complaint. Forget the venality of authorities who search for excuses to harrass someone they want to hit back at. Ignore the crassness of those who applaud this harrassment because of their own sympathies. Put all that away and ask yourself: what's at the bottom of Manushi's complaint, the thing that sets it apart from the car example above? The thing that makes it seem plausible, whereas my bank confession would elicit guffaws? This: Manushi desperately wanted to emigrate to the USA. Think of it: would all this have happened had the tour been to Burma? It's that obsession with America, again. Now let's say Manushi got to the promised land via Darpana's tour, and went off to "settle down" with her husband. Let's say a little Manisha comes along after nine months. Let's say that in about thirty years, Manisha runs for governor of Idaho. Will that "put India firmly on the global map"? And is that the "bright future" Manushi looked forward to? ? From menso at r4k.net Wed Nov 19 20:03:01 2003 From: menso at r4k.net (Menso Heus) Date: Wed, 19 Nov 2003 15:33:01 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] FW: [Politech] Brits launch "Chasing Bush" website to coordinate protests Message-ID: <20031119143301.GF60285@r4k.net> ----- Forwarded message from Declan McCullagh ----- It's here: http://www.interwebnet.org/ Also see: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,6903,1086397,00.html?=rss 'Shoot-to-kill' demand by US Martin Bright, home affairs editor Sunday November 16, 2003 The Observer Home Secretary David Blunkett has refused to grant diplomatic immunity to armed American special agents and snipers travelling to Britain as part of President Bush's entourage this week. In the case of the accidental shooting of a protester, the Americans in Bush's protection squad will face justice in a British court as would any other visitor, the Home Office has confirmed. The issue of immunity is one of a series of extraordinary US demands turned down by Ministers and Downing Street during preparations for the Bush visit. These included the closure of the Tube network, the use of US air force planes and helicopters and the shipping in of battlefield weaponry to use against rioters. ... _______________________________________________ Politech mailing list Archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ Moderated by Declan McCullagh (http://www.mccullagh.org/) - ----- End forwarded message ----- - -- - -------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Disco never died, it just changed it's name to protect the innocent" - Gloria Gaynor - -------------------------------------------------------------------------- From nyvoices at indypress.org Thu Nov 20 02:51:35 2003 From: nyvoices at indypress.org (Rehan Ansari) Date: Wed, 19 Nov 2003 16:21:35 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Edition 91: 20 November 2003 Message-ID: <002501c3aee3$743893e0$6901a8c0@herman> This Week's Voices That Must Be Heard By IPA-New York, a sponsored project of the Independent Press Association Edition 91: 20 November 2003. NEWS ITEMS: Novoe Russkoe Slovo sold to Kiev-based party by Jonathan Spektor, Russian Forward, 20 November 2003. Translated from Russian by Rachel Thorner. Novoe Russkoe Slovo, the oldest daily newspaper in America, and Narodnaya Volna, the oldest Russian radio station. has been sold to the Kiev-based Media International Group (MIG) . MORE. City corner taken away from day laborers by Cristina Loboguerrero, El Diario / La Prensa, 11 November 2003. Translated from Spanish by Karina Valencia. Workers who gather at Throckmorton Street in Freehold, N.J could be arrested and deported. The campaign to disseminate the Council's decision includes announcements over the radio and the distribution of flyers in Freehold as well as in Mexico, in places such as Oaxaca, Chiapas and Puebla. MORE. Tales of sexual harassment hidden behind smiles by Sonia Huq, Weekly Thikana, 14 November 2003. Translated from Bangla by Minhaz Ahmed . Many of the women complainted of sexual harassment by older shop owners. Their stories of harassment, however, are hidden behind sweet smiles. They fear losing their honor and prestige. They feel unable to fight back due to their illegal status in the United States. MORE. Book give-away is a stand against offensive media in the community by Talsie D. Moorer, Amsterdam News, 19 November 2003. English language. Media activists in Harlem pass out books and paint over billboards advertising tobacco and alcohol products. MORE. BRIEFS: Immigrant workers win battle against former employer in Harlem by Izadeli Montalvo, El Diario / La Prensa, 6 November 2003. Translated from Spanish by Hirsh Sawhney. The dilemma after winning the green card by Anna Salamon, Super Express, 14 November 2003. Translated from Polish by Ania Milewska. The CEO of money transfer company arrested, later released on bail, business is closed down, Bangla Patrika, 14 November 2003. Translated from Bangla by Moinuddin Naser . Cooperative investments in real estate on the rise among Koreans by Chung-won Park, Korea Daily News, 14 November 2003. Translated from Korean by Sun-yong Reinish. EDITORIALS: Crossing the cultural chasm by Pradeep Srivastava, India Abroad, 7 November 2003. English language. Too often culture determines destiny. It establishes a person's desires, values, belief system and conduct. Desires govern a person's determination, which is reflected in one's deeds. I would like to share some of the ideas that have helped me teach my children how to integrate Indian and American culture. MORE. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031119/74a34ea8/attachment.html From epk at xs4all.nl Fri Nov 21 04:14:53 2003 From: epk at xs4all.nl (Eric Kluitenberg) Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2003 23:44:53 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Debates & Credits Book and DVD Released Message-ID: Dear Reader-List subscribers, Since media and the city is a recurring them on this list and certainly in the scope of the Sarai initiative, I wanted to forward this announce for your information about a book and DVD recently released at De Balie in Amsterdam, reflecting upon a series of media art projects in public urban space in Moscow, Amsterdam and Ekaterinburg in the Fall of 2002. The book contains some interesting essays reflecting on media, the public sphere and urban space. check also the web journal: http://www.debates.nl kind regards, eric ------------------------------ Debates & Credits Media / Art / Public Domain Book and DVD Released As the final part of the Dutch Russian art and media project Debates & Credits, a book and DVD documenting the project and reflecting on the outcomes have recently been published by De Balie in Amsterdam. The texts are written in both English and Russian. Debates & Credits explored the poetics and politics of public space in Amsterdam, Moscow, and Ekaterinburg, through a series media art actions specifically designed for the urban landscape. The book provides a full documentation of the art and media projects that were executed in the frame of Debates & Credits in these cities in the Fall of 2002. The book includes a full-colour print section, as well as video documentations on the accompanying DVD. After the execution of the actions, which were documented in a web journal, we asked a number of distinguished colleagues to reflect critically on the outcomes and the issues raised by the project. This has resulted in a number of challenging essays, as well as an artist contribution by Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, who had been working in the same period on highly similar projects engaging the interface of media and urban space. His work is introduced in the book by art and media theorist Timothy Druckrey. _______________________________ Essays were contributed by: - Viktor Voronkov, sociologist, director of the Center for Independent Social Research, Saint Petersburg - Oliver Marchart, political and cultural theorist, works at the Media Studies Department, University of Basel - Max Bruinsma, freelance critic, lecturer, curator, and independent consultant editorial design, Amsterdam and by the curators of Debates & Credits: - Tatiana Goryucheva, art theorist, historian of media art and curator, Moscow - Eric Kluitenberg, media theorist, writer and organiser on culture and technology, Amsterdam _______________________________ Artists participating in Debates & Credits: Archeopteryx (.ru) / Arno Coenen (.nl) / Oleg Kireev & the Getto collective (.ru) / MACHINE (.nl) / Galina Myznikova & Sergei Provorov (.ru) / Leonard van Munster (.nl) / Arseni Sergeev (.ru) / park tv (.nl) _______________________________ Overview of Content: Essay No.1: Eric Kluitenberg, "Virtualité, adieu mon amour. What happens when 'our' media encounter the 'real' world?" Essay No.2: Tatiana Goryucheva, "Minima Sententia. Instrumentalisation of the Image and Simulation of Public Communication" Photo Essay: "Moscow Brands: Who speaks for the Public?" Reports about the art projects of Debates & Credits (word and image) Commentary: Timothy Druckrey, "Relational Architecture: the work of Rafael Lozano-Hemmer" "Legal / Illegal" - Declaration and Report from the Moscow Open Net Parliament, Oleg Kireev & the Getto collective Essay No.3: Oliver Marchart, "Media Darkness. Reflections on Public Space, Light and Conflict" Essay No.4: Viktor Voronkov, "Life and Death of the Public Sphere in the Soviet Union" Essay No.5: Max Bruinsma, "Just Use It!" Frequently Asked Questions about the Public Domain Biographies _______________________________ Web Journal: More materials, reports, images and videos can be found