From sunil at mahiti.org Fri Oct 1 06:52:55 2004 From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham) Date: Fri, 01 Oct 2004 01:22:55 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Request for Feedback: Free And Open Source Software Licensing Primer Message-ID: <1096593774.1316.119.camel@box> Dear Friends, Apologies for cross posting. The IOSN/APDIP/UNDP FOSS Licensing Primer is a brief introduction to different FOSS licenses, primarily the GNU GPL license. It presents a summary of issues involved with using the different FOSS licenses. It offers several scenarios, and proposes a framework for licensing of government sponsored software. The primer also addresses common questions and misconceptions regarding copyright and licensing issues. Please download from here: http://www.iosn.net/licensing/foss-licensing-primer/foss-licensing-primer.sxw http://www.iosn.net/licensing/foss-licensing-primer/foss-licensing-primer.pdf So far we have got feedback from Richard M. Stallman, Eric S. Raymond, Dr. Nah Soo Hoe and Mahesh T. Pai We would be very grateful if you could send in your comments and feedback by 10 October 2004. Thanks, Sunil ------------------------------------------------------------------------ INTERNATIONAL OPEN SOURCE NETWORK ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The International Open Source Network (IOSN - http://www.iosn.net) is a Centre of Excellence for Free / Open Source Software in the Asia-Pacific Region. IOSN is an initiative of the Asia-Pacific Information Development Programme (APDIP - http://www.apdip.net), which has been supporting the strategic and effective use of Information Communication Technology (ICT) for poverty alleviation and sustainable human development in the Asia-Pacific region since 1997. Via a small secretariat, the IOSN is tasked specifically to facilitate and network Free / Open Source Software advocates and human resources in the region. Activities undertaken by IOSN is listed below: A. Free / Open Source Information Resource Facility 1. Collaborative Website: On-going Mapping of Free / Open Source activities in Asia-Pacific; Collaborative database of countries; languages, fonts,and organisations in Asia-Pacific; On-line Information/Clearing-house and Mailing Lists 2. Software Repository: A collection of FOSS software and GNU/Linux distributions specific to the Asia Pacific is being created. 3. Documentation of Best Practise 4. Open Source Primers: General FOSS by Kenneth Wong/Phet Sayo; Malaysia; Licensing by Shunling Chen ­ Taiwan; Policy by Kenneth Wong; Localisation by Anousak Souphavanh / Theppitak Karoonboonyanan - Thailand; Network/Security/Infrastructure by Gaurab Raj Upadhaya - Nepal; and Education by Wooi Tong Tan - Malaysia. B. Creation of a Database of Free / Open Source Experts and Human Resources in the Region 1. Networking of Experts 2. Technical Support C. Training and Workshops 1. FOSSAP 2004: More than 50 senior policy makers and open source practitioners from 20 countries attended this event. http://www.iosn.net/fossap/ 2. Training of Trainers: We are currently planning the first training in Vietnam in partnership with Linux Professional Institute D. Research and Development 1. Localisation Toolkit in collaboration with Centre for Advanced Computing [CDAC], India 2. End-user training material in Text and Multimedia format. Script by Dr. Nah Soo Hoe, Malaysia and production by GetIT multimedia, Singapore. 3. GNU/Linux Live CD Project by Colin Charles, Australia of the Fedora Project. 4. Q&A on FOSS R&D/Case Studies of implementations 5. Micro-grant Programme in collaboration with University of South Pacific ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Thanks, ಸುನೀಲ್ -- Sunil Abraham, sunil at mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA Ph/Fax: +91 80 51150580. Mobile: +91 80 36701931 Currently on sabbatical with APDIP/UNDP Manager - International Open Source Network Wisma UN, Block C Komplex Pejabat Damansara. Jalan Dungun, Damansara Heights. 50490 Kuala Lumpur. P. O. Box 12544, 50782, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Tel: (60) 3-2091-5167, Fax: (60) 3-2095-2087 sunil at apdip.net http://www.iosn.net http://www.apdip.net From lawrence at altlawforum.org Fri Oct 1 10:23:07 2004 From: lawrence at altlawforum.org (Lawrence Liang) Date: Fri, 01 Oct 2004 10:23:07 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Judge Rules Against Patriot Act Provision In-Reply-To: <51b3f59a04093020153b24600f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: ------ Forwarded Message From: Nandkumar Saravade Reply-To: Nandkumar Saravade Date: Fri, 1 Oct 2004 08:45:55 +0530 To: Subject: [claw-in] FW: Judge Rules Against Patriot Act Provision http://www.reuters.com/printerFriendlyPopup.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=63697 63 Judge Rules Against Patriot Act Provision Wed Sep 29, 2004 04:52 PM ET By Gail Appleson NEW YORK (Reuters) - Surveillance powers granted to the FBI under the Patriot Act, a cornerstone of the Bush Administration's war on terror, were ruled unconstitutional by a judge on Wednesday in a new blow to U.S. security policies. U.S. District Judge Victor Marreo, in the first decision against a surveillance portion of the act, ruled for the American Civil Liberties Union in its challenge against what it called "unchecked power" by the FBI to demand confidential customer records from communication companies, such as Internet service providers or telephone companies. Marrero, stating that "democracy abhors undue secrecy," found that the law violates constitutional prohibitions against unreasonable searches. He said it also violated free speech rights by barring those who received FBI demands from disclosing they had to turn over records. Because of this gag order, the ACLU initially had to file its suit against the Department of Justice under seal to avoid penalties for violation of the surveillance laws. Although the ACLU's suit was filed on behalf of an Internet access firm, the ruling could apply to other entities that have received FBI secretive subpoenas, known as national security letters. The ACLU said that the Patriot Act provision was worded so broadly that it could effectively be used to obtain the names of customers of Web sites such as Amazon.com or eBay, or a political organization's membership list, or even the names of sources that a journalist has contacted by e-mail. "This is a landmark victory against the Ashcroft Justice Department's misguided attempt to intrude into the lives of innocent Americans in the name of national security," said ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero. "Even now, some in Congress are trying to pass additional intrusive law enforcement powers. This decision should put a halt to those efforts," he said. PATRIOT ACT He said the suit was one of the ACLU's legal battles to block certain sections of the Patriot Act that went "too far, too fast." The FBI has had power to issue national security letters demanding customers records from communication companies since 1986. These letters do not require court supervision, but the FBI could at first only seek such private information if the subject was suspected of being a foreign spy. In 1993, Congress expanded the powers further to include people who communicated with suspected spies or terrorists. But a section of the Patriot Act -- a controversial law the Bush administration pushed through Congress after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks to help it battle terrorism -- gave the FBI even more power to obtain information through these letters. In his ruling, Marrero prohibited the Department of Justice and the FBI from issuing the national security letters, but delayed enforcement of his judgment pending an expected appeal by the government. The Department of Justice said it was reviewing the ruling. The decision is the latest blow to the Bush administration's anti-terrorism policies. In June, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that terror suspects being held in U.S. facilities like Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, can use the American judicial system to challenge their confinement. That ruling was a defeat for the president's assertion of sweeping powers to hold "enemy combatants" indefinitely after the Sept. 11 attacks. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> $9.95 domain names from Yahoo!. Register anything. http://us.click.yahoo.com/J8kdrA/y20IAA/yQLSAA/W_EolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cyberlaw-india/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: cyberlaw-india-unsubscribe at yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ------ End of Forwarded Message From coolzanny at hotmail.com Sat Oct 2 10:28:33 2004 From: coolzanny at hotmail.com (Zainab Bawa) Date: Sat, 02 Oct 2004 10:28:33 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Borivali Railway Station and MNC Drop Box Message-ID: 28 September 2004 Churchgate to Borivali Station 6:00 PM Now, imagine the following: Ø At Bandra Station, the hoardings are loudly propagating the brand new Orange phone from which you can watch Television and clips of your favorite TV Serial. Ø The train halts at Andheri where the advertising is loud and clear about a great career in E-Serve, a branch of Citigroup Companies. You are promised nine levels of fast growth and a great career. Ø You land at Borivali Station and DNA Group Builders are confidently selling (through hoardings) about a dream house in a dream locality with amenities of a swimming pool, gymnasium, supermarket and everything that you want right at your doorstep! Imagine the above in reverse order! Now, aren’t you being sold a fast dream through a fast train at quick paced railway stations? This evening, I was doing the rounds of Borivali station. Borivali station is Mumbai’s connection with Gujarat, Ahmedabad and Surat. I am not joking – you have to come here to experience the real thing! It is predominantly a Gujarati area. A joke which a Gujarati friend used to tell me very often was, “You see Zainab, all these Gujarati families from Ahmedabad take a mail train to Mumbai and land at Borivali. From Borivali, they take a taxi and head straight to the US Consulate for visas to America. Along the way, in the taxi, they teach their children how to answer questions at the consulate in Gujju English!” I believe this myth – it is quite a reality. A year ago, an acquaintance in one of the American Centers in the city carried out an exercise in Surat town which involved knocking at the door of every household and finding that at least one member in the family is settled in the US of A! Borivali is a highly disorganized station. At 6:00 PM in the evening, the station was teeming with several thousands of people, each one popping their head out of the crowds to see whether their train was arriving on the platform or not. An important thing about Borivali station is that outstation trains land here and also halt here between stations. But unlike other stations where the local and outstation train platforms are separated, at Borivali, the same station serves local and outstation trains. This leads to uncertainty and the uncertainties are pertaining time – will the train be on time??? The other interesting characteristic of Borivali station is that in the evenings, the crowds are heavy in both directions for local trains i.e. thousands of people are coming back from town to their homes and at the same time, thousands of people are traveling back from Borivali to their homes in other localities. When I was in the train this evening, I noticed that the crowd of ladies traveling with me from Borivali were actually going back all the way to Dadar and switching trains from Western to Central lines. Now, that’s quite a task late evening. In fact, while standing at the platform waiting for a train to return back home, a burkha clad woman got talking with me: Burkha Clad Woman: Ladies compartment will come here nah? Me: Of course. Don’t you see so many ladies standing here? Burkha Clad Woman: Oh yes. After a while, Burkha Clad Woman said to me: It will be quite crowded now. These days, traveling by train from Borivali Station is an ordeal. There is so much rush even when we have to travel in the down direction, towards Churchgate. (With some thought, she qualified her previous statement.) But, I am sure it must be even worse to travel from Churchgate to Borivali, even for those going to Virar. Look there (she said pointing to the opposite platform where teeming thousands were standing with their heads outstretched in the direction in which the train was expected to arrive.)! At Churchgate – food stalls: I had boarded a train from Churchgate to Borivali. I was peering around at Churchgate which seemed very sane even at 5:00 PM in the evening. Today, I spent sometime at Churchgate station. I stood at the Himachal Pradesh Apple Juice stall and was drinking some apple juice. I noticed that people actually take time to stand at various food stalls at Churchgate station and talk to their colleagues. Churchgate Station is the hub for office-goers and collegians. These two tribes are most frequent at the station. People fix meeting spots at various stalls. While picking up a coffee or a Frankie, they chat with each other. Also, if individuals want to have a private chat on the mobile phone, they will go over to the coffee stall, pick up a coffee and hang around the stall till they finish their conversation. The food stalls at Churchgate station are a resting point, a place where you take time off and be with yourself or your colleague. There is a certain ‘sophisticated’ crowd which stands at the Frankie stalls and the coffee stalls. The prices of the food items are very affordable. But it is the fast track executives who patronize these fast foods. On the other hand, right at the start of the platform are stalls selling Railway Canteen Food including donoughts and burgers ala Indian Style, non-veg pattice and sandwiches, and the faithful samosas, kachoris and Indian snacks. These have patrons in the form of the government office-going crowd and even from among the corporate executives. Other stalls at the station include the Wheelers’ (which Laloo Prasad Yadav was threatening to evict), a UTI Bank ATM counter (with a security guard outside), a stall selling religious and Indian culture and history books, a Railway Canteen (in addition to the stalls) and a new Chinese Restaurant which will be opening shortly. The MNC Drop Box: While walking along Churchgate station, I noticed at one of the side-walls there was rectangular drop box attached to the wall which boldly said, “MNC Drop Box”. What is this? Let me explain. An MNC drop box is a service where you can drop your mobile phone bills, electricity bills and deposit cheques. On the MNC Drop Box, logos of different Multi National Companies are put. The logos are grouped in categories like mobile phone companies, power companies and different banks. The idea is that you do not have to go out of your way to pay your bills – you can do it at the railway station with this facility. It therefore appears that the railway station is also becoming a customized service for users. While the transitions are taking place at this site, you can also complete mundane monetary transactions. What do you think about this? The MNC Drop Box is now available at various stations. So far, I have noticed it at Churchgate, Mumbai Central and Borivali stations. Talk about transformations of the railway station. I wonder what is the railway station like in the imagination of the everyday Mumbaiite in terms of his conception of the city and his personal aspirations? Cut to Borivali Station: I got off the train. People were pushing me in various directions. You cannot afford to be slow on the platform at Borivali station though you can be leisurely at the Foot Over Bridges (FOB). Food is the main theme of this station. All kinds of foods are available here. Some stalls specialize in juices. Patrons at the stall represent the practice of ‘a quick bite, a quick drink’ unlike Churchgate which I have elaborated upon above. The other thing about Borivali Station is that it is quite unplanned. Most of the public here wants to avoid using the FOB and cross the tracks to reach from one platform to the other. Further, at a point in the station, some platforms are short while others stretch into some kind of eternity. This causes a level of disorganization. I am not yet sure about accidents and deaths here, though the Railway Police has some offices tackling with accidents and deaths. As you walk along platform number 1 on this station, you will notice as wall-less urinal here. It is meant only for men. While the urinal itself may go unnoticed, the stench of ammonia cannot be missed. There are also benches on platform number 1 where people sit and talk. Today I noticed several couples sitting here and talking. There is a foundation called Majithia Foundation which has installed boards on the station, some of which are attached right above the benches. On each of these boards, there are moral sayings in either English or Gujarati. You will find similar Majithia Foundation boards at Churchgate station except that these are numerous at Borivali and few at Churchgate. These boards are old plantations on the stations and are firm and solid. I do not know how many people notice these. At a point on the platform, there is a television screen which displays news. I think Sahara news was being played out on the screen. There was a little bunch of men watching the news. One of the things about television screens at railway stations is that usually, there are few bunches of men who stand and watch. Accumulated crowd is a hindrance at the railway station, especially if the crowd is right in the middle of movement of the rest. I see the plantation of television screens also a part of the age of customization for the individual customer. There is a segment of the population among the commuters which patronizes newspapers in the evening while returning back home. The television screen is meant for this segment. At Churchgate station though, the television screen shows things apart from news including entertainment, film promos, etc. The hoardings along Borivali station appeared fresh and new. As mentioned in the beginning, today the hoardings were selling the dream of a dream home, given to you by DNA Builders. They are actually into the construction business, not into gene-play! It was mighty tough to move around the station given the crowds. From an aerial angle as well, all you can immediately notice is thousands of heads, eager heads, each one waiting for his/her train! Event of the Day: On the return journey, the train crossed Kandivali and Malad stations. At Goregaon, passengers entering the train were whispering, ‘there has been a death on the railway tracks’. The train halted a while on the tracks at a signal, just before Jogeshwari station. Some of us women peered out of the windows to see what was happening. A police officer with a torch and two railway karmcharis (workers) were searching the tracks for a dead body – someone was run over by a train while crossing the tracks. The women around me began to shudder, imagining the gruesome death. Some of them had goose flesh, while others kept nodding their heads in fright. I narrated the incident to my mother at the breakfast table the next day. She had a similar reaction of shudder and fright. Perhaps I was the only one unmoved – the insensitive passenger. I have goose flesh and a similar reaction when I stand at VT station near the dustbin and people spit into it. The sputum is grimy and too difficult to accept in my real imaginations! Yikes! _________________________________________________________________ Win a trip to Singapore! http://eu.xmts.net/80450 Experience the magic! From smitashu at vsnl.com Fri Oct 1 17:05:04 2004 From: smitashu at vsnl.com (s choudhary) Date: Fri, 01 Oct 2004 17:05:04 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Shankar Guha Niyogi & NCERT Message-ID: <09d601c4a7b0$d2691040$e7ec41db@n4r8e2> Dear friends, chhattisgarh-net at yahoogroups.com is an e mail discussion group on Chhattisgarh In the course of one of our exchanges we also wrote to Mr Krishna Kumar, Director NCERT requesting him to include life of Mr Shankar Guha Niyogi in children's curriculum. We have received a positive response from Mr Krishna Kumar ( attached below). We look for your suggestions on how best to proceed. regards Shubhranshu Choudhary Freelance Journalist 312, Patrakar Parisar Sector 5, Vasundhara Ghaziabad 201012 India Ph - + 91 98110 66749 e mail - smitashu at vsnl.com http://36garh.notlong.com Copy of letter from Mr Krishna Kumar, Director NCERT Dear Mr. Choudhary, Many thanks for your message. If you prepare a write-up on Niyogi's life and struggle, which may be interesting as a reading for children, please send it to me. If it takes the shape of a book, that will be even better. With regards and best wishes, Yours sincerely, Krishna Kumar -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041001/6969ed8c/attachment.html From cupadhya at vsnl.com Fri Oct 1 13:51:03 2004 From: cupadhya at vsnl.com (Carol Upadhya) Date: Fri, 01 Oct 2004 13:51:03 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] please post announcement Message-ID: <415D136F.D97DC8B5@vsnl.com> Call for Papers: International Conference on New Global Workforces and Virtual Workplaces: Connections, Culture, and Control The National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bangalore, India, is organising an international conference on ‘New Global Workforces and Virtual Workplaces: Connections, Culture, and Control’, on August 12-13, 2005. The conference, funded by the Indo-Dutch Programme on Alternatives in Development, aims to bring together scholars from different countries (especially in Asia) who are engaged in research on the new forms of work and categories of global workers that are emerging in the ‘new’ economy, specifically in the information technology (IT) and IT Enabled Services (ITES) sectors. The organisers invite papers that are based on original research and that fall into any of the sub-themes listed below, or which raise related issues: 1) Sourcing and social structuring of the new global workforce 2) Corporate culture in the new global workplace 3) Work culture and the work process 4) Skills, deskilling and threat of obsolescence 5) Disciplinary regimes and resistance 6) Work, culture and identity 7) Mobility and social security 8) Ancillary services for the processing of ‘new economy’ workers 9) Class, consumption and urban social transformations 10) Nations, borders, and cross-border flows Those interested in attending the conference may write to the address below for more details. Tentative titles and abstracts should be submitted by December 1, 2004. Travel and accommodation for authors of accepted papers will be covered by the organisers. Carol Upadhya (Sociology and Social Anthropology) National Institute of Advanced Studies Indian Institute of Science Campus Bangalore 560 012 India cupadhya at vsnl.com niasssa at yahoo.co.in _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From isast at leonardo.info Fri Oct 1 03:04:38 2004 From: isast at leonardo.info (Leonardo/ISAST) Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 14:34:38 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] [Leonardo/ISAST Network] Call - 8th Leonardo/Olats Space and the Arts Workshop Oct 23 deadline Message-ID: <200409302134.CLE47598@ms2.netsolmail.com> To: Leonardo Network From: Leonardo Space Arts Working Group We are pleased to announce co-sponsorship by Leonardo of the first International Academy of Astronautics Symposium in Budapest, Hungary on: The Impact of Space on Society: Cultural Aspects Papers on the space arts are particularly solicited. Participants will also participate in the 8th Leonardo Space Arts Workshop. First IAA International Conference and 8th Leonardo/Olats Space and the Arts Workshop Budapest March 16–19 2005 Call for Participation http://www.congrex.nl/05c04/ http://www.impactofspace.hu In collaboration with the First IAA International Conference that will take place March 17-19 2005 in Budapest, Leonardo/Olats is holding its 8th Space and the Arts Workshop on March 16th 2005 on the theme of "The Impact of Space on Society: Cultural Aspects". Under the sub-theme of "Art and literature, science fiction, cultural aspects of space activities", the selected participants to the conference form the core group of the Leonardo/Olats Space and the Arts Workshop. Attention: there is a registration fee to the Conference (200 Euros for early birds; 250 Euros after). Proposal and registration is to be done via the following web site : http://www.congrex.nl/05c04/ Deadline for abstract submission : October 23rd The Impact of Space on Society The arts have been an integral part of space exploration and space activities since the beginning. Over the years artists, writers and film-makers have captured the imaginations of their generations gradually making the idea of space exploration an exciting and integral part of our society’s shared aspirations which in turn has helped generate public support and enthusiasm for the civilian space initiatives. What is the role and place of artists today? We are seeking presentations from artists, writers and other cultural professionals that address the role of the artist in the context of societal and cultural aspects of space activities from a future oriented perspective. Timetable 23rd October 2004 - Deadline for abstracts 10th December 2004 - Notification of acceptance 16-19 March 2005 - Workshop and conference Organization There is a registration fee to the conference. All participants to the workshop are also to present to the conference. Submitting an abstract implies the commitment to take part in both events. Travel and accommodation expenses are the responsibility of each participant. Committees "Arts and Space" Selecting Committee Ivan Almar (Chairman, IAA Commission 6) Annick Bureaud (Leonardo/Olats) Roger Malina (International Academy of Astronautics) David Raitt (ESA) Arthur Woods (OURS Foundation) Nina Czegledy, (ISEA President) Miklos Peternak (C3) Jean-Luc Soret (@rt-Outsiders) Conference International Program Committee Ivan Almar (Chairman, IAA Commission 6) François Becker (ISU) Roger Malina (IAA) David Raitt (ESA) Arthur Woods (OURS Foundation) Background of the Leonardo/Olats Space and the Arts Workshop Under the title "Rencontres du 13 avril" a series of small, one-day Workshops on Space and the Arts was co-organized by Leonardo/Olats, the OURS Foundation and the International Academy for Astronautics between the years 1997 and 2002. Held in Boulogne-Billancourt, a suburb near Paris, these workshops attracted leading space scientists, engineers and artists on specific themes chosen to generate exchanges between artists and scientists concerning the cultural impact of space activities. Since 2004, the workshop has become nomadic and is held in different countries in partnership with other organizations. The different topics of the past seven workshops have been: 1997 April 13th - "The Artists as Space Explorers" 1998 March 25th - "Space Art / Earth Art" 1999 March 21st - "Cultural Perspectives on Space" 2000 March 26th - "Life in Space" 2001 March 25th – “Outer Space - Cyber Space" 2002 March 17th -"The Collaborative Process in Space Art" 2004 May 18-21 – "Space: Science, Technology and the Arts", in partnership with ESTEC The documentation about each past workshop is online on the Leonardo/Olats web site at http://www.olats.org _______________________________________________ Leonardo-isast mailing list Leonardo-isast at mit.edu http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/leonardo-isast _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From lalitbatra77 at yahoo.co.in Fri Oct 1 23:21:16 2004 From: lalitbatra77 at yahoo.co.in (lalit batra) Date: Fri, 1 Oct 2004 18:51:16 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] niyogi memorial convention Message-ID: <20041001175116.23303.qmail@web8405.mail.in.yahoo.com> NIYOGI MEMORIAL CONVENTION ON LABOUR STRUGGLES FOR JUSTICE Thirteen years after the martyrdom of Shankar Guha Niyogi his legacy lives on. Guided by his creative and charismatic leadership, the Chhattisgarh Mukti Morcha redefined trade union struggles by breaking the narrow shackles of economism. Under the slogan of “sangharsh aur nirmaan”, this movement touched and transformed all aspects of people’s lives – it established a worker’s hospital, led vibrant anti liquor movements, and actively promoted local history and traditions. It created an active relationship with the movements of the peasantry and labour in the surrounding countryside. The slogan “Naye Bharat Ke Liye Naya Chattisgarh” captures this people-centric model of development. Niyogi’s vision of a society free of oppression stands in stark contrast to the lop-sided priorities of the development model being implemented in Chhattishgarh today. Shankar Guha Niyogi was murdered in the early hours of 28th September 1991 by the industrial mafia of Chattisgarh. At that time he was organising contract workers in Bhilai. Even as the government of Madhya Pradesh was wooing foreign investors and promising a dispute free industrial haven, workers were unionising. The burgeoning agitation launched by the contract workers for the implementation of labour laws under his leadership posed a threat to the profits of industrialists, and also to the unchallenged supremacy they enjoyed in the area for decades. His cold-blooded murder sent shock waves throughout the nation. In the trial for his murder, the trial court for the first time in the legal history of the country convicted two industrialists on the charge of conspiracy for the murder of a trade union leader. The final appeals in this matter have been argued before the Supreme Court and the judgment is now awaited. The theme of the convention is “Labour Struggles for Justice” in today’s context of dilution of labour laws, attack on fundamental rights like the right to strike, and growing repression of workers. PROGRAMME Session 1: 3.00 pm to 5.00 pm Aruna Roy, Mazdoor Kisan Sangharsh Samiti, Rajasthan on Rural Workers’ Issues and Struggles Jayati Ghosh, Professor, Jawaharlal Nehru University on Changing Macroeconomic Policies and Growing Repression of Workers Arundhati Roy, Author and Social Activist on Global Political Context of an Increasingly Anti-Labour World Economic Order Sudha Bharadwaj, Secretary, Chhattisgarh Mukti Morcha on Challenges Before the Workers’ and Peasant Movement in Chhattisgarh Indira Jaising, Senior Advocate, SC, on Judiciary and Workers Rights Session 2: 5.00 pm to 6.00 pm Comments by representatives of Trade Unions and Workers’ Organizations Chairperson: Dunu Roy, Environmental Activist, Hazards Centre, New Delhi Venue : Deputy Speaker’s Hall, Constitution Club, Viththalbhai Patel House, New Delhi Date : 5th October 2004 K.J Mukherjee Smita Gupta Vrinda Grover SOLIDARITY GROUP FOR CHHATTISGARH WORKER’S MOVEMENT ________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo! India Matrimony: Find your life partner online Go to: http://yahoo.shaadi.com/india-matrimony _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From marnoldm at du.edu Sat Oct 2 10:48:04 2004 From: marnoldm at du.edu (Michael Arnold Mages) Date: Fri, 01 Oct 2004 23:18:04 -0600 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Make History with the US Department of Art and Technology -- October through November Fourth on -empyre- Message-ID: subscribe to the discussion at http://www.subtle.net/empyre/ The members of the U.S. Department of Art and Technology will do whatever it takes to keep America safe. That means amplifying our intelligence, taking action on all key fronts, and deconstructing and re-writing media texts. The US Department of Art & Technology is an artist-led, virtual government agency. The US DAT functions as a conduit between the arts and the broader political and economic culture for facilitating the artists¹ need to extend aesthetic inquiry into the social sphere where ideas become real action. The Department proposes and supports the idealized definition of the role of the artist in society as one whose reflections, ideas, aesthetics, sensibilities, and abilities can have significant and transformative social impact on the world stage. Secretary Randall M. Packer: Head of the US Department of Art and Technology and chief media arts advisory for the Federal Government, Sectretary Packer represents the United States in aesthetic and cultural matters generally and gives advice and opinions to the President and to the heads of the executive departments of the Government when so requested. Joining Secretary Packer throughout the month are many of the agents and staff artists for the USDAT. Some of those attending will be: Under Secretary for the Office of Artist & Homeland Insecurity, Jeff Gates; Director of the Bureau of Pharmakogeographical Surveying, Trace Reddell; Commanding General of Operation Artistic Freedom, Andrew Nagy. Among the recent projects undertaken by the USDAT are: ---> The Experimental Party DisInformation Center, an immersive media installation subverting Republican propaganda. Three years in the making, the installation is the culmination of a project started by US Department of Art & Technology Secretary Randall M. Packer in 2001 when he created a ³virtual government agency² as a critique of the role of the artist in society. http://www.experimentalparty.org/ ---> Media Deconstruction Kit (MDK): MDK is a real-time system that alters broadcast media live and in real-time, transforming news stories, advertising, political pundancy, live up-dates, scrolls, and network logos into an immersive, sensorial, multimedia experience. (Randall Packer, Wesley Smith) http://www.experimentalparty.org/mdk ---> WetheBlog.org: A medium that offers an artistic alternative to the spin-doctors of the political parties. WetheBlog.org is the virtual community to participate in with media artists, cultural critics and other creative people who are repositioning themselves as new leaders in the governance of this planet. (Jeff Gates) http://wetheblog.org ---> Homeland Insecurity Advisory System: A Web-based initiative designed to broadcast the daily threat condition confronting citizens of the US and around the world due to the risk of our government-in-action. (Jonah Brucker-Cohen) http://www.usinsecurity.us -- -empyre- facilitates critical perspectives on contemporary cross-disciplinary issues, practices and events in networked media by inviting guests -- key new media artists, curators, theorists, producers and others to participate in thematic discussions. To participate, subscribe to -empyre- at: http://www.subtle.net/empyre/ -- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From uspia at nus.edu.sg Sat Oct 2 23:34:46 2004 From: uspia at nus.edu.sg (Irina Aristarkhova) Date: Sun, 3 Oct 2004 02:04:46 +0800 Subject: [Reader-list] democracy in Russia In-Reply-To: <20040924160030.57297.qmail@web12206.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <8B9832B2-149D-11D9-AE91-000393011D5E@nus.edu.sg> Dear All, Whatever little democracy we have managed to create in Russia is deteriorating with a speed of light - and it is not only 'Western propaganda', this time. Beslan is to Russia what 9-11 was to the USA. At least, in government's attempt to make its citizens paranoid, fearing their neighbors and reporting on every move of 'strange looking' people. Today we've learned that the new social movement called "Russia anti-terror" is being created to "conduct civic surveillance over public places, as well as public ad-hoc education, and to inform authorities on found misbehavior in the work of various organizations". The leaders present this new movement not as political organization, but of a 'human rights' type. They strive towards 'peace and order', it seems. In a country, where the work of informants has been the main resource for exiling people to Siberia and Gulag for centuries, this is not an innovation, but a well-known technique of everyday life. Those 15 years of democracy (though violent ones) are too little for a country like that. I would like to finish with words by "Russia anti-terror" leader (A. Lebedev) on how one would define a 'dangerous element': "Who is amoral person? It is the one who is listening to music at night, disturbing the sleep of his neighbors. Such person might happen to be a terrorist or someone who morally supports terrorism. That is, a normal person at night sleeps, not sings.' Any comment? I often hear that India is the largest democracy in the world. At the same time, I learn from this list that 'freedom of speech and dissent' are often being persecuted in various ways, including most violent means. How does one reconcile it? Continue to work, despite of....? Best regards, Irina From definetime at rediffmail.com Mon Oct 4 15:40:16 2004 From: definetime at rediffmail.com (sanjay ghosh) Date: 4 Oct 2004 10:10:16 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] (fwd) Fox News apologises Message-ID: <20041004101016.9998.qmail@webmail28.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041004/c05bcf55/attachment.html -------------- next part --------------   Fox News apologises for Kerry fabrication Oliver Burkeman in New York Monday October 4, 2004 The Guardian Fox News, the influential rightwing US television network, said yesterday it had "reprimanded" its chief political correspondent after its website carried fabricated quotes attributed to John Kerry, in which he called himself a "metrosexual" who enjoys getting manicures. The network, owned by Rupert Murdoch, apologised for the article in which the Democratic challenger was quoted telling a rally in Florida: "Didn't my nails and cuticles look great? What a good debate!" Comparing himself to the president, Mr Kerry was supposed to have said: "I'm metrosexual - he's a cowboy." Women voters, he purportedly added, "should like me! I do manicures." The article appeared under the byline of Carl Cameron, who has been following Mr Kerry on the campaign trail. It had been posted on the site, the network said in a statement, because of "fatigue and bad judgment, rather than malice." "Carl Cameron made a stupid mistake and he has been reprimanded for his lapse in judgment. It was a poor attempt at humour and he regrets it," a Fox spokesman Paul Schur told the Los Angeles Times, though he would not give details of what action would be taken against Mr Cameron. The "metrosexual" story taps into a persistent theme underlying the election race, in which the Republican party and its supporters in the media have sought to make a campaign issue of the candidates' perceived masculinity. At the party's convention in New York last month, California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger called Mr Kerry's advisors "economic girlie-men". A metrosexual, the fake Fox article helpfully concluded, "is defined as an urbane male with a strong aesthetic sense who spends a great deal of time and money on his appearance and lifestyle". From shivamvij at gmail.com Sun Oct 3 17:23:50 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Sun, 3 Oct 2004 04:53:50 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] GoM for print media Message-ID: Group of ministers to look into policies of print media EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE Posted online: Thursday, September 30, 2004 at 0201 hours IST http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=56088 NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 29: The proposal was to promulgate an ordinance banning Indian edition of international newspapers, but the Cabinet today bought time by forming a group of ministers for a comprehensive look at the policies in print media. Following pressure from the Left parties, Information & Broadcasting Ministry had suggested amendment in the Press and Registration of Books Act to stop publication of The International Herald Tribune from India. It had also suggested that the ordinance should prevent syndication of content beyond 7.5 per cent. However, the Cabinet today decided to to float a GoM which would ''view in one go'' the past decisions of the NDA government and the emerging scenario for a comprehensive view of the print media sector, I&B Minister S. Jaipal Reddy told reporters. The Cabinet decided to set up the GoM ''not only to go into the violations that may occur, but also to look at the entire policy paradigm,'' Reddy said. To a query on when the GoM would be constituted, Reddy said the Prime Minister would take a decision about its composition. According to Reddy, the Cabinet considered amendments to certain sections of the PRB Act of 1867, and took note of the resolution adopted in 1955 ''which did not want publication of foreign magazines and newspapers in India''. The decisions of the NDA government to permit 26 per cent foreign direct investment in publications, periodicals and newspapers dealing with news and current affairs were also taken into account, he added. From zest_india at yahoo.co.in Sun Oct 3 14:47:16 2004 From: zest_india at yahoo.co.in (Shivam) Date: Sun, 3 Oct 2004 02:17:16 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Indian Christ Message-ID: <20041003091716.62028.qmail@web8403.mail.in.yahoo.com> Indian IconJesus Christ has often been reinterpreted, says Georgina L Maddoxhttp://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=56118');//-->');//--> Posted online: Sunday, October 03, 2004 at 0000 hours IST FOR some it�s the poignancy of the crucifixion, for others the enormity of His endurance. For centuries, artists have been fascinated by Jesus Christ, some not even for religious reasons. When the Bible made its way to India through the hands of missionaries, it wasn�t long before Christ figured in a Mughal miniature. With Neville Tuli�s upcoming Mumbai auction featuring several intriguing versions of Christ, we take a look at contemporary Indian artists and their interpretation of an ancient subject. Placing him in saffron robes or on the lap of a missionary nun in India, artists have claimed this icon as their own. JAMINI ROY He was seen as one of the pioneers of Modernism who switched from the �60s trend of academic painting to a more indigenous style that drew heavily on the Kalighat patas (scrolls). No wonder Roy�s depiction of Christ is not the idealised Renaissance figure but a Santhal, monumental and dignified in his stoicism. An integration of a European theme with indigenous technique, this 1964 oil on canvas is a National Art Treasure that cannot be exported. PRICE: Approx Rs 1.75 crore MF HUSAIN Known to be one of the most secular of the Progressives in his approach to religious themes, Husain makes an oblique reference to Christ. With a minimal and all encompassing gesture, the artist renders the hand Christ raised while preaching. Ironically, it is also one of the most repeated dance gestures used by Indian performers, and Husain cleverly introduces Christ into the great Indian pantheon of deities. The orange in this undated oil is just incidental. PRICE: Rs 2.5 lakh KRISHEN KHANNA An associate of the Bombay Progressives who were fascinated by the iconic status of Christ, Khanna was no exception. His series on Christ included Supper and Emmaus, a 1984 oil, where Khanna sprinkled his interpretation of the icon with the life of the man on the street. He set his characters in a dhaba in Delhi�s Nizamuddin. ��I painted Christ as a fakir... it deals with the persecution of people who don�t fit in,� the artist wrote. PRICE: Approx Rs 18,000 FN SOUZA Goa-born Souza was surrounded by classic Christian iconography. But the rebel painted almost a hundred unconventional images of Christ. Some are so gory, they make for difficult viewing. However, in 2001, a mellower Souza painted Last Supper, where Christ is a sublime being. But the disciples� faces have been distorted in Souza�s characteristic style. ��I attack my canvases,�� wrote the late artist. PRICE: Approx Rs 30 lakh ANJOLIE ELA MENON Menon�s poignant Mother Teresa Caring Christ unites two universal figures of compassion with a distinctly Indian flavour. Mother Teresa takes the place of the Virgin and holds the emaciated body of a very brown Christ. The image created a stir when shown in 1998. PRICE: Approx Rs 12 lakh BADRI NARAYAN A quiet self-taught painter with a yen for lyrical mythological subjects from the Mahabharat to the Bible, Narayan painted many Jesus figures. This 1989 Christ With the Bird of Eternal Life is the artist�s vision of the risen Messiah. A yogi emanating spiritual calm, He�s swathed in orange with yogi beads and dreadlocks. The bird, a recurring motif in Narayan�s work, symbolises the flight of the spirit. PRICE: Approx Rs 59,800 --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041003/b800c6d2/attachment.html From aesthete at mail.jnu.ac.in Sat Oct 2 14:42:49 2004 From: aesthete at mail.jnu.ac.in (Dean School of Arts and Aesthetics) Date: Sat, 02 Oct 2004 14:42:49 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Evening with Chandralekha Message-ID: <1096708369.90fb1c00aesthete@mail.jnu.ac.in> Please note further details about the evening with Chandralekha at the School of Arts and Aesthetics The School of Arts and Aesthetics welcomes you to an evening with Chandralekha, the legendary dancer and choreographer. Chandralekha has been expressing her aesthetic and political vision through dance-making. At once conscious of the deep history of the traditions she employs—Yoga, Bharata Natyam and Kalaripayattu (an Indian martial art)—and the need to address contemporary issues, Chandralekha establishes a bold new paradigm for the contemporary Indian artist In the first part of the programme, Chandralekha will speak about her life's work. Her talk will be illustrated with video clips of her work, from early days to the present. In the second part of the programme, noted filmmaker Ein Lall will present her film: SHARIRA: Chandralekha's exploration in Dance (2003, 30 mins). There will be time for discussion with both Chandralekha and Ein Lall after the screening. Date:5th October, 2004 Time: 5 pm. Venue: School of Arts and AEsthetics Auditorium Directions to the Auditorium: Enter JNU campus by the main gate. Carry on straight till the road ends in a T Junction. Turn left; a second Y or T junction follows. Turn left again. On the right you will see the main adminstration building. If you take the second entrance to the admin building car park (on your right, you will see the SAA buildings and the small SAA car park immediately on your left. The dark sandstone building is the auditorium and the light sandstone building is the faculty building. . ============================================== This Mail was Scanned for Virus and found Virus free ============================================== _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From nomig at nomig.net Mon Oct 4 21:29:43 2004 From: nomig at nomig.net (NomIg.) Date: Mon, 4 Oct 2004 11:59:43 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] [call] Revolution:USA Message-ID: <20041004155958.STMN1890.tomts36-srv.bellnexxia.net@ginko> Revolution:USA - A Coldcut/NomIg. Project http://www.revusa.net email: revolution at nomig.net Revolution USA is an online, multimedia political art project put together by Coldcut (www.ninjatune.net/coldcut) and collaborators NomIg. Using samples of the last 40 years of American presidents and media figures, we have created an online Archive of Political Corruption and Scandals. This site features an interactive timeline of major US political scandals and corruption with an integrated database containing: pertinent video clips and samples for download and streaming; pictures; a textual description of each event and offsite links for further research. The site contains hundreds of clips of US politicians in 'awkward' moments and other relevant footage, free audio loops and tracks created by Coldcut which are available for download (currently totaling over 13GBs). The aim is to build a digital library detailing the blatant corruption of the US political landscape in order to evoke social change through audience participation. We are inviting all artists to access the site, download the materials and create cut-up a/v tracks and documentaries using the footage, the audio clips and whatever else you can get your hands on. This allows for a new intersection between artist and audience where the worlds of the filmmaker and the viewer merge into a single act. The works will then be hosted on the site and made available as streaming media for the world to watch. Users of the site will then be able to vote for what they think are the best works and the winners will be announced. The end result is an intersection between the worlds of documentary, interactive film making and web interactivity and programming. For more information and to see the current crop of remixes (including a must-see by TV Sheriff): www.revusa.net or contact revolution at nomig.net Sincerely, -NomIg. From jo at turbulence.org Tue Oct 5 00:08:52 2004 From: jo at turbulence.org (Jo-Anne Green) Date: Mon, 04 Oct 2004 11:38:52 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Turbulence Commission: "Two Textual Instruments, Part 2: News Reader" by Noah Wardrip-Fruin, with David Durand, Brion Moss, and Elaine Froehlich Message-ID: <416198BC.9090902@turbulence.org> October 4, 2004 Turbulence Commission: "Two Textual Instruments, Part 2: News Reader" by Noah Wardrip-Fruin, with David Durand, Brion Moss, and Elaine Froehlich http://turbulence.org/works/twotxt/nr-index.htm "News Reader," the second of two textual instruments commissioned by Turbulence, is software for reading and playing the network news environment. Initially, it offers the current "top stories" from Yahoo! News which are always drawn from mainstream sources. Playing these stories brings forth texts generated from alternative press stories, portions of which are introduced (through interaction) into the starting texts, gradually altering them. "News Reader" is an artwork designed for daily use, providing a sometimes humorous, sometimes disturbing experience of our news and the chains of language that run through it. "Two Textual Instruments: Regime Change and News Reader" is a 2003 commission of New Radio and Performing Arts, (aka Ether-Ore) for its Turbulence web site. It was made possible with funding from the LEF Foundation. BIOGRAPHIES NOAH WARDRIP-FRUIN has recently co-edited two books: The New Media Reader (2003) and First Person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game (2004). His artwork has been presented by the Whitney and Guggenheim museums. DAVID DURAND is Director of Electronic Publishing Services at Ingenta plc and Adjunct Associate Professor at Brown's Department of Computer Science. He is co-author of Making Hypermedia Work. He participated in the XML, TEI, HyTime, XLink and WebDAV standards efforts. BRION MOSS, an engineer by training and vocation, first entered the art world through his participation in the conceptualization and creation of The Impermanence Agent. He is currently employed as a computer geek by IGN/Gamespy. ELAINE FROEHLICH is principle of Active Surface Design and Director of the Computer Based Design Program for Continuing Education at the Rhode Island School of Design. Past projects include interaction design for Mesa Vista and book design for the Encyclopedia Africana. For more information about Turbulence, please visit http://turbulence.org -- Jo-Anne Green, Associate Director New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc.: http://new-radio.org New York: 917.548.7780 . Boston: 617.522.3856 Turbulence: http://turbulence.org New American Radio: http://somewhere.org Networked_Performance Blog and Conference: http://turbulence.org/blog -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041004/61dba36f/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From lalitbatra77 at yahoo.co.in Mon Oct 4 23:24:06 2004 From: lalitbatra77 at yahoo.co.in (lalit batra) Date: Mon, 4 Oct 2004 18:54:06 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Convention on Right to Information Message-ID: <20041004175406.45288.qmail@web8407.mail.in.yahoo.com> National Campaign for People’s Right to Information Date: 15/09/2004 Dear friends, Greetings from the National Campaign for the People’s Right to Information! We are writing to invite you to the Second National Convention on the People’s Right to Information, to be held in New Delhi, from October 8-10, 2004. As you know, the right to information is a fundamental right guaranteed under our Constitution. This is an all-important right for realising all other fundamental rights. The demand for strong and effective right to information legislation has been growing as are a variety of citizens’ efforts to use right to information provisions to make transparency and accountability in governance more meaningful for ordinary citizens. This is, in several ways, the first step towards entrenching a more participatory democracy. As a result of broad-based campaigns, 9 states have passed right to information laws to operationalise the people’s right to information. In addition, there are several executive orders at the State and the National level, which give citizens the right to access information from specific departments. In 2002, Parliament passed the Freedom of Information Act which has not come into force yet. However, most citizens’ groups have basic objections to the provisions of this law and many of the state laws, and there has been an ongoing campaign for better legislation. In addition to improved legislation, there remains the need for ensuring better implementation of existing laws on right to information. While right to information has shown great potential for citizens’ empowerment, it has also become clear that without sustained campaigning and pressure from citizens’ groups, its full potential will not be realised. It is with this aim of fostering collective action that a group of concerned peoples, organisations, campaigns, human rights and other social activists, journalists, lawyers, academics and other development organisations came together, in 1997, to launch the National Campaign for People’s Right to Information (NCPRI). Following this, the First National Convention on the Right to Information was held in Beawar in April 2002. The Second National Convention is being organised in New Delhi at a time when an increasingly larger number of people are using their right to information and greater opportunities exist for ensuring that a strong national law is brought into effect. The Second National Convention will commence on October 8, 2004 (Friday) with a National Public Hearing on the issue of the Public Distribution System (PDS). The PDS has been chosen because of its current relevance at the national level, the extensive use by citizens’ groups of right to information law to access records related to the PDS and the need for active citizens’ participation for framing an effective Public Distribution System. The second and third day (Oct. 9-10) will comprise of 2-3 plenary sessions where issues of common interest will be discussed. There will be other sessions where simultaneous workshops will be organised on the relationship between right to information and citizens’ entitlements in various spheres. It is hoped that these workshops will result in a more practical and sharper understanding of the use of right to information by citizens. Through this National Convention, the NCPRI hopes to involve more individuals and citizens’ groups in the Campaign and collectively chart its future. The NCPRI is raising funds in order to enable larger participation of interested people from all over the country. A nominal registration fee of Rs. 100/- per participant will be charged which will include basic accommodation (from October 8th- 10th) and subsidized food (from 8th night – 10th night). Arrangements will be made for the sale of reasonably priced lunch packets at the Public Hearing. Participants will have to bear their own travel costs to Delhi and from the railway/bus station to the venue. · Delhi University (DU) Campus is the venue for the National Public Hearing on PDS and the National Convention. · Your accommodation has been arranged at Harijan Sewak Sangh (Gandhi Ashram) situated at Kingsway Camp, (10 minutes walking distance from DU Campus) We would appreciate an early response from you with an indication of the number of participants who will be accompanying you. Your response will help us plan the workshops and organise the logistics for the Convention. While participants will be free to attend any workshop of their choice, it is possible that you might be contacted by the workshop organisers independently. For further information you may please contact any of the following - Arvind (20033988), Ms. Vishaish (9818345439), Ms. Sowmya (9818505853), Ms. Anjali (9811558533), Nikhil/Salim (9810884111) or Venkatesh (9871050555) or email to ncpri2004 at yahoo.co.in You may also send confirmation of your participation by post to - NCPRI, c/o C-18A, Munirka, New Delhi-110 067. If you wish to send monetary contributions to meet the expenses of the Convention please issue a cheque or draft drawn in favour of ‘National Campaign for People’s Right to Information’ and post it to the above address. We request you to circulate this invitation within your networks. With best wishes, Yours sincerely, NCPRI Working Group: Shekhar Singh, Aruna Roy, Ajit Bhattacharjea, Prabhash Joshi, Maja Daruwala, Dr. Suman Sahai, Harsh Mander, Bharat Dogra, Nikhil Dey, Arvind Kejriwal, Prakash Kardaley, Shailesh Gandhi, Vijay Pratap and Prashant Bhushan (Convenor) ________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo! India Matrimony: Find your life partner online Go to: http://yahoo.shaadi.com/india-matrimony _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From vishnu at cscsban.org Mon Oct 4 18:10:54 2004 From: vishnu at cscsban.org (T. Vishnu Vardhan) Date: Mon, 04 Oct 2004 18:10:54 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] CSCS Library Fellowships Message-ID: <6.0.1.1.0.20041004180726.021083e8@209.182.55.202 > Hi, CSCS invites applications for Library fellowships. Please read the ad below and should you need any further clarifications write to me vishnu at cscsban.org Vishnu Centre for the Study of Culture and Society, Bangalore, invites applications for Library Fellowships to work in Centre's library for one month. Who can apply: Undergraduate Teachers. Applications will be received through out the year. One fellowship is exclusively reserved for a project on Curriculum Development. CSCS library has a collection of about 8000 books, 144 journals and access to J-Store. The Library holdings cover areas like Film Theory, Popular Culture, Communication Theory, Media Studies, Feminist Theory, Visual Arts, Photography, Anthropology, Sociology, Philosophy, Politics and Law. This is complemented by a vast collection of films and documentaries. Visit our online Library catalogue at www.cscsarchive.org/Library For details about the Centre, Library and application procedure and other details please visit our website www.cscsban.org or write to vishnu at cscsban.org Centre for the Study of Culture and Society 466, 9th Cross, Madhavan Park I Block, Jayanagar, Bangalore - 560011 T. Vishnu Vardhan Centre for the Study of Culture and Society, 466, 9th Cross, 1st Block, Jayanagar, Bangalore - 560011. e-mail: vishnu at cscsban.org thvishnu_viva at yahoo.com Tel. no. 080-26562986 mobile no. +919845207308 fax no. 080-26562991 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041004/dcaed095/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From shivamvij at gmail.com Tue Oct 5 14:46:17 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Tue, 5 Oct 2004 14:46:17 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] How many more journalists to die? Message-ID: How many more journalists to die? Star National Desk | 5 October 2004 The Daily Star: http://www.thedailystar.net/2004/10/05/d41005070366.htm Journalists in Rajshahi and Gaibandha on Sunday protested the brutal killing of Dipankar Chakrabarty, a senior journalist and vice-president of Bangladesh Federal Union of Journalists (BFUJ) in Bogra on Sunday. Our Rajshahi Staff Correspondent reports: Local journalists staged demonstrations on the streets. In an exceptional demonstration, journalist Zahangir Alam Akash remained standing for two hours without any pause. His eyes and mouth were fastened with black cloth while his hands were tied up behind with rope. He displayed a big list of journalists killed by miscreants. He posed a question who is the next target? He also addressed briefly before ending the demonstration. Rajshahi Sangbadik Samaj brought out a big procession from Alupotty crossing and held a rally at Zero point. Among others, the Editors' Forum Convener Liaqut Ali, senior journalists Abdul Quader, Hasan Millat and Mustafijur Rahman Khan Alam spoke. Jatiya Sangbadik Shangstha, Rajshahi Journalists' Union, Metropolitan Press Club, Rajshahi Press Club and a few NGOs protested the killing holding separate meetings and statements. Our Gaibandha Correspondent reports: Gaibandha Press Club in an emergency meeting condemned the killing of the senior journalist. Speakers expressed deep shock at the killing. They also expressed their grave concern at the increasing trend of killing media persons. Presided over by Gobinda Lal Das, President of Gaibandha Press Club, the meeting was addressed, among others, by journalists KM Rezaul Hoque, Nurul Alam Jahangir, Abu Zafr Sabu, Abedur Rahman Shawpon, Nuruzzaman Prodhan, Shahbul Shaheen Tota and Amitav Das Himun. Speakers further demanded exemplary punishment to the culprits and asked the government to restore law and order in the country. Processions and meetings are being held till filing of the report on Monday noon. From shivamvij at gmail.com Wed Oct 6 23:05:16 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2004 10:35:16 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] PM calls for review of media policy Message-ID: http://in.news.yahoo.com//041005/43/2h4j6.html PM calls for review of media policy By Indo-Asian News Service New Delhi, Oct 5 (IANS) Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Tuesday called for a review of India's media policy, saying it was necessary in today's era of information revolution and the opening up of the country's economy. "We need to ensure that there is a suitable framework for freedom of competition to be meaningful for all players in the media sector," the prime minister told a gathering of women journalists and other members of the fourth estate. "A review of our media policy is therefore necessary, both in the context of changes consequent to the information revolution, and in the light of the incremental process of opening of the Indian economy," he said. Addressing a few hundred members of the Indian Women's Press Corps (IWPC) and other invitees on its 10th anniversary at the Taj Palace Hotel here, Manmohan Singh said his government had constituted a group of ministers on the issue. The group, chaired by Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee, had been asked to advise the government on how to create a fair and balanced policy framework for the media sector. "Our government welcomes the possibility of discussing the policy towards investment in our media with representative bodies such as IWPC," he said. "I have little doubt that greater professionalism can be ensured in media by allowing the winds of competition to blow freely across sectors of the media." Manmohan Singh said there was a need to create a "more equitable, gender-neutral" society in the country. He said the government would work towards achieving it with assistance from NGOs and organisations like IWPC. "Let me assure you that our government is committed to the realisation of these fundamental objectives," he said. Manmohan Singh said it was an interesting historical fact that IWPC's establishment coincided "with a momentous transformation of the Indian media". He said the emergence of organisations like IWPC was yet another manifestation of the process of broadbasing of the media. "This process is plainly visible in the TV channels that we watch, and in the newspapers that we read today, and the country is the better for it," the prime minister noted. He, however, said that despite considerable progress in reducing gender biases, some distance remained before one could say that women had successfully broken through the proverbial glass ceiling. From samina at vsnl.com Wed Oct 6 17:48:46 2004 From: samina at vsnl.com (Samina) Date: Wed, 06 Oct 2004 17:48:46 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] FW: Newsletter: the Democracy Project In-Reply-To: <345D6A30F0443D41BCE029E2D7C90B3D5B68CA@server01.idfa.lan> Message-ID: Perhaps of interest to some on the list ... Samina Filmmakers are invited to submit a project on the theme of DEMOCRACY. STEPS International - a working group of commissioning editors and producers - is inviting interested filmmakers to submit their proposals for a collection of documentary films on the theme of DEMOCRACY. Together with IDFA, the FORUM and the Jan Vrijman Fund, STEPS will be hosting a day of pitching on November 25 - following the FORUM that takes place from November 22 through 24 in Paradiso. We are looking for stories that reflect different issues of democracy from filmmakers around the world. Submissions should be for films of 52 minutes or longer. It is not necessary to pitch a project to have it considered for selection. Proposals for pitching Democracy at the IDFA forum must be submitted, as set out below, by October 31 2004 the DEMOCRACY project visit our homepage ------ End of Forwarded Message -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041006/5982cfee/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image001.gif Type: image/gif Size: 7683 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041006/5982cfee/attachment.gif -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image002.gif Type: image/gif Size: 4833 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041006/5982cfee/attachment-0001.gif -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image003.gif Type: image/gif Size: 800 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041006/5982cfee/attachment-0002.gif -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image004.gif Type: image/gif Size: 73 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041006/5982cfee/attachment-0003.gif From jcm at ata.org.pe Fri Oct 8 00:35:33 2004 From: jcm at ata.org.pe (Jose-Carlos Mariategui) Date: Thu, 07 Oct 2004 14:05:33 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] 8vo Festival International de Video/Arte/Electr =?iso-8859-1?q?=F3?= nica (VAE8) Message-ID: 8vo Festival International de Video/Arte/Electrónica (VAE8) 6th of September ­ 30th of November, 2004 Complete Programme: http://www.vae8.net The Festival International de Video/Arte/Electrónica (VAE8) in Peru has become one of the more important artistic events in country and one of the main ones in Latin America. From 1998 the Festival has been promoting and spreading the new technologies and means of artistic expression, extending the panorama with respect to the electronic languages and to the disciplines that tie art, science and technology. In the last 6 years more than 80,000 people had attended the multiple activities and events of the VAE. In previous years we have counted with the presence of artists like Marcel Odenbach (Germany), Randy Yau (the United States), Hans Diebner (Germany), Robert Cahen (France), Oliver Agid (France) and theoreticians like Airlindo Machado (Brazil), Rodrigo Alonso (Argentina), Nils Roller (Germany), among more than 50 international guests. For the Festival VAE8 (http://www.vae8.net) international artists such as Zbigniew Karkowski (Poland), Christopher Havel (France), Andy Lugimbuhl (Swiss), Lucas Bambozzi (Brazil) and Leslie Peters (Canada) are being presented in Perú. The festival is in charge of Realidad Visual, an independent organization of art and new media constituted by artists, and researchers of diverse disciplines. In previous years Festival VAE was in charge of ATA (Alta Tecnología Andina) represented by José-Carlos Mariátegui, Alfonso Castrillón and Jorge Villacorta, who now comprise the VAE¹s Advisory Committee. One of the most important aspects of this new version of the VAE8 is its decentralization character because it promises to arrive at more communities and spaces in Peru, increasing the possibilities of interchange between artists of diverse regions of the country and with their international counterparts. This year the Festival will be presented for the first time in provinces of Peru, in cities such as Puerto Maldonado, Trujillo, Cajamarca, Cuzco and Arequipa Some activities will extend until half-full of November. The Festival has intensely supported the production of new Peruvian projects of electronic art. More than 100 Peruvian works had been released during last the 4 years. The last year thanks to the World Wide Video Festival (Amsterdam) and the support of the Hivos Cultural Fund (Holland) we managed to support in the production of five new national projects (from Jose-Carlos Martinat, Iván Lozano, Diego Lama, Angie Bonino and Enrique Mayorga). 8vo international Festival de Video /Arte/Electronica (VAE8) http://www.vae8.net Press: ddoliver at realidadvisual.org Coordination: vae at infonegocio.net.pe From penguinhead at linux-delhi.org Fri Oct 8 11:08:21 2004 From: penguinhead at linux-delhi.org (Pankaj Kaushal) Date: Fri, 08 Oct 2004 11:08:21 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] indymedia servers raided by FBI Message-ID: <416627CD.8050508@linux-delhi.org> Yesterday at about 18:00 CET FBI raided the indymedia servers hosted by Rackspace both in US and England. The reasons why the hard drives were taken are still unknown. Since the subpoena was issued to Rackspace and not to Indymedia, the reasons for this action are still unknown to Indymedia. Talking to Indymedia volunteers, Rackspace stated that "they cannot provide Indymedia with any information regarding the order." ISPs have received gag orders in similar situations which prevent them from updating the concerned parties on what is happening. full story: http://www.indymedia.org/en/2004/10/111999.shtml Details of the downtime: http://nyc.indymedia.org/feature/display/126066/index.php Cheers! Pankaj (2b || !2b) From eye at ranadasgupta.com Fri Oct 8 13:58:10 2004 From: eye at ranadasgupta.com (Rana Dasgupta) Date: Fri, 08 Oct 2004 13:58:10 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Giving money to beggars Message-ID: <41664F9A.4040103@ranadasgupta.com> As Mulla Nasruddin emerged from the mosque after prayers, a beggar sitting in the street solicited alms. The following conversation ensued: MULLA: Are you extravagant? BEGGAR: Yes, Mulla. MULLA: Do you like sitting around drinking coffee and smoking? BEGGAR: Yes. MULLA: I suppose you like to go to the baths every day? BEGGAR: Yes. MULLA: And maybe amuse yourself, even, by drinking with your friends? BEGGAR: Yes, I like all those things. "Tut, tut," said the Mulla, and gave him a gold piece. A few yards further on, another beggar who had overheard this conversation begged for alms importunately. MULLA: Are you extravagant? BEGGAR: No, Mulla. MULLA: Do you like sitting around drinking coffee and smoking? BEGGAR: No. MULLA: I suppose you like to go to the baths every day? BEGGAR: No. MULLA: And maybe amuse yourself, even, by drinking with your friends? BEGGAR: No, I want only to live meagrely and to pray. Whereupon the Mulla gave him a small copper coin. "But why," wailed the beggar, "do you give me, an economical and pious man, a small copper coin, when you gave that extravagant fellow a gold piece?" "Ah," replied the Mulla, "his needs are greater than yours." From shivamvij at gmail.com Wed Oct 6 22:42:55 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2004 10:12:55 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Injustice to Dalit Students at IIT Bombay Message-ID: Demand for Full Inquiry and Justice in the matter related to Injustice to the three Deserving Dalit Students of the Preparatory Course (2002-2003) at IIT Bombay Sign the petition: http://www.petitiononline.com/dum_iit/petition.html _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From joasia at i-dat.org Fri Oct 8 19:08:54 2004 From: joasia at i-dat.org (joasia) Date: Fri, 08 Oct 2004 14:38:54 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] 'Making a Difference' by Lucy Kimbell Message-ID: Making a Difference at the University of Plymouth ------------------------------------------------- - a project for i-DAT by Lucy Kimbell 11th - 22nd October 2004 Portland Square University of Plymouth UK http://www.i-dat.org/makingadifference Please join us with the Vice-Chancellor of the University for a breakfast preview at 10am, on Monday 11th October 2004. Making a Difference at the University of Plymouth is a project for i-DAT by Lucy Kimbell. It uses Arch-OS, an innovative digital system embedded in the architecture of the Portland Square building, enabling passers-by to express the corporate mantra of our times. On pressing a special button, the phrase is broadcast over the entire building, beginning with the first clear iteration of sound but increasingly becoming layered and invasive. The wish to make a difference is also automatically sent as an email to the Vice-Chancellor of the University to register this fact. Data is collected and made public but to questionable effect. Higher education has changed rapidly over recent years, reflecting the general tendency of increased corporatisation of culture at large. Management cultures insist on personal responsibility where the individual employee is supposed to align themselves with the organisation's brand values. The phrase, 'I want to make a difference', reveals something of the tendency towards increased individualisation and a break with previous collective ways of engendering change. Does this demonstrate the view that large corporate and hierarchical institutions are ineffectual, that local and more complex models are at work in the forces of change? Who holds responsibility in seeking positive improvement in the workplace and in terms of the service on offer? Will the number of people pressing the 'I want to make a difference' button reveal a true willingness or an empty gesture towards change? The shift from the individual sound to a chorus by the end of the project presents itself as an allegory in this respect. Lucy Kimbell is AHRB Creative and Performing Arts Fellow at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art, University of Oxford. 'Making a Difference at the University of Plymouth' is a project by Lucy Kimbell, with special thanks to George Grinsted for software development. For more information on the project: email contact at i-dat.org or phone +44 (0)1752 232560 -- i-DAT Institute of Digital Art and Technology School of Computing, Communications and Electronics, University of Plymouth, Portland Square, Plymouth, PL4 8AA, Devon, UK. http://www.i-dat.org From nmajumda+ at pitt.edu Fri Oct 8 21:23:46 2004 From: nmajumda+ at pitt.edu (Neepa Majumdar) Date: Fri, 08 Oct 2004 11:53:46 -0400 (EDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Endangered Archives Programme (fwd) Message-ID: CALL FOR APPLICATIONS- Endangered Archives Programme ENDANGERED ARCHIVES PROGRAMME Coming in October 2004 In pursuit of their general aim to support fundamental research into important issues in the humanities and social sciences, the Trustees of the Lisbet Rausing Charitable Fund have decided to sponsor a Programme focusing on the preservation and copying of important but vulnerable archives throughout the world. The Programme is administered by the British Library and applications will be considered by an International Panel of historians and archivists. The Programme will achieve its objectives principally by making a number of grants to individual researchers to locate relevant collections, wherever possible to arrange their transfer to a suitable local archival home, and to deliver copies into the international research domain via the British Library. Pilot projects may also be funded. Grants will be made each year and will vary in amount, but a guideline maximum of £50,000 for a full project, and £10,000 for a pilot project, is envisaged. It will also make available - to overseas archivists and librarians only - bursaries for professional attachments at the British Library to foster better archival standards in cataloguing, preservation, etc., and thereby to assist the process of safeguarding other such collections locally in the future. The aim is to safeguard archival material relating to societies usually at an early stage of development i.e. its normal focus will be on the period of a society's history before 'modernisation' or 'industrialisation' had generated institutional and record-keeping structures for the systematic preservation of historical records, very broadly defined. The relevant time period will therefore mostly vary according to the society with which we deal. The Programme will be completely open as to theme and regional interest, although it will normally, but not invariably, be concerned with non-western societies. For the purposes of the Programme, archives will be interpreted widely to embrace not only rare printed sources (books, serials, newspapers, ephemera, etc.) and manuscripts in any language, but also visual materials (drawings, paintings, prints, posters, photographs, etc.), audio or video recordings, digital data, and even other objects and artefacts - but normally only where they are found in association with a documentary archive. In all cases, the validity of archival materials for inclusion in the Programme will be assessed by their relevance as source materials for the pre-industrial stage of a society's history. The Fund does not offer grants to support the 'normal' activities of an archive, although the Programme may offer support for such items as costs directly related to the acceptance of relocated material. Further information about the timetable, criteria, eligibility and procedures will be announced on the Programme's website at www.bl.uk/endangeredarchives in October. Preliminary enquiries or expressions of interest may be addressed now to eap at bl.uk. This message was posted via the American Center for Mongolian Studies list-serv. For more information on the ACMS, or to post a message to this list-serv, please contact Charles Krusekopf at . From velivelli at yahoo.com Fri Oct 8 21:36:25 2004 From: velivelli at yahoo.com (aditya velivelli) Date: Fri, 8 Oct 2004 09:06:25 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Injustice to Dalit Students at IIT Bombay In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20041008160625.90560.qmail@web40909.mail.yahoo.com> Its ridiculous to write a petition for this. First of all the Dalit students are given the opportunity to get into IIT through reservations and then they are also given a preparatory course and finally only three dalit students have been expelled (out of scores of them, I guess) and you write a petition for them. Where are we going? --- Shivam wrote: > Demand for Full Inquiry and Justice in the matter > related to Injustice > to the three Deserving Dalit Students of the > Preparatory Course > (2002-2003) at IIT Bombay > > Sign the petition: > > http://www.petitiononline.com/dum_iit/petition.html > _______________________________________________ > announcements mailing list > announcements at sarai.net > https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements > _________________________________________ > 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!? Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish. http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail From radiofreealtair at gmail.com Sun Oct 10 12:24:40 2004 From: radiofreealtair at gmail.com (Anand Vivek Taneja) Date: Sun, 10 Oct 2004 12:24:40 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The man who lost his past In-Reply-To: <20040906055912.1877.qmail@webmail29.rediffmail.com> References: <20040906055912.1877.qmail@webmail29.rediffmail.com> Message-ID: <8178da990410092354963297@mail.gmail.com> ... Paul Berczeller calls Steven Spielberg's 'The Terminal' puerile, and at one level that's easy to agree with. 'Sir Alfred' Merhan Karimi Nasseri's life, suspended in Charles de Gaulle Airport is a knife edged absurdist comment on our times, Toba Tek Singh for the twenty first century. And like Sadat Hasan Manto's unforgettable character, Merhan refuses to make a 'sane' choice - instead he prefers being stuck in limbo, a man without a country. To take such a character and put him into a Hollywood film with a schmaltzy, happy ending would of course immediately attract the 'puerile' label... But, I found the film aware of borders, aware of the constant gaze of the surveillance camera, aware of the inherent cruelty of 'Homeland Security' and bureacratic red tape, aware that the 'border' isn't just the arbitrary line that divides nations on maps, but everywhere that you have to 'Prove your Identity' - and yet full of hope. Saadat Hasan Manto may have been a greater story writer than God, but the creed of the storyteller is (I hope and wish and pray) not just to lay bare with economical scapel strokes the heart of human darkness, but to enlighten it. ...And how else would you challenge the Panopticon of the surveillance state, unless you did it the Victor Navorski way? By talking back to the Surveillance Cameras, like the New York Surveillance Camera Players... http://synchroni-cities.blogspot.com/2004/10/terminals-borders-goodbyes.html On 6 Sep 2004 05:59:12 -0000, sanjay ghosh wrote: > > > The man who lost his past > > Merhan Karimi Nasseri has spent 16 years living in Charles de Gaulle airport. Now Steven Spielberg's Terminal has catapulted him to international stardom - but casts little light on who he really is. And Sir Alfred, as he calls himself, isn't too sure either. Paul Berczeller, who spent a year with Nasseri, set out to unravel the mystery > > Monday September 6, 2004 > The Guardian > > I first saw him, many years ago now, staring out with an uncanny gaze of blank intensity from the pages of a newspaper. Seated alone on a bench, immune to the endless motion of the airport around him, there was a curious inscrutability to his slight, balding yet dignified countenance. He looked like some unlikely cross between a Zen master and Chaplin's Tramp. He had these amazing long brows, as dark as his hooded eyes, and a small, perfectly groomed moustache perched on top of his upper lip. It was like a caricature of a face, five charcoal marks on a canvas. But strangely noble, too. > > His name was Merhan Karimi Nasseri though he called himself "Sir Alfred". He lived in a lost dimension of absurd bureaucratic entanglement. That is to say, on a bench in Terminal One of the Charles de Gaulle International Airport, and he had lived there since 1988. For a series of insanely complicated reasons, the Iranian-born refugee was now a man without a country - or any other documented, internationally accepted identity status. Alfred couldn't leave France because he did not have papers; he couldn't enter France because he did not have papers. The authorities told him to wait in the airport lounge while they sorted the paradox out. That he did - for years and years. > > Then one day, I heard that Alfred had finally been given his papers. He was free to go anywhere in the world he wished. Except now it seemed he didn't want to leave the airport after all. It was the only home - the only past - he had left. > > I woke up that night burning with an idea for a movie about Alfred - co-starring Alfred himself. I counted the hours before I could hit my desk and get started on the script. To me, his unlikely nightmare was nothing less than one of the quintessential tales of our lonely, displaced, increasingly unreal age. > > Perhaps I was a little overexcited, but I soon found that I was not the only one inspired by Alfred's true story. Every screenwriter in London seemed to have a version of his life in the drawer somewhere. And every single one (except mine) was a romantic comedy with a happy ending. None of the others had been made, nor would they ever be. Because word was out that over at DreamWorks, Steven - the Steven - was interested in the story. In sunny faraway LA, the big boys were preparing to immortalise Sir Alfred. > > Meanwhile, down at the other end of the world cinematic digestive system, my friend Glen Luchford and I grabbed a DV camera and a few changes of clothes and drove overnight to meet Alfred in the airport. Fittingly, days turned into months and we ended up spending close to a year with him shooting our low budget, arthouse feature, Here to Where (2001). If you've seen it, I probably know you. > > Recently, Alfred has been back in the news again. Spielberg's latest, The Terminal, starring Tom Hanks and Catherine Zeta-Jones, is playing on thousands of screens around the world. Media everywhere is asking the same old question. Who is Alfred? No one has a clue. Alfred least of all, it seems. That is exactly how he wants it - I have spent enough time with him to know that. He has been in the airport for 16 years now. I suppose my fantasy upon first meeting Alfred back in the summer of 2000 was that I would be the one to save him. Where friendly lawyers, concerned doctors, crusading refugee groups and assorted praying Christians had failed, I would succeed. I would be the one to convince him to finally leave the airport. > > He lived in the basement shopping mall of Terminal One. The circular main building was a triumph of avant-garde airport design when it opened in 1974, but its swank jet-age days were long gone. Alfred's red bench was the only anchor in his life. It was his bed, living room and corporate headquarters. It was actually two benches pushed together, about eight feet long in total and gently curved, just about wide enough to sleep on if he kept his hands tucked under the pillow. (Alfred did have a pillow - and sheets - that he carefully laid down when he turned in for the night.) But he never slept during the day, though his eyes would often droop out of boredom; you could always find Alfred sitting in the middle of his bench, in front of a rickety, white Formica table, which he employed as a desk. > > >From this perch, Alfred would survey his world. The display windows of an electronics store were across a corridor to his left; he could see the back of a newsagent's to the right. If he moved to one side of his bench, he could gaze across to a MacDonald's on the outer ring of the level. If he moved to the other, there were the shuttered doors of the misleadingly named Hotel Cocoon. > > Stacked around the back of the bench were boxes, suitcases and plastic bags containing everything Alfred owned in the world. This included: an extensive archive of newspaper, magazine and TV reports about himself; a rather large library donated by friendly passengers with lousy taste; giant files of postcards and letters from well-wishers around the world; his dry cleaning; a vast collection of McDonald's straws and - most tantalisingly - a diary which recorded in apparently exacting detail every day of his bizarre existence since he first appeared at Terminal One. > > Sitting next to Alfred I tried to get into the rhythm of his airport life. It was punctuated every other minute by three chimes heralding the flight announcements, that exotic mantra of foreign destinations that practically drove me mad by the end of my first day there. But Alfred had evolved in his strange habitat; he was able to tune them out. Life in the airport followed a masterplan, designed and controlled by some far off power. Waves of passengers came and went, the same patterns of humanity every hour, every day - the tide would bring in the Japanese in the early morning, the Africans would wash past the bench late at night. > > Many passers-by recognised Alfred; some had even made a special pilgrimage to meet him, first or last stop on their Paris tour. Even those who had never heard of him seemed to sense that this was no ordinary passenger. He provoked pity in all of them but Alfred certainly didn't see it that way. He had an extremely high opinion of himself. And besides, as he would quickly remind you, his situation was only "temporary". > > During Alfred's first years in the airport, his basic needs were supplied by sympathetic passers-by and airport workers who knew of his Kafkaesque situation. People bought him food, gave him money and listened with sympathy to his tale. But by the time I met him, Alfred had developed a more retail approach to survival. Now he preferred to engage with the professionals of the media, people like me. In return for a few exclusive hours of his stream of consciousness tale, Alfred would graciously accept a small gratuity. The constant stream of journalists and film-makers passing through provided more than enough to keep him going. > > And yet from the moment I sat down next to him I felt the force of his - there is no better word - dignity. Alfred seemed totally content within himself. He did not aim to please or play on your sympathy. He was not the homeless guy on the tube singing for a drink. Everything in Alfred's life was conducted on his own terms. In some sense he was a freer man than most. > > Despite outward appearances, Alfred lived a life of total self-sufficiency and order. He kept himself meticulously clean and groomed, using a nearby airport bathroom. He hung his freshly dry-cleaned clothes from the handle of a suitcase next to his bench. He always ate a MacDonald's egg and bacon croissant for breakfast and a McDonald's fish sandwich for dinner. (Perhaps one day McDonald's will have the wit to sign Alfred up for a celebrity endorsement.) He always left a tip. Alfred was not, to put it bluntly, a bum. > > Still, I felt sorry for him - how could I not? Because one thing was never made quite clear in all the reports about Alfred: just how far gone he was. When he got talking about politics or the economy you could sense the remnants of a fine mind. But when he turned to his past you were dragged into the labyrinth of Alfred's fragile mental state. All the stories he had ever told over the years, all the articles ever written about him, were jumbled together in his head to produce a narrative that changed from day to day. The more you pressed him, the more absurd his supposed memories would become until he would suddenly stop short and fall silent. There seemed to be something in his past that he needed to forget. > > It was very frustrating. He once spent a week insisting to me that he was really Swedish. But his most consistent story, as far as I could piece it together, went like this: > > After his physician father's death in 1972, his family summoned him with the news that he was illegitimate. His real mother was, in fact, Scottish. (Looking at him, this seemed unlikely.) His family rejected him and Alfred left home to study Yugoslav economics in northern England. (This, amazingly, turned out to be true.) He returned to Iran in 1974 and got caught up in anti-Shah demonstrations. Arrested and tortured by Savak, the Iranian ministry of security, Alfred was stripped of his Iranian nationality and expelled. He spent the next years roaming through Europe in a search for asylum. Finally, in 1981, Belgium granted him refugee status and identity documents. That should have been a happy ending, of sorts. > > Instead, soon afterwards Alfred was robbed of his documents or - according to another version - sent them back to the authorities in what he called "a moment of folly". He left Belgium for France where he spent the next years in and out of jail on illegal immigration charges. Apparently, he tried to return to England but was turned back at Heathrow. It was at this point, in 1988, that he first settled into his limbo waiting for papers in Terminal One. A prominent lawyer took on Alfred's case and fought a 10-year legal battle to win him identity documents and the right to travel. But then Alfred refused to leave the airport. > > If nothing changed, he would die on his red bench. > > It seems very naive to me now, but I hoped that the making of Here to Where would somehow provide the catalyst for Alfred to reclaim a "normal" existence. It was the story of Paul Hugo, a selfish and incompetent American director (played by me, naturally) who goes to Paris to make a fiction film about Alfred's life. Along the way, Hugo's own life falls apart; his producer and crew turn on him, his main actor quits, his girlfriend leaves him and shooting grinds to a halt. The arrogant young man changes from using Alfred to identifying with him. Hugo redirects all his frantic energies to saving him - or what he thinks will save him. My plan was that the last scene would see Alfred and I leave the airport together both on film and in real life. > > It didn't exactly work out like that. For one thing, Alfred wasn't going anywhere, despite all my best efforts. Otherwise, our script took over reality or perhaps it was vice versa - I wasn't sure after a while. My friend Glen and I were at each other's throats, the crew was in revolt, my girlfriend left me, the money ran out. Only Alfred kept his cool, looking on with his usual Zen-like detachment. > > The last day of filming was an emotional one for me. My character Paul Hugo had spent the night in the airport sleeping on the floor next to Alfred. Early the next morning they were in the airport bathroom, looking into the mirror at themselves, shaving. Nothing had worked out as I hoped. I felt we had failed Alfred in every way. > > "I'm worried about what's going to happen to you," my character said. He was still trying to get Alfred to leave the airport, though I had long given up. > > "I followed my identification," Alfred replied. "But you've been doing that a long time, right?" "Yes, it takes longer," he said. "I know, but nothing has changed." "Many things have changed." "But you're still here, Alfred, right? You're still at the airport." "Yes," he replied, carefully grooming his moustache. "One of the airport's passengers. I'm always a passenger. If I go, I come back again. I'm not wandering. I don't wander." > > Suddenly, Alfred turned his back on me and walked out of the bathroom. I broke down in tears - me, not Paul Hugo. Like everyone else, we had used him and were about to walk away. What did he truly understand about our intentions - about the cynical real world beyond his bench? > > Alfred walked up to Glen in the corridor outside the bathroom. > > "How did I do?" he asked. > > Last week I flew to meet Alfred, three years since I last saw him. His noble Persian face lit up when he recognised me, but then it always does when he first sees a reporter. We shook hands. He seemed quite content. > > "I am famous now," was the first thing he said to me. > > That was the only thing that mattered to him any more. Not his family or friends, not his past or future - only the archive of articles about a wasted life and a poster advertising Spielberg's film which he proudly hung from a suitcase next to his bench. "Life is waiting," went the Hollywood ad slogan. > > Alfred was thrilled about The Terminal, though he would never get a chance to see it. He was looking forward to the Oscars. I didn't want to shatter his daydreams by telling him what a load of puerile crap Spielberg's movie was. I doubt he would have believed me anyway. "Yes, my interest in America has gone up because of movie," Alfred said. "That is very good." > > Apparently Alfred had received a cheque of several hundred thousand dollars for his life story. It had been deposited in the airport's Post Office bank. But Alfred had never cared much about money. He was now under the impression that DreamWorks was going to get him a passport and take him to California. Spielberg was going to come to his rescue; Tom Hanks was going to visit him at his bench. In fact, publicity material for the film didn't mention Alfred at all; they were distancing themselves from his depressing story. It wasn't exactly a happy Hollywood ending. > > I asked him if he had heard from any friends or family since I last saw him. He grabbed an old Toronto Globe and Mail article from one of his suitcases. "It says that my relation has elapsed. Cut off. In this phase, I am without parents." I looked at the article. "He has taken to saying he has no parents at all," it said. > > Alfred looked away from me for a moment. "He denied me. Not his son." He turned back to watch me write notes. He seemed pleased. "In 1968 they denied me, said I was not their son, so I left country. My parents, I suppose, are Americans. If Clark Gable says he's my father - I don't accept unless he has documents to prove." > > One of the strangest things about Alfred's situation is that no one from his past has ever come forward. It is as if he had never existed before the day he was first spotted in the airport. Perhaps all of us intrigued by Alfred's story preferred it that way. > > But once I decided to solve the mystery of who he really was, his acquaintances and family were surprisingly easy to find. > > Alfred had four brothers and two sisters, all of them middle-class people who lived in Tehran, except for one sister who was a dentist in Luxembourg. One worked in a bank, another was a chemist, another worked for state television and radio. Their father, Abdelkarim, was a physician who worked for the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in Masjed Suleiman, the birthplace of the Iranian oil industry - just like Alfred had always said. After he retired from the oil company, Abdelkarim moved the family to Tehran. He died in 1967 of cancer when Alfred was 22. > > It seems the family had known for a long time about Alfred's plight. They were a very well educated family, knew the west well, and read newspapers from abroad. But they apparently always believed that Alfred was living the life he wanted, that he had some kind of master plan. > > Alfred's closest relative was his brother, Cyrus, who was two years older than him. In their youth, the two boys seemed to have an idyllic childhood in Masjed Suleiman. "He was close to me and we usually had the same friends," he said. "We were mostly together. We had a good life. I liked swimming and Merhan used to play table tennis. He was very good at it." > > Cyrus was a businessman who imported surgical supplies into Iran. He knew England well. He and his wife, Mina, had lived and worked there for many years. Their son still did. Cyrus was, in fact, responsible for Alfred attending university in Bradford. He was very reluctant to talk, at first. The family thought that Alfred's problem was still only one of papers - and they worried that speaking to me might cause their lost brother problems with the authorities. It seems that the family had no idea of Alfred's fragile mental state. > > Alfred had lived with Cyrus and Mina for a time in London before moving into a flat of his own. They also lived upstairs from him in Tehran after they got married. At the time he was living with his mother. So Mina knew Alfred - or Merhan, as she scolded me when I used his new name - well. And the portrait both she and her husband painted of him couldn't be more different from the man now sitting on his bench in Terminal One. "What can I say, he was very normal in every way," she said. In every way? She laughed charmingly. "He was a good-looking man. Some of my friends wanted to be his wife or girlfriend. He had very normal relations with girls. But Merhan chose his own life and I guess it was not a family one." > > We agreed that Merhan was a very intelligent man. "He was an intellectual. He spent all his time studying and reading books and listening to the radio," Mina said. "He talked all the time about politics. He read books on politics all day and night. It was very important to him. And then he started to do what he believed in." > > One of the key parts of Alfred's story was always his arrest and torture by Savak because of his opposition to the Shah, followed by his deportation to Europe. Cyrus was reluctant to talk about this aspect of Alfred's life. But doing a bit more digging through sources in Iran, I was able to find out what really happened. > > Apparently, Alfred participated in a student strike at Tehran University in 1970 to object to a new university regulation. Things started to get out of hand and Savak got involved. They questioned all the students and gathered up the ringleaders, about 20, including Alfred. After a few hours of questioning in a university classroom, the matter was apparently dropped. This was evidently Alfred's only serious problem with the security services. > > There was no arrest, no torture, no confiscation of his passport and no deportation. It was not nearly as dramatic a story as Alfred now remembered. But he must have been scared. He certainly never forgot the incident. > > The last time Cyrus and Mina saw Alfred was in 1976 when their son was born in England. Alfred had abandoned his studies in Bradford, apparently because his money had run out, according to Mina. (Actually, according to fellow students and teachers I spoke to, Alfred failed his course. They had all wondered what a young Iranian was doing in England studying Serbo Croatian.) > > He left England to travel through Europe. For a while, he kept in touch, but then his letters stopped coming. With the revolution and then the war with Iraq, his family back home had their own problems to deal with. After four years without any contact, they went to the Foreign Ministry to ask for help trying to find him. "But we could not find any sign of him," said Cyrus. > > Then in 1991, a family friend came upon Alfred at his bench in the airport. Amazed to find him after all that time, the friend went up to greet him. But Alfred wouldn't acknowledge that he knew him. The same thing happened on other occasions to other family and friends who tried to make contact with him. Finally they stopped trying. Was he ashamed of what he had become? Did the studious boy who loved politics consider himself a failure? Is that why he distanced himself from friends and family? > > "Why did he say in the newspaper that his family rejected him?" asked Mina. "We do not understand that. That was not true. We thought this was the way he wanted to live. Everyone has his own life and he was going on in his own way. That's what we thought." > > But I was curious - there were still things I wanted to know. The Alfred I knew was mentally ill. Had there ever been signs of it when he was younger? "No, no, not at all!" said Mina. "If there is something wrong with him now, it's not from the past. It must have happened to him there." This supported what Alfred's lawyer had said to me. He had arrived sane at the airport. At some point along the way - no one knew quite when - Alfred tipped over into madness. His life was indeed ruined by the absurdities of bureaucracy. > > And what of Alfred's mother? It turns out that she died only four years ago - at the very time I was filming Here to Where. She knew all about what had happened to her son. And according to Cyrus and Mina, she couldn't understand why he insisted on saying that she was not his mother. It was the great sadness of her life. "He came from me," she told her other children. "Why does he say that?" Alfred doesn't know that she is dead. Cyrus is planning to fly to Paris next month to see his long lost brother. Perhaps Alfred's long journey still has another unlikely twist. > > > _________________________________________ > 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 not meddle in the affairs of dragons, because you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup. http://www.synchroni-cities.blogspot.com/ From ninad.pandit at krvia.ac.in Mon Oct 11 17:08:43 2004 From: ninad.pandit at krvia.ac.in (Ninad Pandit) Date: Mon, 11 Oct 2004 04:38:43 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Daniel Libeskind in KRVIA, Mumbai Message-ID: <1201.203.94.214.192.1097494723.squirrel@203.94.214.192> "Ever since I began architecture, I had an abhorrence to conventional architecture offices. There was something about the atmosphere of redundancy ,routine and production that made me allergic to all forms of specialization and so-called professionalism. Ten years ago we founded our office in Berlin as a result of a decision, an accident, a rumor on the street and began an unimaginable journey down a path on which we are still travelling." (from http://daniel-libeskind.com ) Dear all: Daniel Libeskind, the Architect of the Jewish Museum and the New WTC towers, will be visiting Mumbai briefly, and will present some of his work at krvia, Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute for Architecture and Environmental Studies, on Thursday,14th October 2004, at 2:15 pm in the krvia auditorium. A link to the PDF poster for the event is here: http://home.ripway.com/2004-7/139709/PDFs/DrLibeskindvisitskrvia2004.pdf Please do come for the presentation. Please direct all queries to my address. Ninad Pandit Brief Bio of Daniel Libeskind: (from http://wikipedia.org) Daniel Libeskind, born May 12, 1946 in Lodz, Poland, the son of Holocaust survivors, is an architect who became a U.S. citizen in 1965. He is a 1965 alumnus of The Bronx High School of Science. His architecture uses a language of skewed angles, intersecting geometries, shards, voids and punctured lines to communicate feelings of loss, absence and memory whilst addressing the immediate situation, however typical, in a manner that constantly calls attention to itself. He has mainly designed museums and galleries. His recent projects include: Completed * the Jewish Museum in Berlin, Germany; * the Felix-Nussbaum-Haus in Osnabrück, Germany, a museum dedicated to the life and art of the painter Felix Nussbaum. * the Imperial War Museum North in Greater Manchester, United Kingdom Proposed * 'The Spiral' extension to the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, has now been cancelled following its failure to attract funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund. * the 'Frederic C. Hamilton Building' of the Denver Museum of Art (under construction) * 'The Crystal', a major renovation of the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, slated for completion in 2006. * the 'Freedom Tower' and 'Memory Foundations' for the redevelopment of the World Trade Center site in New York. the poster requires a PDF viewer. It can be found on: http://www.acrobat.com From abhayraj at nls.ac.in Mon Oct 11 02:30:31 2004 From: abhayraj at nls.ac.in (abhayraj at nls.ac.in) Date: Mon, 11 Oct 2004 02:30:31 +0530 (IST) Subject: [Reader-list] Policy, Anonymous Speech and Notice Boards Message-ID: <1284.219.65.142.136.1097442031.squirrel@219.65.142.136> My continuing research on notice boards and anonymous speech in universities in Bangalore provides opportunity for some tentative comments on a ‘notice board policy’ of sorts, which it is believed, should inform the rules/regulations pertaining to usage of boards in university campuses. An abstract of the broad framework of this project is available at (last visited on 4th October, 2004) http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/2004-January/003363.html. Empirical research across selected universities in Bangalore shows that very rarely is a comprehensive and clearly identifiable policy, as such, ascertainable as regards the usage of notice boards – though, broad generalizations that may be equated to policy dictates remain discernible from custom, university authority actions, ongoing practice, etc. While discussing any specific policy as regards anonymous speech on university notice boards, it is submitted, that certain key principles be necessarily taken account of: KEY PRINCIPLES 1. Respect for Freedom of Speech: Despite the constitutional grandeur and exalted status of freedom of speech, it remains vital, at a practical realist level, for policy to acknowledge that student notice boards be accessible in such manner that the freedom of speech of all students be respected. Simply put, all students should have real (vis-à-vis merely formal) equal access to the notice boards. Flowing from this proposition, any such responsible policy must highlight the need to proactively ensure the non-existence of factors (rules/regulations and other general determinant causes) that effectively restrict access/use of a notice board by a particular student/group thereby impliedly curtailing the right to freedom of speech. The outer boundary limiting the ambit of the ‘proactive need’ is easily enough determined by the responsible authority by reference to all existing factors and circumstances and prevailing legal discourse (for example, the existing jurisprudence under Article 14 and Article 15 of the Constitution provides ready remedy to the problem of identifying a clear outer limit. To further emphasize the point, a notice board policy should effectively reflect that caste, religion, race, sex, sexual orientation, place of birth, language, ideology, etc. (this can be easily enough decided upon by the responsible authority) will not be restricting factors to access. 