on-line in the web journal of Debates & Credits: http://www.debates.nl _______________________________ You can order the Book/DVD on-line via Nijhof & Lee International Booksellers at: http://www.nijhoflee.nl/article/9789066172982 _______________________________ Publication details: "Debates & Credits - Media / Art / Public Domain" Tatiana Goryucheva & Eric Kluitenberg (ed.) Publisher: Uitgeverij De Balie, Amsterdam Year of publication: 2003 pp. 144 Includes DVD ISBN: 90-6617-298-3 _______________________________ De Balie Centre for Culture and Politics Amsterdam http://www.debalie.nl From aiindex at mnet.fr Fri Nov 21 08:41:16 2003 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2003 04:11:16 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] What is Wrong with this Picture? (Bombay, January 26-28, 2004) Message-ID: SOUTH ASIA CITIZENS WIRE | 21 November, 2003 via South Asia Citizens Web: www.sacw.net _______ [8] India: Upcoming Conference : What is Wrong with this Picture? Investigating Visual Studies International Conference (Bombay - January 26-28, 2004) -------------- [8] What is Wrong with this Picture? Investigating Visual Studies: International Conference Organized by Prashant Parikh and Arindam Dutta Mohile Parikh Center National Center for Performing Arts Mumbai, India January 26-28, 2004 Program Monday, January 26: In the Dock: Visual Evidence 09.00 - 09.45: Coffee 09.45 - 09.50: Introduction by Prashant Parikh 09.50 - 10.00: Introduction by Arindam Dutta 10.00 - 11.00: Ackbar Abbas 11.00 - 11.30: Coffee 11.30 - 12.30: Tapati Guha-Thakurta 12.30 - 01.30: Lunch 01.30 - 02.30: Ranjit Hoskote 02.30 - 03.30: Harsha Dehejia 03.30 - 04.00: Coffee 04.00 - 05.00: Panel discussion Day chair: Kamala Ganesh Tuesday, January 27: Strategies of the Visual: Methodologies and Disciplinary Critiques 10.00 - 11.00: Chris Csikszentmihalyi 11.30 - 12.30: Parul Dave Mukherji 01.30 - 02.30: Arindam Dutta 02.30 - 03.30: Susan Buck-Morss 04.00 - 05.00: Panel discussion Day chair: Shubadha Joshi Wednesday, January 28: Technologies of the Visual 10.00 - 11.00: R. Srivatsan 11.30 - 12.30: Sanjit Sethi 01.30 - 02.30: M. Madhava Prasad 02.30 - 03.30: Tom Levin 04.00 - 05.00: Panel discussion Day chair: Gita Chadha 05.00 - 05.05: Vote of thanks by Amrita Gupta, MPC Visual Arts Forum Program Coordinator Format of Conference: Each of twelve speakers will give a forty-five minute talk followed by fifteen minutes of questions. An hour-long panel discussion will round out each day. Concept Note 'What is Wrong with this Picture?' Investigating Visual Studies Arindam Dutta In Art History, the disciplinary question 'What is art?' is never far from the mind. To ask the same question of Visual Studies, Art Historyís more recent offshoot, may be either simpler or trickier, since the objective and subjective elements of study are both obvious and, on the other hand, could possibly be extended to simply everything. What the eye sees - vision itself - remains unperturbed and untrammeled by any disciplinary boundaries. Understanding this, archaic philosophy sought to harness vision with the categories of knowledge. In the Platonic characterization, the epistemic category precedes the seduction of vision; vision plays tricks with the mind. On the other hand, vision was also accorded with a discerning, verificatory ability, as illustrated in the contemporary adage 'What you get is what you see.' In both senses, the linkage of vision and knowledge is ancient. 'To see is to know': this conceit links together the Sanskrit word, vidya, or knowledge, the epistemological tracts called the Vedas, and video. It is perhaps because of these archaic, intimate links that in the new forms of Visual Studies in the last twenty years, contributions have been forthcoming from almost all the modern disciplinary ramparts - Language Studies, Art and Architectural History, Anthropology, Sociology, History, Political Science - the 'Arts' in the wider sense. 'Visual studies' in this sense also appears to circulate in a field where its other siblings have intermingled reign, comprising the only slightly older academic fields of semiotics, cultural studies and visual culture. As opposed to art historyís obsession with its institutional locations, the larger compass of Visual Studies has drawn its partisans to studies of film, television, advertising media, photography, design culture, graffiti and the like. In addition, visual studies has also operated as a surrogate terrain for exercising cutting edge analytical techniques - Lacanian psychoanalysis, feminism, post-structuralism - very often outside their parent disciplines, where their methodological consistency would be tested. This promiscuity has drawn both support and criticism from the various academic barricades. Even if one does not submit to disciplinary parochialism, the apparent laxity evinced above may have certainly undermined the academic ground which Visual Studies stands on; failure to determine methodological grounds by which critical work is to be judged has the long term effect of corroding the institutional relevance of academic work in general. A 1996 review by the magazine October suggested as much, alleging that visual studies, in effect, only offered university students a self-vindicating terminology for their consumptive tendencies, rather than graduating them into unfamiliar frameworks of non-intuitive knowledge. As a para-discipline, Visual Studies has largely tended to lack methodological reflection. Some scholars, such as Barbara Maria Stafford and more recently Jonathan Crary, have displaced this methodological shortcoming - and perhaps impossibility - by attempting an epistemology of the visual as such, by looking at the manner in which the eye is configured within certain conventions. The emphasis on convention has moved the consideration of the eye away from a 'natural' organ to the technological and technical idioms to which the eye is (always) subject. An entire genre of critical studies has concentrated on the eyeís myriad machinic surrogates and transplants: beginning with Descartes' example of the egg-shell in his essay on Optics, with its technological derivatives: the telescope, microscope, photography, cinema, X-rays, CAT-scans, and MRIs. The implications there have been to understand vision as entwined within a host of technological and philosophical discourses. The focus on visual prosthesis has, ironically, found its takers in artistic practice as well, igniting an entire field of experimentation with visual technologies whose ambits are well outside the conventional armature of the museum wall or space. In spite of its reservations, art history has had to take cognizance of these shifts. Other scholars of visual studies have concentrated on the objects of culture rather than the configurations of the eye, often unwittingly extending and reversing framework of iconological studies into more careful examinations of receptivity and audience. Drawing from the critical insights arrived at within anthropology, literary criticism, and sociology, these studies are perhaps most indebted to the Frankfurt School in its synthesis of visual and mass phenomena. Other significant influences include certain - often unconsidered usages of visual metaphors - such as Lacan's theory of the ìmirror stageî and the gaze and Luce Irigaray's theorization of the speculum and the 'Specular Cave' (itself locating a blind spot in the Platonic schema of vision). The hypnotic 'gaze' of power, more a notional rather than physical entity, has nonetheless spawned a host of studies into societal relationships with the visual at its center. As the notion of the surveillance-state - with its burgeoning closed-circuit cameras, identity-tagging, optic- and DNA-scanning devices - increasingly takes hold around the world, the philosophical domain of the gaze has given an unnerving physical manifestation that erodes the divisions between object and subject. Our conference What is Wrong with this Picture? Investigating Visual Studies will examine this new indeterminate territory of visual studies. The conference will be held on January 26th, 27th, and 28th, 2004, at the Mohile Parikh Center, in the National Centre for Performing Arts in Mumbai (Bombay), India. Twelve speakers will be invited, from India and abroad, to give papers and participate in panel discussions over a three-day period. Conference papers will comprise case studies, disciplinary and methodological critiques, and philosophical reflections of and on visual studies as a field. The Indian location of the conference is particularly apposite since, in many ways, institutions devoted to art history - the principal antagonist and contributor to visual studies - remain thin on the ground. With increasing integration with the global economy and the corresponding deluge of electronic media into the country, Indian institutions might be said to have skipped the 'art historical' phase in their history and fast-forwarded to a more receptive attitude to media and visual studies instead. The conference comprises three days of events with talks in the mornings and talks and panel discussions in the afternoon. The three days are designated as follows: Day 1. In the Dock: Visual Evidence This session will be devoted to case studies, and discussing what counts as a case study in visual studies. Day 2. Strategies of the Visual: Methodologies and Disciplinary Critiques How do visual studies relate to other disciplines and critical strategies? Day 3. Technologies of the Visual What are the idioms, technological and technical paradigms that visual studies operates with? _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ Buzz on the perils of fundamentalist politics, on matters of peace and democratisation in South Asia. SACW is an independent & non-profit citizens wire service run since 1998 by South Asia Citizens Web URL: www.sacw.net. The complete SACW archive is available at the URL: bridget.jatol.com/pipermail/sacw_insaf.net/ [The earlier URL for SACW web site , is now longer valid, you may search google cache for materials on the old location] South Asia Counter Information Project a sister initiative, provides a partial back -up and archive for SACW. URL: perso.wanadoo.fr/sacw/ DISCLAIMER: Opinions expressed in materials carried in the posts do not necessarily reflect the views of SACW compilers. -- From secretariat at pukar.org.in Thu Nov 20 18:19:56 2003 From: secretariat at pukar.org.in (PUKAR) Date: 20 Nov 2003 12:49:56 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] The PUKAR Winter Institute Message-ID: <20031120124956.2003.qmail@users.npsis.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031120/69ffc853/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From treborscholz at earthlink.net Thu Nov 20 22:44:43 2003 From: treborscholz at earthlink.net (Discordia_Collective) Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2003 12:14:43 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Discordia Welcomes New Editors Message-ID: Discordia welcomes new editors-- Nat Muller, Janet Owen, Gabriel Pickard, Joseph Rabie, and Sophia Rawlinson. Nat Muller (NL) is a free-lance writer, curator, producer, critic and delight-maker. She holds a BA from Tel-Aviv University (Israel) in English Literature and an MA in Queer and Gender Theory from Sussex University (UK). She has worked as a sex educator, bookshopkeeper, free-lance journalist and as project manager and curator at V2_Organisation , Institute for Unstable Media in Rotterdam, and Axis, Bureau for Gender and the Arts in Amsterdam for which in 2000 she edited the reader _Ctrl+Shift Art - Ctrl+Shift Gender: Convergences of New Media, Art and Gender_. Nat has published articles in off- and online media, and has given presentations on the subject of media technology, art, and gender (inter)nationally. Currently she is a researcher at the Theory Department of the Jan van Eyck Academy in Maastricht, and an active member of the art&technology collective FoAM (http://f0.am/). Her main interests include: user research in technological environments, the creation of new public & participatory contexts, food and social communication, gender and technology, and Middle-Eastern politics. Artist, curator, and writer Janet Owen is the Co-founder of the AIM international festival of time-based media, most recent curatorial projects include: 'Being Human, Becoming Something Else' at the Susquehanna Art Museum, and 'AIM on Sunset', (co-curated with Lynzie Baldwin) for the Sunset Strip video screens, LA. Most recently her writing has been included in "Kolibri" (Revolver, Archiv für aktuelle Kunst, Frankfurt/Main). http:www.usc.edu/aim Gabriel Pickard is an activist and critical coder, based in Germany, who will be contributing to a wide variety of political and technical issues. He has been blogging his thoughts at http://werg.demokratica.de Joseph Rabie is the director of a multimedia services company called Magelis, in Toulouse, France, working for a wide range of clients (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, National Space Agency...). He also directs a new publishing company called Galaxy Train, based in the Pyrenees Mountains, working in the field of interactive fiction and child education. Both companies function in accordance with a collegial model of work. Joe's personal artistic work is articulated around an interactive demo called the "Over My Dead Body" project, and interactive photography ("photographs, not only sensitive to light, but also to the observer's scrutiny"). His interests include discourse as the source of civilized discord. http://www.magelis.com http://www.magelis.com/joezone/ http://www.overmydeadbody.org Sophia Rawlinson is a 22 year-old recent graduate of Goldsmith's College with a BSC (Hons) Multimedia Technology degree from the University of Essex and an MA in Interactive Media from the University of London. Her interests include investigating the possibilities of using new media to raise awareness of social issues, the broader issue of social software & software criticism, e-democracy, CD ROM development/publishing and curating new media. Sophia's skills include designing and developing interactive media products. Sophia currently does volunteer work at a youth charity in London. She lives at: http://www.s-rawlinson.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk. Discordia || And Welcome to It http://www.discordia.us _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From abirbazaz at rediffmail.com Sat Nov 22 21:37:56 2003 From: abirbazaz at rediffmail.com (abir bazaz) Date: 22 Nov 2003 16:07:56 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] UN adopts self-determination resolution Message-ID: <20031122160756.31735.qmail@webmail9.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031122/b567e091/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- India fails to stop UN adopting self-determination resolution http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_468181,00050002.htm Asian News International United Nations, November 22 Casting aside India's objections, The United Nations General Assembly has adopted a resolution for the peoples' right to self-determination. According to the Dawn, the resolution was passed by an 88-3 vote on Thursday. The three countries objecting to the resolution in which Pakistan had taken a lead role were India, Mauritius and Bhutan. In all, 30 countries sponsored the resolution. By adopting the resolution, the UN General Assembly declared its firm opposition to the acts of foreign military intervention, aggression and occupation, since those acts have resulted in the suppression of the right of self-determination. The assembly also called upon states to cease their military intervention in, and occupation of foreign countries and territories and all acts of repression, discrimination and maltreatment, the paper reported. India had launched a massive diplomatic campaign to oppose the resolution, immediately after it was sponsored some two weeks ago. It lobbied member states to vote against it, saying that, "some of the references made by Pakistan, on behalf of the co-sponsors, challenged and threatened the territorial integrity of India. Explaining the American abstention, the US delegate explained that Washington believed that the best solution would be a mutual resolution of issues between India and Pakistan. From rajincommand at btinternet.com Sun Nov 23 18:20:20 2003 From: rajincommand at btinternet.com (RAJU-SHELU) Date: Sun, 23 Nov 2003 12:50:20 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] street musicians in mumbai (project) Message-ID: <000601c3b1c0$5ac34650$a0c58451@sohel> hello! I am an animation student in the UK. I was looking for a particular sound clip from streets of mumbai. I dont know if you have come accross, but we sometimes get to see these half naked men on streets beating themselves with a hunter while another guy plays drums...that is a very provocative sound to the ears, a little pragmatic. i am searching for that sound to add to an animation project of mine. this project consists of one such indian street scenes as well. i will be really grateful if you could help me locate this sound from somewhere...maybe you have come accross it, maybe you have watched some indian movie that has this sound...you know any help will be really appreciated. please mail me at the above ID at your convienience. thanks and regards Raj -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031123/8fc64373/attachment.html From zest_india at yahoo.co.in Sun Nov 23 13:30:10 2003 From: zest_india at yahoo.co.in (=?iso-8859-1?q?Shivam=20Vij?=) Date: Sun, 23 Nov 2003 08:00:10 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Invitation to subscribe to www.thehoot.org's monthly newsletter Message-ID: <20031123080010.43167.qmail@web8201.mail.in.yahoo.com> Do you want to know what is going behind the scenes in that one industry that defines how you see the world around you? The more the media matters, the more we must track what it does. Every Monday, www.TheHoot.org brings you in-depth reports from all parts of the sub-continent and even abroad. As the watchdog’s watchdog we take a hard-edged look at issues that plague the media, and offer riffs and reflections on what is in the news and what ought to be.   Every month, using Yahoo! Groups, we shall inform you about the new stories in The Hoot. All you have to do is to subscribe to our monthly newsletter by sending a blank mail to thehoot-subscribe at yahogroups.com or clicking here: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/thehoot/join   Thanks! ________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo! India Mobile: Download the latest polyphonic ringtones. Go to http://in.mobile.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From programacion at ciberart-bilbao.net Mon Nov 24 15:53:16 2003 From: programacion at ciberart-bilbao.net (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Programaci=F3n_Ciber@RT?