2. Importance of Anonymity: Secondly, the recognition of anonymity as an important safeguard protecting the freedom of speech of a minority individual/group. Three factors that heighten the importance of anonymity in a university setting: a) The heightened role and significance of the notion of ‘peer pressure’ in an educational institution (generally, but not always competitive) scenario. b) The general nature of faculty-student relationship (power inequality, marks/grades/recommendations dependance, moral discipline, age-division, etc. etc.) and the attributed significance and nature of student obligation to the institution/faculty. c) The existence of mainstreams and vulnerable fringes within the student community, and all consequent physical/social/emotive ramifications of such power/interest groupings during formative periods of education. 3. Possible Abuse of Notice Boards: Recognizing the existence of mainstreams and vulnerable fringes and the occurrence of what may be termed hate speech (including offensive speech) in most public-discussion fora implies recognition of the fact that notice boards contain an in-built risk of possible abuse resulting in overall negative consequences. Therefore, notice board policy must positively assert the need to prevent occurrence of such hate-speech and must seek to institutionalize practices that minimize the likelihood of such hate speech. The need for such an approach draws strength from awareness of the particularly negative consequences of hate speech in a university context. 4. Objective Sought to be Achieved by Restrictions on Notice Board: In light of the above principles, it is necessary that when it is sought to place restrictions on access/usage of a notice board, such restrictions actually achieve the objectives justifying their existence and do not in the process unnecessarily/wrongly curtail the freedom of speech of any individual/section of the student community or increase the risk thereof. In essence, the correct balance between the need to prevent hate speech and the need to promote/respect freedom of speech is of instrumental significance in any such notice board policy. With respect to anonymity and hate speech, it is believed that a proper starting ground should involve acceptance of two principles: a) Firstly, that a blanket ban on anonymity per se is undesirable as it places a significant impediment to disadvantaged/marginalized individuals/groups to access public notice boards and thereby effectively curtails the right to freedom of speech. b) The facilitation of unregulated anonymous speech on university notice boards increases the likelihood of hate speech, and reduces the accountability of such proponents of such hate speech. POLICY PROPOSALS AS REGARDS THE AUTHORITY ADMINISTERING/IN-CHARGE OF A STUDENT NOTICE BOARD 1. Obligations of the Notice Board Authority Firstly, it is necessary that one accept the notion that the authority (either university authorities or student groups) administering a particular student notice board has an obligation to prevent access, via the notice board it administers, to material that constitutes hate speech. Such a basic acceptance effectively precludes a ‘hands-off’ approach of non-accountability that is common in most university campuses. Of course, such an obligation will not extend to cases where offensive material has been placed on a notice board illegally – that is, outside of the prescribed/permitted route for display of notices. 2. Discretion of the Notice Board Authority Secondly, in the interests of the right to freedom of speech, it is necessary that the discretion of the authority in preventing particular speech from being displayed on the notice board be guided by a clear definition/articulation of what constitutes hate speech/unacceptable speech. This facilitates attainment of the correct balance between prevention of hate speech and respect for anonymity (and correspondingly free speech). POLICY MODELS FOR NOTICE BOARD USAGE I have outlined below a number of possible theoretical models that could govern notice board usage in a university, with specific thrust on the aspect of anonymous speech. Importantly, a combination of essential features from different models might provide the most suitable solution keeping in light the specificities of different university settings and factors (for example, the accepted importance of free speech, existence of foundation for institutional regulation/governance, prevalent levels of hate-speech incidence, clear existence of marginalized groups, level of existence of notice-board culture and use, etc.) In the interests of brevity, the defining features and the primary pros and cons of each model have been outlined below. 1. Open Access System – Unregulated. The most basic model would be an open access unregulated system of notice boards where any notices may be put up not being subject to restrictions of any form. Under such a system of course, anonymous speech would have the same status as non-anonymous speech. Advantages and Limitations: While being greatly facilitative of free speech, such a system would offer absolutely no protection against hate speech and its negative consequences. Further, it would also render greatly difficult any accountability for hate speech incidence. 2. Open Access System – Regulated. Similar to the above system, any notices may be put up not being subject to restrictions at source of any form. However, notices deemed undesirable (in accordance with clearly stipulated criterion as mentioned earlier) can be removed at any stage by the competent authority. Advantages and Limitations: Such a model has advantages similar to that above, with one important addition – the negative consequences of hate speech can be significantly checked through prompt removal of offensive notices by the competent responsible authority/general student populace. On the flip side, non-accountability for hate speech, and the legitimate window of opportunity (reduced but still existent) for hate speech, still persist. 3. Content-Based Authorization System. A basic content-based authorization system permits only those notices that have been authorized by the responsible authority, to be actually displayed on the notice board. Such authorization could be denied only in those situations where the notice is deemed undesirable in accordance with clearly stipulated criterion (as has been addressed earlier) so as to prevent excessive fetters on the freedom of speech. Since the authorization is dependant only on the content of the notice, such a system will treat anonymous speech and non-anonymous speech on the same footing, with anonymity not posing, as of itself, any impediment to access the notice board. In operation, when notices without authorization are put up on the notice board, these remain subject to be taken off by the authority responsible or the general student populace. Advantages and Limitations: This model is clearly in greater consonance with a balanced approach vis-à-vis the two models above, both of which weigh decidedly in favour of absolute freedom of speech and anonymity, possibly at the costs of prevention of hate speech. The primary advantage of this model is that is offers no legitimate window/opportunity for hate speech. Therefore, in such a model, the incidence of hate speech will be exclusively through non-institutionalized means, thereby reducing both the likelihood of such hate speech, and overall weakening the case for any justifications of such hate speech. Further, while such a model is wholly supportive of anonymity (subject to the limited exception pointed out hereafter), and thereby promotes the freedom of speech of marginalized speech, it does so without any negative repercussion on the issues of accountability – the mere fact that an anonymous notice has been authorized and is then legitimately displayed on a notice board indicates that its content is such that issues of accountability for hate speech do not feature here. The limited disadvantage of this basic model is that the anonymity it guarantees is not absolute since the grantor of authorization remains aware of the identity of the source of the notice. This minor yet significant limitation can be suitably overcome by considering hybrid models premised on content-authorization but still accommodating for absolute anonymity. 4. Hybrid Content-Based Authorization Systems Such models, while based primarily on the above outlined structure, have the added feature/advantage of expressly accommodating for greater/complete anonymity. One approach could be to permit anonymous messages to be forwarded for authorization through any other student, thereby ensuring that the identity of the notice source is known only to the person(s) so chosen by the source of the notice, and is not available to the possibly less sympathetic/discreet authority responsible for the notice board. Another possible approach is to facilitate the creation of an exclusive mechanism whereby anonymous messages may be directly delivered/sent to the authority (simple suggestions being the possibility of email submissions or the creation of a collection box for anonymous notices) for authorization and display on the notice board without the source being required to disclose her/his/its identity to the responsible authority. Such an approach effectively ensures that no legitimate forum is available for hate-speech, while at the same time being sensitive to the need for anonymity of certain students/groups within the university community. CONCLUDING REMARKS As is fairly evident, the approach guiding the above analysis emphasizes on the prevention of institutionally legitimated hate-speech through notice boards while institutionally protecting the expression of such anonymous speech (not falling within the ambit of hate-speech). While recognizing the need for a guided approach to prevent the expression of hate speech in all its forms in university campuses (a detailed study of which remain outside the scope of this project), one must not lose sight of the the importance of protecting legitimate anonymous speech in university settings. Secondly, we believe that a guided policy approach regarding anonymous speech remains preferable to a spontaneous case-by-case approach (as illustrated by the case-study undertaken in NLSIU and priorly outlined in my third posting, available at (last visited on 8th October, 2004) http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/2004-June/003845.html ), which often hastily and wrongly compromises the interests and utility behind protection of anonymous speech in a blind rush to prevent the occurrence of hate-speech. It is towards fleshing out the contours of such a policy perspective that the present project is undertaken, and it is submitted that such considerations do merit serious thought with regard to practices pertaining to notice board usage in universities, in light of the significant negative consequences possible when one loses sight of the relative importance of anonymity in speech in universities. I look forward to any comments, suggestions or information. I can be contacted at abhayraj at nls.ac.in Abhayraj Naik From abhayraj at nls.ac.in Mon Oct 11 02:35:33 2004 From: abhayraj at nls.ac.in (abhayraj at nls.ac.in) Date: Mon, 11 Oct 2004 02:35:33 +0530 (IST) Subject: [Reader-list] Why Notice Boards? Message-ID: <1287.219.65.142.136.1097442333.squirrel@219.65.142.136> One of the most common questions I’ve received during the course of my research on anonymous speech and notice boards in universities in Bangalore, is as to why my study is restricted primarily to notice boards and doesn’t include online bulletin boards/discussion lists and other possible mediums for expression of anonymous speech in universities. A few brief comments in response would be apposite. At the outset, it is undeniable that a complete study of the notions of anonymous speech, hate speech, and freedom of speech in universities will have to include all possible mediums of expression of anonymous speech, hate speech, etc. The reason I chose to focus on physical notice boards in this study was influenced by several factors specific to physical notice boards vis-à-vis other mediums: 1. Significantly, notice boards that are physically located within a university campus serve as ideal examples for the notion of institutionally legitimated forums for expression of speech. While such an argument may also be mounted for online notice boards, discussion forums, etc. either physically based from the university computers or even accessible from within the university, the stronger direct linkage between physical notice boards and the university legitimization of the contents thereof provided a compelling reason for an independent study. 2. Secondly, physical notice boards are a fairly guaranteed component of most university campuses providing for a ready and uniform source of study of anonymous speech, while in contrast, most of the Bangalore universities considered had no clearly established online or other public discussion forum available. 3. Physical notice boards in university campuses are generally non-discriminatory as regards the viewer – that is, apart from the students themselves, they remain visible as a medium of expression and communication to faculty, visitors, etc. 4. While considering the community (students and faculty) within the university, physical notice boards generally enjoy greater readership than other media. Also, individual notices on a physical notice board generally enjoy greater and more constant visibility when compared to expression in other mediums. 5. There remains a very practical difficulty with regard to anonymous speech on notice boards – its difficult to ensure anonymity. Unlike sending a posting to an online group, or scribbling something on the wall inside a darkened toilet cubicle, its very likely that someone’s going to see you putting something up on a public notice board. 6. Finally, the non-facilitation of anonymous speech on a public notice board in a university, leaves very few alternate options for expression of such speech to the same audience and with the same effectiveness. Unlike online speech, where it is always possible to create an alternate discussion list or alternate discussion board, such luxury is rarely existent when it comes to physical notice boards. This consequently, makes it all the more important as to whether anonymous speech is permitted on a particular public university notice board or not. That said, I do hope to gradually expand my focus to include other mediums of expression in universities in my continuing research, where possible. I look forward to any comments, suggestions or information. I can be contacted at abhayraj at nls.ac.in Abhayraj Naik From ysaeed7 at yahoo.com Mon Oct 11 11:21:43 2004 From: ysaeed7 at yahoo.com (Yousuf) Date: Sun, 10 Oct 2004 22:51:43 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Muslim posters - a late feedback Message-ID: <20041011055143.54431.qmail@web51409.mail.yahoo.com> Dear friends I am forwarding a friend's recent feedback on one of my Sarai postings, which some of you might be interested in reading. Yousuf --- Jagannathan wrote: > Dear Yousuf, > You mention somebody pointing out > that the Buddha was an iconoclast, and would have > been happy to see the destruction of the Bamiyan > Buddhas. While we are in no position to say what the > Buddha might have said or done, I must put the > historical record straight. There is no record of > the Buddha expressing any desire to destroy any > icons. In fact, there is no historical evidence of > there being any idol worship in the time of the > Buddha. While we believe that there would have been > idol worship, the first actual evidence we have is > from about three hundred years after the date of the > Buddha. Secondly, what the Buddha objected to was > deifying him. His teaching did not not offer support > for life-- ie, praying for illness to be averted, > asking for blessings and boons for success in your > affairs etc... It was mainly an ethical system for > personal moral upliftment. It was in that context > that he did not want to be worshipped as even in the > course of his life he refused to perform miracles > (unlike Jesus), and told his chief disciple Ananda > that the dharma that he had preached should be their > guide in the future. As to the second aspect of > whether he would have approved of the destruction of > the idols-- his was essentially so tolerant a > system, in fact, called 'the middle path' that > Buddha would probably have always been in favour of > live and let live, even if certain philosophies or > modes of thinking were absolutely at variance with > his own. So, my opinion is that he would have not > really have berated the worshippers of his images, > at the most he might have said that it was of no > real use; it would be better to live morally pure > lives! Love, bharati > > From: Yousuf > To: reader-list at sarai.net > Sent: Wednesday, June 23, 2004 3:30 PM > Subject: Religious popular art : posting #5 > > > Sarai Fellowship 2004: Muslim Religious Posters > > What You See is What You Believe: > The Tangible Versus Intangible Divinity > > Among the common users of Muslim devotional > posters > interviewed during this study, many are unclear > and > sometimes confused about the nature of attitude > and > status to be given to these images, unlike, say > Hindu > devotees, who would use the image or idol of a > deity > solely for worshipping. Since most of the devotees > (interviewed) came from poor or lower middle class > or > rural areas, many were probably not familiar with > the > concept of iconoclasm in Islam. They broadly knew > that > idolatry is certainly unIslamic (this is what > differentiates them from the Hindus), but the > images > of local saints, their tombs, other Islamic > folklore, > and many symbols of composite culture ingrained in > their collective/folk memory, are openly accepted > and > venerated, without drawing any lines between > Islamic > and unIslamic - until someone with a > Wahhabi/purist > bend of mind comes and tells them that what they > are > doing is not right. > > So, what exactly goes on in the minds and hearts > of > the religious people who fall in the gray area > between > iconoclasm and idolatry? We may begin by exploring > first what is Islamic iconoclasm. The prohibition > of > religious iconography existed even before Islam. > Recently, when the world was crying on the > demolition > of Buddha's statue in Afghanistan's Bamian by the > Taliban, somebody pointed out that one person who > would be happiest to see this demolition is Buddha > himself, as he was himself one of the first > destroyers > of religious icons. > _______________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Declare Yourself - Register online to vote today! http://vote.yahoo.com From anya at bgl.vsnl.net.in Sun Oct 10 23:12:56 2004 From: anya at bgl.vsnl.net.in (Ananya Vajpeyi) Date: Sun, 10 Oct 2004 19:42:56 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] jacques derrida: obituary Message-ID: > Philosopher Jacques Derrida Dies at 74 > > Saturday October 9, 2004 9:01 PM > > By ELAINE GANLEY > > Associated Press Writer > > PARIS (AP) - World-renowned thinker Jacques Derrida, a charismatic > philosopher who founded the school known as deconstructionism, has > died, > the French president's office said Saturday. He was 74. > > Derrida died at a Paris hospital of pancreatic cancer, French media > reported, quoting friends and admirers. > > The snowy-haired French intellectual taught, and thought, on both > sides of > the Atlantic, and his works were translated around the world. > > Provocative and as difficult to define as his favorite subject - > deconstruction - Derrida e modern-day French thinker best known > internationally. > > ``With him, France has given the world one of its greatest > contemporary > philosophers, one of the major figures of intellectual life of our > time,'' > President Jacques Chirac said in a statement, calling Derrida a > ``citizen > of the world.'' > > Born to a Jewish family on July 15, 1930, in El Biar, Algeria, then > part > of France, Derrida wrote hundreds of books and essays. His reputation > was > launched with two 1967 publications in which he laid out basic ideas, > ``Writing and Difference'' and ``Of Grammatology.'' Among other works > were > the 1972 ``Margins of Philosophy'' and, more recently, > ``Specters of Marx'' (1993). > > Derrida was known as the father of deconstructionism, a branch of > critical thought or analysis developed in the late 1960s and applied > to > literature, linguistics, philosophy, law and architecture. > > Derrida focused his work on language, showing that it has multiple > layers > and thus multiple meanings or interpretations, challenging the notion > that > speech is a direct form of communication or even that the author of a > text > is the author of its meaning. > > Deconstructionists like Derrida explored the means of liberating the > written word from the structures of language, opening limitless > textual > interpretations. Not limited to language, Derrida's philosophy of > deconstructionism was then applied to western values. > > The deconstructionist approach has remained controversial, with > detractors even proclaiming the movement dead. So divisive were > Derrida's ideas that Cambridge University's plan to award him an > honorary degree in 1992 was forced to a vote which he won. > > Critics accused Derrida of nihilism, which he adamantly denied. > > ``Deconstruction is on the side of 'yes,' an affirmation of life,'' > Derrida said in an August interview with the daily Le Monde. > > Former Culture Minister Jack Lang, who knew Derrida, praised his > ``absolute originality'' as well as his combative spirit. > > ``I knew he was ill, and at the same time, I saw him as so combative, > so > creative, so present, that I thought he would surmount his illness,'' > Lang > said on France-Info radio. > > Derrida was often named - but never chosen - for a Nobel Prize in > Literature. > > In 1949, Derrida left Algeria for Paris to further his education, > receiving an advanced degree in philosophy from the prestigious Ecole > Normale Superieure in 1956. He later taught philosophy at the Sorbonne > University from 1960-64 and at the Ecole des Hautes Etude en Sciences > Sociales from 1984-99. > > He also taught in the United States, at the University of California > at > Irvine and at Johns Hopkins and Yale universities. > > Despite his esoteric path, Derrida said in several interviews that he > really wanted to be a soccer player but wasn't talented enough. > > He refused to confine himself to an intellectual ivory tower, > fighting for > such things as the rights of Algerian immigrants in France and against > apartheid in South Africa. > > French Culture Minister Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres called Derrida > ``profoundly humanist,'' saying the philosopher spent his final years > working for the ``values of hospitality,'' particularly between > Europe and > the Mediterranean. > > ``He wanted to build an open idea of Europe,'' a ministry statement > said. > > As Derrida grew ill, death haunted him. In a Le Monde interview in > August, > Derrida said that learning to live means learning to die. > > ``Less and less, I have not learned to accept death,'' he was quoted > as > saying. ``I remain uneducable about the wisdom of learning to die.'' > Guardian Unlimited (c) Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004 > > > *********************************************************************** > ******** Ananya Vajpeyi, Ph.D. Scholar of Peace 2004-05 WISCOMP: Women in Security, Conflict Management and Peace UGF, Core 4A, Habitat Center Lodhi Road New Delhi 110003, INDIA -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 9698 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041010/eb82ce6c/attachment.bin From definetime at rediffmail.com Fri Oct 8 20:10:00 2004 From: definetime at rediffmail.com (sanjay ghosh) Date: 8 Oct 2004 14:40:00 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] (fwd) Hungrey and homless Message-ID: <20041008144000.6248.qmail@webmail46.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041008/a334c22e/attachment.html -------------- next part --------------   Hungrey and homless John O'Farrell Friday October 8, 2004 The Guardian Newspaper headlines are generally designed to terrify the public while the journalists who concoct them remain indifferent. But a story yesterday had the opposite effect; readers shrugged and turned the page while reporters everywhere spluttered on their pints, skipped breakfast and dashed straight to work. "The outsourcing of journalism," declared the Guardian, as the news agency Reuters began shifting its financial coverage to Bangalore. "This is an outrage!" said Telegraph leader-writers, who'd just finished an editorial about how British workers must accept pay cuts to compete with call centres in India. "These Asians..." ranted the Daily Star hacks - "they stay over there, and take our jobs!" Reuters journalists had been writing for some time about how cost-efficient it might be for corporations to take advantage of India's highly educated workforce. At least now they know that their bosses bother to read their stuff. "Breaking news will continue to be reported from the world's financial centres," wrote the media company's press secretary, struggling with the two removal men who were carrying out his desk. "Journalists miles away from the actual stories?" exclaimed one outraged cub reporter. "How will they check for mistakes?" At which point the entire newsroom looked at him with one eyebrow raised and he was quietly shown the door. Without anyone realising, this has been happening in local newspapers for some time. Trainee journalists in India get to their computers at 8am and by lunchtime have produced all the news stories that you read in your local freesheet. The template is straightforward; the software prompts the operator to make a series of simple choices to create a typical local news report... "Pensioner mugged for only 10p/50p/£1.20 (delete accordingly). "A cowardly attack on a local pensioner was carried out in broad daylight/in the park/in this court report I just read/earlier this week. The attacker was wearing a bomber jacket and jeans/a hooded top and trainers/and fled the scene with only _p (insert pitiful amount here). Police said this was a particularly despicable/shocking/vague/story and are warning pensioners to take extra care/stay inside/not to read their local newspaper and live in permanent terror." To balance up this routinely depressing item the would-be journalists are then presented with heart-warming reports such as "Hospice Hero Cycling to Scotland!" and "Brownies Cake Sale Takes the Biscuit!" to put above "notice of planning application for new conservatory". Then they just press "send" on their computer and the next day four copies of the local advertiser are pushed through your door. But now the software has been refined so that Indian computer operators can write the stories for British national newspapers too. The subject matter differs according to which newspaper the journalist writes for. Click on the Daily Mail icon and you get the headline "Asylum Seekers Threat to House Prices", and the piece pretty well writes itself from there - although the software prevents you deleting the words "mother of two", "fear" and "Islamic extremists". Click on the Sun and you get: "It's Christine Agui-Leera!" You just have to write the caption for a photo of an attractive young singer with a low-cut dress and faulty bra. Soon, London will be full of unemployed journalists, Fleet Street's finest former wordsmiths holding up cardboard signs saying "hungrey and homless - plese halp". And the placards of the Murdoch crew will include a plug for what's on Sky that night. But this is payback time for centuries of colonisation. Britain occupied India, imposed the English language and left the country significantly poorer, so that 200 years later it is cheaper to get Indians to compile our crosswords and review the new Dido album. Some former colonies are in a better position than others. "Right," says the finance minister of East Timor, "we're setting up an online news agency." "But we were colonised by Holland. I'm afraid there's not much call for Dutch financial journalism." "Even in the Netherlands?" "Nope, they speak better English than the Americans." Unless of course this is an elaborate plan to halt immigration. The presumption was always that third world workers hoped to come and work in the paradise that was Europe or America. Give them a few months of learning about the sort of newspapers we read and they'll all be saying: "Er, actually, I think I'll stay right here, thank you very much." Although this column will continue to be credited to John O'Farrell it has now been outsourced to topical comedy writers in southern India. No discernible change in standard is anticipated. comment at guardian.co.uk From shivamvij at gmail.com Sun Oct 10 23:18:05 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Sun, 10 Oct 2004 10:48:05 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] 'Media opportunities' Message-ID: Media opportunities [Byline strangely missing!] Business Standard | 8 October 2004 http://www.business-standard.com/common/storypage.php?hpFlag=Y&chklogin=N&autono=169291&leftnm=lmnu5&lselect=0&leftindx=5 [why does this link have to be so long?] The Prime Minister has done well to clarify that his government intends to open up the media sector. Speaking in the capital a few days ago, and again in Mumbai on Wednesday, Dr Manmohan Singh has clearly held out the promise of reform in a sector where even the most limited opening up was subjected to intense debate and polarised opinions. But as a report in this newspaper today tells us, Reuters, one of the world?s largest media organisations, is moving something like a tenth of its global manpower to India. Clearly, the media sector has enormous opportunity for growth and diversification?and job creation. The opportunities for using the knowledge base and skills of English-speaking professionals, who can do at a fraction of the cost what is done in other markets, create a whole new world of outsourcing possibilities which should be fully exploited. Also, some of the investment rules could do with change. For instance, there is no particular reason why foreign direct investment should be allowed, but not portfolio investment by foreign institutional investors. This change is now proposed for TV news channels, but what applies to TV should apply equally to other forms of media. Equally, there is no particular reason why reputable titles published elsewhere should not be allowed to get printed in India. This is completely banned at the moment, and the subject of a court dispute in one contentious case. The fact is that if proper scrutiny is done before allowing entry, the existence of international titles in the Indian market will add to the diversity and richness of India's media market, make global titles available here at a fraction of their current cost, and in general help develop higher professional standards. Readers will benefit, and many jobs will get created. What about the old concerns about national security and sovereignty? The security issue was always a red herring, given the fact that all manner of international television and radio channels beam into India round the clock - without national security being affected. In any case, this is easily handled by applying selection criteria to ensure that only the most reputed international players get a toehold in the print media market. Suspect publications from Pakistan, China, or any other region considered undesirable in this context, can be easily kept out. The sovereignty issue is not a serious problem because no publication can hope to survive and prosper in the Indian market if it adopts anti-Indian editorial positions. Indeed, giving global media organisations a greater stake in the Indian market will sensitise them more to Indian viewpoints, and get India greater mileage in the international media. In short, the group of ministers that is proposed to be appointed for studying the issue, should get down to its task without delay. From shivamvij at gmail.com Sun Oct 10 22:24:35 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Sun, 10 Oct 2004 09:54:35 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] An appeal to help Dalit Social Revolutionaries In-Reply-To: <20041010135746.204F0393E@sitemail.everyone.net> References: <20041010135746.204F0393E@sitemail.everyone.net> Message-ID: Dear all, Please read this appeal and donate generously. And do pass this on to others. Thanks Shivam AN APPEAL TO HELP DALIT SOCIAL REVOLUTIONARIES Ayanreddiyapatti village in Virudhanagar district is a typical southern Tamil Nadu village. Here, for a long time Dalits (mostly of the Parayar sub-caste) could not wear footwear, could not wear pants, could not take water from common wells. Ayanreddiyapatti has 100 Dalit families, 1000 families of Naickers, and 500 Reddiars families. While the Reddiars did not bother the Dalits much, the Naickers' sole purpose in life seemed to be feudally lord over the Dalits. It was not as if the Dalits were extremely impoverished. Several dalits owned cultivable land, many held government jobs, some were into business, and their education level was generally higher than that of the caste Hindus in the village. Since the 1990s, the Naickers started taunting and harassing the dalits even more, seeing that the educated dalits were resisting their oppression and several untouchability practices. The Naickers would steal the domestic animals and poultry belonging to Dalits, ravage their fields just ahead of harvest time, steal their crops, and generally make life miserable for Dalits. Unlike the Dalits who were moving into modernity, the Naickers only had feudal power and little education. Their main source of power was landholding and caste pride. Since 1990, a group of educated dalit youth — Manoharan (M.Com), Jayasundar (BA), Anthony, Selvaraj (BA), Dharmaraj, Paandi, Jeyaraj (M.A) and a few others — were working to create awareness among the Dalits of Ayanreddiyapatti. Some of them became members of Vidudhalai Chiruththaigal (literally Liberation Panthers), known in the English-language press as Dalit Panthers of India (DPI). Since 1995, the DPI even held meetings in Ayanreddiyapatti much to the consternation of the Naickers. When Dalits erected a party flag, this was uprooted; Ambedkar posters were plastered with dung; DPI wall writings were defaced. The Naickers were most upset when during a panchayat election in 1997 a Dalit contested for the post of a ward member. On 16 January 1997, Vidudhalai Chiruththaigal held a meeting in Ayanreddiyapatti under the leadership of Thirumavalavan. The DPI then was not yet a political party and was a social movement led by Thirumavalavan. DPI had been holding meetings in Ayanreddiyapatti for three successive years. In the meeting held on 16 January 1997, the Naickers were told to behave in a humane way towards Dalits, and the Dalits made it clear to the Naickers that they would not sit back and suffer humiliation and attacks on their self-respect any longer. 'When attacked, we'll hit back to defend ourselves' was the message of the meeting. On the morning of 18 January, by 7 a.m., the Naickers ganged up to attack the Dalit settlement to 'teach them a lesson'. The alert Dalits resisted this advance and prevented the Naickers from entering. In the ensuing clash, one Naicker oppressor, Pandiarajan (30), was killed. He was the president of Veerapandia Kattabomman Youth Forum, a Naicker outfit that ran amok among the Dalits, and was the source of all their troubles. 26 dalits were accused of the single murder and served 3 months in the Madurai Central Jail before trial began. Of these, 13 were released and the remaining 13 were slapped with life sentence in 1999 by the Srivalliputtur Sessions Court. These 13 Dalit revolutionaries served another 21 months in the Madurai Central Jail. After an appeal at High Court, bail was granted only in December 2000 and the 13 Dalits were released on conditional bail. Currently, the case is being heard in the Madras High Court and the 13 dalits are being defended by Mr Suthanthiram, a leading criminal lawyer. The lawyer's fee is Rs 1.5 lakh for defending all the thirteen accused. The 13 (in the order of accused) are: A1. M. Rathinasamy (55); A2. R. Jeyaraj (32); A3. R. Jayasundar (28); A4. K. Samuel (55); A5. S. Manoharan (28); A6. S. Dharmaraj (38); A7. S. Ulaganathan (42); A8. Selvaraj (32); A9. Paandi (40); A10. K. Varadaraj (50); A11. M. Paularaj (52); A12. Anthony (35); A13. V. Raj (38) Of these, the first accused M Rathinasamy, a mill worker at the time of the incident, was a CPI(M) union secretary, who was trying to raise the Dalit issue within CPI(M). The second and third accused (R. Jeyaraj and R. Jayasundar) are his sons who were active in Vidudhalai Chiruththaigal (DPI). R. Jeyaraj, the second accused, a man out on bail whose life today hangs in the balance, has continued to be an activist of the Dalit movement. Before his arrest in the case, he had been a journalist with several publications and TV channels such as Nakkheeran, Swadesimitran, Tamizhan Express, Vijay TV and Nila TV. After being released on bail, he used this experience to help the DPI found its monthly journal Thaimann in 2001. Today, he is the Editor-in-Charge of Thaimann, one of the few full-fledged Dalit publications from Tamil Nadu. The DPI has formed a three-member committee, headed by N. Elansezhian, to help raise money for the 13 accused to fight their legal battle. This is an appeal to all those concerned to contribute to this just cause for social justice. Those whom the court terms as accused are social revolutionaries who fought an unjust social order and merely asserted their right to equality. It is our duty to help them. Please send your remittance in the form of cheque / Demand Draft in favour of "N. Elansezhian" who heads the legal committee looking into the case. N.Elansezhian is also a member of the DPI's central committee. He can be contacted at (91-44-) 94440-19110. For further clarifications, contact S. Anand, Chennai at 094440-61256; navayana at ambedkar.org. Cheques/ DDs may be sent to: "N. ELANSEZHIAN" 6A/ 4, BRINDAVAN STREET EXTENSION WEST MAMBALAM CHENNAI TAMIL NADU—600033 Sd/ Ravikumar and S. Anand Navayana Publishing www.navayana.org List of those who have contributed to the corpus till now: Fr Raja, Mata Church, Kadapakkam village, Kanchipuram district—Rs 15,000 V.K.T. Balan, Director, Madura Travels—Rs 5,000 N. Elansezhian, DPI member—Rs 5,000 R. Sivapriya, Editor, Orient Longman—Rs. 1,000 S. Anand, Special Correspondent, Outlook, Chennai; Navayana Publishing—Rs. 1,000 Ravikumar, Navayana Publishing, Pondicherry—Rs 2,000 _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From sunil at mahiti.org Mon Oct 11 22:36:02 2004 From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham) Date: Mon, 11 Oct 2004 17:06:02 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] UNESCAP EGP: OSS + KM Message-ID: <1097514362.647.88.camel@box> Dear Friends, This is our presentation at the UNESCAP Expert Group Meeting: Open Source Software for Knowledge Management (KM), 11-13 October 2004, Bangkok. Thanks, Sunil ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Free/Open Source Software and the International Open Source Network Presented at the Expert Group Meeting on Open Source Software for Knowledge Management UN-ESCAP, Bangkok 11-13 October, 2005 ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Introduction to IOSN ------------------------------------------------------------------------- The International Open Source Network1 is a Centre of Excellence for Free / Open Source Software (FOSS) in the Asia-Pacific Region. IOSN is an initiative of the UNDP’s Asia-Pacific Information Development Programme2, which supports effective use of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) for poverty alleviation and sustainable human development. Via a small secretariat, the IOSN is tasked specifically to accelerate the adoption of FOSS by facilitating and networking advocates, developers, and users in the region; developing FOSS tools; building capacities; and supporting FOSS R&D. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Community Management ------------------------------------------------------------------------- IOSN runs a portal which has over 1000 registered members and has had over 100,000 unique visitors in the last two months. This global community has created over 2,500 content objects in a voluntary capacity. The content organisation is based on region, country and theme and interested members have been granted additional permission to manage and publish content these public sections. Other users publish content only in their personal folders. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Publications ------------------------------------------------------------------------- IOSN publishes a FOSS primer series. The current and upcoming titles include general introduction to FOSS; FOSS government policy; FOSS in education, localisation; licensing; open content; open standards; network security and infrastructure. The authors come from the Asia-Pacific region. The primers undergo peer and public review before being published electronically and in hard copy. These primers are aimed at policy-makers and decision-makers from the government, multilateral, donor, and development agencies. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Events ------------------------------------------------------------------------- IOSN organises conferences such as Free Open Source Software – Asia-Pacific (FOSSAP). Last year, more than 50 senior policy-makers and FOSS practitioners from 20 countries attended this regional consultation in Kuala Lumpur (www.iosn.net/fossap). IOSN has promoted and supported events such as Software Freedom Day, which is an annual event in celebration of FOSS on August 28th. IOSN is also organising a talk series in partnership with government, academia and the local FOSS community. The first speaker will be Richard Stallman, Founder of the Free Software Movement, who will speak in Malaysia and Singapore. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Training ------------------------------------------------------------------------- IOSN is producing end-user training material in print and interactive multimedia format. It covers the use of the GNU/Linux desktop for users that may have no prior knowledge of Linux or PC usage. IOSN is also producing a live CD for users of proprietary software who wish to learn more about FOSS. Both these projects are in partnership with private sector and academia from Malaysia, Singapore, and Australia. A pilot Linux training of trainers and proctors in partnership with the Ministry of Science and Technology of Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh City government and the Linux Professional Institute, Canada, will be held in November in Vietnam. 20 Linux trainees from North, Central and South regions of Vietnam will be trained and certified as qualified Linux system administrators. The proctors come from six South-East Asian countries and will be able to administer affordable paper tests for Linux skills certification. Internationally recognized certification in conjunction with open content training materials and certified personnel for certification will FOSS adoption in developing countries. There are plans to translate the open content Linux system administration training materials to other languages. IOSN also supports the development of a localisation toolkit in collaboration with Centre for Advanced Computing [CDAC], India. This practical toolkit will enable developers and translators build GNU/Linux distributions and FOSS applications in the language of their choice. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Grant Scheme ------------------------------------------------------------------------- IOSN manages a micro-grant programme in collaboration with the University of South Pacific. USD 1000 will be provided to 40 FOSS practitioners over the next two years to work on projects relevant to the development sector. Applications for the first round of grants have been received; the selection committee will announce the grantees shortly. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- FOSS and Knowledge Management ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Management implies that resources are finite. Finite resources like human resources and financial resources diminish when consumed or shared. Knowledge however multiplies when shared. New knowledge builds on existing knowledge. In 1675, Isaac Newton wrote "If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants". Therefore, we are talking about knowledge production not knowledge management. In other words, the FOSS philosophy, the mechanism of copy-left and open licenses, enables accelerated knowledge production. In addition, FOSS provides a framework to protect and grow the creative commons. A vibrant creative commons and public domain is critical for innovation and enterprise in the public and private sector. A researcher developing a cure for HIV/AIDS or a FOSS practitioner developing a micro-credit software should not be forced to find their way through a minefield of patent and copyright litigation. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- FOSS and Development Practise ------------------------------------------------------------------------- It goes against the development ethos, if consultants produce knowledge under proprietary licenses – wherein its use is controlled by either the contracting body or the consultant. As this knowledge, whose production costs have already been paid for, will be resold to poor people from other countries and projects. Whilst this might be good for development consultants, this makes no sense for the developing world. If, on the other hand, this knowledge were freely licensed to the public, then the global community would benefit from using, studying, modifying, and sharing it. IOSN believes that this small systemic change in the licensing of knowledge produced by the development sector will have a far-reaching impact. It will stretch the development dollar and will improve the efficacy of the sector as a whole. It would also spark global collaboration around this body of shared knowledge. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Case Study: Knowledge Management at IOSN Portal ------------------------------------------------------------------------- IOSN has opted to use Plone3 as its content-cum-community management system. With a community of more than 1000 members, this becomes a knowledge production and management system. Plone has support for localisation and has been translated into 36 languages. It is highly standards compliant and renders well across several different browsers and devices. It adheres to international standards for access by the disabled. It also has powerful content types, interactive modules and work-flows that can be modified to suit different modes of knowledge production. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Enabling Copyright Framework ------------------------------------------------------------------------- IOSN uses four types of licenses to enable a knowledge producing community. For software projects, IOSN recommends GNU GPL or BSD style licenses. “Creative Commons Attribution” or “Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike” licenses are recommended for documentation projects. This choice of licenses allows the authors and developers to decide whether the users can create derivative works under non-free licenses. This is in line with the inclusive moniker FOSS (that is Free and Open Source Software), which represents the interests of both camps. When the IOSN end-user training manual was released under the Creative Commons Attribution license, there was a great deal of positive feedback from the FOSS community worldwide. Volunteer translators have offered to work on the German, Dutch, Filipino, French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, and Tamil versions of the manual. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Open Standards and Formats ------------------------------------------------------------------------- The IOSN portal is Dublin Core Compliant. The Dublin Core is a set of standards for the use of the Resource Description Framework (RDF) dialect of XML, to describe library meta-data or any web page. This standard consists of 16 optional meta-data elements, any of which may be repeated or omitted4. By complying with this standard, the IOSN portal easily inter-operates with many other products and services. It is important that we build knowledge management systems that comply with Open Standards and Formats. It is not sufficient to comply with previously closed standards and formats that are even now being made available by single proprietary vendors as a means to capture market share. One must adopt open standards and formats that have been designed by consortia having adequate representation from industry, academia, and the user community. Only then will there be an abundance of FOSS tools that could be used to produce or consume data in these formats accurately. In the absence of these tools, the public is coerced into purchasing or pirating proprietary software to interact with the knowledge management system. This is especially tragic if this knowledge has been created using public funds. Therefore, public bodies, especially government and development agencies, must be wary of ending up as marketing agents for proprietary software vendors. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Collaborative Authoring ------------------------------------------------------------------------- The lone inventor or innovator is a myth. Especially in the Asia-Pacific, intellectual and creative pursuits are group activities. Often these groups are not democratic, but merit based hierarchies. We have a similar system of managers and members maintaining and updating Blogs and Wikis on the IOSN portal. These are perfect tools for collaborative authoring and are perfect for capturing of tacit knowledge. Blogs allow for log or diary style entries, threaded discussions around each entry, and rating of comments. The Wiki allows for tracking document history, allowing for comparison of different versions and also for undoing a particular user's changes. One of the popular blog sites Livejournal has more than 4 million registered users and Wikipedia has more than 300000 articles that has had more than 60 million page views. FOSS technologies and licenses are used to power both these projects. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Collaborative Publishing ------------------------------------------------------------------------- The IOSN portal automatically updates the section pages using RSS feeds from relevant external news sites and also blogs of Linux User Groups. For example, if one goes to the Education sub-section, one will notice that we feature a feed from School Forge. Similarly, our feed is featured on Planet MYOSS, the community site of the Malaysian Open Source Community. This could be understood as peer-to-peer publishing or collaborative publishing. Collaborative publishing is both highly scalable and cost effective at the same time. For example, in September 2004, the IOSN portal was slash-dotted twice in one week. Once the community noticed the large traffic on the portal, they started volunteering to mirror our end-user training material. Soon we had six mirrors in Germany, Switzerland, Australia, Italy, Mexico, and United States. Other volunteers uploaded the files on E-Donkey - a peer-to-peer network. Collaborative publishing ensures the independence of knowledge. Often States and corporations undermine free speech and fearless knowledge by capturing and controlling public media spaces. However, FOSS projects like Free Net, allow for digitally signed anonymous collaborative publishing. It would be impossible to build an equivalent proprietary tool as the community is afraid that a single vendor would be able to expose their anonymity. Technical reasons aside, there is a fundamental philosophical reason why the Free Net project opposes copyright and is thus an indirect endorsement of FOSS. The FAQ on the Free Net project site states that “the core problem with copyright is that enforcement requires monitoring of communications, and you cannot be guaranteed free speech if someone is monitoring everything you say. You cannot guarantee freedom of speech and enforce copyright law”. In other words, you could say that FOSS ensures freedom of speech, information sharing, and knowledge production on the Internet. Sunil Abraham, and Khairil Yusof International Open Source Network (IOSN) UNDP Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme (APDIP) ------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://www.unescap.org/icstd/events/EGM_KM.asp http://www.unescap.org/icstd/documents/SC_ICST/Prov_Agenda.pdf http://www.unescap.org/icstd/applications/OSS/Participants.pdf Thanks, ಸುನೀಲ್ -- Sunil Abraham, sunil at mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA Ph/Fax: +91 80 51150580. Mobile: +91 80 36701931 Currently on sabbatical with APDIP/UNDP Manager - International Open Source Network Wisma UN, Block C Komplex Pejabat Damansara. Jalan Dungun, Damansara Heights. 50490 Kuala Lumpur. P. O. Box 12544, 50782, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Tel: (60) 3-2091-5167, Fax: (60) 3-2095-2087 sunil at apdip.net http://www.iosn.net http://www.apdip.net From shivamvij at gmail.com Mon Oct 11 15:10:32 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Mon, 11 Oct 2004 02:40:32 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] Delhi Metro: The change is showing, and how Message-ID: Here is a very basic, indifferent newspaper feature on something that the papers have not been documenting: the vast cultural change that the Delhi Metro will bring about in the daily life of Delhi. Shivam Delhi Metro: The change is showing, and how Chetan Chauhan Hindustan Times | New Delhi, October 11 http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/5922_1051129,0015002200000001.htm Shefali Gupta, a student of Laxmibai College in Ashok Vihar, Umesh Aggarwal, an Azad Market-based wholesale trader and Ushfak Amin, a worker in Ballimaran, have little in common, except for the fact that the Metro has changed their lives. Shefali no longer has to suffer a private bus. She takes the Metro from Pitampura till Keshavpuram. "It is the most comfortable change in my life. There are no lewd comments or people brushing against you," she says, while returning from her college. It used to take Umesh over an hour to reach his shop from his home in sector-9 Rohini. "Time was not the only worrying factor. The entire route used to be congested and the drive used to be tiring," he says. Now, he reaches Azad Market in half-an-hour and that too without any hassles. "I drive a couple of kilometres to reach Rohini-West metro station and park my car there," he says. For Ushfak, his daily cycle journey is a thing of the past. And he is not alone. "Many prefer Metro over the cycle even though it is a costly affair," he says. All this is visible on the first metro corridor between Shahdara and Rithala within a year of the line becoming operational. Delhi Metro Rail Corporation officials say they intend to bring in discipline and make people believe that metro will be the city's lifeline. "Security guards will be reduced once riders get accustomed to the system," an official said. From shivamvij at gmail.com Mon Oct 11 15:31:02 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Mon, 11 Oct 2004 03:01:02 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] Metro at night Message-ID: Here's another, wish they had uploaded the pix that the paper had. Note how the metro has been 'disciplining' citizens, despite all the cynicism we saw on day 1 when there was a stampede, and we all heard the holier than thou commentary about how we don't deserve the metro... Shivam Metro at night How do they make it sparkle and gift-wrap it for the city every night? AMBA BATRA finds out in an exclusive ride, long after the last commuter has gone home. Amba Batra New Delhi, October 9: http://cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=102900 Delhi Metro has a mesmerising effect on commuters. People who won't think twice before spitting, littering or scrawling — say on a DTC bus — hold it in awe. It's a gift that they cherish and it, in turn, checks their baser instincts. That a train service that carries about one lakh commuters daily, and through a stretch that has suddenly emerged from the dark ages, should be so well-maintained is remarkable. But it's not just the effect at work — there's a lot of effort too. When the city goes to sleep after 10, and the trains — between Rithala and Shahdara — quickly end their last trips, breezing through the green-roofed stations, a new story beings to unfold. The trains which have been in service for nearly two years show no traces of wear and tear. The drivers lead them towards the workshed at Shastri Park Depot where they are to be washed and scrubbed. At the stations on the way, a workforce of cleaners on contract have already begun their third shift. They mop the floors and give an extra shine to all stainless steel accessories in perfected routine, picking up bits of paper and erasing dusty footprints. All cleaning work at Delhi Metro is outsourced. Batches of 10 cleaners cover the stations in three shifts every eight hours. ''Our cleaning work never stops, and it's because of our persistence that even commuters have become responsible,'' says Satish Kumar, Director, Rolling Stock and Electricals. ''While the life of a station is 100 years, the trains have a life of 30 years. All the areas of both train and stations are easily wipeable and one usually finds wrappers and the odd lost and found item,'' says Piyush Bhardwaj, Deputy General Manager, Rolling Stock. The first stop is the washing plant. Here, the train is soaped and rinsed once every three days and 50 per cent of the water is recycled. Then the train is parked at the workshed where it's handed over to the contract cleaners. All 15 trains are cleaned internally every day by a team of 30. Between several cups of tea and many rounds of gossip, they rub a special chemical solution to make the windows, doors and seats sparkle. It takes the workers about an hour to clean a train and the the first one is ready to roll out at 4.45 am. From yukihiko at sfc.keio.ac.jp Mon Oct 11 15:35:13 2004 From: yukihiko at sfc.keio.ac.jp (Yukihiko Yoshida) Date: Mon, 11 Oct 2004 19:05:13 +0900 Subject: [Reader-list] Little Asia Dance Exchange Network 2004 Message-ID: <200410111005.i9BA5D828811@ccz03.sfc.keio.ac.jp> Hello from TOKYO, Little Asia Dance Exchange Network 2004 is touring around Asia. The female dancer in the following webpage is Ms. Motoko Ikeda. She is one of best dancers in Japan and leading Japanese Dance World as talented dancer. Please check it out ! ---schedule Little Asia Dance Exchange Network 2004 http://www.esplanade.com/SOPApp/espsop/portal_proxy?GXHC_gx_session_id_=3993cb711c72cbb7&GXHC_IMP_COOKIE=3993cb711c72cbb7&uri=ZOCOt2kpxPS5!hJfb=E,ZwUJvrFmwiwKeHOG4WjRhMAM,lzQBH3x3Ggg2CS-,0RuDVkFq6LPADCKQwO5sJFM Taipei 8 Oct (Fri) 7:30pm Perf 1 9 Oct (Sat) 2:30pm Perf 2 9 Oct (Sat) 7:30pm Perf 3 5 solos + "Doubling" each show (workshop on the week of 11 Oct, tbc) Seoul 20 Oct (Wed) 8pm Perf 1 "Doubling" + invited Korean artist Ms. Jeon In-jung’s solo (30 mins) Tokyo 23 Oct (Sat) 8pm Perf 1 24 Oct (Sun) 8pm Perf 2 2 Japanese companies + "Doubling" each show Hong Kong 28 Oct (Thur) 8pm Perf 1 + meet-the-artist 29 Oct (Fri) 8pm Perf 2 30 Oct (Sat) 8pm Perf 3 5 solos + "Doubling" each show Singapore 5 Nov (Fri) 8pm Perf 1 3 solos (Motoko, Daniel, Yu-chun) + "Doubling" 6 Nov (Sat) 8pm Perf 2 3 solos (Natalie,Young-doo, invited Singapore artist Chery Quek) + "Doubling" (workshop on 6 Nov 1-4pm) Melbourne 11 Nov (Thur) 8pm Perf 1 12 Nov (Fri) 8pm Perf 2 + meet-the-artist 13 Nov (Sat) 8pm Perf 3 2-3 solos + "Doubling" each show (workshop on 12 Nov 2-4pm) ----- --Yuk;-)iko YOSHIDA Yukihiko YOSHIDA A Roue,Systems Humanist/Generalist -artist researcher- <.org> Phd. Candidate:Keio University,Graduate School for Media and Governance webmaster:Japanese Society for Dance Research World Dance Alliance Asia Pacific /WDA-AP Research and Documentation Network Dance Critic: Music and Dance Press (since 1930) ArtsCure http://www.dpsny.org/ RealTokyo http://www.realtokyo.co.jp/ e-mail address : yukihiko at sfc.keio.ac.jp yukihiko at xanadu.net webpage: http://www.sfc.keio.ac.jp/~yukihiko/ From ritika at sarai.net Mon Oct 11 15:42:10 2004 From: ritika at sarai.net (Ritika) Date: Mon, 11 Oct 2004 15:42:10 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Delhi Metro: The change is showing, and how In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <416A5C7A.2050807@sarai.net> Ahhh metro is such a relief. Even if i have to stand from my place of work to my home...who cares...atleast i can be myself. I don't have to worry about who's trying to touch me and where should i be pinching him etc etc.. I am a regular in metro. From my home in pitampura to my work place till tees hazaari... it takes 20 mins and thats it. The initial 3-4 months were extremenly irritating though. The people who would were new to metro ...would have similar type of conversations. STRANGE...but ALWAYS. It had almost become predictable. The conversation would range from - the "tachnology" of metro...to expenses incurred on one glass window...to how the ac works...to how conveneient it has become...to whether it'll be vaible economically in the long run...haanji bahaai saab...metro ne dilli ko jeena sikha diya... hai ... everybody was a self proclaimed genius on Metro. Interstingly i always noticed that it were only men who "always knew it all"...women were generally quiet... After 6 months of regular use of metro, i am seeing a decline in the 'inquisitive' type of conversations. They have almost died down (atleast the time during which i travel). Men and women look so bored...its not even funny. The conversations are now limited to ... mota lalas who have to get down for sadar bazaar....at best shout at heir mundus over phone for not opening the shops on time...the lawyers are fun to listen to...some stray people ask for legal advice...some get..some don't... Others still keep looking bored SO far the metro is clean. people have not yet spat in it, its comfy...for me. However, every time i heave a sigh of relief..i remember a colleague who did his research on people displaced during metro....and wonder.. cheers ritika Shivam wrote: > Here is a very basic, indifferent newspaper feature on something that > the papers have not been documenting: the vast cultural change that > the Delhi Metro will bring about in the daily life of Delhi. > Shivam > > > > Delhi Metro: The change is showing, and how > > Chetan Chauhan > Hindustan Times | New Delhi, October 11 > http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/5922_1051129,0015002200000001.htm > > > Shefali Gupta, a student of Laxmibai College in Ashok Vihar, Umesh > Aggarwal, an Azad Market-based wholesale trader and Ushfak Amin, a > worker in Ballimaran, have little in common, except for the fact that > the Metro has changed their lives. > > Shefali no longer has to suffer a private bus. She takes the Metro > from Pitampura till Keshavpuram. "It is the most comfortable change in > my life. There are no lewd comments or people brushing against you," > she says, while returning from her college. > > It used to take Umesh over an hour to reach his shop from his home in > sector-9 Rohini. "Time was not the only worrying factor. The entire > route used to be congested and the drive used to be tiring," he says. > Now, he reaches Azad Market in half-an-hour and that too without any > hassles. "I drive a couple of kilometres to reach Rohini-West metro > station and park my car there," he says. > > For Ushfak, his daily cycle journey is a thing of the past. And he is > not alone. "Many prefer Metro over the cycle even though it is a > costly affair," he says. All this is visible on the first metro > corridor between Shahdara and Rithala within a year of the line > becoming operational. > > Delhi Metro Rail Corporation officials say they intend to bring in > discipline and make people believe that metro will be the city's > lifeline. "Security guards will be reduced once riders get accustomed > to the system," an official said. > _________________________________________ > 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: From shivamvij at gmail.com Mon Oct 11 16:03:41 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Mon, 11 Oct 2004 03:33:41 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] Re: Re: Delhi Metro: The change is showing, and how In-Reply-To: <416A5C7A.2050807@sarai.net> References: <416A5C7A.2050807@sarai.net> Message-ID: Dear Ritika, As for people displaced by the Metro and other evils, including environmental, the Metro Corp has been much more compassionate than we have known the state to be in recent times. Your observations as a regular metro traveller are interesting. My joy rides on the metro and the regular rides in crowded buses make me compare the two, and I think that in the long run there'll be a lot less conversation, a lot more bored looks in the Metro. The metro encourages that, both because it's so perfect, like McDonald's food items, and also because a super fast metro train doesn't give passengers much time to chit-chat about the world. There's no conductor, no fighting, no 'eve-teasing', no ten rupee goods being sold by neo-literate 'marketing' guys. In otherwords, the metro is metropolitan, with its unmistakable metropolitan detachedness, and the buses 'provincial' and 'mofussil'. Also, as I have said earlier on this list, the class strata of people travelling in buses is extremely narrow, whereas the HT article I posted shows how people of different classes are using the metro. A friend remarked that delhi is not one city but many cities put together. the metro is erasing those differences. But near Shahadra if you look through the window you realise that you are indeed in India. The metro is an illusion that will soon open its doors and ask you to get out: "Thank you for using Delhi Metro." Shivam From ninad.pandit at krvia.ac.in Tue Oct 12 22:16:20 2004 From: ninad.pandit at krvia.ac.in (Ninad Pandit) Date: Tue, 12 Oct 2004 09:46:20 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Daniel Libeskind details Message-ID: <1379.203.94.214.18.1097599580.squirrel@203.94.214.18> Due to some problems of downloading the PDF from my hosting service, those links have now been changed in this mail. "Ever since I began architecture, I had an abhorrence to conventional architecture offices. There was something about the atmosphere of redundancy ,routine and production that made me allergic to all forms of specialization and so-called professionalism. Ten years ago we founded our office in Berlin as a result of a decision, an accident, a rumor on the street and began an unimaginable journey down a path on which we are still travelling." (from http://daniel-libeskind.com ) Dear all: Daniel Libeskind, the Architect of the Jewish Museum and the New WTC towers, will be visiting Mumbai briefly, and will present some of his work at krvia, Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute for Architecture and Environmental Studies, on Thursday,14th October 2004, at 2:15 pm in the krvia auditorium. A link to the PDF poster for the event is here: http://64.235.44.51:8080/krvianew/Members/admin/Dr%20Libeskind%20visits%20krvia%202004%20.pdf/download The PDF link that to the poster announcing the presentation by Daniel Libeskind in krvia, Mumbai is possibly too large for people who are bandwidthically challenged. (600k). A smaller Jpeg of the poster is available here: http://64.235.44.51:8080/krvianew/Members/admin/Dr%20Libeskind%20visits%20krvia%202004.jpg/download Please do come for the presentation. Please direct all queries to my address. Ninad Pandit Brief Bio of Daniel Libeskind: (from http://wikipedia.org) Daniel Libeskind, born May 12, 1946 in Lodz, Poland, the son of Holocaust survivors, is an architect who became a U.S. citizen in 1965. He is a 1965 alumnus of The Bronx High School of Science. His architecture uses a language of skewed angles, intersecting geometries, shards, voids and punctured lines to communicate feelings of loss, absence and memory whilst addressing the immediate situation, however typical, in a manner that constantly calls attention to itself. He has mainly designed museums and galleries. His recent projects include: Completed * the Jewish Museum in Berlin, Germany; * the Felix-Nussbaum-Haus in Osnabrück, Germany, a museum dedicated to the life and art of the painter Felix Nussbaum. * the Imperial War Museum North in Greater Manchester, United Kingdom Proposed * 'The Spiral' extension to the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, has now been cancelled following its failure to attract funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund. * the 'Frederic C. Hamilton Building' of the Denver Museum of Art (under construction) * 'The Crystal', a major renovation of the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, slated for completion in 2006. * the 'Freedom Tower' and 'Memory Foundations' for the redevelopment of the World Trade Center site in New York. the poster requires a PDF viewer. It can be found on: http://www.acrobat.com Please forward the news of this event to everyone. Ninad Pandit From avinash at sarai.net Wed Oct 13 11:22:26 2004 From: avinash at sarai.net (avinash kumar) Date: Wed, 13 Oct 2004 11:22:26 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] From Truthout: Soldiers in Iraq write to Michael Moore Message-ID: <416CC29A.8040701@sarai.net> http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/100604Y.shtml > > Dear Mike, Iraq Sucks > The Guardian > > Tuesday 05 September 2004 > > > Civilian contractors are fleecing taxpayers; US > troops don't have > proper equipment; and supposedly liberated Iraqis > hate them. After the > release of Fahrenheit 9/11, Michael Moore received a > flood of letters > and emails from disillusioned and angry American > soldiers serving in > Iraq. Here, in an exclusive extract from his new > book, we print a > selection. > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > > > From: RH > To: mike at michaelmoore.com > Sent: Monday, July 12, 2003 4:57 PM > Subject: Iraqi freedom veteran supports you > > Dear Mr Moore, > I went to Iraq with thoughts of killing people who I > thought were > horrible. I was like, "Fuck Iraq, fuck these people, > I hope we kill > thousands." I believed my president. He was taking > care of business and > wasn't going to let al Qaeda push us around. I was > with the 3rd > Squadron, 7th Cavalry, 3rd Infantry division out of > Fort Stewart, > Georgia. My unit was one of the first to Baghdad. I > was so scared. > Didn't know what to think. Seeing dead bodies for > the first time. > People blown in half. Little kids with no legs. It > was overwhelming, > the sights, sounds, fear. I was over there from > Jan'03 to Aug'03. I > hated every minute. It was a daily battle to keep my > spirits up. I hate > the army and my job. I am supposed to get out next > February but will > now be unable to because the asshole in the White > House decided that > now would be a great time to put a stop-loss in > effect for the army. So > I get to do a second tour in Iraq and be away from > those I love again > because some guy has the audacity to put others' > lives on the line for > his personal war. I thought we were the good guys. > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > From: Michael W > Sent: Tuesday July 13 2004 12.28pm > Subject: Dude, Iraq sucks > > My name is Michael W and I am a 30-year-old National > Guard > infantryman serving in southeast Baghdad. I have > been in Iraq since > March of 04 and will continue to serve here until > March of 05. > > In the few short months my unit has been in Iraq, we > have already > lost one man and have had many injured (including > me) in combat > operations. And for what? At the very least, the > government could have > made sure that each of our vehicles had the proper > armament to protect > us soldiers. > > In the early morning hours of May 10, one month to > the day from my > 30th birthday, I and 12 other men were attacked in a > well-executed > roadside ambush in south-east Baghdad. We were > attacked with small-arms > fire, a rocket-propelled grenade, and two > well-placed roadside bombs. > These roadside bombs nearly destroyed one of our > Hummers and riddled my > friends with shrapnel, almost killing them. They > would not have had a > scratch if they had the "Up Armour" kits on them. So > where was [George] > W [Bush] on that one? > > It's just so ridiculous, which leads me to my next > point. A > Blackwater contractor makes $15,000 [8,400] a month > for doing the same > job as my pals and me. I make about $4,000 [2,240] a > month over here. > What's up with that? > > Beyond that, the government is calling up more and > more troops from > the reserves. For what? Man, there is a huge fucking > scam going on > here! There are civilian contractors crawling all > over this country. > Blackwater, Kellogg Brown & Root, Halliburton, on > and on. These > contractors are doing everything you can think of > from security to > catering lunch! > > We are spending money out the ass for this shit, and > very few of the > projects are going to the Iraqi people. Someone's > back is getting > scratched here, and it ain't the Iraqis'! > > My life is left to chance at this point. I just hope > I come home > alive. > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > From: Specialist Willy > Sent: Tuesday March 9 2004 1.23pm > Subject: Thank you > > Mike, I'd like to thank you for all of the support > you're showing for > the soldiers here in Iraq. I am in Baghdad right > now, and it's such a > relief to know that people still care about the > lemmings who are forced > to fight in this conflict. > > It's hard listening to my platoon sergeant saying, > "If you decide you > want to kill a civilian that looks threatening, > shoot him. I'd rather > fill out paperwork than get one of my soldiers > killed by some raghead." > We are taught that if someone even looks threatening > we should do > something before they do something to us. I wasn't > brought up in fear > like that, and it's going to take some getting used > to. > > It's also very hard talking to people here about > this war. They don't > like to hear that the reason they are being torn > away from their > families is bullshit, or that their "president" > doesn't care about > them. A few people here have become quite upset with > me, and at one > point I was going to be discharged for constantly > inciting arguments > and disrespect to my commander-in-chief (Dubya). > It's very hard to be > silenced about this when I see the same 150 people > every day just going > through the motions, not sure why they are doing it. > > [ Willy sent an update in early August ] > > People's perceptions of this war have done a > complete 180 since we > got here. We had someone die in a mortar attack the > first week, and > ever since then, things have changed completely. > Soldiers are calling > their families urging them to support John Kerry. If > this is happening > elsewhere, it looks as if the overseas military vote > that Bush is used > to won't be there this time around. > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > From: Kyle Waldman > Sent: Friday February 27 2004 2.35am > Subject: None > > As we can all obviously see, Iraq was not and is not > an imminent > threat to the United States or the rest of the > world. My time in Iraq > has taught me a little about the Iraqi people and > the state of this > war-torn, poverty-stricken country. > > The illiteracy rate in this country is phenomenal. > There were some > farmers who didn't even know there was an Operation > Iraqi Freedom. This > was when I realised that this war was initiated by > the few who would > profit from it and not for its people. We, as the > coalition forces, did > not liberate these people; we drove them even deeper > into poverty. I > don't foresee any economic relief coming soon to > these people by the > way Bush has already diverted its oil revenues to > make sure there will > be enough oil for our SUVs. > > We are here trying to keep peace when all we have > been trained for is > to destroy. How are 200,000 soldiers supposed to > take control of this > country? Why didn't we have an effective plan to > rebuild Iraq's > infrastructure? Why aren't the American people more > aware of these > atrocities? > > My fiancee and I have seriously looked into moving > to Canada as > political refugees. > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > From: Anonymous > Sent: Thursday April 15 2004 12.41am > Subject: From KBR truck driver now in Iraq > > Mike, I am a truck driver right now in Iraq. Let me > give you this one > small fact because I am right here at the heart of > it: since I started > this job several months ago, 100% (that's right, not > 99%) of the > workers I am aware of are inflating the hours they > claim on their time > sheets. There is so much more I could tell you. But > the fact is that > MILLIONS AND MILLIONS of dollars are being raped > from both the American > taxpayers and the Iraqi people because of the > unbelievable amount of > greed and abuse over here. And yes, my conscience > does bother me > because I am participating in this rip-off. > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > From: Andrew Balthazor > Sent: Friday August 27 2004 1.53pm > Subject: Iraqi war vet - makes me sound so old > > Mr Moore, I am an ex-military intelligence officer > who served 10 > months in Baghdad; I was the senior intelligence > officer for the area > of Baghdad that included the UN HQ and Sadr City. > > Since Bush exposed my person and my friends, peers, > and subordinates > to unnecessary danger in a war apparently designed > to generate income > for a select few in the upper echelon of America, I > have become > wholeheartedly anti-Bush, to the chagrin of much of > my pro-Republican > family. > > As a "foot soldier" in the "war on terror" I can > personally testify > that Bush's administration has failed to effectively > fight terrorists > or the root causes of terror. The White House and > the DoD failed to > plan for reconstruction of Iraq. Contracts weren't > tendered until > Feb-Mar of 2003, and the Office of Reconstruction > and Humanitarian > Assistance (the original CPA) didn't even come into > existence until > January 2003. This failure to plan for the "peace" > is a direct cause > for the insecurity of Iraq today. > > Immediately after the "war" portion of the fighting > (which really > ended around April 9 2003), we should have been > prepared to send in a > massive reconstruction effort. Right away we needed > engineers to > diagnose problems, we needed contractors repairing > problems, we needed > immediate food, water, shelter, and fuel for the > Iraqi people, and we > needed more security for all of this to work - which > we did not have > because we did not have enough troops on the ground, > and CPA decided to > disband the Iraqi army. The former Iraqi police were > engaged far too > late; a plan should have existed to bring them into > the fold right > away. > > I've left the military. If there is anything I can > do to help get > Bush out of office, let me know. > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > From: Anthony Pietsch > Sent: Thursday August 5 2004 6.13pm > Subject: Soldier for sale > > Dear Mr Moore, my name is Tony Pietsch, and I am a > National Guardsman > who has been stationed in Kuwait and Iraq for the > past 15 months. Along > with so many other guard and reserve units, my unit > was put on convoy > escorts. We were on gun trucks running from the > bottom of Iraq to about > two hours above Baghdad. > > The Iraqi resistance was insanity. I spent many > nights lying awake > after mortar rounds had just struck areas nearby, > some coming close > enough to throw rocks against my tent. I've seen > roadside bombs go off > all over, Iraqis trying to ram the side of our > vehicle. Small children > giving us the finger and throwing rocks at the > soldiers in the turrets. > We were once lost in Baghdad and received nothing > but dirty looks and > angry gestures for hours. > > I have personally been afraid for my life more days > than I can count. > We lost our first man only a few weeks before our > tour was over, but it > seems that all is for nothing because all we see is > hostility and anger > over our being there. They are angry over the abuse > scandal and the > collateral damages that are always occurring. > > I don't know how the rest of my life will turn out, > but I truly > regret being a 16-year-old kid looking for some > extra pocket money and > a way to college. > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > From: Sean Huze > Sent: Sunday March 28 2004 7.56pm > Subject: "Dude, Where's My Country?" > > I am an LCPL in the US Marine Corps and veteran of > Operation Iraqi > Freedom. Mr Moore, please keep pounding away at > Bush. I'm not some > pussy when it comes to war. However, the position we > were put in - > fighting an enemy that used women, children, and > other civilians as > shields; forcing us to choose between firing at > "area targets" (nice > way of saying firing into crowds) or being killed by > the bastards using > the crowds for cover - is indescribably horrible. > > I saw more than a few dead children littering the > streets in > Nasiriyah, along with countless other civilians. And > through all this, > I held on to the belief that it had to be for some > greater good. > > Months have passed since I've been back home and the > unfortunate > conclusion I've come to is that Bush is a lying, > manipulative > motherfucker who cares nothing for the lives of > those of us who serve > in uniform. Hell, other than playing dress-up on > aircraft carriers, > what would he know about serving this nation in > uniform? > > His silence and refusal to speak under oath to the > 9/11 Commission > further mocks our country. The Patriot Act violates > every principle we > fight and die for. And all of this has been during > his first term. Can > you imagine his policies when he doesn't have to > worry about > re-election? We can't allow that to happen, and > there are so many like > me in the military who feel this way. We were lied > to and used. And > there aren't words to describe the sense of betrayal > I feel as a > result. > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > From: Joseph Cherwinski > Sent: Saturday July 3 2004 8.33pm > Subject: "Fahrenheit 9/11" > > I am a soldier in the United States army. I was in > Iraq with the > Fourth Infantry Division. > > I was guarding some Iraqi workers one day. Their > task was to fill > sandbags for our base. The temperature was at least > 120. I had to sit > there with full gear on and monitor them. I was > sitting and drinking > water, and I could barely tolerate the heat, so I > directed the workers > to go to the shade and sit and drink water. I let > them rest for about > 20 minutes. Then a staff sergeant told me that they > didn't need a > break, and that they were to fill sandbags until the > cows come home. He > told the Iraqis to go back to work. > > After 30 minutes, I let them have a break again, > thus disobeying > orders. If these were soldiers working, in this > heat, those soldiers > would be bound to a 10-minute work, 50-minute rest > cycle, to prevent > heat casualties. Again the staff sergeant came and > sent the Iraqis back > to work and told me I could sit in the shade. I told > him no, I had to > be out there with them so that when I started to > need water, then they > would definitely need water. He told me that wasn't > necessary, and that > they live here, and that they are used to it. > > After he left, I put the Iraqis back into the shade. > I could tell > that some were very dehydrated; most of them were > thin enough to be on > an international food aid commercial. I would not > treat my fellow > soldiers in this manner, so I did not treat the > Iraqi workers this way > either. > > This went on for eight months while I was in Iraq, > and going through > it told me that we were not there for their freedom, > we were not there > for WMD. We had no idea what we were fighting for > anymore. > > ------- > > Jump to TO Features for Wednesday October 6, 2004 > > (In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, > this material is > distributed without profit to those who have > expressed a prior interest > in receiving the included information for research > and educational > purposes. t r u t h o u t has no affiliation > whatsoever with the > originator of this article nor is t r u t h o u t > endorsed or sponsored > by the originator.) From vivek at sarai.net Tue Oct 12 13:42:22 2004 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Tue, 12 Oct 2004 13:42:22 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Fwd: NYTimes.com Article: Abu Ghraib Photos Return, This Time as Art] Message-ID: <416B91E6.8030204@sarai.net> Dear All, I found the article below interesting, especially in light of discussions we recently had at the Sarai salon in the corner bookstore, about the circulation of images post 9/11, apropos Ranjani Majumdar's talk especially. It's a tame article, but I think raises some interesting questions-- where is the place of a discussion on aesthetics in the context of horror? Can aesthetic exploration have anything to say to the conditions and contexts that produce, reproduce and circulate these images, or is it merely an insult to injury? If it can, what would an aesthetics of such, look like? V. Abu Ghraib Photos Return, This Time as Art October 10, 2004 By MICHAEL KIMMELMAN FIVE months after they made their first shocking appearance, the Abu Ghraib photographs have become a museum exhibition. Once ubiquitous on television and in newspapers, they now qualify as quasi-aesthetic artifacts, pictures you may choose to seek out - for edification, as a distraction, even. Presented jointly at the International Center of Photography in New York and the Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, "Inconvenient Evidence" includes 17 of the published pictures from the notorious prison in Iraq, reminding us of the deep and symbiotic relationship between photographs and the conduct of modern war. They also demonstrate how quickly the life cycle of an image spins these days. In New York, where the photographs have been printed straight off the Web and tacked to the walls with pushpins, there is a more conventional show of famous shots from Life magazine just a few steps away. The comparison is useful: the visual equivalent of cellphone chatter has achieved the power to shape public opinion that Larry Burrows's classic Vietnam pictures, which Life published, had a generation ago. Now war's participants snap the images themselves. Both shows are on view at the Center through Nov. 28. After that, they'll be taken down and replaced by others: the Abu Ghraib photographs have joined the vast, passing pageant of American cultural experience. Placing these atrocious pictures in a sleek white room and inviting us to cogitate on their visual properties raises some interesting ethical questions. Why Abu Ghraib but not images of beheadings, which are also on the Web, floating in the digital ether, fragments from the same new photographic universe? Would it be considered an invasion of the dead men's privacy? Too disgusting? Politically incorrect? There is a dead prisoner on view. As for surviving detainees, how might they feel about being exhibited like this? Elsewhere, their images have become tools of political resistance, but here the detainees are in a sense twice violated, first as objects of the photographers' derision, then as objects of the audience's detached contemplation. Meanwhile, other images from the war remain conspicuously invisible. Photographers still cannot take pictures of the returning coffins of American soldiers; the most gruesome battle injuries still don't make it into the day's news; supposedly even more shocking images from Abu Ghraib are still under wraps somewhere. An obvious danger of showing the available Abu Ghraib pictures like this is that the setting might somehow defuse the content, turning the images into just one more artful provocation. Surprisingly, the show has the opposite effect: the coolly cerebral space reinforces the distinction between the usual contrived "shock" art and these genuinely shocking amateur snapshots. The art critic John Berger once drew a distinction between public and private photographs. Public photographs are comprehensible to strangers and predicated on the viewers' sympathy. Charles Moore's famous shots of police dogs lunging at civil rights marchers - one of them is among the pictures in the Life show - elicit sympathy for the subjects. Like all public photographs of suffering, it is taken as if in our name, and shocks us into a condition of moral alarm. The photographer's virtue is implicit. But private pictures, never meant to be seen beyond a certain circle of friends, occupy a morally ambiguous state. The photos of Abu Ghraib detainees menaced by guard dogs, unconsciously echoing Moore's image - as photographs lodged in the collective memory bank sometimes get replayed and even shape public behavior - imply no outrage about what's happening. In fact, the intent of the pictures is precisely to compound the humiliation. The moral quagmire brings to mind recently published photographs from German archives showing Nazis as war victims. Or the photographs from Tuol Sleng, the Khmer Rouge death camp, which the Museum of Modern Art exhibited some years ago. Shot, like the Nazi photos, for the purpose of record-keeping, they show a mother cradling a baby; two men, blindfolded and shackled, holding hands; a boy, quietly standing, with his prison number safety-pinned into his bare chest, like a modern St. Sebastian. All of them about to die. Or closer to home, the lynching photographs that went on view recently at the New-York Historical Society, which showed crowds of spectators proudly mugging at their murderous handiwork: all these photographs raise the same disturbing questions about the motives of the photographers. What did they presume about the people looking at their pictures? That said, even the most repulsive photographs bear witness. They are evidence. And therefore a kind of gift to memory. We live in an amnesiac society. The Abu Ghraib photographs have passed from the headlines to the art pages in half a year. One can only imagine how much further they may retreat in six more months. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/10/arts/design/10kimm.html?ex=1098566868&ei=1&en=d3da52e9c1211c18 --------------------------------- Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company From sudhir at circuit.sarai.net Tue Oct 12 16:00:40 2004 From: sudhir at circuit.sarai.net (sudhir at circuit.sarai.net) Date: Tue, 12 Oct 2004 12:30:40 +0200 (CEST) Subject: [Reader-list] Call for Editors - deadline extension Message-ID: <3805.163.1.43.132.1097577040.squirrel@163.1.43.132> Dear all Apologies for cross-posting as this is likely to be of interest to many on these lists. Best Sudhir RECRUITMENT: DEADLINE EXTENSION The International Journal of Communications Law and Policy (IJCLP) is expanding its activities and is looking to recruit three new editors, with immediate effect. The ideal candidate is an academic scholar with a strong background in(network) economics, political science, computer science, communications and information management studies, or cultural theory, having an interest in communications law. All things being equal, preference will be given to candidates from jurisdictions not yet represented on the IJCLP board. Successful candidates will become part of an international team and network of young scholars in communications law and Internet studies. The editorial board’s main task is the on-line publication of semi-annual issues on international communications law, and the organization of writing competitions in conjunction with international conferences on related topics. Applications should be sent to Simone Bonetti & Boris Rotenberg. These shouldinclude a brief resume or CV, and a 500 word cover letter explaining the applicant’s suitability for this appointment. The deadline for sending in applications is now 1 pm EST on 14th October 2004. For more information on IJCLP, please visit our site (www.ijclp.org), or contact Simone Bonetti (simo.bonetti at tiscali.it) & Boris Rotenberg (boris_rotenberg at yahoo.it). --------------------------------- From definetime at rediffmail.com Mon Oct 11 17:45:46 2004 From: definetime at rediffmail.com (sanjay ghosh) Date: 11 Oct 2004 12:15:46 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] (Fwd) 7 billion $ lawsuit launched against Bush & Co. Message-ID: <20041011121546.3913.qmail@webmail17.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041011/2d18902c/attachment.html -------------- next part --------------   Note: Forwarded message attached -- Orignal Message -- From: "Rakesh Kapoor" To: "Sanjay Ghosh" Subject: Fw: 7 billion $ lawsuit launched against Bush & Co. (fwd) -------------- next part -------------- An embedded message was scrubbed... From: "Rakesh Kapoor" Subject: Fw: 7 billion $ lawsuit launched against Bush & Co. (fwd) Date: no date Size: 43010 Url: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041011/2d18902c/attachment.mht From definetime at rediffmail.com Tue Oct 12 10:48:55 2004 From: definetime at rediffmail.com (sanjay ghosh) Date: 12 Oct 2004 05:18:55 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] (fwd) Why not eat children? Message-ID: <20041012051855.12231.qmail@webmail27.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041012/9f915b79/attachment.html -------------- next part --------------   Why not eat children? Reforms that are presented as economic necessities are in fact usually political choices Alan Freeman Tuesday October 12, 2004 The Guardian Is social justice possible in a world dominated by corporate globalisation? This Friday, more than 20,000 people, drawn from social movements, peace organisations and trade unions across Europe and the world, will converge on London for the third European Social Forum to debate how to change direction. The experience of two countries, in particular, poses the question most starkly: Germany's welfare state reforms under Gerhard Schröder, and the transformation of Venezuela under Hugo Chavez. The fundamental issue is: does society serve the economy, or should the economy serve society? The core of Schröder's Agenda 2010 package - alongside cuts in health and education spending - is labour reform. Private capital has deserted Germany. Investment has sunk from 24% to 20% of GDP in 10 years, leaving 4.5 million people without work. Schröder's solution is to drastically reduce what German citizens since Bismarck have regarded as universal rights. Long-term income support will be cut to a minimal €345 (£240) per month, and withdrawn from anyone refusing any job in any part of Germany, while workfare and self-employment schemes will create a new layer of low-paid workers in precarious jobs. In short, the market is to have its way with the people. The most salient fact about these reforms is that the German people don't want them. This reality lies behind the ruling Social Democratic party's catastrophic recent election performance, the revival of the left-leaning Party of Democratic Socialism and, more ominously, the growth of the openly fascist right. This groundswell of opposition confronts an inherently undemocratic argument: what you want socially doesn't count, because the reforms are economically unavoidable - there is no other way to revive investment and growth except to cut the rights and price of labour. Germans may prefer not to push a million more children below the poverty line, and the odd bleeding-heart liberal may shrink from converting the workless into itinerants. Unfortunately, in a globalised world, there is only one route to a competitive Germany: do what the market requires. But there is an instructive flaw in this central claim of the "reformers". On the most basic index of world market performance - trade - Germany is competitive, with an all-time high second-quarter surplus of €24bn. The real question is how to use that surplus, as happened during the 20 years when Germany achieved its current prosperity, to make sustainable and democratic social choices for Germany's future. The only sane answer is to adopt economic policies that use the surplus for social justice. It's not as if such policies don't exist. Germany has the economic and political clout to take a different path, and to change the roadmap. Berlin could revive growth and employment by reigning in the Bundesbank; enchanting the world by using its influence to slash euro interest rates (coinciding with Gordon Brown's objectives); and launching, for the first time from the left, a wave of state-led investment to bring Germany back from the brink of a new post-Versailles chaos. But it chooses not to heed its voters. It chooses the alternative to social rights. It chooses to open the gates to the far right - because that is what the neoliberal establishment demands. Every apparently economic choice is, in reality, social. We can choose a society of basic rights - education, health, housing, child support and a dignified pension - or greed, pandemic inequality, ecological vandalism, civic chaos and social despair. As Jonathan Swift satirically suggested, if economic efficiency is the only issue, why not solve all problems by eating children? Schröder's reforms are a delusionary reversal of the relation between economy and society. Justice and democracy are sacrificed on the altar of a mythical market presented, like the gods of an ancient religion, as a force outside society instead of a creation of it. They are a political choice dressed up as a market necessity. Of course, some social options are not available under any economic system. It would be utopian to raise hopes of what simply cannot be. But Germany's choices are not of this type. All periods of high German economic growth coincided with large-scale social provision. Indeed, growth under the welfare state, at 240% from 1950-1970, has never been equalled. Another Germany is entirely possible, under three conditions. Society must get what it genuinely wants; economic policy must deliver this; and political alliances must carry these policies out. The evidence in support of such approaches comes from many places, particularly Latin America whose rich experience will feature in the ESF debates in London this weekend. Western liberal and social democracy is still evaluating the experiments of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, Lula in Brazil, and Nestor Kirchner in Argentina, but some things are already clear. First, "economic rationality" in the shape of neoliberal globalisation is socially and politically suicidal. In 25 years, the ratio between average income in the advanced countries and the rest of the world has more than doubled, from 10.7 to 23.3 - the steepest increase in history. In Argentina, whose experience is no different from the rest of the continent, the ratio between the average income of the top and the bottom decile has risen from 25 to 64 in 10 years. Market-driven globalisation is tearing these societies apart. Second, when a figure such as Chavez proposes even quite moderate social reforms to re-establish, for broad swaths of the population, such basic rights as literacy, a minimum income, education and health, then political and social support is overwhelming. One need not even refer to the election's outcome for proof. The Venezuelan opposition itself integrated these reforms into its election programme. Faced with the tide of social backing for them, spurious arguments about economic sustainability melted away. Moreover, no one contests the actual numbers of people who voted. By any standard, Venezuela testifies that when social objectives are placed in the driving seat, the result is a massive re-engagement of the population into the political process. The most simplistic response - that Venezuela's oil gave it the economic resources to make these changes - is the keystone of the matter. Of course, Venezuela has oil. So does the Middle East. But unlike other oil-rich states, Venezuela chose to use its resources to social ends. This was a political, not an economic choice. If poverty-racked Venezuela can apply a different economic model right next door to the centre of US military operations in the continent - in Colombia - then so can wealthy Germany, Europe and Japan, and so, for that matter, can the US. Another world really is possible. The social forum, which began in Brazil's Porto Alegre, will make it so by reversing the traditional direction of intellectual trade. Instead of exporting northern economics to the south, it will begin importing southern sociology to the north. · Alan Freeman is co-editor, with Boris Kagarlitsky, of The Politics of Empire and the Crisis of Globalisation, published by Pluto. Both will be speaking at the European Social Forum at Alexandra Palace in London on Saturday afreeman at iwgvt.org The Guardian is media partner for the ESF. Bookings available via www.fse-esf.org From coolzanny at hotmail.com Wed Oct 13 07:40:44 2004 From: coolzanny at hotmail.com (Zainab Bawa) Date: Wed, 13 Oct 2004 07:40:44 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Tea Shop Message-ID: 7 October 2004 Tea Shop This afternoon, we decided to have tea after lunch. There are quite a few tea shops around Nirala Residential Area. Some of them are simple structures built of material like wood and hay. Some are more established, in the sense of being concretized, along the lines of tea shop cum restaurant. Tea is a relatively cheap affair. You can ask for a �choto cha� which means small tea (i.e. half cup) or a �bodo cha� which means a big tea (i.e. full cup). Then again, you have �lal cha� which means red tea without milk or you have �dudh cha� which means milk tea. The lal cha contains lemon and ginger if you may please while the dudh cha is an illusion of milk because Milkmaid or condensed milk is used as a substitute for real milk. Lal cha costs two taka while dudh cha is about three taka and half both these prices in case you have a choto cha. Apart from tea, the tea shop serves you tidbits like breads of different kinds, kola (bananas), biscuits, candies and toffees, and fried snacks in case it is a concretized tea shop. In case of a wayside tea shop made out of wood, normally a little wooden bench is placed outside for about two to four people to sit a time while sipping tea. A tea shop is more than just the structure. It is a location, a place and more importantly, a space with a different sense of time. A tea shop is a point of convergence. An example is the tea shops in Kolkatta which are known as �addas� or place for gossip and discussion. Increasingly, tea shops are being replaced (if I may say so) by coffee shops and tea houses including Barristas and Caf�offee Days. One idea of a tea shop in Mumbai City could be the Uddipi restaurants, though while in an Uddipi tea is a cheap affair, it is also a rushed affair during lunch times and business hours. It is intriguing to examine the notions of time and space in both, the modern structures as well as the traditional ones. A Barrista or a modern day coffee shop/caf�s an individualized space. In contrast, the tea shop, like the one I am mentioning here in Khulna, is more a community space. The main difference between the Barrista and tea shop is that the former is an enclosed space (or closed space) while the latter is such that it is an open space, even if it is a concretized tea shop. This then means that the terms for entry and exit are different in both cases. In case of a Barrista, you have to fulfill certain social and economic criteria in order to access it. In case of a tea shop, it is open to all. People of some segments of social and economic classes may not frequent/patronize the tea shop because of their own inhibitions, but the place as such does not put restrictions on you. Also important is the very prices of tea and coffee in both these places - in a Barrista, you must at least have fifty rupees to make an entry whereas in a tea shop, five taka could do you enough. Further, the concept of credit operates at the tea shop unlike in a Barrista where service is on the basis of immediate payment � only credit cards here please! I believe the same analogy can also be applied to the local general store (kiryana shop) as against a mall like Big Bazaar if you have to shop groceries and food stuff � no credits in the case of the latter. The tea shop at Nirala is a place where students from the University gather. They discuss academics, happenings at the university, gossiping about professors and girls in the campus. The tea shop is then one of the locations where time is practiced in terms of leisure and growth of individual and his relationships (I say �his� because usually, a tea shop in Khulna tends to be a male affair. Females visit tea shops if they are accompanied by men. Otherwise you do not see them around much at the tea shops. In this sense, access to Barrista is not restricted in terms of gender.) The other important point of difference between a Barrista and a tea shop is the practice of leisure. When you are done with your coffee in Barrista, you are expected to either leave or order for something else. You have to pay to sit, though there are some exceptions in case if Barrista is not crowded, it is possible that you can sit inspite of having finished with your grub and are not ordering anymore. In a tea shop in contrast, the idea is to encourage you to continue sitting, or there are no restrictions if you sit even after you have finished. If you continue sitting, it is likely that you will ask for another cup of tea. Also, since credit systems do work in a tea shop, your desire to go easy is not restricted by the currency in your pocket. I do not know what place a tea shop would have in an urban setting like Mumbai. These are the days of coffee and tea machines � instant and quick. I associate a tea shop with the very practice and notion of time and also with the idea of a meeting space. Does it then not make greater sense to improve upon the designs of indigenous structures rather than import entirely new concepts and structures from outside? _________________________________________________________________ Sports, sports and more sports! Keep up with all that�s happening! http://www.msn.co.in/sports/ Stay connected with MSN Sports! From coolzanny at hotmail.com Wed Oct 13 07:40:02 2004 From: coolzanny at hotmail.com (Zainab Bawa) Date: Wed, 13 Oct 2004 07:40:02 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] A Month of Travel: Viewing the City Message-ID: 4-6 October 2004 Mumbai-Howrah Mail via Nagpur and via the road border to Bangladesh This month I am a traveler. As you have already seen, I am transferring myself from Mumbai to Bangladesh in the span of the next three night and two days. But what makes this journey interesting is the fact that I seem to better understand my own city when I am away from it. I can see the transitions and transformations in Mumbai with greater clarity when I am in another place. I began my journey on the night of October 4. A co-passenger, heading towards Bhandara, was talking to me. He was telling me about his experiences in the local trains of Mumbai in is day-long visit to the city. While the crowds seemed to have shocked him, he was also in awe of the world that exists within the realm of the compartment. When the train halted at Dadar, a marketing executive in an international medical company got in. He was headed for Nagpur and he also began to recount his experiences in the local train in the morning of day long visit to the city. �It�s crazy here! There is no life in Mumbai. I think Delhi is at least better in this respect. In Mumbai, people are just rushing. No time for family, no nothing. If there is one day of holiday, then the family wants to go to a multiplex theater which means two to two and a half thousand rupees worth of expenditure. I am so glad that there is no multiplex theater in Nagpur. If there would have been one and my wife would have demanded that I take her there, it would have meant a deep hole in my pocket!