=) Date: Mon, 24 Nov 2003 11:23:16 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Call for Papers - Ciberart Conference Message-ID: <016201c3b274$fb11e3f0$0300a8c0@GERALDINE> ***************************************************************************************************************************************************** CALL FOR PAPERS - CIBERART BILBAO 2004 INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE Submission Deadline for Conference "Challenges for a Ubiquitous Identity" Extended until January 7th 2004 ***************************************************************************************************************************************************** The International Conference will be held within the International Festival of New Technologies Ciberart Bilbao 2004 which will take place from April 26th to 29th 2004 (Bilbao - Spain). We are inviting you to present your papers for the key themes of the Conference which include: Computational Sociology, Televirtuality and Telepresence, Body and Nets, Synaptic Cartography, Planetary Art, The Museum of the Ubiquitous Art. The Scientific Committee that will select the submitted papers is formed by the following theorists: Roy Ascott (UK), Victoria Vesna (USA), Ángel Kalenberg (Uruguay), Elisenda Ardèvol (Spain), Guilia Colaizzi (Italy), Peter Andres (USA), Alex Galloway (USA), Josu Rekalde (Spain), Lourdes Cilleruelo (Spain), Ramón López de Mantáras Badia (Spain), Javier Echevarría (Spain) y Pierre Bongiovanni (France). April 29th, last day of the Conference, will be dedicated to the Planetary Collegium presentations, group of theorists directed by Roy Ascott. A list of the speakers is available at the Festival's web page. We invite you to visit our web page for further information about the Conference and Festival: http://www.ciberart-bilbao.net/congreso_en.htm We would also like to remind you that deadline for Artwork submission is December 15th 2003. Contact: congres at ciberart-bilbao.net programacion at ciberart-bilbao.net www.ciberart-bilbao.net Tel: +34 96 373 01 81 Fax: +34 96 373 05 45 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031124/5bc954a9/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From epk at xs4all.nl Tue Nov 25 19:52:03 2003 From: epk at xs4all.nl (Eric Kluitenberg) Date: Tue, 25 Nov 2003 15:22:03 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] FYI: Transit Central Asia - debates & films Message-ID: A N N O U N C E M E N T TRANSIT CENTRAL ASIA December 12 - 17, 2003 De Balie - Centre for Culture and Politics Amsterdam, The Netherlands http://www.debalie.nl De Balie focuses its attention to Central Asia, to Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Five countries that not long ago were simply called the Muslim-republics of the Soviet Union, but since their independence have become an uncertain geopolitical factor. Which direction will Central Asia go? Back towards eastern despotism, a traditional clan-structure or an authoritarian protectorate? Could an Islamist revolution happen or is such a major turnabout already in the making? Or is there a possibility that the Muslim republics will evolve in more open and democratic forms of ruling? Transit Central Asia, a program with experts and guests from the region, feature films, music, debates, lectures and interviews. On December 12 in the afternoon a Round Table about the curtailment of press freedom and civil rights, in the evening a discussion (in English) about the western policy towards Central Asia, with Yevgeny Zhovtis (lawyer from Kazakhstan), Ron Strikker (Dutch ministry of Foreign Affairs), Robert Templer (International Crisis Group) and Neil Carmichael (Shell International), eastern teahouse and live music by Mäshräp Ensemble. Saturday afternoon December 13 presentations by Dutch people who have come to know Central Asia from within (in Dutch), Saturday night, interviews (in Dutch and Russian) with journalists from the region (Karim Kahriev from Uzbekistan, Kuban Mambetaliev from Kyrgyzstan, Yevgeny Zhovtis from Kazakhstan and Oleg Panfilov from Tajikistan). Transit Central Asia will show twelve recent feature films from Central Asian directors. The films (English subtitles) are mostly simple stories and give much attention to detail. Themes are quite intimate - they focus on traditions, atmosphere and culture - or have an absurdist narrative. Visit our website for more information and timeschedule: http://www.debalie.nl/artikel.jsp?podiumid=salon&articleid=6905 (or call 020 553 51 51, and ask for Hella Rottenberg or Marga Verheije) ------------------- Overview Film Program Transit Central Asia Angel on the Right (Farishtay kifti rost) Jamshed Usmonov, Tajikistan, 2002, 91 min., 35 mm, Dutch Subtitles Jamshed Usmonov sketches the harsh and immoral life in Asht, the village where the director himself was born. The story is about a criminal who returns home, is cheated by the villagers and haunted by the past. Pseudo-documentary film, in which the director's mother and brother play the feature roles. Antiromantika Nariman Turebayev, Kazakhstan, 2001, 16 min., 35mm A young man takes a gorgeous prostitute to his room. But instead of love, what happens is anti-romantika. He feels even lonelier than before. A black and comic short story. Bus Stop (Beket) Aktan Abdykalykov, Ernest Abdyjaparov, Kyrgyzstan, 2000, 22 min., 35mm, B/W Set in the declining years of the USSR, comrade Boykenzhaev is assigned to manage the building of an international cemetery where people from different religions and nationalities will be buried. All goes well until the bureaucratic opening ceremony when there are no suitable corpses to be found. The Dance of Men (Dilhiroj) Yusup Razikov, Uzbekistan, 2002, 77 min., 35mm, English Subtitles Following the important moments in the life of the boy Sanam, we learn about the conflicts between traditions and human nature in a small Uzbek village. Thanks to the wisdom of the women in the community crises are overcome. The story spans childhood, youth, courtship, and separation of Sanam and his beloved and the triumph of their courtship. Don't Cry (Jylama) Amir Karakulov, Kazakhstan, 2003, 80 min., 35mm, English Subtitles The story of a Chinese-trained opera singer living in a remote Kazakh village with a grandmother and her ailing young granddaughter. Most of the action consists of the steadfast heroine trying to make enough money to get the rare and costly medicine that may save the child's life. With his cast of amateurs the director illuminates the details of everyday life: reality and fiction dissolve into each other. Identifikation der Wünsche (Identifikatsiya Zhelanii) Tolib Khamidov, Tajikistan, 1991, 58 min., 35 mm, German Subtitles Three teen-aged boys and their unfocused sexual desires is the subject of the story. They have been carrying on with a donkey, while dreaming of making it with a woman. The first woman they want to try, is the mother of their friend, who works as a part-time prostitute in order to sustain her son. The Needle (Igla) Murat Nugmanov, Kazakhstan, 1988, 82 min., 35mm, English Subtitles A student tries to save his former girlfriend from her drug addiction and from an unscrupulous drug dealer, nicknamed The Doctor. Shot in the surreal landscape round the Aral sea, this film was a big hit in the disintegrating Soviet Union. Rock star Viktor Tsoy plays the leading part, his band Kino made the soundtrack. La Route (Jol) Darezhan Omirbayev, Kazakhstan, 2001, 85 min., Dutch Subtitles A road movie which takes us through the Kazakh steppe. Film director Amir travels to his remote provincial village dreams, remembers and contemplates about the difficulties involved in making a film. The Swing (Selkinchek) Aktan Abdykalykov, Kyrgyzstan, 1993, 48 min., 35 mm, B/W The almost wordless story is about a young boy in a Kirghiz village, whose days are spent in the company of an elderly, retarded man. Together, they push a beautiful girl on a swing. There is joy, there is disappointment, there is death, and there is love, all rendered with a timeless, almost otherworldly grace. ------------------- De Balie Kleine-Gartmanplantsoen 10 1017 RR Amsterdam The Netherlands http://www.debalie.nl T +31 20 55 35 151 F +31 20 55 35 155 E balie at balie.nl From rafael at csi.com Tue Nov 25 21:43:34 2003 From: rafael at csi.com (Rafael Lozano-Hemmer) Date: Tue, 25 Nov 2003 17:13:34 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Life 6.0, Jury Statement Message-ID: LIFE 6.0, 2003 www.vidalife.org The jury for the Life 6.0 competition in Madrid ­ Daniel Canogar, Chris Csikszentmihalyi, Machiko Kusahara, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Jane Prophet and Nell Tenhaaf ­ reviewed 71 artworks that utilise artificial life concepts and techniques. These pieces were pre-selected from a record number of 89 submissions received from 21 countries. The Telefonica Foundation in Spain will give out the following awards: SHARED FIRST PRIZE (4,250 euros each) France Cadet "Dog[Lab] 01" France One of the most unsettling aspects of molecular biology is the ability to manipulate behaviour. Many experiments have shown that the behaviour of one animal may be placed into another. For instance, in 1999 neuroscientists altered a mouse by inserting a gene from a prairie vole, a different animal known for its fidelity and sociability. The normally solitary mice now showed the social behaviours of the gregarious prairie vole. While most of us have no idea how to even think about these issues, France Cadet has undertaken her own experiment in signification. Her Dog[LAB] project is a monstrous hybrid, merging children¹s toys, hacked electronics, and social and political concerns into robotically enacted dramas. Cadet performed surgery on several robotic dogs, customized their forms, and reprogrammed them with unusual behaviours. Her new dogs are genetically manipulated animal combinations, plastic chimeras. For instance, one is the ³ultimate² domestic pet, a mixture of equal parts cat and dog. This earnest Frankenpet alternately wags its tail playfully, grooms itself, does feline stretches and, eventually, falls asleep and dreams dog dreams. Another is a cowdog, and as a result is prone to robotic BSE, twitching and collapsing while whining like a sad puppy. Cadet¹s work reminded some of the jurors that the more life-like robots become, the more prone they¹ll be to neurosis and illness. We all admired the unusual way that Cadet addressed weighty issues of science and society while keeping her tongue well in cheek. Stanza "The Central City" United Kingdom www.thecentralcity.co.uk This net art work, made over four years, is an impressive collection of interconnected environments created using generative procedures. The focus is on urban environments, resulting in a vast web site of interconnected idealised spaces and polyphonic neighbourhoods. These environments explode with ideas from art, architecture, design and urbanism. Visuals from live web cams and pre-recorded audio are controlled by the user to make spaces that fragment and are reconstituted in real time. The ever-changing nature of the city is foregrounded in the way that its features flow through the site; streets and buildings seem to change right before our eyes in visual compositions reminiscent of Dziga Vertov¹s avant-garde documentary ³The Man with the Movie Camera.