� Both individuals spoke of their early morning train rides to their workplace destinations. The Bhandara chap was an engineer. He said, �My goodness, what things they sell inside the train. Today I saw that the hawkers were selling a torch which helps you to detect a fake currency note from the original and the best part was that people were buying. Then, I was waiting at Ghatkopar railway station and I saw that people were crossing the railway tracks inspite of the overhead bridges. I cannot dare to this.� The Nagpur marketing executive was not at all impressed and he said, �I think this is crazy. Look at the amount of people on a railway station. I think Thackeray is right when he says throw out all the migrants from the city. Clearly, there seem to be too many migrants in here.� But the Bhandara chap insisted, �However terrible, it is worth the experience to travel in a local train. At least you must go through it once.� I am stating the above conversation with the aim to communicate perspectives to you � how people from outside Mumbai see the city. Also, the chat between the two of them reveals subtly notions of heritage in a city. Definitely, the local train is an important lived heritage of Mumbai. This month, we shall take a look at Khulna City in Bangladesh. Khulna is a �developing� city. Usually, the mention of Bangladesh brings to mind the immediate and spontaneous association of Dhaka. But I will move a bit from the immediacy and spontaneity and deviate from the norm. Before we delve into Khulna, let�s briefly look at last month�s work and summarize some of the main observations and analyses: � The Railway Station is now becoming a site for surveillance and policing in addition to transport of workforce and goods, and facilitating movement across the city. In one of the developments towards the end of September, the railway police have introduced Sniffer Dogs and Equipment to check luggage and passengers at VT�s outstation railway platforms. The purpose behind this move is to detect narcotics and explosives if any. Seems like one of the unintended (aka delayed) effects of September 11! � The Seafront in Mumbai has definitely seen an important change i.e. removal of hawkers from the overall experience of time on the seafront. They have now been relegated to some distant, remote corner. They are also under strict surveillance, especially at Nariman Point. At one point in time, a family visit to the seafront would be a sort of picnic and hawkers would form an essential part of that experience of picnic. Today, while hawkers are out of the picnic experience, at some level, digital cameras and video-cameras are becoming part of the �visit and picnic� experience. � The seafront is an important space for senior citizens in the city. It allows them the luxury to congregate with their community and socialize. � Jogging is a multifarious activity with different connotations including social, sexual (in terms of image), economic (meaning makes business sense to jog), health and personal and political (because usually personal politics are discussed and deliberated upon while jogging. For instance, a group of married women jogging would discuss family politics. Two office colleagues jogging would mean talks about office politics, etc.). � Time spent on the seafront is individual time and individual space even amidst crowds. This is what makes the sea face a special location in the city � it affords anonymity while at the same time, it is an experience of community where the individual is not alone in his/her contemplations, reflections and explorations because there are others around him/her too. � Anonymity is also a feature of the railway station. Both at Churchgate and VT, the transitions are quick. Therefore, visibility is either absent or temporary at a railway station. Whether this principle of �transient visibility� applies to the advertisement boards and hoardings at the railway stations in addition to human beings is an investigation I shall attempt to conduct in November. � Railway stations are receiving gradual facelifts to fit the bill of �global city development� or what our planners and bureaucrats call �the Shanghai model�. Mini television screens is one such introduction in the subway market of Churchgate. While these facelifts take place, some things indigenous still retain their place and relevance. For e.g. the original UP pani-puri and bhel-puri shop owner in the Churchgate subway market. It is this fusion/imposition/superimposition which makes for interesting study and raises questions about history, locality, future development and the global city model. I will now make a very brief description of Khulna City and how its study makes for important in terms of the work I am conducting in Mumbai. Like I mentioned above, Khulna is a �developing� city which means shopping malls are gradually coming up here and multinational corporations are establishing their presence and space. This is my second visit to Khulna. The last time I was here (which was more than a year ago), Khulna appeared more like a town to me. Its special feature is the existence of Khulna University which then makes this a student city, somewhat along the lines of Pune. Time and space are different practices here. The seafront in Khulna is known as the �Ferry Ghat� which is more of a commercial hub than a space for recreation and outing. Similarly, the railway station is meant for inter-city transport and not for local purposes. The local mode of transport is the cycle rickshaw and the �bhen�. What�s a bhen? In simple terms, a bhen resembles the hawker�s four wheel flat cart i.e. with a wooden plank and four wheels which help in ferrying. The difference in the case of the bhen and the hawker�s cart is in terms of design and degree i.e. the bhen has a three-wheel cycle with a wooden plank on it. At one time, about six people can be ferried on a bhen. It is a kind of community transport vehicle, say along the lines of a public bus where people get on and off at different points of the journey. The cycle rickshaw is more individual in contrast. There is also the auto-rickshaw which is known as �baby taxi�. Baby taxi is meant for long distance transport and is rarely used. Khulna city is linear. It has certain locations which have their respective practices of time and space. Let me attempt to put forward a few here. The first is the New Market which is a market complex for shopping, snacks and outing. Every city and town in Bangladesh has a New Market which is closed every Tuesday. In New Market, people conduct window shopping which is usually a leisure activity universally. Thus, time acquires a different notion here. Then there is the Bodo Bazaar which is a wholesale market for meat, vegetables, fruits and household items including utensils and low-cost furniture. It is mighty crowded and is a site of quick transitions � this means that you shop, and move forward quickly. Else, you shall be pushed away or aside. It somehow reminds me of the railway station in Mumbai � space crunch produces faster transitions in terms of movement, is it? Bodo Bazaar also has its share of technology shops including photo studios some of which have latest technology in them. There is a huge commercial tower like complex here known as Jalil Towers where computer equipment and all kinds of software and hardware can be procured. Picture Palace, the city�s only cinema hall is located in Bodo Bazaar. It is said that all kinds of vulgar Bengali films are shown in here. Then there is the Nirala Mod which means Nirala residential complex market converging point. (Mod is a Hindi term for something like a point where things and places converge.) Nirala Mod is again a multifarious place which means that it has a wholesale vegetable and meat market known as Kaccha Bazaar in the vicinity. It also has quite a few shops where stationery items are sold, the reason being that the Mod is close to the University and hence, the students are the main buyers around here. The Mod also has several kinds of eateries, again because students from the University frequent here. The Mod has its own unique pace. It is neither too rushed, nor too easy. The Mod is also a site for transport. It is here where buses head towards the Gullamari bridge where the main bus stand is situated. One can also see the University bus running along here. The University bus is meant for students of the University. One has to simply say �Baarsity� and get on the bus. Else, say �Chhatro� which means student and you are assured a free ride. I shall end here. What makes Khulna an interesting place for study is its now rapidly changing practices of time and space given that it is �developing�. The developments are rather rapid. Two shopping malls in the space of one year�s time, including introduction of huge advertising boards at Moila Putta Mod and various international electronic and technology showrooms including Sony and others have begun to change the character of this town cum city. People are beginning to move out, not just into sphere of the global market through the shopping malls, but also out of the socially established practices and customs of family and community. More laters!!! _________________________________________________________________ All the news that matters. All the gossip from home. http://www.msn.co.in/NRI/ Specially for NRIs! From coolzanny at hotmail.com Wed Oct 13 07:45:32 2004 From: coolzanny at hotmail.com (Zainab Bawa) Date: Wed, 13 Oct 2004 07:45:32 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Safe and Save! Message-ID: 8 October 2004 Safe and Save Mall This evening, I went to a shopping mall which is situated right behind New Market. It is called Safe and Save. Yeah, I know the name sounds funny, but I have noticed that even in a city like Srinagar, shops tend to have these funny little names. Safe and Save is a new mall. As you enter, you are confronted with about six little television screens which monitor movements of customers, what I call �shop lifting detection machines�. Safe and Save is two storeyed. The ground floor consists mainly of food and household items including meat, vegetables, fruits, washing powders, toiletries, and a plethora of such things which a housewife tends to be obsessed with. The top floor or first floor if you may please consists of garments department, leather accessories and shoes department, and perfumes, etc. Basically, it is a complete mall which means everything is available under one roof (and in two floors). Today being a Friday (Bangladesh has weekly holiday on Friday as per the convention followed in Islamic countries), there is an unusual rush of people shopping all over. On the ground floor, there are various offers and freebies on display � �purchase two and get one free�, �buy goods worth so much and get this gift�, �lucky draw�, �prices of some items below the marked price�, etc. Of course, VAT is the norm here in case of shopping malls here. Couple of interesting things I observed around here. Firstly, several burkha clad women were seen around with their families in the shopping mall. I perceived that these burkha clad women belonged to the upper economic strata of Bangladeshi society. The mall is an important source of outing for them. Is it their breathing place? I dunno! I also noticed that not so well-to-do families were also around here, trying to purchase some household items. It seems like the malls are a novelty in the lives of the people here. Before getting to the mall, I was discussing with a friend about how when I was in this city last year, people would often tell me that Dhaka is more fun than living in Khulna. �That�s because�, he said, �there are hardly any artificial avenues for entertainment here unlike in Dhaka. Besides, there is no place to go for an outing. If you take the example of Srinagar, the moment you step out of the house, it is outing � you have the mountains, the Dal Lake, and what have you. In Srinagar, you do not need artificial avenues of entertainment. Here, people want an outlet � they want to go somewhere!� So, the shopping mall seems to give them an entry into the global market of goods and products. My friend�s words gave me a flash of insight � the seafront in Mumbai city is actually an important avenue for outing and recreation. Here�s a place where you do not have to pay to hang around. You simply have a good time here! In Delhi city, such avenues are sparse. The only crowded place that I have seen, especially at nights, is the India Gate where people laze around and chat with friends and family. Safe and Save has an interesting design concept � it is a bold experiment in terms of composition and building. That is an interesting part about architecture in Bangladesh. Further, architects are able to exactly recreate international models of commercial buildings here � apparently, their sense of composition of space is better here, as an architect practicing here tells me! As the tea shop, the mall also gives me food to think about the very notions of �public� and �private� in a city and the concept of space. Don�t have much to say for the time being, but hopefully, we shall return back to this concept very soon. _________________________________________________________________ Sports, sports and more sports! Keep up with all that�s happening! http://www.msn.co.in/sports/ Stay connected with MSN Sports! From vivek at sarai.net Wed Oct 13 12:46:18 2004 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Wed, 13 Oct 2004 12:46:18 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Fwd: NYTimes.com Article: The Mystery of the Bulge in the Jacket] Message-ID: <416CD642.1020302@sarai.net> To construct W. as an individual, acting subject would be a mistake: Bush, it seems, is at the very least a committee, and this is especially true in the context of today's instantaneous networks. (See article below.) The Mystery of the Bulge in the Jacket October 9, 2004 By ELISABETH BUMILLER WASHINGTON, Oct. 8 - What was that bulge in the back of President Bush's suit jacket at the presidential debate in Miami last week? According to rumors racing across the Internet this week, the rectangular bulge visible between Mr. Bush's shoulder blades was a radio receiver, getting answers from an offstage counselor into a hidden presidential earpiece. The prime suspect was Karl Rove, Mr. Bush's powerful political adviser. When the online magazine Salon published an article about the rumors on Friday, the speculation reached such a pitch that White House and campaign officials were inundated with calls. First they said that pictures showing the bulge might have been doctored. But then, when the bulge turned out to be clearly visible in the television footage of the evening, they offered a different explanation. "There was nothing under his suit jacket," said Nicolle Devenish, a campaign spokeswoman. "It was most likely a rumpling of that portion of his suit jacket, or a wrinkle in the fabric." Ms. Devenish could not say why the "rumpling" was rectangular. Nor was the bulge from a bulletproof vest, according to campaign and White House officials; they said Mr. Bush was not wearing one. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/09/politics/campaign/09bulge.html?ex=1098630913&ei=1&en=74f4b39d9fd826e7 From tellsachin at yahoo.com Tue Oct 12 23:42:11 2004 From: tellsachin at yahoo.com (Sachin Agarwal) Date: Tue, 12 Oct 2004 11:12:11 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Re: facets of metro. In-Reply-To: <20041012060252.70E6228EBC3@mail.sarai.net> Message-ID: <20041012181212.67306.qmail@web41521.mail.yahoo.com> see another aspect of how metro changed the lives of people. at http://www.chowk.com/show_article.cgi?aid=00003910&channel=market%20street&start=10&end=19&page=2&chapter=1&order=0 Apart from the status of a world-class public transport system, the Delhi Metro is also forcing unemployment upon thousands. Although it has created a few hundred technical jobs, but talk to shopkeepers and rehri-wallahs (street vendor/hawker) whose small establishments were demolished to erect tall concrete structures for the Delhi Metro. The central and state governments both want to take credit for the Delhi Metro, but who will take credit for the losses in the incomes of thousands of Delhi�s lesser mortals? Most owners of the �blue line� buses (earlier called �red line�), the backbone of the city�s public transport system, depend on the daily income generated by their bus. The conductor, driver and the bus-owner share their revenue at the end of each day. Their hardship in acquiring a CNG bus for twenty lakh rupees and selling their diesel bus at throwaway prices, largely remained out of the sight of the mainstream media. This has had profound effects on their living standards. sachin agarwal --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? vote.yahoo.com - Register online to vote today! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041012/5acede39/attachment.html From sadan at sarai.net Wed Oct 13 14:15:30 2004 From: sadan at sarai.net (Sadan Jha) Date: Wed, 13 Oct 2004 14:15:30 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Juddith Butler on Jacques Derrida Message-ID: <416CEB2A.30908@sarai.net> Dear all, I found this text by Juddith Butler on Derrida and thought to share it with you. sadan. On Jacques Derrida October 9, 2004 Judith Butler "How do you finally respond to your life and your name?" Derrida raised this question in his final interview with Le Monde, published in August 18th of this year. If he could apprehend his life, he remarks, he would also be obliged to apprehend his death as singular and absolute, without resurrection and without redemption. At this revealing moment, it is interesting that Derrida the philosopher should find in Socrates his proper precursor, that he should turn to Socrates to understand that, at the age of 74, he still did not quite know how best to live. One cannot, he remarks, come to terms with one's life without trying to apprehend one's death, asking, in effect, how a human lives and dies. Much of Derrida's later work is dedicated to mourning, though he offers his acts of public mourning as a posthumous gift, for instance, in The Work of Mourning published in 2001. There he tries to come to terms with the death of other writers and thinkers through reckoning his debt to their words, indeed, their texts; his own writing constitutes an act of mourning, one that he is perhaps, avant la lettre, recommending to us a way to begin to mourn this thinker who not only taught us how to read, but gave the act of reading a new significance and a new promise. In that book, he openly mourns Roland Barthes who died in 1980, Paul de Man, who died in 1983, Michel Foucault, who died in 1984, and a host of others, including Edmund Jabes (1991), Louis Marin (1992), Sarah Kofman (1994), Emmanuel Levinas (1995) and Jean-Francois Lyotard (1998). The last of the essays, for Lyotard, included in this book is written six years before Derrida's own death. It is not, however, Derrida's own death that preoccupies him here, but rather his "debts." These are authors that he could not do without, ones with whom and through whom he thinks. He writes only because he reads, and he reads only because there are these authors to read time and again. He "owes" them something or, perhaps, everything, if only because he could not write without them; their writing exists as the precondition of his own; their writing constitutes the means through which his own writing voice is animated and secured, a voice that emerges, importantly, as an address. It strikes me as strange that in October of 1993 when I shared a stage with Derrida at New York University, I had a brief, private conversation with him that touched upon these issues. As we were seated at a table together with some other speakers, I could see in Derrida a certain urgency to acknowledge those many people who had translated him, those who had read him, those who had defended him in public debate, and those who has made good use of his thinking and his words. I leaned over after one of his several gestures of nearly inhuman generosity and asked him whether he felt that he had many debts to pay. I was hoping, vainly it seemed, to suggest to him that he need not feel so indebted, thinking as I did in a perhaps naively Nietzschean way that the debt was a form of enslavement, and that he did not see that what others offered him, they offered freely. He seemed not to be able to hear me in English. And so when I said "your debts," he said, "my death?" "No," I reiterated, "your debts!" and he said, "my death!?" At this point I could see that there was a nexus between the two, one that my efforts at clear pronunciation could not quite pierce, but it was not until I read his later work that I came to understand how important that nexus really was. He writes, "There come moments when, as mourning demands (deuil oblige), one feels obligated to declare one's debts. We feel it our duty to say what we owe to the friend." He cautions against "saying" the debt and imagining that one might then be done with the debt that way. He acknowledges instead the "incalculable debt" that one that he does not want to pay: "I am conscious of this and want it thus." He ends his essay on Lyotard with a direct address: "there it is, Jean Francois, this is what, I tell myself, I today would have wanted to try and tell you." There is in that attempt, that essai, a longing that cannot reach the one to whom it is addressed, but does not for that reason forfeit itself as longing. The act of mourning thus becomes a continued way of "speaking to" the other who is gone, even though the other is gone, in spite of the fact that the other is gone, precisely because that other is gone. We now must say "Jacques" to name the one we have now lost, and in that sense "Jacques Derrida" becomes the name of our loss. And yet we must continue to say his name, not only to mark his passing, but precisely as the one whom we continue to address, in what we write, because it is, for many of us, impossible to write without relying on him, without thinking with and through him. "Jacques Derrida," then, as the name for the future of what we write. * * * It is surely uncontroversial to say that Jacques Derrida was one of the greatest philosophers of the 20th century, that his international reputation far exceeds any French intellectual of his generation. More than that, his work fundamentally changed the way in which we think about language, philosophy, aesthetics, painting, literature, communication, ethics and politics. His early work criticized the structuralist presumption that language could be described as a static set of rules, and he showed how those rules admitted of contingency and were dependent on a temporality that could undermine their efficacy. He wrote against philosophical positions that uncritically subscribed to "totality" or "systematicity" as values, without first considering the alternatives that were ruled out by that preemptive valorization. He insisted that the act of reading extends from literary texts to films, to works of art, to popular culture, to political scenarios, and to philosophy itself. The practice of "reading" insists that our ability to understand relies on our capacity to interpret signs. It also presupposes that signs come to signify in ways that no particular author or speaker can constrain in advance through intention. This does not mean that our language always confounds our intentions, but only that our intentions do not fully govern everything we end up meaning by what we say and write (see Limited Inc., 1977). Derridaâs work moved from a criticism of philosophical presumptions in groundbreaking books such as On Grammatology (1967), Writing and Difference (1967), Dissemination (1972), The Post Card (1980), and Spurs (1978), to the question of how to theorize the problem of "difference." This term he wrote as "différance," not only to mark the way that signification works, with one term referring to another, always relying on a deferral of meaning between signifier and signified, but also to characterize an ethical relation, the relation of sexual difference, and the relation to the Other. If some readers thought that Derrida was a linguistic constructivist, they missed the fact that the name we have for something, for ourselves, for an other, is precisely what fails to capture the referent (as opposed to making or constructing that referent). He clearly drew critically on the work of Emmanuel Levinas in order to insist upon the "Other" as one to whom an incalculable responsibility is owed, one who could never fully be "captured" through social categories or designative names, one to whom a certain response is owed. This framework became the basis of his strenuous critique of apartheid in South Africa, his vigilant opposition to totalitarian regimes and forms of intellectual censorship, his theorization of the nation-state beyond the hold of territoriality, his opposition to European racism, and his critical relation to the discourse of "terror" as it worked to fortify governmental powers that undermine basic human rights, in his defense of animal rights, in his opposition to the death penalty, and even in his queries about "being" Jewish and what it means to offer hospitality to those of differing origins and language. One can see these various questions raised in The Ear of the Other (1982), The Other Europe, Positions (1972), For Nelson Mandela (1986), Given Time (1991) The Gift of Death (1992), The Other Heading: Reflections on Today's Europe (1992), Spectres of Marx (1993), Politics of Friendship (1994), The Monolingualism of the Other (1996), Philosophy in a Time of Terror (with Jurgen Habermas) (2002), and his conversations with Helene Cixous, Portrait of Jacques Derrida as a Young Jewish Saint (2001). Derrida made clear in his small book on Walter Benjamin, The Force of Law (1994), that justice was a concept that was yet to come. This does not mean that we cannot expect instances of justice in this life, and it does not mean that justice will arrive for us only in another life. He was clear that there was no other life. It means only that, as an ideal, it is that toward which we strive, without end. Not to strive for justice because it cannot be fully realized would be as mistaken as believing that one has already arrived at justice and that the only task is to arm oneself adequately to fortify its regime. The first is a form of nihilism (which he opposed) and the second is dogmatism (which he opposed). Derrida kept us alive to the practice of criticism, understanding that social and political transformation was an incessant project, one that could not be relinquished, one that was coextensive with the becoming of life itself, and with a reading of the rules through which a polity constitutes itself through exclusion or effacement. How is justice done? What justice do we owe others? And what does it mean to act in the name of justice? These were questions that had to be asked regardless of the consequences, and this meant that they were often questions asked when established authorities wished that they were not. If his critics worried that, with Derrida, there are no foundations upon which one could rely, they doubtless were mistaken in that view. Derrida relies perhaps most assiduously on Socrates, on a mode of philosophical inquiry that took the question as the most honest and arduous form for thought. "How do you finally respond to your life and to your name?" This question is posed by him to himself, and yet he is, in this interview, a "tu" for himself, as if he is a proximate friend, but not quite a "moi." He has taken himself as the other, modeling a form of reflexivity, asking whether an account can be given of this life, and of this death. Is there justice to be done to a life? That he asks the question is exemplary, perhaps even foundational, since it keeps the final meaning of that life and that name open. It prescribes a ceaseless task of honoring what cannot be possessed through knowledge, that in a life that exceeds our grasp. Indeed, now that Derrida, the person, has died, his writing makes a demand upon us, bequeathing his name to us who will continue to address him. We must address him as he addressed himself, asking what it means to know and approach another, to apprehend a life and a death, to give an account of its meaning, to acknowledge its binding ties with others, and to do that justly. In this way, Derrida has always been offering us a way to interrogate the very meaning of our lives, singly and plurally, returning to the question as the beginning of philosophy, but surely also, in his own way, and with several unpayable debts, beginning philosophy anew. From shivamvij at gmail.com Thu Oct 14 17:29:56 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Thu, 14 Oct 2004 04:59:56 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] 'Copyright laws must strike a balance': Arjun Message-ID: Copyright laws must strike a balance: Arjun [India News]: New Delhi, Oct. 13: http://www.newkerala.com/news-daily/news/features.php?action=fullnews&id=36378 Human Resource Development Minister, Arjun Singh has called for evolving a regime of intellectual property rights which strikes a balance between private incentives for innovators and the public interests by maximizing access to intellectual products. Inaugurating the Asia-Pacific Symposium on Emerging Issues of Copyright Protection in the Digital Environment here today, he said that the advent of digital technology has created a new world order by tearing asunder national boundaries in cyber space. He said that while the new technology helps in wide dissemination of content on the one hand, it also facilitates piracy. The Minister said that the country was somewhat groping in dark about ten years ago when digital technology and its products made a mark in the world. He expressed satisfaction that India has one of the most modern copyright laws in the world today to protect the interests of innovators, according to a press release. The three day conference has been organised by the Ministry of Human Resources Development in collaboration with the Geneva based World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) and Delhi University. Over 40 participants from about 20 Asia-Pacific countries are attending the Symposium. The participants will be sharing their national experiences as also to deliberate on changes that should be brought about to protect intellectual property rights.(ANI). From avinash at csdsdelhi.org Wed Oct 13 17:01:47 2004 From: avinash at csdsdelhi.org (Avinash Jha) Date: Wed, 13 Oct 2004 17:01:47 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Politics of American Un-civilization Message-ID: <003101c4b117$f9b09540$4a00a8c0@library> Friends, I am appending below my translation of a small piece that appeared in the Hindi journal 'LokVidya Samvad'. The piece argues that the worldwide publicity of torture taking place in Abu Gharaib and elsewhere is part of a plan. I take the claim seriously and would like to inquire into how exactly these pictures were leaked to the media. I have read that Seymoor Hersh and CBS Television were the first to publish these. What is their background? Are there any heroic stories as to how this leak was made possible? Are there any US enquiries as to the security lapses which made this leak possible? It does seem to me that appearance one after another of these videos and pictures from a high security prison is suspicious. avinash From: LOKVIDYA SAMVAD, No. 14, July 2004 (p.20) Politics of American Un-civilization What happened in Abu Gharaib prison and the worldwide publicity it gained, both should be regarded as parts of US strategy. It is not a strategy of war but the strategy of establishing an uncivilized regime in the world. This should also be seen in the context of forthcoming elections in the US to which Bush Administration is responding in part by this particular strategy. The story goes that the Officers of the US Army may have been aware of the torture of Iraqi prisoners but they were not a part of it, and that the pictures and videos of the torture were heroically leaked to the media leading to their worldwide dissemination. We think this is just lies. Ever since the war has been on in Iraq, the US has successfully censored the news and pictures coming out of there. There were hardly any pictures of the protracted battles that took place while the pictures of the demolition of Saddam Hussain's statue were repeated over and over again on the TV screens. Only victories of US army found place in the media coverage. Only on rare occasions did one fine the stories of Iraqi Army's resilience and of defeats suffered by US forces. Is the heroism of the media limited only to showing the victimhood of Iraqis? The truth lies somewhere else. The whole thing is about the priorities and policies of the US administration. The way US went ahead to start a war in Iraq solely on the basis of its military strength in opposition to global resistance, spurning the sentiments of people everywhere, and by completely disregarding the United Nations, brings to light the current US policy and strategy. The policy clearly is to rule the world and the strategy is terror. US cannot hope to win the support of people and countries to its policies on the basis of their consent. It can gain their allegiance only by striking fear into them. By publicizing the pictures from Abu Gharaib depicting behavior that crosses all limits, the US is telling everyone that the people opposing US will meet with the same consequences. The worldwide publicity of these pictures can only be part of a well-thought out strategy. This year's election also requires Bush administration to show itself as that demon which has in it to rule the world with iron hand. In the age of globalisation, control on international trade can be exercised only in this manner and only thus the dream of an American Century can be fulfilled. The republican party cannot trounce the democratic party by paying lip service to democratic values or by talking about international cooperation. Only way Bush can win is by arousing the egotistic and animal instincts of the American people. __________________________________________________ Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041013/95d71774/attachment.html From barbara at roomade.org Thu Oct 14 15:32:49 2004 From: barbara at roomade.org (Barbara vanderlinden (T)) Date: Thu, 14 Oct 2004 12:02:49 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] ROOMADE & A-PRIOR PRESENT THE INTRUDER / ANA TORFS - Opening 14/10/2004 Message-ID: THE INTRUDER ANA TORFS Roomade Koopliedenstraat 60-62 Rue des Commerçants B-1000 Brussels >From October 15 through October 24, 2004 Open from October 15 through October 24 >From 12PM to 8PM Free entrance Contact: E: office at roomade.org E: aprior at skynet.be http://www.roomade.org http://www.aprior.org THE INTRUDER The Intruder is a slide projection by the Belgian artist Ana Torfs based on a text by Maeterlinck. It brings back to live static puppet-theatre and introduces several characters (family-members) all situated in one room: the blind grandfather, his son, his son-in law, and his granddaughter. What are they waiting for? They do not know! They are waiting for someone to knock on the door, waiting for the light to fade out, waiting for Fear, waiting for Death. Do they speak? Yes! They speak a few words, breaking the silence for a moment, then they begin listening again. Leaving their sentences unfinished and their gestures interrupted. They listen, they wait. Perhaps she will not come? Oh! She will come. She always comes. It is late, maybe she will only come tomorrow. And the people gathered in the big room begin to smile and to hope. There is a knock on the door. And that is all; this is the whole of their lives, this is the whole of life. Cited from: Remy de Gourmont, Le livre des masques (Paris: Mercure de France, 1896). The work of Ana Torfs (Born 1963) includes a 35 mm film, series of photographic works, slide projection installations and diverse artist's publications. She investigates, among other things, issues concerning the portrait, the relationship between text and images, and the complexities of perception, which are brought up in her work frequently. She has participated in exhibitions, such as the Lyon Biennial, Lyon (1995), the Montreal Biennial, Monteal (2000), Exploding Cinema/Cinema Without Walls, Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam (2001), ForwArt, Brussels (2002) and Réalités, National Gallery Zacheta, Warsaw (2003). Most recently she is realizing a newly commissioned web project for the Dia Art Foundation in New York, New York. A PRIOR MAGAZINE The October 2004 number of the Belgium based contemporary art magazine A Prior will focus on Ana Torfs¹ most recent work. Apart from a visual outline it will contain texts by major authors. Further A Prior Magazine presents a special artist's project by Franciska Lambrechts (Born 1967) and an unpublished diary fragment of the Belgian author Daniël Robberechts (1937-1992). A Prior Magazine, English, Dutch and French (Published by VZW Mark, Brussels, 2004). -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041014/3712aa66/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: image/jpeg Size: 27325 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041014/3712aa66/attachment.jpe -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: application/octet-stream Size: 237624 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041014/3712aa66/attachment.obj From definetime at rediffmail.com Thu Oct 14 11:29:42 2004 From: definetime at rediffmail.com (sanjay ghosh) Date: 14 Oct 2004 05:59:42 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] (fwd) Heavy hand of the law Message-ID: <20041014055942.24808.qmail@webmail18.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041014/8fc94636/attachment.html -------------- next part --------------   Heavy hand of the law Last week's seizure of material belonging to anti-globalisation websites could have serious consequences for citizen publishers. Bobbie Johnson reports Thursday October 14, 2004 The Guardian It is a story with components that would have most conspiracy theorists running for the nearest tinfoil hat shop: a radical media organisation, the FBI and an apparently anonymous foreign government. Last week, Rackspace, a hosting company with headquarters in Texas, handed two of its London-based web servers to the FBI after a subpoena for their contents was issued by a US district court. The servers contained material belonging to the Independent Media Centre - better known as Indymedia - a conglomeration of global radical anti-globalisation sites produced by ordinary citizens. Indymedia claims it was not informed of the decision to seize its content, nor has it been told the reasons, despite the fact that 20 sites and more than 1m pieces of content were affected. The FBI has said it was acting on behalf of a foreign government, though for the American subpoena to have power in the UK, it would need approval from either the British courts or the home secretary. Such agreements would usually be made over investigations into terrorism, though nobody involved has been able to confirm this. Rackspace said it is complying with a court order "which establishes procedures for countries to assist each other in investigations such as international terrorism, kidnapping and money laundering". Clearly, such serious allegations against any media organisation - even one produced by amateurs - could be devastating. "The site crashed last Thursday at 4pm," says one Indymedia UK volunteer who asked to remain anonymous. "Since then, the only official communication we've had was from Rackspace, but they would only say they couldn't tell us what was going on. No one at the FBI has talked to us about this, and we have not been told anything." With the situation shrouded in a legal fog, the often-controversial grassroots news organisation has struggled to operate its sites across countries including the UK, France, Belgium, Serbia, Portugal, Italy and parts of South America. "This seizure has grave implications for free speech and privacy," says Kurt Opsahl, staff attorney of Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights campaign group working with Indymedia to uncover the root of the FBI action. It is not the first time Indymedia has come to blows with law enforcement. During the G8 summit in Genoa three years ago, buildings used by Indymedia journalists were among those raided by Italian police. Computers were destroyed and equipment seized in an action that international press watchdog Reporters Sans Frontieres described as unprecedented and incredibly violent. Founded as an anti-globalisation news source covering the protests against the World Trade Organisation summit held in Seattle in 1999, Indymedia quickly turned into an international network of citizen journalists. It provides a voice of underground political opinion around the world, though its open door policy has seen the occasional publication of unsavoury and offensive content, including anti-semitism and incitement to violence - though representatives are quick to disown these. The latest raid is more than just emblematic of the conflict between one radical anti-government organisation and the establishment. It highlights the potential for conflict between law enforcement agencies and citizen publishers and sends a warning to anyone involved in web publishing operations. "Certainly on face value it looks like an attempt to gag an independent media organisation," says Barry Hugill, a spokesman for civil liberties organisation Liberty. "It is just possible that there is a legitimate reason for this action, but we certainly need more clarification." At a time when mainstream media is being opened up to the masses, such crackdowns deal a blow to citizen journalism. Threats to the freedom of web publishers could damage the amateur investigators and webloggers who are the lifeblood of independent online journalism. The lack of information given about these seizures raises the potential threat that anyone could see their content removed without warning or explanation. It shows how fragile internet publishing can be - even in the hands of major media organisations. "It is easy to go after the provider or the hosting company to close down a website," says Yaman Akdeniz, the director of Cyber Rights and Civil Liberties and a lecturer at the University of Leeds cyberlaw research unit. "Unfortunately, arbitrary censorship exists. There are less risky places to publish information and there are more risky places. I do not recommend anybody to rely on a hosting company in the UK, and certainly our cyber-rights.org servers are run outside the UK for a variety of reasons." · Send comments to online.feedback at guardian.co.uk. Please include address and phone number. If you do not want your email address published, please say so. From ravig1 at vsnl.com Thu Oct 14 14:04:35 2004 From: ravig1 at vsnl.com (Ravi Agarwal) Date: Thu, 14 Oct 2004 14:04:35 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Fw: Fw:Amitav Ghosh on Sunderban Message-ID: <047101c4b1c8$a9850860$6801a8c0@ToxicsLink.local> A Crocodile In The Swamplands Sahara's misconceived hotel project can only be an ecological disaster for the Sunderbans and a nightmare in the marshes for any tourist who might be lured by its foolish design. AMITAV GHOSH In 2003, the business group Sahara India Parivar submitted an ambitious plan to the government of West Bengal proposing the creation of an enormous new tourism complex in the Sunderbans. Although the details of the plan have not been made available to the public, the broad outlines are described on the Sahara Parivar website. According to the site, the project will include many different kinds of accommodation, including "5-star floating hotels, high-speed boathouses, land-based huts, luxury cottages" and an "eco-village". Landing jetties are to be built and the project is to be serviced by hovercraft and helicopters. "Exclusive, beautiful virgin beaches" are to be created and hundreds of kilometres of waterways are to be developed. The facilities will include "a casino, spa, health, shopping and meditation centres, restaurant complexes and a mini golf course", and tourists will be offered a choice of "aqua sports", including scuba diving. The total cost of the project will be somewhere in the region of six billion rupees (155 million US dollars). In short, an industrial house that has no special expertise in ecological matters is proposing a massive intervention in an area that is a designated World Heritage Site and Biosphere Reserve. The precise status of the project is not clear. For a while, to the dismay of environmentalists everywhere, it was thought that the West Bengal government had already given the project the go-ahead. But recent statements issuing from Writers Building suggest that the authorities are currently re-evaluating the Sahara Parivar's proposal. This is a welcome development, not least because it provides an opportunity for a public discussion of the project and its merits. To begin with, it is worth asking whether the project is feasible even on its own terms. What, for example, are the chances of converting a stretch of the Sunderbans into an arena for water sports and a haven for beach lovers? This is an area of mud flats and mangrove islands. There are no 'pristine beaches' nor are there any coral gardens. The Ganges-Brahmaputra river system carries eight times as much silt as the Amazon and the waters of this region are thick with suspended particulate matter. This is not an environment that is appropriate for snorkelling or scuba diving. In the water, visibility is so low that snorkellers and scuba divers would scarcely be able to see beyond their masks. What is more, these waters are populated by estuarine sharks and marine crocodiles. A substantial number of villagers and fishermen fall prey to these animals every year. Snorkellers and divers would face many dangers and, in the event of fatalities, the Sahara Parivar and the West Bengal government would be liable to litigation. Even swimming is extremely hazardous in the Sunderbans. The collision of river and sea in this region creates powerful currents, undertows and whirlpools. Drownings are commonplace and boats are often swamped by the swirling water. Swimmers who accidentally ingest water would face another kind of hazard. Consider, for example, the experience of an American woman who visited the Sunderbans in the 1970s: she dipped her finger in a river and touched it briefly to her tongue, to test its salinity. Within a short while she developed crippling intestinal convulsions and had to be rushed to hospital. Bacteria and parasites are not least among the many life forms that flourish in the waters of the Sunderbans. The location the Sahara Parivar has chosen for its project lies athwart the entrance to the Hooghly River, in the vicinity of Sagar Island. This spot has the advantage of commanding direct access to the Bay of Bengal while also being easily accessible from Calcutta. But when the weather is taken into account, these apparent pluses are quickly revealed to be an uncompounded tally of minuses. A quick glance at a map is all it takes to see that the chosen location is directly exposed to the weather systems of the Bay of Bengal. What would happen if the complex were to find itself in the path of an incoming cyclone? The Bay of Bengal is one of the most active cyclonic regions in the world: two of the most devastating hurricanes in human history have been visited upon the coast of Bengal, in 1737 and 1970. Each of these cyclones claimed over 3,00,000 lives, a toll higher than Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined. The toll might have been higher still if not for the Sunderbans. The mangrove forests have historically absorbed the first shock of incoming cyclones: they are the barrier that protect the hinterland This is why the people who live in this region have generally been wary of creating settlements that abut directly on the sea. That this region will be hit by another devastating storm is a near certainty, in this era of global warming. Much of the destruction caused by cyclones is the result of 'storm surges'â?"the massive tidal waves that precede an incoming storm. What would happen to Sahara's 'floating hotel' with its restaurants, helipads, shopping arcades, meditation centres, etc, if it were to be hit by a 15-metre-high tidal wave and 200 kmph winds? Suffice it to say that the damage would be enormous and many lives would be lost. And what of the casualties? There are no advanced medical facilities in the Sunderbans: where would survivors be treated? Tourists who are harmed or injured are almost certain to initiate litigation. Who will be liable for damages: the Sahara Parivar or the Government of India? And what of the question of insurance, which appears to have been ignored by the government and by the Sahara Parivar alike? The 'floating hotel' will need to be insured, like any seagoing vessel. Considering the pattern of cyclonic activity in the region, no reputable firm is likely to provide insurance for this project. If they did, the premiums alone would make the project unprofitable. If there is no insurance, the government will be fully liable for all damages. If indeed there is a major catastrophe here, the entire tourism industry in India would suffer a crippling blow to its reputation. The risk simply is not worth it. The Sahara Parivar claims that it will open 'virgin' areas to tourists. But the islands of the Sunderbans are not 'virgin' in any sense. The Indian part of the Sunderbans supports a population of close to four million peopleâ?"equivalent to the entire population of New Zealand. The Sunderbans are an archipelago of islands, large and small. Many, if not most of the islands, have been populated at some time or the other. In fact, several islands were forcibly depopulated in order to make room for Project Tiger. In 1979, the Left Front government evicted tens of thousands of refugee settlers, mainly Dalits, from the island of Morichjhapi. The cost in lives is still unaccounted, but it is likely that thousands were killed. The eviction was justified on ecological grounds: the authorities claimed that the island of Morichjhapi had to be preserved as a forest reserve. It is scarcely conceivable that a government run by the same Left Front is now thinking of handing over a substantial part of the Sunderbans to an industrial house like the Sahara Parivar. It runs contrary to every tenet of the Front's professed ideology. The Sahara Parivar's project would turn large stretches of this very forest, soaked in the blood of evicted refugees, into a playground for the affluent. Although forgotten elsewhere, in the Sunderbans the memory of Morichjhapi is still vividly alive: would it be surprising if the people there took this project to be an affront to their memories and a deliberate provocation? And if indeed there were to be protests and disturbances, how would the government ensure the safety of the tourist complex? Piracies and water-borne dacoities are daily occurrences in the Sunderbans. The government is powerless to prevent these crimes. To police the winding waterways of the Sunderbans is no easy matter and the police presence in the region is minimal anyway. How will the authorities provide security to tourists in a region where the machinery of state has not so much withered as never been properly implanted? It is clear then that even within its own terms, this project is misconceived. Its chances of profitability are so slim as to suggest that some other intention lurks behind the stated motives for embarking on it. Certain other business houses are also said to be interested in expanding into the Sunderbans, and this may well have something to do with recent rumours concerning the possible discovery of oil in the region. But what would happen if a large-scale tourist project were actually to take shape in the Sunderbans? What for example, would be the environmental impact? It needs to be noted first that the Sahara Parivar's project has not been subjected to a rigorous environmental impact appraisal. However, several independent groups have conducted preliminary studies and their conclusions suggest that the effects may be disastrous. For instance, the floating hotel is sure to have an impact on the patterns of sedimentation in its vicinity. The consequences are impossible to predict. It is quite conceivable that the structures will have the effect of retarding the flow of silt out of the Hooghly into the Bay of Bengal. This in turn will lead to increased siltation upriver and it might even cause a blockage in the rivermouth. The floating hotel and its satellite structures will also disgorge a large quantity of sewage and waste into the surrounding waters. This refuse will include grease, oil and detergents. The increased level of pollution is certain to have an impact on the crabs and fish that live in these waters. Very high levels of mercury have already been detected in the fish that is brought to Calcutta's markets. A sharp increase in pollution could have a potentially devastating effect on the food supply of the entire region. The polluting effects would not be restricted to sewage and waste: there would be light and noise pollution as well. The hotel's lights would disorient certain species. Olive Ridley turtles, for instance, would not be able to find their way back to their nesting places. The Sahara Project also envisages the deployment of a large number of speedboats and other high-powered watercraft, possibly even including jet skis. Fast moving craft such as these pose a great danger to marine mammals, particularly to such endangered species as the Irrawaddy Dolphin (Orcaella brevirostris). The high-pitched noise produced by speedboats disrupts their echo-location systems, often resulting in casualties. In January 2000, I myself came upon the carcass of an Irrawaddy Dolphin on the banks of the Matla river. A huge hole had been gouged out of its head, probably by a propeller. Increased traffic in these waters will result in many more such casualties. Historically, the waters of the Sunderbans were home to great numbers of whales and dolphins. British naturalists of the 19th century reported the area to be "teeming" with marine mammals. Very few of these animals are to be seen in these waters today. Their fate is unknown because there has been no major census or survey. There is limited expertise in this field in India and the Sunderbans being a border region, foreign researchers have not been allowed to conduct surveys for reasons of security.For all we know, the cetacean population of this region has already dwindled catastrophically. It would be nothing less than an outrage if an area that has been closed to zoologists should now be thrown open to tourist developers. These are just a few of the project's possible ecological consequences: there are sure to be many others. Tourism is the world's largest industry and it is already one of India's most important revenue earners. Clearly, every part of the country will have to reach an accommodation with this industry: it would be idle to pretend otherwise. There is no reason why tourists should be excluded from the Sunderbans, so long as their presence causes no harm to the ecology or to the people who live there. But if tourism is to develop here, it should be on the model of other ecologically sensitive areas, such as the Galapagos islands, where the industry is held to very high standards. The Sunderbans deserve no less and it is the duty of the Government of India and the government of West Bengal to ensure that this unique ecosystem and its inhabitants, animal and human, receive their due. The Sahara Parivar is not the first to conceive of a grandiose plan for this region. In the early 19th century, the British dreamt of creating a port on the Matla river that would replace Calcutta and be a rival to Bombay and Singapore. In 1854, Henry Piddington, a pioneering British meteorologist, wrote an open letter to Lord Dalhousie, begging him to reconsider the project. In his letter, Piddington warned that in the event of a cyclone (a word he had invented), the new port would probably be swept away. Lord Dalhousie, secure on his proconsular throne, paid no attention to this lonely voice: the port was built and took its name from Lord Canning. But Henry Piddington was soon vindicated: Port Canning was swamped by a storm in 1867. It was formally abandoned by the British five years later. Over the last few months, due to the efforts of a small group of concerned people, many letters have been sent to the chief minister of West Bengal asking him to re-examine the Sahara Parivar's project. It falls to him now, as a democratically elected leader, to show better judgement than did his lordly predecessors in Writers Building. (The Sunderbans form the setting of Amitav Ghosh's most recent novel, The Hungry Tide.) (http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20041018&fname=Col+Amitava&sid =1) Siddhartha Ghosh Dastidar October 14, 2004 Turbulence Artist Studios: [ FALLUJAH . IRAQ . 31/03/2004 ] by Michael Takeo Magruder http://turbulence.org/studios/takeo Requires Flash 6+ plugin and Mono Audio According to witnesses and U.S. officials, four American 'civilians' were ambushed and shot or beaten to death by Iraqi insurgents. Townspeople mutilated the bodies of the men, dragged them through the streets, lynched them from a bridge, and burned them while crowds danced and cheered. The desecration of the victims' bodies was filmed in its entirety by an Associated Press camera crew. There was no intervention by coalition forces during the attack or the subsequent mutilations. The coverage of the event was highly censored on all international media networks. The 'civilian' casualties were mercenaries employed by Blackwater Security Consulting, of Moyock, N.C. This work is not intended as a discourse on the axiom of 'the evil nature of war'. It is merely a consideration of an event we have (or have not) witnessed and a reflection on the iconic nature of conflict in the new millennium. BIOGRAPHY Michael Takeo Magruder is an American artist based in the UK who works within the fields of New and Interactive Media. He received his formal education at the University of Virginia, USA, graduating with a degree in Biological Sciences. For the past eight years his artistic practice has reflected upon society's data-driven and information saturated existence through the examination of international news communications. By recombining the notions of art and media, it has been his intention to analyze the interconnections which have been forged between the individual and the pervasive media network. It is a questioning of product vs. process, knowledge vs. stimulation, fact vs. perspective. Magruder's artistic production has been exhibited worldwide and encompasses an eclectic mix of forms, ranging from futuristic stained-glass windows, digital lightscreens and modular light-sculptures to architectural manipulations, ephemeral video projections and interactive network installations. His current explorations and research embrace 3D stereoscopic projection, immersive multi-sensory environments and interactive non-linear narratives for network/gallery settings. His work in these fields is presently supported by Turbulence.org, 3D Visualization Group: University of Warwick, and Arts Council England. For further information about Turbulence please visit http://turbulence.org -- Jo-Anne Green, Associate Director New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc.: http://new-radio.org New York: 917.548.7780 . Boston: 617.522.3856 Turbulence: http://turbulence.org New American Radio: http://somewhere.org Networked_Performance Blog and Conference: http://turbulence.org/blog -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041014/be622d84/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From shivamvij at gmail.com Wed Oct 13 23:18:36 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Wed, 13 Oct 2004 10:48:36 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] 'Coming back to Dehra Dun has always made me nervous' Message-ID: Dear all, This 12 years old speech by Vikram Seth gives you insight into the relationship between a developing individual and society in an Anglophile boarding school. An Outlook article pasted after the speech suggests that Doon, for one, is trying to address these concerns. cheers | shivam o o o o o o Founders Day Speech - October 1992 By Vikram Seth http://doononline.net/pages/info_features/features_spotlights/spotlights/seth/speech.htm Headmaster, Members of the Board, ladies and gentlemen, and most of all, boys and girls too. I should add, because the daughters of teachers and staff are as much students here as the boys and in fact seem to win half the art prizes, besides climbing peaks of over 20,000 feet. But for the rest of this talk I shall say boys, and the girls will forgive me. I have had a wonderful two days here and, indeed, a very varied two days. From the athletics competition on the main field yesterday to an informal tour of Jaipur House (my old house)-and that new house at the end of Skinnner's field-now what on earth is its name? Ah, yes Oberoi and a very attractive looking house it is too; architecturally as well as in terms of its intake, I am sure. From a spirited meeting of the Board of Governors to a spirit-filled dinner for the Class of '67-the Old boys and masters at their most reminiscent, the wives yawning indulgently; from seeing the excellent work of the boys in the art exhibition and general exhibition this morning to the anticipation of seeing my own Beastly Tales adapted and performed in half an hour if I can keep my speech short it has been by turns entertaining and affecting, fascinating and exhausting. I have generally enjoyed it and I would like to thank all of you. So much of my life is tied up with Dehra Dun that being back here forces me to think of when I first went to Welham at the age of six. I remember being left by my mother in the care of strangers, reassuring strangers, suspiciously reassuring and feeling both indignant and disbelieving that she could dream of going back to Patna without me. But she did go away, and so did the mothers of all the other new boys, and we were all in shock for several weeks. But the Welham authorities were obviously practiced in dealing with the trauma of separation. Just before dinner every day, we new boys would be led to a bench near the hospital, and there overlooking the playing field, we would sit. One boy would begin sobbing, and then another, and then we would all join in, weeping in concert for half an hour until we were quite hungry, and could be led gently away to be fed. Since then, coming back to Dehra Dun has always made me nervous. But there are two other reasons why, though I was conscious of the honour of being invited, I was uneasy about accepting. The first is that I thoroughly dislike public speaking. But your chairman, Mr. Lovraj Kumar, I s not only an old friend, but also an extremely persuasive one, and he made it clear that I was to say yes; he never said so in so many words, but I felt that it would be both churlish and arrogant to refuse. The second reason is more complicated, and I will try to explain it as well as I can; A few years ago, after a gap of about sixteen years, I returned to Doon. I had avoided returning for quite a while: certainly, I had made no particular effort to come back. But the family was taking a few days off together in Dehra Dun, and I decided that I would visit my old school again. I walked around the campus: from the main building to the tennis courts with their bel trees; those green elephant apple; those chaltas which made such lethal meteors: pas the hospital, past a military airplane which I didn't remember from my time here, past a small temple, the school panchayt, several signs describing the bird life of the campus, the servants quarters, the backs of Hyderabad and Kashmir House, at that time Oberoi house did not exist; the new swimming pool, along Skinners' Field; past Jaipur house and the lichi trees which I remember having raided from the balcony of my dorm, and then back across the main field to the Main Building. It turned out to be a whole parikrama full of new sights and old sights. And at the end of the circuit, the school bell was ringing, tolling rather, in its old familiar way and I was brought back to my own school days by the last few fading notes, and especially the lightness of the last couple of notes which one could never be completely sure would be the very last. These last few strokes of the bell, I remember, used to cause me particular anxiety when I was running a change-in-break and had almost reached the sanctuary of the main building from the distant border settlement of Jaipur House. It always seemed unjust to me that the Tata House boys could virtually saunter through their changes in-breaks, grinning away, while for us they were like mini-marathons. Well, this time I was sauntering along myself under a chir pine, though not exactly grinning, and I remember thinking how beautiful the School was after all, and rebuking myself for having avoided visiting it for so many years, and not having kept up with it at all. The fact of the matter is that I had been pretty unhappy during my school days and that was why I hadn't wanted to come back to visit. I did teach here for one term a couple of years after I left, but this didn't really change my feelings about my school days. People are always surprised, sometimes even shocked when I say this, and most of all ex-Doscos, but it is true. Part of it was my own fault-or, perhaps, I shouldn't say fault, my own character. My brother Shantum, who followed me five years laters had a good time in school, and kept up with this school friends better than I did. I, for my part, just wanted to forget all about School once I'd left; and since I went to a school in England for a year after Doon, I did not even have to go on to a college and bump into those who had been my contemporaries at Doon and this, for me, was an unmixed blessing. Now it's strange in a way to say that I was unhappy at Doon. After all, I did well here academically, joined a number of societies, edited the Weekly, and took part in debates and plays, many of them in the Rose Bowl itself. Since my reports were good, my parents thought that I was fine-and said nothing to the contrary. I was kept well occupied from morning to night. And yet I had a terrible feeling of loneliness and isolation during my six years' here. Sometimes at lights out I wished I would never wake up to hear the Chhota Hazri bell. For days after I left I thought of School as a kind of jungle, and looked back on it with a shudder. Now, part of all this- was of course simply the general stress and strain of adolescence, but part o f it was also the ethos, the atmosphere of the place. It was a place where sports were almost the only thing that mattered as far as the boys were concerned. I was teased and bullied by my classmates and my seniors because of my interest in studies and reading, because of my lack of interest at that time in games, because of my unwillingness to join gangs and groups, because of my height as you can see from the adjustment of the mikes and most importantly of all because I would get so furious when I was bullied. No doubt, if in my teens I had been more relaxed about things, or if I had more of a sense of humor, things wouldn't have been so bad. But I wasn't, and I didn't, and they were. Given all this, I had serious doubts about whether I should in all conscience stand on this stage and so ungratefully talk about my miserable time here. After a bit of thought and some struggle I decided I should. For one thing, I learned a lot at Doon, a very great deal indeed as I will mention later, and I am very grateful for that. For another, I thought it would be interesting for you and by you I mean particularly the boys to hear someone who has a somewhat different view of things from the usual school days were the best days of my life litany; it might give you heart when you're feeling low or perplexed. I looked down the list of new boys in an old Weekly recently, and discovered that about half the new intake consisted of brothers or sons of Old Boys; so I imagine that many of you know from experience the kind of gung-ho Old boy guff that I'm referring to. One of the hardest and most harmful things about school – not just Doon but any boarding school – is that boys are deprived of the love and day to day company of their fathers and mothers for two thirds of the year and possibly for longer, because when they do go back home for the holidays, parents are often so unused to spending time with their children that they don't quite know what to do with them even when they share the same roof. The boys, while growing up, hardly know what it is like to have a sister. The effect of this lack of family life, of affection, is very difficult to assess, but I think it has serious effect on their minds and hearts. It forces them to be more independent of their parent, certainly, but it also makes them more emotionally insecure, and as a result more eager, even desperate, to conform to their peer group, to seek popularity among their companions, and to appear as tough and cool as possible and as brutal as possible to those outside the group or younger than themselves. This culminates after a few years in the ridiculous concern for privileges and seniority and sometimes abuse of authority that one often finds among the captains and prefects and monitors; they exercise authority in the way that one would expect of overgrown adolescent who has been pushed around without recourse of justice for years on end and them suddenly finds that he has been given the right to push other people around. All this was bad enough in my time; from my conversations with other old boys, I understand that this rampant bullying by seniors became even worse some years after that. What it now is like, I have no idea. I met the prefects at lunch today and enjoyed the meeting greatly. But then, I am just visiting, and it is impossible to gauge the atmosphere in School in a couple of days. The concern and care of teachers and housemasters is no real substitute for the security that comes from the affection of one's parents. When I was looking down that list of new boys, I asked myself this question: if I ever get married and have children, would I send them to Doon – or any other boarding school for that matter? My answer was that I am not sure. Now after all I have said so far, you might think that my answer would have been a resounding no. But the fact of the matter is that there is another side to things and one which is just as important. I owe a great deal to my years here and it is necessary to acknowledge this. Two things that Doon gave me and I will mention just the two most valuable things – were a sense of equality with boys from very different backgrounds; the headmaster has already touched upon this and a wide range of interests outside the purely academic. I'll deal with the first, first. The sense of equality was something that Doon never laid any oppressive stress on, and it was all the more effective for that. It just happened. Boys dressed in the same uniform regardless of their parents' wealth. They got the same amount of pocket money. Caste did not matter, religion did not matter, the part of the country you came from didn't matter, the social status of your family was unimportant. It was a considerable sacrifice for my parents to send me and my brother here, and it was even more difficult for other parents but it did not matter to us that the boy next to us might be the son of a millionaire. Nor did it matter to him. Our friendships and enmities had almost nothing to do with the world outside Chandbagh. This was a wonderful lesson, and a rare one: one that could not have been taught in a day school. For though in a day school we would have had the company and affection and example of our parents, we would also have absorbed their social prejudices and after school hours, have mixed largely with children of the same social background, locality and economic class. I hope that this sense of equality holds at Doon though I am informed, again through Weekly, that the dress code has lately been shaken to its foundations by the invasion of fancy sports shoes the boys will know what I am talking about. More seriously I also understand that the geographical mix of boys is much more restricted, than it once was, which is a pity. (Something, I understand, is being done about this.) On the other hand, there is a greater range in terms of family income, because of the larger number of scholarships and part scholarships that the Headmaster has mentioned and that is excellent news. In general, it is good to know that differences in wealth continue to count for little here. As for my second great debt to Doon-an-all around education, not one confined to one's studies – one only has to look around the Rose Bowl to see what I mean. This wonderful theatre was built many years ago by the boys themselves, some of whom are sitting here, under the guidance of a master. For me it is a symbol of all that is best about the School. The shape is inspired by the models of ancient Greece, the plays acted here have ranged from the dance dramas of Tagore and a play based on Nehru's Discovery of India to the great plays of Western, not just English literature: Twelfth Night and Becket and The Government Inspector and even a lively dated musical version of The Frogs by Aristophanes where if I remember Elvis competed with the Beatles and supermen glided down a rope to where the Mushrooms are now standing. The surroundings too are beautiful. The bamboo there burst into flower one year before dying and later sprang up again. The skies provided us with genuine thunder and lightning for the storm scene in Julius Caesar on the night of the performance. Ther e were quite a few birds and snakes in that khud over there. But this natural beauty can be found all over the school: as I mentioned before it was, after all, the old Forest Research Institute. Living for years in these surroundings bred in me an unconscious love of nature which was reinforced by mid-term expeditions to the hills and rivers around, and which has never deserted me even amid the polluted drabness of large cities. I needn't list the other areas outside the classroom where the school allows one to expand one's interests: debates, art, Indian and Western music, chess, photography woodwork, special groups and societies for those interested in science or mathematics, sports of all kinds from cross-country running to cricket, and social working the community-including, most particularly, helping out in times of crisis such as the recent earthquakes. So many schools in these academically competitive times have narrowed their focus to grades and exams and college-admission requirements, to the difference, as the Headmaster mentioned, between 92 and 93 percent, and very little else. Doon has not. Nor was this breadth of interest merely a question of the facilities available here. What was crucial was that certain teachers, I won't say very many, but certainly a few themselves embodied this wider vision for a full life. I was very lucky indeed to have, both as housemaster and as teacher, a man whose active interests ranged from mountaineering to Mozart, from the poetry of Ghalib and Tennyson perhaps I should say Tannvson – to the social habits of what he chose to call " that delightful bird the Rad-chested bulbul." In fact, if one wanted to avoid a scheduled test on sheep-farming in the Canterbury plains or some other unexciting but exacting topic, the most promising technique was to look out of the first floor window of this classroom in an abstracted way, raise one's hand, and say, "Sir, please sir, what is that bird, sir, the one that just made the sound gu-turr, gu-turr?" While perfectly aware of our tactics, Guru was entirely unable to resist telling us about the bird, and its call, and its habitat, and its mating season, and its Latin name and the average length of its beak; and twenty minutes later, we boys, wiser but unconscious of being wiser, would be smiling to ourselves, secure in the knowledge that we had flown safely over the Canterbury plains without being forced to crash land. People sometimes ask me whether in addition to these two great gifts, Doon didn't teach me lessons of leadership and character building and independence of mind. My answer in a word, is no. I don't think I have leadership qualities anyway, and I certainly don't think that the system of authority that I talked about earlier leads to great qualities in leadership. As for character building, I suppose it could be said that there is a sort of make-or-break aspect of all a taste for power, perhaps, boarding schools. You learn to cope or else you collapse. I finally learned to cope with my solitude; but any real strength or warmth of character came to me later and in surroundings where I could choose my company and was more at ease with myself. As for independence of mind, I don't think Doon helped me. As I explained, the ethos was one of conformity, of fear of public opinion, of hostility to anyone who was eccentric or odd in any way. I very much hope that this has changed or is changing. It is difficult even at the age of forty to think for oneself, to take an independent stance, to speak one's mind, to accept that one might make oneself unpopular by doing so, in short to trust in oneself. At fifteen it requires great courage, and I just did not have it. I lay low and muttered resentfully and thought that perhaps there was something wrong with me that I didn't fit in. I hope that you boys have an easier time of it. Remember, there is such a thing Life After School. I hope that later you will treat your school days in perspective, and not get obsessed by tem one way or another. There is nothing sadder than someone who has done nothing solid or independent in life clinging to his old school tie for a sense of his own worth – or, more absurdly still, for his sense of superiority over others. On the other hand, it would be a pity if you allowed a few unhappy or traumatic incidents of your school years (which now form such a large proportion of your life) to haunt you down the decades. If they do haunt you, so, I hope, will the redeeming beauty of the fines of our assembly prayers one of which we heard earlier this evening. The only way you can come to balance the good with the bad is through the habit of independent thought. Both now and later, and whether or not your environment encourages to do so, try to think things out independently. Just because someone in authority says something does not mean you should believe it. Think it out. Think it through. Don't take important matters on trust. Obviously one does not have the time to think out everything but important matters one just has to think out by oneself; examine public opinion, especially that part of public opinion that you have almost made your own. Ask yourself when necessary what it is that you want to do in life – perhaps for yourself, perhaps for the world around you. If there is something deep within you, whether personal or professional, that pulls you one way, and you have discussed the matter with yourself and come to a clear conclusion, don't let the wish to be thought of as a good chap force you in the opposite direction. You may not be successful or popular in the eyes of the world – or you may be successful only incidentally but you will have lived your own life, the only one that is to a fair extent in your control, the only one that you have. It passes far too quickly, and soon it is over. I myself can hardly believe that I have reached the conventional halfway mark. And whatever you choose to do don't give up too easily. Accept that acceptance will be slow in coming, if indeed it comes at all. The headmaster has said very generous things about my work, and I am delighted that my Beasts, despite their strange ways have been so well received here. People tell me that I am a successful author, and I suppose in a sense its true. What people notice, however is the successes; how many failures and near failures I have had no one knows. But in life and in work, one must take failure as not just acceptable but inevitable. As a writer you may wrestle for weeks with a single page of a novel, or a single stanza of a poem, and it may still not come out right. Or you may send out a manuscript that you have sweated on for years to one publisher after another, and be turned down again and again. The rejections come, and the hurt, but what is more important than any of the rejections is the one acceptance that may possibly arrive. I am sure that in other fields, whether scientific or academic or industrial or political, the same is true. In love, too, it doesn't matter how many times you are rejected; its that one acceptance by someone you love that matters. I admit that is not a very romantic or indeed a poetical thought to end with; but I am off-duty as a poet today. Anyway, I reckon that you will find my Beasts more entertaining, and certainly more poetical, than me. And in addition they have the advantage of succinctness in speech; they are confined to the rhyming couplets, their rhyming iambic tetrameter couplets and their author can (and does) cut them off when they're been talking too long. To their relief and perhaps to yours, I shall end here. I do wish you all the very best. o o o o o o o The Doon School, Dehra Dun Outlook Magazine: December 4th, 2001 ARIJIT BARMAN http://www.doononline.net/pages/info_features/pressroom/press51.htm Doon is now chalking out a blueprint for the future with its most ambitious aim: to carve a place among the 10 best schools of the world. Think of a 65-year-old residential school nestled in the Shivaliks that strives to serve the individual talent of every boy against an age-old system of regimentation. Think again of an institution modelled on the much-hallowed British public schools but doing away with the usual draconian regimes. That's Doon School. In its democratic environment, students take key decisions on various issues and learn to combine freedom with responsibility. More importantly, they develop a bond, the essence of a family that transcends hierarchies and set rules. It's indeed a home away from home for all the 500 boys who spend six crucial years of their adolescence amidst sylvan surroundings. "We encourage all our students to believe they are stakeholders in the school. They are groomed to participate in the business of life working in a community," says headmaster John Mason. It's not surprising therefore to find a student waking up a housemaster for a midnight snack. Handling so many adolescent boys is a challenging proposition and the housemasters, matrons and the tutors double up as guides, focusing on the various facets of personal development. Moreover, a discreet counselling service also delves into personal or inter-personal dynamics of living in residence. The personal interaction—be it in the classroom or in the dinning room or even on the cricket field—nurtures the student-teacher relationship. Every class has a maximum of 24 students which makes it easier for the teacher to personally monitor individuals. "We prepare hand-written notes on each of the boys and invite parental feedback... It's like an extended family," says deputy headmaster Jayant Lal. It's only after Class 6 that a child can get admission to Doon after a national-level written test and interview. Failing which you get a chance to sit for an exam again at Class 7 level. Annual fees amount to a little over Rs 1 lakh. The school's management also spends Rs 35 lakh annually on need-based scholarships from a Rs 4-crore corpus to make it accessible to all and is now also keen to look beyond scholastics and admit budding talents of the performing arts. It has been a long endeavour to produce a youthful corps d'elite—from Rajiv Gandhi, Karan Singh, Vikram Seth, Arun Bharatram to Suman Dubey, Prannoy Roy and Roshan Seth. Doon is now chalking out a blueprint for the future with its most ambitious aim: to carve a place among the 10 best schools of the world. From shivamvij at gmail.com Thu Oct 14 19:08:03 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Thu, 14 Oct 2004 06:38:03 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Call for Papers on PARTITION AND MIGRATION Message-ID: Call for Papers on PARTITION AND MIGRATION Papers are solicited for a book that seeks to connect the different facets of partition violence to histories of migration and relocation within and across the nation-states of India and Pakistan as well as to the West. For many survivors, the partition of 1947 remains the defining moment of trauma that marks their lives and memories. In recent years, historians, activists, and literary scholars have recovered stories of survivors of partition violence in order to understand its human side and the multiple dimensions of the ways in which the "partitioned subject" reconstituted him/herself in relation to the violence. This book seeks to complicate such stories in order to examine the ways in which forms of violence arising from the conflicts between "homeland" and the nation states' regulatory practices concerning issues of domicile, nationality, citizenship, ethnicity and language impacted the process of migration itself. How do such forms of violence mediate the afterlives of migrants in places that are marked by new pressures of differences, hopes and possibilities? What do they speak about the failures of nation and home? How do the mediations of gender account for the failures and possibilities of their new homes and nations? The aim of this book is to bring together essays that explore the ways in which representational forms such as literature, film, media, theatre, testimonies and oral histories negotiate these and other related questions. The book will also examine the interventions that such representations may make in existing opinion on the subject. Please submit proposals (250-300 words) for essays, along with a title, by November 15th, 2004 to Nandi Bhatia and Anjali Gera (e-mail addresses given below). Anjali Gera Department of Humanities and Social Sciences Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur 721 302 Nandi Bhatia University of Western Ontario Canada Email: agera_99 at yahoo.com, nbhatia2 at uwo.ca source: South Asia Citizens Wire / Harsh kapoor _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From shivamvij at gmail.com Sat Oct 16 21:30:03 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Sat, 16 Oct 2004 09:00:03 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] Indian coverage of global conflict: 'Embedded in a foreign frame' Message-ID: Embedded in a foreign frame By Saeed Naqvi The Indian Express | 15 October 2004 http://iecolumnists.expressindia.com/full_column.php?content_id=56949 The photograph is blown up to the size of a cinemascope screen. A blasted foreground, broken bricks, boulders stretch far into a battered building, bombed and burning. Silhouetted against the fading light is a soldier, like a sentry keeping watch on desolation. This is Grozny, capital of Chechnya. It is a strange photograph to dominate a well appointed restaurant off Paddington tube station in London. But then, the restaurant is part of an unusual institution — the Frontline Club whose members are journalists from the frontline, like Grozny. Photographs like this one — from Afghanistan, Kosovo, Iraq — are all gifts to the club by cameramen, photographers, reporters "who have been there". There are three other floors. On the third are rooms for journalists (members) to stay. The second is for conferences, seminars, discussions with "frontline" journalists and screenings of films like Fahrenheit 9/11. The first floor is the club-house, heart of the building. At the entrance are photographs of eight journalists, all members of the club, killed in recent wars. "At last count, 53 journalists including interpreters have been killed in Iraq, making it the dealiest war in history for our profession," says Vaughan Smith, founder of the club. His friend, Pranvera Shema from Kosovo (she is also the club manager), says the club aims to remember all journalists, worldwide, who have been killed in the line of duty. Members are veterans of many frontlines — John Pilger, Philip Knightley — with as many stories. In a sense, the club gives clues to the evolution of a new kind of outdoors reporting following the conflicts that erupted at the time the Soviet Union began to collapse. It all began as Frontline TV news in 1989, when first pictures appeared of the Soviet departure from Afghanistan. Technology helped. The professional handicam arrived in the market, facilitating the one-man reporter-cameraman to reach the frontlines, unencumbered with too much baggage. The independent, freelance journalist was in the vanguard, providing footage networks and news agencies otherwise had no access to. Many of these "one-man-bands" as Vaughan Smith describes these freelancers, had an army background with a smattering of local languages. Frontline TV news flourished until 1996. Thereafter, networks began to have their own "line" on events in Gaza, Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq. News was tailored to serve the national purpose. Freelancers would "blow the whistle" if their footage was subjected to tendentious editing. The day of the "embedded" journalist had arrived. But as conflicts became more vicious, insurance companies hiked up their rates. Under the watchful eyes of penny-pinching proprietors, editors again fell back on under insured freelancers and local stringers. The old dictum has been brought into play: staffers die in wars, stringers in insurgencies. Away from all this upheaval, secure in the Indian land-mass, is the Indian journalist. He is covering a great story, of course, because I truly believe the 21st century will in large part be India's story. But the great Indian drama is taking place in a regional and a global context. The Indian story will not make sense unless it is seen as part of complex global linkages. If our journalism is focused exclusively on India, who will inform us about Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Palestine, Israel? Since we're now engaging the eastern flank, where are our networks in Yangon, Bangkok, Jakarta, even Dhaka? FICCI has brought a high powered business delegation to the UK. Businessmen have been interacting with their British counterparts and think tanks like Chatham House. British sources speak positively of the discussions. But these days Americans, British, Europeans are all riveted on Iraq — to a lesser extent Israel, Afghanistan, Sudan. To hold their attention for any length of time we would do well to have informed views on these subjects based on our exclusive sources of information. But how can we make credible conversation on these issues when all we can do is to echo what we have watched on BBC and CNN? We have no other sources. The depth of our democracy, satisfactory economic growth, well equipped armed forces will have multipliers attached to them if we have a global TV-radio network to inform us about the world and inform the world about us. Vested interests pulverise us with the cant that the task is too big. Public spirited entrepreneurs could take up the project provided they are willing to be guided not by the market for "tamasha" but the requirements of serious journalism. They will make more money than they imagine. Such a network should ideally be part of our public service broadcasting, which requires Prasar Bharati to be truly independent, not the half hatched egg it is today. Our frontline journalists are waiting for such opportunities. From definetime at rediffmail.com Sat Oct 16 10:25:44 2004 From: definetime at rediffmail.com (sanjay ghosh) Date: 16 Oct 2004 04:55:44 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] UN engaged in retrieving corporate profits Message-ID: <20041016045544.31971.qmail@webmail28.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041016/3d3a8140/attachment.html -------------- next part --------------   Why is war-torn Iraq giving $190,000 to Toys R Us? Saturday October 16, 2004 The Guardian / Naomi Klein Next week, something will happen that will unmask the upside-down morality of the invasion and occupation of Iraq. On October 21, Iraq will pay $200m in war reparations to some of the richest countries and corporations in the world. If that seems backwards, it's because it is. Iraqis have never been awarded reparations for any of the crimes they suffered under Saddam, or the brutal sanctions regime that claimed the lives of at least half a million people, or the US-led invasion, which the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, recently called "illegal". Instead, Iraqis are still being forced to pay reparations for crimes committed by their former dictator. Quite apart from its crushing $125bn sovereign debt, Iraq has paid $18.8bn in reparations stemming from Saddam Hussein's 1990 invasion and occupation of Kuwait. This is not in itself surprising: as a condition of the ceasefire that ended the 1991 Gulf war, Saddam agreed to pay damages stemming from the invasion. More than 50 countries have made claims, with most of the money awarded to Kuwait. What is surprising is that even after Saddam was overthrown, the payments from Iraq have continued. Since Saddam was toppled in April, Iraq has paid out $1.8bn in reparations to the United Nations Compensation Commission (UNCC), the Geneva-based quasi tribunal that assesses claims and disburses awards. Of those payments, $37m have gone to Britain and $32.8m have gone to the United States. That's right: in the past 18 months, Iraq's occupiers have collected $69.8m in reparation payments from the desperate people they have been occupying. But it gets worse: the vast majority of those payments, 78%, have gone to multinational corporations, according to statistics on the UNCC website. Away from media scrutiny, this has been going on for years. Of course there are many legitimate claims for losses that have come before the UNCC: payments have gone to Kuwaitis who have lost loved ones, limbs, and property to Saddam's forces. But much larger awards have gone to corporations: of the total amount the UNCC has awarded in Gulf war reparations, $21.5bn has gone to the oil industry alone. Jean-Claude Aimé, the UN diplomat who headed the UNCC until December 2000, publicly questioned the practice. "This is the first time as far as I know that the UN is engaged in retrieving lost corporate assets and profits," he told the Wall Street Journal in 1997, and then mused: "I often wonder at the correctness of that." But the UNCC's corporate handouts only accelerated. Here is a small sample of who has been getting "reparation" awards from Iraq: Halliburton ($18m), Bechtel ($7m), Mobil ($2.3m), Shell ($1.6m), Nestlé ($2.6m), Pepsi ($3.8m), Philip Morris ($1.3m), Sheraton ($11m), Kentucky Fried Chicken ($321,000) and Toys R Us ($189,449). In the vast majority of cases, these corporations did not claim that Saddam's forces damaged their property in Kuwait - only that they "lost profits" or, in the case of American Express, experienced a "decline in business" because of the invasion and occupation of Kuwait. One of the biggest winners has been Texaco, which was awarded $505m in 1999. According to a UNCC spokesperson, only 12% of that reparation award has been paid, which means hundreds of millions more will have to come out of the coffers of post-Saddam Iraq. The fact that Iraqis have been paying reparations to their occupiers is all the more shocking in the context of how little these countries have actually spent on aid in Iraq. Despite the $18.4bn of US tax dollars allocated for Iraq's reconstruction, the Washington Post estimates that only $29m has been spent on water, sanitation, health, roads, bridges, and public safety combined. And in July (the latest figure available), the Department of Defence estimated that only $4m had been spent compensating Iraqis who had been injured, or who lost family members or property as a direct result of the occupation - a fraction of what the US has collected from Iraq in reparations since its occupation began. For years there have been complaints about the UNCC being used as a slush fund for multinationals and rich oil emirates - a backdoor way for corporations to collect the money they were prevented from making as a result of the sanctions against Iraq. During the Saddam years, these concerns received little attention, for obvious reasons. But now Saddam is gone and the slush fund survives. And every dollar sent to Geneva is a dollar not spent on humanitarian aid and reconstruction Iraq. Furthermore, if post-Saddam Iraq had not been forced to pay these reparations, it could have avoided the $437m emergency loan that the International Monetary Fund approved on September 29. With all the talk of forgiving Iraq's debts, the country is actually being pushed deeper into the hole, forced to borrow money from the IMF, and to accept all of the conditions and restrictions that come along with those loans. The UNCC, meanwhile, continues to assess claims and make new awards: $377m worth of new claims were awarded last month alone. Fortunately, there is a simple way to put an end to these grotesque corporate subsidies. According to United Nations security council resolution 687, which created the reparations programme, payments from Iraq must take into account "the requirements of the people of Iraq, Iraq's payment capacity, and the needs of the Iraqi economy". If a single one of these three issues were genuinely taken into account, the security council would vote to put an end to these payouts tomorrow. That is the demand of Jubilee Iraq, a debt relief organisation based in London. Reparations are owed to the victims of Saddam Hussein, the group argues - both in Iraq and in Kuwait. But the people of Iraq, who were themselves Saddam's primary victims, should not be paying them. Instead, reparations should be the responsibility of the governments that loaned billions to Saddam, knowing the money was being spent on weapons so he could wage war on his neighbours and his own people. "If justice, and not power, prevailed in international affairs, then Saddam's creditors would be paying reparations to Kuwait as well as far greater reparations to the Iraqi people," says Justin Alexander, coordinator of Jubilee Iraq. Right now precisely the opposite is happening: instead of flowing into Iraq, reparations are flowing out. It's time for the tide to turn. ·Naomi Klein is the author of No Logo, and Fences and Windows From souweine at hawaii.edu Sat Oct 16 15:05:42 2004 From: souweine at hawaii.edu (Isaac D W Souweine) Date: Sat, 16 Oct 2004 14:35:42 +0500 Subject: [spam?] [Reader-list] Politics of American Un-civilization Message-ID: Avinash: You refer to this article as making a "claim" that you take "seriously". I have read the article (or rather your translation) and I'm wondering whether it really deserves to be called a "claim", as opposed to say "unfounded speculation". This question (of terminology) has also set me on some other wonderings. As to the merits of the ideas in the article, I can't say, but seeing as the piece includes no factual support, relying instead on the appeal that is always enjoyed by claims about grand/unexpected conspiracies (novel interpretations are so rare these days), I'm wondering about whether there are certain levels of responsibility attached to reproducing such claims/speculation. Don't get me wrong - such a thing could be true. Moreover, in an era of technically “free” but systematically vapid and disinformative media, it is the job of regular everyday citizens to use the tools at their disposal, especially information technology, to circulate facts and ideas that would otherwise be buried or strategically misinterpreted. In this sense, I commend your search for more information on this issue and of course the list is a perfect place to make inquiries. At the same time, considering the way memes of information flow, especially in a networked world, I still have misgivings. Because the fact is, many people will not follow this up (we’re all busy people after all), but they will read and here it and maybe they will reproduce it, as in "Hey, did you here that those Abu Gharib pictures are actually part of a state department plot . . . .". Perhaps I should not be worried - ideas survive or fail according to their own merits and all that, but I guess my concern is connected to this fact: for the past months, having little access to libraries, I have been doing a lot of research on the internet, despite the fact that I have been told by so many and have seen for myself that in the global information commons there is a huge amount of what Thoreau would poetically call "seaweed" but that is better labeled as either " speculation and misinformation" or, perhaps even worse (for being more subtle), “poorly researched, imprecise and slightly incorrect facts”. Of course, there is increasingly lots of really quality information that abides by basic standards of accuracy, but this problem (the problem of democracy??) remains endemic. Knowing all this, I'm wondering - do we have a responsibility with regard to populating this or any list or any internet-accessible place with information that abides by a certain standard?? I know problems exist even with the way this question is framed – whose standard? How is it overseen etc.? But even accepting these problems, I think the question is worth considering. There is more to say on this, definitions to specify, philosophers to quote (JS Mill where are you), implications to unpack etc., but I’ll leave it there for the time being. . . Yours, Isaac Souweine Content-type: multipart/alternative; boundary="Boundary_(ID_+u9LCO2YpdC3SzCTUK/upw)" --Boundary_(ID_+u9LCO2YpdC3SzCTUK/upw) Content-type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-transfer-encoding: quoted-printable Friends, I am appending below my translation of a small piece that appeared in the Hindi journal 'LokVidya Samvad'. The piece argues that the worldwide publicity of torture taking place in Abu Gharaib and elsewhere is part of a plan. I take the claim seriously and would like to inquire into how exactly these pictures were leaked to the media. I have read that Seymoor Hersh and CBS Television were the first to publish these. What is their background? Are there any heroic stories as to how this leak was made possible? Are there any US enquiries as to the security lapses which made this leak possible? It does seem to me that appearance one after another of these videos and pictures from a high security prison is suspicious. avinash From: LOKVIDYA SAMVAD, No. 14, July 2004 (p.20) Politics of American Un-civilization What happened in Abu Gharaib prison and the worldwide publicity it gained, both should be regarded as parts of US strategy. It is not a strategy of war but the strategy of establishing an uncivilized regime in the world. This should also be seen in the context of forthcoming elections in the US to which Bush Administration is responding in part by this particular strategy. The story goes that the Officers of the US Army may have been aware of the torture of Iraqi prisoners but they were not a part of it, and that the pictures and videos of the torture were heroically leaked to the media leading to their worldwide dissemination. We think this is just lies. Ever since the war has been on in Iraq, the US has successfully censored the news and pictures coming out of there. There were hardly any pictures of the protracted battles that took place while the pictures of the demolition of Saddam Hussain's statue were repeated over and over again on the TV screens. Only victories of US army found place in the media coverage. Only on rare occasions did one fine the stories of Iraqi Army's resilience and of defeats suffered by US forces. Is the heroism of the media limited only to showing the victimhood of Iraqis? The truth lies somewhere else. The whole thing is about the priorities and policies of the US administration. The way US went ahead to start a war in Iraq solely on the basis of its military strength in opposition to global resistance, spurning the sentiments of people everywhere, and by completely disregarding the United Nations, brings to light the current US policy and strategy. The policy clearly is to rule the world and the strategy is terror. US cannot hope to win the support of people and countries to its policies on the basis of their consent. It can gain their allegiance only by striking fear into them. By publicizing the pictures from Abu Gharaib depicting behavior that crosses all limits, the US is telling everyone that the people opposing US will meet with the same consequences. The worldwide publicity of these pictures can only be part of a well-thought out strategy. This year's election also requires Bush administration to show itself as that demon which has in it to rule the world with iron hand. In the age of globalisation, control on international trade can be exercised only in this manner and only thus the dream of an American Century can be fulfilled. The republican party cannot trounce the democratic party by paying lip service to democratic values or by talking about international cooperation. Only way Bush can win is by arousing the egotistic and animal instincts of the American people. __________________________________________________ Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi. --Boundary_(ID_+u9LCO2YpdC3SzCTUK/upw) Content-type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE Friends,   I am appending below my translation of a small piece that appeared in the Hindi journal 'LokVidya Samvad'. The piece argues that the worldwide publicity of torture taking place in Abu Gharaib and elsewhere is part of a plan. I take the claim seriously and would like to inquire into how exactly these pictures were leaked to the media. I have read that Seymoor Hersh and CBS Television were the first to publish these. What is their background? Are there any heroic stories as to how this leak was made possible? Are there any US enquiries as to the security lapses which made this leak possible? It does seem to me that appearance one after another of these videos and pictures from a high security prison is suspicious.   avinash  