² Users of The Central City interact with the piece by selecting from multiple menus based on an iconic language. Starting from recognizable imagery that is either pre-recorded or live, viewers can morph images and algorithmically change sounds. Through these processes, ordered and grid-like cities slip into disorder, and surveillance systems are subjected to processes that make them ³bleed², that ³torment² them and subject them to ³earthquakes². The sophistication and subtlety of the image generation reflects Stanza¹s earlier paintings, and provide a sophisticated, adult alternative to SimCity. The user is encouraged to take a painterly approach to image transmutation, resulting in a subtle and ironic convergence of art and civic issues. THIRD PRIZE (1,500 euros) Ethan Bordeaux, Ben Recht, Noah Vawter and Brian Whitman. "Concrete Music" USA The project Concrete Music gives life to a song. Instead of a permanent recording on a CD that is reproduced exactly every time you press ³play², this musical composition is in constant evolution. Its creators developed a hardware music processor from commodity hardware, an algorithmic music language robust enough to last 30 years, and a synthesis framework capable of composing timeless textures. Starting with initial parameters of tone, texture waves, rhythm and critical duration, the song composes itself by gradually mutating from its base state. Because of this large scale of compositional drift, only time will tell what the music will grow into as it progresses. Concrete Music also has a sculptural component: the generator of this algorithmic music is encased in rough-hewn concrete. This unusual shell appears to guarantee its existence for some time, as if it were a time capsule that could be found and listened to in a remote future. The song in this sound sculpture acquires a life of its own and refuses to die, and, in this way, Concrete Music materializes one of humanity¹s great longings: immortality throughout time. At the same time, it serves as a nod to the ³musique concrete² of the 50s. HONORARY MENTIONS (in alphabetical order) Peter Bosch, Simone Simons "Aguas Vivas" Spain / Netherlands Much research in artificial life is visualized on computer screens; for instance, cellular automata are often represented as fields of changing pixels that look like fluid waves or schools of fish. These digital representations have become so ubiquitous that we associate artificial life art with the digital screen and virtual worlds. Bosch and Simons have produced an installation piece that confounds this assumption. A projection displays a white cross and circle on a black background, reminiscent of a target; a cinematic countdown sign; or TV test card. As we watch, this image becomes progressively and chaotically disrupted. We assume that these are non-linear images generated digitally, using algorithms and pixels. Then the source is revealed: A metal container sits on eight springs that are agitated by an oscillation motor, above it is a white neon light in the shape of a circle and cross. Aguas Vivas uses a ŒHeath Robinson¹ structure comprising of the oscillating container that sends vibrations through its cargo of oil to present us with a convincing and rich variety of real-time images. The simple and effective structure of this piece is the result of a series of works, or iterations, made over seven years. Francisco Javier Fernández Herrero "Artificial Architecture, 1.0" Spain The field of Architecture has always had two types of practitioners: On one hand, pragmatic architects whose priority is to pile up dirt and glass, on the other, dreamers who place concept over concrete. These later are often referred to in English as ³paper architects.² In the late 1970¹s, a new branch was added, as paper architects went ³paperless² and started using computers to express their conceptual interests. Fernandez Herrero¹s ³Artificial Architecture² is a significant contribution to this field. Using algorithmic processes, this loquacious software spits out hundreds of floor plans per minute, producing sinuous, curving structures for which all the IKEAs in the world could not provide enough furniture. Parametric controls allow for various aspects of the synthesized plans to be adjusted, from length of walls to number of rooms, though it is still apparently impossible to make anything rational, normal, or easy to build. When Fernandez Herrero stacks these floors on top of each other, the resulting virtual buildings are at times exquisite, at times horrific. Artificial Architecture is like an automated idiot savant of postmodern buildings, an oracle speaking in compositional tongues, a design generator capable of capturing abstract blocks and dealing with incomplete states of information. But unless the artist also manages to automate the town council, don¹t expect to see any of these structures on your street any time soon. Hanna Haaslahti "White Square" Finland / Belgium This work was the "public choice", as it was the most voted piece in the presentation of the nominees at the awards ceremony. The shadow is our alter ego, a double mystery that accompanies us throughout our lives. Its phantasmagoric projection onto our surroundings gives us visual confirmation that we exist. Yet, how do we confirm our existence in virtual space? The installation White Square by Finnish artist Hanna Haaslahti invites us to reflect on this notion by making use of a technological shadow. Participants enter a darkened room where they see an empty, white square of approximately 3 x 4 metres projected on the floor. Upon entering the illuminated space of the white square, several shadows appear and start dancing around the feet of the participants. This image invites us to contemplate the existence of parallel realities usually hidden to us. The shadows respond to the velocity, direction and position of the participants. When a shadow touches a border of the square the image starts to pixelate, as a way to metaphorically indicate the body¹s lived space or lebensraum. White Square is especially effective when several participants are in the space together. In this case, the shadows begin to interact with each other to create dynamic movements that remind us of the virtual interaction that takes place in electronic spaces. With this installation, Hanna Haaslahti proposes new ways in which to experience our bodies in digital space. Mina Långström "The Chinese Room" Finland The Chinese Room looks at the problem of interpreting new forms of visual evidence that arise in surveillance culture. In this participatory installation, the viewer sits at a control panel with a console of ten surveillance channels that look into a virtual world with two polygonal animated characters. The viewer can select cameras, allowing them to peer into the world. In a nice turn of reflection, the viewer is simultaneously scrutinized via a real video camera, bringing them into the simulated environment. But none of the people here ever makes real contact. They find out about each other only through hearsay and virtual camera tracking. The artist's critical interest in techno-utopias is visible in several aspects of this work. The theme of watching and being watched suggests the allure of technologically mediated intimacy, but at the same time it speaks to the threat of inescapable surveillance. The 3D animated characters that populate the narrative invoke the animation industry ideal of simulated actors, which has arisen from a research agenda driven by the goal of doing something purely because it can technically be done. Yet in "real world" terms it could come to displace working actors. The epistemological problem of what we can know about each other which is posed in this work, extends in a continuum from everyday interpersonal contact that is turned into fodder for reality T.V., into the social realm where alienation and paranoia result. George Legrady "Pockets full of memories II". Hungary / USA / Canada Most people come to an exhibition to appreciate something created by the artist, but the traditional paradigm of art appreciation does not apply to interactive art. George Legrady has said that "interactivity is about creating self-consciousness, or consciousness about one's presence". The artist has worked on the theme of archiving memories in three-dimensional interactive