 

From: LOKVIDYA SAMVAD, No. 14, July 2004 (p.20)

 

Politics of American Un-civilization

 

What happened in Abu Gharaib prison and the worldwide publicity it gained, both should be regarded as parts of US strategy. It is not a strategy of war but the strategy of establishing an uncivilized regime in the world. This should also be seen in the context of forthcoming elections in the US to which Bush Administration is responding in part by this particular strategy. 

 

The story goes that the Officers of the US Army may have been aware of the torture of Iraqi prisoners but they were not a part of it, and that the pictures and videos of the torture were heroically leaked to the media leading to their worldwide dissemination. We think this is just lies. Ever since the war has been on in Iraq, the US has successfully censored the news and pictures coming out of there. There were hardly any pictures of the protracted battles that took place while the pictures of the demolition of Saddam Hussain’s statue were repeated over and over again on the TV screens. Only victories of US army found place in the media coverage. Only on rare occasions did one fine the stories of Iraqi Army’s resilience and of defeats suffered by US forces. Is the heroism of the media limited only to showing the victimhood of Iraqis? The truth lies somewhere else. The whole thing is about the priorities and policies of the US administration.

 

The way US went ahead to start a war in Iraq solely on the basis of its military strength in opposition to global resistance, spurning the sentiments of people everywhere, and by completely disregarding the United Nations, brings to light the current US policy and strategy. The policy clearly is to rule the world and the strategy is terror. US cannot hope to win the support of people and countries to its policies on the basis of their consent. It can gain their allegiance only by striking fear into them. By publicizing the pictures from Abu Gharaib depicting behavior that crosses all limits, the US is telling everyone that the people opposing US will meet with the same consequences. The worldwide publicity of these pictures can only be part of a well-thought out strategy.

 

This year’s election also requires Bush administration to show itself as that demon which has in it to rule the world with iron hand. In the age of globalisation, control on international trade can be exercised only in this manner and only thus the dream of an American Century can be fulfilled. The republican party cannot trounce the democratic party by paying lip service to democratic values or by talking about international cooperation. Only way Bush can win is by arousing the egotistic and animal instincts of the American people.

 

 

Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi. --Boundary_(ID_+u9LCO2YpdC3SzCTUK/upw)-- -------------- next part -------------- _________________________________________ 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: From nisar at keshvani.com Sat Oct 16 13:37:22 2004 From: nisar at keshvani.com (nisar keshvani) Date: Sat, 16 Oct 2004 03:07:22 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Leonardo Abstracts Service - Call for Submissions Message-ID: <200410160307.AA917698@keshvani.com> As part of the Leonardo Educators Initiative, the Leonardo Abstracts Service (LABS) is pleased to announce its first cycle of shortlisted peer reviewed abstracts. Scholars published in the first cycle in the Leonardo Electronic Almanac October 2004 are: * Peter Anders: A Procedural Model for the Integration of Physical and Cyberspaces in Architecture Thesis Supervisors: Roy Ascott, Michael Phillips, Michael Punt * Principles of Metadesign: Processes and Levels of Co-Creation in the New Design Space by Elisa Giaccardi Thesis Supervisor: Roy Ascott * Fatima Lasay: Phase Space Portraits of the Nuestra Señora delos Dolores of Baclayon Thesis Supervisor: Santiago Albano Pilar * Maureen A. Nappi: Language, Memory and Volition: Toward an Aesthetics of Computer Arts Thesis Supervisors: Benjamin Binstock and Judith R. Weissman LABS is seeking PhD, Masters and MFA thesis abstracts for its next publication cycle. Authors of theses interested in having their thesis abstract considered for publication should fill out the Thesis Abstract Submittal form at http://leonardolabs.pomona.edu Deadline for submission is: 15 November 2004 What is LABS? LABS is a comprehensive database of Ph.D., Masters and MFA thesis abstracts in the emerging intersection between art, science and technology. Individuals receiving advanced degrees in the arts (visual, sound, performance, text), computer sciences, the sciences and/or technology, which in some way investigate philosophical, historical, or critical applications of science or technology to the arts, are invited to submit an abstract of their thesis for publication consideration in this database. The LABS project does not seek to duplicate existing thesis databases but rather to give visibility to interdisciplinary work that is often hard to retrieve from existing databases. The abstracts are available online at Pomona College, Claremont, California, so that interested persons can access them at no cost. The English language peer review panel for 2004/2005 are Pau Alsina, Jody Berland, Sean Cubitt, Frieder Nake, Sheila Pinkel and Stephen Petersen. What is the Leonardo International Academic Community? The Leonardo International Academic Community is a mailing list to encourage discussion and exchange of ideas (to join email: lea [@] mitpress [dot] mit [dot] edu with a brief introduction) amongst leaders and thinkers in academia. Academics also receive the Leonardo International Faculty Alerts - announcing job and other opportunities in the field. From basharatpeer at rediffmail.com Sun Oct 17 15:00:36 2004 From: basharatpeer at rediffmail.com (basharat peer) Date: 17 Oct 2004 09:30:36 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] confessions-dec 13 case Message-ID: <20041017093036.30412.qmail@webmail25.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041017/719b1800/attachment.html -------------- next part --------------   Confessions were forced in Dec. 13 Case In his submission before the Supreme Court in the Parliament attack case, the senior counsel Mr. Shanti Bhusan argued on Thursday that the confessions made by the accused Mohammad Afzal and Shaukat Hussain Guru were extracted from them by the Special Cell of the Delhi police under torture. Afzal and Shaukat were given death sentences by the High Court in its judgment of 29 October, 2003. Their confessions formed a crucial evidence against them. In fact, Afzal’s confessional statement is the only evidence for the identity of the terrorists who died in the attack, the names of organizations they belonged to, the hatching of the conspiracy from Pakistan, and the details of arms and ammunition brought from Kashmir. The appeal against the High Court judgment by the defence is currently being heard by Justice Reddy and Justice Naolekar at the Supreme Court. On the fifth day of his submissions in defence of Shaukat Hussain Guru, Mr. Shanti Bhusan focused mostly on the validity of the confessions. He pointed out that the disclosure statement of the accused recorded by the police on 16 December 2001 soon after their arrest already contained all the details of the official confession made later under POTA on 21 December 2001. If the disclosure statements were voluntarily made, they clearly showed that the accused were eager to confess to their alleged crime. Hence the accused could have been produced before a judicial magistrate on the 17th itself for a recording of the confession under the Criminal Procedure Code. Instead of taking this course, the police waited till the 19th when the POTA clauses were officially introduced in the case, and the confessions were recorded befor a police officer on 21 December. This suggests that the police wanted to use the convenience of POTA, and avoid the safegurds against forced confessions provided in the Code. So the possibility that both the disclosure statements and the confessions were extracted under torture can not be ruled out. Mr. Shanti Bhusan also pointed out that the Deputy Commissioner of Police, who was empowered to record the confessions, gave a written order to his subordinate Assistant Commisioner of Police to produce the accused before the DCP at 11.30 A.M. on 21 December 2001. As such, Mohammad Afzal, Shaukat Guru and SAR Geelani were produced at the appointed time. However, Geelani refused to make a confessional statement, and his statement to this effect was recorded by 11.55 A.M. Then, instead of producing the next accused before the DCP for the confessions, they were taken away and brought back over three hours later when the recording of Shaukat’s confession started at 3.30 P.M.; recording of Afzal’s confession started at 7.30 P.M. The only explanation, according to Shanti Bhusan, is that, after Geelani refused to confess, the other two accused were subjected to further torture so that they fell in line before the recordings were resumed. In view of these and other infirmities in the said confessions, and the long series of legal pronouncements that discouraged the use of confessions before the police, the bench asked if there was an explanation as to why such a confession was allowed under POTA. Interestingly, the bench itself reflected that this method could be needed only in those exceptional circumstances, such as operations in remote areas, in which a judicial magistrate may not be easily available. The case under discussion, in contrast, was handled in New Delhi. Earlier, Mr. Shanti Bhusan had already pointed out that many individual statements in these confessions were in contradiction with other evidence produced by the prosecution. Mr. Shanti Bhusan’s submission will resume on 26 October after the autumn recess. Nirmalangshu Mukherji, Department of Philosophy, Delhi University From definetime at rediffmail.com Mon Oct 18 08:51:55 2004 From: definetime at rediffmail.com (sanjay ghosh) Date: 18 Oct 2004 03:21:55 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] (fwd) Black disenfranchisement Message-ID: <20041018032155.3542.qmail@webmail17.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041018/6a48634e/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- Any means necessary In the 60s, police dogs and billy clubs kept black Americans from the polls. Today's methods are more refined Gary Younge Monday October 18, 2004 The Guardian There is nothing George Bush likes more than extolling the virtues of democracy in faraway places. On October 8, during the second presidential debate, he promised: "Freedom is on the march. Tomorrow, Afghanistan will be voting for a president." Apparently some Afghans enjoyed their new freedoms so much, they voted for the US surrogate, Hamid Karzai, several times over, after the ink used to mark voters' thumbs wore off. By the middle of the day, all 15 of Karzai's challengers had withdrawn. Freedom was not even limping let alone marching. "Today's election is not a legitimate election," said Abdul Satar Sirat, after he and the other disgruntled candidates had met in his house. Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, knew better. "This election is going to be judged legitimate," she said. "I'm just certain of it." When it comes to fixing elections, the Bush administration has a way of making the lame walk. By Monday an exit poll funded by the US government and conducted by the International Republican Institute, which has links to the Republican party, revealed Karzai as a comfortable winner. After diplomatic arm-twisting by the US ambassador, the 15 challengers withdrew their withdrawals. It was a miracle. A few days later, in the final presidential debate, Bush would literally claim divine intervention. "In Afghanistan, I believe that the freedom there is a gift from the Almighty." Back in the US, however, the Almighty seems far less generous. Bush's enthusiasm to export democracy is not matched by his desire to defend it at home. With just a fortnight to go to the presidential election, efforts to obstruct and deny the vote, particularly to black and Latino voters, are intensifying. Forty years after the civil rights act enshrined the franchise in the constitution for African-Americans, freedom is being crippled. The group most likely to serve in Iraq and Afghanistan, where they are ostensibly extending democracy and freedom - African-Americans - is most likely to be denied those rights in the US. There is nothing new in this contradiction. In the cold war, when the US lectured the eastern bloc on the delights of democracy, black Americans couldn't vote. The issue of disenfranchisement does not affect only minorities. The use of electronic voting in many states, using machines that leave no paper trail, has sent confidence that a fair election is likely, or even possible, into freefall. Once dismissed as the obsession of conspiracy theorists, fear of fraud is now mainstream. "Will your vote be counted?" asks the cover of Newsweek. "Election protests already started: Fraud intimidation alleged in key states," says a USA Today front page. The former employee of a company hired by the Republican party to register voters in Nevada says he was told to throw Democrats' registration forms away. And last January, the Republican Ellyn Bogdanoff won a seat in Florida's senate by just 12 votes, out of almost 11,000 cast. According to state law there should have been an automatic recount; moreover, 137 votes emerged blank. But because the voting had been done by machine there was nothing to recount. Bogdanoff took the seat. The machines will be used on November 2. Sometimes these efforts bear the official imprimatur of local officials. Given the debacle in Florida four years ago, you would think the governor (Bush's brother Jeb) would be anxious to ensure that anyone who wants to vote can. Instead he has introduced a rule that registration forms should be rejected if a citizenship check box is not complete - even when people have signed an oath on the same form declaring themselves to be US citizens. Meanwhile Ohio's Republican secretary of state, Kenneth Blackwell, attempted to enforce a rule by which only registration cards printed on heavy, 80lb paper stock would be accepted, claiming lighter cards might be shredded by postal equipment (meaning that voters who have to re-register on the heavier paper might not make it on time). And last summer the chief executive of Diebold, which makes many of the voting machines, said he was "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes" to Bush. African-Americans, however, remain the principal target of the Republican campaign to block the vote. Unlike the 60s, when black Americans were barred from the polls by police dogs, water cannon and billy clubs, the means today are more refined. Occasionally the mask slips. In July, John Pappageorge, Michigan's Republican state legislator, told a Republican meeting: "If we do not suppress the Detroit vote, we're going to have a tough time in this election cycle." Detroit is more than 80% black. It does not take a genius to work out whose votes he was keen to suppress. So far it has mainly been a mix of petty harassment and bureaucratic pedantry, devised to intimidate newly registered and poor voters, a huge proportion of whom are black and Latino. Take Florida. According to the Washington Post, African-Americans in Republican-run Duval county were the most likely to have their voter registration forms rejected, while rejections for Democrats outnumbered Republicans by three to one. In 2000, 42% of ballots rejected by the Duval county election board came from mainly black areas. In Ohio, Mr Blackwell also told election boards that anyone who turned up at the wrong polling station would not be able to cast a provisional ballot (to be verified later). The Democrats successfully sued, saying that the ruling would disadvantage minority and poor voters, who tend to move more often. It is not difficult to fathom what is driving these efforts, which are being replicated throughout the country. The best indication of how an American will vote is race. More than 80% of African-Americans voted Democrat in the last election. Incapable of persuading them to vote Republican, Republicans now seek to prevent them voting Democrat. This task has become particularly urgent because voter registration recently ended in many states, revealing that voter rolls in black and Latino areas have swollen in far greater numbers than in Republican precincts. Between the last election and August this year, almost 200,000 additional black voters were registered in Florida. So while these attempts are clearly racial in nature, they are essentially partisan in motivation. With apologies to Malcolm X, they are about winning by any means necessary. Republicans support democracy when democracy supports Republicans. But they are equally happy to do without it when it is inconvenient. That was always true abroad, from Venezuela to Nicaragua and Pakistan to Saudi Arabia. Now it is true at home, from Detroit to Duval County. Freedom is on the retreat. And the man who assumed office four years ago thanks to thousands of disenfranchised black voters is again leading the charge. g.younge at guardian.co.uk From shivamvij at gmail.com Mon Oct 18 14:22:08 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2004 14:22:08 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] 'Steel City tackles its water woes' Message-ID: Steel City tackles its water woes The Steel City of Jamshedpur suffers severe water stress. But over the last decade, steel giant Tata Steel has reduced pollutant discharge by 98%, cut water consumption by 67.3%, and achieved zero groundwater extraction. The conservation efforts of the industry that dominates this town are being replicated by citizens in the old city. Manipadma Jena travelled to Jamshedpur to document this pathbreaking corporate-citizens initiative http://www.infochangeindia.org/features215.jsp From monica.mody at gmail.com Mon Oct 18 16:27:01 2004 From: monica.mody at gmail.com (Monica Mody) Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2004 16:27:01 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] who made? who watched? who acted? Message-ID: <4badad3b04101803571012560c@mail.gmail.com> I am enthralled by the story of a big, beautiful blonde who kicked and punched her way to folklore and movielore, becoming famous as "hunterwali". Fearless Nadia, who could always be counted on to take the side of the oppressed, who first announced without a tremor in her voice, "auraten kamzor nahin hoti!" An ilk-defying icon of the 1930s and 40s, I watched her in action today on a sound-gone-bad DVD where all the interviews were rendered in an uptempo whirr. That did not take away from the magic of the story of Mary Evans, aka Nadia Hunterwali, unfolding amidst the times when films had not yet become commodities; movies were miracles of technology that took an amorphous imagination by the scruff of the neck and nailed it to materiality and posterity. The film, "Fearless: the Hunterwali Story" (by late Riyad Vinci Wadia), raised other interesting issues. Most of the film posters seemed to be in English. So were the films meant chiefly for the consumption of the English-speaking class? Did the British watch them as well? Did they have a parallel endeavor where they made films in India starring Englishmen and -women? Apart from Nadia, were there other actors of European descent in the pre-independence days? And if so, how did they fare post-1947? I thought the Readers-List would be a good place to bring all my questions. Forgive me if some of the answers are common knowledge. I'm afraid I have really slipped in my Stardust reading. -- http://insmallpieces.blogspot.com From sunil at mahiti.org Tue Oct 19 04:59:40 2004 From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham) Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2004 23:29:40 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Call for Nominations for Advisory Panel: Asia Pacific Open Regional Dialogue on Internet Governance Message-ID: <1098142180.700.84.camel@box> :: Deadline Extended: Call for Nominations for Advisory Panel Asia :: Pacific Open Regional Dialogue on Internet Governance: The UNDP-Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme (APDIP) has extended its deadline for nominations of qualified individuals to serve on the Advisory Panel for its new Open Regional Dialogue on Internet Governance in the Asia-Pacific. The Panel shall be representative of the broadest range of stakeholder in Internet governance from the Asia-Pacific region. It will advise on the entire scope and methodology of the initiative that aims to facilitate a regional dialogue on Internet governance, generate research for evidence-based policy-making in this area and catalyse the formulation of an Asia-Pacific perspective on Internet governance as input to the 2005 UN World Summit on the Information Society. Members are expected to provide electronic feedback on project development and all draft outputs, contribute to electronic discussions of key issues, and attend at least one face-to-to face panel meeting to be scheduled for 2005. Selected members might also be invited to attend relevant policy conferences in the region. Appointment is on a pro-bono basis, while any meeting-related travel and subsistence expenses will be covered by APDIP. Nominations of qualified individuals from public sector, civil society or the private sector of any country in the Asia-Pacific region can be submitted online until October 26, 2004 at http://igov.apdip.net/panel/nomination/ For more on the Asia-Pacific Open Regional Dialogue on Internet Governance see http://igov.apdip.net For more on APDIP see www.apdip.net Should you require further information, please feel free to contact Dieter Zinnbauer at dieter at apdip.net Dieter Zinnbauer (PhD) Internet Policy Consultant UNDP-APDIP Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Tel.: +603-20959122 (General) Fax: +603-20939740 URL: www.apdip.net Email: dieter at apdip.net Thanks, ಸುನೀಲ್ -- Sunil Abraham, sunil at mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA Ph/Fax: +91 80 51150580. Mobile: +91 80 36701931 Currently on sabbatical with APDIP/UNDP Manager - International Open Source Network Wisma UN, Block C Komplex Pejabat Damansara. Jalan Dungun, Damansara Heights. 50490 Kuala Lumpur. P. O. Box 12544, 50782, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Tel: (60) 3-2091-5167, Fax: (60) 3-2095-2087 sunil at apdip.net http://www.iosn.net http://www.apdip.net From smitashu at vsnl.com Mon Oct 18 23:53:32 2004 From: smitashu at vsnl.com (s choudhary) Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2004 23:53:32 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Transitor turns 50... Message-ID: <033801c4b540$1555dea0$daec41db@n4r8e2> New Delhi, 18 Oct 2004.Today I want to pay my tributes to that small instrument which made such a huge impact on my life when I was growing up in a small sleepy town in the middle of hills and jungles in Central tribal India. It was my friend, my teacher, my university,and my window to the rest of the world- my transistor- which completes its journey of 50 years today. It was the era before the arrival of TV, newspapers took 2 days to reach remote areas, and transistor was the source of information and entertainment. 18th October 1954 when TI-1 was first introduced, as transistor was called at that time; it costed more than $50, quite a huge sum for that period. It was a revolution for the younger generation in America. Whereas the Radio was part of the installed furniture,controlled by the parents at home , the transistor gave the freedom to choose your favourite programme. It was also when the Rock n Roll arrived. The two clicked together so well- the rebellion of the sixties was reflectd in the popularity of these little machines. The transistor has been on roll since then. Very soon Japanese models took over the first American ones and that remains the rule so far. Prices today for a transistor have come down to less than $1 and has made itself affordable for the poor. Moving ahead from diode and triode, the technology of transistor was a big step forward. We see its usage even today in TV and computers which uses the transistor technology in various forms. Many have graduated from transitor to television to broadband & computers now. But for a huge majority transistor remains a trusted ally even after 50 years. Be it be a rikshaw puller in Delhi or a farmer in remote corner of India, the one thing they have in common apart from being poor is a transistor. If you leave last couple of decades ours has been a story of transistor radios. I remember visiting a market called BBC Bazar in Bangladesh. It came by that name in a very interesting way- It was the year 1971, the war of liberation was on and the only transistor in the locality was available in a hamlet in this remote area half a day from capital Dhaka. The whole population converged to listen to the evening news which turned a small hamlet into a full fledged market named after the most popular radio station at that time. India has 104 million transistor homes, more than double than the reach of TV. And radio transmissions are available to 98.5% of the population. According to Planning Commission statistics more than half of Indian houses do not have any electricity connection. With these kind of figures does one need to emphasise the importance of transistor for a country like India ? Ten years back, the Indian supreme court gave an interesting ruling. This judgement strongly critiqued the long-held government monopoly over broadcasting in this country. In early 1995, the court declared the airwaves as public property, to be utilized for promoting public good and ventilating plurality of views, opinions and ideas. (AIR 1995 Supreme Court 1236). In view of this, the judges said it was essential that the Indian Parliament "steps in soon to fill the void by enacting a law or laws, as the case may be, governing the broadcast media, i.e. both radio and television". Parliament has stepped in to relax laws to liberate television but many wonder why Governement is so afraid to free Radio. Radio still remains a powerful tool for the rulers to spread "their" message. But it is still a one way traffic where people have no control on what they listen. Even our tiny neighbours like Nepal and Sri Lanka have gone forward to legalise community radio stations where people talk to each other rather than being talked at all the time. It was not surprising that there were no celebrations planned for a technology which has given us so much and contains huge potential to democratise our polity. This probably tells about the time and place we live in. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Shubhranshu Choudhary Freelance Journalist Ph : + 91 98110 66749 e mail : smitashu at vsnl.com http://36garh.notlong.com http://smitashu.8m.net -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041018/3cdd21e0/attachment.html From shivamvij at gmail.com Mon Oct 18 14:33:58 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2004 14:33:58 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] A Sociological Understanding of 'Alig' Identity' Message-ID: The Centre for Studies on Indian Muslims, Hamdard University, invites you to attend a talk on 'Perpetuating Culture and the Production of Self: A Sociological Understanding of 'Alig' Identity' (Reflections on What it Means to be a Student of the Aligarh Muslim University) By S. M. Faizan Ahmed S. M. Faizan Ahmed received a Bachelor's degree in Sociology from the Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, and did his post-graduation from the Dept. of Sociology, Delhi School of Economics, Delhi. Apart from his independent research, he has also been involved with several research institutions in Delhi. He has worked on Partition, Masculinities, Labour issues, the Students' movement and Muslim Politics. He is currently engaged in writing a monograph entitled "Making Democarcy Meaningful: Towards a New Brand of Muslim Politics". Date: 21st October, 2004 (Thursday) Time: 2:45 pm Venue: Board Room (Near VC's office), Main Administrative Building,Hamdard University, New Delhi (Near Batra Hospital) via: _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From vivek at sarai.net Tue Oct 19 15:21:19 2004 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 15:21:19 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Norman Mailer on the US Elections Message-ID: <4174E397.7020102@sarai.net> From a recent issue of the New York Review of Books, mostly for enjoyment's sake: this is the best piece of writing I've seen from Mailer in a long while. V. *NORMAN MAILER* /Provincetown, Massachusetts/ A victory for Bush may yet be seen as one of our nation's unforgettable ironies. No need to speak again of the mendacities, manipulations, and spiritual mediocrity of the post–9/11 years; the time has come to recover from the shock that so abysmal a record (and so complete a refusal to look at the record) looks nonetheless likely to prevail. Who, then, are we? In just what kind of condition are the American people? A quick look at our movie stars gives a hint. The liberal left has been attached to actors like Warren Beatty and Jack Nicholson. They spoke to our cynicism and to our baffled idealism. But the American center moved their loyalties from the decency of Gary Cooper to the grit and self-approval of John Wayne. Now, we have the apotheosis of Arnold Schwarzenegger. He captured convention honors at the Garden in the course of informing America, via the physicality of his presence, that should the nation ever come to such a dire pass as to need a dictator, why, bless us all, he, Arnold, can offer the best chin to come along since Benito Mussolini. Chin is now prepared to replace spin. In 1983, during the formative years of spin, 241 Marines were blown up by one terrorist blast in Beirut. Two days later, on October 25, Reagan landed 1,200 marines in Grenada, which is 3,000 miles away from Beirut. By the time that the invasion force grew to 7,000 Marines, the campaign was over. The US lost 19 dead, while 49 soldiers in the Grenadian army perished on the other side, as well as 29 Cuban construction workers. Communism in the Caribbean was now kaput (except for the little matter of Castro and Cuba). After this instant victory over a ragtag foe, Reagan was stimulated enough to accept his supporters' claim that America had now put an end to our shame in Vietnam. Reagan understood what Americans wanted, and that was spin. It was more important to be told you were healthy than to be healthy. Bush-and-Rove enlarged this insight by an order of magnitude. They acted on the premise that America was prodigiously insecure. As an empire, we are nouveaux riches. We look to overcome the uneasiness implicit in this condition by amassing mega-money. The sorriest thing to be said about the US, as we sidle up to fascism (which can become our fate if we plunge into a major depression, or suffer a set of dirty-bomb catastrophes), is that we expect disasters. We await them. We have become a guilty nation. Somewhere in the moil of the national conscience is the knowledge that we are caught in the little contradiction of loving Jesus on Sunday, while lusting the rest of the week for mega-money. How can we not be in need of someone to tell us that we are good and pure and he will seek to make us secure? For Bush-and-Rove, 9/11 was the jackpot. The presidency is a role, and George, left on his own, might have become a successful movie actor. Kerry's task by now is to scourge Bush's ham machismo. But how? Kerry's only real opportunity will come as he steps into a most constricting venue—the debates. Kerry has to dominate Bush without a backward look at his own dovish councils—"Don't be seen as cruel, John, or you will lose the women!" To the contrary—Kerry must win the men. He has to take Bush apart in public. By the end of the debates, he has to succeed in laying waste to Bush's shit-eating grin and present himself as the legitimate alternative—a hero whose reputation was slandered by a slacker. That will not be routine. Bush is the better actor. He has been impersonating men more manly than himself for many years. Kerry has to convince some new part of the audience that his opponent is a closet weakling who seizes on inflexibility as a way to show America that he is strong. Bush's appeal is, after all, to the stupid. They, too, are inflexible—they also know that maintaining one's stupidity can become a kind of strength, provided you never change your mind. There is a subtext which Kerry can use. Bush, after all, is not accustomed to working alone in hostile environments. He has been cosseted for years. It is cruel but true that he has the vulnerability of an ex-alcoholic. People in Alcoholics Anonymous speak of themselves as dry drunks. As they see it, they may no longer drink, yet a sense of imbalance at having to do without liquor does not go away. Rather the impulse is sequestered behind the faith that God is supporting one's efforts to remain sober. Giving up booze may have been the most heroic act of George W.'s life, but America could now be paying the price. George W.'s piety has become a pomade to cover all the tamped-down dry-drunk craziness that still stirs in his livid inner air. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ These gloomy words were written before the first debate on September 30. They were followed by an even gloomier final flourish: "Through this era of belly-grinding ironies, the most unpalatable may be that we have to hitch our hopes to a series of televised face-offs whose previous history has seldom offered more than a few sound bites for the contestants and apnea for the viewer. God bless America! We may not deserve it, but we could use the Lord's help. Bush's first confidence, after all, is that the devil will never desert him in his hour of need. His only error is that he thinks it is the Son who is speaking to him." The debate, however, offered surprising ground for optimism. Kerry was at his best, concise, forceful, almost joyous in the virtuosity of his ability. He was able to speak his piece despite the Procrustean bonds of the debate. And Bush was at his worst. He looked spoiled. He was out of his element. He was tired from campaigning. There are times when a man has campaigned so much that he is running on hollow. Even Bush's face had become a liability. He looked cranky and puckered up. For years, he had been able to speak free of debate, always able to utter his homey patriotic gospel without interruption. Now in the ninety minutes of formalized back and forth, with the camera sometimes catching his petulant reactions while Kerry spoke, he looked unhappy enough to take a drink. Most of this was seen on a big state-of-the-art television set, and the verdict seemed clear. Kerry had won by a large margin. Bush's only credit was that he had gone the distance without making any irremediable errors. Kerry's poll numbers seemed bound to increase. Only one caveat remained. The first twenty minutes of the debate had been seen on the kind of modest-sized set that most of America would be using. On that set, one saw a somewhat different debate. Karl Rove had scored again. However it had been managed, the placement of the cameras favored Bush. His head took up more square inches on the screen than Kerry's. In television, that is half the battle. Kerry looked long and lean as he spoke out of what seemed to be a medium shot, whereas Bush had many a close-up. This advantage partly disappeared on the large set. There, each man's expression was clear, and their relative strengths and weaknesses were obvious. On a small set, however, some of the cinematographic advantage went the other way. We will have to wait for the polls. Will they be as skewed as the camera angles? We seem to be living these days in a kaleidoscope of ironies. Is the worst yet to come? If it is a close election, the electronic voting machines are ready to augment every foul memory of Florida in 2000. Perhaps it is no longer Jesus or Allah who oversees our fate but the turn of the Greek gods to take another run around the track. When it comes to destiny, they were the first, after all, to conceive of the Ironies. From vivek at sarai.net Tue Oct 19 15:41:32 2004 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 15:41:32 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] apologies Message-ID: <4174E854.8090606@sarai.net> Very sorry, readers, for double-posting Sanjay's N. Klein. But my question of trying to find a unifying logic to these processes beyond personal evil and greed still stands... V. From nehal7 at yahoo.com Tue Oct 19 16:02:03 2004 From: nehal7 at yahoo.com (Nehal Gandhi) Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 03:32:03 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Foibles sign-offs Message-ID: <20041019103203.5962.qmail@web11506.mail.yahoo.com> Foibles sign-offs http://jobsadvice.guardian.co.uk/officehours/story/0,14369,1237932,00.html Diana Cambridge Monday June 14, 2004 The Guardian Why does it take me longer to decide on a sign-off to an email than it does to write the email? Yours what? Sincerely, hopefully, faithfully, truly, in haste, or just "yours"? Kind regards or regards ? Love and kisses, if you have a joking relationship? Then there's best - wishes, luck, regards, or just "best"? Is it best to put just your name? Kind regards seems to be the usual sign off in business, though it's flowery and most likely untrue. "If you get an email without some note of esteem or whatever at the end, it does look terse and impersonal," says Ben, a recruitment interviewer. "So I always put something, though it's just a matter of form." If you're a cake decorator, the dedicated ones always sign themselves "yours in sugar". Trust me - I used to work for a cake magazine. So that makes it easy for them - the rest of us still have to think about it. Should you put kisses after your signature to people you don't know, haven't met and are dealing with on a business basis? It depends on the industry - what might be OK in creative media is less so in utilities or security. Most people don't mind this sign-off from a woman they don't know and who doesn't know them, though they probably still find it surprising. But it's more disconcerting coming from an unknown man. Roguish, arch sign-offs are always a turn-off. Avoid "over to you!" or adding the phrase "you guys" ("best to you guys over there!") to anything. Terrible things like "over and out", "roger", "keep the faith" or even " keep your eye on the prize" still crop up. And "keep smiling" has been known to drive previously unflappable models of decorum into homicidal furies. I was taken aback by an email from a Famous Person, can't say who, when I asked for her address. She emailed back "2 Posh Street, Oxford. Fast!" I could almost smell her irritation. Well, we're all busy - she could have saved precious time by not adding the redundant adjective. Never try to give an impression of your fantastically busy life by your sign-off unless you want to show off. It doesn't take much longer to type "yours" than "yrs" or "regards" rather than "regs". "Cheers!" is beyond the pale - though I often use it if want to sound confident and, well, cheerful. If you want to be honest, "yours wearily" or "yours pointlessly" would be more like it - but never be sarcastic by email. Anything written down is taken more seriously by people than the things they hear. They can't hear your tone of voice which might be amused, jokey, affectionate - not mocking, cold and critical, as they imagine it. Respect the recipient's space, says Susan St Maur, author of Powerwriting (Prentice Hall Business, �12 99). "Knock before you enter, then be the perfect guest, remember to say please and thank you. Leave before you've worn out your welcome," she says. So don't use words in your email that you wouldn't use in person. Sometimes, the shortest exchange can be the most effective, like this one, said to be between Victor Hugo and his publisher after The Hunchback of Notre Dame was published and easily adaptable to our electronic age. Dear Paul ? Victor And the reply: Dear Victor ! Paul. So you see - you don't necessarily need a sign-off at all. Sign-off language � If you mix typefaces and use a lot of icons in your sign-off, you risk coming across as unstable and immature. � Underlining or putting things in caps too often can have a similar effect. � Don't abbreviate the words in sign-offs. � If signing by hand, your signature should be legible. � A big signature is always better than a little one. � Vary your sign-off occasionally so that your communications don't seem routine to recipients. � Not to have a sign-off is OK as long as you include "thanks". _______________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Declare Yourself - Register online to vote today! http://vote.yahoo.com From vivek at sarai.net Tue Oct 19 16:54:19 2004 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 16:54:19 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Politics of American Un-civilization In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4174F963.1020404@sarai.net> I'd like to thank Avinash for translating this article for those of us who do not read or even understand Hindi; it's important to get a sense of the range of what goes on in other languages, and to bring together discourse and conversations across linguistic barriers. So I hope you'll post more translations, even of material you don't agree with. However, I don't agree with some of the assumptions underpinning the article, though of course it's hard to pronounce on factual certitude when the facts themselves will never completely be at hand. Firstly, it is important to keep in mind that the published photographs themselves are just the tip of iceberg. We know from congressmen and others that there are several (perhaps hundreds) of other visual documents, including videos depicting rape, etc, which have not been released for general consumption precisely because they would threaten to seriously unmask the true nature of the US occupation. Since many of these interrogation procedures are identical to those reportedly taking place thousands of miles away in Guantanamo Bay, we can also surmise that these procedures were not anomalies but a deliberately implemented policy and, from info leaks from the CIA, we have heard that this policy was broadly outlined and signed into existence right from the White House, with an army of attendant lawyers, in response to its failure to actually capture any "terrorists" of note. And we know (this underscores the article's point that we only get the US point of view and points to the flawed belief that photographs are somehow more "truthful" than oral depositions) from the testimonies of Iraqi prisoners and their families that the torture often went much, much further into unphotographed and unspeakable brutality. This is common word-of-mouth knowledge in Iraq: the photographs were a big shock only to those of us looking in from the outside. So if the state dept really wanted to "strike terror" it ought to have leaked more info about what is actually happening. The procedures depicted in the photographs are chilling to see, no doubt, but they surely don't reflect the extent of brutality that happens, and has been happening every day, in interrogation rooms around the world, whether it be wrought upon nationalist fighters or even ordinary pickpockets. Secondly, the assumption that any leak must have been deliberately engineered shuts off the possibility of internal outrage and shame. Leaks seem to be happening at many levels. Many of the US soldiers in Iraq are not properly trained fulltimers, but part of the National Guard-- which means they expected to do a few drills on weekends and go on with college, or work, or whatever was being financed. Many of them are from deeply rural areas where they did not even get to witness casual urban violence. Plopped in the middle of Iraq, shooting and getting shot at by eleven-year old Iraqis, they must be deeply traumatised (the suicide rate for this group is high), and are less likely to buy into the code of silence that constricts professional soldiers. While their emails home are censored, a fair amount seems to be getting through, including letters to Michael Moore. From the sense I get, the photographs were a common practice and must have been in very wide circulation long before they hit the press, so anybody could have leaked them. It is also possible, for me at least, that they were leaked by disgruntled and traumatised officers, a few of whom have also written to Moore. There are also leaks happening all the way up the hierarchy. Bush is famous for overruling logic at meetings and making quick decisions based on what he calls his "gut instincts" (email communications from Jesus in heaven, perhaps). This has alienated many within his own party (though few are talking)and many who have had their jobs through several administrations. There seems to be, especially, a large amount of dissent fomenting in the CIA, because they are simultaneously blamed for intelligence lapses AND not listened to. While CIA employees themselves cannot talk to the press, the preferred method seems to be to leak the info to ex-CIA friends, who are not bound anymore by the code. So the person who usually comes on TV to hint at leaks is an ex-CIA official. These are, admittedly, people who are still heavily invested in US dominance, and have presided over many years of torture and assassination; but they would rather that imperialist policy be dictated by logic and assessment than by Jesus via his deputy prophet. So they are less shocked and traumatised by what goes on but believe that the White House has embarked on an adventure that has been and will continue to be very diffuse and counterproductive. So there is ample evidence that the US power structure is cracking under the weight of its own contradictions, and that the leaks are seeping through these cracks. V. > > >From: LOKVIDYA SAMVAD, No. 14, July 2004 (p.20) > > > >Politics of American Un-civilization > > > >What happened in Abu Gharaib prison and the worldwide publicity it gained, both should be regarded as parts of US strategy. It is not a strategy of war but the strategy of establishing an uncivilized regime in the world. This should also be seen in the context of forthcoming elections in the US to which Bush Administration is responding in part by this particular strategy. > > > >The story goes that the Officers of the US Army may have been aware of the torture of Iraqi prisoners but they were not a part of it, and that the pictures and videos of the torture were heroically leaked to the media leading to their worldwide dissemination. We think this is just lies. Ever since the war has been on in Iraq, the US has successfully censored the news and pictures coming out of there. There were hardly any pictures of the protracted battles that took place while the pictures of the demolition of Saddam Hussain's statue were repeated over and over again on the TV screens. Only victories of US army found place in the media coverage. Only on rare occasions did one fine the stories of Iraqi Army's resilience and of defeats suffered by US forces. Is the heroism of the media limited only to showing the victimhood of Iraqis? The truth lies somewhere else. The whole thing is about the priorities and policies of the US administration. > > > >The way US went ahead to start a war in Iraq solely on the basis of its military strength in opposition to global resistance, spurning the sentiments of people everywhere, and by completely disregarding the United Nations, brings to light the current US policy and strategy. The policy clearly is to rule the world and the strategy is terror. US cannot hope to win the support of people and countries to its policies on the basis of their consent. It can gain their allegiance only by striking fear into them. By publicizing the pictures from Abu Gharaib depicting behavior that crosses all limits, the US is telling everyone that the people opposing US will meet with the same consequences. The worldwide publicity of these pictures can only be part of a well-thought out strategy. > > > >This year's election also requires Bush administration to show itself as that demon which has in it to rule the world with iron hand. In the age of globalisation, control on international trade can be exercised only in this manner and only thus the dream of an American Century can be fulfilled. The republican party cannot trounce the democratic party by paying lip service to democratic values or by talking about international cooperation. Only way Bush can win is by arousing the egotistic and animal instincts of the American people. > > > > > >__________________________________________________ >Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi. > >--Boundary_(ID_+u9LCO2YpdC3SzCTUK/upw) >Content-type: text/html; charset=o-8859-1 >Content-transfer-encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE > > > > > > > > >Friends, >  >I am appending below my translation of a small >piece that appeared in the Hindi journal 'LokVidya Samvad'. The piece argues >that the worldwide publicity of torture taking place in Abu Gharaib and >elsewhere is part of a plan. I take the claim seriously and would like to >inquire into how exactly these pictures were leaked to the media. I have read >that Seymoor Hersh and CBS Television were the first to publish these. What is >their background? Are there any heroic stories as to how this leak was made >possible? Are there any US enquiries as to the security lapses which made this >leak possible? It does seem to me that appearance one after another of these >videos and pictures from a high security prison is suspicious. >  >avinash >  > >

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From: LOKVIDYA SAMVAD, No. 14, >July 2004 (p.20)

>

 

>

Politics of American >Un-civilization

>

 

>

What happened in Abu Gharaib >prison and the worldwide publicity it gained, both should be regarded as parts >of US strategy. It is not a strategy of war but the strategy of establishing an >uncivilized regime in the world. This should also be seen in the context of >forthcoming elections in the US to which Bush Administration is responding in >part by this particular strategy.  >

>

 

>

The story goes that the Officers >of the US Army may have been aware of the torture of Iraqi prisoners but they >were not a part of it, and that the pictures and videos of the torture were >heroically leaked to the media leading to their worldwide dissemination. We >think this is just lies. Ever since the war has been on in Iraq, the US has >successfully censored the news and pictures coming out of there. There were >hardly any pictures of the protracted battles that took place while the pictures >of the demolition of Saddam Hussain’s statue were repeated over and over again >on the TV screens. Only victories of US army found place in the media coverage. >Only on rare occasions did one fine the stories of Iraqi Army’s resilience and >of defeats suffered by US forces. Is the heroism of the media limited only to >showing the victimhood of Iraqis? The truth lies somewhere else. The whole thing >is about the priorities and policies of the US administration.

>

 

>

The way US went ahead to start a >war in Iraq solely on the basis of its military strength in opposition to global >resistance, spurning the sentiments of people everywhere, and by completely >disregarding the United Nations, brings to light the current US policy and >strategy. The policy clearly is to rule the world and the strategy is terror. US >cannot hope to win the support of people and countries to its policies on the >basis of their consent. It can gain their allegiance only by striking fear into >them. By publicizing the pictures from Abu Gharaib depicting behavior that >crosses all limits, the US is telling everyone that the people opposing US will >meet with the same consequences. The worldwide publicity of these pictures can >only be part of a well-thought out strategy.

>

 

>

This year’s election also >requires Bush administration to show itself as that demon which has in it to >rule the world with iron hand. In the age of globalisation, control on >international trade can be exercised only in this manner and only thus the dream >of an American Century can be fulfilled. The republican party cannot trounce the >democratic party by paying lip service to democratic values or by talking about >international cooperation. Only way Bush can win is by arousing the egotistic >and animal instincts of the American people.

>

 