space for many years. In this work, the familiar objects that visitors carry around form the body of the work -- a visual database of personal memories and identities. A visitor to the exhibition, carrying only necessary objects, is invited to submit one of these belongings to the database. The object is scanned and archived according to a description attached to it, which is prompted by questions the system asks as to what it means to its owner. Submitted objects include mobile phones, photo ID, or one's hand or other body part. For a visitor the process is about redefining what these "personal" belongings mean, which inevitably leads to thoughts about one's identity. The item is immediately sorted in the database based on a self-organizing mapping program (SOM), which simulates processes that take place in our brains. Hence each object and the memory it triggers becomes part of a networked space of memories. One can view the object entered and see how it is connected to other people's memories and thoughts, or just enjoy how people think similarly or differently toward the same object. We still don't know exactly how memory works, but Pockets Full of Memories II allows us to explore its associative processes through familiar things. Simon Schiessl "Haptic Opposition" Germany / USA Artists as well as engineers have been experimenting with machines that have their own "mood" and thoughts. Sony's AIBO is an example of how such an approach is welcome in pushing the borders of human machine interaction. We are on the cusp of confronting machines that have personality. While such personality is overtly designed in the case of entertainment robots, the logic of the machine itself and its more chaotic features may result in some unexpected moods. "Haptic Opposition" explores "moody" interaction between a machine and its users within a humorous setting. On a flat wooden box is mounted a slim LED display at eye level, which is movable horizontally. It shows a flow of text that contains philosophical thoughts, and travels to the left and right if there is no interaction. When a visitor arrives and starts pushing the display, it interrupts the machine's ability to continue displaying the text. The machine detects the force and resists the induced movement. Thus the visitor encounters the physical resistance of the machine. As the machine becomes annoyed it turns either nervous or aggressive, showing its will to keep on expressing its thoughts, eventually displaying its own program code. While the piece demonstrates an interesting approach to research on haptic interfaces, an important field in virtual reality and human interface research, its original approach and its sense of humour are significant for alife related art. Jaime del Val "Morfogénesis" Spain The physical body is enveloped within a magical visual and auditory dream world in this live performance work that blends electronic art, interactive dance, virtual architecture and electro acoustic sound. A dancer who is moving behind a transparent screen controls the real time generation of projected images and sounds. A camera picks up the dancer's movement, then this video is digitally processed and the resulting imagery is projected onto the screen showing the dancer's shape morphed within trails of coloured light. The software used recursively modifies and re-modifies the visual information tracked by the camera. Real and virtual space are brought together convincingly in this work by resisting the photorealism commonly found in virtual 3D environments. In fact the artist refuses the technological temptations of both spectacle and mystification, in favour of simplicity of movement and clarity of structure. Here the dancer moves in a constrained almost 2-dimensional plane that respects the projection screen. Whereas most interactive dance often leaves the viewer puzzled as to what effects the dancers are initiating, and why, at certain points in this piece floating wisps of colour and abstract shapes appear to be pulled and formed by the dancer's gestures. The moving body in Morfogénesis with its generic look and smooth flowing motion achieves a liquid integration with the transformed image of itself, a body in the process of constant becoming. INCENTIVE FOR NEW PRODUCTIONS (8.000 Euros) Diana Larrea (in collaboration with Javier Velasco) "HAL" Spain Diana Larrea has spent many years researching myths from the world of cinema and how they influence the social dimension. For example, Larrea has constructed models to recreate classic moments from time-honoured movies, including scenes from Planet of the Apes, and Goddard¹s A Bout de Souffle. In the project presented to the jury of Life 6.0, this artist proposes to build a model of HAL, the famous artificial life entity from 2001: A Space Odyssey. With the aim of faithfully imitating the outer appearance of the authentic HAL, Larrea¹s installation will consist of 13 television monitors set into a black, metallic structure. A variety of sensors controlled by a microprocessor and custom software will provide an interactive element to the installation. The software, to be developed by a company that constructs systems for intelligent buildings, will simulate HAL¹s behaviour and allow for different kinds of interaction with the public. With this proposed remake of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Diana Larrea alludes to the myth of the creature that rebels against its creator. This universal myth has arisen in numerous narratives of classical mythology and in literature, including Oedipus and Frankenstein. In cinema, the notion of machines rising up against their maker has also become a recurrent theme, as can be seen in classic movies such as Metropolis, Terminator and Blade Runner. Diana Larrea proposes to show us how we now project this collective myth onto the world of artificial life. INCENTIVE FOR INVESTIGATION (2.000 Euros) Mario Humberto Valencia, Diego Bustamante y Ariel Bustamante "Cultivo" Colombia The EXP media group proposes a robotic sculpture with contagious movements controlled by A-Life algorithms. The Jury decided to award 2.000 euros to this group so that they can continue developing and designing this proposal further. MORE INFORMATION A videotape of the ten winners will be produced and distributed to non-profit art centres, libraries and academic institutions. For this, please contact Ana Parga . For more information, pictures, and videos on the Vida-Life Art and A-life awards, please visit http://www.vidalife.org From ck24 at st-andrews.ac.uk Wed Nov 26 00:35:35 2003 From: ck24 at st-andrews.ac.uk (Dr Chandrika Kaul) Date: Tue, 25 Nov 2003 19:05:35 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Announcement: Gender and History Workshop Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.0.20031125190046.02cb9500@langs.st-andrews.ac.uk> Hello. I work on representations of India in the western particularly British media in the 19th and 20th centuries. Apart from wanting to join the reader-list, I have a very urgent query regarding a colleague, Professor Monica Juneja, Delhi Univ. I note that she is listed as one of the speakers in the Gender workshop advertised via the reader-list and wondered if i could be sent her email or my email could be passed onto her? I need to contact her urgently re: a visit i am making to New Delhi in december. I was her student some years ago but have lost touch since she moved to Delhi. Thank you for your help. Dr Chandrika Kaul Lecturer in Modern British and Imperial History University of St Andrews St Katherine's Lodge, The Scores, St Andrews FIFE KY16 9AL, Scotland, UK Phone - direct - 01334 -463306; mobile - 07968 - 152663 email ck24 at st-andrews.ac.uk; chandrikakaul at hotmail.com From zest_india at yahoo.co.in Wed Nov 26 15:54:28 2003 From: zest_india at yahoo.co.in (=?iso-8859-1?q?Shivam=20Vij?=) Date: Wed, 26 Nov 2003 10:24:28 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Correction Message-ID: <20031126102428.75200.qmail@web8205.mail.in.yahoo.com> Some days ago I posted a message on this list, inviting all of you to subscribe to www.thehoot.org's monthly newsletter. You could do so by two means. One, by visiting http://groups.yahoo.com/group/thehoot/join and two, by sending a blank mail to an address. The address in question was mistyped by me - a crucial 'o' was missing. Please note that the address is thehoot-subscribe at yahoogroups.com. My apologies to all those who got Mailer Daemons! And thanks to Manoj Vijayan for pointing this out. In case you tried the link and it didn't work, try visiting it through www.proxify.com. Thanks! ________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo! India Mobile: Download the latest polyphonic ringtones. Go to http://in.mobile.