>

DEFANGED_style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"> 

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>Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi. > > >--Boundary_(ID_+u9LCO2YpdC3SzCTUK/upw)-- > > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >_________________________________________ >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: > > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >_________________________________________ >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: > From vivek at sarai.net Tue Oct 19 17:32:58 2004 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 17:32:58 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] any takers? Message-ID: <41750272.4030703@sarai.net> The Guardian Wednesday October 13, 2004 My fellow non-Americans ... The result of the US election will affect the lives of millions around the world but those of us outside the 50 states have had no say in it - until now. In a unique experiment, G2 has assembled a democratic toolkit to enable people from Basildon to Botswana to campaign in the presidential race. And with a little help from the folks in Clark County, Ohio, you might help decide who takes up residence in the White House next month. Oliver Burkeman explains how Get the name of a US voter http://guardian.assets.digivault.co.uk/clark_county/ It's just possible that you have heard this once or twice before recently, but the forthcoming American election, on November 2, may be the most important in living memory. People have been saying this about every presidential race for decades - but, as one environmentalist put it recently in a US newspaper interview, precisely the problem with crying wolf is that sometimes there is a wolf. You would be forgiven, though, for feeling increasingly helpless as you hear the "most important election" mantra repeated daily: unless you happen to be a voter in a handful of swing states, there's little you can do about the final result. If you're not American, the situation is more acute. Certainly, the actions of the US impact on our lives in overwhelming ways; British political life may now be at least as heavily influenced by White House policy as by the choices of UK voters. And yet, though the US Declaration of Independence speaks of "a decent respect to the opinions of mankind", you don't, of course, have a vote. You can't even donate money to the campaigns: foreign contributions are outlawed. And you're unlikely to have the chance to do any campaigning on the ground. All you can do is wait and watch: you're powerless. Or are you? At G2, that sounded like fighting talk. Where others might see delusions of grandeur, we saw an opportunity for public service - and so, on the following pages, we have assembled a handy set of tools that non-Americans can use to have a real chance of influencing the outcome of the vote. We've identified ways to give money to help your preferred candidate, even though direct campaign contributions from foreigners aren't allowed. There are ideas for making your voice heard in the influential local media outlets where it could really count. And at the core of it is a unique scheme to match individual Guardian readers to individual American voters, giving you the opportunity to write a personal letter, citizen to citizen, explaining why this election matters to you, and which issues you think ought to matter to the US electorate. It may even be a chance to persuade somebody to use their vote at all. To maximise the likelihood of your efforts making a difference, we've zeroed in on one of the places where this year's election truly will be decided: Clark County, Ohio, which is balanced on a razor's edge between Republicans and Democrats. In the 2000 election, Al Gore won Clark County by 1% - equivalent to 324 votes - but George Bush won the state as a whole by just four percentage points. This time round, Ohio is one of the most crucial swing states: Kerry and Bush have been campaigning there tire lessly - they've visited Clark County itself - and the most recent Ohio poll shows, once again, a 1% difference between the two of them. The voters we will target in our letter-writing initiative are all Clark County residents, and they are all registered independents, which somewhat increases the chances of their being persuadable. Several of the ideas described here can easily be applied across the US too, though, and we have provided further resources on our website for this purpose. While there's no point being coy about Britain's preferences in this election (never mind those of Guardain readers) - a poll last month put backing for Kerry at 47%, against 16% for Bush - we have included information for supporters of both main candidates. It's worth considering at the outset how counterproductive this might all be, especially if approached undiplomatically. Anybody might be justifiably angered by the idea of a foreigner trying to interfere in their democratic process. But this year the issue is more charged than ever: the Bush/Cheney campaign has made a point of portraying Kerry as overly concerned about what other nations think, and the Democrat's ambiguous debate point about American foreign policy decisions needing to pass a "global test" has become one of the president's key lines of attack. "People don't necessarily want to hear what people from other countries have to say," says Rachelle Valladares, the London-based chair of Democrats Abroad. "If you contact someone you know personally in the States, and urge them to vote, it would probably carry twice the weight." Michael Dorf, a Columbia university law professor who has studied foreign influences on US elections, points out that it would not be to either candidate's advantage "to be seen as the candidate of the foreigners. Part of it's just xenophobia, but there is also a sense that, you know, this is our election: you vote for your parliament and prime minister, we vote for our president and Congress." On the other hand, being from Britain ought to give you a certain leverage: in stump speeches and debates, Bush has repeatedly praised Tony Blair's cooperation over Iraq, making America's long- treasured alliance with the UK key to the president's defence of his foreign policy. Kerry, too, knows that he's speaking to a resilient strand of opinion when he emphasises the need for strong international alliances: a better coalition in Iraq, he constantly reiterates, might have saved US lives. (One recent poll suggested that 43% of Americans think that declining world respect for their nation is a "major problem".) As a British citizen, you can certainly wield some influence, but you could seriously alienate people too. Write to a voter The most powerful transatlantic connection is a personal one, so we have designed a system to match individual Guardian readers with individual voters in Clark County, in the crucial swing state of Ohio. To join in, visit www.guardian.co.uk/clarkcounty and enter your email address. You'll receive, by email, the name and postal address of a Clark County voter. We have included only those voters who chose to list themselves as unaffiliated, instead of as Republican or Democrat: that is no guarantee that they are persuadable, of course, but it does increase the chances. The data on which our system is based is publicly available, but we have designed it to give out each address only once, so there is no danger of recipients getting deluged. In formulating your letter, you will need to introduce yourself: no individual Clark County voter will have any reason to be expecting your communication. And in choosing your arguments, keep in mind the real risk of alienating your reader by coming across as interfering or offensive. You might want to handwrite your letter, for additional impact, and we strongly recommend including your own name and address - it lends far more credibility to your views, and you might get a reply. Finally, post your letter soon. Letters sent by regular airmail from the UK to the US usually take five days to reach their recipient, and there is little time to waste. Postage costs 43p for a postcard, 47p for a letter weighing 10g or less, and 68p for a letter weighing up to 20g. You don't have to visit a post office, but Royal Mail recommends writing "Par Avion - By Airmail" on the front of the envelope, and your return address on the back. Give money American law forbids foreigners from giving money to affect the outcome of a federal election - except that, on closer inspection, it doesn't. You're banned from donating to the campaigns themselves, or to many of the independent campaigning groups that fight explicitly on behalf of one candidate. So you need to identify officially non-partisan groups whose activities, none the less, have the practical effect of helping one candidate over the other. "Perhaps the most important way foreigners could help John Kerry would be to help out those organisations which have, as part of their mission, fostering African-American voter turnout," says Nathaniel Persily, a Pennsylvania university expert on election law. "It's quite clear that if there was 100% African-American turnout in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida, John Kerry would win this election running away." The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is the most obvious choice here - an influential, well-organised, non-partisan body whose get-out-the-vote activities are extremely likely to end up helping the Democrats. "On the Republican side, it would be the Christian conservatives," Persily adds. "[Bush adviser] Karl Rove has tried to register four million additional Christian evangelicals, and if they all turn out, then Bush wins." The leading option here would be the Christian Coalition, which describes itself as "America's leading grassroots organisation defending our Godly heritage". As for more overtly partisan organisations, we don't recommend trying to donate - but it's worth pointing out that much of the law banning foreign contributions has never been tested in court and, argues Michael Dorf at Columbia, may even be unconstitutional on grounds of free speech. "If a group calling itself Europeans for Truth wants to run ads giving their view of the truth," Dorf says, "it's hard to draw a principled distinction between that and a British newspaper available at a US newsstand that has an editorial calling Bush and Blair liars." Visit the NAACP website: http://www.naacp.org Give to the NAACP: https://www.naacp.org/contribute.php or fax a credit-card donation to 001 410 580 5623. Give to the NAACP in Ohio: Send a money order marked "donation" to NAACP, 233 South High Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215 USA. Give to the Christian Coalition: www.cc.org or phone 001 202 479 6900. Give to the Christian Coalition in Ohio: www.ccohio.org or phone 001 330 8871922, or send a money order to Christian Coalition of Ohio, PO Box 852, Westfield Center, Ohio 44251, USA. For resources on giving money in other swing states, visit www.guardian.co.uk/clarkcounty. Make your voice heard If you want to broadcast your views to a wider audience, focus on the media outlets swing-state residents are reading and hearing. Take care: deluging the same organisation with numerous near- identical messages rarely impresses (we speak from experience), and some activists have run into controversy recently by disseminating "astroturf" - letters purporting to be personal but emanating, in reality, from party headquarters. Springfielders read the Springfield News Sun (www.springfieldnewssun.com;) and the Columbus Dispatch (www.dispatch.com), based in the nearby state capital, is another influential outlet. If you're feeling brave, though, you might want to explore the highly influential talk-radio airwaves. On the right, the overarchingly dominant figure is Rush Limbaugh, heard on hundreds of stations nationwide, including 19 in Ohio, some of which can be heard in Clark County. This is a strictly at-your-own-risk proposition, but if you want to join the debate, listen to the show live on the web at www.rushlimbaugh.com, between 5pm and 8pm UK time every weekday, and call in on 001 800 282 2882. Among yesterday's topics: why John Kerry doesn't understand the significance of 9/11; why John Kerry would be dangerous for America; how John Kerry politicised the death of Christopher Reeve. Air America, the upstart liberal radio counterweight, is still in its infancy, but it can be picked up in parts of Ohio and other battleground states. Listen to the flagship show presented by the leftwing humourist Al Franken at www.airamericaradio.com, also between 5pm and 8pm on weekdays, then call in on 001 866 303 2270 (neither call will be free from the UK). Franken's focus yesterday was the "absolutely shameless" behaviour of the conservative media in America. You can target your message on other key states by visiting a website such as www.electoral-vote.com, which updates regularly with the latest local polls, so that you can identify where the race is currently closest. Select your state, then call up a list of relevant media contacts - or even send them emails directly - via the impressively comprehensive Capitol Advantage site at http://ssl.capwiz.com/congressorg/dbq/media/. Win the chance to watch the campaign on the ground We are offering the four people who write the most persuasive letters to Clark County voters the chance to travel there and watch the campaign in person. At the end of October, the winners will accompany a group of Guardian journalists to Ohio to meet voters and observe the closing days of the race. For a chance to take part, you should email a copy of your letter to clark.county at guardian.co.uk, or send a copy to Clark County competition, G2, The Guardian, 119 Farringdon Road, London EC1R 3ER. Letters should arrive no later than October 20. · For more details on how you can get involved and latest news from the US campaign trail, go to guardian.co.uk/uselections2004. For terms and conditions of the Clark County competition, see www.guardian.co.uk/clarkcounty. The Guardian Wednesday October 13, 2004 Dear Clark County voter, Give us back the America we loved. Yours sincerely, John Le Carré Three prominent Britons hit the campaign trail John Le Carré Maybe there's one good reason - just one - for re-electing George W Bush, and that's to force him to live with the consequences of his appalling actions, and answer for his own lies, rather than wish the job on a Democrat who will then get blamed for his predecessor's follies. Probably no American president in all history has been so universally hated abroad as George W Bush: for his bullying unilateralism, his dismissal of international treaties, his reckless indifference to the aspirations of other nations and cultures, his contempt for institutions of world government, and above all for misusing the cause of anti-terrorism in order to unleash an illegal war - and now anarchy - upon a country that like too many others around the world was suffering under a hideous dictatorship, but had no hand in 9/11, no weapons of mass destruction, and no record of terrorism except as an ally of the US in a dirty war against Iran. Is your president a great war leader because he allowed himself to be manipulated by a handful of deluded ideologues? Is Tony Blair a great war leader because he committed Britain's troops, foreign policy and domestic security to the same hare-brained adventure? You are voting in November. We will vote next year. Yet the outcome in both countries will in large part depend on the same question: how long can the lies last now that the truth has finally been told? The Iraq war was planned long before 9/11. Osama provided the excuse. Iraq paid the price. American kids paid the price. British kids paid the price. Our politicians lied to us. While Bush was waging his father's war at your expense, he was also ruining your country. He made your rich richer and your poor and unemployed more numerous. He robbed your war veterans of their due and reduced your children's access to education. And he deprived more Americans than ever before of healthcare. Now he's busy cooking the books, burying deficits and calling in contingency funds to fight a war that his advisers promised him he could light and put out like a candle. Meanwhile, your Patriot Act has swept aside constitutional and civil liberties which took brave Americans 200 years to secure, and were once the envy of a world that now looks on in horror, not just at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib, but at what you are doing to yourselves. But please don't feel isolated from the Europe you twice saved. Give us back the America we loved, and your friends will be waiting for you. And here in Britain, for as long as we have Tony Blair singing the same lies as George Bush, your nightmares will be ours. © David Cornwell 2004 · John Le Carré is a novelist. Antonia Fraser O duty Why hast thou not the visage of a sweetie or a cutie ... ? Why art thou so different from Venus? And why do thou and I have so few interests in common between us? These sentiments on the subject of duty, so brilliantly expressed by Ogden Nash, may well be yours, dear Unknown, when I, a national of another country, urge you to do your duty and vote in your coming presidential election. In fact, of course, we have all too many interests in common. When you vote - and please do vote by the way, even if you disagree with everything I am about to say - that vote will have as much effect on my future and the much longer future of my children and grandchildren, as it will on your own. For this is a crucial election, the most crucial, I believe, of my lifetime (and I first voted in 1955!). First of all, if you back Kerry, you will be voting against a savage militaristic foreign policy of pre-emptive killing which has stained the great name of the US so hideously in recent times. A policy that Bush and his gang are set to continue - if they get the opportunity. I say "the great name" of the US because I believe that to be profoundly true. Although resolutely against the Iraq war, I remain equally resolutely philamerican, almost every movement towards liberty in the past having its roots or its refuge in the US. As a wartime child, I am well aware of the benevolence of the American soldiers who came to our aid, the ones that filled the foreign graveyards where they lay, fallen because they had joined our war. Brought up in Oxford, I regarded these men as gods, generous gods. I shall never forget Hank, a composite of the very young American soldiers who regularly got my brother Thomas and me into the Ritz cinema to see movies such as Saboteur. In fact, Hank, in retrospect, looked rather like the Great Tom, my cinematic hero in Saving Private Ryan (so maybe Tom is Hank's boy; I like to think so). From the image of Hank to that of Abu Ghraib ... Then there is the question of women's rights, and the possible repeal of legislation that has for a generation made all women equal before the law, not just the rich. Once again, this history of women's rights in America is long, strong and wonderful. As long ago as 1835, Alexis de Tocqueville, visiting America from France, discovered "the singular address and happy boldness" of its women, featured in Democracy in America. If you vote for Kerry, you will help to avert a move backwards towards women's suffering. President Bush declared on Friday that, "History will decide". Dear Unknown, please be part of that history and restore your country to its greatness, both foreign and domestic. · Antonia Fraser is a biographer and historian. Richard Dawkins Dear Americans, Don't be so ashamed of your president: the majority of you didn't vote for him. If Bush is finally elected properly, that will be the time for Americans travelling abroad to simulate a Canadian accent. Please don't let it come to that. Vote against Bin Laden's dream candidate. Vote to send Bush packing. Before 9/11 gave him his big break - the neo-cons' Pearl Harbor - Bush was written off as an amiable idiot, certain to serve only one term. An idiot he may be, but he is also sly, mendacious and vindictive; and the thuggish ideologues who surround him are dangerous. 9/11 gave America a free gift of goodwill, and it poured in from all around the world. Bush took it as a free gift to the warmongers of his party, a licence to attack an irrelevant country which, however nasty its dictator, had no connection with 9/11. The consequence is that all the worldwide goodwill has vanished. Bush's America is on the way to becoming a pariah state. And Bush's Iraq has become a beacon for terrorists. In the service of his long-planned war (with its catastrophically unplanned aftermath), Bush not only lied about Iraq being the "enemy" who had attacked the twin towers. With the connivance of the toadying Tony Blair and the spineless Colin Powell, he lied to Congress and the world about weapons of mass destruction. He is now brazenly lying to the American electorate about how "well" things are going under the puppet government. By comparison with this cynical mendacity, the worst that can be said about John Kerry is that he sometimes changes his mind. Well, wouldn't you change your mind if you discovered that the major premise on which you had been persuaded to vote for war was a big fat lie? Now that all other justifications for the war are known to be lies, the warmongers are thrown back on one, endlessly repeated: the world is a better place without Saddam. No doubt it is. But that's the Tony Martin school of foreign policy [Martin was a householder who shot dead a burglar who had broken into his house in 1999]. It's not how civilised countries, who follow the rule of law, behave. The world would be a better place without George Bush, but that doesn't justify an assassination attempt. The proper way to get rid of that smirking gunslinger is to vote him out. As the bumper stickers put it, "Re-defeat Bush". But, this time, do it so overwhelmingly that neither his brother's friends in Florida nor his father's friends on the Supreme Court will be able to rig the count. Decent Americans - there are absolutely more intelligent, educated, civilised, cultivated, compassionate people in America than in any other country in the western world - please show your electoral muscle this time around. We in the rest of the world, who sadly cannot vote in the one election that really affects our future, are depending on you. Please don't let us down. · Richard Dawkins is professor of the public understanding of science at Oxford University. More letters to Clark County will be appearing in G2 over the next fortnight. 13.10.2004: A brief guide to Clark County http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,13918,1326097,00.html 13.10.2004: Dear Clark County voter: three prominent Britons reach out 13.10.2004: How to contact the US media http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,13918,1325803,00.html _______________________________________________ Foil-l mailing list Foil-l at insaf.net http://insaf.net/mailman/listinfo/foil-l_insaf.net -- Vivek Narayanan Senior Content Editor (English) The Sarai Programme Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110054. Work Phone: (91-11) 2396 0040 Mobile: (91-0) 98109 36654 Fax: (91-11) 2392 8391 From diya at sarai.net Tue Oct 19 19:17:53 2004 From: diya at sarai.net (Diya Mehra) Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 15:47:53 +0200 (CEST) Subject: [Reader-list] US Reaction to Guardian letter writing campaign Message-ID: <1605.67.101.70.249.1098193673.squirrel@67.101.70.249> UK anti-Bush letters spark outrage Tuesday, October 19, 2004 Posted: 8:54 AM EDT (1254 GMT) 14,000 people registered to write letters to Cook county. LONDON, England (Reuters) -- A pro-Kerry letter-writing campaign by Britain's left-leaning Guardian newspaper, targeting undecided U.S. voters, has provoked outrage across the Atlantic. The paper has encouraged its readers to express their opinions on the November 2 presidential election to voters in the key swing state of Ohio -- to the fury of Clark county. "Hey England, Scotland and Wales, mind your own business. We don't need weenie-spined Limeys meddling in our presidential election," was one of the e-mail reactions to the campaign. The Fox national cable television network tore into the newspaper and even John Kerry's own Democrats expressed horror at the campaign. "We all feel it is not a good idea. I think it was unwise. It is so poorly thought-out," said Sharon Manitta, spokeswoman in Britain for Democrats Abroad. But the newspaper, whose cartoons regularly portray President George W. Bush as a semi-literate ape, was unrepentant. "We did consult a number of opinions and made our decision accordingly," assistant features editor Paul MacInnes told Reuters. "It has been an operation to give our readers an opportunity to express their opinions." With just two weeks to go before the election, Kerry is running neck and neck with Republican incumbent Bush. Ohio is a key swing state which Bush won by just four percentage points in 2000, and Clark county is at its heart. The campaign is a bid to sway voters on the county's electoral register who have declared themselves undecided. As of Monday night, more than 14,000 people had registered to write to a voter in Cook county which has a population of just 143,000. Individuals like film director Ken Loach, spy writer John Le Carre, historian Antonia Fraser and opposition Liberal Democratic parliamentarian Menzies Campbell have all written in their own capacity -- not that their names necessarily carry much weight in Cook county. The Guardian, which simply bought a list of registered voters and extracted the undecided, pledged that it would only give out the name of each voter once, to avoid them being swamped by unsolicited mail from complete strangers. "We know that in many ways this is the world's election, and we understand the passion and concern in many parts of the world over it. But I wonder how people here in the UK would react to Americans telling them how to vote," Democrats Abroad's Manitta said. "This will certainly garner more votes for George Bush. I have strongly advised other media entities who have come to me and suggested this against doing so," she added. While some e-mails to the Guardian from Democrats in Ohio were supportive, others suggested the campaign was misguided. But their mild admonitions paled into insignificance against the more reactionary views received by the paper. "Real Americans aren't interested in your pansy-ass, tea-sipping opinions. If you want to save the world, begin with you own worthless corner of it," wrote one from Texas. -- Diya Mehra Sarai: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29 Rajpur Road, New Delhi 54 (011) 23960040, www.sarai.net From lokesh at sarai.net Wed Oct 20 12:48:24 2004 From: lokesh at sarai.net (Lokesh) Date: Wed, 20 Oct 2004 12:48:24 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] (Invitation) seminar on'women's movement for the 21st century Message-ID: <41761140.5060202@sarai.net> Seminar on 'Women's Movement for the 21 st Century' Greetings ! Each year, Stree Adhikar Sangathan ( WRO- Women's Rights Organisation) organizes an intensive three-day workshop for its members to encourage collective thinking, learn from experiences, improve theoretical understanding, review activities and plan for the future. Apart from those who are involved with WRO throughout the year, we benefit tremendously from knowledge and experiences of our friends who help us in this workshop as resource persons. Earlier WRO workshops have been held in Allahabad (2000), Delhi (2001), Lucknow (2002) and Varanasi (2003). As part of this workshop, we also organize a one day public event on an issue of current relevance. Topics of earlier public events were on Women on the Threshold of Transition ( 2000), Women in the Context of Indian Culture and Civilization ( 2001), Our Culture and Communalism (2002) and Women and Communalism (2003). This year we plan to hold the public event on the first day of the workshop itself i.e. on October 21st, 2004 to discuss and debate on Women’s Movement for the 21 st Century. Few leading scholar-activists of the women's movement have agreed to join us for the deliberations and share with us their concerns. Prof.Uma Chakravory, Dr Saroop Dhruv, Prof Zoya Hasan, Dr. Nivedita Menon and Dr Mary John have already confirmed their participation. We will be happy if you can join us for the seminar which would be held at 1 p.m. on 21 st October 2004 at Mobile Creches office ( Behind Shivaji Stadium- Sector 4, DIZ area, Raja bazaar, New Delhi 110001, Ph. 23347635) Waiting to hear from you Stree Adhikar Sangathan ( Contact : 011-27872835 / 9891170909/ 0532 -2552324) From shivamvij at gmail.com Wed Oct 20 15:05:49 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Wed, 20 Oct 2004 15:05:49 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Google 'saved' Australian hostage Message-ID: BBC News Tuesday, 19 October, 2004, 08:40 GMT 09:40 UK http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/3755154.stm Google 'saved' Australian hostage An Australian journalist kidnapped in Iraq was freed after his captors checked the popular internet search engine Google to confirm his identity. John Martinkus was seized in Baghdad on Saturday, the first Australian held hostage in Iraq since the US-led invasion. But his captors agreed to release him after they were convinced he was not working for the CIA or a US contractor. He was reported to be making his way home to Australia on Tuesday. His executive producer at Australia's SBS network, Mike Carey, said Google probably saved freelance journalist Martinkus. "They Googled him and then went onto a web site - either his own or his book publisher's web site, I don't know which one - and saw that he was who he was, and that was instrumental in letting him go, I think, or swinging their decision," he told AP news agency. Martinkus told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that he was snatched at gunpoint from outside a hotel close to Australia's embassy in Baghdad by Sunni Muslims, and that they had threatened to kill him. "I told them what I was doing (and that) I wasn't armed," he said. Asked how he coped, he said: "I just kept talking." From avinash at csdsdelhi.org Wed Oct 20 17:24:11 2004 From: avinash at csdsdelhi.org (Avinash Jha) Date: Wed, 20 Oct 2004 17:24:11 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Politics of American Un-civilization Message-ID: <001901c4b69b$6d87f7f0$4a00a8c0@library> Vivek, Your contention that the leak was not deliberate on the part of Bush Administration but rather a result of disaffection and disagreement with Bush's policies is at least as reasonable as the article that I posted earlier. Actually, what is important is to realize that at least after the bombings of World Trade Tower and Pentagon, the US policy is not to act by building consensus and the US is not interested in maintaining even an appearance of 'civilized' combat. If one is agreed upon it, one wonders whether there is a great point in following this debate about deliberate leak. But I think the case for deliberate leak requires at least some restatement. To my mind there are three questions involved here - nature of US administration and their policy, nature of western media, and the question of how does the US administration use the media to communicate to adversaries, potential adversaries, supporters, critics, the 'civilized world', the 'uncivilized world' and so on. As to the nature of US state and policies Bush has clearly said that they are engaged in a 'new kind of war' in which "no fixed rules will govern decisions on when and how to employ US forces" (Rumsfeld's words). One of Hersh's anonymous sources in his new book says, "Now we're going to be the bad guy, and being bad guy works."[quoted in Bacevich review in Washington Post Book World, reproduced in Asian Age 17th October.] One has been left with no doubt regarding the relationship of mainstream western media to US state policies. Even non-US media faithfully reflects the state of relation between west European states, the UK and the US. How did the media portray these tortures? How does it contrast with the way civilian killings in Iraq were reported? The leak might well have been the work of those opposing Bush, but the Bush administration showed no urgency at all to curb the leak and very little consternation at being exposed. Normally, a counter media campaign would have been immediately in place to discredit the stories to some extent at least. Videos and pictures have not prevented this in the past. This brings us to the third and the most important question - how does an undemocratic, militarist political entity in power, which is working within a loosely democratic framework and discourse, uses mass media. It cannot openly repudiate all democratic norms because it is legitimized by them, it has come to power through these same democratic frameworks. At the same time, it wants to communicate to its constituency and actually build a constituency of undemocratic militarist mass. Finally, it has to communicate to its adversary for the practical purpose of demoralizing and defeating them. So the communication is ambiguous and unstable. I believe one can see this in the way Sangh Parivar speaks through its many mouths and uses the media. And to me Abu Ghraib pictures and videos seem quite theatrical. They do not show brutality beyond a point, as you note. They seem perverse. But what do they communicate to the potential adversary and actual supporters? How will they respond to these pictures? I do not have unequivocal answers to these questions. But this is where I reached after having read your mail on the list. Avinash __________________________________________________ Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041020/6f6049c7/attachment.html From ghoshvishwajyoti at rediffmail.com Wed Oct 20 12:19:32 2004 From: ghoshvishwajyoti at rediffmail.com (vishwajyoti ghosh) Date: 20 Oct 2004 06:49:32 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] EXHIBITION: Paris: mythologies and memories... Message-ID: <20041020064932.15375.qmail@webmail18.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041020/d94e6e51/attachment.html -------------- next part --------------     Who is the audience really looking for in the Louvre on a Sunday morning? How does MonaLisa handle so much pressure in the days of 21st century stardom and media craze? Where does The Eiffel tower stand in the minds of Parisians today? What are the sounds of silence in a busy Metro? What is Lautrec still doing in Moulin Rouge? What if Gandhi arrived today in Gar du Nord to find a chicken Restaurant in his name? What is the role is an artist when the readers wait for him for hours for a dedicace in Angouleme? YOU ARE CORDIALLY INVITED TO: PARIS- mythologies and memories AN EXHIBITION OF DRAWINGS, POSTCARDS AND COMICS BY Vishwajyoti Ghosh Supported by Alliance Francaise and French Embassy in India Venue: ALLIANCE FRANCAISE Goa 15-30 Oct. Pune 10-21 Dec. PARIS- mythologies and memories is an exhibition of black and white drawings, post cards and comics which talk about the city from an outsider’s lens. Short letters from Paris, rendered in a comic form, as interesting insights on various issues like History, The Eiffel tower, Pierre Lachaise and death, Love and companionship of a metropolis, Immigration and dreams In short, this exhibition is a short carnet of a short life in a big, farway city. VISHWAJYOTI GHOSH, D-598/c, CHITTARANJAN PARK, NEW DELHI-11019, INDIA CELL: 0091-9891238606 STUDIO: 0091-11-51603319 RES.: 0091-11-26270256 -------------- next part -------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From vivek at sarai.net Tue Oct 19 11:46:19 2004 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 11:46:19 +0530 Subject: [Fwd: Fwd: [Reader-list] UN engaged in retrieving corporate profits] Message-ID: <4174B133.5060600@sarai.net> More from Naomi Klein: What I am struggling to assimilate all this information into is a larger logic, a way of reasoning; for what I am left at the moment is pure greed and opportunism. But surely that is too simplistic a way to see a vast network with various actors, not all of them purely self-interested? V. Why is war-torn Iraq giving $190,000 to Toys R Us? Saturday October 16, 2004 The Guardian / Naomi Klein Next week, something will happen that will unmask the upside-down morality of the invasion and occupation of Iraq. On October 21, Iraq will pay $200m in war reparations to some of the richest countries and corporations in the world. If that seems backwards, it's because it is. Iraqis have never been awarded reparations for any of the crimes they suffered under Saddam, or the brutal sanctions regime that claimed the lives of at least half a million people, or the US-led invasion, which the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, recently called "illegal". Instead, Iraqis are still being forced to pay reparations for crimes committed by their former dictator. Quite apart from its crushing $125bn sovereign debt, Iraq has paid $18.8bn in reparations stemming from Saddam Hussein's 1990 invasion and occupation of Kuwait. This is not in itself surprising: as a condition of the ceasefire that ended the 1991 Gulf war, Saddam agreed to pay damages stemming from the invasion. More than 50 countries have made claims, with most of the money awarded to Kuwait. What is surprising is that even after Saddam was overthrown, the payments from Iraq have continued. Since Saddam was toppled in April, Iraq has paid out $1.8bn in reparations to the United Nations Compensation Commission (UNCC), the Geneva-based quasi tribunal that assesses claims and disburses awards. Of those payments, $37m have gone to Britain and $32.8m have gone to the United States. That's right: in the past 18 months, Iraq's occupiers have collected $69.8m in reparation payments from the desperate people they have been occupying. But it gets worse: the vast majority of those payments, 78%, have gone to multinational corporations, according to statistics on the UNCC website. Away from media scrutiny, this has been going on for years. Of course there are many legitimate claims for losses that have come before the UNCC: payments have gone to Kuwaitis who have lost loved ones, limbs, and property to Saddam's forces. But much larger awards have gone to corporations: of the total amount the UNCC has awarded in Gulf war reparations, $21.5bn has gone to the oil industry alone. Jean-Claude Aimé, the UN diplomat who headed the UNCC until December 2000, publicly questioned the practice. "This is the first time as far as I know that the UN is engaged in retrieving lost corporate assets and profits," he told the Wall Street Journal in 1997, and then mused: "I often wonder at the correctness of that." But the UNCC's corporate handouts only accelerated. Here is a small sample of who has been getting "reparation" awards from Iraq: Halliburton ($18m), Bechtel ($7m), Mobil ($2.3m), Shell ($1.6m), Nestlé ($2.6m), Pepsi ($3.8m), Philip Morris ($1.3m), Sheraton ($11m), Kentucky Fried Chicken ($321,000) and Toys R Us ($189,449). In the vast majority of cases, these corporations did not claim that Saddam's forces damaged their property in Kuwait - only that they "lost profits" or, in the case of American Express, experienced a "decline in business" because of the invasion and occupation of Kuwait. One of the biggest winners has been Texaco, which was awarded $505m in 1999. According to a UNCC spokesperson, only 12% of that reparation award has been paid, which means hundreds of millions more will have to come out of the coffers of post-Saddam Iraq. The fact that Iraqis have been paying reparations to their occupiers is all the more shocking in the context of how little these countries have actually spent on aid in Iraq. Despite the $18.4bn of US tax dollars allocated for Iraq's reconstruction, the Washington Post estimates that only $29m has been spent on water, sanitation, health, roads, bridges, and public safety combined. And in July (the latest figure available), the Department of Defence estimated that only $4m had been spent compensating Iraqis who had been injured, or who lost family members or property as a direct result of the occupation - a fraction of what the US has collected from Iraq in reparations since its occupation began. For years there have been complaints about the UNCC being used as a slush fund for multinationals and rich oil emirates - a backdoor way for corporations to collect the money they were prevented from making as a result of the sanctions against Iraq. During the Saddam years, these concerns received little attention, for obvious reasons. But now Saddam is gone and the slush fund survives. And every dollar sent to Geneva is a dollar not spent on humanitarian aid and reconstruction Iraq. Furthermore, if post-Saddam Iraq had not been forced to pay these reparations, it could have avoided the $437m emergency loan that the International Monetary Fund approved on September 29. With all the talk of forgiving Iraq's debts, the country is actually being pushed deeper into the hole, forced to borrow money from the IMF, and to accept all of the conditions and restrictions that come along with those loans. The UNCC, meanwhile, continues to assess claims and make new awards: $377m worth of new claims were awarded last month alone. Fortunately, there is a simple way to put an end to these grotesque corporate subsidies. According to United Nations security council resolution 687, which created the reparations programme, payments from Iraq must take into account "the requirements of the people of Iraq, Iraq's payment capacity, and the needs of the Iraqi economy". If a single one of these three issues were genuinely taken into account, the security council would vote to put an end to these payouts tomorrow. That is the demand of Jubilee Iraq, a debt relief organisation based in London. Reparations are owed to the victims of Saddam Hussein, the group argues - both in Iraq and in Kuwait. But the people of Iraq, who were themselves Saddam's primary victims, should not be paying them. Instead, reparations should be the responsibility of the governments that loaned billions to Saddam, knowing the money was being spent on weapons so he could wage war on his neighbours and his own people. "If justice, and not power, prevailed in international affairs, then Saddam's creditors would be paying reparations to Kuwait as well as far greater reparations to the Iraqi people," says Justin Alexander, coordinator of Jubilee Iraq. Right now precisely the opposite is happening: instead of flowing into Iraq, reparations are flowing out. It's time for the tide to turn. ·Naomi Klein is the author of No Logo, and Fences and Windows -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... 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Name: message.txt Url: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041019/061a5ada/attachment.txt From geeta.patel at verizon.net Wed Oct 20 23:55:50 2004 From: geeta.patel at verizon.net (Geeta Patel) Date: Wed, 20 Oct 2004 14:25:50 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] Fw: rakesh sharma Message-ID: <00de01c4b6d2$3a9d6f00$6501a8c0@GeetaPatel> > >Wellesley College Presents > > > > THE FINAL SOLUTION - A FILM FEATURING FAMILIES CAUGHT UP IN THE POLITICS > > OF HATE > > Film and discussion with Director Rakesh Sharma > > > > *Best Documentary & Critics Choice, Hong Kong International Film Festival > > *Wolfgang Staudte Award & Special Jury Award, Berlin International Film > > Festival > > > > Sponsored by The Womens' Studies Department, Wellesley Association for > > South Asian Cultures, Advisor to Students of Asian Decent, Art and Art > > History Department, Political Science Department, Committee Against > >Racism > > and Discrimination and the Committee for Lectures and Cultural Events > > > > Date: Sat, Oct. 30th > > Time: 4pm - 6pm > > Venue: PNW 212 > > > > The Final Solution examines the aftermath of the burning of Hindus on the > > Sabarmati Express train at Godhra on February 27 2002. The film reveals > > the reaction to the tragic incident in which hundreds of women were raped > > and more than 2000 Muslims were murdered. > > > > Rakesh Sharma, an independent documentary film maker, began his career in > > 1986 as an assistant director on Discovery of India. Sharma has won > > numerous awards. His other widely appraised works include "Aftershocks: > > the Rough Guide to Democracy". > > > > Reception to follow. Free and Open to All. > > > > For disability services contact Jim Wice - 781 283 2434 > > questions - email sbaig at wellesley.edu > > > "Geeta Patel" writes: > >Bani Darling, Sarmili love: > >Do you two have a version of what you will send out on lists for Final > >Solution? I need it ASAP! > > > > :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: : > Bani Bedi : Wellesley College : 106 Central Street : Wellesley, MA 02481 : > 781 283 1555 > > > If you're not happy with what you have, how could you be happier with more? > -- Kobi Yamada > > From shuddha at sarai.net Thu Oct 21 00:03:14 2004 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2004 00:03:14 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Politics of American Un-civilization In-Reply-To: <001901c4b69b$6d87f7f0$4a00a8c0@library> References: <001901c4b69b$6d87f7f0$4a00a8c0@library> Message-ID: <4176AF6A.8080608@sarai.net> Dear Avinash and Vivek, I have been following with some interest the discussion on the veracity of the Abu Ghraib videos and images following from the posting of the 'lokvidya' piece on the same.So much so that I am provoked to gather the courage to make what is for me a rather rare posting (nowadays) on to the Reader List. I cannot but help thinking whenever Abu Ghraib is referred to about two other pieces of imagery that I have seen that have always left me with a lot of questions. Let me talk about them a little. Perhaps even in an unforgivably cursory fashion. One is a set of images of public executions in the Islamic Republic of Iran, that I sawpresented in a sit in by Iranian political refugees in Frankfurt this summer, and another is the video that some of us in Sarai and Delhi university have seen of the video footage of the police/paramilirary/army violence meted out to demonstraters in the north eastern Indian state of Manipur. In both instances, what has struck me is the theatrical, almost scripted quality of the violence that both these sets of images seem to contain. In the images from Iran, I have seen young men and women being hung from cranes with their eyes open, facing death, as a mullah stands watchful. In the Manipur footage I have seen men of the security forces (it is not always clear whether they are police, paramilirary or army personnel) routinely humiliate and terrorize the population with a horrible banality. In both these instances, I am left wondering, who took these images, and why. Of course, they may also have been taken by sadist Indian or Iranian people in power, and of course they may have a certain utility in terrorizing those that they seek to terrorize (the Iranian opposition to a deeply violent regime, or to those Manipuris who resist the violence of the armed occupation of the security forces of the Indian state). If this were true (and it may well be true) then their nature mirrors the reality implicit in the charge contained in the Lok Vidya text's take on the Abu Ghraid images - the one that suggests that the Abu Ghraib videos only demonstrate the depths to which US government and military procedures can plummet . And that they are a part of a deliberate US government strategy to terrorize the Iraqi people. So too, the Manipur videos must be a deliberte attempt to scare the Manipuris, and the Iranian execution images a state sanctioned means to silence dissent. Their usage by Iranian and Manipuri opposition groups complicates this assumption a little, but let us leave this aside for the moment. But, if we are prepared to accept this, there seems to be little point in saying that the US government alone does this. I find little justification in attatching the tag - 'American' to the expression 'Un Civilization', It seemse to me about as pointless as saying - 'Iranian barbarians' or 'Indian brutes'. I find labels like 'Indian brutes' offensive, even though I know that the Indian state acts in a brutal fashion, all the time. I want to argue for a distinction between the actions of the state and the propenstities of subjects. Every act of violence in the North East or in Kashmir, is undertaken ostensibly in the name of all Indian citizens, and that includes me, and the writers of the Lok Vidya text. If we want to say 'American Un-Civilization' then let us at the same time, and in the same breath, take responsibility and complete, personal, moral responsibility, as Indian citizens for the enormous violence and humiliation that Indian nationalism and the Indian state have visited on many people in South Asia. Let us stand up and be counted as brutes in our own backyard. Some may reject this imperative as absurd, and I would not disagree with them. But one cant have it both ways, you cant absolve yourself and blame others for the same offenses. Most governments in the world have acted with appalling violence towards those that they have had the opportunity to rule, including those like the Iranian government, who make a loud noise about how they are opposed to US Imperialism, or the Indian government, which is always happy to have folk dances from the north east on Republic day annotate the torture cells and sophisticated methods of militarized repression for the north easterners - as part of the same uncomplicated and wonderful reality that is the day to day practice of Indian nationalism. On the other hand, we may also specualate that just as there are people everywhere in the world who are horrified and angry at the violence of their own governments, there are people in Iran, the North East (and hopefully the rest) of India and in the US administered prisons of Abu Ghraib (as well as in the United States) who act as conscientious whistle blowers, who want to let people all over the world know what happens in the name of American democracy, the Islamic revolution in Iran or the ideology of Indian nationalism...It may be possible that they are also part of the networked chaind of authorship and viewership that devolves on to the Abu Gh'raib images, the Iranian execution photographs and the Manipur videos... The Lok vidya text, in designing a grand strategem in which the images are only a mechanism of mastery, seems to rule out this possibility, and seem to suggest that there can be only one explaination for the authorship and the reception of such images, and that explaination always only points in the direction of the imperatives of power, especially what is considered to be the functional imperatives of the 'American' hegemon. Reality may be more complicated than the comforts of Indian or third worldist Anti- Americanism may allow for (and let me make it clear here that I am no apologist for the American, or for that matter what is called the Indian or Iranian master narrative) Perhaps the writers of the Lok Vidya text might do well to consider that just as all those who happen to have American passports might not automatically endorse the actions of the United States administration at home and abroad, so too, some of us who may be Iranian or Indian or Chinese or Russian citizens may not be always in agreement with the violence our states visit on to Kashmir, the Indian North East, in Iran, in Tibet and China or in Chechnya (or elsewhere in the territorities they make fragrant with their sovereign powers) . If you look at the videos from Manipur, you can see that Abu Gh'raib is only one more place in the world where people are robbed of dignity. Something not very different also happens, and happens as a part of routine state policy, routine military conduct, within the territory of the Indian republic on a fairly routine basis. I feel the kind of hysterical anti-Americanism that the title 'American Un Civilization' suggests leaves us, the rest of the world, - the Indians, the Iranians, the Chinese, the French, and all the rest - on a moral high horse that I am not at all comfortable about riding. Perehaps, as a conscious denizen of a messy world, I have never been able to achieve the pristine innocence that riding that moral high horse seems to require as a pre condition. What I am aware of is the sensation at the pit of my stomach, that informs me that the Ashwamedha Yagya (the Imperial Horse Sacrifice) of Indian nationalism is as sickening as is the excess of the violence of the current US mandate in Iraq, or, the history of the lethal and murderours intensity of Ba'athist Iraqui Nationalism under the Saddam Hussein dispensation. Lamenting the violence of one, cannot blind me to the other. And this inability not to see the networked-ness of violence, makes it difficult for me to accept the explainatory or ethical value of judgements like 'American Un-Civilization'. Most importantly, it does violence, - immense and enormous violence to those millions of Americans who took to the streets of American cities in loud and visible disagreement, against the war in Iraq, and who are continuing to make their dissent known in many different ways. Perhaps Lok Vidya rides their high horse better than I do, but I am more comfortable with an obstinate and lowly mule that never trusts the motives of any master, least of all its own... with regards Shuddha -- Shuddhabrata Sengupta (Raqs Media Collective) The Sarai Programme Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110054, India Phone : + 91 11 23960040 Fax : + 91 11 23943450 E Mail : shuddha at sarai.net http://www.sarai.net http://www.raqsmediacollective.net From vivek at sarai.net Thu Oct 21 12:10:51 2004 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2004 12:10:51 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] American reactions to Guardian's Clark County letter campaign Message-ID: <417759F3.6080409@sarai.net> To see this story with its related links on the Guardian Unlimited site, go to http://www.guardian.co.uk Dear Limey assholes Last week G2 launched Operation Clark County to help readers have a say in the American election by writing to undecided voters in the crucial state of Ohio. In the first three days, more than 11,000 people requested addresses. Here is some of the reaction to the project that we received from the US Monday October 18 2004 The Guardian Dear wonderful, loving friends from abroad, We Ohioans are an ornery sort and don't take meddling well, even if it comes from people we admire and with their sincere goodwill. We are a fairly closed community overall. In my town of Springfield, I feel that there are some that consider people from the nearby cities of Columbus or Dayton, as "foreigners"- let alone someone from outside our country. Springfield, Ohio Have you not noticed that Americans don't give two shits what Europeans think of us? Each email someone gets from some arrogant Brit telling us why to NOT vote for George Bush is going to backfire, you stupid, yellow-toothed pansies ... I don't give a rat's ass if our election is going to have an effect on your worthless little life. I really don't. If you want to have a meaningful election in your crappy little island full of shitty food and yellow teeth, then maybe you should try not to sell your sovereignty out to Brussels and Berlin, dipshit. Oh, yeah - and brush your goddamned teeth, you filthy animals. Wading River, NY Right on! Just wanted to say thanks from California for your effort and concern. This IS a very important election ... There are so many people here in the States that care about the impact America has on the rest of the world. I am personally saddened for the loss of all innocent lives. The best statement Americans can make to the rest of the world is to not elect Bush for president. Thank you so much for getting involved in our world. California Consider this: stay out of American electoral politics. Unless you would like a company of US Navy Seals - Republican to a man - to descend upon the offices of the Guardian, bag the lot of you, and transport you to Guantanamo Bay, where you can share quarters with some lonely Taliban shepherd boys. United States I am a student and life-long resident of Clark County, Ohio. I just wanted you to know that this is a wonderful idea you've initiated; people here love and respect the United Kingdom, especially the prime minister. I hope this campaign will be successful for your newspaper and for us voters. Springfield, Ohio KEEP YOUR FUCKIN' LIMEY HANDS OFF OUR ELECTION. HEY, SHITHEADS, REMEMBER THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR? REMEMBER THE WAR OF 1812? WE DIDN'T WANT YOU, OR YOUR POLITICS HERE, THAT'S WHY WE KICKED YOUR ASSES OUT. FOR THE 47% OF YOU WHO DON'T WANT PRESIDENT BUSH, I SAY THIS ... TOUGH SHIT! PROUD AMERICAN VOTING FOR BUSH! Shame on you for using the people of Ohio like this. The US presidental election isn't just about foreign policy, it's about healthcare, taxes, education, transportation, natural resources and all manner of issues with little to no impact on the people of Britain. We live in a globalised, interconnected world. If China shuts its borders to US imports, you better believe American companies, shareholders and workers are affected. Should US citizens therefore have a direct say in Chinese policies? No - Americans should demand that their own elected leaders address the issues with their Chinese counterparts. The British have a similar voice in US policies - through your own elected representatives who have any number of diplomatic, economic and military tools at their disposal. You vote for your leaders and we'll vote for ours. Your problem is with your leaders, not ours. Washington DC Real Americans aren't interested in your pansy-ass, tea-sipping opinions. If you want to save the world, begin with your own worthless corner of it. Texas, USA Thank you, thank you, thank you! What a wonderful idea! I am a US citizen who is scared to death that Bush and Klan will get back in. We need all the help we can get to ditch this bunch of maniacs. United States I just read a hilarious proposal to involve your readership in the upcoming US presidential election. At least, I'm hoping that it is genius satire. Nothing will do more to undermine the Democratic cause in Ohio than having patronising Brits wander around Clark County telling people how to vote. Just, for a second, imagine if the Washington Post sent folks from Ohio to do the same in Oxfordshire. I'm saying this as a Democrat, and as someone who has spent the last few years in the UK. That is, with all due respect. Please, please, be rational, and move slowly away from the self-defeating hubris. United States I enjoy reading your paper and agree with your politics, but this is really too much.Your plan, if carried out, will hurt the Bush opposition TERRIBLY. We cannot afford to have this associated with John Kerry or anyone else. It will be; the press is going in for a kill, days before the election. United States Your idea is superb and frankly, we need a little help over here right now. Ohio My dear, beloved Brits, I understand the Guardian is sponsoring a service where British citizens write to Americans to advise them on how to vote. Thank heavens! I was adrift in a sea of confusion and you are my beacon of hope! Feel free to respond to this email with your advice. Please keep in mind that I am something of an anglophile, so this is not confrontational. Please remember, too, that I am merely an American. That means I am not very bright. It means I have no culture or sense of history. It also means that I am barely literate, so please don't use big, fancy words. Set me straight, folks! Dayton, Ohio Hey England, Scotland and Wales, Mind your own business. We don't need weenie-spined Limeys meddling in our presidental election. If it wasn't for America, you'd all be speaking German. And if America would have had a president, then, of the likes of Kerry, you'd all be goose-stepping around Buckingham Palace. YOU ARE NOT WANTED!! Whether you want to support either party. BUTT OUT!!! United States Please be advised that I have forwarded this to the CIA and FBI. United States As an American who is very anti-Bush, I applaud your letter-writing campaign. I have read some of the letters that you published, and while I agree with most of the content, I also believe they will not be persuasive. This is because they are too aggressive and, as stated on your website, you don't know anything about these voters. If they happen to be leaning toward Bush, these letters will not put them off. New York THE AMERICAN TAXPAYERS HAVE SPENT TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS PROTECTING THE PEOPLES OF THE EU, AND WHAT DO WE GET IN RETURN. BETRAYAL, BETRAYAL, BETRAYAL. I HAVE BEEN TO YOUR COUNTRY, THE COUNTRY OF MY ANCESTORS, AND I KNOW WHY THEY LEFT. MAY YOU HAVE TO HAVE A TOOTH CAPPED. I UNDERSTAND IT TAKES AT LEAST 18 MONTHS FOR YOUR GREAT MEDICAL SERVICES TO GET AROUND TO YOU. HAVE A GREAT DAY. Harlan, Kentucky We all enjoyed this at work. Cheers. United States Thank you for taking such an active interest in the elections here in America. I appreciate what the Guardian is doing. Your effort to reach out to "swing states" and make a difference is commendable. I hope that many of your readers will take your challenge to help make a change in Washington by contacting voters. Clarke County, Georgia Keep your noses out of our business. As I recall we kicked your asses out of our country back in 1776. We do not require input from losers and idiots on who we vote for in our own country. Fuck off and die asshole!!!!! Knoxville, Iowa Gentle folks at the Guardian, In your plea to get your non-American readers to write to voters in Clark County, Iowa, you are correct that events in the US have had, and will have, effects on world events. For example, we have pulled your chestnuts out of the fire in two world wars that were occasioned by European diplomacy. Maybe you'd like a vote in which American president will oversee the next rescue. The next time you have elections in Great Britain, I shall endeavour to send names of your citizens to people in France, Iraq, India, the United Arab Emirates, Botswana, Pakistan, China and Argentina so that they may attempt to influence your election. It's only fair that everybody in the world should have a say in the selection of the prime minister. California Mind your own flipping business. United States Dear Guardian folks, While I empathise with your plight, this attempt to influence voters by sending letters from foreigners will have a negative effect on your ultimate goal. You will cause people to empathise with the president, not the other way around. People will read these letters and say, "John Le who? Never heard of him, but who is he to tell me who to vote for?" Ohio I am a registered voter in Clark County, Ohio, and am very much interested in hearing what our overseas friends have to say about our election. You are correct in assuming that this election in the US is the most important election in memory. The threat of terrorism is a very real threat, not just in our country, but all over the world. In this day and age there must be worldwide unity against these fanatical groups who just hate. Not just Americans, but all western civilisation. United States Thanks for running this initiative. It may be the only way I get to have an impact on the American election, despite the fact that I'm a registered American voter. See, I vote in New York, which is solidly Democratic. Due to the electoral college system, once a majority is secured in any state, subsequent votes don't really matter. Whether NY goes 51% or 99%, the impact on who actually wins is the same. So thanks for the opportunity to impact somebody else's vote, where it may really matter. Amsterdam, Holland Who in the hell do you think you are??? Well, I'll tell you, you're a bunch of meddling socialist pricks! Stay the hell out of our country and politics. And another thing, John Kerry is a worthless lying sack of crap so it doesn't surprise me that a socialist rag like yours would back him. I hope your cynical ploy blows up in your cowardly faces, you bunch of mealy-mouthed morons! United States I used to visit the UK every year. I love the history and culture of your country. But after I heard about your campaign to influence our elections, I've decided that neither myself, nor my family will ever visit again. I'm offended by your campaign and because of it, I'm remembering more of the negative aspects I've seen in the UK than the positive ones. Though I still love the castles! Detroit Dear British friends, I think you have an interesting idea to encourage international grassroots efforts, but I sincerely doubt most Springfielders are going to be influenced by letters from a country they probably can't even point to on a map. I wish you luck with your campaign, but I warn you that you're not likely to accomplish much. Dayton, Ohio You radical leftwingers are worse than the Taliban. I suggest you stand back and take a good hard look at yourselves. PS: When do you propose to add Michael Moore to your staff of lunatics? United States I suggest that if a particular reader of the Guardian would like to vote in America - would really like to influence the American election, say - that reader should move to America, become a citizen of the United States. Everyone is welcome here. Even the readers of the Guardian. But if you don't wish to be an American, to live in Ohio, for instance, and participate in the American political process, that is too bad. Perhaps there is something wrong with you. Perhaps it is your teeth. New York Go back to sipping your tea and leave our people alone. Ohio As an American who is afraid of the terrible ramifications if Bush is elected, I commend your efforts to try to get Britons involved. Although many Americans would be critical of British people "meddling" with our politics and elections, all the world will share in the disaster if Bush is re-elected. Many of us are very concerned. I teach young adults, most of whom have been very uninvolved in voting and politics. Many of them are going to vote. We need all the help we can get. United States As a US citizen, I want to advise you that you and anyone that participates in subverting the US presidential election can be criminally charged and perhaps even charged as spies. California Thank God above for you English! Just when I was beginning to despair at the thought of Bush being re-elected, you come along with a strategy to help us! Your invitation to your readership and rationale for offering it are provocative at the least, and laudable at best. Springfield, Ohio · www.guardian.co.uk/clarkcounty Copyright Guardian Newspapers Limited -- Vivek Narayanan Senior Content Editor (English) The Sarai Programme Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110054. Work Phone: (91-11) 2396 0040 Mobile: (91-0) 98109 36654 Fax: (91-11) 2392 8391 -- Vivek Narayanan Senior Content Editor (English) The Sarai Programme Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110054. Work Phone: (91-11) 2396 0040 Mobile: (91-0) 98109 36654 Fax: (91-11) 2392 8391 From sunil at mahiti.org Fri Oct 22 06:20:08 2004 From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham) Date: Fri, 22 Oct 2004 00:50:08 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Asia Source: Tech camp for the voluntary sector Message-ID: <1098406208.709.48.camel@box> ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Asia Source: Tech camp for the voluntary sector ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bangalore, India. January 28th to February 4th 2005. Asia Source hopes to bring together over 100 people from 20 countries to increase the use of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) amongst the voluntary sector in South and South East Asia. This week long event will bring together NGOs and NGO technology support professionals working at the grassroots level across the region to learn new skills, exchange tips, and share experiences. Together with regionally and globally renowned experts and specialists they will look at the use of FOSS within the non-profit sector from both an access and a content perspective. Offering participants the opportunity to explore the practical technical side of FOSS whilst providing a conceptual backdrop. Asia Source will be the first event of its kind in the region, bringing together regional non-profit professionals with a rights based focus, it will invite those from both the technical and content end of the spectrum to focus on the practical elements of FOSS deployment. Participants with a range of expertise will be provided with a space for intensive peer learning. They will be given the opportunity to develop their understanding of FOSS, learn how to select and apply alternative technologies, and be provided with the skills and tools to utilise this within the context of their daily work. They will also be encouraged to explore the challenges and the future potential of FOSS adoption within the social context. During this 'camp' style event, participants will take part in a range of sessions. From planning and helping an NGO to migrate to FOSS, to sharing tips and techniques on using FOSS tools for content development, advocacy and campaigning. In parallel to this they will look beneath user-level scenarios, and break-down tricky issues such as localisation techniques and how to develop total cost of ownership models. Four themes will flow throughout the event 1. 'FLOSSophy' for NGOs 2. Migration and Access 3. Tools for content and communication 4. Localisation Asia Source will be held in a small artists community on the outskirts of Bangalore. Its aim is to become a community building event, with the potential to seed connections and future partnerships across borders and between skillsets. The event is co-organised by Mahiti.org (Bangalore) and the Tactical Technology Collective (Amsterdam). The event is guided by an advisory board of established non-profit and FOSS professionals from across the South and South East Asian region. Asia Source belongs to a larger family of Source Events that seek to increase the viability of FOSS use by the non-profit sector. Other source events have taken place in South East Europe, Southern Africa and are planned in 2005 in Western Africa. For more information please visit http://www.tacticaltech.org/asiasource or http://www.mahiti.org/asiasource Applications will be announced and invited between October and November 2004. Participants will be selected by the advisory board based on their interest and experiences. There will be a small registration fee for the event. A limited number of travel and registration fee scholarships will be available and may be applied for on application. If you would like to receive an application form or have any questions please write to asiasource at tacticaltech.org. Thanks, ಸುನೀಲ್ -- Sunil Abraham, sunil at mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA Ph/Fax: +91 80 51150580. Mobile: +91 80 36701931 Currently on sabbatical with APDIP/UNDP Manager - International Open Source Network Wisma UN, Block C Komplex Pejabat Damansara. Jalan Dungun, Damansara Heights. 50490 Kuala Lumpur. P. O. Box 12544, 50782, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Tel: (60) 3-2091-5167, Fax: (60) 3-2095-2087 sunil at apdip.net http://www.iosn.net http://www.apdip.net From ananya at waag.org Wed Oct 20 23:11:53 2004 From: ananya at waag.org (ananya vajpeyi) Date: Wed, 20 Oct 2004 19:41:53 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] From the European Social Forum Message-ID: <54795D20-22BF-11D9-938E-000A95B44366@waag.org> The Work of Images in Wartime: On the last day of the 3rd European Social Forum, held in London from October 15 to 17, 2004, there was an anti-war demonstration, in which 20-25,000 people marched from Russell Square to Trafalgar Square protesting the American occupation of Iraq and Britain's support to the US. At the concluding Trafalgar Square meeting / concert, there was a large screen set up beside the stage, constantly showing images to go along with the music. All these images were carefully selected to get their message across without any cognitive delay. There were pictures of political leaders, pretzels, Ronald Mc Donald, hamburgers, bombs dropping out of fighter planes, caricatures of Bush and Blair, guns, tanks, Disney-Paris, American troops in the Middle East, Arundhati Roy in the Narmada Valley, anti-WTO protesters in Seattle, South American farmers, Guantanamo Bay, Donald Rumsfeld, riot police, etc. etc., i.e., contemporary images, taken from war, dissent movements, world politics and American pop culture in general, especially aspects of it that Europeans tend to dislike. So far, so good. What I found appalling and abhorrent was that the Abu Ghraib pictures were also up there. It is not clear to me why it's alright to put photographs of torture in loops and play them like music videos at a concert in the open air with thousands of viewers, even if it is a gathering of protest. It's not like anyone had a choice -- you couldn't turn the images off, because it wasn't your private television you were watching. You were forced to behold these atrocious sights, huge, lit up, unfolding in the historic heart of London. There were children in the crowd, as many people had brought their kids along, the demonstration being held on a Sunday afternoon. Displaying the human rights violations and crimes against humanity of Abu Ghraib in a public setting without giving viewers a discretionary option -- to me this seems like a gross misuse of the media. It is an assault on the viewer and also disrespectful to the victims whose misery is turned into a global spectacle. War crimes must have witnesses for there to be justice, but an anti-war demonstration is not a space for acts of witnessing that have any standing or use in a court of law. As participants in the demonstration, we were all forcibly turned into spectators equally of the cruelty of the perpetrators and the suffering of their victims, the debasement of the American soldiers at Abu Ghraib and the humiliation of the Iraqi prisoners. If my act of witnessing cannot serve a legal purpose or a political purpose or even a moral purpose, I do not want to be arm-twisted into this kind of spectatorship. Images of torture are not entertaining, not instructive, not informative, and not valid instruments of propaganda that purports to be non-violent in its methods, its medium and its message. Perhaps resorting to such explicit images of violence is an index of the frustration, even impotence, that many in dissenting sections of European society feel when confronted with the power of the current American administration and its allies. By descending to the level of splicing in Abu Ghraib footage, those protesting American -- and in this case British and Israeli -- occupation and domination in Iraq and Palestine appear to be no less desperate than the terrorists who make videos as they behead their hostages and then want these to be aired on television channels across the world. But even if it is the case that all players have been pushed to the wall by an intransigent world power like the United States, such extreme tactics have to be condemned, no matter which side employs them and which side we would like to support in these terrible conflicts. Some years ago in India, I came to know and like Daniel and Mariane Pearl. Danny's horrendous execution at the hands of kidnappers and its recording on film were not just traumatic and tragic events for his family, friends and colleagues: the whole civilized world was in shock. Today decapitation videos are par for the course. What is more egregious -- that innocents are butchered at all? That their murder is filmed? That such films are broadcast? That such broadcasts become routine and lose any meaning whatsoever? This perversion of the media in the very last hours of the European Social Forum left a bitter taste in my mouth. No one can deny that the world is radically mediatized. Media will service any ideology without much discernment. But there must be limits and rules to the mediatization of war. Recall Guy Debord: "[Life in the era of spectacular technology] no longer projects into the sky but shelters within itself its absolute denial, its fallacious paradise. (...). The spectacle is the nightmare of imprisoned modern society which ultimately expresses nothing more than its desire to sleep. The spectacle is the guardian of sleep." (The Society of the Spectacle, 1:20-21). Making a spectacle out of the monstrous acts in Abu Ghraib is an entailment of political slumber that also perpetuates that slumber. It is important for people to continue to build solidarity campaigns in a time of extreme, possibly terminal, cynicism. I have discovered anecdotally that hardly anyone, even those who are on the left in an organized or unorganized fashion, believes in the efficacy of protest, or in the capacity of popular movements to actually effect political change. Be it east and west, activists, artists and intellectuals are tired of raising their voices in a vacuum. It's very telling that not only do thinking people find it difficult to experience "political euphoria", they have little or no faith in democratic dissent, especially when it is expressed through non-violent means (-- which doesn't necessarily mean they believe in violent resistance). At the ESF there were lots of young people -- mostly students, from the looks of it -- but there were also lots of older folks, in their 50s and 60s, people who might have been active in left movements in their youth. In other words, there were people who came because they had no political experience and wanted a taste of it, and there were others who probably recalled a time of greater political engagement and came in order to relive that time. It was heartening to see both types in action and at work. Ananya Vajpeyi, Ph.D. Writer in Residence Waag Society for Old and New Media De Waag, Nieuwmarkt #4 1012 CR Amsterdam NL From geeta.patel at verizon.net Wed Oct 20 23:46:34 2004 From: geeta.patel at verizon.net (Geeta Patel) Date: Wed, 20 Oct 2004 14:16:34 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] Fw: rakesh sharma Message-ID: <002001c4b6d0$f3a13e20$6501a8c0@GeetaPatel> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Bani K. Bedi" To: "Geeta Patel" Cc: Sent: Wednesday, October 20, 2004 10:50 AM Subject: Re: rakesh sharma > > Hi Geeta, > This is what we sent out to the off campus listservs. Hope it is what you > are looking for! > Bani > > > >Wellesley College Presents > > > > THE FINAL SOLUTION - A FILM FEATURING FAMILIES CAUGHT UP IN THE POLITICS > > OF HATE > > Film and discussion with Director Rakesh Sharma > > > > *Best Documentary & Critics Choice, Hong Kong International Film Festival > > *Wolfgang Staudte Award & Special Jury Award, Berlin International Film > > Festival > > > > Sponsored by The Womens' Studies Department, Wellesley Association for > > South Asian Cultures, Advisor to Students of Asian Decent, Art and Art > > History Department, Political Science Department, Committee Against > >Racism > > and Discrimination and the Committee for Lectures and Cultural Events > > > > Date: Sat, Oct. 30th > > Time: 4pm - 6pm > > Venue: PNW 212 > > > > The Final Solution examines the aftermath of the burning of Hindus on the > > Sabarmati Express train at Godhra on February 27 2002. The film reveals > > the reaction to the tragic incident in which hundreds of women were raped > > and more than 2000 Muslims were murdered. > > > > Rakesh Sharma, an independent documentary film maker, began his career in > > 1986 as an assistant director on Discovery of India. Sharma has won > > numerous awards. His other widely appraised works include "Aftershocks: > > the Rough Guide to Democracy". > > > > Reception to follow. Free and Open to All. > > > > For disability services contact Jim Wice - 781 283 2434 > > questions - email sbaig at wellesley.edu > > > "Geeta Patel" writes: > >Bani Darling, Sarmili love: > >Do you two have a version of what you will send out on lists for Final > >Solution? I need it ASAP! > > > > :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: : > Bani Bedi : Wellesley College : 106 Central Street : Wellesley, MA 02481 : > 781 283 1555 > > > If you're not happy with what you have, how could you be happier with more? > -- Kobi Yamada > > From jo at turbulence.org Thu Oct 21 02:05:23 2004 From: jo at turbulence.org (Jo-Anne Green) Date: Wed, 20 Oct 2004 13:35:23 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Turbulence Spotlight: "pages of madness" by ajakumar Message-ID: <4176CC0B.3010202@turbulence.org> October 20, 2004 Turbulence Spotlight: "pages of madness" by ajakumar http://turbulence.org/spotlight/ajaykumar/index.htm "pages of madness" focuses on mental illness in ethnic minorities following recent medical research which suggests that, due to social factors such as systematic racism, black people in the UK are significantly more likely than white people to suffer from mental illnesses such as schizophrenia. Drawing on medical evidence and the artists' own experiences of mental health issues, "pages of madness" provides an experimental response to this phenomenon, exploring the psyche of a mentally ill person through the use of textual interplays, sound, and photographic and video images. It includes reconceptions of concrete poetry and the ciné-roman, investigations in narrative space and construction, and explorations of the contemporary notions of cyberspace and Asian ideas of void. BIOGRAPHY ajaykumar is an award-winning and critically acclaimed artist and academic at Goldsmiths, University of London and the Royal College of Art. He began in the realm of performance research, which "organically involved into concerns with composition of the photographic, cinematic, and digital image, in relation to ontology. This now manifests in trans-disciplinary, trans-sensory, and trans-media art." For more Turbulence Spotlights, please visit http://turbulence.org/spotlight/index.html -- Jo-Anne Green, Associate Director New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc.: http://new-radio.org New York: 917.548.7780 . Boston: 617.522.3856 Turbulence: http://turbulence.org New American Radio: http://somewhere.org Networked_Performance Blog and Conference: http://turbulence.org/blog -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041020/88f98ba2/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From info at mysprat.org Fri Oct 22 19:25:20 2004 From: info at mysprat.org (info at mysprat.org) Date: 22 Oct 2004 19:25:20 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] An Indian Muslim Appeals to America Message-ID: <20041022192517.71917201378C8406@mysprat.org> 21-Oct-04 Dear Friend, I am a Muslim from India. I always looked up to America to lead humanity to a more civilized world. Lately I feel disillusioned and disturbed. This piece expresses my apprehensions and, in the context of ensuing Presidential elections, appeals to the American people for justice. Perhaps you may find this worth circulating or having published as an open letter or otherwise. May I also take this opportunity to thank you for your generous support and solidarity with the cause of Satya Satyagrah? M Hasan Jowher President SPRAT [Society for the Promotion of Rational Thinking] SF-8, Rajnagar Complex, Narayan Nagar Road, Paldi, AHMEDABAD 380 007 India Tel : 91-79-266346 55 / 66 / 77 Fax: 91-79-2661 20 49 Email: mhj at mysprat.org Web: www.mysprat.org ==================================== AN OPEN LETTER TO AMERICAN FRIENDS Dear Fellow Americans Exporting Injustice - A Muslim Viewpoint ------------------------------------------------ Thank you America for your numerous gifts to earth. Your medicines saved numerous precious lives, your inventions made our life comfortable. American explorations from the sub-atomic to supra-galactic broadened our understanding of life, its origin and perhaps direction. And above all we thank you for proclaiming the dignity of human race and liberty and equality of all humans on earth. Without you this world would have been badly impoverished. On this third anniversary of Nine-Eleven I join you in mourning the loss of innocent American lives and offer profound condolences to the bereaved. I want you to know that I had profusely cried with you and was angry no less. I too want its perpetrators punished. Along with other like criminals. As a curious middle class Muslim in the far off India I grew up admiring your heroism, sportsmanship and adventures, science and technology, struggles and compassion. I marveled at your fine democratic spirit and institutions. Although culturally very different, I instinctively aligned myself with your travails and lapped up your icons. For most of mankind you became the ultimate dreamland. That sadly is past. Alas! the famed American spirit, too, seems to have fallen prey to the vagaries of history. Your successive governments' foreign policies have developed utter contempt for the weak and vulnerable. Virtually righting the might you have adopted disturbing double standards conveniently overlooking stark truths. May I present another side of the reality? You virtually coined the phrase Islamic Terrorism popularizing the notion that Muslims are by default terrorists. Undoubtedly Nine-Eleven was an act of terrorism. But reckon who killed more humans in history. Muslims? Consider the massacre of Jews in Germany, the carnage of innocents on both sides in the two world wars including in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Picture these victims: mothers feeding babies, patients inside hospitals, revelers in wedding processions, peasants at work in agricultural farms and workers in medicine factories.. killed in Sudan, Vietnam, Afghanistan and now in Iraq. These were about as innocent as those in WTC. The victims, not the killers happened to be Muslims. You and I have squarely condemned the Palestinian suicide bombers, the barbaric Beslan school killers. But have you imagined how a Palestinian, driven out of his homeland feels when Israeli occupiers bulldoze his villages and destroy whole streets in "preemptive strikes" - an expression converting murder to statecraft? Or how the Chechens deprived of their right of self-determination for 300 years perceive our world? A bomb is a bomb, whether crude or nuclear; missiles, chemical weaponry, armoured vehicles, gunships, communication jammers and peeping satellites.. are not within the reach of the Palestinians and Iraqis. Suicide bombing, kidnapping and throat slaughters are. If these appear barbaric please remember they are but minuscule, though more visible version of state sponsored terrorism. The American state has made this ancient human aggression more sophisticated and remote-managed - and hence seemingly less barbaric. But when American fighter aircrafts rained wholesale bombs on unsuspecting innocent Muslims, the rest of the world saw it as just that: barbaric. Mass murder using state apparatus. When your foreign policy pampers Muslim despots, Emirs, Sheikhs and kings - for your oil needs - and helps them suppress the people's struggles for freedom, liberty and democracy, why does your sense of democracy not militate? Would you like a Muslim ruler to impose his values upon you and your country and, if you disobey, be punished and called aggressors, militants, terrorists? Isn't your President doing just that in Iraq? In simple language America is aggressor and the Iraqis are fighting for their freedom from occupation. Your government has fed you on familiar diet: homeland security, chasing the enemy, preempting terrorism et al. But, sorry, most people believe that today America has more enemies than before, that despite your mighty arsenal you live in greater danger than ever before. Anyone who pushes people to suicides lives dangerously. Haven't you somehow developed a jaundiced, self-centered world-view? Liberty, democracy, freedom and rule of law for yourselves at home, injustice, aggression for others outside? Your soldiers are liberators and heroes; theirs jihadis, militants, aggressors, fanatics! To know how the world regards your foreign policy, you don't need global referendum; the UN General Assembly proceedings, despite the stifling pressure exerted by your government through puppet regimes and leaders, suffice. How come the heirs to the heroes of liberty came to condone such plain indignity? Most of humanity sympathized with you for Nine-eleven. Even after blatant aggression in Iraq most people - including Muslims - distinguish the state from the ordinary American. By re-electing Mr Bush, however, you will be endorsing his policy of murder and aggression. Would you then not be liable to retaliation from his victims? Some don't believe America has the sole monopoly of murder. We respect you because of what you gave, not for your power of killing. We count upon you to free earthlings of disease, deflect asteroids heading toward earth, not to police the earth and dictate your values on our lives. We want to love you, not fear. We adore those of you that show concern, understanding and reconciliation, not those calling for confrontation, destruction. If this madness continues, humanity loses, peace perishes, innocents fall, undoing all the good your forefathers did. John Kerry who? I don't know. Bush I do. One is an unknown face, another tested evil. What right do I have to muddle in your politics? The same way as you have in Iraq, Korea, Iran, Libya, Indonesia.. minus the gun. I absolutely dislike Osama and his ilk because they are against science, reason, modernity, secularism. But in all fairness - like many Americans - I see merit in his grievances. Remember he had started on your approved model: clean-shaven, trousers and jackets, a degree in economics, dances in Beirut.. But your system let him down, denied him justice. And the Jihadis won. Your political extremism fanned his religious extremism. Your injustice made the monster you now find him. You partnered him in repelling invading Soviets in Afghanistan. He partners with the Baathis in fighting your invasion of Iraq! As truth seekers can you not see the man's commitment to his cause, sacrifices and character? What if you catch and kill him? You will have unwittingly made him a martyr. Then you lose, he wins more. Instead, through justice and fairness deflect his argument, his case. Reach out, as you once did, with truth, compassion, equality and thereby spread the famed American spirit. Yes, the Jihadi's method is violent and I believe will betray their cause. But can you cure the ailments by treating merely the symptoms? Gandhi, Mandela and Dalai Lama have a message for you: truth, understanding and reconciliation. You have an opportunity this November of asserting Americanism. Peace on earth also happens to hinge on your decision. ================== The author runs a voluntary organization, SPRAT, to further human rights and may be reached at mhj at mysprat.org From shivamvij at gmail.com Fri Oct 22 17:25:01 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Fri, 22 Oct 2004 04:55:01 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] Where Ravana's effigy is not burnt Message-ID: India and Hinduism are more complex than secularists perhaps understand them to be. Does an atheist like me mock at the below item? And if he says no, he respects these sentiments, is he being honest? Shivam Baijnath's unique Dussehra: Where Ravana's effigy is not burnt! By ANI in Baijnath (Kangra District) New Kerala | 21 October 2004 http://athens-olympics-2004.newkerala.com/?action=fullnews&id=38021 Unlike the rest of India, the people of Baijnath in Himachla Pradesh's Kangra District has reservations about celebrating the festival of Dussehra. The local belief here is that whoever burns the effigy of Ravana, the mythological demon king, will not survive to celebrate the festival in the coming year. A strange kind of quiet descends on the area on Dusshera day and people prefer not to venture out of their houses. Even the town's Shiv Temple for which Baijnath is famous wears a deserted look, unlike the rest of the country This practice has been observed in this area for the last 20 years. "Twenty years back, Dussehra was celebrated with zest and fervor. But there is a myth that whosoever burns the effigy of Ravana dies before the next Dussehra festival. The person used to die in one year so that is why we stopped celebrating Dussehra," said Kishori Lal, the President of the Baijnath Panchayat. "This is true that we do not celebrate Dussehra. But during 1970's locals of the area used to celebrate Dussehra. Whoever used to lead the festival and burn the effigy used to die within a year. So people thought that ravana was a disciple of Lord Ram so people should not burn his effigy," said Arun Nanda, a local resident. Legend has it that Ravana prayed for penance at the Shiv Temple here, and therefore, Dussehra is not celebrated here. From shivamvij at gmail.com Sat Oct 23 16:07:26 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Sat, 23 Oct 2004 16:07:26 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] List of Indian documentary films from UMC-TISS in Mumbai In-Reply-To: <1098480211.420.36470.m12@yahoogroups.com> References: <1098480211.420.36470.m12@yahoogroups.com> Message-ID: From: "Frederick Noronha (FN)" Documentary films can be a powerful source for building awareness and campaigns. Below is an interesting list of alternate documentary films from the TISS in Mumbai. If you know of any other interesting alternative Indian documentary films, please let me know at fred at bytesforall.org Encourage Indian documentary film-making (it's booming currently, as technology and costs make it more accessible to make a film) by buying a VCD for yourself. More about Indian alt documentary at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/docuwallahs2 -FN - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - UNIT FOR MEDIA AND COMMUNICATIONS Tata Institute of Social Sciences SYNOPSES OF VIDEO PRODUCTIONS HEALTH AND DISABILITY >From the Diary of a Genetic Counsellor ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 30 mins, English, 1991, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro The programme takes up two cases of Down's syndrome, with different genetic profiles (Trisomy 21 and Translocation 14- 21) and traces the counselling process involved in each case. The aim is to highlight the counselling strategies that could be adopted to help clients to come to terms and deal with the genetic disorder. This programme would be of use to medical practitioners as well as other professionals and paraprofessionals involved in work with the mentally challenged Prerna ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Slide-sound on video, 30 mins, English and Marathi versions, 1991, Directed by Neelam Kshirsagar This programme presents a profile of the health worker, who, in the course of her regular community visits, helps in the detection of mental disability. The slide show traces the process of genetic counseling, through case studies of Down's syndrome. It stresses the importance of early intervention and rehabilitation. The aim is to present, for the health worker and the lay-person, the counselling process, with specific reference to Down's syndrome. Pramila and Parvati ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 35 mins, English, 1993, Directed by Shilpa Ranade The video explores, in depth, the perceptions of two visually challenged women, who speak of their experience of childhood, getting an education, finding employment, marriage and child rearing. In a candid account, the friends discuss the trials they face everyday in meeting the challenge of parenting their sighted children. Their children's perception of visual disability and their aspirations for the future are also presented. Perspectives on Mental Health ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 60 mins, English, 1991, Directed by Shilpa Ranade Mental Health services in India are offered by mental hospitals, psychiatric units attached to general hospitals and voluntary agencies. The video traces the history of mental health services in the country and the changing paradigms of mental illness, treatment and rehabilitation, underlying these interventions. The models and approaches adopted by various institutions are explored, in the light of the need for low-cost, appropriate and accessible interventions in the Indian context. ENVIRONMENT/ NATURAL RESOURCE MANAGEMENT Pani Panchayat ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Part I & II, 50 mins., English and Marathi versions, 1986, Directed by Anjali Monteiro Documents a water cooperative movement of small farmers in a drought-prone block of Maharashtra. In the first part, Pani Panchayat is juxtaposed with the State's promotion of large irrigation projects. The second part is an appraisal of Pani Panchayat and the extent to which it presents an alternative model. Magra Mewar Vikas Sanstha ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Part I & II, 68 mins., English, 1991, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro MMVS, based in Ajmer and Bhilwara districts of Rajasthan, is a co-ordinating voluntary agency of village committees that have taken up sustainable development of their common property resources based on the principles of contributory voluntary labour and equitable distribution of produce. The video evaluates these efforts in the context of the on-going ecological degradation of the Central Aravallis and governmental initiatives to remedy the situation. One Hundred Years of Drought ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 21 mins., English, Hindi and Marathi versions, 1993, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro The video examines the causes of recurrent drought in Maharashtra, attempting to demonstrate the extent to which drought is a socially created phenomenon, a fall out of ecologically unsound policies and practices, both at micro and macro levels. It includes a brief review of the impact of colonial role and famine policy, as well as the post- independence path of development, premised on the growth of heavy industry, large dams and modernisation of agriculture. This has resulted in deforestation, soil erosion and depletion of ground water reserves, calling for alternative appproaches involving people's participation in integrated watershed management, based on the principles of sustainable development, self-reliance and equity. Janaranya ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Joint Forest Management in Uttara Kannada 54 mins., English and Kannada versions, 1999, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro Uttara Kannada in the Western Ghats region of Karnataka is one of the most densely forested districts in India. The film examines State interventions such as the Joint Forest Planning and Management against the backdrop of livelihood and survival issues of forest dependent communities. Jungle Tales ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Surviving Development in Uttara Kannada 52 mins., English and Hindi versions, 1999, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro Uttara Kannada in Karnataka is one of the most densely forested districts in India. Development projects in the district have displaced one out of every ten inhabitants. The film examines livelihood and survival issues of forest dependent communities against the backdrop of this destruction of a fragile and versatile ecosystem in the Western Ghats region, and State interventions towards Joint Forest Management, funded by multi-lateral aid agencies. GENDER ISSUES Lage Jiva Ghar Ghar ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A Document on Women and Shelter 44 mins., English and Marathi versions,1990, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar, Simantini Dhuru and Anjali Monteiro The programme traces the differential socialisation processes that girl children internalise, to focus on women's limited rights to property. It goes on to discuss the alternatives available to women in distress, such as working women's hostels and shelter homes, emphasising the need to search for more appropriate systems of support. Sudha Police Station Gayi Thi On the Demystification of Police Procedures for Women ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 16 mins.,Hindi, 1992, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro Sudha, a woman facing domestic violence, approaches a police station for help. Her experience there leaves her wondering whether the police can be of any help in such situations. She meets Anita, an activist, who familiarises her with the basic procedures and police personnel involved in registering cognisable and non-cognisable complaints. In the process, Sudha begins to appreciate the possibilities and limitations of police intervention. Odhni: A Collective Exploration Of Ourselves, Our Bodies ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 23 mins., English and Hindi versions, 1993, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro Based on a workshop with a group of women on the theme of self-image and sexuality, this video expresses women's perceptions of the relationships of power that impinge on women's bodies and their selves. Through a process of sharing and exploration, the group attempts a critique of the dominant modes of power that are immediate to their lives. Breaking the Barriers ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 60 mins, English, 1999, Directed by Sushma Narain Domestic violence is one of the gravest and the most pervasive of human right violations. Yet, there is very little by way of response from the community or the state. For this crime is looked upon as a personal matter, not withstanding the fact that for large number of women this personal matter translates into a life along "adjustment" with torture, both mental and physical. For many, this adjustments end only with the loss of their lives. There have been attempts to mainstream the issue pf domestic violence both by the State and the civil society. This film looks at some of these initiatives of the community and the State aimed at breaking the barriers that divide lives into personal and public. INDIGENOUS PEOPLES The Fifth Schedule ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Part I & II, 44 mins, English and Telugu versions, 1988, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Shaibani Azam Set in the Godavari district of Andhra Pradesh, it highlights non-tribal intrusions into the tribal habitat resulting in large-scale alienation of tribal land, deforestation and ecological degradation. Against this backdrop, the programme evaluates the existing initiatives for development, both governmental and voluntary. Tanda ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A Document on the Denotified Tribes in Maharashtra Part I and II, 60 mins, English and Marathi versions, 1988, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar The first part looks at colonial history to examine the process by which many disparate tribes were labelled as `criminal'. The second part establishes, through case studies, that even after independence the status of these tribes has not substantially changed Kahankar : Ahankar ---------------------------------------------------------------------- (Story Maker : Story Taker) 38 Mins., English and Marathi versions, 1995, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro This is an attempt at bringing together a selection of the stories and paintings of the Warlis, and some of the writings about `them'. To the Warlis, a community of Adivasis (indigenous peoples), who live close to Bombay, these stories represent their `history', their world-view. All the outsiders, the Portuguese, the Marathas, the British, the `native' settlers... they all tried obliterating this history and wisdom. The work of the outsiders who wrote about `the Warli' represents this process of creating new mythologies. By bringing together these disparate discourses, this video aspires to critique these mythologies... To read between the lines, as the stories themselves do. MEDIA EDUCATION The Plot Thickens... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 14 mins.,English and Hindi versions, 1993, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro This series of short videos is dedicated to the critical spirit in all of us. Whether it is a questioning of the notion of an objective reality (in `Dialogue') and an instrumental language (in `Table, table and ...) or an appreciation of how the media reproduce dominant relations of power in our culture, the attempt is to facilitate a rethinking of our relationship to the world around us. `Ideological Baggage' explores the construction of gender in a television commercial while `Packaged Desire' examines the modus operandi of advertising. `The Phantom Country', `The Myth of Columbus' and `A Taste of Fascism' deal with various aspects of racism in the media. Identity: The Construction of Selfhood ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 20 mins., English and Hindi versions, 1994, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro Questioning the notion of the self as a pre-given, primordial and purposive entity, this video explores the gamut of modes in which identities are produced, circulated and consumed within our culture. Identity is both difference and relationship; identity is enmeshed in relations of power, be they of gender, race or religion. Traversing a multi-cultural terrain inhabited by Paul Klee and the Indo-Anglian poet A.K. Ramanujan, by popular commercials and the writings of riot-affected children, Michel Foucault and Sant Kabir, the medieval Sufi poet, the video is an invitation to examine anew our praxis of identity as an eternally negotiated site of change and resistance. COMMUNITY PARTICIPATION Punarvasan ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A Document on Reconstruction in Post-earthquake Marathwada Parts I & II, 58 mins., English, 1995, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro This video, shot during the period between October 1993 and December 1994, critically examines various aspects of the reconstruction programme in the Latur and Osmanabad districts of Maharashtra, following the earthquake of September 30, 1993. Part I traces the first stage of the reconstruction programme, where donor-sponsored housing relocation schemes were undertaken. The issues explored include the validity of the decision to relocate 52 villages, the lay-out and design of the settlements and houses and the building technologies adopted. It concludes with a case study of the village Talani. The second part looks at the notion of peoples' participation in the reconstruction programme. It presents various experiments involving the use of low-cost indigenous materials, local participation in settlement design, training of local artisans, demonstration of retrofitting techniques, information-education campaigns and so on. Water to the People ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Towards Community Participation in Rural Drinking Water Schemes 34mins., English and Marathi versions, 1998, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro This video is a case study of the drinking water schemes in the districts of Jalgaon and Nashik in Northern Maharashtra. It documents the processes and structures which have enabled the institutionalisation of community centred strategies, facilitated at various levels, by the Women's Studies Unit of TISS, Community Participation Consultant to the project. These include aspects such as training of government functionaries, formation of village water committees and the mechanisms for sustainable local participation. Reconstructing Communities ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 52 mins, Part I &II, English, 2002, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro On September 30, 1993, an earthquake measuring 6.4 on the Richter scale devastated 67 villages in the Latur and Osmanabad districts of Maharashtra, India. The death toll exceeded 8000 and over 16,000 were injured. This video critically explores the possibilities and limitations of community participation, in the 52 villages that were relocated, under the aegis of the Maharashtra Earthquake Emergency Rehabilitation Programme (MEERP). This World Bank funded project, implemented between 1993 and 1998, focused on housing, infrastructure, social, economic and community rehabilitation and the preparation of a Disaster Management Plan. It had community participation as a key modality. Tata Institute of Social Sciences was the community participation consultant, for the villages to be relocated. Through case studies of selected villages, the video examines the processes and dynamics of community participation in a pre-determined, target-driven project, for post-disaster rehabilitation. THE CITY Saacha (The Loom) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 49 Mins, English and Marathi versions, 2001, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro Saacha is about a poet, a painter and a city. The poet is Narayan Surve, and the painter Sudhir Patwardhan. The city is the city of Mumbai (a.k.a. Bombay), the birth place of the Indian textile industry and the industrial working class. Both the protagonists have been a part of the left cultural movement in the city. Weaving together poetry and paintings with accounts of the artists and memories of the city, the film explores the modes and politics of representation, the relevance of art in the contemporary social milieu, the decline of the urban working class in an age of structural adjustment, the dilemmas of the left and the trade union movement and the changing face of a huge metropolis. Naata (The Bond) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 45 mins., English and Hindi versions, 2003, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro 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, 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. Naata is also about us; among other things, it is an attempt to reflect on how we relate to spaces of the other, spaces like Dharavi. It is, above all, about Mumbai, the city that encompasses Bhau, Waqar and us. Hum Sab ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 40 mins, English and Hindi, 2003, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro An edited version of Naata (synopsis above), which focuses on the story of Bhau Korde and Waqar Khan, leaving out the bits where the filmmakers reflect on their own experiences, related to ethnic amity and identity. OTHER THEMES Shared Fate ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Slide-sound on video, 30 mins, English, 1984, Directed by Nandan Kudhyadi and Anjali Monteiro Through a fictionalized case study, this slide-sound presentation traces the entire process of adoption, with special emphasis on the role of the social worker. Issues discussed include the legal framework for adoption, adoption procedures, counseling the adoptive parents, follow-up after adoption and the importance of telling the child that she/he is adopted. YCP 1997 43 Mins., English,1997, Directed by K.P. Jayasankar and Anjali Monteiro Built between 1865 and 1876, Yerwada Central Prison (YCP), Pune, is one of the oldest prisons in India, with over 2500 inmates. In this video, six poets and artistes of the YCP share their work, their lives... Through their poems and musings, the film explores the modes in which they creatively cope with the pain and stigma of incarceration, in the process questioning their selfhood and the socially constructed divides between 'us' and 'them', between the 'normal' and the 'deviant'. Towards a People-centred Tomorrow ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 28 mins, English, 2003, Directed by B. Manjula Traces the history and present contribution of the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, a pioneering institution for social work education in South Asia. >From its inception in 1936, the Institute has designed its programmes of training, research and field action to meet the emerging needs of the country with a focus on relevant and sustainable development goals. MORE DETAILS FROM: --------------------------------------------------------------------------- K.P. Jayasankar, Ph.D. Reader Unit for Media and Communications Tata Institute of Social Sciences Mumbai 400 088, India Tel: 25563290 upto 96 Ext. 210 E mail: kpj at tiss.edu URL: www.tiss.edu o o o o o via // http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Indian_Online_Media_Forum/ From avinash at csdsdelhi.org Sat Oct 23 19:01:29 2004 From: avinash at csdsdelhi.org (Avinash Jha) Date: Sat, 23 Oct 2004 19:01:29 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Politics of American Un-civilization References: <001901c4b69b$6d87f7f0$4a00a8c0@library> <4176AF6A.8080608@sarai.net> Message-ID: <000901c4b904$11fe1b10$4a00a8c0@library> First of all, let me point to a misunderstanding which can be cleared by even a cursory reading of the text that I posted. No claim was made that if there is a leak, it has to be deliberate. Or, if pictures or videos of torture come to light they must be deliberate in order to terrorize people. The claim is about a specific episode. Actually all responses to the piece display this misreading. If I were to claim that some misreadings are deliberate, it will certainly not mean that all misunderstandings are deliberate misreadings. There certainly are whistleblowers and they take great risks. In fact, I was looking for the whistleblowers in this specific case, and finding none. I don't rule it out even for this case, even now. But there certainly are deliberate leaks too, as there are deliberate misreadings. If other images of such violence also seem to display a theatrical, scripted quality, then certainly my observation that the theatrical quality in Abu Ghraib videos points to something deliberate about it is invalid. And I am not about to embark on a comparative analysis of these images. People can judge it for themselves and I am not desperate to prove this claim. It is not so important. The problem with Shuddha's mail begins from what follows these readings - "if we are prepared to accept this [that Abu Ghraib videos, Manipur video and the images of Iran executions are deliberate attempts to terrorize people], there seems to be little point in saying that the US government alone does this." Who says that the US government alone does this? My neighbourhood goonda may also e doing it. When I talk about my neighbourhood goonda, to the exclusion of all other oppressors, because he is the one I want to deal with now, no one can come and tell me that I must talk about US imperialism, Indian imperialism. Nor does it mean that my neighbourhood goonda or my national dictator is as powerful and as important for the whole world as the US state. The point is not talking about this and that in the same breath. One is not dealing in oppressions, one is trying to deal with specific oppressions. What does one deal with, at what moment, in what way, is not subject to some general prescription. To say, as Shuddha does, that "Most governments in the world have acted with appalling violence towards those that they have had the opportunity to rule, including those like the Iranian government, who make a loud noise about how they are opposed to US Imperialism, or the Indian government,...", in this context, is either meaningless or dangerous. It is the same argument Indian state uses for encounter killings of naxalites and militants or Hindutavadi extremists make about Muslims. "They are oppressing their own people, so they can be eliminated". This is what the US said about Saddam Hussain's regime. The argument in this form is dangerous. If one is saying that most governments have acted with appalling violence so why talk of America - the argument in this form is meaningless. Let's fight against all states! Certainly. But the US state has a special relation with all states. The US will let you fight against some states and not against some other states. Some states are more equal than others in the global society. Even an ordinary American with an ordinary American passport enjoys privileges all over the world. And even innocent Americans land up paying a price for this privilege. European passport fetches a little less privilege. Indian passport even less. But more than many others. And certainly more than those who have no passports. If he wants to "argue for a distinction between the actions of the state and the propenstities of subjects", he must. Experience of many white people on the streets during the Iranian revolution or at a massive angry gathering on the occasion of Steve Biko's funeral showed that many common people make that distinction. Examples can be multiplied from various contexts and surely this is not limited to non-Europeans or non-whites only. Of course, there will be as many examples of occasions when the distinction between the state and the people is blurred or vanishes completely. People who are subject to and complicit with racist, militarist political entities are likely to fail to make this distinction. The piece from Lokvidya Samvad argues that the political force that the US represents and especially the force that Bush represents survives and grows by arousing the 'egotistic and animal insticts' of American people and such people are likely to fail to see that distinction between people and states which is so important to Shuddha and to many more people. This is perhaps one sense in which this force is also a force of un-civilization. Actually, it is not the claim that the original 'Lok Vidya Samvad July 2004' piece that I translated and posted makes, which is in question. The very act of making such claim and doing so using the language of 'American Un-civilization' is being identified with "hysterical anti-Americanism" and much more. You will think twice before making any similar claim on this list. Not that being hysterical is necessarily something I will always deny. There are so many things in life that make one hysterical. What does the piece in question state? It says that the US is adopting a strategy of terror. "The way US went ahead to start a war in Iraq solely on the basis of its military strength in opposition to global resistance, spurning the sentiments of people everywhere, and by completely disregarding the United Nations, brings to light the current US policy and strategy. The policy clearly is to rule the world and the strategy is terror." Note "current policy and strategy". Then it goes on to argue that the leak of Abu Ghraib was part of this policy of terror. Further, that this policy of terror is also necessitated by the electoral needs of Republican Party. "The republican party cannot trounce the democratic party by paying lip service to democratic values or by talking about international cooperation. Only way Bush can win is by arousing the egotistic and animal instincts of the American people." It may be right or wrong but is it disrespectful to American people? Does not the statement imply that a political force of this kind can be built only by arousing the egotistic and animal instincts of people, wherever it may be. Is this equating state and people? Only argument that Shuddha offers against the specific claim made in the article is that genuine whistleblowers do exist. Is he reading subtle, elusive sub-texts and wants to alert us all. Actually, he seems to be doing much more. He starts by referring to 'lok vidya piece', goes to 'lok vidya text', to 'writers of the text', and finally, in the last paragraph it is 'lok vidya' itself which "rides the moral high horse". To the readers of this list, lok vidya has been presented, described, interrogated, and fixed as displaying 'hysterical anti-Americanism', as an entity which does not flutter its eyelashes at the brutality of Indian, Iranian and Iraqi states, one which cannot see the difference between states and their subjects. The article or the argument is not contested in a dialogue of equals, as was done by Vivek (please note, readers, that the posting is addressed to both "Dear Avinash and Vivek"). It has to be framed, discredited and destroyed because it talks in a different language - the language of 'un-civilization', of 'egotistic and animal instincts'. And the same tiresome anti-American politics. Nip it in the bud. The world is populated either by globalists like himself or nativists/nationalists as constructed by himself. Lok vidya literally means 'People's knowledge' or 'Worldly knowledge'. Lok vidya Samvad is a journal and a group which wants to engage in a dialogue about people's knowledge. So, obviously, the writer who writes in Lok vidya Samvad cannot speak on behalf of lok vidya. People's knowledge can not be identified with the voice of any One. People's knowledge is grounded in ordinary life. No One or no theoretical construct has the authority or the power to go beyond ordinary life to reconstruct life according to its dictates. There is knowledge dialogue always going on in life, sometimes less, sometimes more. We (meaning every one) can participate in the dialogue but cannot place ourselves above the dialogue. If Shuddha is aggrieved by slurs we sometimes indulge in when we talk about the naivety of Americans, or their self-importance, their ignorance of the world and so on, he is justified in his irritation. Often it is accompanied with a feeling of superiority, the kind Europeans feel regarding lack of culture and civilization in America in contrast to Europe. This indeed is deplorable. But this is certainly no way to fight those attitudes. Let me end with a joke. Gandhi was once asked - "What do you think of Western Civilization?" He replied - "It is a good idea". We are waiting. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Shuddhabrata Sengupta" To: "Avinash Jha" ; Sent: Thursday, October 21, 2004 12:03 AM Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Politics of American Un-civilization > Dear Avinash and Vivek, > > I have been following with some interest the discussion on the veracity > of the Abu Ghraib videos and images following from the posting of the > 'lokvidya' piece on the same.So much so that I am provoked to gather the > courage to make what is for me a rather rare posting (nowadays) on to > the Reader List. > > I cannot but help thinking whenever Abu Ghraib is referred to about two > other pieces of imagery that I have seen that have always left me with a > lot of questions. Let me talk about them a little. Perhaps even in an > unforgivably cursory fashion. > > One is a set of images of public executions in the Islamic Republic of > Iran, that I sawpresented in a sit in by Iranian political refugees in > Frankfurt this summer, and another is the video that some of us in Sarai > and Delhi university have seen of the video footage of the > police/paramilirary/army violence meted out to demonstraters in the > north eastern Indian state of Manipur. In both instances, what has > struck me is the theatrical, almost scripted quality of the violence > that both these sets of images seem to contain. In the images from Iran, > I have seen young men and women being hung from cranes with their eyes > open, facing death, as a mullah stands watchful. In the Manipur footage > I have seen men of the security forces (it is not always clear whether > they are police, paramilirary or army personnel) routinely humiliate and > terrorize the population with a horrible banality. In both these > instances, I am left wondering, who took these images, and why. > > Of course, they may also have been taken by sadist Indian or Iranian > people in power, and of course they may have a certain utility in > terrorizing those that they seek to terrorize (the Iranian opposition to > a deeply violent regime, or to those Manipuris who resist the violence > of the armed occupation of the security forces of the Indian state). If > this were true (and it may well be true) then their nature mirrors the > reality implicit in the charge contained in the Lok Vidya text's take > on the Abu Ghraid images - the one that suggests that the Abu Ghraib > videos only demonstrate the depths to which US government and military > procedures can plummet . And that they are a part of a deliberate US > government strategy to terrorize the Iraqi people. So too, the Manipur > videos must be a deliberte attempt to scare the Manipuris, and the > Iranian execution images a state sanctioned means to silence dissent. > Their usage by Iranian and Manipuri opposition groups complicates this > assumption a little, but let us leave this aside for the moment. > > But, if we are prepared to accept this, there seems to be little point > in saying that the US government alone does this. I find little > justification in attatching the tag - 'American' to the expression 'Un > Civilization', It seemse to me about as pointless as saying - 'Iranian > barbarians' or 'Indian brutes'. I find labels like 'Indian brutes' > offensive, even though I know that the Indian state acts in a brutal > fashion, all the time. I want to argue for a distinction between the > actions of the state and the propenstities of subjects. Every act of > violence in the North East or in Kashmir, is undertaken ostensibly in > the name of all Indian citizens, and that includes me, and the writers > of the Lok Vidya text. If we want to say 'American Un-Civilization' then > let us at the same time, and in the same breath, take responsibility and > complete, personal, moral responsibility, as Indian citizens for the > enormous violence and humiliation that Indian nationalism and the Indian > state have visited on many people in South Asia. Let us stand up and be > counted as brutes in our own backyard. Some may reject this imperative > as absurd, and I would not disagree with them. But one cant have it both > ways, you cant absolve yourself and blame others for the same offenses. > > Most governments in the world have acted with appalling violence towards > those that they have had the opportunity to rule, including those like > the Iranian government, who make a loud noise about how they are opposed > to US Imperialism, or the Indian government, which is always happy to > have folk dances from the north east on Republic day annotate the > torture cells and sophisticated methods of militarized repression for > the north easterners - as part of the same uncomplicated and wonderful > reality that is the day to day practice of Indian nationalism. > > On the other hand, we may also specualate that just as there are people > everywhere in the world who are horrified and angry at the violence of > their own governments, there are people in Iran, the North East (and > hopefully the rest) of India and in the US administered prisons of Abu > Ghraib (as well as in the United States) who act as conscientious > whistle blowers, who want to let people all over the world know what > happens in the name of American democracy, the Islamic revolution in > Iran or the ideology of Indian nationalism...It may be possible that > they are also part of the networked chaind of authorship and viewership > that devolves on to the Abu Gh'raib images, the Iranian execution > photographs and the Manipur videos... > > The Lok vidya text, in designing a grand strategem in which the images > are only a mechanism of mastery, seems to rule out this possibility, and > seem to suggest that there can be only one explaination for the > authorship and the reception of such images, and that explaination > always only points in the direction of the imperatives of power, > especially what is considered to be the functional imperatives of the > 'American' hegemon. > > Reality may be more complicated than the comforts of Indian or third > worldist Anti- Americanism may allow for (and let me make it clear here > that I am no apologist for the American, or for that matter what is > called the Indian or Iranian master narrative) > > Perhaps the writers of the Lok Vidya text might do well to consider that > just as all those who happen to have American passports might not > automatically endorse the actions of the United States administration at > home and abroad, so too, some of us who may be Iranian or Indian or > Chinese or Russian citizens may not be always in agreement with the > violence our states visit on to Kashmir, the Indian North East, in Iran, > in Tibet and China or in Chechnya (or elsewhere in the territorities > they make fragrant with their sovereign powers) . If you look at the > videos from Manipur, you can see that Abu Gh'raib is only one more place > in the world where people are robbed of dignity. Something not very > different also happens, and happens as a part of routine state policy, > routine military conduct, within the territory of the Indian republic on > a fairly routine basis. > > I feel the kind of hysterical anti-Americanism that the title 'American > Un Civilization' suggests leaves us, the rest of the world, - the > Indians, the Iranians, the Chinese, the French, and all the rest - on a > moral high horse that I am not at all comfortable about riding. > Perehaps, as a conscious denizen of a messy world, I have never been > able to achieve the pristine innocence that riding that moral high horse > seems to require as a pre condition. > > What I am aware of is the sensation at the pit of my stomach, that > informs me that the Ashwamedha Yagya (the Imperial Horse Sacrifice) of > Indian nationalism is as sickening as is the excess of the violence of > the current US mandate in Iraq, or, the history of the lethal and > murderours intensity of Ba'athist Iraqui Nationalism under the Saddam > Hussein dispensation. Lamenting the violence of one, cannot blind me to > the other. And this inability not to see the networked-ness of violence, > makes it difficult for me to accept the explainatory or ethical value of > judgements like 'American Un-Civilization'. > > Most importantly, it does violence, - immense and enormous violence to > those millions of Americans who took to the streets of American cities > in loud and visible disagreement, against the war in Iraq, and who are > continuing to make their dissent known in many different ways. > > Perhaps Lok Vidya rides their high horse better than I do, but I am > more comfortable with an obstinate and lowly mule that never trusts the > motives of any master, least of all its own... > > with regards > > Shuddha > > > > -- > Shuddhabrata Sengupta (Raqs Media Collective) > The Sarai Programme > Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) > 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110054, India > Phone : + 91 11 23960040 > Fax : + 91 11 23943450 > E Mail : shuddha at sarai.net > http://www.sarai.net > http://www.raqsmediacollective.net > > __________________________________________________ Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi. From rmazumdar at vsnl.net Sat Oct 23 20:40:59 2004 From: rmazumdar at vsnl.net (Ranjani Mazumdar) Date: Sat, 23 Oct 2004 20:40:59 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] film appreciation course Message-ID: <6.1.2.0.2.20041023135441.02713400@mail.vsnl.net> UNDERSTANDING CINEMA A Film Appreciation Course Habitat Film Club 2nd to 14th November, 2004 The Film Appreciation Course is an introductory series of lectures/discussions on Understanding Cinema. Moving images on the screen - how do we look at the images projected on the white surface before us. And more importantly, how do the images look at us, engaging us, enticing us, speaking to us with a language that can cut across or create borders and boundaries? What is the spell its narratives cast on us when the lights go down? What cultural forms and political intents do they draw sustenance from? And what fantasies/emotions/ideas do they give play to, and form for us? These are some of the questions that the Course will address. The course has been designed to initiate students into viewing film texts critically. The participants will be introduced to the basic concepts of film language and film form and to some of the major movements and masters of world cinema. Indian cinema - the popular cinema and the New Wave - will also be dealt with. Theoretical questions related to realism, genre and melodrama will be discussed, and detailed analysis of selected film texts representative of different kinds of cinemas will be undertaken. All the lectures will use extensive film clips to illustrate the points being made. In addition there will also be one full-length film screening at the end of the evening. The course will begin on 2nd November with an introduction to the programme followed by a screening of Alejandro Innaritu’s 21 Grams. All the class lectures will begin at 6.30 p.m and there will be a film screening on every weekday at 9 p.m. On the weekends, the programme will run from 10 a.m onwards. The film screening on these days will be at 7.30 pm. Our special guest for the course, Anurag Kashyap will be present for the screening of his new film Black Friday which will be screened on the 13th of November at 7.15 pm. The interaction with the director is on the 14th November at 11 a.m. The detailed programme will be handed out on the 2nd with the Registration package that will also include a reader related to the issues that will be discussed in the course. 75% Attendance is mandatory for the Certificate. The Faculty Madan Gopal Singh Film Scholar, Scriptwriter, Singer-Musician Coordinator, Cinema Studies, School of Convergence, New Delhi Faculty, Department of English, Satyawati College, Delhi University Ravi Vasudevan, Film Scholar, Co-Director, SARAI; Fellow, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSD Shohini Ghosh Media Critic and Scholar, Faculty, Mass Communication Research Centre at Jamia Millia Islamia Rashmi Doraiswamy Film Critic and Scholar, Fellow, Third World Academy, Jamia Millia Islamia Ira Bhaskar Film Scholar, Faculty, Dept of English, Gargi College, Delhi University Ranjani Mazumdar (Coordinator & Instructor) Independent Filmmaker, Scholar & Visiting Faculty at the Mass Communication Research Centre, Jamia Millia Islamia Our Special Guest for the Course: Anurag Kashyap with his new Film Black Friday Students Course fee (Full Course) = Rs.1250/- (Weekend) = Rs.300/- (Dailies) = Rs.150/- Others Course fee (Full Course) = Rs.1750/- (Weekend) = Rs.500/- (Dailies) = Rs.150/- (Registration on till 1st of November. For further details, please contact the Programme Desk, Convention Centre Lobby, India Habitat Centre, Lodhi Road, Delhi – 110003). Limited Seats - enrollment on first come first serve basis. Schedule of classes and screenings attached From 133344 at soas.ac.uk Sat Oct 23 23:15:19 2004 From: 133344 at soas.ac.uk (TARAN KHAN) Date: Sat, 23 Oct 2004 17:45:19 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Follow up note on Very Progressive People Message-ID: <1098553519.bfe27680133344@soas.ac.uk> This note is a belated (apologies for that) update on the reading performance ‘Very Progressive People’, initially presented at Sarai as part of the Independent Research Fellowship workshop in August 2004. At the invitation of the Aligarh Muslim University, a somewhat reworked version of the piece was performed at the Women’s College auditorium on 7th October. This was important for several reasons. One, that Sultana Jafri, one of the protagonists of the research was an alumnus of this institution. Two, it allowed us to get feedback from a completely different and very important kind of audience. The Women’s College at AMU has seen several luminaries of the Urdu renaissance and Muslim feminist thought (or, if that sounds too wishful- progressive women figures) pass through its doors, it has been central to the mission of providing quality education to Muslim women in keeping with the spirit of ‘enlightened’ Islam; it has certainly been central to the entire experience of being a Indian Muslim woman. In this sense, what we were presenting to the audience at this venue was very familiar. Meaning that it was not an external history we were performing but stories they had experienced themselves or witnessed as histories of friends and colleagues (for the older faculty members certainly). Even for the younger generation of the audience, this milieu was household, everyday stuff-they may have heard similar yarns from aunts, grandmothers (like me) or family friends. In effect, we were speaking to an audience which belonged to the same milieu, presenting the familiar with (hopefully) fresh and relevant vision. The experience was useful again in several ways. It gave the actors the space of the proscenium stage to engage with, it also threw up possibilities of various new modes of using the video/audio elements spatially and conceptually. The responses and feedback I have got from people (especially women) who saw the performance in Aligarh are very good inputs for the expanded script I am working on of the performance. Most important for me (and most enjoyable for all of us) was the special performance for my grandmother (another protagonist in the research) in her living room. I am happy to report that she enjoyed the entire piece thoroughly, and has given us a certificate of authenticity on having ‘got it right’. Will keep this list posted on the further travels and avatars of ‘very progressive people’. Best, Taran Khan Aligarh From souweine at hawaii.edu Sun Oct 24 20:51:54 2004 From: souweine at hawaii.edu (Isaac D W Souweine) Date: Sun, 24 Oct 2004 20:21:54 +0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Politics of American Un-civilization Message-ID: Avinash: I wonder if you’re giving enough credit to the implications of Shuddha’s post for forming a nuanced understanding of geo-political power relations. Everyone seems to agree that the Lok Vidya text/piece/article treats “the US” qua political agent a bit simplistically/unproblematically. And yet in your most recent response you still seem to favor the “block’s biggest bully” analogy, as if the power which we name as “US power” redounded to one definable group of influential people. For me, Shuddha’s piece is a reminder of the need for a more discriminating, complex understanding of power and how it works. This isn’t about discounting state power or the centrality of the international state system, but it definitely is about remaining committed to drawing specific, precise maps of power relations, as opposed to relying on simple sketches. Thus, just as we must be careful to separate the “US” from “the Bush regime” and the “US voting public”, we must also be careful to understand that so-called “US power” is not univocal. While this is most obvious when considering conflicts between US state power and the power of so-called US corporations (often better termed multi or transnational), I think the basic approach can be extended in just about all directions, especially as one investigates the curious political alliances in the US electorate which allow for something like, say, US policy viz. the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. With the rise of things like globalized corporate mediatainment on the one hand and cheap, distributed information technology on the other, the world really is getting more complicated in terms of the way ideologies are produced and contested, the way temporary alliances are built and dissolved. In the face of this complexity, it seems to me that our job is to rise to the challenge, even if we have to take our treasured dialectics of oppression and resistance and imbue them with unsettling degrees of flexibility, overlap and indeterminacy. All that said, and having now reread the Lok Vidya piece a few more times, I guess at another level I’m wondering what all the fuss is about. So this particular US regime is less into soft power and more into scare tactics and divinely inspired governance-by-hunch. But is it some new fact that the world’s great superpower wants to “rule the world", at least to the extent that such a thing is possible? Did Bill Clinton preside over a much different US regime in terms of basic power aims? Indeed, since the time James Monroe in 1823 (with JQ Adams whispering in his ear) told Europe to stay out of his rather inclusively drawn back-yard, the plot seem to have remained somewhat consistent, even if the backyard has since grown. I don’t mean to conflate almost 200 years of world history here, nor do I mean to elide the differences between different US regimes, which have often been significant (at least for certain populations), but unless the writer of the Lok Vidya piece thinks its news that America really isn’t out there supporting truth, justice and “democracy”, there seems to be a whole lot of hand wringing going on here. Mind you, I’m happy to grant that if any politicians deserve to be treated with Starwarsesque finger wagging about their desire for world dominance, it’s certainly the Leo Strauss toting neo-con crew of Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld etc., who really are as ideological as they come. Likewise, I would certainly agree that these politicians/strategists and the regime they drive have instituted aggressive, destabalizing and violent geo-political strategies, that they have tried to alter longstanding and necessary rules of international diplomacy (e.g. the Geneva accords) and that, most importantly, their reactionary politics, which unfortunately bode quite ill for passport-privileged Americans (among others), should be fought at every turn. But, all that acknowledged, why aren’t we taking some time to consider this shift from soft to hard power and asking whether it augurs certain changes in the world system viz the centrality/viability of US power (not to mention more complex and interesting changes occurring in the role of nation states, international regulatory bodies, global capitalism etc.). Taking Gramsci at his word - when hegemony fails, is not coercion soon to follow? I know, the big bad bully still has lots of army bases, but how are his long-term prospects? These days, everyone is so fixated on the madness of the Bush regime, which makes for easy pickings at one level, but if an incredibly divided US voting public does manage to banish the younger Bush, what then? If America relearns a bit of its soft power touch, will it shift from being the govt. of uncivilization to the govt. of civilized repression?? Beacuse as I see it, Mr. Kerry’s job will be to oversee the same basic regime of state power as his predecessor (though perhaps with a more internationalist demeanor). Meanwhile, the actual power wielded by the so-called “Most Powerful Man in the World” will continue to become more variegated, multi-valent and distributed, thus requiring ever-more careful analysis in the service of precisely drawn maps for resistance/ transcendence. ----- Original Message ----- From: Avinash Jha Date: Saturday, October 23, 2004 7:01 pm Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Politics of American Un-civilization > First of all, let me point to a misunderstanding which can be > cleared by > even a cursory reading of the text that I posted. No claim was > made that if > there is a leak, it has to be deliberate. Or, if pictures or > videos of > torture come to light they must be deliberate in order to > terrorize people. > The claim is about a specific episode. Actually all responses to > the piece > display this misreading. If I were to claim that some misreadings are > deliberate, it will certainly not mean that all misunderstandings are > deliberate misreadings. There certainly are whistleblowers and > they take > great risks. In fact, I was looking for the whistleblowers in this > specificcase, and finding none. I don't rule it out even for this > case, even now. > But there certainly are deliberate leaks too, as there are deliberate > misreadings. > > If other images of such violence also seem to display a > theatrical, scripted > quality, then certainly my observation that the theatrical quality > in Abu > Ghraib videos points to something deliberate about it is invalid. > And I am > not about to embark on a comparative analysis of these images. > People can > judge it for themselves and I am not desperate to prove this > claim. It is > not so important. > > The problem with Shuddha's mail begins from what follows these > readings - > "if we are prepared to accept this [that Abu Ghraib videos, > Manipur video > and the images of Iran executions are deliberate attempts to terrorize > people], there seems to be little point in saying that the US > governmentalone does this." Who says that the US government alone > does this? My > neighbourhood goonda may also e doing it. When I talk about my > neighbourhoodgoonda, to the exclusion of all other oppressors, > because he is the one I > want to deal with now, no one can come and tell me that I must > talk about US > imperialism, Indian imperialism. Nor does it mean that my > neighbourhoodgoonda or my national dictator is as powerful and as > important for the whole > world as the US state. The point is not talking about this and > that in the > same breath. One is not dealing in oppressions, one is trying to > deal with > specific oppressions. What does one deal with, at what moment, in > what way, > is not subject to some general prescription. > > To say, as Shuddha does, that "Most governments in the world have > acted with > appalling violence towards those that they have had the > opportunity to rule, > including those like the Iranian government, who make a loud noise > about how > they are opposed to US Imperialism, or the Indian government,...", > in this > context, is either meaningless or dangerous. It is the same > argument Indian > state uses for encounter killings of naxalites and militants or > Hindutavadiextremists make about Muslims. "They are oppressing > their own people, so > they can be eliminated". This is what the US said about Saddam > Hussain'sregime. The argument in this form is dangerous. If one is > saying that most > governments have acted with appalling violence so why talk of > America - the > argument in this form is meaningless. Let's fight against all states! > Certainly. But the US state has a special relation with all > states. The US > will let you fight against some states and not against some other > states.Some states are more equal than others in the global > society. Even an > ordinary American with an ordinary American passport enjoys > privileges all > over the world. And even innocent Americans land up paying a price > for this > privilege. European passport fetches a little less privilege. Indian > passport even less. But more than many others. And certainly more > than those > who have no passports. > > If he wants to "argue for a distinction between the actions of the > state and > the propenstities of subjects", he must. Experience of many white > people on > the streets during the Iranian revolution or at a massive angry > gathering on > the occasion of Steve Biko's funeral showed that many common > people make > that distinction. Examples can be multiplied from various contexts and > surely this is not limited to non-Europeans or non-whites only. Of > course,there will be as many examples of occasions when the > distinction between the > state and the people is blurred or vanishes completely. People who are > subject to and complicit with racist, militarist political > entities are > likely to fail to make this distinction. The piece from Lokvidya > Samvadargues that the political force that the US represents and > especially the > force that Bush represents survives and grows by arousing the > 'egotistic and > animal insticts' of American people and such people are likely to > fail to > see that distinction between people and states which is so > important to > Shuddha and to many more people. This is perhaps one sense in > which this > force is also a force of un-civilization. > > Actually, it is not the claim that the original 'Lok Vidya Samvad > July 2004' > piece that I translated and posted makes, which is in question. > The very act > of making such claim and doing so using the language of 'American > Un-civilization' is being identified with "hysterical anti- > Americanism" and > much more. You will think twice before making any similar claim on > thislist. Not that being hysterical is necessarily something I > will always deny. > There are so many things in life that make one hysterical. > > > What does the piece in question state? It says that the US is > adopting a > strategy of terror. "The way US went ahead to start a war in Iraq > solely on > the basis of its military strength in opposition to global resistance, > spurning the sentiments of people everywhere, and by completely > disregardingthe United Nations, brings to light the current US > policy and strategy. The > policy clearly is to rule the world and the strategy is terror." Note > "current policy and strategy". Then it goes on to argue that the > leak of Abu > Ghraib was part of this policy of terror. Further, that this > policy of > terror is also necessitated by the electoral needs of Republican > Party. "The > republican party cannot trounce the democratic party by paying lip > serviceto democratic values or by talking about international > cooperation. Only way > Bush can win is by arousing the egotistic and animal instincts of the > American people." It may be right or wrong but is it disrespectful to > American people? Does not the statement imply that a political > force of this > kind can be built only by arousing the egotistic and animal > instincts of > people, wherever it may be. Is this equating state and people? > Only argument > that Shuddha offers against the specific claim made in the article > is that > genuine whistleblowers do exist. > > Is he reading subtle, elusive sub-texts and wants to alert us all. > Actually,he seems to be doing much more. He starts by referring to > 'lok vidya piece', > goes to 'lok vidya text', to 'writers of the text', and finally, > in the last > paragraph it is 'lok vidya' itself which "rides the moral high > horse". To > the readers of this list, lok vidya has been presented, described, > interrogated, and fixed as displaying 'hysterical anti- > Americanism', as an > entity which does not flutter its eyelashes at the brutality of > Indian,Iranian and Iraqi states, one which cannot see the > difference between states > and their subjects. The article or the argument is not contested > in a > dialogue of equals, as was done by Vivek (please note, readers, > that the > posting is addressed to both "Dear Avinash and Vivek"). It has to > be framed, > discredited and destroyed because it talks in a different language > - the > language of 'un-civilization', of 'egotistic and animal > instincts'. And the > same tiresome anti-American politics. Nip it in the bud. The world is > populated either by globalists like himself or > nativists/nationalists as > constructed by himself. > > Lok vidya literally means 'People's knowledge' or 'Worldly > knowledge'. Lok > vidya Samvad is a journal and a group which wants to engage in a > dialogueabout people's knowledge. So, obviously, the writer who > writes in Lok vidya > Samvad cannot speak on behalf of lok vidya. People's knowledge can > not be > identified with the voice of any One. People's knowledge is > grounded in > ordinary life. No One or no theoretical construct has the > authority or the > power to go beyond ordinary life to reconstruct life according to its > dictates. There is knowledge dialogue always going on in life, > sometimesless, sometimes more. We (meaning every one) can > participate in the dialogue > but cannot place ourselves above the dialogue. > > If Shuddha is aggrieved by slurs we sometimes indulge in when we > talk about > the naivety of Americans, or their self-importance, their > ignorance of the > world and so on, he is justified in his irritation. Often it is > accompaniedwith a feeling of superiority, the kind Europeans feel > regarding lack of > culture and civilization in America in contrast to Europe. This > indeed is > deplorable. But this is certainly no way to fight those attitudes. > > Let me end with a joke. Gandhi was once asked - "What do you think of > Western Civilization?" He replied - "It is a good idea". > > We are waiting. > > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Shuddhabrata Sengupta" > To: "Avinash Jha" ; > Sent: Thursday, October 21, 2004 12:03 AM > Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Politics of American Un-civilization > > > > Dear Avinash and Vivek, > > > > I have been following with some interest the discussion on the > veracity> of the Abu Ghraib videos and images following from the > posting of the > > 'lokvidya' piece on the same.So much so that I am provoked to > gather the > > courage to make what is for me a rather rare posting (nowadays) > on to > > the Reader List. > > > > I cannot but help thinking whenever Abu Ghraib is referred to > about two > > other pieces of imagery that I have seen that have always left > me with a > > lot of questions. Let me talk about them a little. Perhaps even > in an > > unforgivably cursory fashion. > > > > One is a set of images of public executions in the Islamic > Republic of > > Iran, that I sawpresented in a sit in by Iranian political > refugees in > > Frankfurt this summer, and another is the video that some of us > in Sarai > > and Delhi university have seen of the video footage of the > > police/paramilirary/army violence meted out to demonstraters in the > > north eastern Indian state of Manipur. In both instances, what has > > struck me is the theatrical, almost scripted quality of the violence > > that both these sets of images seem to contain. In the images > from Iran, > > I have seen young men and women being hung from cranes with > their eyes > > open, facing death, as a mullah stands watchful. In the Manipur > footage> I have seen men of the security forces (it is not always > clear whether > > they are police, paramilirary or army personnel) routinely > humiliate and > > terrorize the population with a horrible banality. In both these > > instances, I am left wondering, who took these images, and why. > > > > Of course, they may also have been taken by sadist Indian or Iranian > > people in power, and of course they may have a certain utility in > > terrorizing those that they seek to terrorize (the Iranian > opposition to > > a deeply violent regime, or to those Manipuris who resist the > violence> of the armed occupation of the security forces of the > Indian state). If > > this were true (and it may well be true) then their nature > mirrors the > > reality implicit in the charge contained in the Lok Vidya > text's take > > on the Abu Ghraid images - the one that suggests that the Abu > Ghraib> videos only demonstrate the depths to which US government > and military > > procedures can plummet . And that they are a part of a > deliberate US > > government strategy to terrorize the Iraqi people. So too, the > Manipur> videos must be a deliberte attempt to scare the > Manipuris, and the > > Iranian execution images a state sanctioned means to silence > dissent.> Their usage by Iranian and Manipuri opposition groups > complicates this > > assumption a little, but let us leave this aside for the moment. > > > > But, if we are prepared to accept this, there seems to be little > point> in saying that the US government alone does this. I find little > > justification in attatching the tag - 'American' to the > expression 'Un > > Civilization', It seemse to me about as pointless as saying - > 'Iranian> barbarians' or 'Indian brutes'. I find labels like > 'Indian brutes' > > offensive, even though I know that the Indian state acts in a brutal > > fashion, all the time. I want to argue for a distinction between the > > actions of the state and the propenstities of subjects. Every > act of > > violence in the North East or in Kashmir, is undertaken > ostensibly in > > the name of all Indian citizens, and that includes me, and the > writers> of the Lok Vidya text. If we want to say 'American Un- > Civilization' then > > let us at the same time, and in the same breath, take > responsibility and > > complete, personal, moral responsibility, as Indian citizens for the > > enormous violence and humiliation that Indian nationalism and > the Indian > > state have visited on many people in South Asia. Let us stand up > and be > > counted as brutes in our own backyard. Some may reject this > imperative> as absurd, and I would not disagree with them. But one > cant have it both > > ways, you cant absolve yourself and blame others for the same > offenses.> > > Most governments in the world have acted with appalling violence > towards> those that they have had the opportunity to rule, > including those like > > the Iranian government, who make a loud noise about how they are > opposed> to US Imperialism, or the Indian government, which is > always happy to > > have folk dances from the north east on Republic day annotate the > > torture cells and sophisticated methods of militarized > repression for > > the north easterners - as part of the same uncomplicated and > wonderful> reality that is the day to day practice of Indian > nationalism.> > > On the other hand, we may also specualate that just as there are > people> everywhere in the world who are horrified and angry at the > violence of > > their own governments, there are people in Iran, the North East (and > > hopefully the rest) of India and in the US administered prisons > of Abu > > Ghraib (as well as in the United States) who act as conscientious > > whistle blowers, who want to let people all over the world know what > > happens in the name of American democracy, the Islamic > revolution in > > Iran or the ideology of Indian nationalism...It may be possible that > > they are also part of the networked chaind of authorship and > viewership> that devolves on to the Abu Gh'raib images, the > Iranian execution > > photographs and the Manipur videos... > > > > The Lok vidya text, in designing a grand strategem in which the > images> are only a mechanism of mastery, seems to rule out this > possibility, and > > seem to suggest that there can be only one explaination for the > > authorship and the reception of such images, and that explaination > > always only points in the direction of the imperatives of power, > > especially what is considered to be the functional imperatives > of the > > 'American' hegemon. > > > > Reality may be more complicated than the comforts of Indian or third > > worldist Anti- Americanism may allow for (and let me make it > clear here > > that I am no apologist for the American, or for that matter > what is > > called the Indian or Iranian master narrative) > > > > Perhaps the writers of the Lok Vidya text might do well to > consider that > > just as all those who happen to have American passports might not > > automatically endorse the actions of the United States > administration at > > home and abroad, so too, some of us who may be Iranian or Indian or > > Chinese or Russian citizens may not be always in agreement with the > > violence our states visit on to Kashmir, the Indian North East, > in Iran, > > in Tibet and China or in Chechnya (or elsewhere in the territorities > > they make fragrant with their sovereign powers) . If you look at the > > videos from Manipur, you can see that Abu Gh'raib is only one > more place > > in the world where people are robbed of dignity. Something not very > > different also happens, and happens as a part of routine state > policy,> routine military conduct, within the territory of the > Indian republic on > > a fairly routine basis. > > > > I feel the kind of hysterical anti-Americanism that the title > 'American> Un Civilization' suggests leaves us, the rest of the > world, - the > > Indians, the Iranians, the Chinese, the French, and all the rest > - on a > > moral high horse that I am not at all comfortable about riding. > > Perehaps, as a conscious denizen of a messy world, I have never > been> able to achieve the pristine innocence that riding that > moral high horse > > seems to require as a pre condition. > > > > What I am aware of is the sensation at the pit of my stomach, that > > informs me that the Ashwamedha Yagya (the Imperial Horse > Sacrifice) of > > Indian nationalism is as sickening as is the excess of the > violence of > > the current US mandate in Iraq, or, the history of the lethal and > > murderours intensity of Ba'athist Iraqui Nationalism under the > Saddam> Hussein dispensation. Lamenting the violence of one, > cannot blind me to > > the other. And this inability not to see the networked-ness of > violence,> makes it difficult for me to accept the explainatory or > ethical value of > > judgements like 'American Un-Civilization'. > > > > Most importantly, it does violence, - immense and enormous > violence to > > those millions of Americans who took to the streets of American > cities> in loud and visible disagreement, against the war in > Iraq, and who are > > continuing to make their dissent known in many different ways. > > > > Perhaps Lok Vidya rides their high horse better than I do, but > I am > > more comfortable with an obstinate and lowly mule that never > trusts the > > motives of any master, least of all its own... > > > > with regards > > > > Shuddha > > > > > > > > -- > > Shuddhabrata Sengupta (Raqs Media Collective) > > The Sarai Programme > > Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) > > 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110054, India > > Phone : + 91 11 23960040 > > Fax : + 91 11 23943450 > > E Mail : shuddha at sarai.net > > http://www.sarai.net > > http://www.raqsmediacollective.net > > > > > > > __________________________________________________ > Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi. > > > > _________________________________________ > 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: > From rmazumdar at vsnl.net Sat Oct 23 13:55:54 2004 From: rmazumdar at vsnl.net (Ranjani Mazumdar) Date: Sat, 23 Oct 2004 13:55:54 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] film appreciation course Message-ID: <6.1.2.0.2.20041023135441.02713400@mail.vsnl.net> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041023/97cbe814/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 2004 schedule.doc Type: application/msword Size: 50688 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041023/97cbe814/attachment.doc -------------- next part -------------- From shivamvij at gmail.com Sun Oct 24 16:20:54 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Sun, 24 Oct 2004 16:20:54 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] 'Iron Ladies' in St. Stephen's College Message-ID: The Gandhi Study Circle and The Cine Club St. Stephen's College in association with Nigah present Iron Ladies A raucous, musical comedy based on a real life story of a Volleyball team comprising transgender and gay men who outdid the 'real men' to become national champions in Thailand. Awarded Best Picture by the Thai motion picture association and a huge box-office hit in Thailand, Hong Kong, Japan. Thai with English Subtitles and to be followed by a discussion on transgender issues. 1:45 p.m., Wednesday 27 October 2004, Room XE, St.Stephen's College (part of the Gender and Sexuality Month of the Gandhi Study Circle.) _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From tuli at MIT.EDU Sat Oct 23 20:33:52 2004 From: tuli at MIT.EDU (Arundhati Banerjee) Date: Sat, 23 Oct 2004 11:03:52 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] (no subject) Message-ID: MIT-INDIA Program and Poverty Action Lab invite you to : "The Role of Micro-finance in Indian Development" a talk by Dr. Nachiket Mor Executive Director, ICICI Bank, India and World Fellow, Yale University Dr. Mor will TALK about the financial sector of India and engage in a half-hour Q & A session with our audience. Date: Thursday, October 28, 2004 Time: 5.30-6.30 P.M. Venue: Building 32, Room 155 Address: Building 32, Ray and Maria Stata Center, 32 Vassar Street, Cambridge, MA. 02139 Find this on the MIT map by going to http://whereis.mit.edu/map-jpg?selection=32&selectlayer=Buildings&selectfield=facility&zoom=level2¢erx=710494¢ery=496368&oldzoom=level3&map.x=301&map.y=194 Nachiket Mor is the Executive Director of ICICI Bank, one of India's premier banks and financial services holding that offer a wide spectrum of financial services to individuals and companies. He leads the Social Initiatives Group of ICICI and many other development activities in the financial sector and he is a board member of the Azim Premji Foundation. For more details, contact Aditi Mitra-Gupta, MIT-India Coordinator: Aditi Mitra-Gupta MIT-India Program Coordinator , Massachusetts Institute of Technology E38 -754, 292 Main Street Cambridge, MA 02139, USA Phone: 1-617-258-5917 Fax 1-617-258-7432 Email: amitra at mit.edu MIT-India Program website http://web.mit.edu/mit-india/www/index.html -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041023/a1ef1330/attachment.html From db at dannybutt.net Mon Oct 25 03:32:09 2004 From: db at dannybutt.net (Danny Butt) Date: Mon, 25 Oct 2004 11:02:09 +1300 Subject: [Reader-list] US comedy sketch about Hyderabad call centre Message-ID: There are a lot of things to talk about in this sketch from a US comedy show, that is obviously relevant to a number of the discussions that have been taking place on the list (I don't think I've seen it here so far) http://www.vritti.net/index.php?p=23 Linked from the above page is a 12MB Windows Media File (sorry, I can't convert it into an open format, someone else might be able to) of the clip. Danny -- http://www.dannybutt.net #place: location, cultural politics, and social technologies: http://www.place.net.nz From sunil at mahiti.org Mon Oct 25 22:09:49 2004 From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham) Date: Mon, 25 Oct 2004 16:39:49 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Beta 1 of our Interactive GNU/Linux End User Guides Message-ID: <1098722388.680.134.camel@box> Dear Friends, UNDP-APDIP's International Open Source Network (IOSN), has released for public review a preview of upcoming interactive mulitmedia guides to using the Linux desktop, based on the popular User Guide to Using the Linux Desktop printed training materials. The interactive guide to Using the Linux Desktop provides online and downloadable multimedia guides based on the User Guide to Using the Linux Desktop[1] printed materials. The requirements for the interactive demo is a browser with Macromedia Flash Player 7 plugin installed. This is available for Windows, Linux and Mac platforms from the Macromedia website [2] IOSN plans to put all the training materials on a Live CD, where a user can simply insert the CD and go through the training materials on a live Linux Desktop environment without having to install Linux on their desktop computers. IOSN's Live CD will be based on the Fedora Project [3] and the Gnome desktop platform [4] to be consistent with the existing materials. However, this should not be construed as an endorsement of this distribution of Linux over the others on the part of the authors. An example of an existing and successful open source Live CD is Knoppix [5] which is based on the Debian Linux [6] distribution and the K Desktop Environment (KDE) [7]. All materials are released under the Creative Commons Attribution License [2] and the source files and scripts for all the modules will be made available for the final release. User Guide to Using the Linux Desktop - Interactive (Beta 1) http://www.iosn.net/training/end-user-manual/interactive IOSN welcomes public feedback and comments for this beta so that we can incorporate user feedback into the final product. [1] http://www.iosn.net/training/end-user-manual/ [2] http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash [3] http://fedora.redhat.com/ [4] http://www.gnome.org/ [5] http://www.knoppix.org/ [6] http://www.debian.org/ [7] http://www.kde.org/ [8] http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/ Thanks, ಸುನೀಲ್ -- Sunil Abraham, sunil at mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA Ph/Fax: +91 80 51150580. Mobile: +91 80 36701931 Currently on sabbatical with APDIP/UNDP Manager - International Open Source Network Wisma UN, Block C Komplex Pejabat Damansara. Jalan Dungun, Damansara Heights. 50490 Kuala Lumpur. P. O. Box 12544, 50782, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Tel: (60) 3-2091-5167, Fax: (60) 3-2095-2087 sunil at apdip.net http://www.iosn.net http://www.apdip.net From shivamvij at gmail.com Mon Oct 25 18:00:06 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Mon, 25 Oct 2004 18:00:06 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] spam? who, me? Message-ID: dear all have been very embarassed lately about being identified as The guy Who Posts a Lot on the Sarai List. Am I a spammer? cheers | shivam From itsnishant at gmail.com Tue Oct 26 00:51:33 2004 From: itsnishant at gmail.com (Nishant Shah) Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 00:51:33 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Announcement: Play Performance in Bangalore Message-ID: When I first got the offer, I looked at her sceptically. 'Love Letters!' the play that has been everywhere and has been done everything to. A production of Love Letters! And then one thing led to many and we came up with an idea of working with a concept of 'intimate theatre.' And after four months of work we have now reached the days when we can announce that Dreamscope theatres, an amateur production house that works with new talent, invites you to a performance of one of the most celebrated plays of our times - A.R. Gurney's Love Letters. Performed in an art gallery in Bangalore - Gallery Sumukha- and combining elements of an art exhibition, a play and a live band, Love Letters invites you to be a part of the intimate theatre that it is desgined to be. Scheduled to be on the 28th, 29th and 30th of October, the play tickets are priced at Rs. 99 per head. Because of the nature of the production, the tickets are limited. So if you want to be a part of this experience, make sure you either ping me at itsnishant at gmail.com or offline me at nicksshah at yahoo.com and book your tickets before they run out. And if anybody from out there is in Bangalore on those dates, you know where you need to be. For more information on the play, click here: http://www.livejournal.com/users/latelyontime/89410.html -- Nishant says Tell me something about yourself. Go ahead...tell all From ravikant at sarai.net Sun Oct 24 15:08:56 2004 From: ravikant at sarai.net (Ravikant) Date: Sun, 24 Oct 2004 09:38:56 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] article on magazine design from japan Message-ID: <200410240938.56938.ravikant@sarai.net> Interesting essay from www.honco.net which hosts the journal - The Book and the Computer. Visit the site for photo features, films and symposia. Enjoy. Ravikant -------- A Miscellany of the Unexpected Sugiura Kohei In 50 years of designing magazines, I have had a great deal of freedom to develop and try out new ideas. I have worked for 40 different publications and on over 2,000 individual issues, and with just a few exceptions, I have been granted the opportunity to move beyond the predetermined constraints of conventional formats. Needless to say, I could not have produced this body of work alone. I have worked closely with the talented young designers on my staff, and I owe much to their invaluable assistance. Looking back over this half century of work, I am aware that certain key principles have guided my approach to magazine design. It is my hope that the comments that follow will enrich the reader's experience in viewing my work. Magazines gather the fruits of the season A magazine is a bundle of paper that gathers from the world around us a miscellany of news, gossip and debate. The key word here is "miscellany." Indeed, the Japanese word for magazine -- zasshi -- literally means "miscellaneous chronicles." But "miscellany" is not a terribly dignified word, connoting as it does a hodgepodge of unrelated items. In Buddhism, however, zoushiki, or "miscellaneous colors," is a term of praise for mandalas and other visual representations of the Buddha-realm. This suggests that, if our miscellany is assembled with power and purpose, it will be no mere hodgepodge but something of authentic value, even something that can unlock the secrets of the cosmos. Every issue of a magazine purports to gather together the season's latest stories and controversies, just as one gathers from an orchard the season's ripest fruit. A good cover brings to the surface the inner power of the magazine, offering a taste of the diverse fruits that lie within, waiting to be sampled. A magazine is like a living creature, and the rhythm with which it materializes on bookstore racks and enters our lives -- quarterly, monthly, or weekly -- is its own particular biorhythm. Despite this comforting cyclical familiarity, or perhaps precisely because of it, a magazine must, to catch the eye of the reader, offer with each issue a fresh new face. The cover should convey the aromas of the new season, of the fresh fruit within, now ripe to bursting. Magazine covers are faces The notion of the cover as a face relates to the traditional Chinese science of physiognomy, the reading of faces to discern human character. The underlying premise of physiognomy is that "the part contains the whole," a notion that can be found in other practices. Iridology, for example, teaches that every part of the body has a corresponding location in the iris of the eye, an idea one also finds in systems for reading the ears and the soles of the feet. According to Chinese tradition, the face reveals not only indicators of the health of a person's various internal organs but also tells much about his or her character and way of life. Before the 1970s, the covers of Japanese magazines were all designed with a similar format, in which the title was placed over a single photograph or illustration. The effect was something like draping an article of clothing over a person's body. I began to wonder if there wasn't some way to display the inner substance of the magazine, the essence of that "body," on the cover. Rather than literally cover a publication, I wanted to try a new approach, which would provide the magazine with an expressive face that reflected its soul. My attempts came to fruition in covers for magazines like SD and Ginka. Magazines are constantly in flux The publication of a periodical is a process of ceaseless change. The covers of conventional magazines, rather than reflecting this fact, seem to ignore it. Indeed, the more august its reputation, the more likely a magazine is to cling to a design that seeks to evoke dignity through immobility. The title logo never changes, nor does the publication's size or even its color scheme. The only elements that change from issue to issue are the images on the cover, yet even they adhere to the same fixed dimensions. I grew to dislike this enforced stability intensely. To me, it seemed that a magazine by its very nature must change -- like leaves with the season, like one's pulse racing in response to exciting news, like the emotions that play across our faces. Whether its heart beats in time to a weekly, monthly or quarterly rhythm, a magazine is always in flux. I decided deliberately to highlight this flux in my design of several magazines. I began doing this in 1966 with SD, a monthly whose cover design I altered every issue. I radically redesigned the quarterly Ginka every four issues -- that is, once a year -- and the monthly Uwasa no Shinso every three issues. With SD and Ginka, I varied the typography and the size of the cover photos. I frequently put calligraphic script on the cover of Ginka, and featured a different style of illustration every month on Uwasa no Shinso. The transitions through which the covers of a magazine move should also, when viewed over time, express an identifiable personality. Their flux should resonate like the biorhythms of a distinct organism. One could say, then, that what I was striving to express was an identity that emerges in and through the very process of change. Magazines should reflect an interplay of order and chaos In my designs, after mixing together the text and images, I like to add, for good measure, a dollop of "noise." The effect I seek is one in which images and text, while jostling one another, somehow coexist within a single whole. I call this the "interplay of order and chaos." Most publications reflect the conventional wisdom of advertising design, which abhors any kind of noise, viewing it as a flaw. But I consider noise a close relative of text and pictures. If you take information -- that is, bits and pieces of intellectual abstraction without physical form -- and shine a light on it, you will see how the reflected light bends and scatters. At one extreme of the spectrum, information may crystallize into symbolic elements, such as the letters of text. Moving in the other direction, it may acquire the amorphous outline of a picture. If you then take imagery to an even more abstract level, you get noise. These forms are really just variations along a single spectrum. Order and chaos on a cover of objet magazine yu ("noise" detail at right) I came to this way of thinking through the study of kanji, the Chinese characters that make up much of written Japanese. Kanji, which derive from ancient pictographs, are complex characters often composed of many strokes. If you shift a character just a bit in the direction of its pictographic origins, you can readily turn it into an image -- or into noise. The freedom and outright wildness of some Chinese and Japanese calligraphy attests to these possibilities. A magazine is a bundle not only of text but also of photos, illustrations, diagrams and advertisements. These categories are not always clearly demarcated. A title logo may be more pictorial than textual; the magazine may contain photorealistic illustrations and imagistic text -- not to mention advertisements that pose as feature articles. Different modes of expression merge and overlap with one another. They are all part of the same continuum of expression -- of text, image and noise. The "interplay of order and chaos" is just my way of describing the attempt to give shape to this continuum. Magazine designs should surprise In all my designs, I try to catch the reader off-guard, and I have devised a number of strategies for this purpose. I have laid out some covers of episteme, Ginka, and Uwasa no Shinso along the angle of the earth's axis, which tilts 23.5 degrees. The cover of issue no. 8 of yu emulates the maze-like, circular layout of Islamic calligraphy. On one series of magazine covers, I created stereovision images to be viewed through 3D glasses. I have shrunk text and pictures to microfiche size, and I have intentionally misdrawn kanji to evoke a baby's babble. Like the seasonal changes they follow, magazines should always offer an element of the unexpected to their readers. That has been my primary credo throughout my career. 3D image and "microfiche" on covers of Toshi-Jutaku, a journal of urban housing A Word of Thanks In 1970 I was typically designing five or six magazines at a time. By 1990, this number had risen to 12. As I've noted above, I could not have handled this much work -- in addition to designing books and posters -- without a lot of help. I assigned some magazines to different members of my staff, who managed both to meet our deadlines and to put their own creative stamp on my basic ideas. The following designers worked with me on the magazines introduced in this online exhibit: episteme: Suzuki Hitoshi Ginka: Sato Atsushi Uwasa no Shinso: Suzuki Hitoshi, Tanimura Akihiko, Akazaki Shoichi, Wang Haur-Ger, Sakano Koichi, Shimada Kaoru Nihon no Bigaku: Tanimura Akihiko, Sato Atsushi Shizen to Bunka: Akazaki Shoichi, Sato Atsushi I am grateful to the innovative editors of these magazines, who understood what I was trying to do and made my ideas a reality. Given the outlandish demands I frequently made of them, the patience of the skilled printers we relied on was especially remarkable and deserving of thanks. Magazine design is, of course, a team effort, a product of the imagination, wisdom and skill of many people. To those who have worked with me over the years to transform the commonplace medium of the magazine into something extraordinary -- a miscellany of the unexpected -- I extend my heartfelt gratitude. From impulse at bol.net.in Tue Oct 26 13:46:18 2004 From: impulse at bol.net.in (Kavita Joshi) Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 13:46:18 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Announcement: Films on Manipur, Gujarat: Message-ID: <002801c4bb53$19f6c960$22cb5ecb@kavita> SPIC MACAY * FILMS FOR FREEDOM present a package of films 26th October 2004 | 7:30 PM | IIT Delhi, Jwalamukhi Hostel, Common Room FINAL SOLUTION a film by Rakesh Sharma (149 min) A film on recent events in Gujarat, on Godhra and its aftermath, and on the politics of hate and violence. Winner of the Wolfgang Staudte Award, Berlin · Special Jury Award (Netpac), Berlin · Humanitarian Award, Hong Kong · Silver Dhow · NRI-SAHI Award USA 27th October 2004 | 7:30 PM | IIT Delhi, Jwalamukhi Hostel, Common Room ANTI AFSPA STRUGGLE: special screening Video clips from the ongoing Anti-AFSPA struggle in Manipur. (20 Min) SOME ROOTS GROW UPWARDS a film by Kavita Joshi & Malati Rao (52 min) Shot in Manipur, this film examines the work, life and times of theatre director Ratan Thiyam against the backdrop of a violence-torn state. Winner of the Best Film (adults) Award · Technical Excellence Award (sound) · Citation for Film on the Arts: at the UGC-CEC Video Awards 2002 ENTRY IS FREE & OPEN TO ALL *** -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041026/b5fdc054/attachment.html From isast at leonardo.info Tue Oct 26 05:48:42 2004 From: isast at leonardo.info (Leonardo/ISAST) Date: Mon, 25 Oct 2004 17:18:42 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Leonardo/ISAST gives New Horizons Award for Innovation to Critical Art Ensemble Message-ID: <200410260018.COL00702@ms2.netsolmail.com> For immediate release October 25, 2004 Contact: isast at leonardo.info Leonardo/ISAST Announces: Leonardo/ISAST gives New Horizons Award for Innovation to Critical Art Ensemble The Leonardo/International Society for the Arts, Sciences and Technology Governing Board (Leonardo/ISAST) is pleased to announce a special Leonardo New Horizons Award given to Critical Art Ensemble (CAE). CAE is internationally acclaimed for their artistic work in fields such as biotechnology, robotics and tactical media. Their performances and installations have reached viewers around the world and have broken new ground in the often controversial area of new technologies. The Leonardo/ISAST Governing Board voted to give CAE this special award to affirm the principle that artists should engage emerging technologies and be willing to take critical stances that may be at odds with those of the mainstream. Freedom of artistic expression and research form a part of the foundation of an open society. For more information on Critical Art Ensemble, please visit http://www.critical-art.net. Leonardo/ISAST recognizes the challenges that artists face as they strive for exposure and recognition. These challenges are amplified for artists working with new media and new techniques---especially for those artists who are pushing the boundaries of the integration of art and technology. The Leonardo New Horizons Award for Innovation was initiated to recognize new and emerging artists for innovation in new media. Evelyn Edelson-Rosenberg, Jean-Marc Philippe, Jaroslav Belik, Peter Callas, Patrick Boyd, Christian Schiess, I Wayan Sadra, Kitsou Dubois, Gregory Barsamian, Graham Harwood and Ewen Chardronett have received this award. More information on previous Leonardo New Horizons Award winners can be found at: http://leonardo.info/isast/awards.html. For over 35 years, Leonardo/ISAST has served 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. Leonardo/ISAST activities include publication of the art, science and technology journal Leonardo; Leonardo Music Journal; the Leonardo Book Series; the electronic journal, Leonardo Electronic Almanac; and our World Wide Web Site, Leonardo On-Line (all published by The MIT Press). More information about Leonardo/ISAST membership and activities can be found online at: http://www.leonardo.info. _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From iyer_renu at rediffmail.com Mon Oct 25 18:05:29 2004 From: iyer_renu at rediffmail.com (renu swaminathan iyer) Date: 25 Oct 2004 12:35:29 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] spam? who, me? Message-ID: <20041025123529.29739.qmail@webmail30.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041025/3480a0ff/attachment.html -------------- next part --------------  ofcourse! who else!? On Mon, 25 Oct 2004 Shivam wrote : >dear all >have been very embarassed lately about being identified as The guy Who >Posts a Lot on the Sarai List. >Am I a spammer? >cheers | shivam >_________________________________________ >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: From kristoferpaetau at WEB.DE Tue Oct 26 18:17:14 2004 From: kristoferpaetau at WEB.DE (Kristofer Paetau) Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 14:47:14 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] Open call to paticipate within "BoundLess" (museum) group exhibition Message-ID: <906659300@web.de> Dear Friends, Colleagues and Amateurs of contemporary art, Check out this open call for (free) participation in the project of Jan Christensen, within the "BoundLess" group exhibition in Stenersenmuseet, Oslo, Norway, curated by Henry Meyric Hughes. I think it's a very good project in that kind of an institutional context. Please send your material / questions directly to: jan_b_christensen at yahoo.com For informations about my Artinfo-l mailing list and how to unsubscribe, please have a look at the end of this mail. Best wishes, Kristofer Paetau ------------------------------- This is an open call for contributing material to a project intended for a group show in Stenersenmuseet, Oslo, Norway, curated by Henry Meyric Hughes. The show is scheduled to open in February, 2005. I have been invited as a participating artist for the show "BoundLess", which has a theme based on the idea of artists travelling, creating networks of affiliated people and the notion that creativity is relative and subject to your meetings and subsequent inspirations. I would like to open this up further by inviting ANYBODY to submit material such as text or images - or both - which will fit on a sheet of A4 in black and white. It could be a text, an article, a drawing, a note, a photograph or whatever. Your material will be included in the show as a reproduction, without any restrictions or censorship, and I will furthermore make an effort to reproduce selected images and illustrations (blown up as posters or painted up as some sort of background decoration), as a backdrop to the show. I will even try to execute any instructions you supply, to the best of my ability. There is no limit to the number of pieces you submit, but please note that each work of art should be limited to a single sheet of paper. Please forward this email to ANYBODY you might think would find it interesting. You may credit this show as a group show, in which you participate by your involvement in this installation, though I can not guarantee that details regarding each participant will be included for additional printed matter, apart from what I will myself produce, as part of the show, which will be some sort of printed document consisting of all contributions, including credits (names only,) and, hopefully, a poster. The complete document will then be available for download as a PDF from my homepage ( http://www.janchristensen.org ). I will respond personally to every contributor with detailed information regarding the exhibition. Please note that there will not be any fees or reimbursements included for participants to this project. Please be aware that copyrights will not be respected. Popular culture is founded on appropriation. Please send ANY ideas, texts and material to me by email as soon as possible and no later than 31 December, 2004. email: jan_b_christensen at yahoo.com Format: DIN A4 Black and White File formats: RTF (Rich Text Format), PDF and JPEG. Dpi: 72-300 dpi Fonts: If you are using uncommon fonts for RTF and PDF documents, please include the fonts (PC) with the attachment, or simply produce the text as a 300 dpi JPEG file. I hope you find this interesting and I hope to see your contribution. Thank you in advance and sincerely yours, Jan Christensen. *** This is not spam. Please excuse any cross-mailing. *** ------------------------------- Artinfo-l is an independent, non-commercial artistic media and a communication network. The aim is to provide You with interesting visual and intellectual material in the field of contemporary art. Substantial research related to contemporary art should be made accessible and wide-spread; this is why I constantly enlarge the Artinfo-l list, in order to include more potential Amateurs of contemporary art. I apologize for cross&multiple-postings and you can of course unsubscribe: To unsubscribe automatically, please send an empty e-mail from your e-mail account to: ARTINFO-L-unsubscribe-request at listserv.dfn.de If this doesn't work, please reply to this mail and write UNSUBSCRIBE in the mail subject and please include any old & alternative e-mail addresses in the mail. You probably got this mail re-routed from another e-mail account and I need to find out from which account it was, in order to unsubscribe you. Thank you, Kristofer Paetau ------------------------------- ________________________________________________________________ Verschicken Sie romantische, coole und witzige Bilder per SMS! Jetzt neu bei WEB.DE FreeMail: http://freemail.web.de/?mc=021193 From shivamvij at gmail.com Mon Oct 25 14:42:26 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Mon, 25 Oct 2004 14:42:26 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] 'Jail is Like College' Message-ID: Any comments? shivam Burail Jail is Like College By Times News Network in Chandigarh The Times of India | 25 October 2004 http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/897873.cms If you think jails and colleges do not have anything in common, you are way off the mark. Burail Jail is bridging the gap between the two in its own unique way. Like the fear of ragging haunts new students, for inmates of Burail Jail, it is a test which is impossible to clear. Raja (name changed), arrested in a criminal case, gave one such exam a few days ago. A coin was fixed on his forehead by another inmates and he was told to drop it on the floor without touching it. Raja managed easily. But this was just the beginning. Now, he was told to place his hands behind his back. He had to repeat the act, only this time the coin was cleverly handed over to another inmate behind him. Thinking that the coin was still stuck on his forehead, Raja kept on trying. After enjoying the scene, his tormentors announced his punishment: to clean the barrack or bring five pouches of milk from the canteen. This is the latest style of ragging attaining popularity among the jail inmates nowadays. Surprisingly, instead of putting an end to the practice, jail staff also enjoy the ragging, say reliable sources. "A few months ago we had raised the issue with the authorities, but nothing has come out of it," says human rights advocate Arvind Thakur. "Alleged Pakistani spy Aabid Mahmood, murder case accused Mahant Jaidev Giri, smuggling case accused Aashish Arora, and Balwan Singh, an accused in an attempt to kidnapping case, also faced ragging many a times," claims Thakur. Balwan, a resident of Himachal Pradesh, had to face the ignominy of being called a 'pahadi machar'. Mostly, undertrials, arrested for petty crimes, get a taste of such ragging. The fear of their 'seniors' holds them back from making any complaints. Official sources say that there are provisions to stop ragging and they keep a close watch on the activities of the inmates. However, acting jail superintendent Naresh Narwal denies that any such practice exists in the jail. "We have no knowledge of ragging in the jail," he claims. From sunil at apdip.net Tue Oct 26 05:43:05 2004 From: sunil at apdip.net (Sunil Abraham) Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 00:13:05 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Fight for your right to share! Message-ID: <1098749585.643.287.camel@box> The WIRED CD: Rip. Sample. Mash. Share. http://creativecommons.org/wired/ Beastie Boys / Now Get Busy David Byrne / My Fair Lady Zap Mama / Wadidyusay? My Morning Jacket / One Big Holiday Spoon / Revenge! Gilberto Gil / Oslodum Dan the Automator / Relaxation Spa Treatment Thievery Corporation / DC 3000 Le Tigre / Fake French Paul Westerberg / Looking Up in Heaven Chuck D with Fine Arts Militia / No Meaning No The Rapture / Sister Saviour (Blackstrobe Remix) Cornelius / Wataridori 2 Danger Mouse & Jemini / What U Sittin' On? (starring Cee Lo and Tha Alkaholiks) DJ Dolores / Oslodum 2004 (includes (cc) sample of "Oslodum" by Gilberto Gil) Matmos / Action at a Distance -- Sunil Abraham sunil at apdip.net http://www.iosn.net Manager - International Open Source Network UNDP Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme Wisma UN, Block C Kompleks Pejabat Damansara. Jalan Dungun, Damansara Heights. 50490 Kuala Lumpur. P. O. Box 12544, 50782, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Tel: (60) 3-2091-5167, Fax: (60) 3-2095-2087 Mob: (60) 1-6311-1330 From shivamvij at gmail.com Wed Oct 27 15:10:40 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 15:10:40 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] 'There is no case for torture, ever' Message-ID: There is no case for torture, ever English law has long recognised that extracting information by threats and brutality is barbaric. Moreover, such evidence is unreliable Nick Cohen Sunday October 24, 2004 The Observer Extract: If the Law Lords doubt the wisdom of centuries and are considering upholding the Court of Appeal's verdict, may I suggest a small experiment? If they give me a law officer, the Lord Chancellor perhaps, or the Director of Public Prosecutions, and a couple of heavies, and leave us alone in a locked room, I think I can guarantee that within a week he will have revealed that the entire senior judiciary are members of al-Qaeda. see:http://observer.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,6903,1334783,00.html From matml at gmx.it Wed Oct 27 18:29:52 2004 From: matml at gmx.it (Matteo Pasquinelli) Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 14:59:52 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] Warporn Warpunk! Autonomous videopoiesis in wartime Message-ID: <17D0CA26-2818-11D9-BA2C-000A95A4DB38@gmx.it> Edited by Arianna Bove and Erik Empson. Web, Pdf, italian and spanish translation here: www.rekombinant.org/article.php?sid=2364 --- Matteo Pasquinelli WARPORN WARPUNK! Autonomous videopoiesis in wartime Grinning monkeys How do you think you can stop war without weapons? The anti-war public opinion that fills squares worldwide and the cosmetic democracy of International Courts stand powerless in front of the raging US military. Against the animal instincts of a superpower reason cannot prevail: a homicidal force can be arrested only by another, stronger force. Everyday we witness such a Darwinian show: history repeating itself through a cruel confrontation of forces, whilst what rests is freedom of speech exercised in drawing-rooms. Pacifists too are accomplices of instinctive forces, because animal aggressiveness is inside us all. How do we express that bestiality for which we condemn armies? Underneath the surface of the self-censorship belonging to the radical left (not only to the conformist majority), it should be admitted publicly that watching Abu Ghraib pictures of pornographic tortures does not scandalize us, on the contrary, it rather excites us, in exactly the same way as the obsessive voyeurism that draws us to videos of 9/11 videos. Through such images we feel the expression of repressed instincts, the pleasure rising again after narcotized by consumerism, technologies, goods and images. We show our teeth as monkeys do, when their aggressive grin looks dreadfully like the human smile. Contemporary thinkers like Baudrillard and Zizek acknowledge the dark side inside Western culture. If 9/11 has been a shock for Western consciousness, Baudrillard puts forward a more shocking thesis: we westerners were to desire 9/11, as the death drive of a superpower that having reached its natural limits, knows and desires nothing more than self-destruction and war. The indignation is hypocrisy; there is always an animal talking behind a video screen. On the videowar battleground Before pulling the monkey out of the TV set, we have to focus on the battleground on which the media match is played. The more reality is an augmentation of mass, personal, and networked devices, the more wars become media wars, even if they take place in a desert. The First Global War started by live-broadcasting the 9/11 air disaster and continued with video-guerrilla episodes: everyday from the Iraqi front we received videos shot by invaders, militiamen, and journalists. Every action in such a media war is designed beforehand to fit its spectacular consequences. Terrorists have learnt all the rules of spectacular conflict while imperial propaganda, much more expert, has no qualms about playing with fakes and hoaxes (for instance the dossiers on weapons of mass destruction). Bureaucratic propaganda wars are a thing of the past. New media has generated guerrilla combat, opening up a molecular front of bottom-up resistance. Video cameras among civilians, weblogs updated by independent journalists, smart-phones used by American soldiers in the Abu Ghraib prison: each represents an uncontrollable variable that can subvert the propaganda apparatus. Video imagery produced by television is now interlaced with the anarchic self-organized infrastructure of digital networked media that has become a formidable means of distribution (evidenced by the capillary diffusion of the video of the beheading of Nick Berg). Today's propaganda is used to manage a connective imagery rather than a collective spectacle, and the intelligence services set up simulacra of the truth based on networking technologies. The videoclash of civilizations Alongside the techno-conflict between horizontal and vertical media, two secular cultures of image face each other on the international mediascape. The United States embodies the last stage of videocracy, an oligarchic technocracy based on hypertrophic advertising and infotainment, and the colonization of the worldwide imagery through Hollywood and CNN. Nineteenth century ideologies such as Nazism and Stalinism were intimately linked to the fetishism of the idea-image (as all of western thought is heir to Platonic idealism). Islamic culture on the contrary is traditionally iconoclast: it is forbidden to represent images of God and the Prophet, and usually of any living creature whatsoever. Only Allah is Al Mussawir, he who gives rise to forms: imitating his gesture of creation is a sin (even if such a precept never appears in the Koran). Islam, unlike Christianity, has no sacred iconographic centre. In mosques the Kiblah is an empty niche. Its power comes not from the refusal of the image but from the refusal of its centralizing role, developing in this way a material, anti-spectacular, and horizontal cult. Indeed, on Doomsday, painters are meant to suffer more than other sinners. Even if modernization proceeds through television and cinema (that paradoxically did not have the same treatment of painting), iconoclastic ground remains active and breaks out against western symbols, as happened in the case of the World Trade Centre. To strike at western idolatry, pseudo-Islamic terrorism becomes videoclasm, preparing attacks designed for live broadcasting and using satellite channels as a resonant means for its propaganda. Al-Jazeera broadcasts images of shot-dead Iraqi civilians, whilst western mass media removes these bodies in favour of the military show. An asymmetrical imagery is developing between East and West, and it will be followed by an asymmetrical rage, that will break out with backlashes for generations to come. In such a clash between videocracy and videoclasm, a third actor, the global movement, tries to open a breach and develop therein an autonomous videopoiesis. The making of an alternative imagery is not only based on self-organizing independent media, but also on winning back the dimension of myth and the body. Videopoiesis should speak - at the same time - to the belly and to the brain of the monkeys. Global video-brain Western media and awareness was woken up by the physical force of live-broadcasted images not by the news of tortures at the Abu Ghraib prison or of Nick Berg's beheading. Television is the medium that taught the masses a Pavlovian reaction to images. It is also the medium that produced the globalisation of the collective mind (something more complex than the idea of public opinion). The feelings of the masses have been always reptilian: what media proliferation established is a video mutation of feelings, a becoming-video of the collective brain and of collective narration. The global video-brain functions through images whereas our brains think out of images. This is not about crafting a theory, but recognising the natural extension of our faculties. Electronic and economic developments move at too high a speed for the collective mind to have time to communicate and elaborate messages in speech, there is only time for reacting to visual stimuli. A collective imagery arises when a media infrastructure casts and repeats the same images in a million copies, producing a common space; a consensual hallucination around the same object (that afterwards becomes word-mouth or the movie industry). In the case of the TV medium such a serial communication of a million images is much more lethal, because it is instantaneous. On the other hand, the networked imagery works in an interactive and non-instantaneous way, this is why we call it connective imagery. Imagery is a collective serial broadcasting of the same image across different media. According to Goebbels, it is a lie repeated a million times that becomes public discourse, part of everyday conversations, and then accepted truth. Collective imagery is the place where media and desire meet each other, where the same repeated image modifies millions of bodies simultaneously and inscribes pleasure, hope and fear. Communication and desire, mediasphere and psychosphere, are the two axis that describe the war to the global mass, the way in which the war reaches our bodies far from the real conflict and the way image inscribes itself into the flesh. Animal narrations Why does reality exist only when framed by a powerful TV network? Why is the course of events affected by the evening news? Collective imagery is not affected by the video evolution of mass technologies only, but also by the natural instincts of human kind. As a political animal (Aristotle), the human being is inclined to set up collective narratives, that represent the belonging instinct to its own kind. Let's call them animal narratives. For this reason television is a "natural" medium, because it responds to the need of creating one narrative for millions of people, a single animal narrative for entire nations, similarly to what other narrative genres, like the epic, the myth, the Bible and the Koran, did and still do. Television represents, above all else, the ancestral feeling to belong to one Kind, that is the meta-organism we all belong to. Each geopolitical area has its own video macro-attractor (CNN, BBC, etc.), which the rest of the media relate to. Beside the macro-attractors, there are meta-attractors, featuring the role of critical consciousness against them, a function often held by press and web media (the Guardian, for instance). Of course the model is much more complex: the list could continue and end with blogs, which we can define as group micro-attractors, the smallest in scale, but suffice it to say here that the audience and power of the main attractor are ensured by the natural animal instinct. This definition of mass media might seem strange, because they are no longer push media that communicate in unidirectional ways (one-to-many), but pull media that attract and group together, media in which we invest our desires (many-to-one). Paraphrasing Reich's remark on fascism, we can say that rather than the masses being brainwashed by the media establishment, the latter is sustained and desired by the perversion of the desire to belong. Digital anarchy. A videophone vs. Empire Traditional media war incorporates the internet and the networked imagery (with television, internet, mobile phones and digital cameras) turns into a battle ground: personal media such as digital cameras bring the cruelty of war directly into the living room, for the first time in history at the speed of an internet download and out of any governmental control. This networked imagery cannot be stopped, and neither can technological evolution. Absolute transparency is an inevitable fate for all of us. The video phone era seriously undermines privacy, as well as any kind of secrecy, state secrecy included. Rumsfeld's vented outrage in front of US Senate Committee on Armed Services about the scandal at Abu Ghraib is extremely grotesque: "We're functioning... with peacetime constraints, with legal requirements, in a wartime situation, in the Information Age, where people are running around with digital cameras and taking these unbelievable photographs and then passing them off, against the law, to the media, to our surprise, when they had - they had not even arrived in the Pentagon". A few days later Rumsfeld prohibited the use of any kind of camera or videophone to the American soldiers in Iraq. Rumsfeld himself was the 'victim' of the internet broadcasting of a famous video that shows him politely shacking hands with Saddam Hussein in 1983. New digital media seem to have created an unpredictable digital anarchy, where a video phone can fight against Empire. The images of torture at Abu Ghraib are the internal nemesis of a civilization of machines that is running out of control of its creators and demiurges. There is a machine nemesis but also an image nemesis: as Baudrillard notes, the Empire of the Spectacle is now submitted to the hypertrophy of the Spectacle itself, to its own greed for images, to an auto-erotic pornography. The infinitely repeatable character of digital technology allowed for the demise of the copyright culture through P2P networks, but also for the proliferation of digital spam and the white noise of contents on the web. Video phones have created a networked mega-camera, a super-light panopticon, a horizontal Big Brother. The White House was trapped in this web. Digital repetition no longer delivers us to the game of mirrors of Postmodern weak thought - to the image as self-referential simulacrum - but rather to an interlinked universe where videopoiesis can connect the farthest points and cause fatal short circuits. War porn Indeed, what came to light with the Abu Ghraib media scandal was not a casual short-circuit, but the implosion into a deadly vortex of war, media, technology, body, desire. Philosophers, journalists and commentators from all sides rushed to deliver different perspectives for a new framework of analysis. The novelty of the images of Abu Ghraib and Nick Berg (whether fictional or not is not the point) consists in the fact that they forged a new narrative genre of collective imagery. For the first time, a snuff movie was projected onto the screen of global imagery and internet subcultures, used to such images, suddenly came out of the closet: rotten.com finally reached the masses. Rather than making sense of a traumatic experience, newspapers and weblogs worldwide are engaged in drawing out the political, cultural, social and aesthetic repercussions of a new genre of image that forces us to upgrade our immunity system and communicative strategies. As Seymour Hersh noted, Rumsfeld provided the world with an good excuse to ignore the Geneva Convention from now on. But he lowered the level of tolerance of the visible as well, forcing us to accept cohabitation with the Horror. English-speaking journalism defines as war porn the popular tabloids and government talk-shows fascination with super-sized weapons and well-polished uniforms, hi-tech tanks and infrared-guided bombs, a panoplia of images that some define as the aseptic substitute of pornography proper. Ridley Scott's Black Hawk Down is war hardcore, to name one. The cover of Time, where the American soldier was chosen as Person of the Year, was defined pure war porn by Adbusters: "Three American Soldiers standing proudly, half-smiles playing on their faces, rifles cradled in their arms". War porn is also a sub-genre of trash porn - still relatively unknown, coming from the dark side of the net. It simulates violent sex scenes between soldiers or the rape of civilians (pseudo-amateur movies usually shot in Eastern Europe and often passed as real). War porn is freed from its status of net subculture: its morbid interest and fetish for war imagery become political weapons, voyeurism and the nightmares of the masses. Is it a coincidence that war porn emerges from the Iraqi marshes right at this time? Digital-body rejection The metaphorical association of war with sex that underpins much Anglo-American journalism points to something deeper that was never before made so explicit: a libido that, alienated by wealth, awaits war to give free reign to its ancestral instincts. War is as old as the human species: natural aggressiveness is historically embodied in collective and institutional forms, but several layers of technology have separated today's war from its animal substratum. We needed Abu Ghraib pictures to bring to the surface the obscene background of animal energy that lied underneath a democratic make-up. Did this historic resurfacing of the repressed occur today simply because of the mass spreading of digital cameras and video phones? Or is there a deeper connection between the body and technology bound to prove to be deadly sooner or later? As the mass media are filled with tragic and morbid news, the framing of digital media seems to be missing something from its inception. This could be that passion of the real (Alain Badiou) which, exiled onto the screen, explodes out of control. New personal media are directly connected to the psychopathology of everyday living, we might say that they create a new format for it and a new genre of communication, but above all, they establish a relation with the body that television never had. War porn seems to signal the rejection of technology by subconscious forces that express themselves through the same medium that represses them: this rejection might point to the ongoing adaptation of the body to the digital. Proliferation of digital prosthesis is not as rational, aseptic and immaterial as it seems. Electronic media seemed to have introduced technological rationality and coolness into human relations, yet the shadows of the digital increasingly re-surface. There comes a point when technology physically unbridles its opposite. The internet is the best example: behind the surface of the immaterial and disembodied technology lies a traffic of porn content that takes up half of its daily band-width. At the same time, the Orwellian proliferation of video cameras, far from producing and Apollonian world of transparency, is ridden with violence, blood and sex. The next Endenmol Big Brother will resemble the movie Battle Royal, where Takeshi Kitano forces a class of students on an island and into a game of death where the winner is the last survivor. We have always considered the media as a prosthesis of human rationality, and technology as the new embodiment of the logos. But new media also embody the dark side of the Western world. In war porn we found this Siamese body made up of libido and media, desire and image. Two radical movements that are the same movement: war reinvests the alienated libido, personal media are filled by the desperate libido they alienated. The subconscious can not lie, the skeletons sooner or later start knocking on the closets door. Imagery reset War results from the inability to dream, after depleting all libidinal energy in an outflow of prosthesis, commodities, images. War violence forces us to believe again in images of everyday life, images of the body as well as images of advertising. War is an imagery reset. War brings the attention and excitement for advertising back to a zero degree, where advertising can start afresh. War saves advertising from the final annihilation of the orgasm, from the nirvana of consumption, the inflation and indifference of values. War brings the new economy back to the old economy, to traditional and consolidated commodities, it gets rid of immaterial commodities that risk dissolving the economy into a big potlatch and into the anti-economy of the gift that the internet represents. War has the "positive" effect of redelivering us to 'radical' thought, to the political responsibility of representation, against the interpretative flights of "weak thought", of semiotics and postmodernism (where postmodernism is the western image looking for an alibi to its own impotence). The pornographic images of war, as we said, are the reflux of the animal instinct that our economic and social structure has repressed. But rather than a psychoanalysis that reactively justifies new customs and fashions, we seek to carry out a 'physical' analysis of libidinal energy. In wartime we see images re-emerge with a new autonomous and autopoietic force. There are different kinds of image: war porn images are not representations, they speak directly to the body, they are a cruel, lucid and affirmative force, like Artaud's theatre, they are re-magnetised images that do not provoke incredulity, they are neural icons running on the spinal motorways, as Ballard would put it. Radical images redeliver the body to us, radical images are bodies, not simulacra. Their effect is first physical then cognitive. The movement-image and the flux-matter are rigorously one and the same thing (Deleuze). The damned tradition of the image is back, with the psychic and contagious power of Artaud's theatre, a machinic image that joins together the material and the immaterial, body and dream. Fiction is a branch of neurology (Ballard). In a libidinal explosion, war porn liberates the animal energies of Western society like a bomb. Such energies can be expressed through fascist reactions as well as liberating revolts. Radical images are images that are still capable of being political, in the strong sense of the word, and they can have an impact on the masses that is simultaneously political, aesthetic and carnal. Videopoiesis: the body-image How can we make an intelligent use of television? The first intelligent reaction is to switch it off. Activists collective such as Adbusters.org (Canada) and Esterni.org (Italy) organize yearly TV strikes, promoting a day or a week's abstinence from television. Can Western society think without television? It cannot. Even if we were to stop watching TV because of a worldwide black-out or a nuclear war, our imagery, hopes and fears would carry on thinking within a televised brainframe. This is not about addiction, the video is simply our primary collective language: once upon a time there were religion, mythology, epic and literature. We can repress the ritual (watching TV) but we cannot repress the myth. We can switch television off, but not our imagery. For this reason the idea of an autonomous videopoiesis is not about practicing of alternative information but about new mythical devices for the collective imagery. In its search for the Perfect Image - that is the image that is capable of stopping the War, subverting Empire and starting the Revolution - the global movement has theorised and practiced video activism (from Indymedia to street TVs) and mythopoiesis (from Luther Blissett to San Precario). However, it never tried to merge those strategies into a videopoiesis capable of challenging Bin Laden, Bush, Hollywood and the CNN at the level of myth, a videopoiesis for new icons and formats, like for instance the video sequences of William Gibson's Patter recognition distributed on the net. Videopoiesis does not mean the proliferation of cameras in the hands of activists, but the creation of video narratives, a new design of genres and formats rather than alternative information. The challenge lies in the body-image. Through videopoiesis we have to welcome the repressed desires of the global movement and open the question of the body, buried under a para-catholic and third-worldist rhetoric. While Western imagery is being filled with the dismembered bodies of heroes, the global movement is still uneasy about its desires. War porn is a challenge for the movement not to equal the horror but to produce images that awaken and target the sleepy body. Throughout its history, television has always produced macro-bodies, mythical giant bodies magnified by media power, bodies as cumbersome as Ancient Gods. The television regime creates monsters, hypertrophic bodies such as the image of the President of Unites States, the Al-Qaeda brand and movie stars, while the net and personal media try to dismember them and produce new bodies out of their carcasses. Videopoiesis must eliminate the unconscious self-censorship that we find in the most liberal and radical sections of society, the self-censorship that, behind a crypto-catholic imagery, hides the grin of the monkey. Once crypto-religious self-censorship is eliminated, videopoiesis can begin its creative reassembly of dismembered bodies. Warpunk. I like to watch! Watching cruel images is good for you. What the Western world needs is to stare at its own shadows. In Ballard's The Atrocity Exhibition war news and violent scenes improve adults' sexual activity and the condition of psychotic children. War lords are filling the collective imagery with brute force. Why leave them to do it in peace? If in the real world we are always victims of the blackmail of non-violence, in the realm of imagery and imagination we can feed our wet dreams at last. If American imagery is allowing a drift towards Nazism and is offering an apology and justification for any kind of violence, our response can only be an apology of resistance and action, that is warpunk. Warpunk is not a delirious subculture that embraces weapons in an aesthetic gesture. On the contrary it uses radical images as weapons of legitimate defense. To paraphrase a Japanese saying, warpunk steals from war and empire the art of embellishing death. Warpunk uses warporn in a tragic way, to overcome Western culture and the self-censorship of its counter-culture. Above all we are afraid of the hubris of the American war lords, of the way they face any obstacle stepping over all written and unwritten rules. What is the point of confronting this threat with the imagery of the victim, that holds up to the sky hands painted in white? Victimhood is a bad adviser: it is the definitive validation of Nazism, the sheep's baa that makes the wolf even more indifferent. The global movement is quite a good example of "weak thought" and reactive culture. Perhaps this is because, unlike war lords and terrorists, it never developed a way of thinking about the tragic, war, violence and death. A tragic thought is the gaze that can dance on any image of the abyss. In Chris Korda's I like to watch video (download available on www.churchofeuthanasia.org) porn scenes of oral sex and masturbation are mixed with those of football and baseball matches and with well-known NY911 images. The phallic imagery reaches the climax: the Pentagon is hit by an ejaculation, multiple erections are turned into the NY911 skyline, the Twin Towers themselves become the object of an architectural fellatio. This video is the projection of the lowest instincts of American society, of the common ground that bind spectacle, war, pornography and sport. It is an orgy of images that shows to the West its real background. Warpunk is a squadron of B52s throwing libidinal bombs and radical images into the heart of the Western imagery. Matteo Pasquinelli (matATrekombinant.org) Bologna, May 2004 From iram at sarai.net Wed Oct 27 18:56:20 2004 From: iram at sarai.net (iram at sarai.net) Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 15:26:20 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] spam? who, me? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Dear all, especially Shivam, The sarai reader list is `an open dicussion list' and I feel that since its inception, it has served as a lively platform for discussion and debate on a wide range of issues. I look forward to postings by my fellow list members and the unfortunate charges of being a `spammer' should not be a deterrent to any of us to write on the reader list. So, post away... cheers, iram On 2:30:06 pm 10/25/04 Shivam wrote: > dear all > have been very embarassed lately about being identified as The guy Who > Posts a Lot on the Sarai List. > Am I a spammer? > cheers | shivam > _________________________________________ > 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: /pipermail/reader-list/> > From Joe.Lockard at asu.edu Tue Oct 26 21:55:52 2004 From: Joe.Lockard at asu.edu (Joe Lockard) Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 09:25:52 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] CFP -- Bad Subjects -- Iraq War Culture Message-ID: <34DEEDF063C615459D0C2426BB187A1906DC16@ex1.asurite.ad.asu.edu> > Call for Reviews - Iraq War Culture > Bad Subjects > Issued: October 25, 2004 > Deadline: Open > > > Bad Subjects is issuing an open call for review essays of 1000-3000 words dealing with the cultural landscape created by the Iraq War. We are interested in essays that examine cultural products (art, film/video, photography, writing, music, theater, dance, software) or public-sphere phenomena (protests, political events, media coverage, educational projects, public reports, law) that respond to the war and its social environment. > > This review essay series will be especially concerned to address issues created by the ideologies of the American Empire and 'democratic imperialism'; permanent military mobilization and domestic security watches; diminution of civil liberties and human rights; religious triumphalism and its relations with state violence; and the deepening of economic inequalities and poverty under global capitalism. How are such issues reflected in Iraq War culture and challenged through cultural critique? The editors will be interested equally in essays that review resistant cultural or political responses to Iraq War culture. > > Bad Subjects is a heterodox progressive journal publishing on 'the politics of everyday life.' It currently serves approximately 5000 readers daily from the English Server at Iowa State University and is the oldest cultural studies publication on the Internet. The journal is located at . > > This is currently an open-deadline call. Submit review essays as Word attachments to Joe Lockard (English Department, Arizona State University) at Joe.Lockard at asu.edu . > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Joe Lockard > Assistant Professor > 209 Durham Languages and Literatures Bldg. > English Department > POB 870302 > Arizona State University > Tempe, AZ 85287-0302 > Tel: (480) 727-6096 > Fax: (480) 965-3451 > E-mail: Joe.Lockard at asu.edu > http://www.asu.edu/english/who/lockard.htm > > From jo at turbulence.org Tue Oct 26 23:04:58 2004 From: jo at turbulence.org (Jo-Anne Green) Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 10:34:58 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Turbulence Spotlight: "Thinking Machine 4" by Martin Wattenberg (with Marek Walczak) Message-ID: <417E8AC2.70106@turbulence.org> October 26, 2004 Turbulence Spotlight: "Thinking Machine 4" by Martin Wattenberg (with Marek Walczak) http://turbulence.org/spotlight/thinking "Thinking Machine 4" explores the invisible, elusive nature of thought. Play chess against a transparent intelligence, its evolving thought process visible on the board before you. The work consists of an artificial intelligence program--ready to play chess with the viewer. If the viewer takes up the challenge, the computer's thought process is sketched on screen as it plays. A map is created from the traces of literally thousands of possible futures as the program tries to decide its best move. Those traces become a key to the invisible lines of force in the game as well as a window into the spirit of a thinking machine. The pace of interaction is deliberative, unlike the rushed tempo of popular video games. Indeed the true subject of the piece is not games or chess, but contemplation and introspection. BIOGRAPHIES MARTIN WATTENBERG'S work centers on the theme of making the invisible visible. Past projects include "The Shape of Song" and "Apartment" (both Turbulence commissions), "Third Person," and the Whitney Artport's "Idea Line." Wattenberg is a researcher at IBM, where he creates new forms of data visualization. He is also known for the SmartMoney.com "Map of the Market." He holds a Ph.D. in mathematics from U.C. Berkeley. MAREK WALCZAK is an artist and architect who is interested in how people participate in physical and virtual spaces. This has led to projects such as "Apartment" (a Turbulence commission), shown at the Whitney Museum and many venues worldwide, and "Dialog Table," a commission of the Walker Art Center that replaces a keyboard and mouse with a shared interface based on gesture recognition technology. Current projects include a one block long façade at 7 World Trade Center that reacts to pedestrians walking beneath it (for James Carpenter Design) and interactive video installations such as "Third Person," recently shown at the ICA, London. Marek trained as an architect at the Architectural Assoc. in London and Cooper Union in New York. For more Turbulence Spotlights please visit http://turbulence.org/spotlight/index.html -- Jo-Anne Green, Associate Director New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc.: http://new-radio.org New York: 917.548.7780 . Boston: 617.522.3856 Turbulence: http://turbulence.org New American Radio: http://somewhere.org Networked_Performance Blog and Conference: http://turbulence.org/blog -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041026/47d5c737/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From audijit at yahoo.com Thu Oct 28 11:26:03 2004 From: audijit at yahoo.com (Arijit Paul) Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 22:56:03 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] khetro broadsheet02 article Message-ID: <20041028055603.79990.qmail@web52502.mail.yahoo.com> Dear friends, I have got of the khetro broadsheet02. This issue focuses on the ongoing debate about the changing shape of cinema and theatre with the intervention of newer technologies. It also carries articles on Bengali desktop on Linux platform, and the development of interactive identification keys for monitoring biodiversity. I think the articles will be of interest to many of you. So I am posting them for open reading and discussion. Arijit. FIRST POSTING: Editorial Capital is like water, it flows wherever it finds gap. Wherever it can sniff some growth it runs towards that. Thus the cities are. While the city encroaches on the rural landscape, pace of livelihood becomes unnerving and quick fix commodities gets doorstep identities; multitasking and multiplexes grab our everyday life. The intervention of digital technology in the field of cinema making as well as viewing - have set a new trend in our entertainment culture. Last few decades have seen considerable amount of closure of cinema halls. As a survival strategy Multiplexes are sprouting fast. Films are on offer, along with cafes, gift shops, video games parlours, music shops, fast food arcades - all under the same roof. Low budget cinema and films without stars are being produced almost specifically for multiplex audiences. High quality but inexpensive digital video cameras and digital editing have democratised filmmaking. Shooting on videotape and getting the final film on celluloid (the reverse telecine process) for projection in cinema halls, is now being implemented. New age High Definition (HD) technology has already entered the field. With available and cheap copying facilities, film viewing is more widespread now. In theatre, too, newer forms are constantly being tried out. Improved technical facilities and the introduction of newer technologies are influencing today's theatre makings. Laser and video projections on stage or even on performers bodies, or the incorporation of digital sound and signs are part of theatre language now. Apart from regular proscenium theatre, experimental, interpretative performances centering around events like a book release at a bookstore, exhibitions or live art at a gallery, or inside a caf� on a sultry evening, have enhanced the options for viewing various kind of 'theatres'. By using everyday living spaces and characters, theatre productions sometimes take a shape which one may call 'documentary theatre'. These activities have initiated a process which moves towards redefining the existing forms of theatre as well as its performance spaces. In Calcutta, an old theatre hall is going to reopen as a multiplex. It might be an indication that, like cinema, the theatre will also have to enter into a process of justifying its marketability as an entertainment product soon. It is quite a possibility that the multiplex phenomenon, is going to redefine several aspects of our urban living. In broadsheet 01 we have tried to draw the outline of our contemporary urban existence by examining and analysing city�s ecological dimensions and introducing different new media technologies and forms. This issue has focuses on certain topics - the ongoing debate on the changing shape of 'cinema' and 'theatre' in the context of the fast growth of multiplexes in Indian metros, the possibility of the Internet being used as a cheaper and widespread option for viewing full length films, the concept of open content / creative commons licenses for documentaries, the creation of localized desktops on free software platforms like Linux, and the development of interactive identification keys for monitoring biodiversity. By discussing these issues the broadsheet 02 also initiates an exploration of possibilities all these forming spaces and technologies throw up, especially in the context of India�s tradition of coexistence of various cultures both ancient and contemporary. *************** khetro, an open space for interaction, innovation, and implementation in the field of community culture, media, and ecology. --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041027/08dcb648/attachment.html From audijit at yahoo.com Thu Oct 28 11:33:10 2004 From: audijit at yahoo.com (Arijit Paul) Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 23:03:10 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] khetro broadsheet02 articles- Rekindling The Box Offices Message-ID: <20041028060310.60198.qmail@web52508.mail.yahoo.com> Dear friends, I have got of the khetro broadsheet02. This issue focuses on the ongoing debate about the changing shape of cinema and theatre with the intervention of newer technologies. It also carries articles on Bengali desktop on Linux platform, and the development of interactive identification keys for monitoring biodiversity. I think the articles will be of interest to many of you. So I am posting them for open reading and discussion. Arijit. SECOND POSTING: Rekindling The Box Offices Nilotpal Majumdar The last time I visited New Tarun for a night show was many years ago. I didn�t even remember the film. The unbearable stink and the quality of audience, its ecstatic allegiance towards the mystic world of moving images, the filthy noise of appreciation made me leave the show much before the last frame. It was an enigma of shafts of light on the burnt out screen, the suspected rapist being thrashed, the dance, the car chase and the anguish of futile love. I was married then and had opted to be a compulsive, overtly protective husband. It was raining and we had laboured to set out for an outing. But we left the auditorium when a drunken man threw up in the row ahead. Graciously, I would like to put it as �cultural shock�. New Tarun is a cinema hall in the northern fringe of Kolkata. It was then a highly charged center of great attraction for many of those city humbugs who now are in their mid-life crisis. The New Tarun had been the biggest influence in my post-childhood corruption. It made me believe that for a front stall ticket, either you have to fight or have to sneak in violating the norms of queues. No one could afford to be civilized and miss the show. I used to sell our old newspapers to raise funds for entry tickets. The thickly crowded lobby, the chanting ticket �blackers�, the hairclips and Afghan Snow and the police baton-charge on the vulnerable front stall counter - all had been part of the light of life in the magic fount of Lumiere marvel. The glass-covered display board was screaming with photo-mounts of matinee icons, exposed cleavages of celluloid seductresses, the swords, revolvers, firearms, the spinning frills of cabaret dancers, the spill of blood or severely butchered �baddie�. It was a beehive buzzing day and night. It had pushed me to seek solitude in the bathroom for an intensely delicate reason for hours between euphoria and sainthood. The theatre dared me to dream symptoms of Robin Wood. I signed up for membership of a bodybuilding club after watching Samson and Delilah and the same film inspired me to compose my first love letter, a yearning for eyelids and glowing nails. If I turned myself out to be a notorious �matribhakto�, the ominous suburban cinema hall had been the lone preacher. New Tarun provided all that I looked for in adolescent thrills. The theatre campus was actually a captive breeding ground for non-elitist activities of the economically marginalized. Foodstuff and tea-stalls, paan-cigarettewallas, the �luchi baudi� and the school dropouts � it was a space throbbing with anti-academic, anti-establishment guts. With the blackers, the dadas, clerks, bribe-seeking constables of the Calcutta Police, the teachers of geography and woodcraft, liquor barons and fishermen - the theatre campus was a happy world of people of all classes. In this pluralistic hierarchical order the boisterous ushers and the box-office men were on a high. New Tarun is now a haunted place with a wrecked neon sign hanging overhead. It has a lone paan shop, a super lotto agent opposite, hammy adverts of the next release of a film in the multiplex through a crackling Radio Mirchi bulletin. A few blackers and dadas have switched over to real estate or become Marxists. Some of them died during the turbulent seventies chasing the obligatory dream of a model classless society. But those powerful men of the past � the ushers, guards and the box office countermen bargain in limbo where the pull-down mechanism does not crank even once a day. It is a dilapidated assembly where all the ceiling fans are not powered and roof lights do not glow. A rusted jumbo can is a refuge for cockroaches, rats race around on the cracked floor. The margerine-yellow screen has turned almost copper. On a lone poster of a sex-education film the female protagonist�s skin is enveloped with opaque blue. They all wait, suspending disbelief, for the crowds to come. The ushers wait with their dim torches. The muted lobby yearns for the tramping of hurried feet. The commerce of illusion, however, does not bring people in. At the end of the third bell the ushers either cancel the show or together watch a particular reel for juicy content. How long will New Tarun remain as a non-functional theatre before it converts itself into a marriage-hall or a residential complex? One sunny day, a drizzle of postcards suddenly buffs our sky of hope. The prophecy is irreversible � we got to know another revolution called Digital, the age of total interactivity beyond cultural and emotional frontiers. The media artists discern the thrill of autonomy � the freedom of articulation from political, economic and distribution control. The digital revolution has, as saying goes, democratized visual expression all over the world and has reduced the dependence of a film artist on finite audience, skilled technicians, money power and mystery of bulky technology. Progressively, the horizon is opening up to the author from creation to screening for infinite viewers. It is possible for any one to evolve a visual vocabulary that interprets our time and space. We started enjoying the idea that our expressions would have a desirable interactivity and create a niche market for cultural products. The demon of the Hollywood narrative regime is suddenly taken aback. The age of independents has arrived and has reversed the grim protocol of storytellers� aesthetics � that is how the modern myth goes! The digital scope and hope indicate that the audiovisual industry is soon going to be the greatest enterprise in our times. Enter the management gurus, corporate support, institutional finance, erudite brand developers and marketing jargon. Now the audience of cinema is envisaged to be a gang of passionate shoppers with defined brand loyalties! How many New Taruns will be converted to malls with digital projection? The business of illusion is shifting its prospect base to multiplexes � essentially shopping malls of garments, jewellery, innerwear of international brands with burgers, beer pubs and massage parlours of freaky games. It implies that the future of cinema is seeking shelter in the glossy supermarkets! I am sure I won�t see �luchi baudi� any more. She does not have any relevance in this �multiplex� world. Her frying pan and gleaming oven during intermission of shows had been a viable initiative, I knew. The dream is soaring all over that neo-supermarkets� box offices would finance and support independent artists to create a viable, effective visual narrative. Does not it sound too surreal? Who are we are going to sell our freedom for � multiplex chain owners or corporate professionals? Or even to the super god of capital who does not have the perception of non-viability. The digital monolith would be nurturing a cultural revolution that we did not possibly dream up. The bubbles of multiplex and imaging for upmarket consumption equate disastrously the present state of affairs of New Tarun. Hope Tarkovsky won�t mind if Nostalgia is screened free for those who buy a pair of hotdogs. * Nilotpal Majumdar is a filmmaker presently heading the Editing Dept. in Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute, Calcutta. --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - Helps protect you from nasty viruses. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041027/79dc6a0e/attachment.html From audijit at yahoo.com Thu Oct 28 11:46:26 2004 From: audijit at yahoo.com (Arijit Paul) Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 23:16:26 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] khetro broadsheet02 articles- Rekindling The Box Offices Message-ID: <20041028061626.86504.qmail@web52502.mail.yahoo.com> Dear friends, I have got of the khetro broadsheet02. This issue focuses on the ongoing debate about the changing shape of cinema and theatre with the intervention of newer  technologies. It also carries articles on Bengali desktop on Linux platform, and the development of interactive identification keys for monitoring biodiversity. I think the articles will be of interest to many of you. So I am posting them for open reading and discussion. Arijit.      THIRD POSTING:  

Screen, Stage, and the Multiplex

Nilanjan Bhattacharya

 

 

Multiplexes are in and the cinema halls are not yet out though - but are facing a serious threat to their existence. It�s evident that this time the city of Calcutta is not against the turn. Three multiplexes with multiple film-screening options are already in existence and a few more are coming up soon. Cinema as an �art� might be facing the hardest challenge since it�s invention more than 100 years ago. The Challenge of being sold as a �product� along with many other products which do not have any relation with �art� per se. It is a reality that multiplexes have enhanced the choices of viewing, simply by keeping multiple film screening theatres in one arena. And other options for consumers - like fashion garments, fast food, footwear and accessories - have followed. Sometimes this could happen in reverse order. At least in these multiplex units the �film� and the �product� relationship is quite evident. People of the cities in India have now more options to choose from, about what they are going to do for the day, simply by standing inside a multiplex. And it seems like that they want to avail of this newfound autonomy.

 

Being the government body responsible for the city�s management, the Calcutta Municipal Corporation (CMC) - or in its new appellation, the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) - with their plans to develop shopping malls, plazas, amusement parks and many other things, had already entered the big booming construction industry in our neo-Kolkata. In tune with this, they have taken up a project, which comes up as a pioneering initiative in the Indian context - turning the Star Theatre into a theatre multiplex.

 

Star Theatre is a glorious name associated with Bengali culture, as it was a thriving centre for commercial theatre since 1883. It also reminds us of a number of legendary theatre stalwarts like Girish Ghosh, Binodini Dasi, Amarendra Dutta, Ardhendusekhar, Prabha Devi, Sishir Bhaduri and many others down the ages. The Star was first inaugurated on 21st July 1883 at Beadon Street in North Calcutta. It closed down in the year 1887. The theatre came up again on 25th May 1888 at 75/3, Cornwallis Street, Calcutta, under different ownership and it remained open till 14th October 1991, the day it was devastated by a fire. KMC had acquired the site in 2001. The multiplex will be inaugurated on 13th October 2004 on the auspicious day of Mahalaya.

 

The history of Bengal�s proscenium theatre dates back more than 200 years. Even before the formalization of proscenium commercial theatre in Bengal, the theatre or �play� used to be considered as a �product� for entertaining the viewers. Performances of plays at rich people�s courtyards in earlier days, or later, the use of words like bhalo samogry (good product), notun notun jinish (new things), on the top of the advertisement handbills to mention the production itself, supports this orientation. The idea of making �the product� or the play more interesting to draw more viewers had influenced the directors, playwrights, and the producers of Bengali theatre. The regular practice of putting independent song and group dance items in between plays, or in the beginning, or at the end, were meant to add the variety and to increase the level of entertainment for the viewers.

 

This trend increased with Amarendra Nath Dutta, who brought realism to the Bengal stage by introducing more realistic sets, backdrops, and live properties for the first time, during his period (1897-1916) of work as a director, actor, playwright, and producer. Amarendra Dutta with his Classic Theatre group brought in basic changes in marketing strategy too. By improving the paper quality, design and printing, of the advertisements on handbills, introducing catchy, colloquial and slightly subversive language in handbills and newspaper advertisement columns, printing programmes on hand fans which were to be distributed among the viewers, Amaraendranath used to goad sustained debates and enthusiasm with each of his plays, in a way similar to the marketing of a �product� nowadays.

 

Much before Amrendra Dutta came onto the scene, the Great National Theatre (1873-1877) had introduced the concept of the �free gift� for the viewers. This practice continued for some time. Emerald Theatre (1887-1897) distributed earrings and rings among the viewers, the National Theatre used to distribute free gifts by lottery as the show tickets used to carry numbers for the draw. Ranging from umbrellas, or a bag of coal, to even a slice of pumpkin, the gift items were exhibited in front of the footlights! Amarendra Dutta�s Classic Theatre had distributed books, like the complete works of the Bengali poet and playwright Michael Madhusudan Dutta and Sabdakalpodrum, as free gifts.

 

All these acts and strategies had positive effects temporarily on ticket sales. It is also evident that the strategy of distributing free gifts on a purchased show ticket had reflected the act of tagging two or more �products� together even in those days. We can also see the same trend in performances by foreign theatre companies here in Calcutta. Much later, an advertisement on 23rd Ddecember1936 in The Statesman, carried an announcement of a free gift - a Hillman �MINX� car - to the lucky winner on the last day of the performance of the Hollywood musical, �Swing Time� at the New Empire.

 

From today�s point of view a very strange thing took place in the entertainment scene in Calcutta more than 100 years ago. Again, Amarendranath Dutta was the man behind it. He had introduced the screening of the bioscope on the Bengali stage for the first time before the beginning of his play, �Alibaba�, on 4th April 1898 at Classic Theatre. (According to Shankar Bhattacharya�s Bangla Rangalayey Itihasher Upadan, the first time the bioscope was screened on stage in Calcutta was at the Minerva Theatre on 31st January 1898.)

 

Within a year of its invention, the bioscope was screened for the first time in India in a Bombay hotel on 7th July 1896. Screenings of small length �moving pictures� began in Calcutta in the same year. Those were the early days of �cinema� and the cinema hadn�t really found its definition yet. Before the bioscope came people around the world never had the experience of seeing such a �technology miracle� in front of their eyes. No wonder that the advertisements of the Bioscope used to carry such phrases like, �the eighth wonder of the universe�. The surprise value was very high at that time which had attracted people to this newborn �media�. And like a senior, a big brother, Bengali theatre had tried to adopt that child into his own family, to bring it under his roof.

 

To the theatre directors and producers of the time, the bioscope was a new �product�, which they found could go very well with the theatre performances to increase a production�s commercial draw. A list of productions of the Star Theatre from Shankar Bhattacharya�s Bangla Rangalayey Itihasher Upadan, shows that all the evenings of the theatre performances between 2nd November 1898 to 31st December �98 were accompanied by bioscope screenings at the end of the play. A typical evening�s programme, like, for instance, that on 29th October �98 included a bioscope show at the end of the play Babu. The screen showed the death of Lord Nelson, Queen Victoria�s Diamond Jubilee celebrations and the funeral procession of William Gladstone. The screenings were followed by live entertainment - The Rainbow Dance by Miss Nelly Mountcastle. It�s also very significant that within the above mention period, out of 26 days of performances there were 11 different plays performed. This statistic shows the conscious efforts by the producers, directors and the playwrights to attract more viewers by offering variety. Almost everything was attempted � mythology, comedy, social tragedy, even patriotism.

 

On the other hand, to an enthusiastic director like Amarendranath, who had always believed in experimenting with different aspects of theatre, the bioscope had come up with a whole lot of possibilities of experimenting within the structure of the play itself. An announcement of the Classic Theatre in 1901 narrates: A series of superfine pictures from our world renowned plays Vramar, Alibaba, Hariraj, Dolo Lila, Budha, Sitaram, Sarala etc. will be produced to extreme astonishment of our patrons and friends.                                                                                                                                                                          &nb sp;                   

With the help of Amarendranath, Hiralal Sen�s Royal Bioscope Company picturised some small scenes from the various plays of Amarendranath. Amarendranath had used those scenes in between his plays. Like in the play Bhromor, an outdoor scene showed the hero, Gobindalal (Amarendranath) approaching land from the river. He was on a boat. As soon as the picture ended, viewers could see Gobindalal entering the house on the stage! It was true that Amarendranath had used that technique primarily to thrill his viewers but consciously or unconsciously he had actually improvised and adopted a style, which later on became an accepted mode for many modern theatre directors.

 

In this context it�s quite interesting to observe the early attempts to bring in the sense of multiplicity by offering variations like putting bioscope scenes in the middle of theatre shows, or performing a different play each day. Other attractive elements like, magic shows and dance performances, either before or after the main play, were also thought up to boost the same sense of multiplicity itself. So one may say that an undefined structure for providing variety to the clientele/audience was very much in existence in those days. Though there was no concept of multiple stages or screens then, like today�s multiplexes offer, the provision of multiple choices to the viewers (seven different plays in a week), the implementation of aggressive marketing strategies (free gifts, media hype, catchy advertisements) or the adoption of modern techniques and technologies, were efforts to boost the �trade�. In a way, the early theatre industry of Bengal had created an ambience quite similar to the present day multiplex. 

 

Now, when the entertainment industry is at another point of transition, two of our most powerful media art forms are taking a turn towards a new definition of �art entertainment�. Probably, with this strange twirl of the �history� or the �market�, the infrastructures of both the theatre and the cinema industries are going to look almost the same. It seems that they both are destined to be sold, catered and distributed as �products� along with so many similar or different kinds of products available in the market. But at the same time we cannot deny the fact that cinema and theatre stand apart from other �products� simply by their power to mesmerize people. Both could also provide the viewers food for thought, which may make them feel empowered. These are the qualities, which still hold the position of these art-entertainment forms quite high in society.

 

The closing down of more than 15 cinema halls within the main city of Calcutta, in a span of five years, and the obliteration of Bengali commercial theatre, have signalled a kind of transition. Apparently it seems that the youth of Calcutta have embraced their newfound conviction in �multiplexism�. Already 3 multiplexes with multiple cinema screening facilities have come up in the city, and another four (which all together will have 24 screening theatres) will come into existence soon. The Star multiplex will have one theatre stage, one seminar hall and one open stage � all centrally air-conditioned. The Mayor�s commitment goes, �the chairs in the Star theatre hall will be same as �Inox� screening theatre�. The similarity does not end there. Inside the Star Multiplex there would be a caf�fast food stalls and gift shops. There would surely be free gifts, competitions, prizes and pizzas�

 

With the digital revolution, new ideas have started flooding in followed by the newer technologies both in the fields of cinema and theatre. New demands for widening the creative interactions, exchange, and forms, have come up. Now it is important to observe how much space or scope the multiplexes provide for the new kind of films or theatres. Or, indeed, how the new generation of filmmakers or theatre directors can take advantage of these multiplexes. 

 

 

References:  Bangla Shitya O Chalochchitra by Dr. Nisith Kr. Mukhopadhay/ Bangla Rangaloyer Itihasher Upadan by Shankarlal Bhattacharya/ Bangali Modhyobitter Theatre by Dr. Prosun Mukhopadhay/ Rangalayey Amarendranath by Ramapati Dutta/ Rangalayey Trish Bwatsar by Apareshchandra Mukhopadhay/ Natyochinta 20th anniversary issue

 

* Nilanjan Bhattacharya is a researcher and filmmaker, based in Calcutta.