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From sadan at sarai.net Fri Nov 28 22:05:24 2003 From: sadan at sarai.net (sadan) Date: Fri, 28 Nov 2003 11:35:24 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] youth festival Message-ID: <200311281135.24811.sadan@sarai.net> Youth Festival: AIDS, Sexuality & Reproductive Health Rights Pratibimb along with various other organizations in Pune are organizing a youth festival to make young people aware about issues related to AIDS, sexuality and Reproductive Health Rights. This festival will take place on 1-4 December at J. P Naik Centre, Kothrud, Pune. This is the 5th year Pratibimb and its network organizations set up a festival with the purpose to help young people understand different subjects affecting their lives. Around 1000 youth from all over India, between the ages of 15-25, are expected to attend this festival. The festival will be held in five languages, English, Hindi, Kannada, Marathi and Telugu. Youth belongs to different sections, such as street youth, students and non-students, tribal and rural youth are going to participate in this program. The program will be inaugurated on 1st December, world AIDS Day by Pune Mayor Deepti Chaudhari. Eminent personalities such as Nandita Das, Anu Aga, Ila Mehta will be guests on the occasion. The program will be divided into 3 sections. Panel discussions on Sexuality is led by well-known personalities such as Dr. Shanak Samak, Dr. Vithal Prabhu, while Reproductive Health Rights are dwelt by Dr. Seemantini Pathare and resource persons from MAMTA, Olava. Group discussion on AIDS are conducted by organists such as NARI, IHMP, Nari Samata Manch, Prayas, TRPF Belgaum, MAMTA, New Delhi, and also resource persons of corporate welfare centers such as GlaxoSmithKline and Forbes Marshall etc. The highlights of the program will be the cultural program including debate, street Theatre, groups songs, paintings and choreography, all based on the them" AIDS and Sexuality". The themes for debate: Should sex education made compulsory in schools! Do love marriages make better families than arranged marriages? Indian parents do not understand the minds of young people. The four best teams under each category will be selected and a final presentation will be held on 4th December. An exhibition called " Priceless Labor" by Vidya Kulkarni, as well as issues related to AIDS, will be showing at the venue Pune. Participants will be awarded with certificates in the hand of various dignitaries. Registration for participation is welcome from colleges, youth organisations and NGOs. The last day for registration is on 28th November 2003. Those interested contact Pratibimb:email-pratibimb_g at hotmail.com Best, Amit kumar _________________________________________________________________ Access Hotmail from your mobile now. http://server1.msn.co.in/sp03/mobilesms/ Click here. ------------------------------------------------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From uspia at nus.edu.sg Fri Nov 28 18:54:38 2003 From: uspia at nus.edu.sg (Irina Aristarkhova) Date: Fri, 28 Nov 2003 21:24:38 +0800 Subject: [Reader-list] 'master-slave' computer terminology questioned Message-ID: <37AD48B8-21A6-11D8-955C-000393011D5E@nus.edu.sg> > > Hi all, > > I thought this might be of interest. > > Regards, > Irina > > > http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/ptech/11/26/master.term.reut/index.html > > 'Master' and 'slave' computer labels unacceptable, officials say > > Wednesday, November 26, 2003 Posted: 11:33 AM EST (1633 GMT) > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Story Tools >      >      > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > RELATED > > • Business 2.0: A new language for the server room  > > > LOS ANGELES, California (Reuters) -- Los Angeles officials have asked > that manufacturers, suppliers and contractors stop using the terms > "master" and "slave" on computer equipment, saying such terms are > unacceptable and offensive. > > The request -- which has some suppliers furious and others busy > re-labeling components -- came after an unidentified worker spotted a > videotape machine carrying devices labeled "master" and "slave" and > filed a discrimination complaint with the county's Office of > Affirmative Action Compliance. > > In the computer industry, "master" and "slave" are used to refer to > primary and secondary hard disk drives. The terms are also used in > other industries. > > "Based on the cultural diversity and sensitivity of Los Angeles County, > this is not an acceptable identification label," Joe Sandoval, division > manager of purchasing and contract services, said in a memo sent to > County vendors. > > "We would request that each manufacturer, supplier and contractor > review, identify and remove/change any identification or labeling of > equipment components that could be interpreted as discriminatory or > offensive in nature," Sandoval said in the memo, which was distributed > last week and made available to Reuters. > > The memo did not include any suggestions for alternative labels. > > Dennis Tafoya, director of the affirmative action office, said in a > separate memo that an "exhaustive search" had been undertaken to find > all such labels and replace them with more "appropriate" ones. A form > was sent to all departments to identify equipment carrying the labels > "master" and "slave" or any other offensive terms. > > Faced with an avalanche of complaints from vendors and the general > public, Sandoval told Reuters in an interview that his memo was > intended as "nothing more than a request" and not an ultimatum or > policy change. > > "I do understand that this term has been an industry standard for years > and years and this is nothing more than a plea to vendors to see what > they can do," he said. "It appears that some folks have taken this a > little too literally." > > Sandoval said that he had already rejected a suggestion that the county > stop buying all equipment carrying the "master" and "slave" labels and > had no intention of enforcing a ban on such terms with suppliers. > > "But we are culturally sensitive and we have 90,000 employees," he > said. "We have to take these things seriously." > > Sandoval added that in addition to the e-mails he's received "telling > me how stupid I am and how I should be fired" he has gotten a positive > response from some companies willing to reexamine their labels. > > In June, the Los Angeles city council unanimously passed a law > requiring that any companies doing business with the city disclose > profits they may have made from slavery in the 19th Century. In 2000, > the council supported federal legislation seeking reparations for > descendants of slaves. > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Copyright 2003 Reuters. All rights reserved. > From penguinhead at linux-delhi.org Sun Nov 30 03:49:08 2003 From: penguinhead at linux-delhi.org (Spoonman) Date: Sun, 30 Nov 2003 03:49:08 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] 'master-slave' computer terminology questioned In-Reply-To: <37AD48B8-21A6-11D8-955C-000393011D5E@nus.edu.sg> References: <37AD48B8-21A6-11D8-955C-000393011D5E@nus.edu.sg> Message-ID: <20031129221908.GA884@serpent> A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: msg_pgp.DEFANGED-5 Type: application/defanged-5 Size: 980 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031130/48d10d4a/attachment.bin From nkarani at hotmail.com Sun Nov 30 01:16:59 2003 From: nkarani at hotmail.com (nkarani at hotmail.com) Date: Sun, 30 Nov 2003 01:16:59 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] March with family and friends on World AIDS Day 2003 (December 1) Message-ID: World AIDS Day, December 1, is being celebrated in a unique way this year by The Humsafar Trust, Mumbai. We are organizing a candle light march by the city's gay community and friends of gay people to highlight the ignorance and shame that surrounds homosexuality in India and the resultant grave effects on the physical and mental health of the community. The programme We shall assemble at the main gate (Dharavi side) of LTMG Hospital (Sion Hospital) around 6.30 p.m. on Monday, December 1, 2003 and walk with placards and candles to Maheshwari Udyan, Matunga. There, the assembly will observe two minute's silence in memory of friends and family we have lost to HIV. Dr. (Mrs.) Hema Jerajani, Head of the Department, Dermatology & STIs, LTMG Hospital, among others, will address the gathering. The background The gay community forms a sizeable minority. Sadly, between 16-25 per cent (according to the estimates of the National Aids Control Organization) of gay men are infected with HIV. An important reason for their vulnerability is the extreme discomfort and invisibility around homosexuality compounded by its criminalisation by the Indian Penal Code. The latent homophobia in Indian society and the lack of a discourse on sexualities spread misinformation and prejudice in society. Consequently, the gay community at large lacks a sense of identity and self-worth, leading to unsafe sex among people. The Humsafar Trust has been battling these very pressures and prejudices for over 10 years now. For more information, please contact Mr. Ashok Row Kavi, Humsafar Trust, on 98203-30169. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031130/a5f41b10/attachment.html From info at nmartproject.net Fri Nov 28 13:33:47 2003 From: info at nmartproject.net (NewMediaArtProjectNetwork) Date: Fri, 28 Nov 2003 09:03:47 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Netart from all Asia & Pacific area - call for entries: new deadline Message-ID: <027101c3b586$2739a440$0400a8c0@agricola11> JavaMuseum - Forum for Internet Technologies in Contemporary Art (Java=Joint Advanced Virtual Affairs) www.javamuseum.org Call for entries: Netart from all Asia & Pacific area New deadline Monday 2 February 2004 Currently, JavaMuseum is planning new features for the "3rd of Java series" 2003/2004, focussing on netart from particular cultural regions on the globe. The feature will be prepared unter the´working title, "Netart from all Asia & Pacific area", in order to pay more attention to this globally emerging cultural region, which is related to netart widely unknow in the Western countries. All artists, who work netbased and are born or have their residency in one of the countries of these areas are invited to submit and participate. All serious submissions will be included. New deadline Monday, 2 February 2004. Please use following entry form for submitting: 1. firstname/name of artist, email, URL 2. a brief bio/CV (not more than 300 words only in English, please) 3. title and URL of the max 3 projects/works, 4. a short work description for each work (not more than 300 words only in English, please), 5. a screen shot for each submitted work (max 800x600 pixels, .jpg) Please send your submission to asianfeature at javamuseum.org ************************ JavaMuseum is the premier Art Space for net based art. Visit the show cases of 1. "Perspectives'03" - competition and show 2003 and the winners of JavaArtist of the Year Award 2003 on www.javamuseum.org/2003/perspectives03/index.html 2. "I-Highway - Netart from Canada"on www.javamuseum.org/2003/canadafeature/index.html 3. "I-rivers" - netart form German speaking countries on www.javamuseum.org/2003/germanfeature/index.html 4. "Current positions of French Netart" on www.javamuseum.org/2002/2nd/frenchfeature/index.html 5. "Current positions of Italian Netart" on www.javamuseum.org/2002/2nd/italyfeature/index.html 6. "Latinonetarte.net" - Netart from Latin American countries, Spain and Portugal on www.javamuseum.org/2003/latinofeature/index.html and much more on www.javamuseum.org ********************************************* JavaMuseum - Forum for Internet Technologies in Contemporary Art (Java=Joint Advanced Virtual Affairs) www.javamuseum.org info at javamuseum.org corporate member of [NewMediaArtProjectNetwork] - the experimental platform for netbased art - operating from Cologne/Germany. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20031128/4fabf39a/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From treborscholz at earthlink.net Sun Nov 30 01:50:46 2003 From: treborscholz at earthlink.net (Trebor Scholz) Date: Sat, 29 Nov 2003 15:20:46 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Call for Submissions/ Conference on Collaboration Message-ID: Call for Submissions The facilitators of the conference "networks, art & collaboration" now invite submissions for in-person and web-based participation in the "networks, art & collaboration" conference, April 24/25, 2004 at The State University of New York at Buffalo. In addition, we now invite texts for publication in a magazine that will be made available at the conference (see call for texts on website). http://freecooperation.org This conference on collaboration will bring together artists, designers, (social) scientists, and engineers in formats such as workshops, lectures, open mic, parties, screenings, interviews, brain storming sessions, and artist presentations ‹ all aiming at ongoing collaborations and exchange of knowledge. The aim of the conference is to get a deeper understanding of the dynamics of collaboration, models of critical web-based art, and the role media technologies play in the making of social networks. The event seeks ways to go beyond the outmoded top-down conference format and intends to experiment with alternative forms of interactive presentations and debate. Dance, discuss, eat, argue, laugh, learn, celebrate dissent, make new friends, and meet future collaborators. Proposal Deadline: January 20, 2004 You can propose an in-person contribution, or submit a proposal for inclusion in the virtual meet space augmented by web-based presentations. Who should participate? We are seeking contributions from researchers and practitioners (academia, music, activism, art, technology, ...) focusing on collaboration. We encourage individuals and groups who are historically underrepresented in these fields to contribute. Submit either individually or team up in a collaboration. In-Person Formats: Some possible forms of participation in person include: brainstorming sessions, interventions and presentations, demos, workshops, panels, dance party, *no lectures.* Virtual Participation Formats: Some possible forms of mediated participation include weblog, wiki, mailinglist, webcast, video conference. Submissions (in person and virtual) are in the following suggested sessions: Track I: Tech skill exchange: peer 2 peer, open source/ free software movement, tools for collaboration/ tutorials, workshops Track II: Models of online cultural production models of critical web-based art/ distributed creativity multi-user games, collaborative novel writing/ e-poetry Track III: Network architectures (lists, blogs and the quest for meaning),  e-learning, class room collaboration in new media education Track IV: Global social movements / participatory cultures Track V: The high art of collaboration (challenges of collaboration), metaphors of collaboration (family, friendship), scalability TO APPLY: Do you apply to participate in-person or as part of the Virtual Meetspace? Which track do you apply to? Would you like to contribute in-person or as part of the virtual meetspace? Which format would suit your contribution best? (ie. brainstorming sessions, artist presentation, interventions and roundtable presentations, demos, workshops, panels, dance party, *no lectures*) With your proposal submit a 250 word biography. Please also include relevant links. Deadline: January 20, 2004 Send proposals to: Geert Lovink geert at xs4all.nl Trebor Scholz treborscholz at earthlink.net _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From zest_india at yahoo.co.in Sun Nov 30 13:28:24 2003 From: zest_india at yahoo.co.in (=?iso-8859-1?q?Shivam=20Vij?=) Date: Sun, 30 Nov 2003 07:58:24 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] http://righttoinformation.info/list.php Message-ID: <20031130075824.6425.qmail@web8201.mail.in.yahoo.com> http://righttoinformation.info/list.php Click at the above link to see the criminal, financial, academic and other records of your candidate before casting your vote in the Delhi assembly elections on 1 December 2003. ________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo! India Mobile: Download the latest polyphonic ringtones. Go to http://in.mobile.yahoo.com From aiindex at mnet.fr Sun Nov 30 22:33:44 2003 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Sun, 30 Nov 2003 18:03:44 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Taslima Nasrin responds to her Book ban + comment in Outlook Message-ID: taslimanasrin.com Taslima Nasrin Responds to her book ban in West Bengal [29 November 2003] What do I feel when I hear that the most cultured and enlightend and intellectual place in Bengal, the West Bengal, has banned Dwinkhandita? I could not believe that it had happened. My hopes and dreams, my strong feelings for, and my pride about West Bengal broke like glass-bangles. Could it possibly be that the state government of West Bengal so feared that my book would hurt the religious feelings of the people, that it would disturb the communal harmony in the state, that it would be necessary to ban it? Many know that the banning of my books has to do with Muslim votes, votes to guarantee the survival of patriarchalism. Yes, I have been outspoken against religions. And yes, the books with my comments on religion are available in West Bengal. Nobody asked to ban those books. Why now? The communal harmony would be disturbed? This is an admission that the ban is only to fool the people. The main reason for trying to shut me up is something else entirely. The reality is that those who espouse patriarchy are the very ones who are adamant about not allowing women to talk about sex or about sexual freedom for women. Male writers, who live in a patriarchal society that gives them advantages not available to women, became furious as soon as my books came out. The media - male-controlled - spread unwarranted hatred against me, leading to libel suits now totaling $4,000,000. They demanded that my books be banned and that I be punished. They called me a pornographer and a prostitute. What galls is that other writers and intellectuals have seemingly not rushed to my immediate defense. How could writers, whose fight is to protect their own right to the freedom of expression, logically take such a stand! What will disinterested critics surely say about their intellectual fragility! What is the bottom line, and why the objections to my books? The line is that I am not supposed, as a writer of my own autobiography, to include my political, social, economical, and personal history. Patriarchical minds object. I am not supposed to write about equality and justice for women. Patriarchical minds object. I must not talk about the enjoyment of sex, if what I write includes showing the enjoyment of sex by women. Patriarchal minds object. I must not dare to challenge patriarchy. For if it were to tumble down women would no longer be able to be treated as slaves, as sexual commodities, and men would have to make a shift in their viewpoints and actions. If individuals in both East and West Bengal are not ready to hear such views, if their minds are stubbornly set against any new ideas, and if they are afraid of other of my ideas, then in the eyes of others it is they who are the authoritarians, the conformists, the perverted people with closed minds. I am a proud nonconformist. I accept the good from the past and reject the bad. But I do not accept the view that it is bad to express oneself freely. Women are being oppressed everywhere, are they not? Well, this oppression simply has to stop! o o o o Outlook | Web [Feature] | Nov 28, 2003 OUTRAGE IN CALCUTTA SUNDEEP DOUGAL Can We Ban All Bans? Obviously not, as that would be a ban too, but the latest ban on Taslima Nasreen's book - no matter how offensive it is or is made out to be - is yet another precedent for spreading more communal disharmony, exactly what it avowedly seeks to prevent. Updates. URL: www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20031128&fname=taslima&sid=1