__________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From vivek at sarai.net Thu Oct 28 12:51:12 2004 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 12:51:12 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] more leaks Message-ID: <41809DE8.6000600@sarai.net> While we continue to process the question of leaks and the differential ways in which understandings of the Abu Ghraib images have splintered, here, compiled and annotated by Sekhar Ramakrishnan to the foil list, are more leaks and more images, more food for thought. V. -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [foil] US lawless in Gitmo, CIA's ghost prisoners Date: Mon, 25 Oct 2004 03:39:15 -0400 From: Sekhar Ramakrishnan Reply-To: rr6 at columbia.edu Organization: Columbia University To: foil-l at insaf.net http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/mmedia/nation/052104-1v.htm has link to a video showing torture at Abu Ghraib. The Post says: Videos Amplify Picture of Violence Friday, May. 21, 2004; 7:00 AM Editor's Note: Images in this video may be disturbing because of their violent or graphic nature. The edited video excerpt is from a collection of short digital video files obtained by The Washington Post. The videos appear to show U.S. soldiers abusing detainees last fall in Abu Ghraib prison. In this video, soldiers are shown apparently attempting to arrange a human pyramid with naked Iraqi prisoners -- a scene similar to those also shown in previously obtained photographs. The video, which was originally recorded sideways, has been edited to display vertically here and certain body parts have been obscured. The brightness of the video, which appeared to have been recorded in low light, was increased as well. Washington Post Sunday, October 24, 2004 Memo Lets CIA Take Detainees Out of Iraq Practice Is Called Serious Breach of Geneva Conventions By Dana Priest At the request of the CIA, the Justice Department drafted a confidential memo that authorizes the agency to transfer detainees out of Iraq for interrogation -- a practice that international legal specialists say contravenes the Geneva Conventions. One intelligence official familiar with the operation said the CIA has used the March draft memo as legal support for secretly transporting as many as a dozen detainees out of Iraq in the last six months. The agency has concealed the detainees from the International Committee of the Red Cross and other authorities, the official said. The draft opinion, written by the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel and dated March 19, 2004, refers to both Iraqi citizens and foreigners in Iraq, who the memo says are protected by the treaty. It permits the CIA to take Iraqis out of the country to be interrogated for a "brief but not indefinite period." It also says the CIA can permanently remove persons deemed to be "illegal aliens" under "local immigration law." Some specialists in international law say the opinion amounts to a reinterpretation of one of the most basic rights of Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which protects civilians during wartime and occupation, including insurgents who were not part of Iraq's military. The treaty prohibits the "[i]ndividual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory . . . regardless of their motive." The 1949 treaty notes that a violation of this particular provision constitutes a "grave breach" of the accord, and thus a "war crime" under U.S. federal law, according to a footnote in the Justice Department draft. "For these reasons," the footnote reads, "we recommend that any contemplated relocations of 'protected persons' from Iraq to facilitate interrogation be carefully evaluated for compliance with Article 49 on a case by case basis." It says that even persons removed from Iraq retain the treaty's protections, which would include humane treatment and access to international monitors. During the war in Afghanistan, the administration ruled that al Qaeda fighters were not considered "protected persons" under the convention. Many of them were transferred out of the country to the naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and elsewhere for interrogations. By contrast, the U.S. government deems former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party and military, as well as insurgents and other civilians in Iraq, to be protected by the Geneva Conventions. International law experts contacted for this article described the legal reasoning contained in the Justice Department memo as unconventional and disturbing. "The overall thrust of the Convention is to keep from moving people out of the country and out of the protection of the Convention," said former senior military attorney Scott Silliman, executive director of Duke University's Center on Law, Ethics and National Security. "The memorandum seeks to create a legal regime justifying conduct that the international community clearly considers in violation of international law and the Convention." Silliman reviewed the document at The Post's request. The CIA, Justice Department and the author of the draft opinion, Jack L. Goldsmith, former director of the Office of Legal Counsel, declined to comment for this article. CIA officials have not disclosed the identities or locations of its Iraq detainees to congressional oversight committees, the Defense Department or CIA investigators who are reviewing detention policy, according to two informed U.S. government officials and a confidential e-mail on the subject shown to The Washington Post. White House officials disputed the notion that Goldsmith's interpretation of the treaty was unusual, although they did not explain why. "The Geneva Conventions are applicable to the conflict in Iraq, and our policy is to comply with the Geneva Conventions," White House spokesman Sean McCormick said. The Office of Legal Counsel also wrote the Aug. 1, 2002, memo on torture that advised the CIA and White House that torturing al Qaeda terrorists in captivity abroad "may be justified," and that international laws against torture "may be unconstitutional if applied to interrogations" conducted in the war on terrorism. President Bush's aides repudiated that memo once it became public this June. The Office of Legal Counsel writes legal opinions considered binding on federal agencies and departments. The March 19 document obtained by The Post is stamped "draft" and was not finalized, said one U.S. official involved in the legal deliberations. However, the memo was sent to the general counsels at the National Security Council, the CIA and the departments of State and Defense. "The memo was a green light," an intelligence official said. "The CIA used the memo to remove other people from Iraq." Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the CIA has used broad authority granted in a series of legal opinions and guidance from the Office of Legal Counsel and its own general counsel's office to transfer, interrogate and detain individuals suspected of terrorist activities at a series of undisclosed locations around the world. According to current and former agency officials, the CIA has a rendition policy that has permitted the agency to transfer an unknown number of suspected terrorists captured in one country into the hands of security services in other countries whose record of human rights abuse is well documented. These individuals, as well as those at CIA detention facilities, have no access to any recognized legal process or rights. The scandal at Abu Ghraib, and the investigations and congressional hearings that followed, forced the disclosure of the Pentagon's behind-closed-doors debate and classified rules for detentions and interrogations at Guantanamo Bay and in Afghanistan and Iraq. Senior defense leaders have repeatedly been called to explain and defend their policies before Congress. But the CIA's policies and practices remain shrouded in secrecy. The only public account of CIA detainee treatment comes from soldier testimony and Defense Department investigations of military conduct. For instance, Army Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba's report on Abu Ghraib criticized the CIA practice of maintaining "ghost detainees" -- prisoners who were not officially registered and were moved around inside the prison to hide them from Red Cross teams. Taguba called the practice "deceptive, contrary to Army doctrine and in violation of international law." Gen. Paul J. Kern, who oversaw another Army inquiry, told Congress that the number of CIA ghost detainees "is in the dozens, to perhaps up to 100." The March 19, 2004, Justice Department memo by Goldsmith deals with a previously unknown class of people -- those removed from Iraq. It is not clear why the CIA would feel the need to remove detainees from Iraq for interrogation. A U.S. government official who has been briefed on the CIA's detention practices said some detainees are probably taken to other countries because "that's where the agency has the people, expertise and interrogation facilities, where their people and programs are in place." The origin of the Justice Department memo is directly related to the only publicly acknowledged ghost detainee, Hiwa Abdul Rahman Rashul, nicknamed "Triple X" by CIA and military officials. Rashul, a suspected member of the Iraqi Al-Ansar terrorist group, was captured by Kurdish soldiers in June or July of 2003 and turned over to the CIA, which whisked him to Afghanistan for interrogation. In October, White House counsel Alberto R. Gonzales asked the Office of Legal Counsel to write an opinion on "protected persons" in Iraq and rule on the status of Rashul, according to another U.S. government official involved in the deliberations. Goldsmith, then head of the office, ruled that Rashul was a "protected person" under the Fourth Geneva Convention and therefore had to be brought back to Iraq, several intelligence and defense officials said. The CIA was not happy with the decision, according to two intelligence officials. It promptly brought Rashul back and suspended any other transfers out of the country. At the same time, when transferring Rashul back to Iraq, then-CIA Director George J. Tenet asked Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld not to give Rashul a prisoner number and to hide him from International Red Cross officials, according to an account provided by Rumsfeld during a June 17 Pentagon news conference. Rumsfeld complied. As a "ghost detainee," Rashul became lost in the prison system for seven months. Rumsfeld did not fully explain the reason he had complied with Tenet's request or under what legal authority he could have kept Rashul hidden for so long. "We know from our knowledge that [Tenet] has the authority to do this," he said. Rashul, defense and intelligence officials noted, had not once been interrogated since he was returned to Iraq. His current status is unknown. In the one-page October 2003 interim ruling that directed Rashul's return, Goldsmith also created a new category of persons in Iraq whom he said did not qualify for protection under the Geneva Conventions. They are non-Iraqis who are not members of the former Baath Party and who went to Iraq after the invasion. After Goldsmith's ruling, the CIA and Gonzales asked the Office of Legal Counsel for a more complete legal opinion on "protected persons" in Iraq and on the legality of transferring people out of Iraq for interrogation. "That case started the CIA yammering to Justice to get a better memo," said one intelligence officer familiar with the interagency discussion. Michael Byers, a professor and international law expert at the University of British Columbia, said that creating a legal justification for removing protected persons from Iraq "is extraordinarily disturbing." "What they are doing is interpreting an exception into an all- encompassing right, in one of the most fundamental treaties in history," Byers said. The Geneva Convention "is as close as you get to protecting human rights in times of chaos. There's no ambiguity here." Washington Post Monday, October 25, 2004 Abu Ghraib Guards Kept a Log Of Prison Conditions, Practices By Josh White The military police soldiers who ran the high-security wing of the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq kept an unofficial log of their daily activities, a diary of sorts that documents the conditions that gripped the prison during the months that detainees were abused in what would later erupt into an international scandal. >From Oct. 19, 2003, to Jan. 18, 2004 -- just days after digital photographs of soldiers mistreating prisoners were turned in to Army criminal investigators -- the members of the 372nd Military Police Company who ran tiers 1A and 1B at Abu Ghraib jotted their experiences in a light green ledger kept in a prison office. On the log's cover is printed in large, handwritten letters: "MI Wing." A copy of the log was obtained by The Washington Post. Day after day, the log's more than 50 pages of handwritten notes and observations describe a spartan prison where some inmates inexplicably vomited after meals, a detainee regularly covered himself in his own feces, and others sharpened toothbrushes into makeshift weapons. There were fights, attacks on soldiers and riots. "Note: No power. No water. Prison in state of lockdown," a soldier wrote on Nov. 17, 2003. The Army soldiers, some of whom have been charged by the military with crimes for the abuses, logged a stream of mysterious and unregistered inmates held by unnamed U.S. government agents, a group of "ghost detainees" who were locked behind a row of 10 solid iron doors. References to "OGA," for Other Government Agency, appear throughout the logbook, meaning agencies such as the CIA and FBI, which had operatives in Iraq looking for the highest-value targets. "We didn't know anything about them," said one MP from the 372nd, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of ongoing investigations. "We called them X-Men. They were there, but they weren't there." The soldiers also wrote about unclear orders being passed down orally from military intelligence officials to "put pressure" on detainees of high intelligence value -- though none of the entries referred directly to the abuses made internationally infamous in digital photographs and in reports arising from multiple military investigations. "MI handlers will be turning on heat to this one," reads an entry at 2:30 a.m. on Nov. 12, referring to inmate No. 152529, identified in investigative documents as Asad Hamza Hanfosh. In a statement, Hanfosh alleged that soldiers stripped him, beat him and left him shackled naked to his bed overnight. "Sleep management program was requested but paperwork has not been approved yet," the entry reads. The Post obtained a digital copy of the logbook by e-mail and took several steps to verify its authenticity. Pentagon officials said the Criminal Investigations Division evidence tag on the log's back cover, dated Jan. 19, matches the tag placed on the original logbook. Army officials who reviewed a copy of the logbook said its contents appeared to be consistent with what investigators have learned about the prison. Sgt. Hydrue S. Joyner, who testified in a preliminary court hearing that he started the logbook on Oct. 19, 2003, reviewed The Post's copy and said it appeared to be complete and accurate. Joyner declined to discuss the entries but pointed out his own handwriting and said he last saw the book when he gave it to a military Criminal Investigations Division agent Jan. 19. The book shows that soldiers repeatedly counted the detainees, worked to get prisoners better food and clothing, and made sure those who were ill got to see the facility's medics. The MPs noted that some detainees had problems urinating, suffered from constipation or lacked proper medication. "Inmate #20092 continues to refuse to eat anything," Joyner wrote. "He will have to receive another I.V. from medical." These guard duties were performed by a unit untrained in detention operations, at a facility that came under frequent enemy attack. The soldiers were forced to improvise. Detainees who were hard to control or had mental problems were handcuffed to their beds or fully restrained. One detainee kept trying to kiss the guards. One ate chicken bones. Some would secret away weapons, such as sharpened toothbrushes, razors, medical needles and guns. "Conducted bed check and prisoner count," begins a Dec. 18 entry. "Note: Inmate #116451 was placed into isolation quiet room because night shift passed on that he attempted to burn the wood blocking his window. Once I came on shift I spoke to the inmate about the incident and he admitted to trying to commit suicide. . . . Note: After last night's incident, NO MATCHES are to be given to inmates." None of the entries clearly states that military intelligence officials were asking the MPs to do anything abusive, as attorneys for some of the MPs have alleged. Numerous entries refer to military intelligence asking MPs to help keep detainees awake for long periods to break them down for questioning. "The logbook certainly validates what Army investigators subsequently found about the environmental conditions inside the prison, the combat conditions outside the facility and the challenges the soldiers faced," said Col. Joseph G. Curtin, an Army spokesman. "It also validates that the behavior of these soldiers was unacceptable." The logbook for the first time shows Cpl. Charles A. Graner Jr. noting in his own words that he was unhappy receiving oral instructions from military intelligence personnel. Graner and six other MPs have been charged in the abuse. Two MPs have pleaded guilty, and the most senior of the soldiers, Staff Sgt. Ivan L. "Chip" Frederick, was sentenced to eight years in prison last week. "Per MI . . . unless told to put pressure on an MI inmate do not do so," reads an entry that bears Graner's name on Oct. 25, 2003, at a time when some of the most serious abuses were occurring. "I will now request everything to be in writting [sic] since it seems one MI handler does not know what the other one is requesting with verbal orders." In an entry from Graner on Oct. 26, writing about three mysterious inmates brought in by U.S. agents: "It has been over three days since OGA inmates were placed in cells 8 and 13. When subjects were first placed on block verbal instructions were that both would be placed on a sleep plan of 20 hours up and 4 hours down. No paperwork has been issued to verify this. Until this is put down on paper, the sleep plan is stopping at this point." Some Army officials said Graner's entries could very well be the work of someone covering their inappropriate behavior. There are omissions of events, such as the sexual humiliation that was captured on the soldiers' cameras. Graner did not return e-mail requests for comment, and Graner's civilian attorney did not return several calls to his office in Texas and to his cell phone. Members of the 372nd have said privately that they were asked to put detainees through physical training to keep them awake during these sleep management programs, but that they were not told specifically what they could and could not do. "Those who knew the rules and knew how to act, we just had them do things we would have done in basic training, like running and push-ups," said the soldier from the 372nd. "I could see how someone could misinterpret that into thinking they could do whatever they wanted." Whatever the sleep programs encompassed, they were abruptly altered in January after the photographs surfaced, according to the logbook. A series of entries shows that standards for sleep programs "will be revised" and that such programs for three inmates would be suspended immediately. On Jan. 16, the log shows that all of the ghost detainees would be "taken out of their cells, processed, and given numbers." Some of the ghost detainees were put on disruptive sleep programs and interrogated in a shower room and in a stairwell -- locations where some of the photographs of abuse also were taken. Pentagon officials, including Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, initially said there were only one or two such secret holds. Subsequent investigations revealed numerous such detainees, and the logbook shows that there were consistently three to 10 ghost detainees at Abu Ghraib from mid-October into January. The inspectors general of the Pentagon and CIA "are working together to look into that specific issue," said Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman. The final entry in the logbook, by Joyner on Jan. 18, shows that the prison leadership wanted things to change, and fast. Joyner, praised by inmates in investigative reports for helping them, has not been charged with a crime. "The new directive for the Tier 1 Wing is as follows: We count the inmates and feed them," he wrote. "No more sleep management, etc." NY Times October 24, 2004 After Terror, a Secret Rewriting of Military Law By TIM GOLDEN WASHINGTON - In early November 2001, with Americans still staggered by the Sept. 11 attacks, a small group of White House officials worked in great secrecy to devise a new system of justice for the new war they had declared on terrorism. Determined to deal aggressively with the terrorists they expected to capture, the officials bypassed the federal courts and their constitutional guarantees, giving the military the authority to detain foreign suspects indefinitely and prosecute them in tribunals not used since World War II. The plan was considered so sensitive that senior White House officials kept its final details hidden from the president's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, and the secretary of state, Colin L. Powell, officials said. It was so urgent, some of those involved said, that they hardly thought of consulting Congress. White House officials said their use of extraordinary powers would allow the Pentagon to collect crucial intelligence and mete out swift, unmerciful justice. "We think it guarantees that we'll have the kind of treatment of these individuals that we believe they deserve," said Vice President Dick Cheney, who was a driving force behind the policy. But three years later, not a single terrorist has been prosecuted. Of the roughly 560 men being held at the United States naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, only 4 have been formally charged. Preliminary hearings for those suspects brought such a barrage of procedural challenges and public criticism that verdicts could still be months away. And since a Supreme Court decision in June that gave the detainees the right to challenge their imprisonment in federal court, the Pentagon has stepped up efforts to send home hundreds of men whom it once branded as dangerous terrorists. "We've cleared whole forests of paper developing procedures for these tribunals, and no one has been tried yet," said Richard L. Shiffrin, who worked on the issue as the Pentagon's deputy general counsel for intelligence matters. "They just ended up in this Kafkaesque sort of purgatory." The story of how Guantánamo and the new military justice system became an intractable legacy of Sept. 11 has been largely hidden from public view. But extensive interviews with current and former officials and a review of confidential documents reveal that the legal strategy took shape as the ambition of a small core of conservative administration officials whose political influence and bureaucratic skill gave them remarkable power in the aftermath of the attacks. The strategy became a source of sharp conflict within the Bush administration, eventually pitting the highest-profile cabinet secretaries - including Ms. Rice and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld - against one another over issues of due process, intelligence-gathering and international law. In fact, many officials contend, some of the most serious problems with the military justice system are rooted in the secretive and contentious process from which it emerged. Military lawyers were largely excluded from that process in the days after Sept. 11. They have since waged a long struggle to ensure that terrorist prosecutions meet what they say are basic standards of fairness. Uniformed lawyers now assigned to defend Guantánamo detainees have become among the most forceful critics of the Pentagon's own system. Foreign policy officials voiced concerns about the legal and diplomatic ramifications, but had little influence. Increasingly, the administration's plan has come under criticism even from close allies, complicating efforts to transfer scores of Guantánamo prisoners back to their home governments. To the policy's architects, the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon represented a stinging challenge to American power and an imperative to consider measures that might have been unimaginable in less threatening times. Yet some officials said the strategy was also shaped by longstanding political agendas that had relatively little to do with fighting terrorism. The administration's claim of authority to set up military commissions, as the tribunals are formally known, was guided by a desire to strengthen executive power, officials said. Its legal approach, including the decision not to apply the Geneva Conventions, reflected the determination of some influential officials to halt what they viewed as the United States' reflexive submission to international law. In devising the new system, many officials said they had Osama bin Laden and other leaders of Al Qaeda in mind. But in picking through the hundreds of detainees at Guantánamo Bay, military investigators have struggled to find more than a dozen they can tie directly to significant terrorist acts, officials said. While important Qaeda figures have been captured and held by the C.I.A., administration officials said they were reluctant to bring those prisoners before tribunals they still consider unreliable. Some administration officials involved in the policy declined to be interviewed, or would do so only on the condition they not be identified. Others defended it strongly, saying the administration had a responsibility to consider extraordinary measures to protect the country from a terrifying enemy. "Everybody who was involved in this process had, in my mind, a white hat on," Timothy E. Flanigan, the former deputy White House counsel, said in an interview. "They were not out to be cowboys or create a radical new legal regime. What they wanted to do was to use existing legal models to assist in the process of saving lives, to get information. And the war on terror is all about information." As the policy has faltered, other current and former officials have criticized it on pragmatic grounds, arguing that many of the problems could have been avoided. But some of the criticism also has a moral tone. "What several of us were concerned about was due process," said John A. Gordon, a retired Air Force general and former deputy C.I.A. director who served as both the senior counterterrorism official and homeland security adviser on President Bush's National Security Council staff. "There was great concern that we were setting up a process that was contrary to our own ideals." An Aggressive Approach The administration's legal approach to terrorism began to emerge in the first turbulent days after Sept. 11, as the officials in charge of key agencies exhorted their aides to confront Al Qaeda's threat with bold imagination. "Legally, the watchword became 'forward-leaning,' '' said a former associate White House counsel, Bradford Berenson, "by which everybody meant: 'We want to be aggressive. We want to take risks.' '' That challenge resounded among young lawyers who were settling into important posts at the White House, the Justice Department and other agencies. Many of them were members of the Federalist Society, a conservative legal fraternity. Some had clerked for Supreme Court justices, Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia in particular. A striking number had clerked for a prominent Reagan appointee, Lawrence H. Silberman of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. One young lawyer recalled looking around the room during a meeting with Attorney General John Ashcroft. "Of 10 people, 7 of us were former Silberman clerks," he said. Mr. Berenson, then 36, had been consumed with the nomination of federal judges until he was suddenly reassigned to terrorism issues and thrown into intense, 15-hour workdays, filled with competing urgencies and intermittent new alerts. "All of a sudden, the curtain was lifted on this incredibly frightening world," he said. "You were spending every day looking at the dossiers of the world's leading terrorists. There was a palpable sense of threat." As generals prepared for war in Afghanistan, lawyers scrambled to understand how the new campaign against terrorism could be waged within the confines of old laws. Mr. Flanigan was at the center of the administration's legal counteroffensive. A personable, soft-spoken father of 14 children, his easy manner sometimes belied the force of his beliefs. He had arrived at the White House after distinguishing himself as an agile legal thinker and a Republican stalwart: During the Clinton scandals, he defended the independent counsel, Kenneth W. Starr, saying he had conducted his investigation "in a moderate and appropriate fashion." In 2000, he played an important role on the Bush campaign's legal team in the Florida recount. In the days after the Sept. 11 attacks, Mr. Flanigan sought advice from the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel on "the legality of the use of military force to prevent or deter terrorist activity inside the United States,'' according to a previously undisclosed department memorandum that was reviewed by The New York Times. The 20-page response came from John C. Yoo, a 34-year-old Bush appointee with a glittering résumé and a reputation as perhaps the most intellectually aggressive among a small group of legal scholars who had challenged what they saw as the United States' excessive deference to international law. On Sept. 21, 2001, Mr. Yoo wrote that the question was how the Constitution's Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable search and seizure might apply if the military used "deadly force in a manner that endangered the lives of United States citizens." Mr. Yoo listed an inventory of possible operations: shooting down a civilian airliner hijacked by terrorists; setting up military checkpoints inside an American city; employing surveillance methods more sophisticated than those available to law enforcement; or using military forces "to raid or attack dwellings where terrorists were thought to be, despite risks that third parties could be killed or injured by exchanges of fire." Mr. Yoo noted that those actions could raise constitutional issues, but said that in the face of devastating terrorist attacks, "the government may be justified in taking measures which in less troubled conditions could be seen as infringements of individual liberties." If the president decided the threat justified deploying the military inside the country, he wrote, then "we think that the Fourth Amendment should be no more relevant than it would be in cases of invasion or insurrection." The prospect of such military action at home was mostly hypothetical at that point, but with the government taking the fight against terrorism to Afghanistan and elsewhere around the world, lawyers in the administration took the same "forward-leaning" approach to making plans for the terrorists they thought would be captured. The idea of using military commissions to try suspected terrorists first came to Mr. Flanigan, he said, in a phone call a couple of days after the attacks from William P. Barr, the former attorney general under whom Mr. Flanigan had served as head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel during the first Bush administration. Mr. Barr had first suggested the use of military tribunals a decade before, to try suspects in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. Although the idea made little headway at the time, Mr. Barr said he reminded Mr. Flanigan that the Legal Counsel's Office had done considerable research on the question. Mr. Flanigan had an aide call for the files. "I thought it was a great idea," he recalled. Military commissions, he thought, would give the government wide latitude to hold, interrogate and prosecute the sort of suspects who might be silenced by lawyers in criminal courts. They would also put the control over prosecutions squarely in the hands of the president. The same ideas were taking hold in the office of Vice President Cheney, championed by his 44-year-old counsel, David S. Addington. At the time, Mr. Addington, a longtime Cheney aide with an indistinct portfolio and no real staff, was not well-known even in the government. But he would become legendary as a voraciously hard-working official with strongly conservative views, an unusually sharp pen and wide influence over military, intelligence and other matters. In a matter of months, he would make a mark as one of the most important architects of the administration's legal strategy against foreign terrorism. Beyond the prosecutorial benefits of military commissions, the two lawyers saw a less tangible, but perhaps equally important advantage. "From a political standpoint," Mr. Flanigan said, "it communicated the message that we were at war, that this was not going to be business as usual." Changing the Rules In fact, very little about how the tribunal policy came about resembled business as usual. For half a century, since the end of World War II, most major national-security initiatives had been forged through interagency debate. But some senior Bush administration officials felt that process placed undue power in the hands of cautious, slow-moving foreign policy bureaucrats. The sense of urgency after Sept. 11 brought that attitude to the surface. Little more than a week after the attacks, officials said, the White House counsel, Alberto F. Gonzales, set up an interagency group to draw up options for prosecuting terrorists. They came together with high expectations. "We were going to go after the people responsible for the attacks, and the operating assumption was that we would capture a significant number of Al Qaeda operatives," said Pierre-Richard Prosper, the State Department official assigned to lead the group. "We were thinking hundreds." Mr. Prosper, then 37, had just been sworn in as the department's ambassador-at-large for war crimes issues. As a prosecutor, he had taken on street gangs and drug Mafias and had won the first genocide conviction before the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. Even so, some administration lawyers eyed him suspiciously - as more diplomat than crime-fighter. Mr. Gonzales had made it clear that he wanted Mr. Prosper's group to put forward military commissions as a viable option, officials said. The group laid out three others - criminal trials, military courts- martial and tribunals with both civilian and military members, like those used for Nazi war criminals at Nuremberg. Representatives of the Justice Department's criminal division, which had prosecuted a string of Qaeda defendants in federal district court over the previous decade, argued that the federal courts could do the job again. The option of toughening criminal laws or adapting the courts, as several European countries had done, was discussed, but only briefly, two officials said. "The towers were still smoking, literally," Mr. Prosper said. "I remember asking: Can the federal courts in New York handle this? It wasn't a legal question so much as it was logistical. You had 300 Al Qaeda members, potentially. And did we want to put the judges and juries in harm's way?" Lawyers at the White House saw criminal courts as a minefield, several officials said. Much of the evidence against terror suspects would be classified intelligence that would be difficult to air in court or too sketchy to meet federal standards, the lawyers warned. Another issue was security: Was it safe to try Osama bin Laden in Manhattan, where he was facing federal charges for the 1998 bombings of American Embassies in East Africa? Then there was a tactical question. To act pre-emptively against Al Qaeda, the authorities would need information that defense lawyers and due-process rules might discourage suspects from giving up. Mr. Flanigan framed the choice starkly: "Are we going to go with a system that is really guaranteed to prevent us from getting information in every case or are we going to go another route?" Military commissions had no statutory rules of their own. In past American wars, when such tribunals had been used to carry out battlefield justice against spies, saboteurs and others accused of violating the laws of war, they had generally hewed to prevailing standards of military justice. But the advocates for commissions in the Bush administration saw no reason they could not adapt the rules, officials said. Standards of proof could be lowered. Secrecy provisions could be expanded. The death penalty could be more liberally applied. But some members of the interagency group saw it as more complicated. Terrorism had not been clearly established as a war crime under international law. Writing new law for a military tribunal might end up being more difficult than prosecuting terrorism cases in existing courts. By late October 2001, the White House lawyers had grown impatient with what they saw as the dithering of Mr. Prosper's group and what one former official called the "cold feet" of some of its members. Mr. Flanigan said he thought the government needed to move urgently in case a major terrorist linked to the attacks was apprehended. He gathered up the research that the Prosper group had completed on military commissions and took charge of the matter himself. Suddenly, the other options were off the table and the Prosper group was out of business. "Prosper is a thoughtful, gentle, process-oriented guy," the former official said. "At that time, gentle was not an adjective that anybody wanted." A Secretive Circle With the White House in charge, officials said, the planning for tribunals moved forward more quickly, and more secretly. Whole agencies were left out of the discussion. So were most of the government's experts in military and international law. The legal basis for the administration's approach was laid out on Nov. 6 in a confidential 35-page memorandum sent to Mr. Gonzales from Patrick F. Philbin, a deputy in the Legal Counsel's office. (Attorney General Ashcroft has refused recent Congressional requests for the document, but a copy was reviewed by The Times.) The memorandum's plain legalese belied its bold assertions. It said that the president, as commander in chief, has "inherent authority'' to establish military commissions without Congressional authorization. It concluded that the Sept. 11 attacks were "plainly sufficient" to warrant applying the laws of war. Opening a debate that would later divide the administration, the memorandum also suggested that the White House could apply international law selectively. It stated specifically that trying terrorists under the laws of war "does not mean that terrorists will receive the protections of the Geneva Conventions or the rights that laws of war accord to lawful combatants." The central legal precedent cited in the memorandum was a 1942 case in which the Supreme Court upheld President Franklin D. Roosevelt's use of a military commission to try eight Nazi saboteurs who had sneaked into the United States aboard submarines. Since that ruling, revolutions had taken place in both international and military law, with the adoption of the Geneva Conventions in 1949 and the Uniform Code of Military Justice in 1951. Even so, the Justice memorandum said the 1942 ruling had "set a clear constitutional analysis" under which due process rights do not apply to military commissions. Roosevelt, too, created his military commission without new and explicit Congressional approval, and authorized the military to fashion its own procedural rules. He also established himself, rather than a military judge, as the "final reviewing authority'' for the case. Mr. Addington seized on the Roosevelt precedent as a model, two people involved in the process said, despite vast differences. Roosevelt acted against enemy agents in a traditional war among nations. Mr. Bush would be asserting the same power to take on a shadowy network of adversaries with no geographic boundaries, in a conflict with no foreseeable end. Mr. Addington, who drafted the order with Mr. Flanigan, was particularly influential, several officials said, because he represented Mr. Cheney and brought formidable experience in national-security law to a small circle of senior officials. Mr. Addington turned down several requests for interviews and a spokesman for the vice president's office declined to comment. "He was probably the only one there who would know what an order would look like, what it would say," a former Justice Department official said, noting Mr. Addington's work at the Defense Department, the C.I.A., and Congressional intelligence committees. "He didn't have authority over anyone. But he's a persuasive guy." To many officials outside the circle, the secrecy was remarkable. While Mr. Ashcroft and his deputy, Larry D. Thompson, were closely consulted, the head of the Justice Department's criminal division, Michael Chertoff, who had argued for trying terror suspects in federal court, saw the military order only when it was published, officials said. Mr. Rumsfeld was kept informed of the plan mainly through his general counsel, William J. Haynes II, several Pentagon officials said. Many of the Pentagon's experts on military justice, uniformed lawyers who had spent their careers working on such issues, were mostly kept in the dark. "I can't tell you how compartmented things were," said retired Rear Adm. Donald J. Guter, who was then the Navy's senior military lawyer, or judge advocate general. "This was a closed administration." A group of experienced Army lawyers had been meeting with Mr. Haynes repeatedly on the process, but began to suspect that what they said did not resonate outside the Pentagon, several of them said. On Friday, Nov. 9, Defense Department officials said, Mr. Haynes called the head of the team, Col. Lawrence J. Morris, into his office to review a draft of the presidential order. He was given 30 minutes to study it but was not allowed to keep a copy or even take notes. The following day, the Army's judge advocate general, Maj. Gen. Thomas J. Romig, hurriedly convened a meeting of senior military lawyers to discuss a response. The group worked through the Veterans Day weekend to prepare suggestions that would have moved the tribunals closer to existing military justice. But when the final document was issued that Tuesday, it reflected none of the officers' ideas, several military officials said. "They hadn't changed a thing," one official said. In fact, while the military lawyers were pulling together their response, they were unaware that senior administration officials were already at the White House putting finishing touches on the plan. At a meeting that Saturday in the Roosevelt Room, Mr. Cheney led a discussion among Attorney General Ashcroft, Mr. Haynes of the Defense Department, the White House lawyers and a few other aides. Senior officials of the State Department and the National Security Council staff were excluded from final discussions of the policy, even at a time when they were meeting daily about Afghanistan with the officials who were drafting the order. According to two people involved in the process, Mr. Cheney advocated withholding the draft from Ms. Rice and Secretary Powell. When the two cabinet members found out about the military order - upon its public release - Ms. Rice was particularly angry, several senior officials said. Spokesmen for both officials declined to comment. Mr. Bush played only a modest role in the debate, senior administration officials said. In an initial discussion, he agreed that military commissions should be an option, the officials said. Later, Mr. Cheney discussed a draft of the order with Mr. Bush over lunch, one former official said. The president signed the three-page order on Nov. 13. No ceremony accompanied the signing, and the order was released to the public that day without so much as a press briefing. But its historic significance was unmistakable. The military could detain and prosecute any foreigner whom the president or his representative determined to have "engaged in, aided or abetted, or conspired to commit" terrorism. Echoing the Roosevelt order, the Bush document promised "free and fair" tribunals but offered few guarantees: There was no promise of public trials, no right to remain silent, no presumption of innocence. As in 1942, guilt did not necessarily have to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt and a death sentence could be imposed even with a divided verdict. Despite those similarities, some military and international lawyers were struck by the differences. "The Roosevelt order referred specifically to eight people, the eight Nazi saboteurs," said Mr. Shiffrin, who was then the Defense Department's deputy general counsel for intelligence matters and had studied the Nazi saboteurs' case. "Here we were putting in place a parallel system of justice for a universe of people who we had no idea about - who they would be, how many of them there would be. It was a very dramatic measure." Mounting Criticism The White House did its best to play down the drama, but criticism of the order was immediate and widespread. Civil libertarians and some Congressional leaders saw an attempt to supplant the criminal justice system. Critics also worried about the concentration of power: The president or his proxies would define the crimes (often after an act had been committed); set the rules for trial; and choose the judges, juries and appellate panels. Senator Patrick J. Leahy, the Vermont Democrat who was then chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, was among a handful of legislators who argued that the administration's plan required explicit Congressional authorization. The Congress had just passed the Patriot Act by a huge margin, and Mr. Leahy proposed authorizing military commissions, but with some important changes, including a presumption of innocence for defendants and appellate review by the Supreme Court. Critics seized on complaints from abroad, including an announcement from the Spanish authorities that they would not extradite some terrorist suspects to the United States if they would face the tribunals. "We are the most powerful nation on earth," Mr. Leahy said. "But in the struggle against terrorism, we don't have the option of going it alone. Would these military tribunals be worth jeopardizing the cooperation we expect and need from our allies?" Senators called for Mr. Rumsfeld and Mr. Ashcroft to testify about the tribunals plan. Instead, the administration sent Mr. Prosper from the State Department and Mr. Chertoff of the Justice Department - both of whom had questioned the use of commissions and were later excluded from the administration's final deliberations. But the Congressional opposition melted in the face of opinion polls showing strong support for the president's measures against terrorism. There was another reason fears were allayed. With the order signed, the Pentagon was writing rules for exactly how the commissions would be conducted, and an early draft that was leaked to the news media suggested defendants' rights would be expanded. Mr. Rumsfeld, who assembled a group of outside legal experts - including some who had worked on World War II-era tribunals - to consult on the rules, said critics' concerns would be taken into account. But all of the critics were not outside the administration. Many of the Pentagon's uniformed lawyers were angered by the implication that the military would be used to deliver "rough justice" for the terrorists. The Uniform Code of Military Justice had moved steadily into line with the due-process standards of the federal courts, and senior military lawyers were proud and protective of their system. They generally supported using commissions for terrorists, but argued that the system would not be fair without greater rights for defendants. "The military lawyers would from time to time remind the civilians that there was a Constitution that we had to pay attention to," said Admiral Guter, who, after retiring as the Navy judge advocate general, signed a "friend of the court" brief on behalf of plaintiffs in the Guantánamo Supreme Court case. Even as uniformed lawyers were given a greater role in writing rules for the commissions, they still felt out of the loop. In early 2002, Admiral Guter said, during a weekly lunch with Mr. Haynes and the top lawyers for the military branches, he raised the issue with Mr. Haynes directly: "We need more information." Mr. Haynes looked at him coldly. "No, you don't," he quoted Mr. Haynes as saying. Mr. Haynes declined to comment on the exchange. Lt. Col. William K. Lietzau, a Yale-trained Marine lawyer on Mr. Haynes's staff, often found himself in the middle. "I could see how the JAGs were frustrated that the task of setting up the commissions hadn't been delegated to them,'' he said, referring to the senior military lawyers. "On the other hand, I could see how some of their recommendations frustrated the leadership because they didn't always appear to embrace the paradigm shift needed to deal with terrorism." Some Justice Department officials also urged changes in the commission rules, current and former officials said. While Attorney General Ashcroft staunchly defended the policy in public, in a private meeting with Pentagon officials, he said some of the proposed commission rules would be seen as "draconian," two officials said. On nearly every issue, interviews and documents show, the harder line was staked out by White House lawyers: Mr. Addington, Mr. Gonzales and Mr. Flanigan. They opposed allowing civilian lawyers to assist the tribunal defendants, as military courts-martial permit, or allowing civilians to serve on the appellate panel that would oversee the commissions. They also opposed granting defendants a presumption of innocence. In the end, Mr. Rumsfeld compromised. He granted defendants a presumption of innocence and set "beyond a reasonable doubt" as a standard for proving guilt. He also allowed the defendants to hire civilian lawyers, but restricted the lawyers' access to case information. And he gave the presiding officer at a tribunal license to admit any evidence he thought might be convincing to a "reasonable person.'' One right the administration sought to deny the prisoners was the ability to appeal the legality of their detentions in federal court. The administration had done its best to decide the question when searching for a place to detain hundreds of prisoners captured in Afghanistan. Every location it seriously considered - including an American military base in Germany and islands in the South Pacific - was outside the United States and, the administration believed, beyond the reach of the federal judiciary. On Dec. 28, 2001, after officials settled on Guantánamo Bay, Mr. Philbin and Mr. Yoo told the Pentagon in a memorandum that it could make a "very strong" claim that prisoners there would be outside the purview of American courts. But the memorandum cautioned that a reasonable argument could also be made that Guantánamo "while not part of the sovereign territory of the United States, is within the territorial jurisdiction of a federal court." That warning would come back to haunt the administration. A Shift in Power Some of the officials who helped design the new system of justice would later explain the influence they exercised in the chaotic days after Sept. 11 as a response to a crisis. But a more enduring shift of power within the administration was taking place - one that became apparent in a decision that would have significant consequences for how terror suspects were interrogated and detained. At issue was whether the administration would apply the Geneva Conventions to the conflicts with Al Qaeda and the Taliban and whether those enemies would be treated as prisoners of war. Based on the advice of White House and Justice Department lawyers, Mr. Bush initially decided on Jan. 18, 2002, that the conventions would not apply to either conflict. But at a meeting of senior national security officials several days later, Secretary of State Powell asked him to reconsider. Mr. Powell agreed that the conventions did not apply to the global fight against Al Qaeda. But he said troops could be put at risk if the United States disavowed the conventions in dealing with the Taliban - the de facto government of Afghanistan. Both Mr. Rumsfeld and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard B. Myers, supported his position, Pentagon officials said. In a debate that included the administration's most experienced national-security officials, a voice heard belonged to Mr. Yoo, only a deputy in the Office of Legal Counsel. He cast Afghanistan as a "failed state," and said its fighters should not be considered a real army but a "militant, terrorist-like group." In a Jan. 25 memorandum, the White House counsel, Mr. Gonzales, characterized that opinion as "definitive," although it was not the final basis for the president's decision. The Gonzales memorandum suggested that the "new kind of war" Mr. Bush wanted to fight could hardly be reconciled with the "quaint" privileges that the Geneva Conventions gave to prisoners of war, or the "strict limitations" they imposed on interrogations. Military lawyers disputed the idea that applying the conventions would necessarily limit interrogators to the name, rank and serial number of their captives. "There were very good reasons not to designate the detainees as prisoners of war, but the claim that they couldn't be interrogated was not one of them," Colonel Lietzau said. Again, though, such questions were scarcely heard, officials involved in the discussions said. Mr. Yoo's rise reflected a different approach by the Bush administration to sensitive legal questions concerning foreign affairs, defense and intelligence. In past administrations, officials said, the Office of Legal Counsel usually weighed in with opinions on questions that had already been deliberated by the legal staffs of the agencies involved. Under Mr. Bush, the office frequently had a first and final say. "O.L.C. was definitely running the show legally, and John Yoo in particular," a former Pentagon lawyer said. "He's kind of fun to be around, and he has an opinion on everything. Even though he was quite young, he exercised disproportionate authority because of his personality and his strong opinions." Mr. Yoo's influence was amplified by friendships he developed not just with Mr. Addington and Mr. Flanigan, but also Mr. Haynes, with whom he played squash as often as three or four times a week at the Pentagon Officers Athletic Club. If the Geneva Conventions debate raised Mr. Yoo's stature, it had the opposite effect on lawyers at the State Department, who were later excluded from sensitive discussions on matters like the interrogation of detainees, officials from several agencies said. "State was cut out of a lot of this activity from February of 2002 on," one senior administration official said. "These were treaties that we were dealing with; they are meant to know about that." The State Department legal adviser, William H. Taft IV, was shunned by the lawyers who dominated the detainee policy, officials said. Although Mr. Taft had served as the deputy secretary of defense during the Reagan administration, more conservative colleagues whispered that he lacked the constitution to fight terrorists. "He was seen as ideologically squishy and suspect," a former White House official said. "People did not take him very seriously." Through a State Department spokesman, Richard A. Boucher, Mr. Taft declined to comment. The rivalries could be almost adolescent. When field trips to Guantánamo Bay were arranged for administration lawyers, the invitations were sometimes relayed last to the State Department and National Security Council, officials said, in the hope that lawyers there would not be able to go on short notice. It was on the first field trip, 10 days after detainees began to arrive there on Jan. 11, 2002, that White House lawyers made clear their intention to move forward quickly with military commissions. On the flight home, several officials said, Mr. Addington urged Mr. Gonzales to seek a blanket designation of all the detainees being sent to Guantánamo as eligible for trial under the president's order. Mr. Gonzales agreed. The next day, the Pentagon instructed military intelligence officers at the base to start filling out one-page forms for each detainee, describing their alleged offenses. Weeks later, Mr. Haynes issued an urgent call to the military services, asking them to submit nominations for a chief prosecutor. The first trials, many military and administration officials believed, were just around the corner.Next: A Policy Unravels Jack Begg contributed research for this article. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/25/international/worldspecial2/25gitmo.html has the second part of Golden's work, but it casts Ashcroft and Rice in such a positive light I am skeptical. NY Times October 22, 2004 General Takes Three Officers Off Tribunal at Cuba Base By NEIL A. LEWIS WASHINGTON, Oct. 21 - The Pentagon official overseeing the war crimes trials in Guantánamo on Thursday dismissed three officers on the military tribunal that is conducting the proceedings, saying they could not judge the cases impartially. The action appeared to create new turmoil for the first United States military tribunals since World War II. At the initial round of hearings in August, defense lawyers said most of the military officers who made up the five-member tribunal along with an alternate were unsuitable because they had served in Afghanistan or had other factors that made them biased. The Pentagon official in charge of the tribunals, Gen. John D. Altenburg Jr., who is retired from the Army, ruled on Thursday that two officers on the panel and the alternate had to step down. But General Altenburg rejected arguments from defense lawyers to dismiss three others. He said proceedings against the first two defendants, scheduled to resume next month, would go forward with the remaining three officers. General Altenburg's actions failed, however, to stem criticism from defense lawyers who said his decisions were illogical, inconsistent and only made the situation more unfair for their clients. "Although it may seem like a partial victory for us, it really puts all of us in a worse position," said Joshua Dratel, a lawyer from New York who is defending David Hicks, 29, an Australian charged with being a soldier for the Taliban. Mr. Dratel said the decisions on Thursday seemed contrived or calculated to retain an advantage for the prosecution. General Altenburg retained enough members for a trial to proceed, Mr. Dratel said, but made the defense's job more difficult. Because two-thirds of the panel is needed to convict a defendant, the prosecution now needs two members to win. With five members, they needed four. General Altenburg agreed to dismiss Col. R. Thomas Bright of the Marines, who supervised an operation that sent suspected terrorists from Afghanistan to Guantánamo Bay, Cuba; Lt. Col. Timothy Tooney of the Air Force, who was an intelligence officer in Iraq, and Lt. Col. Curt Cooper of the Army, who said at the August hearings that he could not really say what the Geneva Conventions were. At the same time, General Altenburg rejected challenges to Col. Jack Sparks Jr. of the Marines, who lost one of his Marine reservists in the attack on the World Trade Center, and to Col. Peter S. Brownback III of the Army, presiding officer of the panel. Colonel Brownback attracted the most vehement opposition among defense lawyers. They said he was unsuitable because he was a longtime close friend of General Altenburg, who would have to rule on Colonel Brownback's decisions. Further, the lawyers suggested that Colonel Brownback lied at the August hearings when he said he had never told a group of lawyers that he believed the defendants were not entitled to a speedy trial. A defense lawyer, Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift, introduced into evidence an audio tape of a meeting in which Colonel Brownback appeared to have said just that. In his decision, General Altenburg said, "The transcripts reveal that on occasion, as in this instance, the presiding officer was too casual with his remarks." But he added that the remarks should not be disqualifying as they did not show conclusively that Colonel Brownback had decided the issue of the right to a speedy before he had heard arguments, but was just inartful in his words. Commander Swift, the lawyer for Salim Ahmed Hamdan, 34, a Yemeni accused of conspiring to commit acts of terrorism, said: "The prosecution lost absolutely nothing in this. They gained in fact." He added that the standards applied by General Altenburg "make no sense" and that the reasons that disqualified Colonels Toomey and Bright should apply equally to Colonel Brownback. Critics of the commission procedures have also complained that Colonel Brownback, as the sole lawyer on the panel, would have an outsize influence over the other members on legal questions. The proceedings against Mr. Hamdan and Mr. Hicks are to resume on Nov. 1, focusing on other motions. The actual trials are most likely to begin in December or January. The Guantánamo center, with 590 detainees, has been widely viewed by other countries and human rights organizations as a symbol of Washington's willingness to flout international law. Although many inmates have been released, many others have been held for more than two years without charges. The Supreme Court ruled in June that the detainees can bring legal issues before American courts. On Wednesday, a federal judge ruled that the detainees can meet lawyers in private. The government had said national security required video and audio monitoring of such meetings. _______________________________________________ Foil-l mailing list Foil-l at insaf.net http://insaf.net/mailman/listinfo/foil-l_insaf.net From vivek at sarai.net Thu Oct 28 14:26:06 2004 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 14:26:06 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] democracy at work Message-ID: <4180B426.20702@sarai.net> Dear Friends, I just received this e-mail from my dear friend Oksana Zabuzhko, one of Ukraine's leading intellectuals whom many of you met when she was a Fullbright fellow here more than ten years ago. A poet, philosopher, translator of Sylvia Plath (as well as of Lucie Brock-Broido, Sue Standing, and Marie Howe), vice-chair of Ukraine's PEN club, and a contributing editor to Agni for nearly fifteen years, Oksana describes a terrifying turn of events in Ukraine, including a violent public assault by organized thugs on a peaceful gathering in Kyiv a couple of nights ago. The immediate aim of the assaults is to create a climate of fear in the country and to prevent free elections from taking place in Ukraine as scheduled next Sunday (October 31). The violence is closely linked to Putin's efforts to bring Ukraine into Russia's sphere of influence--by force, if necessary. The Western media has not been following or publicizing events surrounding the elections at all in the last months. I have heard many explanations for this. When I was in Ukraine last August there was already a climate of high anxiety that far exceeded even the fears surrounding our own elections. The primary reason for this, in a nutshell, is that Prime Minister Yanukhovych, poised to steal the elections with Putin's help, already has a criminal recorded and has widely documented ties with criminal organizations. In addition, he is prepared to roll back many independence reforms in order to realign Ukraine more closelty to Russia. The consequences for ordinary people and intellectuals are likely to be extreme. The kind of intervention I believe in involves shining the light of reason on violent actions. In our time this light takes the form of a free press which will not allow criminal behavior to go unaccounted for, neither in this country nor abroad. Just as our own press is finally waking up to the importance of publicizing through images the consequences of our violence abroad, so should it be prepared to forestall violence by making sure governments know their actions are being scrutinized and observed and that they will be held accountable for them. This situation seems to be on the edge of emergency. All your efforts to bring the world's attention to this matter will contribute to the growth of peace and justice. If the world turns its back on Ukraine now, we risk creating another unstable region at a time when the global situation is already precarious. Without sounding alarmist, the nineteen thirties are around the corner. We move toward them blindly at our own risk. Sincerely, Askold Melnyczuk Founding Editor AGNI Kiev, October 24 2004 Dear friends, I'm writing you this from the country, now haunted with the gory prospect of being forcefully turned, in a week, into one of the most terrible thugocratic dictatorships that Europe has witnessed since Hitler and Stalin. You may find this an exaggeration, yet it's not. It's usually so human, to refuse to believe the worst - until it's too late. Besides, from my recent conversations with my friends and journalists from EU, I know how little information can be found in the European media on the situation in Ukraine - and, as a result, how little understanding there is of what is really at stake here this fall. Last night the first blood was spilled on the Kiev pavement. The autocratic post-Soviet regime, which since the late 1990s has been smothering the budding Ukrainian democracy, and is by now wholeheartedly hated by the vast majority of population (from 67% to 85%, according to the polls!), has given us its final proof, that there'll be NO - however heavily falsified - "free elections" on October 31. There'll be a WAR - an open war, launched against the people of Ukraine by the handful of gangsters now at power, whose only goal is to stay at power after the 31st - at ANY price. Until last night they've been using the "cold-war" methods (to skip the case of an attempted poisoning of the oppositional candidate, Victor Yushchenko, whose chances to win the elections in an honest game are undeniable). There's been a disgusting and overwhelming campaign of lies in the media (most of them, with very few exceptions, controlled by the power), there've been all the dirty, illegal tricks used (payments, threats, repressions etc.), as well as cheating with the voting lists (with, say, tens of thousands of the dead included on them, etc). Nothing of these, though, proved efficient enough to guarantee next Sunday the smooth and peaceful victory to the "candidate of the power" - the present-day Prime Minister (appointed by the president), a former (?) criminal, back in his youth twice convicted for robbery (no kidding!). Yesterday, the grand "orange" manifestation (orange being the colour of the oppositional candidate) of some 150000-200000 people filled the square in front of the Central Election Committee, under the slogan "For honest and transparent elections". It's been a warm, tranquil sunny day (do you know how beautiful is Kiev in the fall?), and the 3-million city was all celebration - of joy, and hope, and solidarity. It's been a long time since I've seen so many happy, smiling faces in the streets - in fact, since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Yet then, in 1991, as the past 13 years have proved, our celebration was definitely premature. With no change of the political elite, with just very small burgeons of civil society, with - well, why don't I put it plainly - no REAL revolution, Ukraine, after a while, started sliding back into the dark shadow of Sovietization. It's only now, that the dragon of Soviet totalitarianism - in the meantime considerably shrunken, losing one part of his body after another (Eastern Europe - the Baltics - then, last fall, Georgia...), all rotten up to the marrow of his bones (its true - criminal - skeleton now fully exposed!) - is REALLY agonizing. And the convulsions of the dragon could be terrible - isn't the case of Russia conspicuous enough? Vladimir Putin, who's so shortly turned his country back into a concentration camp, fully browbeaten with the fear of terrorism, now serves as the major support for the Ukrainian thugs. Small wonder, as criminals and the KGB officers used to belong together since good old Gulag times. The whole presidential campaign of our "candidate of the power", Victor Yanukovich, is a brainchild of Moscow professionals. Politically and intellectually, Kiev now more and more looks like the city under Russian occupation.And what exactly have they plotted to ensure "the succession of power" in Ukraine, has become visible last night. About 23:00, after the singing "orange" crowd in front of the Central Election Committee dispersed, and only some 150 people - among them women, and senior citizens - stayed to wait for the results of the session (which was hold inside) to be announced (on the agenda was an attempt to falsify some 2 million voices, due to the machinations with the voting lists!) - the dragon has bared his teeth for the first time. Some 50 black-leathered men appeared out of the darkness, and attacked people, who were waiting on the park benches, with clubs and knives. There was no police around (!), but three of the attackers - when the parlamentarians and the bodyguards ran out of the building - were caught and handicuffed. According to their IDs, they all appeared to be disguised policemen - of the specially trained "killers' detachments". Yes, there've been rumours circulating before - of some "special detachments" arriving from all over the country and concentrating around the city. Of some strange, and highly suspicious manoeuvres noted by the city-dwellers in some areas. Now, next morning after the "night of the long knives" (as a result of which, 11 peaceful demonstrators were taken to the hospital, some of them seriously wounded), there's no doubt left: the war has been announced. The gangsters at power aren't going to leave in any case. They are going to fight - most probably, after the voting-booths will be closed. Could any, however "specially trained", groups of murderers REALLY work against hundreds of thousands of people? (For people ARE going to go into the streets on the election night, and Ukrainian internet is now boiling with the discussions on how and where to meet, how to protect oneself against the attacks, etc.). Well, maybe they couldn't. And Ukrainian army will hardly agree to turn its guns against its own people, either. But on October 28 - three days before the elections - there'll be a military parade (!) in Kiev (nothing like this was ever held before on this date!). And Russian president Vladimir Putin is coming to Kiev - allegedly, to take part in the parade (?). And to stay in Kiev for 5 (?) days more. Again, there're rumours - oh, these rumours! - that he'll be bodyguarded by some bayonets. More precisely - with two divisions being particularly famous of their operations in the Caucasus... Maybe Ukraine has only one week left. One last week of the electrifying autumn of free political discussions in the cafes and clubs, of gatherings, manifestations, and - well, of hope. For, despite everything, there's an extremely strong, and growing hope, I even daresay, an upsurging belief, that the Ukrainian part of the dragon will be killed next Sunday with the free will of the people. Today the anchorman on the last Ukrainian free TV channel yet unclosed (Channel 5) was smiling the same way people were yesterday in the streets. (For quite a while persecuted, now sued, Channel 5 is under the threat of being closed tomorrow night - but the anchorman was smiling like a winner.) Now covering no more than 30% of the country's territory, Channel 5 was the only one which gave a full report on the events of the last night. Characteristically, none of the beaten witnesses sounded "victimized" - they all talked indignantly, but righteously: that is, like people aware of their rights, and ready to protect them. It's a totally irrational, yet overwhelming feeling: that "we", the people, are stronger than "them", the corrupted power. And that it's "them", not "us", who is scared. On the night of the elections I'll be in the streets, too. I don't know what is going to happen there. That is, what forces will be turned against us, and what will be the final result. Yet, even if the worst happens, and the Putin's bayonets help to turn my country, for God-knows-how-long, into a criminal-presided reservation of the degraded Stalinist type, we'll be in the streets - if only to be able to say, that THIS IS NOT OUR CHOICE. Knowing how easily (and, more than once, eagerly!) does Western press buy the "made-in-Russia" political myths on the current Ukrainian situation (on Ukraine being allegedly "split" into East and West, "pro-Russian" and "pro-Western", Russian-speaking and Ukrainian-speaking parts, each of them allegedly delegating its own candidate for the presidency), I just wanted to let you know how the things look and feel here in the reality. By spreading the truth further, you'll make your own contribution into killing the dragon. For, as we all know from this old guy Orwell (WHO on earth has ever been so careless to have claimed him outdated?) - what the dragon needs most badly for its survival, is precisely the fake, artificially constructed mental picture. And - needless to say that - the agony of the dragon should by no means be lightheartedly taken as a local process only... It's not a farewell letter - it's a letter of hope. Please keep your fingers for us this week! With warmest regards, Oksana Zabuzhko http://www.zabuzhko.com -- AGNI Magazine Sven Birkerts, Editor William Pierce, Senior Editor Check out our website, featuring online-only work: http://agni.bu.edu "Poetry is very different from philosophical thinking. And yet it cannot base or build its difference on ignoring it. I think the difference should be conscious; poetry should have a conscious relationship to the field of thinking, which is the field of contradictions. Starting from there, poetry has something, some supplement-what the French call the supplement d'ame, the supplement of the soul." -- from "Between Athens & Jerusalem: A Conversation with Adam Zagajewski" by Brian Barker and Todd Samuelson, in AGNI Online To subscribe to an AGNI email list, or unsubscribe, go to: http://www.bu.edu/agni/agnimail/index.html From vivek at sarai.net Thu Oct 28 15:33:46 2004 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 15:33:46 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] how one leak happened Message-ID: <4180C402.7000908@sarai.net> This link to a very interesting article in the Village Voice gives a detailed account of how soldiers leaked some information to their families. V. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Village Voice - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0443/robbins.php The Soldiers Who Said No by Tom Robbins A pair of Mississippi women challenge the army brass on behalf of their soldier-husbands in Iraq -- Vivek Narayanan Senior Content Editor (English) The Sarai Programme Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110054. Work Phone: (91-11) 2396 0040 Mobile: (91-0) 98109 36654 Fax: (91-11) 2392 8391 From diya at sarai.net Thu Oct 28 19:06:25 2004 From: diya at sarai.net (diya at sarai.net) Date: 28 Oct 2004 13:36:25 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Read this story Message-ID: <20041028133625.10672.qmail@mail.expressindia.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041028/92f54aaa/attachment.html From audijit at yahoo.com Thu Oct 28 12:03:47 2004 From: audijit at yahoo.com (Arijit Paul) Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 23:33:47 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Khetro Broadsheet02 article- Screen, Stage, and the Multiplex Message-ID: <20041028063347.3762.qmail@web52507.mail.yahoo.com> Dear friends, I have got of the khetro broadsheet02. This issue focuses on the ongoing debate about the changing shape of cinema and theatre with the intervention of newer technologies. It also carries articles on Bengali desktop on Linux platform, and the development of interactive identification keys for monitoring biodiversity. I think the articles will be of interest to many of you. So I am posting them for open reading and discussion. Arijit. THIRD POSTING: Screen, Stage, and the Multiplex Nilanjan Bhattacharya Multiplexes are in and the cinema halls are not yet out though - but are facing a serious threat to their existence. It�s evident that this time the city of Calcutta is not against the turn. Three multiplexes with multiple film-screening options are already in existence and a few more are coming up soon. Cinema as an �art� might be facing the hardest challenge since it�s invention more than 100 years ago. The Challenge of being sold as a �product� along with many other products which do not have any relation with �art� per se. It is a reality that multiplexes have enhanced the choices of viewing, simply by keeping multiple film screening theatres in one arena. And other options for consumers - like fashion garments, fast food, footwear and accessories - have followed. Sometimes this could happen in reverse order. At least in these multiplex units the �film� and the �product� relationship is quite evident. People of the cities in India have now more options to choose from, about what they are going to do for the day, simply by standing inside a multiplex. And it seems like that they want to avail of this newfound autonomy. Being the government body responsible for the city�s management, the Calcutta Municipal Corporation (CMC) - or in its new appellation, the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) - with their plans to develop shopping malls, plazas, amusement parks and many other things, had already entered the big booming construction industry in our neo-Kolkata. In tune with this, they have taken up a project, which comes up as a pioneering initiative in the Indian context - turning the Star Theatre into a theatre multiplex. Star Theatre is a glorious name associated with Bengali culture, as it was a thriving centre for commercial theatre since 1883. It also reminds us of a number of legendary theatre stalwarts like Girish Ghosh, Binodini Dasi, Amarendra Dutta, Ardhendusekhar, Prabha Devi, Sishir Bhaduri and many others down the ages. The Star was first inaugurated on 21st July 1883 at Beadon Street in North Calcutta. It closed down in the year 1887. The theatre came up again on 25th May 1888 at 75/3, Cornwallis Street, Calcutta, under different ownership and it remained open till 14th October 1991, the day it was devastated by a fire. KMC had acquired the site in 2001. The multiplex will be inaugurated on 13th October 2004 on the auspicious day of Mahalaya. The history of Bengal�s proscenium theatre dates back more than 200 years. Even before the formalization of proscenium commercial theatre in Bengal, the theatre or �play� used to be considered as a �product� for entertaining the viewers. Performances of plays at rich people�s courtyards in earlier days, or later, the use of words like bhalo samogry (good product), notun notun jinish (new things), on the top of the advertisement handbills to mention the production itself, supports this orientation. The idea of making �the product� or the play more interesting to draw more viewers had influenced the directors, playwrights, and the producers of Bengali theatre. The regular practice of putting independent song and group dance items in between plays, or in the beginning, or at the end, were meant to add the variety and to increase the level of entertainment for the viewers. This trend increased with Amarendra Nath Dutta, who brought realism to the Bengal stage by introducing more realistic sets, backdrops, and live properties for the first time, during his period (1897-1916) of work as a director, actor, playwright, and producer. Amarendra Dutta with his Classic Theatre group brought in basic changes in marketing strategy too. By improving the paper quality, design and printing, of the advertisements on handbills, introducing catchy, colloquial and slightly subversive language in handbills and newspaper advertisement columns, printing programmes on hand fans which were to be distributed among the viewers, Amaraendranath used to goad sustained debates and enthusiasm with each of his plays, in a way similar to the marketing of a �product� nowadays. Much before Amrendra Dutta came onto the scene, the Great National Theatre (1873-1877) had introduced the concept of the �free gift� for the viewers. This practice continued for some time. Emerald Theatre (1887-1897) distributed earrings and rings among the viewers, the National Theatre used to distribute free gifts by lottery as the show tickets used to carry numbers for the draw. Ranging from umbrellas, or a bag of coal, to even a slice of pumpkin, the gift items were exhibited in front of the footlights! Amarendra Dutta�s Classic Theatre had distributed books, like the complete works of the Bengali poet and playwright Michael Madhusudan Dutta and Sabdakalpodrum, as free gifts. All these acts and strategies had positive effects temporarily on ticket sales. It is also evident that the strategy of distributing free gifts on a purchased show ticket had reflected the act of tagging two or more �products� together even in those days. We can also see the same trend in performances by foreign theatre companies here in Calcutta. Much later, an advertisement on 23rd Ddecember1936 in The Statesman, carried an announcement of a free gift - a Hillman �MINX� car - to the lucky winner on the last day of the performance of the Hollywood musical, �Swing Time� at the New Empire. >From today�s point of view a very strange thing took place in the entertainment scene in Calcutta more than 100 years ago. Again, Amarendranath Dutta was the man behind it. He had introduced the screening of the bioscope on the Bengali stage for the first time before the beginning of his play, �Alibaba�, on 4th April 1898 at Classic Theatre. (According to Shankar Bhattacharya�s Bangla Rangalayey Itihasher Upadan, the first time the bioscope was screened on stage in Calcutta was at the Minerva Theatre on 31st January 1898.) Within a year of its invention, the bioscope was screened for the first time in India in a Bombay hotel on 7th July 1896. Screenings of small length �moving pictures� began in Calcutta in the same year. Those were the early days of �cinema� and the cinema hadn�t really found its definition yet. Before the bioscope came people around the world never had the experience of seeing such a �technology miracle� in front of their eyes. No wonder that the advertisements of the Bioscope used to carry such phrases like, �the eighth wonder of the universe�. The surprise value was very high at that time which had attracted people to this newborn �media�. And like a senior, a big brother, Bengali theatre had tried to adopt that child into his own family, to bring it under his roof. To the theatre directors and producers of the time, the bioscope was a new �product�, which they found could go very well with the theatre performances to increase a production�s commercial draw. A list of productions of the Star Theatre from Shankar Bhattacharya�s Bangla Rangalayey Itihasher Upadan, shows that all the evenings of the theatre performances between 2nd November 1898 to 31st December �98 were accompanied by bioscope screenings at the end of the play. A typical evening�s programme, like, for instance, that on 29th October �98 included a bioscope show at the end of the play Babu. The screen showed the death of Lord Nelson, Queen Victoria�s Diamond Jubilee celebrations and the funeral procession of William Gladstone. The screenings were followed by live entertainment - The Rainbow Dance by Miss Nelly Mountcastle. It�s also very significant that within the above mention period, out of 26 days of performances there were 11 different plays performed. This statistic shows the conscious efforts by the producers, directors and the playwrights to attract more viewers by offering variety. Almost everything was attempted � mythology, comedy, social tragedy, even patriotism. On the other hand, to an enthusiastic director like Amarendranath, who had always believed in experimenting with different aspects of theatre, the bioscope had come up with a whole lot of possibilities of experimenting within the structure of the play itself. An announcement of the Classic Theatre in 1901 narrates: A series of superfine pictures from our world renowned plays Vramar, Alibaba, Hariraj, Dolo Lila, Budha, Sitaram, Sarala etc. will be produced to extreme astonishment of our patrons and friends.   With the help of Amarendranath, Hiralal Sen�s Royal Bioscope Company picturised some small scenes from the various plays of Amarendranath. Amarendranath had used those scenes in between his plays. Like in the play Bhromor, an outdoor scene showed the hero, Gobindalal (Amarendranath) approaching land from the river. He was on a boat. As soon as the picture ended, viewers could see Gobindalal entering the house on the stage! It was true that Amarendranath had used that technique primarily to thrill his viewers but consciously or unconsciously he had actually improvised and adopted a style, which later on became an accepted mode for many modern theatre directors. In this context it�s quite interesting to observe the early attempts to bring in the sense of multiplicity by offering variations like putting bioscope scenes in the middle of theatre shows, or performing a different play each day. Other attractive elements like, magic shows and dance performances, either before or after the main play, were also thought up to boost the same sense of multiplicity itself. So one may say that an undefined structure for providing variety to the clientele/audience was very much in existence in those days. Though there was no concept of multiple stages or screens then, like today�s multiplexes offer, the provision of multiple choices to the viewers (seven different plays in a week), the implementation of aggressive marketing strategies (free gifts, media hype, catchy advertisements) or the adoption of modern techniques and technologies, were efforts to boost the �trade�. In a way, the early theatre industry of Bengal had created an ambience quite similar to the present day multiplex. Now, when the entertainment industry is at another point of transition, two of our most powerful media art forms are taking a turn towards a new definition of �art entertainment�. Probably, with this strange twirl of the �history� or the �market�, the infrastructures of both the theatre and the cinema industries are going to look almost the same. It seems that they both are destined to be sold, catered and distributed as �products� along with so many similar or different kinds of products available in the market. But at the same time we cannot deny the fact that cinema and theatre stand apart from other �products� simply by their power to mesmerize people. Both could also provide the viewers food for thought, which may make them feel empowered. These are the qualities, which still hold the position of these art-entertainment forms quite high in society. The closing down of more than 15 cinema halls within the main city of Calcutta, in a span of five years, and the obliteration of Bengali commercial theatre, have signalled a kind of transition. Apparently it seems that the youth of Calcutta have embraced their newfound conviction in �multiplexism�. Already 3 multiplexes with multiple cinema screening facilities have come up in the city, and another four (which all together will have 24 screening theatres) will come into existence soon. The Star multiplex will have one theatre stage, one seminar hall and one open stage � all centrally air-conditioned. The Mayor�s commitment goes, �the chairs in the Star theatre hall will be same as �Inox� screening theatre�. The similarity does not end there. Inside the Star Multiplex there would be a caf�, fast food stalls and gift shops. There would surely be free gifts, competitions, prizes and pizzas� With the digital revolution, new ideas have started flooding in followed by the newer technologies both in the fields of cinema and theatre. New demands for widening the creative interactions, exchange, and forms, have come up. Now it is important to observe how much space or scope the multiplexes provide for the new kind of films or theatres. Or, indeed, how the new generation of filmmakers or theatre directors can take advantage of these multiplexes. References: Bangla Shitya O Chalochchitra by Dr. Nisith Kr. Mukhopadhay/ Bangla Rangaloyer Itihasher Upadan by Shankarlal Bhattacharya/ Bangali Modhyobitter Theatre by Dr. Prosun Mukhopadhay/ Rangalayey Amarendranath by Ramapati Dutta/ Rangalayey Trish Bwatsar by Apareshchandra Mukhopadhay/ Natyochinta 20th anniversary issue * Nilanjan Bhattacharya is a researcher and filmmaker, based in Calcutta. --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041027/c6fd3fb3/attachment.html From audijit at yahoo.com Thu Oct 28 12:16:39 2004 From: audijit at yahoo.com (Arijit Paul) Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 23:46:39 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Khetro Broadsheet02 article- LIFKEY/LIFDAT Identification Keys for PLants and Animals Message-ID: <20041028064639.7170.qmail@web52507.mail.yahoo.com> Dear friends, I have got of the khetro broadsheet02. This issue focuses on the ongoing debate about the changing shape of cinema and theatre with the intervention of newer technologies. It also carries articles on Bengali desktop on Linux platform, and the development of interactive identification keys for monitoring biodiversity. I think the articles will be of interest to many of you. So I am posting them for open reading and discussion. Arijit. FOURTH POSTING: LIFKEY / LIFDAT Identification Keys for Plants and Animals Introduction We live in a land rich in diversity of life. With a little over 2% of world's land mass India harbours around 8% of its plant and animal species. We also lead the world's tropical, biodiversity rich countries in our knowledge of our plants and animals. Yet, this knowledge is fragmentary, and much more information is needed to address the challenge of conserving and sustainably using these biodiversity resources effectively. Given the tremendous variation from place to place and time to time in the distribution of biodiversity, there was a need for developing a countrywide system of inventory and periodically monitoring biodiversity. For this purpose one needs experts and the experts will need to be an integral part of a network involving participants from every school, college and university, from every village and town. But for such a participatory effort to be possible, people must have easy access to attractively prepared information on our living heritage which are already been prepared and documented. A beginning in this direction was made in 1942 with the publication of Salim AIi's "Book of Indian Birds". With its colour plates and succinct accounts, this book has served to attract thousands of people to bird watching, and these people have, in turn, generated a great deal of information on India's bird life, as may be seen from the unbroken publication over forty years of the "Newsletter for Bird-watchers". But even then very limited additional material on birds and other groups of plants and animals has become available over the last 62 years. There are several reasons behind it including the lack of serious research and fieldwork, and cost ineffectiveness of printing such books with accurate colour plates of groups of plants or animals. Now with the advent of digital technology which is easily accessible, user-friendly and inexpensive, new and effective documentation devices have emerged. Interactive identification keys LlKEY/LlFDAT, a part of the Project Lifescape of the Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science and the Indian Academy of Sciences, is an attempt to take advantage of easy accessible digital technology to develop attractive, user-friendly resource material. This material aims to inform all people, especially the youth, about the wealth of India's living diversity and encourage them to get involved in a countrywide network of monitoring biodiversity. Furthermore, LlKEY/LlFDAT is designed as a participatory programme, which hopes to engage large numbers of people, taxonomists and software experts, teachers and naturalists, photographers and writers in further development of the resource material. LlKEY/LlFDAT currently has three components: (a) An interactive key for the identification of a set of species, (b) Illustrated descriptions of character states used in the key, (c) Illustrated species descriptions. It takes advantage of a computer's capability to employ a probabilistic algorithm using Bayesian inference so that when information is entered on a series of attributes of an organism, the programme generates a list of likely species in decreasing order of probability. This reduces the risk, ever present with the traditional branching keys, of being led down a wrong path with a single error. LlFKEY keys are based on a set of attributes with different character states chosen so as to be easily accessible, relatively constant and unambiguous. In case of birds, for instance, the attributes chosen include: whether the bird has long legs, long tail, prominent beak or a crest, its primary and secondary colours, its habitat and microhabitat, activity pattern, flocking habits and so on. It also uses the time of the year and geographical locality where the bird is observed to take advantage of the information on the patterns of seasonal migrations and geographical distributions of birds. In case of flowering plants the attributes chosen include habit, leaf arrangement, size of the leaf, leaf type, leaf margin, presence and nature of the bark, flower arrangement, flower size, flower colour, fruit shape and so on. For any given attribute, such as leaf shape, we do not ask the user to differentiate amongst the relatively large number of alternative states recognized by the botanists, but only amongst seven more simply defined character states, namely, 1.Linear, 2.Spearhead-shaped, 3.Elliptical, 4.Egg-shaped, 5.Heart-shaped, 6.Round, and 7.Lobed. The key is supported by descriptions and colour illustrations of the various alternative character states for all the attributes used in the key. This should help the user make an appropriate choice amongst the alternatives offered for the attribute under consideration. It is not essential that the user indicate a choice against all the attributes, the key can be operated with incomplete information. The initial version covers 100 species of birds and 262 species of flowering plants. The algorithm The key starts off with the assumption that there are certain prior probabilities of observing a particular species, for instance, of birds. The simplest assumption is that the probabilities are the same for all the species, so that with 100 species from amongst which to select, each species has an equal chance of 1/100 of being the one under consideration. One may adjust these, so that commoner species such as house crows are assigned higher prior probabilities. The probabilities are then modified whenever an observation as to some specific character state of the bird under consideration is recorded. Thus if the principal colour of the bird is recorded as black, the probability of the bird being a house crow or black drongo goes up, while that of its being a cattle egret or a roseringed parakeet goes down. LlFKEY includes detailed descriptions and several colour illustrations of all the species. Taking advantage of the multi-media facilities it also includes various calls of the bird species represented in the database. So the observer can examine the higher ranked choices offered and decide on the possible correct choice by studying the descriptions and images, and listening to calls. Free Software The current version employs Microsoft Access as the backend database with a Visual Basic front-end. LlFKEY and LlFDAT(mathay goler modhey capital R ditey hobey, bodhhoi copyrighter simbol) have been registered as Trademarks by the Indian Institute of Science and the software as well as the database have been copyrighted. The database includes contributions from a number of nature photographers and recordists of birdcalls. These contributors have been fully acknowledged and they continue to retain the copyrights over their own material. The intention is to offer both the software for the interactive key and the database for further development under GNU General Public License. The licenses for most software are designed to take away one's freedom to share and change it. By contrast, the GNU General Public License is intended to guarantee everyone's freedom to share and change software - to make sure the software is free for all its users. This General Public License applies to most of the Free Software Foundation's software and to any other program whose authors commit to using it. The work is on to develop a web-based version of LlFKEY and LlFDAT by employing an open source MYSQL database and PYTHON/ PHP front-end. It will soon be available in other Indian local languages. The aspiration is that as free software, both LlFKEY and LlFDAT would serve as the starting point of a process of continual improvement and development by an ever-growing group of collaborators. There are obviously manifold possibilities of further work, both in terms of the algorithm employed, the code and the database. The user interface can also be made much more attractive. Biologists and amateur naturalists can improve species descriptions, add data on new species and add images and calls. Users can select subsets of species appropriate for their own purpose. LlFKEY and LlFDAT awaits further development and constant upgradation but that's only possible once the acquired knowledge from the fieldwork will start coming in and these software find more users as well as collaborators and contributors. *Excerpted from a note on the LIFEKEY/LIFEDAT Identification Keys prepared by the Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041027/4cfd0910/attachment.html From audijit at yahoo.com Thu Oct 28 12:23:46 2004 From: audijit at yahoo.com (Arijit Paul) Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 23:53:46 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Khetro Broadsheet 02 article- Computing in Bangla Message-ID: <20041028065346.9172.qmail@web52507.mail.yahoo.com> Dear friends, I have got of the khetro broadsheet02. This issue focuses on the ongoing debate about the changing shape of cinema and theatre with the intervention of newer technologies. It also carries articles on Bengali desktop on Linux platform, and the development of interactive identification keys for monitoring biodiversity. I think the articles will be of interest to many of you. So I am posting them for open reading and discussion. Arijit. FIFTH POSTING: Computing in BanglaIntroduction When we look for clothes in the wardrobe we do not search anymore, we google. Computer and its terminologies and experiences have become part of urban every day life. Its no more the days of seeing computers only on the railway ticket counters. With Internet it has created new definition for private and public world. Email, chat, search engines, mailing lists, portals, blogs has changed our experience of time, space and speed many fold. Newspapers and televisions are no more the only source of information from all over the world. Mailing lists and blogs maintained by different people on different subject provide access to numerous concepts and ideas. Though many online libraries and databases are password protected, but even then many more articles, essays and narratives are freely available to us. Most important, in urban India access to computers is not expensive compared to major cities in the world [http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/2001-April/000042.html]. When I receive email saying "Joyda, kemon achcho, ami New York e notun chakri niye ese ekhono bhishon nervous", though written for some other Joy Chatterjee, still I feel excited. And finally when I get a email with Bengali or Hindi script in its subject field, I know time has come when to write means pressing keys on a keyboard and not holding a pen. We need books, copies, alias desktops and software in Bengali. We have Bengali and other Indian language fonts in computers for years to publish books etc. But the computing itself is still done in English. The desktops, software and all kind of usage on computer are based in English. Is it possible to open a pata rather than opening a document in a text editor? Is it possible to do such thing? Can we expect any one to do it? Can we expect a giant like Microsoft to do it for us? Yes, we can and they are doing it. But looking at the interface of Microsoft Office Hindi one of my friends didn�t like the translation of the terms and commands. Hindi has huge debate about use of Arabic/Persian and Sanskrit words. We have seen sanskritisation of Bengali language in 19th Century; similarly Hindi had also gone through similar process in 19th and 20th Century. However, today Hindi has many versions including different versions spoken in different parts of North India. So it is almost impossible to visualize all Hindi speakers using only one version of Hindi. Or can we have software in Bengali that suits the diverse users whether in Calcutta, Purulia or Chittagong. Or one can cutomise the terms, commands, icons according to his/her choice. Presently Ankur Bangla Project working extensively on developing desktop, applications, fonts etc. in Bengali in GNU-Linux as GNU-Linux gives us freedom to create, use, modify, share desktop, software or documentations as per our usage, desire or whims. The Ankur Bangla Project The Ankur Bangla Project [www.bengalinux.org] is a collaborative initiative aimed at bringing Bangla to the FLOSS desktop. Comprising of volunteers, developers, translators, graphic artists, linguists and technocrats from India, Bangladesh and other parts of the world, the Ankur Bangla Project aims to make Bangla Computing possible. The ideal of the project is �Empowering People� and the core objective reflects the effort to make available a completely localized GNU/Linux OS. Simultaneously it provides a scalable and standardized technological infrastructure for Bangla Computing. The project covers all aspects of localization (L10n) of GNU/Linux. Thus it aims to provide a complete 'Bangla Computing experience' while also creating a standard framework and computing infrastructure (at least at the technological level) that makes such computing scalable and economically deployable. The Ankur Bangla Project aims to enhance Bangla computing experience by making data transactions, data search and retrieval feasible in Bangla. Based on a completely localized User Interface (screenshots available at www.bengalinux.org/screenshots, the group aims to provide the entire toolchain required to implement such localized computing on an functional scale. A Localised Low Cost Computing (L2C2) framework and accessibility program involving Text-to-Speech in Bengali are in the development phase. These 2 projects although at the drawing-board level are of social relevance. Currently Ankur Bangla Project is working on quite a few projects. Even though these projects are part of the effort to support Bengali on Linux, the end result of most of these projects actually provide multi-platform support. Following are some of the projects: GNOME Bengali Translation: Bengali translation for GNOME desktop. KDE Bengali Translation: Bengali translation for KDE desktop. Red Hat Linux Bengali Translation: Bengali translation for Red Hat Linux Distribution. Mandrake Linux Bengali Translation: Bengali translation for Mandrake Linux Distribution. Bengali Google: Unicode compliant Bengali version of Google search engine. Bengali Dictionary: Goal is to have an free Unicode compliant Bengali dictionary, spell checker, etc. Free Bangla Fonts Project: Dedicated for creating Free, high quality, completely Unicode compliant Open Type Bangla fonts. Lekho: It is a plain text editor designed to take in phonetic input from a standard US keyboard and convert (transliterate) it online into bangla text. The text is stored as unicode ( UTF-8 ) and can be read by any unicode aware application. Archive of Bengali literature: The goal of this project is to create an archive of public domain Bengali literature accessible through the internet. Ankur Bangla Live! CD: A LiveCD running a localiced version of GNOME 2.4 (Bangla GNOME). A GNU/Linux community at Madhyamgram Madhyamgram is around 40 minutes by train from Kolkata, and is really not the archetypal suburban township. In the midst of such surroundings flourishes a GNU/Linux Community - the GNU/Linux Thek The GLT-Madhyamgram is an initiative of Dipankar Das, who stumbled onto the F/L OSS world by accident. Tired of being the victim of virus attacks on Microsoft platforms, he turned towards GNU/Linux and GLT-Madhyamgram (or GLT-Mad as they fondly call it) is his way of contributing to the community. "The GLT-Mad is a physical helpdesk on matters regarding GNU/Linux", says he. Asked to elaborate on the concept, he illustrates the need for people to interact on a personal level so as to learn and unlearn. "The Internet provides a wealth of material on FLOSS, however it is best to provide a guiding path towards using the system optimally". GLT-Mad is structured to meet such a demand. The concept of a 'thek' was a deliberate attempt to break down the formal structure of 'prescribed learning' and make it more interactive and participatory. Being the founder member and the inspiration has led to Dipankar feeling the need to provide a customised content for the effort. The GLT-Mad thus has a Compilation CD which can be used by other such efforts across the country. He is also working on a primer on GNU/Linux in Bengali crystallising in simple terms the lessons and experience of the first session of the 'Thek'. GLT-Mad does not charge any money from the students, but Dipankar has no objection if other GLTs develop a revenue model. The GLT-book on 'GNU/Linux Iskool' is almost complete and awaiting a publisher who would be willing to realise the publishing model of the Free Software World. Dipankar believes that this book will be of immense help to those who want to use GNU/Linux but are daunted by the aura of 'magic'. GLT-Mad could also do with some of the information rich CDs like FreEduc and Customised Knoppix (like Gnoware) that help to demonstrate the power of GNU/Linux. Conclusion Coming back to idea of localization, there are many things to do. As I have already said that translating the desktops and applications is �Bangla� is not enough, it has to be further localized for different communities according to its culture and linguistic practices. While working with young kids on urban ecology we need software that uses putli for folder and instead of single word �documents� uses phool, pata, phol to talk about contents of the folder, that is, putli. --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041027/08331fc6/attachment.html From audijit at yahoo.com Thu Oct 28 12:29:59 2004 From: audijit at yahoo.com (Arijit Paul) Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 23:59:59 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Khetro Broadsheet 02 pending article Message-ID: <20041028065959.87653.qmail@web52509.mail.yahoo.com> Dear friends, There is another article by Ravi Vasudevan- Film and Cinema, in the Contemporary Media Landscape. I'll be posting the article as soon as I get the file. - Arijit. --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041027/855782bd/attachment.html From definetime at rediffmail.com Thu Oct 28 12:59:02 2004 From: definetime at rediffmail.com (sanjay ghosh) Date: 28 Oct 2004 07:29:02 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] (fwd) Cuba's comeback Message-ID: <20041028072902.2379.qmail@webmail28.rediffmail.com> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041028/1f952fd8/attachment.html -------------- next part --------------   Cuba's comeback Europe should take the lead in breaking the blockade Brian Wilson Thursday October 28, 2004 The Guardian At the United Nations today, a motion condemning the US blockade of Cuba will be carried with overwhelming support. The United Kingdom and all other EU countries will oppose the policy. It is an annual ritual which Washington will duly ignore. This will be the 13th occasion on which such a resolution has been brought forward, with the majority in support of it increasing year by year - 154 to three at the last count. It is not necessary to support Cuba's system of government in order to oppose the blockade, which has crippled the country's economy for 40 years and continues to impose huge privations upon the ordinary Cuban people. Extraterritorial action as pursued by the US against Cuba is flagrantly illegal and therefore extremely dangerous as a precedent. To the rest of the world that matters. To the US administration, particularly in election year, such niceties are of minimal interest. The fact that the UK and EU are opposed to this miserable vendetta should not be undervalued. One day US policy towards Cuba will change - and the question will then be whether we were leaders or mere followers. Quite recently, relations between Cuba and the EU deteriorated sharply. This drive came from the Aznar government in Spain, which had a particular animus towards its former colony as well as a deep attachment to Washington opinion. The expression of this diplomatic freeze was a childish ploy commended by the American Interests Section in Havana. Some EU ambassadors started inviting to embassy functions leading dissidents whom the Cubans regard as fifth columnists in a bitter war of attrition. The outcome was predictable and intended: the Cuban government boycotted these events and other contacts declined. Unfortunately, the UK was seen as a ringleader in this activity, though I am certain no such policy was instigated here. The change of government in Spain has opened up an avenue which can lead to the restoration of normal relationships between EU countries and Cuba. Earlier this month, the new Spanish ambassador in Havana said that agreement on a new policy towards Cuba "is only a matter of time - and not much time". I hope he is right. The biggest factors in driving a new, post-election policy towards Cuba will come from within the US itself. The current position is riddled with hypocrisies. Prior to a recent tightening of restrictions, the US was Cuba's second biggest supplier of tourists and its largest supplier of imported food. Republican governors from the farm states beat a regular trail to Havana to nurture a market which their constituents want to serve. Even in Florida, rapid change is taking place. The vast majority of Cuban-Americans are not political refugees but economic migrants. They no more want to be barred from going home or sending back money to help their families than any other immigrant community. In the latter stages of the Clinton presidency, the policy had moved towards engagement rather than persecution. Soon the same trend will be resumed, but the EU should get there first. Last month, a survey by the Cuba Solidarity Campaign produced responses from 402 MPs who said they would oppose any military aggression against Cuba. That's a start, but maybe we could go a little further. · Brian Wilson is Labour MP for Cunninghame North brian_wilson_mp_@ hotmail.com From reyhanchaudhuri at eth.net Fri Oct 29 07:24:50 2004 From: reyhanchaudhuri at eth.net (reyhan chaudhuri) Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 18:54:50 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] The Unexpected Man Message-ID: <001501c4bd5a$4753d840$55e741db@ReyhanChaudhuri> Yasmina Reza-THE UNEXPECTED MAN transl by : Christopher Hampton / 27th October,2004. Just imagine! The eminently respectable and erstwhile book club at the French Resource Centre should choose a book to be discussed, that has 'four-letter words' right on the first page. Is this obscene? Is it blasphemous? Or is it just a telling message on the times? It may be because there are a lot of 'nouveau' elements in the book. · It proclaims to be a Drama. Drama! That is a form of literature (as opposed to prose or poetry) with people, conversations, juxtaposed dialogues and elaborate directions or indications of the set design, tone, nuances and even audience placements. Here however the author plunges directly into the action, that is if two people seated in a closed cubicle, can be called 'action. · If in a play the actors occasionally talk 'asides' (if at all) to express their 'self-thoughts', we have here the entire work contained with ruminant self-recriminations. · The tone and style of writing of the book is more like 'blank-verse' rather than dialogues or 'jeu des questions' and repondez s'il vous plait'. · The language is terse and snippety, very much like the modern vernacular, of any part of our global world. It teems with ambiguity and half-said contradictory utterances much like most of the concrete but hollow (and not hallowed;) depths of the contemporary world. · There is however no sequential suspense or mounting up of a conclusive finale like stereotypic novels. You plunge into ramblings and they end half-said.... · In consanguineous contradiction, barefaced and bold, it also exposes the multiple layers of the characters or the modern persona, of the new-age Homeo sapien. It reveals, how there are multitudinous consequences of our thoughts. The repercussions of impressions and incidents (however trivial upon the surface) are manifold. It does this plainly, without pompous oration and/or didactic expostulations. A synopsis of the book may be summed up simply as two people 'happen' to be on a train going to the continent. One is a 'fashionable' author and the other is a contemporary woman, who happens to be reading and carrying the latest book by the same author. They eventually talk but conversation is stilted and clumsy, perhaps pointless. In any case, the author though 'arrived' is laden-heavy with complexes of envy (remember his breezy friend-'Yuri),' undone achievement' (the secretary: Mrs.Credo) and self-recriminations(on the latest book and the inadequacies of choice of mate, by his daughter).The woman is in turn grappling with mixed emotions. her having lost Serge(more than a friend) the unfinished business with Georges.The basic unpredictability and half-hearted episodes of modern' life' On a personal note: I sympathise with the girl. Her predicament, when she runs into her favorite author ,in an 'ample-time' setting. How do you handle it and express your joy without shrill artifice. It reminds me of one of our contemporary authors-Vikram Seth. Whose poetry, travel book and the more recent novella on 'violinists' ,I've specially enjoyed(though it did not get rave reviews like his other books). The last one because being an avid listener of both Indian and Western classical music. It has always intrigued me, what kind of people become orchesta musicians, how they rehearse, how they eat and sleep.etc. In any case, I remember (this was a few years ago ,the world-famous Vienna symphony orchestra in town, in one of the large theatres of our city. It was house-full and because of terrorist threats and the President coming to inaugurate the concert, checking was slow and ponderous. It was just a complete coincidence, after frisking, when we stood in line(with my family) to just enter the hall ,who do you think should be right behind us with his sister and aunties? I can still recall with amusement, the futile emotions. I mean what do you do? Ask for an autograph?(Most embarrassing!) Do you nudge your family in front, to look behind in excitement? (A bit cheap!) .Or do you grab the 'shifty' chance to momentously exclaim, your views and impressions of his works.(Most pompous that!). I ofcourse just studied the programe and eventually, we found our way to our back ringside seats, under the dimming lights.(The famous author ofcourse probably went to the front / VIP seats, near the page-3 glitterati and papparazzi) Was it a lost chance? Not at all! Look at the girl's ineffectual/sheepish remarks to her author at the end. I think convince me ,I saved myself from a very cringing clumsy fiasco. Probable doubts or rethinks: There are certain lines in the book, which may be worth pondering upon or unravelling in the book-club session. Some of them which come to my mind on prior perusal are:- ? 1. The biography of a writer?Absolutely ridiculous. (Pg-3) 2.That's all they are working at,time takes it's familiar course. (Pg-9) 3.With the face and figure she's got,how could yu be pleasant.She's bound to have complexes,poor woman.(pg-11) ? 4.For a long time,I've been attacked by people who don't care for the the world and are tormented by non-stop suffering.It seemed to me that the desperate were the only profound,the only really attractvie people. ( pg-15) 5. You manufacture yourself,you shape hte raw material,then you lay it open tothe unexpected.( pg-15) 6.The whole evening had gone by under some star unshackeld from time 7.You cover your tracks,you personally invent protective misunderstandings because youre haunted by the fear of being understood. ( pg-27) ? 8. How to accept never being in control of time or loneliness. ( pg-41) ? 9. I prefer whirling dervishes to human rights. ( pg-43) 10.A splinter of life among so many others,a tiny pinprick in time,amid so much pointless loneliness,so many heaped-up splinters,scraps of deadwood scattered around our paths. (pg 47) 11. We keep on talking about other people,because we're made up of other people.Don't you agree? ( pg 51) 12. And if we didn't care what people said to us,why should we struggle on with a pursuit,which is at the mercy of outside opinion? ( pg 55) 13. How ould you account for the need to invent or dream up other lives? ( pg-63 ) 14. It's given me a nostalgia for what's never taken place. ( pg-65) CONCLUSION: This book is a complete turn-around from the last book (My Father's Glory-My Mother's Castle-Marcel Pagnol), we read for the club. If that was wistful and nostalgic, this is cold and cynical, (atleast on the first read). If that was heartwarming , this gets your soul shrivelled! If that was a celebration of life, this is a clinical judgment upon the helplessness of isolation or envy; It must be added however, (whether with a grudge or a condescension) that on further reflection it gets you thinking. It gets you to have a certain degree of wonderment .A slim book with only two characters that hardly speak 2 conventional dialogues, does manage to make the characters alive and evoke their background, with remarkable 'realness' or facile ease. It perhaps even manages to capture the cynicism and desultory departures of the 'id' of the neo-urban world. I do not come across a book like this everyday. Yours Extricately, Reyhan Chaudhuri. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041028/61f8f196/attachment.html From competition at viper.ch Thu Oct 28 13:50:39 2004 From: competition at viper.ch (VIPER Basel|=?ISO-8859-1?B?oA==?=Competition 2004) Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 10:20:39 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] VIPER BASEL | INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL FOR FILM VIDEO AND NEW MEDIA Message-ID: ______________________________________ VIPER BASEL NEWSLETTER ______________________________________ INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL FOR FILM VIDEO AND NEW MEDIA 18 - 22 NOVEMBER 2004 GENERATIONS ON THE MOVE ______________________________________ WWW.VIPER.CH ______________________________________ 1_VIPER SCREEENINGS EXHIBITION PERFORMANCES 2_VIPER CONFERENCE 3_VIPER FOCUS ART&CINEMA 4_VIPER FOCUS INTERACTION&SPACE 5_VIPER PARTNER EVENTS 6_VIPER SPECIALS ______________________________________ 1_VIPER SCREENINGS EXHIBITION PERFORMANCES VIPER Basel International Festival for Film Video and New Media will be running between Thursday, 18 November and Monday, 22 November 2004. The festival will present an extensive film/video and exhibition programme, a conference, workshops, performances and numerous premiers and events and offers an up-to-date overview over Swiss and international positions in art and new media. VIPER presents the best 133 works from the International Competition. Projects from renowned international art and research labs like the MIT Media Lab Europe/ Dublin, Interaction Design at the Royal College of Art/ London, MonteVideo Netherlands Media Institute/ Amsterdam, Eyebeam Atelier/New York and others. Festival venues: Kunsthalle Basel, Stadtkino Basel, Kultkino Atelier, Museum für Gegenwartskunst, [plug.in], Gare du Nord, Kaskadenkondensator, Cargo Bar, and others ______________________________________ 1_VIPER CONFERENCE Under the motto GENERATIONS ON THE MOVE VIPER is presenting an international Conference. Three subject areas will be up for discussion: PERFORMING TO SURVIVE focuses on equipping the world we live in with digital intelligent technologies. Individuals and collectives become players in the system - lifestyle or a subtle economy of control? TESTING THE CULTURAL AFFAIR enquires about cultural orientation and action in a globally networked world - authenticity in the digital age or multiple consumerism? PROBING CITIZENS WAKE introduces new so-called «governance» models. They stand for our hope of a self-determined constitution for post-industrial, knowledge-based societies - trans-national utopia or cleverly presented self-interest? Participants include: Piotr Cofta (Media Lab Europe Dublin/Trusting Technologies), Sylvia Harvey (University of Lincoln/Faculty of Media and Humanities), Dieter Lesage (Erasmusuniversität Brüssel/RITS) Anthony Dunne (Dunne & Raby, London), Brian Holmes (Multitude Paris), Michael Kieslinger (Fluidtime Wien/Interaction Institute IVREA Turin), Tiziana Traldi (Future Concept Lab Mailand/London), Greg Van Alstyne (Institute without Boundaries, Toronto), Omar Vulpinari (Benetton Fabbrica Interactive Treviso), and others The GENERATIONS ON THE MOVE conference is organised in conjunction with the Swiss Federal Office of Culture's Sitemapping,ch initiative. _____________________________________ 3_VIPER FOCUS ART&CINEMA It is impossible to ignore interactions between film and art, and since digital technologies have swept all before them this has been an increasingly exciting area of artistic action. VIPER BASEL 2004 presents a retrospective of the English artist and filmmaker Isaac Julien. ______________________________________ 4_INTERACTION&SPACE Entire industries, research and design departments are developing 'smart tools' and 'intelligent ambients'. VIPER BASEL presents projects and concepts: Ben Hooker/Shona Kitchen (UK), Katerine Moriwaki (US/IE) Michelle Teran (NL), Alison Sant/Ryan Shaw: Trace (US) and others ______________________________________ 5_VIPER PARTNER EVENTS PRO HELVETIA/XCULT(at)VIPER Official Launch 56kTV - bastard channel - Online Art Project A hybrid between a television and a Web project, an Internet platform that tells itself as the story of a television station. The station works with the low-tech and financial resources of Net art and has employees on four continents. METAWORX(at)VIPER 'Interaction&Process' - lectures, project presentations and performances Models and methods from a research programme in the interaction field. HYPERWERK(at)VIPER nomadics.campus - combining and mediating competences, offering resources and expertise as practised at Hyperwerk will be demonstrated. MEWI(at)VIPER The Institut für Medienwissenschaft, Universität Basel invites as part of the festival to an open seminar: students and visitors discuss selected works of the VIPER Exhibition with a focus on the topic «Aesthetics of Projection». PLUG.IN(at)VIPER 'copy - create - manipulate': The exhibition Cornelia Sollfrank: 'legal perspective' provides practical and theoretical insights into the explosive debate about ' creative commons', 'free art', 'open content' The relating panel discussion "Out of Balance" focuses on discrepancy and radical change in artistic practice and intellectual property. Participants include: Severine Dusollier (creative commons /Brussels), Jamie King (Mute / London), Stella Rollig (Lentos Museum / Linz) and others ______________________________________ 6_VIPER SPECIALS VIPER | OPENING Public Opening with a parcours on Thursday, 18 November 8 p.m., Kunsthalle Basel VIPER | PUBLIC PROJECTS Invitation to the audience to participate in an art project VIPER | DIGITAL ART NIGHT Saturday, 20 November starting at 7 p.m., reservation recommended VIPER | SCHOOL SPECIAL Programme for college and school students from all over Switzerland and the adjacent countries VPER | GUIDED TOURS Introduction and special interest programme ______________________________________ INFORMATION ON THE PROGRAMME AND ADMISSION: WWW.VIPER.CH VIPER BASEL IS LOOKING FORWARD TO YOUR VISIT! ______________________________________ ______________________________________ VIPER BASEL | St. Alban-Rheinweg 64 - 4052 Basel - CH |Tel +41.61.283 27 00 - Fax +41.61.283 27 05 ______________________________________ _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From sunil at mahiti.org Sun Oct 31 22:43:37 2004 From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham) Date: Sun, 31 Oct 2004 17:13:37 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Richard M. Stallman on the Free Software Movement and Patents Message-ID: <1099242817.1284.2744.camel@box> http://www.iosn.net/country/singapore/events/rms-singapore-2004/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Richard M. Stallman on the Free Software Movement and Patents ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Free Software movement highlights the issues regarding patents and the generalization and use of the term Intellectual Property Rights. For countries that are entering into global agreements such as WIPO, it is now crucial to assess the implications and impacts of international patent practises and policies, and to examine and assess the arguments introduced by the Free Software movement. UNDP-APDIP International Open Source Network in collaboration with the School of Information Systems, Singapore Management University cordially invites you to attend an open session featuring Richard M. Stallman, founder of the Free Software movement. Topic Free Software Movement and Patents Date Monday, 1st November 2004 Time 4:00pm Venue Singapore Management University, SMU Auditorium, Bukit Timah Campus, 469 Bukit Timah Road, Singapore 259756 Registration On-line registration is required as there are limited seats available. Please register as early as possible and take note that registration closes on 28 October 2004. Click here to register. If you have any queries, please write to SISseminar at smu.edu.sg. Agenda Open Session Time: 4:00pm - 5:30pm * Welcome Address * Shum Kam Hong, Practice Associate Professor, School of Information Systems, Singapore Management University * Sunil Abraham, Manager, International Open Source Network * Talk by Richard M. Stallman * Discussant * Harish Pillay, Business Development Manager,Red Hat Asia Pacific * Arvind Verma, Consultant, Enabler Technologies, Technology Office, Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) * Question and Answer Session * Tea Break Thanks, ಸುನೀಲ್ Thanks, ಸುನೀಲ್ -- Sunil Abraham, sunil at mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA Ph/Fax: +91 80 51150580. Mobile: +91 80 36701931 Currently on sabbatical with APDIP/UNDP Manager - International Open Source Network Wisma UN, Block C Komplex Pejabat Damansara. Jalan Dungun, Damansara Heights. 50490 Kuala Lumpur. P. O. Box 12544, 50782, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Tel: (60) 3-2091-5167, Fax: (60) 3-2095-2087 sunil at apdip.net http://www.iosn.net http://www.apdip.net From shivamvij at gmail.com Sun Oct 31 15:22:41 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Sun, 31 Oct 2004 15:22:41 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] 'Clean, efficient, on time. . . welcome to the new India' Message-ID: Clean, efficient, on time. . . welcome to the new India By Edward Luce Financial Times (London) | 30 October 2004 http://news.ft.com/cms/s/27154438-2a10-11d9-b3d1-00000e2511c8,ft_acl=,s01=1.html India's urban landscape is littered with half-completed infrastructure projects. But in six weeks' time, citizens of New Delhi will discover something unusually efficient. The Delhi Rail Metro, whose inaugural 18-stop elevated line has been running since March, will open the city's first underground rail link in early December. The line, which will connect Delhi University to Kashmir Gate, will be extended to Connaught Circus, Delhi's traditional shopping hub, and to parliament by next June. In September, a separate 23-station underground line will be opened - three months ahead of schedule. The project, mostly funded with Japanese soft loans, is starting to transform India's teeming capital. When completed, it will have 225 stations covering 245km of track. Technologically it will be a century ahead of most of the creaking lines of the London Underground. "We haven't done a study on the economic effects of the Delhi Metro but they will be substantial," says E. Sreedharan, managing director of Delhi Metro. "But already from the first line we see the effects on people's behaviour - they queue properly, there is no spitting, and it is a safe environment for women to travel." The social impact is visible to anyone travelling on the elevated line, which crosses the Jamuna river to link eastern Delhi with old Delhi. The journey takes 36 minutes, compared with two hours in one of Delhi's overcrowded - and often unsafe - buses. The platforms and carriages are spotlessly clean and the trains arrive bang on schedule every six minutes. There are no paper tickets: passengers use smart cards or smart tokens. Occasionally the commuter forgets this is New Delhi, so smooth is its functioning and orderly the passengers. "There is no eve-teasing [sexual harassment] on the Delhi Metro," says one female commuter, who now saves an hour a day in travel time. "And there are no traffic jams. Always it is on time." By 2009 the network will link New Delhi to Gurgaon, a booming satellite town in the neighbouring state of Haryana, which is also a magnet for many of India's call centres and back- office processing units. It will also extend to Noida, another investment hub, to the east of Delhi in the state of Uttar Pradesh. The roads to both destinations are usually snarled with traffic. But Mr Sreedharan says the impact of the Delhi Metro extends far beyond north India. Already feasibility studies have been conducted in the cities of Bangalore, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad and Mumbai, India's commercial capital, where it would be possible to have only elevated rail since much of the city is built on reclaimed land. By completing each phase of the project ahead of schedule (so far), Delhi Metro has demonstrated that large infrastructure projects can succeed in India. The new Congress-led government has set a target to attract $150bn (€118bn, £82bn) of foreign investment in infrastructure in the next decade. The Delhi Metro also shows that partnerships between the private sector and the public sector can work. Japanese and German contractors are involved at every stage of the $1.5bn project, although ownership is in public hands. "We are redefining the nature of infrastructure projects in India," says Mr Sreedharan. The most impressive section - and the hub for Delhi's north-south and east-west lines - will be at Connaught Circus, which will open in June. The cavernous underground station, which will be visible from the landscaped park above it, is already taking shape amid the masonry and subterranean scaffolding. Just two miles away, at New Delhi's main overground railway station, India's traditional infrastructure still advertises its Victorian roots. There are no smart tickets and the platforms are crowded with hawkers, "coolies" and passengers, some waiting hours for late trains. Although he has been invited, Laloo Prasad Yadav, India's minister for railways, has yet to find the time to visit the Delhi Metro, according to officials. But many are hoping that Mr Yadav, whose priorities do not yet include the modernisation of India's rusting railways network, the second largest in the world, will draw lessons from the Delhi Metro. "What we have here is a massive demonstration effect," says one government economist. "Imagine - of all things - a modernised Indian railways network." From avinash at csdsdelhi.org Fri Oct 29 12:35:51 2004 From: avinash at csdsdelhi.org (Avinash Jha) Date: Fri, 29 Oct 2004 12:35:51 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Power and Complicity/Plan X Message-ID: <001301c4bd85$1c2cbad0$4a00a8c0@library> Isaac: It is true that we cannot just conjure up an absolute other in the form of "US power" or anything else and sit pretty. US power is founded upon a complex set of institutions, relationships, dreams, desires. So much so that we can even look for our own complicity with this same very power which we are naming thus. For this we cannot rely on a small, boxed item which I had posted. This piece wanted to raise one doubt and ask some questions about the US regime, media and their interrelationship. But before we move on, I want to say something which is actually a matter concerning the politics of knowledge. In our search for the subtle and in our desire to escape the gross, we overlook the gross which exists. It seems obvious that a majority of world population today understands the US policy of domination and considers it illegitimate. This common perception is quite valid. Perception of the gross is not gross, even if it is tiresome. And what complex set of perceptions, attitutes, values it is associated with is varied and not easily deducible. Everyone begins from such common perceptions and then moves on to complexities. The problem arises when we reject what has been named thus in common perceptions not because they are not true, but because we have got hold of some subtelties. We are perfectly justified in challenging these perceptions and such naming if they are not true. Or, we can say - "so what?" - as you in some sense are saying. But in order to make precise, fine maps, we cannot forget what it is we are trying to make the map of. Such forgetting will cut the roots of our understanding. Having said that, I may have ignored the dimension of our own complicity with power which Shuddha and you were trying to point to. Our complicity cannot be reduced to the complicity of Indian state, though, and our complicity with the Indian state. That may be one dimension. I am taking the easy way out and posting a piece by Raymond Williams below. As one possible starting point for thinking about it... Plan X (excerpted from *The Year 2000* by Raymond Williams; written in 1983) It is usually taken for granted that to think about the future, as a way of changing the present, is a generous activity, by people who are not only seriously concerned but also, in those familiar adjectives, forward-looking, reforming, progressive. All the good ideas are on this side; all the bad or disappointing practice on the other. There is a question of how far we can go on with this easy assumption. As things now are, all the good ideas, and especially the ways in which they connect or might connect with how people are actually living, have to be rigorously re-examined. Yet there is another check to the assumption. It used to be taken for granted that the opposing forces were not themselves forward-looking: that they were, in those equally familiar adjectives, conservative, regressive, reactionary. Many of them indeed still are, but we misread the current situation if we rely on this easy contrast. There is now a very important intellectual tendency, with some real bases in political power, which is as closely concerned with thinking and planning the future as any reforming or progressive group. Within this tendency the signals are not being jammed but are being carefully listened to. Yet there is then the deliberate choice of a very different path: not towards sharing the information and the problems, or towards the development of general capacities to resolve them. What is chosen instead, intellectually and politically, is a new hard line on the future: a new politics of strategic advantage. I call this new politics 'Plan X'. It is indeed a plan, as distinct from the unthinking reproduction of distraction. But it is different from other kinds of planning, and from all other ways of thinking about the future, in that its objective is indeed 'X': a willed and deliberate unknown, in which the only defining factor is advantage. It is obvious that this has connections with much older forms of competitive scheming and fighting, and with a more systematised power politics. There are all too many precedents for its crudeness and harshness. But what is new in 'Plan X' politics is that it has genuinely incorporated a reading of the future, and one which is quite as deeply pessimistic, in general terms, as the most extreme readings of those who are now campaigning against the nuclear arms race or the extending damage of the ecological crisis. The difference of 'Plan X' people is that they do not believe that any of these dangerous developments can be halted or turned back. Even where there are technical ways they do not believe that there are possible political ways. Thus while as a matter of public relations they still talk of solutions, or of possible stabilities, their real politics and planning are not centred on these, but on an acceptance of the indefinite continuation of extreme crisis and extreme danger. Within this harsh perspective, all their plans are for phased advantage, an effective even if temporary edge, which will always keep them at least one step ahead in what is called accurately enough, the game plan. The first obvious signs of Plan X politics were in the nuclear arms race, in its renewal from the mid-1970s. It was by then clear to everyone that neither staged mutual disarmament (the professed ultimate aim) nor any stable strategic parity (the more regular political ramification) could be achieved by the development of radically new weapons systems and new levels of overkill. Many sane people called these new developments insane, but within Plan X thinking they are wholly rational. For the real objective is neither disarmament nor parity, but temporary competitive advantage, within a permanent and inevitable danger. There were further signs of Plan X in some of the dominant responses to the rise in oil prices. Other groups proposed a reduction in energy consumption, or a reduction in dependence on oil, or negotiations for some general stability in oil and other commodity prices. Plan X people think differently. Their chosen policy is to weaken, divide and reduce the power of the oil producers, whatever the long-run effects on supply, so that a competitive advantage can be retained. To argue that this cannot be a lasting solution is to miss the point. It is not meant to be a lasting solution, but the gaining of edge and advantage for what is accepted, in advance, as the inevitable next round. Again, Plan X has appeared recently in British politics. As distinct from policies of incorporating the working class in a welfare state, or of negotiating some new and hopefully stable relationship between state, employees and unions (the two dominant policies of post-1945 governments), Plan X has read the future as the certainty of a decline in capitalist profitability unless the existing organisations and expectations of wage-earners are significantly reduced. Given this reading, Plan X operates not only by ordinary pressures but where necessary by the decimation of British industrial capital itself. This was a heavy and (in ordinary terms) unexpected price to pay, but one which had to be paid if the necessary edge of advantage was to be gained or regained. Again many sane people say that this policy is insane, but this is only an unfamiliarity with the nature of Plan X thinking. Its people have not only a familiar hard drive, but one which is genuinely combined with a rational analysis of the future of capitalism and of its unavoidable requirements. In this kind of combination, Plan X people resemble the hardest kinds of revolutionary, who drive through at any cost to their perceived objectives. But the difference of Plan X from revolution is that no transformed society, no new order, no lasting liberation seriously enters these new calculations, though their rhetoric may be retained. A phase at a time, a decade at a time, a generation at a time, the people who play by Plan X are calculating relative advantage, in what is accepted from the beginning as an unending and unavoidable struggle. For this is percentage politics, and within its tough terms there is absolute contempt for those who believe that the present and the future can be managed in any other way, and especially for those who try to fudge or qualify the problems or who refuse the necessary costs. These wet old muddlers, like all old idealists, are simply irrelevant, unless they get in the way. Does it need to be said that Plan X is dangerous? It is almost childish to say so, since it is, in its own terms, a rational mutation within an already existing and clearly foreseeable extremity of danger. There is often a surprising overlap between the clearest exponents of Plan X and their most determined political opponents. The need for constant attention to the same kinds of problem, and for urgent and where necessary disturbing action in response to them, is a common self-definition by both groups. The difference, and it ought to be fundamental, is that Plan X is determined solely by its players' advantage. Any more general condition is left deliberately undefined, while the alternative movements see solutions in terms of stable mutual advantage, which is then the principle of a definable and attainable general condition: the practical condition which replaces the unknown and undefined X. If we put it in this way the general choice ought to be simple. Yet we are speaking about real choices, under pressures, and we have then to notice how many elements there are, in contemporary culture and society, which support or at least do not oppose Plan X. Thus the plan is often presented in terms of national competitive advantage: 'keeping our country a step ahead'. In these terms it naturally draws on simple kinds of patriotism or chauvinism. Any of its damaging consequences to others can be mediated by xenophobia, or by milder forms of resentment and distrust of foreigners. Very similar feelings can be recruited into the interests of a broader alliance, as now commonly in military policy. Again, at a substantial level, there is a deep natural concern with the welfare of our own families and our own people. That they at least should be all right, come what may, inspires extraordinary effort, and this, in certain conditions, can appear as Plan X. Moreover, from the long experience of capitalist society, there is a widespread common sense that we have always to look to our own advantage or we shall suffer and may go under. This daily reality produces and reproduces the conditions for seeing Plan X as inevitable. It has then made deep inroads into the labour movement, which was basically founded on the alternative ethic of common well-being. When a trade union argues for a particular wage level, not in terms of the social usefulness of the work but, for example, in terms of improving its position in the 'wages league table', it is in tune with Plan X. There are also deeper supporting cultural conditions. Plan X is sharp politics and high-risk politics. It is easily presented as a version of masculinity. Plan X is a mode of assessing odds and of determining a game plan. As such it fits, culturally, with the widespread habits of gambling and its calculations. At its highest levels, Plan X draws on certain kinds of high operative (including scientific and technical) intelligence, and on certain highly specialised game-plan skills. But then much education, and especially higher education (not only in the versions that are called business studies) already defines professionalism in terms of competitive advantage. It promotes a deliberately narrowed attention to the skill as such, to be enjoyed in its mere exercise rather than in any full sense of the human purposes it is serving or the social effects it may be having. The now gross mutual flattery of military professionalism, financial professionalism, media professionalism and advertising professionalism indicates very clearly how far this has gone. Thus both the social and cultural conditions for the adoption of Plan X, as the only possible strategy for the future, are very powerful indeed. At the same time Plan X is more than any one of these tendencies; it is also more than their simple sum. To emerge as dominant it has to rid itself, in practice, whatever covering phrases may be retained, of still powerful feelings and habits of mutual concern and responsibility, and of the very varied institutions which support and encourage these. Moreover, to be Plan X, it has to be more than a congeries of habits of advantage, risk and professional play. This is most evident in the fact that its real practitioners, still a very small minority, have to lift themselves above the muddle of miscellaneous local tendencies, to determine and assign genuine major priorities. At the levels at which Plan X is already being played, in nuclear-arms strategy, in high-capital advanced technologies (and especially information technologies), in world-market investment policies, and in anti-union strategies, the mere habits of struggling and competing individuals and families, the mere entertainment of ordinary gambling, the simplicities of local and national loyalties (which Plan X, at some of its levels, is bound to override wherever rationally necessary) are in quite another world. Plan X, that is to say, is by its nature not for everybody. It is the emerging rationality of self-conscious elites, taking its origin from the urgent experiences of crisis-management but deliberately lifting its attention from what is often that mere hand-to-mouth behaviour. It is in seeing the crises coming, preparing positions for them, devising and testing alternative scenarios of response, moving resources and standbys into position, that it becomes the sophisticated Plan X. To name this powerful tendency, and to examine it, is not to propose what is loosely called a conspiracy theory. There are many political conspiracies, as we eventually learn when at least some of them are exposed, usually after the event. Elements of Plan X are inherently conspiratorial. But we shall underestimate its dangers if we reduce it to mere conspiracy. On the contrary, it is its emergence as the open common sense of high-level politics which is really serious. As distinct from mere greedy muddle, and from shuffling day-to-day management, it is a way - a limited but powerful way - of grasping and attempting to control the future. In a deepening world crisis, it is certain to strengthen, as against an older, less rational, less informed and planned politics. But then the only serious alternative to it is a way of thinking about the future, and of planning, which is at least as rational and as informed in all its specific policies, and which is not only morally much stronger, in its concern for a common well-being, but at this most general level is more rational and better informed. For the highest rationality and the widest information should indicate a concern for common well-being, and for stable kinds of mutual general interest, as the most practical bases for particular well-being and indeed for survival. __________________________________________________ Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041029/4c1e8a8a/attachment.html From pz at vsnl.net Sat Oct 30 18:30:11 2004 From: pz at vsnl.net (Punam Zutshi) Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 18:30:11 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Fw: Deletions and Revisions in the Revised Edition of the CWMG Message-ID: <002901c4be80$64bb14d0$dcfd41db@punamzutshi> Dear All, I thought this was important to bring to your notice, Punam ----- Original Message ----- From: Tridip Suhrud To: Undisclosed-Recipient:; Sent: Tuesday, October 26, 2004 11:48 AM Subject: Deletions and Revisions in the Revised Edition of the CWMG Dear Friend We seek your time and patience for this rather long e mail. Kindly bear with us. I on behalf of a group of independent scholars would like to bring to your notice the Deletions and Omissions in the Revised Edition (2001) of the Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi (CWMG). The CWMG was commissioned in February 1956. The control and direction of the series was vested in the Advisory Board, the original members of which were Shri Morarji Desai (Chairman), Kakasaheb Kalelkar, Devdas Gandhi, Pyarelal Nayar, Maganbhai P Desai, G Ramachandran, Shriman Narain, Jivanji P Desai and Shri P M Lad. Following were the members of the Advisory Board as reconstituted in 1967. Shri Morarji Desai (Chairman), Kakasaheb Kalelkar, R R Diwakar, Pyarelal Nayar, Maganbhai P Desai, Ramdhari Sinha "Dinkar", Shri Shantilal H Shah, the Director, Publications Division, and the Chief Editor. Shri Bhartan Kumarappa was appointed the first Chief Editor, after his death till October 1959 Shri Jairamdas Doulatram worked as the Chief Editor after which Prof. K Swaminathan assumed the Chief Editorship from February 1960 till the completion of the project.He was assisted first by U R Rao and later by Prof. C N Patel who worked as the Deputy Editor (English). After an extremely careful process of selection, verification and translation Vol. 1-90 were published. Vols. 91-97 were published as Supplementary Volumes while Volumes 98-100 were indices. The CWMG is recognised the world over as the standard reference work, largely due to the intellectual quality of the editorial precision that is evident. The Last Volumes was published in 1994. Subsequently, in 1998 decision was taken by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting to not issue reprints of the CWMG as was the practice hitherto but to prepare a Revised Edition, perhaps with a view to RECAST and RESTRUCTURE the material and to bring Chronological sequence to the Supplementary Volumes. It has not been possible for us to ascertain what the nature of the Consultative Process was or who were the members of the New Advisory Board. The Publisher's note to the revised edition does not mention who was the Chief Editor or who were the members of the Reconstituted Advisory Board were. The outcome of this Revised Edition was a CD-ROM Version (the so called e book) and a new print edition. The Following is the evidence of incompetent and insensitive Editorial work that has resulted in Omissions and Deletions. 1.. The Original Edition (OE) carried a preface for each volume and also list of Acknowledgements and Sources for each volume. 2.. The Revised Edition (RE) in the process of inserting material for sake of chronology lost sight of the Sources and Acknowledgements specific to each volume, hence a decision was taken to have a combined list of Acknowledgements and Sources common for all Volumes. These appear in each volume and occupy 42 pages. That is in 100 volumes 4200 pages are printed which have no segregation or intellectual merit. 3.. The Original had worked out a system of indices of persons and subjects. There were 4000 major entries with 9000 subentries under the various major entries. The Revised edition has done away with the entire classificatory system and subentries and classifications have been dropped, making the entire index meaningless. 4.. For example The entry on Action(s): has 16 subclasification, which bring out the philosophical aspects of Action, such as ; ahimsa in thought, and faith, and freedom from ego, and knowledge, and non-action, and predestination, and rebirth...selfless, and without attachment. The Revised entry had no classification whatsoever, rendering it useless. Same has happened to large numbers of entries like Transvaal, Rajkot, The Gita. 5.. There have also been deletions from the indices itself. The Original had 324 entries under Bhave,Vinoba. The revised edition has only 175 entries which is spread over two widely separated sections in the index of names. The first entry is on p. 43 of vol 100 while the next set of entries are on p. 349 of the same volumes. Why? Because for the editors Bhave, (Acharya) Vinoba and Vinoba Bhave are two separate individuals! 6.. Let's take the example of Khan Abdul Gafar Khan. The original had 382 entries under that name. The new has lost distinction between Khan Abdul Gafar Khan and his elder brother Dr. Khan Sahib. The Combined entries under these two names in the Revised Edition are 115. 7.. Similar is the case of Adajania, Sorabji, Shahpurji, a close associate of Gandhiji in South Africa. The Original has 173 entries while the revised has 26 entries, again the entries are dispersed. 8.. While recasting and rearranging matter in the Revised edition some very thoughtless errors have been introduced. For example Vol. 74 of the Revised edition (ADDENDA). See page 462, 463. The letter to Herman Kallenbach is printed under the title Letter to Prabhudayal Vidyarthi. Letter to Prabhudayal Vidyarthi is printed under Letter to Mathurdas Trikamji, while letter to him is under Letter to Pyarelal and Letter to Pyarelal under Letter to Herman Kallenbach. 9.. We have been able to identify so far over 500 instances of deletion or misinformation in the CD-Rom version and over 300 cases of deletion from the print version. For example 26 letters and documents of Gandhiji from the South African years are missing from the First Revised Edition. This also includes Gandhiji's DRAFT WILL AND TESTAMENT (dated June 19, 1909). There are many such instances. 10.. This clearly is unacceptable to any serious student of Life and Thought of Mahatma Gandhi. This is also indicative of the callous and insensitive approach of the then I & B ministry and the Publications Division. Our Plea is simple: There is no need whatsoever to issue a Revised Edition of the CWMG. The Government must ensure that the Revised Edition and the CD-Rom Version are withdrawn and the original CWMG is Re-printed. The GOI must also institute processes whereby no revisions are introduced in the CWMG in the future. If new material comes to light, the editors of the CWMG had introduced the practice of issuing Supplementary Volumes. The same practice should be followed. We hope that you will study this issue and voice your concerns and join us in appealing to the authorities to re-instate the intellectual integrity of the CWMG. Many Thanks Tridip Suhrud On behalf of Friends of CWMG. We can be contacted at the following numbers: Tridip Suhrud 98240 06160 Dina Patel 079- 26447812 Prof. Jayant Pandya- 079- 2791157 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041030/594c1853/attachment.html From pz at vsnl.net Sun Oct 31 00:49:10 2004 From: pz at vsnl.net (Punam Zutshi) Date: Sun, 31 Oct 2004 00:49:10 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Work on Mahatma, an experiment with errors Message-ID: <00a201c4beb5$561bff90$dafd41db@punamzutshi> Dear All, Here is the article reporting the errors in the Revised Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi. Punam http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/900052.cms Work on Mahatma, an experiment with errors TINA PAREKH TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ TUESDAY, OCTOBER 26, 2004 09:32:11 PM ] AHMEDABAD: If you are researching on Gandhi and using the revised version of the Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi (CWMG) as a resource base, don't be surprised when you notice some important entries on Gandhi's stay in South Africa from 1892-1915 missing. Experts would tell you that this is among other omissions in the new CWMG. The 100-volume series was revised by the I&B ministry in 2001 during the NDA regime. There is also a CD version of the revised series, which has similar lapses. However, the whole matter has come to light only now. Gandhians have already demanded that the revised CWMG and its CDs should be withdrawn. However, whether the distortion is deliberate or out of pure incompetence is not known. But the matter of concern for Gandhians and students is that once the older version is out of circulation, the next generation of researchers will have no authentic version to fall back on. Also, with the old version tampered with, the references in close to 10,000 books written on Gandhi may not now correspond with the volumes of the revised version. "There are about 500 entries missing in the revised version which is a sacrilege. The volumes in circulation will have to be withdrawn.No amount of correction will help," eminent Gandhian Chinubhai Vaidya asserts. Other distortions include letters written by Gandhi to his friends where the content has been swapped. For instance, in volume 74 on page 462-463, the letter, which should have been addressed to Herman Kallenbach, has been printed as Prabhu Dayal Vidyarthi and the letter for Vidyarthi has been printed as Mathurdas Trikumji. The one meant for Trikumji has been printed as Pyarelal, while the one that should have been addressed to Pyarelal has been printed as Kallenbach. Also, an important table on the Khadi workers is missing from volume 32 of the revised series. The preface penned by the editor has been removed from all volumes. A Gandhi expert Tridip Suhrud points out that in the older version the first 90 volumes carried the main content, supplementaries made up for volumes 91 to 97 and the last three volumes contained indices. In the new version, the first 98 volumes have content with all supplementaries having been merged, and just two volumes of indices. "This has resulted in a complete mismatch of indices and content. Further, in volume 96 of the new version, a portion on Gandhiji's draft will is missing." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041031/c0ff68c5/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: spacer.gif Type: image/gif Size: 43 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20041031/c0ff68c5/attachment.gif From shivamvij at gmail.com Fri Oct 29 15:51:03 2004 From: shivamvij at gmail.com (Shivam) Date: Fri, 29 Oct 2004 15:51:03 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] 'The Rape of News': Second edition Message-ID: Dear all, I hope you will buy this book and spread awareness about the issue amongst the newspaper reading public. It is a response to the Times of India's 'presstitution', wherein they publish adverts posing as editorial content. cheers | shivam || shivamvij at gmail.com || From: "Sunil Poolani" Frog Books has just published 'The Rape of News: The Ethics (or the Lack of it) of Selling Editorial Space'. As the name suggests, it questions the role of the Indian media in today's context. The contributors in the volume include: Dilip D'Souza, Lina Mathias, Meena Menon, Sevanti Ninan, Frederick Noronha, Meher Pestonji, Nilanjana S Roy, S Sowmya, Farzana Versey and Shivam Vij. The cover price of the book is Rs 60 and you can avail of the copy by sending Rs 70 (including courier charge) as DD/MO/cheque (please add Rs 10 for non-Bombay chqeques). The DD or cheque has to be drawn in the name of: ZZEBRA. If you are interested in buying the book, please contact us/send the money in the address below. Regards Sunil K Poolani Publisher and Managing Editor Frog Books Zzebra, A to Z Business Chambers Tamarind Lane, Fort Mumbai 400 021 India Tel: 0091 22 22632291 / 92 Mobile: 0091 9819802960 _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements