From ish at sarai.net Sat Jul 1 19:41:13 2006 From: ish at sarai.net (ish at sarai.net) Date: Sat, 01 Jul 2006 16:11:13 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] The Reservation of numbers Message-ID: A couple of weeks back I saw Karan Thapar's Interview with Chidambaram on Reservations. This was a very interesting interview because he raised one very important question ie. How the Govt has come up with the 27% as the reservation number for the OBC's. My anxiety always was how is this 27% number derived, integrated or regressed from empirical data. And I think we have a right to see how this ‘27%’ is derived and how its supporting material has been put together. When asked this Question our very own number crunching machine Chidambaram who only a week back came out with flying numbers for FII, FDI and the sensex , here for reservations seemed choked for numbers and even for words. And when later on when asked about when will govt file the report (which I guess the govt it has to file to the supreme court), the finance minister said the it will take 5-8 weeks. He said ‘The Ministry has to put together all the material available to it reach the conclusion of 27 per cent ... The material will be put together. Wait for the material’. So was this number was derived without the material being put together. hmm This number is going to be applied on the whole nation and there has to be enough material/data to be supporting it on the ‘national level’ and not just state level. And again to explain this existance of 27% will be just numbers, which can be read in one way or the other, recompiled and correlated to suit one Point of View or the other thats the truth of Statistics. Best Ish (sarai.net/ frEeMuZik.net) _____________________________________________________ Following are a few lines of exchange from the interview Please do read the whole interview is at http://www.ibnlive.com/news/devils-advocate-pc-quotaunquote/12758-4-single.html Karan Thapar: This is very interesting. You have already decided that you want 27 per cent reservation for OBCs but you don’t know on what basis you want it. Now you have to go back and discover the basis. P Chidambaram: I am sure the material is there. We are not discovering the basis. Karan Thapar: You are concocting it. P Chidambaram: No we are not either. The ministry has to put together all the material available to it to reach the conclusion of 27 per cent. It will be based on material and the material will be put together - wait for the material. Later on---this is the imp part when Chidambaram was asked about the derivation of 27% and the material to support this 27% and when it will be available for the public to see it----- Karan Thapar: There is something else that also emerges from this. If you are saying that all that material will be put together, clearly it hasn’t been put together as yet. P Chidambaram: Wrong again. It will be put together in the form of an affidavit and will be given to the SC. Karan Thapar: If it is going to be put together then it hasn’t been put together as yet? P Chidambaram: Listen you are quibbling on words. Let me explain my position. You are quibbling and therefore there is no point quibbling in an interview. The material will be put together; the material is available where Supreme Court asks a question. Suppose the Supreme Court asks what have you done about a particular tax matter. I know the answer but will have to put together the material in a form of an affidavit. Karan Thapar: This is not a tax matter. This is an issue that affects the future of people in India. P Chidambaram: Everything affects the people of India. Karan Thapar: Its an issue that has been challenged. When the government is asked what’s the basis on which you have announced 27 per cent reservation in higher education for the OBCs. It’s an amazing thing to say the government will answer in due course. The government needs to give an answer today. P Chidambaram: I am sorry the government does not have to answer you in an interview. Karan Thapar: Its not me its the people of India. P Chidambaram: Government will answer in the proper forum in Parliament in the Supreme Court not in an interview conducted by you. Karan Thapar: But you can’t tell the people of India today. P Chidambaram: I have told you about the material. Shall I say it in Tamil for a change? Karan Thapar: No don’t say it in Tamil. P Chidambaram: I have given you the material, the state government's report. Let me repeat it once again for you. Several reports done by the state governments counter backward casts. The Mandal report, the NSS report and any other surveys. Karan Thapar: All of which are contradictory. P Chidambaram: That’s your judgement. We don’t believe its contradictory. Karan Thapar: Its not my judgement. It’s a fact. P Chidambaram: If it is a fact then why are you asking me the question. Karan Thapar: Because I am trying to prove that you don’t have the basis for the decision you made. P Chidambaram: Go ahead and prove it if it satisfies you. Karan Thapar: If the people of India listening to this interview come to the conclusion that it does not appear to them that the government have an explanation, what would you say. P Chidambaram: The people of India are not people entirely of your thinking. The people of India consists of SCs, STs, and backward classes also. They will be quite happy to know the large amount of material is available in every state. Large amount of material is available to support the argument that a significant proportion of seats must be reserved for the OBCs. Karan Thapar: It sounds to me what you are saying is give us time we will come up with an explanation. We can’t give it today but in eight weeks we will. P Chidambaram: Sorry that’s your conclusion. Let me conclude the way I summarised it. My conclusion is there is ample material, you are simply refusing to see the material, You expect an answer in an interview. The answer will not be given to you in an interview. The answer will be given in a proper affidavit supported by proper documentation in the Supreme Court and in Parliament. Karan Thapar: And not before eight weeks. All right that’s your answer. From proclus at gnu-darwin.org Sun Jul 2 02:34:12 2006 From: proclus at gnu-darwin.org (proclus at gnu-darwin.org) Date: Sat, 1 Jul 2006 17:04:12 -0400 (EDT) Subject: [Reader-list] FOSS, Science, and Public activism Message-ID: <20060701210412.03E036B0FF8@gnu-darwin.org> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 (Sorry if you get more than one copy of this message, but I felt that it was urgent to get this important info out.) The values of freedom and openness are crucial to understanding itself, so that civilization and public welfare now depend on them, as I argue below. These values may find their best expression in the free and open source software (FOSS) movement, and the foresightful example of FOSS developers should now be beneficially applied to many other disciplines in the context of a global and public Internet. It is crucial that we occasionally take time to discuss the reasons _why_ we release our source code, and this is one of those occasions. There are good reasons for the freedom and openness which are characteristics of FOSS development, reasons which should receive wider attention now that they can be readily communicated to other arenas. The consequences of doing otherwise are often catastrophic. For example, it incomprehensible that Genentech could consider withdrawing a cheap cure for blindness (ARMD) from the market. http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/random-bits/2006-june/001374.html The mechanism of this drug is public knowledge. http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/forum.php?thread_id=14183567&forum_id=6042 This abhorrent situation is a great example of the kind of thing that will happen if people don't get behind the values of freedom and openness that we are espousing. Please let Genentech know that you find what they are doing offensive. Publicize the mechanism so that new compounds can be obtained as replacements. For the future, continued vociferous public activism is required to prevent such outrages from occurring in the future. It becomes clear that the compounds which come from common roots, fruits, and vegetables are a shared human heritage and the free and open source of the future. Tannins are another interesting case in point, because as molecules, and as anti-oxidents, they are similar to resveratrol (resV), and that molecular mechanism has been anchored to the public domain via a prior art declaration. It is a so-called CR-memetic, which may increase healthy human longevity by many decades. Here are some links about it. Resveratrol mechanism posts from GNU-Darwin list http://proclus.gnu-darwin.org/gdposts.html CR protocol for human bodies http://proclus.gnu-darwin.org/bootstrap.html Here is some important recent news about it. http://www.imminst.org/forum/index.php?s=&act=print&client=printer&f=237&t=10749 It is exciting to suppose that people can get off the pharmaceuticals that they are taking with calorie restriction or CR-memetics. I personally am trying to get off the cholesterol drug Pravachol, a statin compound, starting a few of weeks ago. Write me, and I'll let you know how it turns out. From the article... "Fontana says ... evidence of "younger" hearts in people on calorie restriction, suggest that humans on CR have the same adaptive responses as did animals whose rates of aging were slowed by CR." I think that it is time to look at the tannins in tobacco leaves. There may be other treasures lurking there too. As you may be aware there is ample public research into any possible beneficial compounds that may be obtained from tobacco leaves. The mechanisms are there waiting to be discovered. If you want to post them, just reply to me and I'd be delighted to host them. The public establishment of prior art is a time-honed method of entering inventions into the public domain. We now have other methods at our disposal as well. If you are planning to establish prior art against future CR-memetic related patents, you might want to have a look at www.creativecommons.org. Perhaps it goes without saying at this point that you should please choose a license that provides for free and broad public access to your memetic. In that way you will assure that the public health is served by anchoring them to the public common, where they cannot be exploited by those who would withhold them for their own profit. The DRM situation is precisely analogous to this. Can you imagine doing science in a world where your ability to read and write your data is filtered through secret protocols that are hidden from you? I recommend the Defective By Design campaign to fight the outrage of DRM, which is incompatible with the scientific pursuit. http://www.defectivebydesign.org/ It is clear that scientific tools must be demonstrably and penetratingly understood, or else our claims will likely be skewed and called into question. Free and open source software is a great example of how to make your science verifiable to the public. Establishing prior art against future patents is another good one, which is precisely analogous in method, making the result explicit to the public, free and open to all. Thank goodness for the free and open software movement, which gave us such a great example of how to serve the public in this manner. I am willing to grant that there are particular exceptions to these rules of freedom and openness, and such exceptions may be relatively harmless; however, let us posit the opposite, that freedom and openness are _not_ crucial to understanding. Think of the implications. When people are compelled to learn, they do not receive the intended message. It is not understood correctly or completely. When crucial facts are withheld from the people you are trying to teach they become paranoid, possibly unteachable. Freedom and openness are obviously the best approach to understanding. This is not a metaphor for the pursuit of science, but a fact. We are learning from nature, and it is ultimately required that our tools be demonstrably and penetratingly understood, or else we will receive incorrect lessons from nature. Clearly this requires public access to the source code and more. This is why many of us are pressing for public access to scientific publications. Moreover FOSS tools are becoming ever more important to the pursuit of the scientific endeavor itself. In our biophysics department we are obsolescing proprietary hardware and software in favor of open standards and free software, which is a widespread phenomenon in the science sector, and sure to continue. We build most of the workstations ourselves with commodity hardware, but we also have some clusters running Debian and FedoraCore. Some of you will know that I am the lead developer for the GNU-Darwin distribution. GNU-Darwin has a FOSS operating system, which is getting alot of press these days. Here is an example How Apple and Microsoft are advancing desktop Linux http://www.desktopLinux.com/news/ns7294331817.html I see the article as counter-productive against building a FOSS coalition that includes democracy, freedom, and public access activists, Apple, GNU-Darwin, GNU, and GNU/Linux all linked together in spectrum. It is important to alert the whole FOSS community that Darwin cannot be classified as a free or open source operation system as of the Darwin-8 revision, because AppleACPIplatform-39 which is required to boot the system is proprietary. It is notable that only the current version of Darwin from Apple is a non-free OS. GNU-Darwin has a free version, an earlier revision that includes the source code. It is FOSS, and we call upon Apple to maintain Darwin as such, as it has been in the past. We hope that the current situation with the kernel and ACPI driver will soon be remedied so that Darwin will continue as a FOSS OS. We are asking for free software developers to please write to the *nix core of Darwin, which is the core OS for both Mac OS X and GNU-Darwin OS. Darwin OS, which underlies both systems, comprises parts from GNU, the BSD's, mach, plus Apple's substantial contributions to the free software community. Be consistent with your philosophy and avoid linkage to proprietary binaries, such as OpenGL and CoreAudio, except when it is imperatively required in order to lead users to the values of software freedom. Under that principle, another reason to maintain compatibility with the *nix core, is so that your code will be readily portable to new platforms and usable by free-software-only aficionados too. GNU-Darwin OS is not an obsolete implementation of Darwin OS, or to be superseded by Mac OS X. We are trying to lead users to freedom, not away from it. By maintaining Darwin core compatibility your code will remain valuable as the marketplace and industry continues to evolve (trust me here), particularly as DRM-related problems continue to come forward. Of course, that means releasing your source code under a FOSS license, such as APSL. Darwin OS is a free and open source operating system that is not going away, so try to focus your coding towards supporting that standard instead of proprietary software. Here is the essence of the current problem with Darwin OS. Apple replaced working boot code with the following proprietary drivers, which are required for the system to boot. Darwin-7: AppleAPIC.kext/ Applei386genericplatform.kext/ Darwin-8: AppleACPIplatform In addition the kernel (xnu) has been taken proprietary in the recent revisions. We are not asking for Apple to give away such things, but rather to continue maintaining Darwin OS as FOSS, which it already was. After repeated attempts by many FOSS developers to get this situation remedied, nothing has happened. It is now time for us to better use the measures at our disposal in order to assure that Darwin OS remains free and open. If you are unhappy that xnu and the boot drivers have not been released, I would encourage you to spread your dissatisfaction to other forums, so that Apple will take notice and commit to a workable free and open Darwin OS from now on. Moving on to coalition strategy now, some of you may not know that GNU/Linux system administration is one of my day jobs. I manage a wide range of systems. Here is a screen-shot of my work desktop, so that you can see I use the same tools at work that I use at home at night on GNU-Darwin. (weekends too, so please read I am your friend) http://proclus.gnu-darwin.org/debian.html The only time that I ever use proprietary software is when I am trying to help other users learn free and open source free software. I'm a long time Apple and GNU/Linux user, and here is the old proof doc ;-}. http://proclus.tripod.com/indulge.html Now, it is embarrassing but, I want you to have a look at my cv. http://biophysics.med.jhmi.edu/love/thesis/cv6.html In all my years I have never used Microsoft Windows. There are only two exceptions to this statement, where I was helping Windows users to access our servers at Hopkins. Clearly, you can get a few things done without it ;-}. One of the primary reasons for founding GNU-Darwin was to help people to put Microsoft behind them, and it is definitely possible to do it now. You have many resources at your disposal to help you leave Microsoft behind. Look at the link below to see what you can do with free software. Apple, GNU-Darwin, GNU.org, and GNU/Linux will all help, and we are largely all helping together, because we have a shared foundation of free software. http://www.gnu-darwin.org/gdc/ Microsoft is only one example. That is why we are so insistent that Apple keep true to free and open source software principles. We should ultimately try to leave all proprietary software behind us, so that we can participate fully in the freedom and openness of the internet culture and public domain. What more do we need, when we have such a rich store of information and so many capable people at our sides? Finally, as a scientist, it is obvious to me that this situation is relevant current and ongoing discussion in the scientific community, and as such, it is also clear that many members of the various lists would be interested in the current state of Darwin with respect to FOSS and with respect to science. Here is the crucial point. The principles of FOSS and scientific inquiry converge. In practical terms, how else can you know is what happening in your experiments? Free and open source software, open standards, best promote the scientific endeavor by mirroring its method, but also they assure that the work is accessible to the public. Freedom and openness are crucial to understanding, and foundational to the scientific endeavor, and they should not be compromised. There are a few examples of exceptions, but clearly, this matter will find further debate in the appropriate forums. We should not quell debate because a few people are offended or complaining. - From a scientific perspective that would be incorrect. On that last point, I would suggest that Apple get on the right side of the debate, and they will make tremendous headway. Now is the time. Some people will find this message annoying and divisive, and the delete button is ready at hand for them, but other people will find it interesting and engaging. All as you like. Let us not quell discussion because a few people are annoyed. Some will call this a troll, but I hope that folks will see through such name-calling. Trolls are mythological creatures, so don't believe in them. Everyone has a right to have their opinion heard, even if those opinions are divisive or unpopular. It is clear that the idea of trolls is being used to attack freedom of expression. In fact, freedom of expression demands that we listen to the so-called-trolls sometimes, and if you are civil, it helps, so don't resort to name-calling. On cross-posting; when there are matters of urgent importance that affect a broad range of subscriber lists, courtesy must sometimes take a back seat, and cross-posting is an example of that. Cross-posting is to be encouraged when the subject of the post is on topic. Each of the various lists will respond in the way that seems appropriate to the people in that forum, and the threads on the various lists will diverge accordingly. As the threads diverge, the cross-posting addresses should be removed as needed. Relevance to all people is an unattainable goal, but messages of the broadest applicability should have the broadest reach, and discussion should not be stymied because some find it irrelevant. I have given this method due consideration; it is not trolling, not spam, not off-topic, and cross-posting is an example of something that is sometimes required according to the felt importance and relevance of a given subject matter. In summary, Freedom and openness are now the bedrock of our civilization and public welfare depends on these values, so that we should actively engage ourselves in preserving and making them happen. In keeping with these principles it is crucial to note that there are exceptions to etiquette, otherwise free expression will be overly channeled, damped, and ultimately suppressed in our forums. This notion of courtesy will certainly receive additional consideration, but meanwhile, let us together get to work on the activism now. Duly, I am amenable to valid criticism and able to respond, but please reply with kindness. Obviously, feel free to write back, copy, or send these comments along to anyone else as you see fit. Regards, Michael L. Love Ph.D Department of Biophysics and Biophysical Chemistry School of Medicine Johns Hopkins University 725 N. Wolfe Street Room 608B WBSB Baltimore MD 21205-2185 Interoffice Mail: 608B WBSB, SoM office: 410-614-2267 lab: 410-614-3179 fax: 410-502-6910 cell: 443-824-3451 http://www.gnu-darwin.org/ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.1 (Darwin) iD8DBQFEpIl6u0oI3iz5oZcRAtpQAJ9X7D6kq1vmWKXkG/3LBvx3gGrK1QCZAbgI 8Ww6QABLiZtmFmS9Ekea5nI= =a0Oy -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- From shahzulf at yahoo.com Sat Jul 1 00:49:46 2006 From: shahzulf at yahoo.com (Zulfiqar Shah) Date: Fri, 30 Jun 2006 12:19:46 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Paulo Coelhos Small Stories Message-ID: <20060630191946.49070.qmail@web38810.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Paulo Coelho’s Small Stories In the tavern Rabbi Wolf entered a bar by chance. Some people were drinking, others were playing cards, and the atmosphere seemed heavy. The rabbi left without saying a word. A young man followed him out: “I know that you didn’t like what you saw in there,” he said. “That’s a place for sinners.” “No, I liked what I saw,” Wolf answered. “Those are men learning to lose everything. When they have lived the experience of losing, all that will remain is for them is to return to God. And from that moment on, what excellent servants they will make!” Ten percent “To be like me is very simple,” said the richest man in Babylonia. “All you have to understand is that a tenth of what you earn is yours.” “That makes no sense,” answered the young man. “All that I earn is mine.” “Don’t you pay the tailor? Don’t you pay the baker every day? You can’t live even for a day without spending. You pay everybody except yourself. From now on, pay yourself a tenth of your salary. Don’t forget that the paths of wealth are magical and strange; if you take good care of that tenth, one day it will reward all your efforts.” Beyond the port A hermit from the monastery of Sceta came up to Abbot Theodore: “I know exactly what the objective of life is. I know what God asks of man, and I know the best way to serve Him. And even so, I am unable to do all that I should be doing to serve the Lord.” “You know that there exists a city on the other side of the ocean,” replied Theodore. “But you haven’t found the ship yet, you still haven't packed your bags on board, and you haven’t crossed the sea. Why keep talking about what it is like and how we should walk down the streets? Put into practice what you’re saying and the path will reveal itself to you.” At heaven’s door When Don Enrique died he went straight to heaven. He knocked hard on the door and a voice asked: “Who’s there?” “It’s Don Enrique Fernandez of Valdivieso.” “Well go away, there’s no room here for two,” said the voice. And so Don Enrique was sent to Purgatory. Some time later, he very timidly returned to heaven. “Who is it?” asked the voice. “It’s me,” answered Don Enrique. “There’s no room here for two,” repeated the voice. Don Enrique went back to Purgatory. One day he went back to knock on heaven’s door. “Who is it?” asked the voice. “A small part of God,” he answered. And heaven’s door opened to him. Rigor and compassion In the heart of winter the samurai presented himself to the Zen master. “I am dying of cold and hunger and I have no way of supporting myself.” Filled with pity, the master went to the statue of Yakushi-Buda, removed the gold chain that adorned the neck and handed it to the samurai. The other pupils complained: "sacrilege!" "Why sacrilege?" asked the master. "You have heard tell of David, who ate the bread from the tabernacle when he was hungry. Christ cured on the Sabbath whenever that was necessary. All I did was put the spirit of Buddha into action: now love and compassion can do their work." Wrong questions What is wisdom? A Sufi story tells us of a man who lived in Turkey who heard of a great master who lived in Persia who held the secret of wisdom. Without hesitating, he sold his things, took leave of his family and went off in search of this secret. After years of traveling he managed to arrive at a cabin where the great master lived. Filled with awe, he drew closer and waited for the wise man to return from his morning stroll. “I come from Turkey,” he said as soon as the wise man turned up. “I have made this long journey just to ask one question.” “That’s fine. You can ask just one question.” “I have to be clear in what I am going to ask; may I ask you in Turkish?” “You may, “ said the wise man. “And I have already asked your only question. Anything else you want to know, you ask your heart. You don’t have to travel so far to discover that it is the best counselor of all.” And he shut the door. Why God did not help us Master and disciple are walking through the deserts of Arabia. The Master uses each moment of the journey to teach his disciple about faith. “Entrust your things to God,” he said. “Because He never abandons His children.” When they camped down at night, the Master asked the disciple to tie the horses to a nearby rock. The disciple went over to the rock, but then remembered what he had learned that afternoon. “The Master must be testing me. The truth is that I should entrust the horses to God." And he left the horses loose. In the morning he discovered that the animals had run off. Indignant, he sought out the Master. “You know nothing about God! Yesterday I learned that I should trust blindly in Providence, so I gave the horses to Him to guard, and the animals have disappeared!” “God wanted to look after the horses,” answered the Master. “But at that moment he needed your hands to tie them up and you did not lend them to Him.” It’s raining and can I go out? An old Buddhist story goes like this: a man is passing through a village under a heavy storm when all of a sudden he sees a house catching fire. Drawing closer, he sees another man – (the fable uses the beautiful image "with fire to the eyelashes ") – crying in his direction: “Is it raining?” The traveler is surprised. “Your house is catching fire!” he says. “I need to know if it’s raining or not. My mother told me that the rain can give us pneumonia.” Zao Chi comments on the fable: "wise is the man who manages to change the situation when he is forced to do so. Foolish is the man who does not trust the hand of God, only the answers of his fellow humans." What is the first step? A man decided to visit a hermit who lived near the monastery of Sceta. “What is the first step of one who aims to follow the spiritual path?” he asked. The hermit took him to a well and asked him to look at his reflection in the water. The man obeyed, but the hermit began to throw small stones, making ripples on the surface. “I won’t be able to see my face right if you keep throwing stones.” “Just as it is impossible to see your face in troubled waters, so it is impossible to seek God if your mind is anxious about the search,” said the monk. “Don’t ask questions, just move forward with faith. This will always be the first and most important step of all. Courtesy: Warriors of light --------------------------------- Why keep checking for Mail? The all-new Yahoo! Mail Beta shows you when there are new messages. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060630/4d067b8a/attachment.html From vikharjnu at gmail.com Sun Jul 2 18:39:45 2006 From: vikharjnu at gmail.com (Vikhar Ahmed) Date: Sun, 2 Jul 2006 18:39:45 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Review of Irshad Manji's "The Trouble With Islam Today: A Wake-Up Call for Honesty and Change" Message-ID: <3dd9e6810607020609h1ed47397ge40a540a02133315@mail.gmail.com> 30th June 2006 Dear Sarai Fellows, This mail contains a review that I wrote for The Biblio: A Review of Books for the May-June 2006 issue. I would appreciate comment and feedback. A Polemical Work against Islam By VIKHAR AHMED SAYEED The Trouble With Islam Today: A Wake-Up Call for Honesty and Change By Irshad Manji Imprint One, New Delhi, 2005, xiii + 258 pp., Rs. 295 Distributed by Foundation Books ISBN 81-88861-02-2 Why am I a Muslim? Is it because I was born a Muslim or is it because I believe in Islam. The two positions are not contradictory; I could be a person who was born a Muslim and also believe this is the best faith among the panoply of spiritual alternatives available. I've never given the question significant thought until reading Irshad Manji's provocative *The Trouble With Islam Today: A Wake-Up Call for Honesty and Change*. This is Manji's second book after *Risking Utopia: On the Edge of a New Democracy *published in 1997. Manji grew up in Canada and her experiences in understanding Islam in Vancouver form a major part of the early chapters of her book. Manji's book primarily targets Muslims and forces them to confront their shibboleths. The book is in the form of an open letter and the introductory chapter begins with an address to "My Fellow Muslims". It is the beginning of a personal memoir and is passionate, controversial, irreverent and even blasphemous at times as this quote demonstrates, "Through our screaming self-pity and our conspicuous silences, we Muslims are conspiring against ourselves. We're in crisis, and we're dragging the rest of the world with us. If ever there was a moment for an Islamic reformation, it's now. For the love of God, what are we doing about it?". Her book is partly an autobiography, a travelogue, a polemic against practised Islam, an amateur attempt at history writing; all of these hyphenated by cursory analysis. She carries on a conversation with the reader and there is no attempt at political correctness. She is blunt and revels in the uneasiness she stirs in the reader. The interesting part about Manji is that she identifies herself as a Muslim in spite of having several irreconcilable differences with Islam (her homosexuality being the biggest). She chooses to criticise Islam while remaining a Muslim and writes that she chose to stay within Islam because "…the imperative of identity kicked in…Most of us aren't Muslims because we think about it, but rather because we're born that way. It's who we are." Manji addresses several themes in her book, some ritualistic and some geopolitical, but at the root of all these troubles she sees Islam to be responsible and feels that the time has come for an Islamic reformation to take place. The most important issue that she raises when she talks about the rituals of Islam is that whether Muslims all over the world are succumbing to a form of 'desert Islam' and coins a phrase 'foundamentalism' to describe this. By desert Islam she means the sort of Islam practised by the Arabs. She writes, "To parrot the desert peoples in clothing, in language, or in prayer is not necessarily to follow the universal God." This harks of Naipaul who wrote in the introduction to his book *Beyond Belief: Islamic Excursions Among the Converted Peoples *that "Islam is in its origins an Arab religion. Everyone not an Arab who is a Muslim is a convert. Islam is not simply a matter of conscience or private belief. It makes imperial demands. A convert's worldview alters. His holy places are in Arab lands; his sacred language becomes Arabic. His idea of history alters." She also writes that literalism is going worldwide in Islam and is ideologically colonising Muslim minds. Legitimacy for every act for Muslims, not only religious, but also political and social, (Islam doesn't differentiate between the spiritual and the temporal realm) needs to be derived from two sources, i.e., the Quran and the hadis. So when Manji is asking Muslims to look beyond these two sources it contradicts one of the fundamental beliefs of any Muslim. She questions the perfection of the Quran calling it an ambiguous document and writes that Muslims must begin to question the Quran and the *hadis*. The Prophet was not an infallible man, she says, and thus his actions need not be emulated. Historians of Islam have made these arguments before but her casual manner will only incense Muslim fideists who believe in the pristinity of the Quran and the infallibility of the Prophet. Manji forcefully calls for an Islamic reformation and says that Ijtihad needs to be done for contemporary times. The first act of 'Operation Ijtihad', as she calls it, should be that female Muslim entrepreneurs need to be encouraged. She chooses this act of female entrepreneurship as the first step in 'Operation Ijtihad' because she writes that "Muslims exhibit a knack for degrading women and religious minorities." She chooses entrepreneurship because "…Muslims have a centuries old affair with commerce" and secondly "…there's no prohibition in the Quran against women becoming businesspeople." There is no problem with the sentiment that female entrepreneurs need to be encouraged and this could, in certain ways, revitalise Muslim societies but is it so easy to practise ijtihad? Ijtihad means the independent assessment of any issue based on the Quran, sunna and fiqh literature and many Muslims (both Sunni and Shia belonging to the recognised schools of Islamic jurisprudence) consider the gates of ijtihad closed. Only a person who is highly qualified in Islamic jurisprudence can practise ijtihad and while Manji may stridently call for 'Operation Ijtihad' ijtihad is not a common everyday occurrence in Islam. The next theme that she addresses is the stubborn streak of Anti-Semitism that prevails among Islamic societies and she blames this on two main reasons. One of these reasons is that Muslims are not aware of the common religious linkages between the two faiths while the second reason is that Palestine has become a global litmus test for Muslims to identify with the *ummah*. The first reason is not convincing because for any Muslim who is slightly familiar with his religion it is common knowledge that Islam was a denouement of Judaism and Christianity and Mohammed was sent as the last prophet because Jews and the Christians were not good religionists. Moses is a highly respected prophet in Islamic hagiography and there are references to Jews in the Quran. The second reason where she talks about Palestine she indicts the Arab states more for the plight of Palestinians than Israel. She seems to almost exonerate Israel for the sorry state of Palestinians and accuses Arab states of catalysing the conflict. It is true that the Arab states have had their own self-interests and domestic causes to be propped up under the banner of Palestine but can Israel be non-culpable? It seems funny to even pose the question when we think of the fact that a country was created where none existed before in 1948. The next theme that she addresses in her book is that Muslims all over the world do not hate America because they perceive it to be against Muslim interests but they hate America because, for them, "Washington is the unrealised hope, not the lead criminal". And what is this unrealised hope? It is the hope that America will bring democracy to Muslim countries. She strongly endorses American invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq but sees them as jobs left incomplete. There has been a regime change bought about by the Americans but now she wants them to make sure that they impose their style of democracy so that Muslims are truly liberated. The fact that America blatantly invaded a sovereign nation on the basis of false evidence doesn't even merit one sentence. She is convinced that Muslims love America simply because there is no rejection of American culture in the Middle East. Muslims are desperate to get on the local version of the show *Who Wants to be a Millionaire *and Saudi Arabian women buy raunchy lingerie. If Manji is following the protests over the cartoons of Prophet Mohammed all over the world, when Pakistani Muslims burn the American flag even though America has nothing to do with the cartoons, is it a sign that they want to be invaded in the hope that true democracy can be imposed? Another theme that Manji touches upon is of Islam and slavery. She quotes verses from the Quran to demonstrate Islam's laxity when it comes to the question of slavery. I wonder how she overlooked the fact that one of the first converts to Islam was an Abyssinan slave, Bilal, who was impressed by Mohammed's message of equality and embraced Islam. He was Islam's first muezzin, no lowly post. There are several other jarring issues that she raises in her book. Suicide bombers come in for her prejudiced scrutiny but she chooses to focus on the hackneyed seventy virgins theme that has become a choice ridicule of Muslims while ignoring the desperate situations that lead young men, sometimes not religious at all, to strap themselves with bombs and blow themselves up. She doesn't talk about female suicide bombers and we can be sure that they don't blow themselves up because of the seventy virgins in paradise. Edward Said and Noam Chomsky are dismissed summarily by Manji. She writes that Edward Said whose book Orientalism became such a rage all over the world needs to rethink his theory because his book was distributed by the west. Noam Chomsky also gets his one line dismissal when she writes that it is not the west but Muslims who 'manufacture consent' in Allah's name. Manji imagines herself to be a pioneer, a mild revolutionary who is intent on reforming Islam. I did find myself nodding to many of the things that she had written when it came to the ritual aspects of Islam. I remember when I was a little child I learnt by rote many verses of the Quran in Arabic without remotely knowing what they meant. I also felt sad that our dog couldn't come inside our house because he was considered an unclean animal and many fellow Muslims disapproved of it. I'm also dismayed that most Muslims in India look up to the clerics who have been trained in Islamic seminaries that still follow a syllabus based on the Dars-i-Nizami, an outdated syllabus (The syllabus originally consisted of 79 books written between ninth and eighteenth centuries and does not have any Western philosophical text in it) But many of her arguments are simply not tenable and she makes one factual error when she writes that it is not possible to know the chronology of the revelation of the Quranic verses. It is possible to find out which verses of the Quran were revealed in Mecca and which ones at Medina. Manji should have done more academic research and relied less on anecdotes. Anecdotes are the paraphernalia of a good writer but are subjective and the reliance on anecdotes gives portions of the book an air of a pamphlet. There are faint ripples for reform being heard all over the Muslim world today but Manji's book will not turn these ripples into waves. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060702/767034ef/attachment.html From vikharjnu at gmail.com Sat Jul 1 23:43:39 2006 From: vikharjnu at gmail.com (Vikhar Ahmed) Date: Sat, 1 Jul 2006 23:43:39 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The Fatwa in Journalism: Research Update Message-ID: <3dd9e6810607011113kbffd194k9e3682a5c5d08731@mail.gmail.com> The Fatwa in Journalism Pico Iyer in his book *Tropical Classical: Essays from Several Directions*, an anthology of his essays, writes in the essay "Prosaic Justice All Around: Salman Rushdie vs. The Ayatollah", "When Khomeini issued a *fatwa,* or death sentence, on Rushdie last week, it became impossible to tell who was the prophet and who the victim-…[1] <#_ftn1>". For any person then who is reading the essay a fatwa then is interpreted to be a death sentence. Vico Giambattista, the seventeenth-eighteenth century Italian philosopher has said that human knowledge is only what human beings have made. In this essay Iyer, who is otherwise a perspicacious travel writer commits a severe gaffe in his role as an interlocutor. Iyer is an intermediary at some level between the reader and his idea. In his communication the author is claming to be an 'expert' (without stating it). A reader who reads this essay instantaneously accepts the 'fact' that a fatwa is a death sentence without questioning Iyer's assessment. As the point made in an earlier posting the definition of a fatwa can hardly be restricted to a 'death sentence' but when good writers like Pico Iyer make such critical errors the magnitude of errors of misinterpretation can only be magnified in the shallow arena of journalism. The word fatwa became a part of general parlance when the Ayatollah Khomeini issued his fatwa where he justified that Rushdie deserved to die because of his blasphemous utterances in his book *The Satanic Verses. *The instrument of the fatwa became famous in 1988 with its association with Salman Rushdie but as Sadik argues in his paper the infamous 'fatwa' was not a fatwa at all [2] <#_ftn2>. Anyway, the impression that the world got was that once a fatwa was pronounced Muslims were bound by their faith to fulfil the letter of the fatwa. Thus, we saw quite a few Muslims the world over baying for Rushdie's blood. Finally, in a recent fatwa, Rushdie's life was spared but raises the necessity to critically question the media's rule in purveying this idea that the fatwa is a death sentence. Pico Iyer has fallen prey to this misinterpretative role performed by the media. Earlier[3] <#_ftn3> last year in June the Darul Uloom Deoband pronounced that Imrana, a woman from Muzafarnagar in UP could no longer be the legal wife of Noor Ilahi. Imrana was directly paying for the crimes of her husband. In the same week the Darul Uloom issued another fatwa proclaiming that ideally Muslim women must not contest panchayat elections, and never without a veil. The Indian print media splashed these issues on the front page giving it more importance than necessitated by the actual pronouncements. Undeniably, the seminary at Deoband is a very important authority for Muslims in South Asia but the print media simply blew the whole issue out of proportion. The issue concerning the panchayat election fatwa was investigated by Basharat Peer of the Tehelka[4] <#_ftn4> who in his interview with the Vice Chancellor found out that a journalist from a local Hindi newspaper had sent a letter seeking opinion whether Muslim women could go out to campaign and contest elections without wearing a veil. The journalist had not mentioned his profession and had merely signed his name. A mufti had read his query and answered according to Islamic law, which forbids women from going out without a veil. Then the journalist had written the story and it looked like the seminary had announced a fatwa on its own. >From there it was picked up by the national newspapers and it looked like the fatwa was a binding order on all Muslims. In a report in The Hindu dated 1st July in the Imrana case the report described a fatwa as an edict[5] <#_ftn5>. The report said, "However, she (meaning Imrana) was yet to receive a formal fatwa (edict) to stay away from her husband and children. Islamic seminary Darul Uloom Deoband issued a fatwa to Imrana that she could no longer live with her husband as she had been raped by her father-in-law." The report while misinterpreting the meaning of fatwa also makes it look like the victim here does not respect the Indian legal system that has a grievance redressal system and as if the fatwa is binding upon her. What is important to note here is that when the print media reports on issues pertaining to the delivery of fatwas it generally treats it under the broad rubric of reporting about Islam and it does this in an insensitive and crass manner without recognising the internal divisions within Islam in India. While Muslims in India can be broadly divided into Sunnis and Shiahs, among the Sunnis they can be further subdivided into the four maslaks or traditions of Islamic jurisprudence, the Hanafis, Shafis, Hanbalis and Malikis. While most Sunni Muslims in India are Hanafis there are divisions amongst the Hanafis themselves and Deoband represents a strand of the Hanafi thought. The Barelwis who are the followers of the late Ahmed Riza Khan Barelwi (d. 1921) and who are the most numerous in India (according to the Islamic scholar Rafiq Zakaria) might not always follow the fatwa of the Deoband as they have their own seminary in Barilley. The Ahl-e-Hadis is another important sect within Indian Islam which does not conform to any of the four maslaks mentioned above and their principal seminary is located in Benares and they will certainly not hold the fatwa of Deoband to be the last word on any particular issue. A few other fatwas that I can think of that have been reported by the Indian media is one fatwa issued by some obscure alim of West Bengla who forbid Sania Mirza from playing because she wore revealing clothes. The manner in which that issue was reported gave so much importance to the ruling of an alim whom nobody had ever heard of that it smacked of callousness in reporting. The December 12th 2005 issue of Outlook had a cover story on Fatwas. The cover had a blown up picture of heavily painted glistening lips crossed out and the headline was *Crazy World of Fatwas*. "No Make Up" in bold red read a bigger strap line and the last line said, "Outlook obtains a fatwa against Muslim women using lipstick in public". The cover story was titled "Ayatollahs All" by Saba Naqvi Bhaumik. The story starts off quite well though it makes one ponder what she means when she writes that of the great mass of Muslims in India, "Some are neo-converts anxious not to commit any sin in their journey to a promised paradise". It is a troublesome statement because almost all Muslims in India are not neo-converts. The story moves on with the author describing how the fatwa entered pubic consciousness (through the fatwa on Salman Rushdie of course). The reporter makes an important point when she writes that there has been an impression that a fatwa is a command or an edict. But then the reporter moves on to investigate the matter by creating a fictitious setting and it looks as if she is out to debase Islam. The question that the reporter chose to seek an opinion of a mufti was, "As a Muslim woman, is it appropriate for me to work and to use cosmetics like lipstick when I go to office?" The opinion sought was from an alim from the Islamic Fiqh Academy in Delhi. It is not said to which *maslak* in Islam this institution belongs nor is any background about the institution given. The impression that the reader would get from reading the fatwa is that Islam does not allow women to wear make up. Then there are five excerpts from the fatwa collection of Darul Uloom Deoband. The magazine writes that they culled out these *gems* (the italics are mine) from the collection and they have been listed under the title of 'Ridiculous Fatwas'. The five *gems* are: 1. If while breaking wind it does not smell or sound, does it still break the wazu (cleaning before prayers)? A. If you are sure you broke wind and you are not under a false illusion and are not physically challenged, then you should do the wazu again. 2. What is the punishment for a man who tells his wife that having sex with her is like having sex with her mother? A. There is no punishment for what a man says in private to his wife. 3. If a chicken defecates in my well, has it become impure? How do I purify my well? A. Throw out 110 buckets of water from your well. Then it will be purified and the water can be used for wazu. 4. If my bathroom does not have high walls and a roof, should I still bathe in the nude? A. If the walls are high enough to cover your body then bathe in the nude, if not, then don't bathe naked. 5. Will Allah accept my prayers if I pass wind while doing my namaz? A. Only if you have kept the wind within you and restrained from releasing it are your prayers valid. If not, you should say your prayers again. The reporter does not state how many fatwas are there in the ten volumes of the compendium of the Darul Uloom Deoband. Even if a safe speculation is made about the number of fatwas in that set, taking into account the fact that the Dar-ul-ifta of Deoband is more than a century old and it is one of the most respected Islamic seminaries in the world, it can easily be said that the number will not be less than several thousands. Culling out five *gems* from this collection very subjectively presents Muslims in a terrible light, almost mocking their religious beliefs. Journalism is a shallow medium of communication of information. The medium demands that 'news' be communicated as instantaneously as possible. It is a competitive process to see who can deliver the news as quickly as possible. In this communication that is a dominant part of popular culture we see that the limited research that tight deadlines lead to a flattening out of the news. Stories aren't investigated at a deeper level and this leads to a certain pursuit of the sensational. There is a celebration of 'sensationalism'. In such a scenario where the sensational is sought after and celebrated questions like objectivity and truth are lost. The fatwa entered the realm of public consciousness through Rushdie and has now embedded itself in the consciousness of the public. Nobody has not heard of a fatwa. The media has used the word so frequently that most consumers know it as some 'Muslim rule'. The media has failed in it's role of presenting something to the audience in an unbiased manner. The fatwa is perceived to be bad now and every time someone hears the word fatwa the first reaction is that it must be another binding rule for all Muslims. The theorists of the media (I had a section on this in my earlier posting) who operate from a slightly Marxist view point write that the bourgeois notions of what constitutes news helps in preserving a certain status quo while the liberal pluralists believe that truth is provided by the media. As can be seen in the analysis of the way the 'fatwa' is reported it acquires an anti-Islamic tinge to it bringing Chomsky's and Herman's fifth filter where Anti-communism is replaced by Anti-Islamic reportage. Of course, a larger research would demonstrate this inherent prejudice in the Indian media of anti-Islamic prejudice that this research has proved through the reportage of the fatwa. The liberal pluralists believe that news helps in the creation of public opinion but is the truth offered for a 'true public opinion' to be formed. As the analysis of the fatwa reportage has demonstrated there has been a gross misrepresentation of the role a fatwa plays in the life of Muslims and more seriously, a gross misrepresentation of what a fatwa actually is. Thus, when truth itself is questionable then can a responsible public opinion be formed? Edward Said writes that the American media is insensitive to the differences that abound within the *ummah* (community) of Muslims. There is a reductionism at work here that seeks to present Muslims as terrorists and fundamentalists. Using the analogy of Islam as reported in America and fatwa as reported in India a similar argument can be made that the variety within Indian Islam is not recognised by the Indian print media and a reductionism is taking place when fatwas are reported reducing them to mere edicts.There is a callousness in reporting about Islam in India that reflects in reports about fatwas. ------------------------------ [1] <#_ftnref1> Iyer…p. 147 [2] <#_ftnref2> Al-Azm, Sadik J. "Is the 'Fatwa' a Fatwa?" *Middle East Report* 183 (Jul.-Aug. 1993): 27. [3] <#_ftnref3> For many portions of this paragraph I have relied on Javed Anand's article, "Let's Call the Ulema's Bluff" in the Times of India dated July 7, 2005. [4] <#_ftnref4> Peer, Basharat. "Inside Deoband: The Third-Umpire of Fatwas". *Tehelka*. 2: 35 dtd. 03/09/05. [5] <#_ftnref5> The Hindu. "I will abide by religious laws, says Imrana" dtd. 1st July 2005 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060701/ccd6f418/attachment.html From charusoni at hotmail.com Mon Jul 3 14:19:02 2006 From: charusoni at hotmail.com (charu soni) Date: Mon, 3 Jul 2006 14:19:02 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] This might interest Sarai readers Message-ID: Commercialisation of the internet and its pitfalls - I think quite a few Sarai readers might find this interesting.... cheers! Charu Soni INTERNET 'NEUTRALITY' VITAL FOR FREE EXPRESSION Reporters Without Borders said today it is backing the principle of Internet 'neutrality' as the US Senate Commerce Committee is due to meet on Thursday to discuss renewal of the 1996 telecommunications law. "The way to defend freedom of expression is to defend this principle," the international press freedom organisation said. Senators Olympia Snowe (Republican) and Byron Dorgan (Democrat) have presented a draft law (Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2006) to force telecoms operators to respect the principle of neutrality, at a time when US operators show signs of seeking to break the principle so as to offer faster services, such as video on demand. "Rejecting the principle of neutrality would have direct consequences for bloggers and Internet-users worldwide," the organisation said. "If telecommunications operators are allowed to offer different services according to the price paid by content providers it is likely that small online publications, particularly blogs, will be relegated to a second class Internet, with an output greatly inferior to that of commercial concerns." "There would be a risk that websites without financial means would disappear to the benefit of big content providers. The neutrality principle has made the Internet an open, creative and free media. It is already being put under threat by the world's authoritarian states, led by China. It would be disastrous if the United States was to give it up as well," it concluded. Under the neutrality principle operators (such as Verizon, France Telecom) are not allowed to make any distinction between people and organisations which provide a Net service. For example, Internet service providers would not be allowed to sign contracts with blogs or websites to provide them with a better service than it provides to others. The US telecoms operators wanting to provide video on demand for example would require a significant bandwidth. At present a blog uses the same network as the CNN website, so a step in that direction would mean creating two Internets: one high speed, for commercial concerns; the other slower for all those without the means to pay for the operators' services. In this scenario, Internet-users could reject blogs or other "minor sources" of information in favour of looking up pages which are faster to access. Many countries already violate the principle of Internet neutrality by blocking access to online publications which displease them. The Net should serve to transmit information, without reference to its origin or destination. Only the users should be able to decide which content they want to access. Therefore, abandoning the neutrality principle in the United States would increase the risk of spreading the Chinese model - a more centralised network in which access providers would have improper and decisive power over content transmission. From nangla at cm.sarai.net Mon Jul 3 18:32:10 2006 From: nangla at cm.sarai.net (CM@Nangla) Date: Mon, 03 Jul 2006 15:02:10 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] Nangla's Delhi - June 24th to 30th Message-ID: <9f7426fbececf86a256a90161c237578@sarai.net> New posts on Nangla's Delhi http://nangla.freeflux.net Going Home, by Jaanu 30.06.2006 When Jaanu went home from Delhi for a few days, he described Nangla to his baba, beginning with happiness, and turning to its condition in the days of its demolition. “Baba, where I live, there are big houses and small houses. Most of the houses are small. You know, like the little mud hut near the row of flowering plants in front of the house.” “Son, how do people sustain themselves?” Read whole post Comments (1) A Good Way To Remember Old Times, by Lakhmi 28.06.2006 As soon as I entered Nangla, I heard a clear sound. It was from a harmonium. Someone was playing the tune of an old film song. But his fingers did not sound practiced. I wondered where source of the sound was. The tune faltered more than once, but it wasn't difficult to recognise the song. [Read whole post] Comments (1) Raindrops, by Neelofar 27.06.2006 Today raindrops have stilled things in Nangla for a while. Rubble from broken houses, dust in the air – they have settled with the rain and a cooling sensation emits from them. Today cool wind blows in the lanes of Nangla, which seems to be trying to carry drying clothes, black tarpaulin sheets which make roofs, curtains on the doors with it. Today the wind is stirring everything within its reach. [Read whole post] Comments (1) Rainfall in Nangla, by Jaanu 27.06.2006 [I] It's 9:00 AM. Black clouds have overtaken the sky. It is quiet around Nangla. Cars are speeding by on the Ring Road. Suddenly, water starts to pour down from the sky. Bikes stop and young men driving them take shelter under the bus stand. Very few people from Nangla have stepped out today. Those who have, have covered themselves with black tarpaulin sheets. [Read whole post] Comments (2) Preparing for the Monsoons, by Shamsher 27.06.2006 Nangla's morning began at 10:30 AM today. Everyone may have woken up at day break, but the early morning downpour kept everyone indoors. The day was thrown back by an hour by the rains. The day's chores began a few hours late, and will have ended later than they usually do. There are additional tasks to be done as well – like sealing the cracks on roofs. Materials accumulating for months on the roofs of homes have to be cleared and a new place found for them. Garbage has to be discarded. Disarranged tarpaulin sheets have to be placed again carefully on the iron rods that make the framework of the roof, and rejoined at the edges. [Read whole post] An Earthen Postcard from JP, by Babli 24.06.2006 [Image] Dear Friends, For some time now, we have been thinking of ways in which it can be possible to allow for fresh images of Nangla Maachi to appear in the eyes of those who live in our locality, JP basti. One of the things we have done is to paint the couplet “It quenches the thirst of the thirsty, such is Nangla; It shelters those who come to the city of Delhi, such is Nangla” on matkas (earthen pitchers which cool water, popular in the summers), and to place these in different places in the locality. [Read whole post] Comments (1) From samit.basu at gmail.com Mon Jul 3 19:11:04 2006 From: samit.basu at gmail.com (samit basu) Date: Mon, 3 Jul 2006 19:11:04 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Trousers of Time: Children's/YA spec-fic and Indian children's literature Message-ID: <2fa79cb60607030641ke4e0946v717f61c793ef21bc@mail.gmail.com> The luckiest bibliophiles in the world are the ones who aren't told what not to read as children, and can make up their own minds depending on what sort of book they actually like reading. A lot of these children grow up to be speculative fiction readers, some because they admire the incredible capacity of good spec-fic to deal with themes both epic and deeply personal, others because they retain their childlike sense of wonder and like spec-fic's special effects. And the very best children's literature, from Pullman, Rowling, Pratchett, Colfer, Snicket and Stroud to Milne, Nesbit, Barrie, Dahl, Seuss, Carroll, Tolkien and Ray, has always contained speculative elements; from myths and fairytales to spaceships and werewolves, children's literature has always stepped outside the real world's boundaries and set minds free. Various people have had problems with this down the ages, mostly members of crackpot religious organizations and associations of conservative parents. Adult writers of speculative fiction have it easier, the only people who don't like them are critics. In a post-Potter universe, it's no surprise that children's fantasy literature reigns supreme in bookstores all over the world, and the most talked-about authors are usually the next next next JK Rowlings. Children are far less aware of literary hierarchies than their grown-up selves, far less interested in what the books they're reading portray about them as individuals, and establish literary pecking orders mostly on the basis of 'I've read more than you,' which can only be a good thing for books and their writers. Jai Arjun Singh, critic and blogger, on spec-fic, children and literary respectability: Well, I think it goes without saying that children by their very nature are more open-minded and receptive to fantastical elements than adults are. But I think the real reason is more basic and depressing: parents tend to think it's alright for kids of a certain age to indulge themselves with what is perceived as "meaningless fun" - and then, as they grow older, to read Serious Literature. That perception runs very deep and is probably responsible for the step-sisterly treatment given to fantasy for adults, and the schism between Children's Literature and Adult Literature. Vandana Singh, writer of speculative fiction and children's books, on the divide: "The world of the imagination has recently (only in modern times, I think) been infantilized. The Real World is seen to be for grown-ups, and all that fairy-tale stuff for kids. This is truly sad and remarkably stupid as well, because you can see in every culture that the oldest tales have elements of magic or other-worldliness to them. Their value lies not in literal interpretations (in which case myths become nothing but unsuccessful attempts at explaining natural phenomena) but because they speak the language of the unconscious mind --- the language of symbol and metaphor. They tell us about ourselves --- our fears and dreams. After all, reality is such a complicated beast. If you are to hold it, understand it, you need something larger than reality to do so. Enter Imaginative Literature. " "Speculative elements in children's fiction has a long history even in our times --- the world, however, needed the Harry Potter phenomenon to wake up to the fact. We insiders were reading Diana Wynne Jones, Ursula K. Le Guin, Lloyd Alexander and others long before Rowling set pen to paper. For whatever reason Harry and his friends came at the right time to spark a massive public interest in children's imaginative literature, and this led to a discovery on the part of the public to a literature that they had, for a very long time, ignored. Now everyone is jumping on the bandwagon of children's spec fic, and that is all to the good. " Ashok Banker, prolific SFF author, on the children's SFF wave: "Actually, there's nothing 'new' or 'now' about this phenomenon. The most popular books for children for the past several decades have been SFF stories. From the LoTR books, which were essentially young adult fiction repackaged and marketed for older readers in the USA, to the Narnia series, The Dark is Rising series, and several others, the bestselling works of YA fiction have always included spec fic titles. At the same time, there's always been a healthy mix of other genres--so, for instance, there are excellent YA books which are wholly realistic and contain zero spec fic elements, my 13-year old daughter's favourite author is Sarah Dessen, for instance, who writes intense, realistic novels like Dreamland and The Truth About Forever that just happen to feature YA characters but are literature by any yardstick." "What has changed recently has been the phenomenon of J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter books. That's singlehandedly changed the entire publishing world, not just YA fiction. To a great extent, yes, it's opened up the doors for a whole barrage of similar fantasy series marketed at YA, some of which is quite readable and enjoyable, while a lot of it is predictably over-marketed, over-published editorially 'created' crap. This is no different from, for example, the horde of 'christian mystery' thrillers that have exploded since the success of Dan Brown's The Da Vince Cold--achoo!" "The other major catalyst of the rise of spec fic in YA publishing has been film and TV. As I mentioned earlier, 25 years ago, SF fans were considered to be wierdos and eccentrics who had their head in the clouds (or outer space) and were dismissed as 'Trekkies' or beanies. Today, the biggest film franchises almost all have spec fic elements. It's the biggest single genre in the movie and entertainment biz now, and it encompasses gaming, which is a multi-billion industry far bigger than even the movie biz, movies, TV, books, comics, merchandizing, toys, you name it." "This mass explosion has made SFF not only respectable and acceptable even to parents who might earlier have become nervous about their kids reading 'escapist' stuff two decades ago, it's also made the genre tropes intimately familiar to every kid. Back then, the scene in a book or movie wherein the hero explained what a werewolf was, and how it could be killed, was a secret thrill to those of us who spent our days and nights immersed in such arcane lore...Today, every Potterhead knows what a Lycan is and how a silver bullet brings him down splat!" In India, languages which have rich and well-established literary traditions of their own also have, as is only to be expected, extremely good children's speculative fiction. In English, too, we have some truly wonderful children's/Young Adult writers, most of whose books contain speculative elements – Kalpana Swaminathan, Manjula Padmanabham, Anoushka Ravishankar and Vandana Singh have all produced work in recent years that's exciting, entertaining, intelligent and not didactic or patronizing at all. But the young reader's open-mindedness can work both ways; while it ensures that children don't see books as political statements, it also means that children won't gravitate naturally towards books by Indian authors just because they are Indian – stories are all-important, and, in the wake of Pottermania, hype. The global children's writing market is probably even more difficult to break into for foreigners than adult literary fiction, and so far Indian children's literature hasn't produced a champion that's given it what IWE usually demands as a token of success, the big UK/US publishing deal that's the best way of ensuring that an Indian book gets talked about in India. And as far as publicity for Indian children's writing is concerned, the situation is fairly dismal – most publishers don't put any significant amount of money in the promotion of their children's titles, and while in an ideal world good work would find huge audiences simply by being good work, in this world most Indian children hungry to read more aren't even aware of what's good in new Indian children's writing, while national news channels continue to flash updates every time JK Rowling sneezes. This is not to say even for a moment that Indian kids should read Indian writers' books ahead of the latest big international craze, thus missing out on the wave of seriously good children's books that have been sweeping across the world in the last decade, but just that it would be so much more pleasant if Indian children knew that there were actually books available that gave them great stories in familiar settings. Jaya Bhattacharji, editor, Young Zubaan, on current possibilities for speculative childrens' writing: "Pottermania has contributed a great deal to the surge in this form of writing. Given that the Rowling phenomena has been pivotal in encouraging reading, irrespective of the size of the book, I think, a lot of children's writers, feel that since this is probably the genre that is selling, it is the one to emulate. " "There certainly is a market in India for this kind of fiction. I am certainly all for any genre that encourages reading and releasing the imagination. But the Indian market has to evolve its own signature/stamp of fantasy fiction. We cannot rely totally on imitating fiction that is necessarily based on a Western/Christian tradition or of even trying to yoke the two systems together. A lot of the fantasy fiction that comes from the West is in the classic form of Good vs Evil; or in the Romance tradition of being on a Quest; or in search of the Holy Grail, whatever it may be; or reliance on Greek mythology. In India, we have a huge amount of influences to rely upon, which don't necessarily encompass the idea of a quest or the Holy Grail. Sure, we do have a strong sense of Right and Wrong; Good vs Evil, but it is tempered by the cultural melting pot that we live in, where a lot of traditions are being intermingled. So, if fantasy has to emerge in India, it has to develop its own distinctive identity. " "The book market for children is completely unpredictable, so the current flavour of the decade is fantasy as it has a reading public, hence sales. Given the huge investments required in children's publishing, most publishers, authors, literary agents will want/ten to be conservative and capitalise on a winning formula rather than take a risk. It is pure economic sense to promote fantasy and hence, its noticeable dominance of the market. " Payal Dhar, YA SFF author, on Indian children's writing: "My biggest complaint with Indian authors writing for children is that they have a particular idea of what children *should* read and not what they *want* to read or even need to read. As a result, we get a very sanitized depiction of the world, glossing over whatever is uncomfortable. I'd like to see that change. I'd like to see a Jacqueline Wilson or Judy Blume come out of India." "Then again, there is a lot of very good fiction available for children, even if it is not by Indian authors. Having been a weird and withdrawn kid (and now adult!) who spends most waking hours reading, I know that anyone (children as well as grown-ups) who wants a good read just goes and gets a book that sounds interesting. They don't say, "I will only read something by an Indian author." On the other hand, what does sometimes matter is, you don't find anything to identify with - yourself, your surroundings, your society. It isn't a crippling disadvantage, though, and doesn't spoil the fun of reading, which is the main thing." Jaya Bhattacharji on what she wants to see in children's spec-fic: Fantasy for children in India, can be set in any context, time zone etc, but it has to be well written. In the sense, that there should be good, cohesive logic to the universe that is being created. There should be details of the environment and the people and certainly not a cacophony of voices, which really don't do much for the characters. Each character should have a distinct voice. If different traditions are to be mixed (and frankly, I am all for experimentation in literature), then it has to be done cleverly, treated lightly and presented in an interesting manner. By clever, I mean that the author should not be "showing off" their immense reading and familiarity with these other traditions, but create multi-layers and echoes in the story, that will prompt the young reader to submerge, discover and be totally entranced by the new literary creation. At the end of the day, it has to be a GOOD STORY. Also, a story well told will live for a very long time to come and not necessarily be written and created with "a" single market, fixed in time. In fact, it will then be read for many generations to come. " The primary mindset barrier Indian speculative children's writing needs to break is not the same one its adult counterpart. Even today, a lot of successful Indian children's books tend to be 'about India' books, rather bland retellings of history and myth pushed down their throats in large quantities by parents worried about their children losing their connection with their homeland in the flood of wizards, goosebumps, American high schools and Unfortunate Events that take care of their children's fiction demands. How quality Indian children's fiction, speculative or otherwise, can be moved out of bookstores and into homes is unfortunately not a problem writers can deal with. But until publishers find a solution, Indian children's writers will have to keep on writing good books that are no doubt hugely satisfying to write, but don't allow them to afford more time to write even more hugely satisfying books. From mail at shivamvij.com Mon Jul 3 15:10:59 2006 From: mail at shivamvij.com (Shivam Vij) Date: Mon, 3 Jul 2006 15:10:59 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The Reservation of numbers In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <9c06aab30607030240v42fe07fag731ae4d5813d5161@mail.gmail.com> Ah, Mr Karan Thapar and his original arguments! I'll tell you how the 27% figure was arrived at. It was forced by the hon'ble Supreme Court - the same hon'ble Supreme Court that now wants to know from the Union of India how the 27% figure was arrived at! The Mandal Commission used several statistics - most importantly, a huge survey conducted by itself - to conclude that 52% per cent of India's population (http://ncbc.nic.in/backward-classes/index.htm ) can be said to be "backward". What exactly is meant by backward? See http://ncbc.nic.in/html/guideline.htm The 1931 census was used to get an idea of the occupational sub-castes - and NOT their populations. Now, someone went to the Supreme Court on the issue of the "creamy layer" cornering the benefits of reservations. Creamy layer has been one argument against reservations, and that reserved seats lie vacant is another. But if the creamy layer takes away all the seats, why do seats lie vacant? That's just one of many contradictions in the anti-quota arguments that Karan Thapar won't ask on prime time TV. Anyway, so the hon'ble Supreme Court in the Indira Sahani judgement said that the total number of reservations can't exceed 50% seats in an institution - and institutions in the south have found innovative ways of bypassing this, btw. Already there was 22.5% reservation for SC/STs. So it was to keep the total number of reserved seats within the 50% bracket that the government decided to have 27% reservations for OBCs. But even that could not be implemented in central educational institutions as VP Singh's government fell. Did someone say something about statistics being lies? Okay, never mind. As for P. Chidambaram, he's finance minister and not the social justice minister. His job is to know the sensex and inflation numbers. As for Karan Thapar, his job is to get his facts right! From the same interview that you quote from, some ROTFL stuff: * Karan Thapar: Mr Chidambaram you are sitting in front of me advocating that reservations have improved the quality of education in Tamil Nadu. The truth is that you yourself didn't go to an institution where there is reservation for OBCs. You went to Loyala College where there is no reservation for OBCs and then you went to Harvard. Your son went to Don Bosco School, Texas University and Cambridge University. P Chidambaram: You got your facts wrong. I went to Presidency College, which has reservation. Karan Thapar: For your MA at which point in time affiliation to colleges were not important. P Chidambaram: Your facts are wrong. I went to Presidency College for my basic under graduate degree where there is reservation. I went to Law College for my law degree where there is reservation. I am not a beneficiary of reservation but I know that reservation brought in students to my class would otherwise have never got in. Karan Thapar: Mr Chidambaram your son went to Don Bosco School where there is no reservation. Then he went to the University of Texas where there is no reservation and then he went to Cambridge University. P Chidambaram: My son would have never got the benefit of reservation anyway. Karan Thapar: Did you not send your son abroad deliberately because you knew that the standard of education in Tamil Nadu had collapsed. P Chidambaram: No not at all. I am a beneficiary of the educational system in Tamil Nadu and I am proud about the educational system in Tamil Nadu. It can be better that is a different matter. Neither my son nor I are the beneficiary of reservations. * What empirical data does Thapar offer to support his contention that the quality of educational and the repute of an institution is inversely proportional to the quantum of reservations? All that Thapar knows about the Mandal report is from a speech by Rajiv Gandhi, who was leader of the opposition. Has he read the Mandal Report? Does he know about the National Commission of Backward Classes? Does anyone know who its chairman is? Is anyone in for an informed debate or will it remain the farce that it is, to be decided on the terms of the meritorious doctors reading 'You Can Win' under the shade of a shamiana? So which college did you go to, friends? That may have a lot of bearing on this country's affirmative action policies. Best, s On 7/1/06, ish at sarai.net wrote: > A couple of weeks back I saw Karan Thapar's Interview with Chidambaram on > Reservations. This was a very interesting interview because he raised one > very important question ie. How the Govt has come up with the 27% as the > reservation number for the OBC's. My anxiety always was how is this 27% > number derived, integrated or regressed from empirical data. And I think we > have a right to see how this '27%' is derived and how its supporting > material has been put together. When asked this Question our very own > number crunching machine Chidambaram who only a week back came out with > flying numbers for FII, FDI and the sensex , here for reservations seemed > choked for numbers and even for words. And when later on when asked about > when will govt file the report (which I guess the govt it has to file to > the supreme court), the finance minister said the it will take 5-8 weeks. > He said 'The Ministry has to put together all the material available to > it reach the conclusion of 27 per cent ... The material will be put > together. Wait for the material'. So was this number was derived without > the material being put together. hmm > This number is going to be applied on the whole nation and there has to be > enough material/data to be supporting it on the 'national level' and > not just state level. And again to explain this existance of 27% will be > just numbers, which can be read in one way or the other, recompiled and > correlated to suit one Point of View or the other thats the truth of > Statistics. > > Best > > Ish > (sarai.net/ frEeMuZik.net) > _____________________________________________________ > Following are a few lines of exchange from the interview > Please do read the whole interview is at > http://www.ibnlive.com/news/devils-advocate-pc-quotaunquote/12758-4-single.html > > > Karan Thapar: This is very interesting. You have already decided that you > want 27 per cent reservation for OBCs but you don't know on what basis > you want it. Now you have to go back and discover the basis. > > P Chidambaram: I am sure the material is there. We are not discovering the > basis. > > Karan Thapar: You are concocting it. > > P Chidambaram: No we are not either. The ministry has to put together all > the material available to it to reach the conclusion of 27 per cent. It > will be based on material and the material will be put together - wait for > the material. > > > Later on---this is the imp part when Chidambaram was asked about the > derivation of 27% and the material to support this 27% and when it will be > available for the public to see it----- > > Karan Thapar: There is something else that also emerges from this. If you > are saying that all that material will be put together, clearly it hasn't > been put together as yet. > > P Chidambaram: Wrong again. It will be put together in the form of an > affidavit and will be given to the SC. > > Karan Thapar: If it is going to be put together then it hasn't been put > together as yet? > > P Chidambaram: Listen you are quibbling on words. Let me explain my > position. You are quibbling and therefore there is no point quibbling in an > interview. The material will be put together; the material is available > where Supreme Court asks a question. Suppose the Supreme Court asks what > have you done about a particular tax matter. I know the answer but will > have to put together the material in a form of an affidavit. > > Karan Thapar: This is not a tax matter. This is an issue that affects the > future of people in India. > > P Chidambaram: Everything affects the people of India. > > Karan Thapar: Its an issue that has been challenged. When the government is > asked what's the basis on which you have announced 27 per cent > reservation in higher education for the OBCs. It's an amazing thing to > say the government will answer in due course. The government needs to give > an answer today. > > P Chidambaram: I am sorry the government does not have to answer you in an > interview. > > Karan Thapar: Its not me its the people of India. > > P Chidambaram: Government will answer in the proper forum in Parliament in > the Supreme Court not in an interview conducted by you. > > Karan Thapar: But you can't tell the people of India today. > > > P Chidambaram: I have told you about the material. Shall I say it in Tamil > for a change? > > Karan Thapar: No don't say it in Tamil. > > P Chidambaram: I have given you the material, the state government's > report. Let me repeat it once again for you. Several reports done by the > state governments counter backward casts. The Mandal report, the NSS report > and any other surveys. > > > Karan Thapar: All of which are contradictory. > > P Chidambaram: That's your judgement. We don't believe its > contradictory. > > Karan Thapar: Its not my judgement. It's a fact. > > > P Chidambaram: If it is a fact then why are you asking me the question. > > > Karan Thapar: Because I am trying to prove that you don't have the basis > for the decision you made. > > > P Chidambaram: Go ahead and prove it if it satisfies you. > > > Karan Thapar: If the people of India listening to this interview come to > the conclusion that it does not appear to them that the government have an > explanation, what would you say. > > > P Chidambaram: The people of India are not people entirely of your > thinking. The people of India consists of SCs, STs, and backward classes > also. They will be quite happy to know the large amount of material is > available in every state. Large amount of material is available to support > the argument that a significant proportion of seats must be reserved for > the OBCs. > > > Karan Thapar: It sounds to me what you are saying is give us time we will > come up with an explanation. We can't give it today but in eight weeks we > will. > > > P Chidambaram: Sorry that's your conclusion. Let me conclude the way I > summarised it. My conclusion is there is ample material, you are simply > refusing to see the material, You expect an answer in an interview. The > answer will not be given to you in an interview. The answer will be given > in a proper affidavit supported by proper documentation in the Supreme > Court and in Parliament. > > > Karan Thapar: And not before eight weeks. All right that's your answer. > > > > _________________________________________ > 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 laure at tank.tv Mon Jul 3 20:47:37 2006 From: laure at tank.tv (laure at tank.tv) Date: Mon, 03 Jul 2006 16:17:37 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] tank.tv / DVD - CALL FOR SUBMISSION Message-ID: <984ae278c4ce07d472f9a3b38617b8a0@tank.tv> To: Artists based in the UK For: Moving Images of max 3mins long & made after 2000 tank.tv???s new project is the release of a unique DVD, featuring an exceptional selection of 25 short moving image works from UK-based artists. Each work should be no longer than three minutes and must have been made in the last six years (created after December 31, 1999). Entry is open to all artists living/working in the UK. The final selection for the disc will be made by an appointed panel of curators and arts executives including: Hans-Ulrich Obrist / Ben Cook & Mike Sperlinger (The Lux) / Stuart Comer (Tate Modern) / Michelle Cotton (Salon S1 Sheffield) / Rose Cupit (Film London) / Christine Van Assche (Centre Pompidou New Media) / Kathrin Becker (NBK Berlin) The DVD will be widely distributed for sale by Thames & Hudson, in the UK and abroad. The short-listed artists will receive ??250 each and have their work promoted internationally. A quarter of the produced DVDs will be given out to educational institutions, public libraries and local cultural centres, reaching more people with the best in moving images from the UK. This project is funded by the National Lottery through Arts Council England. Submission forms can be downloaded from: http://www.tank.tv/dvd.asp Deadline for submissions: 31st July 2006 Please complete the form, and send it together with your work to: tank.tv 5th floor 49-50, Great Marlborough Street London W1F 7JR http://tank.tv Tank.tv is an inspirational showcase of contemporary moving images / dedicated to exhibiting and promoting moving images in a free and accessible way, www.tank.tv acts as a platform for the new, innovative work in film and video From samit.basu at gmail.com Tue Jul 4 13:37:22 2006 From: samit.basu at gmail.com (samit basu) Date: Tue, 4 Jul 2006 13:37:22 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Possible futures of Indian speculative fiction in English Message-ID: <2fa79cb60607040107p6b25a731w4a9cdb2162d55c21@mail.gmail.com> The project's up at my blog, the essays I've sent in so far with hyperlinks added, and interviews with: Anil Menon Ashok Banker Cheryl Morgan Gotham Chopra Jai Arjun Singh Jaya Bhattacharji Jeff VanderMeer Manjula Padmanabhan Mary Anne Mohanraj Matthew Cheney Payal Dhar Rana Dasgupta Sarnath Banerjee Thomas Abraham Vandana Singh Zoran Zivkovic The link is http://samitbasu.blogspot.com/2006/07/trousers-of-time-possible-futures-of.html Thanks, Samit From cugambetta at yahoo.com Tue Jul 4 14:54:15 2006 From: cugambetta at yahoo.com (Curt Gambetta) Date: Tue, 4 Jul 2006 02:24:15 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] crossing the mexican border Message-ID: <20060704092415.6007.qmail@web42407.mail.yahoo.com> thought you all would be interested... an account of crossing the us/mexico border at tijuana from a friend of mine in texas (for those unfamiliar, San Diego is in California, Tijuana in Mexico just south of there... where he was writing from) curt http://badtexas.blogspot.com/2006/06/we-wait-in-line.html __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From aarti at sarai.net Tue Jul 4 15:20:35 2006 From: aarti at sarai.net (aarti) Date: Tue, 04 Jul 2006 15:20:35 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Open Mic/Open Screen Message-ID: <44AA39EB.7060006@sarai.net> ===================================================================================================== Open Mic / Open Screen: An evening of Film, Video, Audio, Poetry, Spoken Word, Prose and Performance ===================================================================================================== 14th July 2006, Friday, 6:00 P.M. Sarai Interface Zone 29 Rajpur Road Civil Lines Delhi - 110054 The 5th Sarai Open Mic, and the 1st in our new cycle of 2006 events, is finally here! For those who have not attended them before, how it works is, everyone gets 1 - 10 minutes to screen/play video/audio works, and read/perform text based work. You can share video, audio,poetry, spoken word, a short prose piece, a performance, singly or in groups, in any language (though do be prepared to translate for those uninitiated :) The screening/performance is decided on a first-come-first-serve basis. Films, Video and Audio pieces should be between 1- 10 minutes long, and on DVD/VCD/CD format only. Alternatively you can also pipe from a laptop. You can share a complete work, parts of a work, a work in progress, even stills, in B/W and or colour. This time, while we will stay with our usual "bring-what-you-wish" ethic, we also have a special one hour thematic feature on - "Permament Address and Perpetual Motion: Dwelling In Delhi": what are the ways in which we can think through inhabiting this city we call "home"? Featured Performances/Screenings: - Nangla Maachi Lab, Cybermohalla - Aman Sethi: News of the World and Other Stories from Bara Tutti - Umang Bhattacharya: Curious Green - Anand V. Taneja: Letters to the Lord of the Djinns. - Gautam Bhan, Nigah Media Collective You can choose to address our theme for the evening, or not, and bring whatever you wish. Do come, to participate and listen, tell your friends and share an evening with us! Write to aarti at sarai.net for further details. _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From aarti at sarai.net Tue Jul 4 15:50:32 2006 From: aarti at sarai.net (aarti) Date: Tue, 04 Jul 2006 15:50:32 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Far Far Away - Book-launch and gifting Message-ID: <44AA40F0.1000105@sarai.net> Dear All, This Friday we will be hosting the book release and gifting by a young artist from New Zealand, Marnie Slater. She runs a non-profit artist-run gallery and performance space and has been travelling in India for the last few months. She has brought out a set of sketches which she will be releasing this Friday. Along with the launch, Marnie wishes to begin a discussion on the possibilities of independent and self-publishing, along with gifting a copy of her book in exchange for a copy of your own publication/s. It would be great if some of us who are in fact thinking through the possibilities and spaces for self-publishing in our own work could be there and contribute to the discussion. I'm enclosing below her concept note/blurb for the evening. Do pass this on to friends - those working with small books, catalogues, zines and broadsheets, designers etc - anyone whom you think would be interested. Do try and make the time to come. Hoping to see you there! Warmly Aarti +++++ ======================================================= Book-reading and discussion @ Sarai: "Far Far and Away" ======================================================= Far Far and Away: Book Reading and Discussion Marnie Slater 6:00 P.M., Friday 7 July 2006, Interface Zone What defines independent publishing? What are the conceptual possibilities provided by the medium of text, image and graphic? What are the practical avenues available to independent publishers? Self-publishing, whether it be in a collective or individually, comes with its own particular parameters and potential. Marnie Slater combines the launch of her recent publication FAR, FAR AWAY with an evening of conversation addressing some of the issues surrounding independent publishing. You are invited to bring along your own book, zine, magazine or catalogue and exchange them for a copy of FAR, FAR AWAY. All exchanged material will go into the developing library of Enjoy Public Art Gallery in Wellington, New Zealand. FAR, FAR AWAY is a collection of drawings made during Marnie's stay in India. Concerned with the historic documentation and exchange of the "exotic", FAR, FAR AWAY engages the book as a site of fiction, capable of inhabiting multiple locations simultaneously. (Marnie Slater is an artist, writer and curator based in Wellington, New Zealand and is a current trust member of the artist run project space Enjoy Public Art Gallery. Marnie has been living in Bombay for the last 5 months with the assistance of a Commonwealth Foundation Arts and Crafts Award.) _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From mail at shivamvij.com Tue Jul 4 19:11:27 2006 From: mail at shivamvij.com (Shivam Vij) Date: Tue, 4 Jul 2006 19:11:27 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The Reservation of numbers In-Reply-To: <9c06aab30607030240v42fe07fag731ae4d5813d5161@mail.gmail.com> References: <9c06aab30607030240v42fe07fag731ae4d5813d5161@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <9c06aab30607040641i10438316v63ef262ac6e7a75@mail.gmail.com> Ah, Karan Thapar and his arguments! I'll tell you how the 27% figure was arrived at. It was forced by the hon'ble Supreme Court - the same hon'ble Supreme Court that now wants to know from the Union of India how the 27% figure was arrived at! The Mandal Commission used several statistics - most importantly, a huge survey conducted by itself - to conclude that 52% per cent of India's population (http://ncbc.nic.in/backward-classes/index.htm ) can be said to be "backward". What exactly is meant by backward? See http://ncbc.nic.in/html/guideline.htm The 1931 census was used to get an idea of the occupational sub-castes - and NOT their populations. Now, someone went to the Supreme Court on the issue of the "creamy layer" cornering the benefits of reservations. Creamy layer has been one argument against reservations, and that reserved seats lie vacant is another. But if the creamy layer takes away all the seats, why do seats lie vacant? That's just one of many contradictions in the anti-quota arguments that Karan Thapar won't ask on prime time TV. Anyway, so the hon'ble Supreme Court in the Indira Sahani judgement said that the total number of reservations can't exceed 50% seats in an institution - and institutions in the south have found innovative ways of bypassing this, btw. Already there was 22.5% reservation for SC/STs. So it was to keep the total number of reserved seats within the 50% bracket that the government decided to have 27% reservations for OBCs. But even that could not be implemented in central educational institutions as VP Singh's government fell. Did someone say something about statistics being lies? Okay, never mind. As for P. Chidambaram, he's finance minister and not the social justice minister. His job is to know the sensex and inflation numbers. As for Karan Thapar, his job is to get his facts right! From the same interview that you quote from, some ROTFL stuff: * Karan Thapar: Mr Chidambaram you are sitting in front of me advocating that reservations have improved the quality of education in Tamil Nadu. The truth is that you yourself didn't go to an institution where there is reservation for OBCs. You went to Loyala College where there is no reservation for OBCs and then you went to Harvard. Your son went to Don Bosco School, Texas University and Cambridge University. P Chidambaram: You got your facts wrong. I went to Presidency College, which has reservation. Karan Thapar: For your MA at which point in time affiliation to colleges were not important. P Chidambaram: Your facts are wrong. I went to Presidency College for my basic under graduate degree where there is reservation. I went to Law College for my law degree where there is reservation. I am not a beneficiary of reservation but I know that reservation brought in students to my class would otherwise have never got in. Karan Thapar: Mr Chidambaram your son went to Don Bosco School where there is no reservation. Then he went to the University of Texas where there is no reservation and then he went to Cambridge University. P Chidambaram: My son would have never got the benefit of reservation anyway. Karan Thapar: Did you not send your son abroad deliberately because you knew that the standard of education in Tamil Nadu had collapsed. P Chidambaram: No not at all. I am a beneficiary of the educational system in Tamil Nadu and I am proud about the educational system in Tamil Nadu. It can be better that is a different matter. Neither my son nor I are the beneficiary of reservations. * What empirical data does Thapar offer to support his contention that the quality of educational and the repute of an institution is inversely proportional to the quantum of reservations? All that Thapar knows about the Mandal report is from a speech by Rajiv Gandhi, who was leader of the opposition. Has he read the Mandal Report? Does he know about the National Commission of Backward Classes? Is anyone in for an informed debate or will it remain the farce that it is, to be decided on the terms of the meritorious doctors reading 'You Can Win' under the shade of a shamiana? So which college did you go to, friends? That may have a lot of bearing on this country's affirmative action policies. Best, s -- www.shivamvij.com | www.theotherindia.org mail at shivamvij dot com From crd at fondation-langlois.org Wed Jul 5 02:21:50 2006 From: crd at fondation-langlois.org (CR+D) Date: Tue, 4 Jul 2006 16:51:50 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] News from the Daniel Langlois Foundation Message-ID: <57e6e8fa70a284102ff512058a2979ee@fdl-webmestre> New recipients of financial support from the Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art, Science, and Technology Strategic Grants for Organisations: Through this program, the Foundation supports non-profit organisations in their strategic development projects. To learn more about the 2006 projects that have received support to date under the Strategic Grants for Organisations program: http://www.fondation-langlois.org/flash/e/index.php?Section=proj&SousSection=pro&TypeIco=col&Annee=2006 Research and Experimentation Grants in Art+Science+Technology: Under this program, the Foundation receives proposals from artists and researchers who work in areas targeted by the Foundation. Each year, the proposal deadline is January 31. To learn more about the projects by artists and researchers selected by the Foundation for 2006: http://www.fondation-langlois.org/flash/e/index.php?Section=proj&SousSection=pro&TypeIco=ind&Annee=2006 The program's guidelines are available on the Foundation's Web site: http://www.fondation-langlois.org/flash/e/index.php?NumPage=515 From hpp at vsnl.com Wed Jul 5 08:45:17 2006 From: hpp at vsnl.com (hpp at vsnl.com) Date: Wed, 05 Jul 2006 03:15:17 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] Check out this blog Message-ID: Dear Friends http://cuckooscall.blogspot.com Great blog, from Calcutta! Lovely pictures. Rivetting content, with a literary flavour. Dr Mrinal Bose Calcutta From ravig1 at vsnl.com Wed Jul 5 15:41:49 2006 From: ravig1 at vsnl.com (Ravi Agarwal) Date: Wed, 05 Jul 2006 15:41:49 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Bhatti Mines appeal Message-ID: An appeal fowarded by the community in Bhatti Mines on hunger strike... best ravi ====================================================================== "Save human -- Save Forest" Note : 5th day of the "Aamaran Anshan"( Hunger Strike till death) and 5 are very serious. From 2 July, 2006 more than 25 people ready to sacrifice for "Aamaran Anshan". Subject: After Kramik Hunger Strike for 39 days, the continuation of Hunger Strike till death from 27June, 2006 against the cruel demolition mission by the Delhi Govt. Dear Sir/Madam, An appeal for protection of more than 20,000 people who suffered a lot in1947 at the time of 'Indo-Pak' division and who were officially settled in 1976 in village Bhatti Mines ( Bhagirath Nagar ) which is on the verge of cruel demolition mission from 30 June and 1 July 2006, because of Delhi Govt. putting false evidences against the village in the Honourable Supreme Court. Hunger Strikers' Name from 27 June, 2006 1.. Om Prakash S/o Sh. Aloo Ram Kharwad 2.. Ram Chandra @ Rama S/o Sh. Tharoo Mal Gadgat 3.. Ramesh S/o Sh. Ram Swaroop Gundali 4.. Beera S/o Sh. Amar Chand Nahar 5.. Gopal S/o Sh. Kamman Ram Majoka 6.. Krishan S/o Sh. Jaggu Ram Dahag Hunger Strikers' Name from 28 June, 2006 1.. Pundit Azad S/o Sh. Uttam Chand Kharwad 2.. Dhara Singh @ Dharoo S/o Sh. Kamman Ram 3.. Sunil Panihar S/o Sh. Hukam Chand 4.. Raju Majoka S/o Sh. Bal Ram Singh General Secretary Dalip Kumar -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060705/0e5bad77/attachment.html From shohini at vsnl.com Tue Jul 4 13:01:21 2006 From: shohini at vsnl.com (Shohini Ghosh) Date: Tue, 04 Jul 2006 13:01:21 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Review of Irshad Manji's book Message-ID: <5D52CCAE-C854-4512-A1BE-F619FE402135@vsnl.com> Dear Vikhar Ahmad: I read your review of Irshad Manji's `The Trouble with Islam Today' with great interest. I agree to a very large extent with your comments about her (frequently naive) political stance on many issues, most notoriously, on the Israel Palestinian conflict. Your review however underplays the dillemma that she outlines very early in her book : "Can Islam and homosexulaity be reconciled?" (Page 23) I think this idea is pretty central to the book. Whether or not one agrees with her formulations, it has to be taken seriously. Had you engaged with the powerful role that desire plays - of which sexual orientation is an integral part - you may have hesitated to conclude that "She [Irshad Manji] doesn't talk about female suicide bombers and we can be sure that they don't blow themselves up because of the seventy virgins in paradise". Well, we can't be so sure, can we? Besides, how many better reasons are there to die? Warmly Shohihi -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060704/b6fecada/attachment.html From hpp at vsnl.com Thu Jul 6 12:55:53 2006 From: hpp at vsnl.com (hpp at vsnl.com) Date: Thu, 06 Jul 2006 07:25:53 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] The most basic human right Message-ID: The most basic human right V Ramaswamy Calcutta hpp at vsnl.com Background “A very creditable achievement, of which you can be justifiably proud.” Thus concluded Dr Yusuf Samiullah, Engineering Adviser, Department for International Development (DFID) of the UK govt, in late-1997. He had just completed an inspection tour of environmental improvement works in slum clusters of Howrah, the historically neglected, and now-blighted industrial city across the river from Calcutta. This work was done through a community-based pilot project. The objective of the project was to initiate and demonstrate community participation in taking up much-needed local environmental improvement tasks; and to derive lessons on the opportunities and difficulties confronting such efforts, so as to enable appropriate re-structuring of municipal infrastructure projects. This pilot project was being taken up as the concluding part of the work of the Social Development group within the Calcutta Environmental Management Strategy & Action Plan (CEMSAP), a project of the state govt. of West Bengal, supported by the DFID. The role of the project’s social development group had been to study the impact of environmental degradation in metropolitan Calcutta on the poor, low income and vulnerable sections; and to develop strategies and action plans to address their environmental needs and priorities within city environmental improvement programmes. The group was instrumental in emphasising that lack of access to adequate supplies of drinking water, compounded by highly inadequate sanitation, was the key environmental problem confronting Calcutta. It was pointed out that the impact of this fell disproportionately on the poor and low income. And that this was a result of the overall disempowered status of such communities. A Community Environmental Management Strategy and Programme was therefore developed and written, which called for the re-design of conventional civic infrastructure projects so as to integrate active participation of the affected communities and their grassroots organisations. The pilot project in Howrah slums was an important means towards taking such action to the ground. Three wards under the Howrah Municipal Corporation, with large slum populations, were assigned for conducting the project. Several months before his inspection visit, Dr Samiullah had attended a meeting with councillors and officials from Howrah, and community representatives, to discuss plans and procedures for taking up the pilot project in slum neighbourhoods. Impressed with the enthusiasm and promised cooperation of the councillors and community representatives, Dr Samiullah gave his approval to the proposed project and increased its budget to Rs 1 million. Over the next 7 months, an intensive process of grassroots action was taken up. Community-level meetings were organised, with poor households, local youth and neighbourhood organisations. Local volunteers were deployed in a range of functions. And ultimately, a number of tubewells (hand-pumps) were installed, a tubewells maintenance squad was organised, broken drains were repaired, and several toilets were constructed. And with the toilets lies a tale. Service latrines A ‘service latrine’ is a toilet that has to be manually cleaned out, by lowly sweepers. This is an arrangement that was widespread in old towns and cities across India. The image of a person carrying a basket of excreta on his / her head – had been the subject of a call to conscience by Mahatma Gandhi. But it was only in 1993 that the govt. of India finally enacted a law banning such ‘manual scavenging’. In 1993, the welfare ministry (which was responsible for enacting and implementing the Act) undertook a survey of the extent to which the law had been implemented in all the states of India. It was found that even the Chief Secretaries of many major states in the country were unaware of the existence of such a law. The govt. also introduced a programme to be implemented through the urban local bodies to subsidise the conversion of these service latrines into sanitary toilets. This had been implemented for several years in Howrah. However, there were severe shortcomings in implementation. Service latrines continued to be in use on a massive scale in Howrah, with all the attendant adverse environmental health risks to the community and the conservancy workers (apart from the violation of the latter’s human dignity). The problem was that in many cases, there were a large number of people using the service latrine. In the slums of Howrah, a plot would typically house 15-20 households, and over 100 persons would be using the latrine, typically a hole in the floor of a small raised cubicle-shed. The govt. subsidy scheme was, however, designed keeping a single (5-7 member) household in view. Septic tanks either did not exist, or were non-functional. The slum plots were congested with the hutments, leaving no spare space. Hence service latrines simply continued to exist and be used. In some of the worst areas, the service latrines made the neighbourhood extremely foul and dangerous. These were the areas where the incidence of water-borne and gastro-intestinal diseases was high, with high infant mortality and morbidity. Not surprisingly, it was emphasised by the slum communities and the councillors that proper toilets were the most vital need of the people. Building cooperation, building toilets To carry out the pilot project, a team was constituted, under my charge in my capacity as social development coordinator of the CEMSAP project. A field office was set up. Prodyut, a political activist cum social worker from the project area, with strong local roots and contacts, was employed to supervise field activity. Two social development professionals were recruited to handle the documentation and administrative aspects. And a couple of students were assigned field liaison tasks. As coordinator of the pilot project, I was a possessed soul. After a tour through some of the slum localities, where one had to literally walk over a slush of excreta – I felt a flush of awakening. I felt my moment had arrived. While anybody would run far away from and shun such places – except if they had to live there – I decided to remain there, and address this problem of service latrines, come what may. I felt thrilled by the challenge. The apparent insolubility of the problem, its neglect, the foul environment, the revulsion of officials and authorities to engage with this, the unending rebuttals of habitual prejudice- and conflict-oriented perceptions – one of my senior project colleagues had opined “Decent people don’t go to Howrah” – all this only strengthened my resolve. I became completely alienated from the society and city I had been part of. Everything took on a mystic and mythic aura in my consciousness. The poor slumdweller living amidst excreta became my ‘D aridra Narayan’, God in the garb of the poor. I had found my God, in the shit. I had found the meaning and purpose of my life. And nothing was going to stop me. And Prodyut was there beside me, to help me in my work. Problems, options and priorities were discussed with communities, their elected municipal representatives and Corporation officials. Assumptions and habitual perceptions – based on the existing corrupt and insincere institutional culture – were directed at me as coordinator. But I discerned and cut through all this, with my resolve, commitment and energy. The work was too serious to be left hostage to anybody. The project team was reorganised, and local community volunteers were taken on against a stipend. The technical solution, under the circumstances, was a twin-pit latrine. This meant knocking down the existing toilet structure, cleaning up the spot, constructing two large, deep brick pits and erecting a multi-seat toilet shed block over the pits. The excreta would flow to one pit; the honey-combed brickwork would enable the liquid matter to be absorbed in the soil. After a year’s use by the dwellers, the first pit would become full. The excreta would then flow to the second pit, while the first pit would remain unused, awaiting organic decomposition of the excreta. After another year, the matter in the first pit would become inert soil, which would be removed and the pit’s re-use begun. The soil would be removed by the dwellers and used or sold as compost. And the second pit would then remain disused for a year; and so on. As the plot was very congested, space had to be created to accommodate the two large pits (needed because of the large number of users). Some huts wou ld have to be shifted. But it was found that it was clean toilets that the people wanted more than anything else. When it became clear to them that the project team did really intend to construct proper toilets - and had no other agenda besides this – they were prepared to do all they could to get this. Meetings were held with all the households in each slum plot. Cost estimates were prepared for the proposed sanitary toilets. Households committed voluntary labour for the work and its monitoring. The landlord (principal tenant actually) was asked to contribute Rs 5,000 towards the total cost of each unit. A memorandum of understanding was drawn up and signed by the landlord and head of each household, and counter-signed by the local ward councillor. Local contractors were selected through public tender to carry out the work. The pilot project budget covered the entire cost of constructing the toilets. But the govt. subsidy, of Rs 5,000 per unit, was to be retained by the project team; and this amount together with the landlords’ contributions was to be used to construct more toilets. Over a period of less than 3 months, 10 toilet blocks were constructed spread over slum pockets of two municipal wards of Howrah. The maximum cost of a unit – under the eagle eyes of the project staff and slum households - was about Rs 22,000. The lives of hundreds of people had been positively transformed. And very foul spots, in the midst of the metropolis, were rehabilitated. These toilets are all still in existence, in perfect condition, kept spotlessly clean by the proud slum households. Howrah Pilot Project But the story does not end there. I had been commissioned to undertake research and write an article for a UK journal. As the subject of the article, I decided to focus on the existing degraded situation in a large Muslim slum within the pilot project, and outline a vision for community-led redevelopment. I saw this as a good opportunity to root myself in a specific place, and devote myself to actually initiating long-term community action, instead of thinking about such matters, or researching or writing about it. I worked on this simultaneously with the pilot project, employing slum youth to assist in field surveys and to lay the ground for a long-term intervention. The pilot project was over and the field office was wound up. All the engineering works were completed on time, using every penny of the allocated budget to do as much as possible. Inspired and spurred by the success of the project and the bonds of cooperation built up with the slum communities, Prodyut and I formed an independent organisation, Howrah Pilot Project (HPP). This would be based in Priya Manna Basti in Howrah, a century-old jute workers’ settlement, that was now home to some 40,000 people, mainly from labouring, Urdu-speaking, Muslim households. From here we would work with the slumdwellers, as concerned and capable citizens, to rebuild the city from the grassroots. HPP would be an organisation whose existence and work was sustained by civic and community consciousness and ownership. The fee I received for my article provided the start-up fund for the newly-formed HPP to take up its work. I was also awarded a year’s fellowship which enabled me to devote time to the HPP. Eliminating service latrines This was August 1997, and the 50th anniversary of India’s independence. I felt that the best way to commemorate the occasion and to pay homage to the memory of Mahatma Gandhi, the father of the nation, was to work to eliminate service latrines from the slums of Howrah. We had after all found and demonstrated the solution to this apparently insoluble problem. I felt like a scientist who has made an earth-shattering new discovery, expanding the frontiers of knowledge and transforming human life. Through my close association and collaboration with specialists from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, who had also been part of the CEMSAP project, I was asked to join an international research study on environmental health and the urban poor, looking at Howrah slums. The research budget for this was provided to HPP and with this a full-fledged community empowerment programme, focussing on poor women and children, was initiated in PM Basti. The objective – to nurture and build grassroots capabilities and institutions to lead community upliftment and slum redevelopment. A service latrine elimination programme was also developed by Howrah Pilot Project. Surveys were conducted in slum pockets. Plot-level meetings with households were organised. It was explained that though the pilot project was over, after the successful demonstration of the conversion of service latrines into sanitary toilets, it was now necessary to enable other similar slum households to also avail of this opportunity. The cost factor was explained. With the necessary cost likely to be about Rs 22-25,000 (in the maximum users case), and Rs 5,000 coming from the govt. subsidy and another Rs 5,000 from the landlord, the remaining Rs 12-15,000 would have to be contributed by the user households. It was suggested that this could be through a credit-financing arrangement with a housing finance company. Each household would begin paying something like Rs 50 per month immediately after the toilet was constructed, and repay for about 15 months. After substantial effort, a leading housing finance company agreed to support this scheme. The loans would be in the name of Howrah Pilot Project, who would take responsibility for the whole venture. Through the CEMSAP project, I had become acquainted with some of the senior officials of the metropolitan development authority. Hence approval of the metropolitan development authority – who would sanction the release of the govt subsidy - was also obtained. They agreed to make available the subsidy for ten toilet units at a time, in advance, provided the programme was approved by the Howrah Municipal Corporation. The scheme was detailed and submitted to the Howrah Municipal Corporation. One ward was to be taken up for complete elimination of service latrines in slums. And that would enable an appropriate city-wide scaling-up subsequently. HPP would take up, using its own resources, the crucial community organising role. A request was made to the Corporation for early release to HPP of the subsidy due for the 10 units constructed under the CEMSAP pilot project (as earlier authorised and agreed to), so that the work could be started. A saga of inaction Nothing happened. Despite repeated efforts, over many months, and letters and meetings with officials – the service latrine elimination programme was a non-starter. Much later, it became clear that this had been simply sabotaged by people within the Corporation. There was a happy and neat arrangement between officials and contractors, to appropriate the subsidy. A bogus toilet would be built – which would be non-functional immediately after. The subsidy was then approved, released and pocketed. The subsidy for the 10 toilets constructed under the CEMSAP pilot project – remains unpaid. For several years HPP retained the landlords’ contributions, awaiting the Corporation’s approval and payment. Finally this was spent on its other community activities. After about a year’s inaction, another attempt was launched. A proposal was submitted to the state environment department, in response to its public advertisement inviting proposals from NGOs for environmental projects. Based on the self-financing scheme developed earlier by HPP, this proposal requested modest support to HPP to organise the beneficiary communities, and more importantly, sought the environment department’s influence upon Howrah Corporation to initiate the programme. Nothing came of that either. Notwithstanding Dr Yusuf Samiullah’s congratulatory feedback, with which this account began. Perhaps it had all been too easy then, happened merely because that was a govt. project and municipal involvement had been formally arranged. Yet another effort was made a year later, with letters being sent to the 40-odd local bodies within metropolitan Calcutta, offering assistance in taking up service latrine elimination in their respective areas. There was no response, except from a small municipality. When we went there for a discussion, we were ultimately told: we are already doing all that’s necessary, there’s no poverty here, try elsewhere. The story doesn’t end there either. Much water has flowed under the Howrah bridge since then. In early 2000, after severe flooding in slum neighbourhoods because of the choking of a major high drain in south-central Howrah, HPP initiated a community-led programme to clean and maintain the high drain. Detailed surveys were undertaken, with invited professional specialists assisted by local people. The approval in principle was obtained from officials in the govt. of India, as well as a UN agency, to support such a programme. However, the formal proposal for this support would have to be made by Howrah Corporation. That is yet to happen. The high drain remains choked. When the situation became critical, some patchwork cleaning was done by the Corporation. A sanitary engineer invited by us who inspected the choked high drain told me: in any civilised society, if this kind of thing existed, it is sufficient basis for an arrest warrant to be issued against the mayor for criminal negligence leading to avoidable deaths and suffering. But here, such things are “normal”. Conclusion These are only a few examples from Howrah Pilot Project’s experience of the long, unending experience of denial and disregard from institutions that poor slumdwellers face. But the work of HPP through its centre in Priya Manna Basti continues. Talimi Haq School, a non-formal school for poor and working children, was started in 1998 and this continues. In 1999, it received a special award as a ‘school that cares’ under the aegis of a city newspaper. In 2003 and again in 2004, children from Talimi Haq School participated in an internet communication project on nature with children from schools in the UK . That enabled them to make many visits to the nearby Botanical Gardens (near the eastern end of the Grand Trunk Road). A women’s spice-making enterprise has been successfully established, which today supplies a range of specialist spices (like biryani and chaap masalas) for export to America, Europe and Japan. A few slum youth, boys and girls, have gone through an intensive process of skill and leadership development and grown and matured as human beings. A number of volunteers from Calcutta have worked for varying periods and had a rich, transformative educational experience. A lot of goodwill has been created. The work has inspired similar grassroots efforts in other slum localities of Calcutta and Howrah. The whole programme is managed by trained community-based volunteers and its modest fund requirement are met through donations by the founders and other well-wishers, and occasional small grants. The endeavour continues. The whole experience has been rich in learning for those involved. HPP is a live laboratory, to yield strategic, experience-based action knowledge on poverty and slum community development. The CEMSAP pilot project had changed my life and Prodyut’s – but I had been personally reluctant to take this up, because after my failed experience of trying to work with others for social ends, I had implicitly slipped into a loner mode. Thus though I was constantly concerned about social questions, I didn’t actually have any truck with anyone, except inside my heart. In the planning phase of the CEMSAP project, I was working closely with other colleagues, but this was like a partnership, and the work was of an intellectual nature. But now, in the absence of anyone else being available to do this, I had to take up leadership and management of a concrete set of activities at the grassroots, and reach out to and relate in differing ways with diverse people. The crossing of the river, and going to Howrah – transformed my life, something I could never have even imagined just before that. Yet this was only something residing deep within me, the plaintive plea of my soul, that t he Almighty entrust a poor Muslim child to me, to love and nurture. Prodyut and I resolved and committed ourselves to devoting ourselves through HPP to PM Basti, come what may. Our early achievements through the pilot project looked on hindsight to have been deceptively easy. All the struggles during that short venture could not compare with the unending ordeal of institutional disregard that the HPP experience had been an apprenticeship and a harsh trial in. Working in a poor, degraded slum in Howrah, controlled by criminalised political cadre - patience, adaptation, and swallowing of pain is taught continuously. An honest, selfless, idealistic, sincere social interventionist – is an aberration and a caricature in such an area of darkness. Poverty, conflict, social and environmental injustice – all degrade the human fibre, revealing man’s ugliest facets. But amidst poverty can also be found simplicity, trust, beautiful dreams and aspirations, and goodness, a fertile soil to plant and nurture a small sapling of conviction and responsibility. HPP is a small, quiet, cheerful island of hope in PM Basti. Postscript The right to defecate is perhaps the most basic human right. In an urban setting this requires toilets. And human dignity calls for a hygienic, sanitary toilet. As a woman explained, if one had no food to eat one could go out and beg for some food; but could one beg for a toilet? Not having a decent toilet – made life a never-ending nightmare. Most of all for women. But evidently this is not at all a concern for many. They can carry on, regardless. While human dignity is abused, and little children die. From aman.am at gmail.com Thu Jul 6 16:48:25 2006 From: aman.am at gmail.com (Aman Sethi) Date: Thu, 6 Jul 2006 16:48:25 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Job Oppurtunities for LLPs. Post 5.0 Message-ID: <995a19920607060418i5b94b7e7p2bb9360d64474eb0@mail.gmail.com> Dear All, Job oppurtunities for LLPPs is a rather long post - and looks at the wider matrix of employment around the labour mandi. Mazdoors rarely sticks to one particular "line", and over a period of time try their hand, and their luck, at a number of things. Have tried to work in a slightly tighter "journalistic" style for this post. Hope u enjoy it. Best A. Part I: Summer It was that time of the year when everyone began short-listing the "hottest day of the year." This year the countdown began early when the 13th of February was declared, some what ambiguously, as the "hottest day in February in a very long time," by a leading English publication. But, that was a mere 28 degrees. By April 7, Delhi had recorded "the hottest day of the season" at 39 degrees; by May, the city was a smoldering 44 degrees (the hottest 8th May in five years) – two degrees below that white-hot 26th of May 1998: the hottest May in 50 years. Incandescent winds prowled the main streets of the city, knocking on windows and battering doors. Like a withering flower, the city slowly contracted into herself. Her filmy, makeshift outer layers peeled away; forcing her inhabitants deep into cool, solid, shadowy gullies, far from the biting heat of day. In Bara Tuti too, summer had left its mark. After a winter of frenetic construction, the summer had brought pareshaani after pareshaani. MCD demolitions, sealings, moratoria, had brought construction activity to a standstill. The heat had sent many back to gaon, but still others stayed back in Delhi – marooned on a baking island, ruing their burnt boats and uncrossed bridges. The focus of the mandi had slowly shifted to the "palli taraf", or other side, of the road in an attempt to escape the worst of the noon-day sun, but some labourers still sat out by the big tyre, waiting for work. This was low season for construction anyway. The rains were expected in a month or two; and most work would probably finish before the first showers, but no one really wanted to take a "chance." When adding extra rooms to a fourth floor in Delhi, chance can mean very many things – an MCD official whose asking price is too high, a mistry who decides to leave for gaon without giving a day's notice, or a delayed payment that makes further construction financially impossible. When "chances" such as these abound, it is best not to tinker with the roof just before the rains set in. Work really picked up in the Id-Diwali period when people fixed their houses, painted their walls, and invited rishtedaars over for the holidays. But Diwali was still some way off. It was still summer, and the mazdoors had to find work in a market that seemed to be in a permanent state of siesta. Ashraf, Rehaan and Lalloo sat on the stairs of a shuttered kirane ki dukaan. Collectively, they were down to their last hundred rupees. The battered bluish note that had been charged with providing them with beedis, chai, food and alcohol until they shook themselves up and walked down to the butcher's shop to paint his blood-smattered walls a dizzy pink. The work could wait, and if it didn't, some more would probably turn up. For now, there was time to drink a leisurely round of chai, and dream about other, better ways of making a living, in places far removed from the sapping heat of summer. Part II- Scheme a little scheme on me. Job opportunities for LLPPs. "It is important to remember," said Ashraf, as he pulled on his beedi, "that the mazdoor is essentially a versatile being. He is not just a body, he is also a state of mind; a sharply focused will that can be utilized for purposes that go beyond laying one brick on another. And in the lean season he must do just that." However, choosing the right job is a delicate matter. In the lean season, any job is the right job, but if you want the RIGHT job – a little thinking is required. "Akal lagaoge, toh ek hi din mein mote ho jaoge." The most important thing is pay or kamai: how much you earn per hour. But pay is not just about the sum, it is about how often you are paid – per day? Per week? Or per month? The "per month" salary cycle is the biggest drawback in any regular job. You may get the job, but what will you eat for the month preceding your first paycheck? A per week cycle is good, but a per day system is the best. Anything longer simply holds you hostage until the payday – and every further delay makes it harder and harder to leave. The pay cycle is intrinsically linked to your freedom, and this is the beauty of dehadi ka kaam (daily wage work). You settle at price, finish the work, take the money and leave. If he pays you the agreed price, great. If he doesn't, no-one at the mandi works for him again. The right job then, is the perfect balance of pay and freedom. A job that allows you the luxury of not going, but also the comfort of assured pay if you do go. A job that requires no qualifications other than the universal LLPP degree. "An LLPP," said Ashraf, to an increasingly awe-struck Rehaan, "is a qualification that we are all borne with, and may be claimed by even the most stubborn illiterates." So when asked: "What is your qualification?" "LLPP." You may answer with pride. Chances are the interviewer will never know its expansion: Likh Lowda, Padh Patthar. Such jobs are hard to find. But they exist, and in the unlikeliest of places. * "The mazdoors are everywhere," says Rehaan, "And that is why we understand the city and sarkar better than anyone else." For the average denizen, the Sarkar is far-away and remote; protected by high walls topped with jagged glass and gun-toting security men in ill-fitting uniforms. Access is close to possible only through a number of small "side entrances" ("Please form a Q") that open out like hundreds of trapdoors in the boundary walls of a medieval city. The last time the public really got a view of the Sarkar, was on the 13th of December 2001, when five armed men stormed "the most guarded 5 acre patch in country"- Sansad Bhavan. The made-for-television drama that lasted 30 minutes and resulted in 12 deaths, and 12 injuries, and brought India and Pakistan to the brink of war. Rehaan storms Sansad Bhavan on a routine and regular basis – he just gets an entry pass made at the gate. "I worked at Sansad Bhavan for more than a year," he says, "Ek dum thaand ki naukari hai. All you have to do is move files from one room to another, carry chairs from one office to another, and roam around the building as you please." Contractors recruit mazdoors from chowks across the city, and get their passes made. On entry, mazdoors are thoroughly checked by armed security men, given a standard-issue trolley, and sent off into the labyrinthine corridors of power. Once in, the mazdoor is called as and when he is needed, and in the meantime is free to roam as far as his access pass lets him. At least 15 mazdoors work at the Parliament on any given day – carrying files, moving furniture, installing air-conditioning units and pushing trolleys. Apart from Rs 250 per day, the job entitles you to meals, transport to and from the mandi, and various air-conditioned spaces to dream in. In sharp contrast to the stated sameness of the outside of Parliament, the inside seems to be a frenzy of activity. Several new offices have been constructed, and an entire universe of files is being shifted from Parliament to these newer buildings. Rumours abound of buildings rented for 20 lakhs a month near Khan Market, of newly built cash-rooms over-flowing with currency, and of course of the luxury in which the officers conduct their daily business. According to Rehaan, every bada officer's office has the following things: an Air conditioner, double bed, sofa set, television, computer, and two chaparasis who appear at the ring of a bell. Each bada officer has about 10 officers under him, and each officer has several others who report to him. Files ka kaam touches the nerve centre of sarkariyat. The file is a governmental neuro-transmitter: The sarkar sees, hears and acts through these files. It is how the Sarkar makes sense of the world around it. Mountains of files, piles of files, rooms full of files. So many files, that they are threatening to overrun Sansad Bhavan. So many files that the government hires mazdoors everyday to load thousands of files into trucks bound for Lok Nayak Bhavan. Apart from acting as the senses of the Sarkar, the file is also the memory of the Sarkar: A record of every entity that has ever encountered the state. A record of every square foot of land bought, sold, or disputed. Every suspect, accused and victim. Every murder, hanging and encounter. Punjab, Sindh, Gujarat, Maratha. A charged, viral being, the file infects every thing it touches. Files record those who made them, changed them, issued them, borrowed them, or signed them. Every action related to a file is the genesis of another file, and so the only agent that can really move them, without getting sucked in, is the mazdoor- unregistered, unidentified, na baap ka naam, na ghar ka pata. They live in along different coordinate axes- intersecting only occasionally, and so mazdoors are ideal for moving files. Working in the heart of the Sarkar also makes the outside world easier to understand. Every micro-process within the Sansad Bhavan finds resonance in the outside world, every law starts as a rumour in the corridors of Sansad Bhavan. Some Bada officer passes on a memo to his messenger chaparasi, who tells the chaiwallah, who tells a some else, who tells a mazdoor, who tells the mandi. Occasionally, everyday occurrences in Sansad Bhavan illustrate just how serious the government is about a particular scheme, policy or directive. For instance, the mandi knew of the scale of the demolitions way before anyone else. Rehaan claims that the first giveaway was when, as a per Supreme Court directive, the Sarkar demolished about 28 "illegally constructed" departments in Sansad Bhavan to make way for a pleasure garden. Phir toh pukka tha. Agar Mantralaya mein bhi todh phod mach gayi, toh Dilli ka kya hoga." * Back to the Railway Station. Crucial as a means to slip into and out of the city at will, the emergency exit in the heart of the maze, the station also the site of one of the more taxing, but well paying jobs: "Railway ka kaam." There plenty of work at the railway station, which is hardly surprising considering that the Indian Railways is the largest utility employer in the world with nearly 1.6 million employees looking after a staggering 5 billion passengers, and 650 million tonnes of freight every year. Exams are held, political parties are mobilized, CBI enquiries are demanded and riots are staged to join this behemoth of a public utility. But, these aren't the jobs that Lalloo refers to, when he speaks of railway ka kaam. At the mandi, railway ka kaam is also called "loading ka kaam". On the face of it, railway ka kaam is 12 hours of back breaking labour. The job essentially involves loading packages from trucks coming from the godown onto out-going trains, and unloading packages from inbound trains onto the same trucks to take back to the godown. Fed up with dealing with the vagaries of labour, the railways have now handed the task over to a private contractor who hires people from the chowk. Labour can either choose to work with the contractor on a semi-permanent basis – in which case they are paid Rs 3500 per month, with advance payments if required; or can work on a per day basis for about Rs 250 per day. However, dehadi jobs are hard to come by and most labourers opt for semi-permanent jobs. The work is hard, and the loads are heavy, but it's a four-day week and Tuesday and Thursdays are off. Crucially, two holidays a week allow a mehnati mazdoor to work on dehadi, and so easily earn an additional Rs 500 per month. Thus, the complete package comes to about Rs 4000 per month. Contractors working with the government also tend to get their money on time, and so usually pay their labourers with comforting regularity. The only thing to watch out for in railway ka kaam is that your time is no longer your own. The freedom of mazdoori - of working at one's own pace and time, does not remain. You are a gulaam to the whims and fancies of the railway time table. Trains scream in and out of the station all day and night, and it is your business to ensure that loading the bogie doesn't hold up the train. Any delay costs the contractor a minimum of a thousand rupees, and the chances are that you'll end up paying for it. Many dismiss "railway ka kaam" as sheer mule work. The money is good, but not good enough to compensate for the mind-numbing labour, and finally "Dilli mein koi Lal Qila toh nahin khareedna." The real money, ironically, is back home in the gaon. * Gaon is where the Goat is. Gaon, where the food is clean, healthy and nutritious, the hand-pump ka pani is clear, sweet and cold. Even the air back home is nice. But, everyone is still here, in this cauldron of a city: eating bad food, breathing stale air, drinking bad alcohol, and dreaming of the gaon, and of the mega scheme that will snatch them up from the footpath and allow them to return home secure in the knowledge "ki kuch kar, k'ma ke aiye hai." In fact, a scheme is already in place, and its basic outline is surprisingly similar to Manmohan Singh's package for Vidarbha. In one of his few statements to the press, the Honorable Prime Minister echoed an observation that Devinder, new arrival at Bara tuti, had made to much smaller, and yet equally interested, crowd only weeks before. The smart money in the village is not on crops, but on animals, and preferably on a combination of both." A strapping jat from UP, Devinder negotiates the world of the gaon and the sheher with equal ease. One look at his muscles confirms that he has, in fact, grown up on pure bhains ka doodh. He spends most of his time in Chandpur gaon,(first bus-stop after the secondary school), working on his family's sugar fields, and heads to the city in the interlude between harvest and sowing to make some money for extra seeds and fertilizer. He also possesses a keen business acumen. In a clear step-by-step programme, Devinder plots out the ultimate paisa vasool plan. As with all plans for market domination, there is the high road and the low road, dependent on the initial capital. Each has different starting points, but ultimately the same destination. * You take the High Road if you are a small time sugar farmer with a few acres of land. Sugar is to the UP farmer, what coconut is to the South. Every step in the process of process of converting sugar-cane juice to white, crystalline sugar is simple and profitable. Extract the juice, and cook if over a fire until thick and syrupy. Add "sulphurous" and "choona" to remove the "maail" or residue (this acts as a bleach and gives the sugar its white color), and then cook it some more. Liberally use the pani ki pichakari to sprinkle water to prevent the syrup from settling, and then pour into a "chakkar", or revolving mill, while sprinkling water all the time. After a few hours, the sugar shall settle down and separate from the seera. The seera is then collected and fermented to make alcohol which is sold as desi sharab. Suplhurous and Choona are usually used in large-scale commercial mills and tend to be slightly expensive. Small scale sugar production often uses the natural, desi, substitute – the trunk of the jungali bhindi. The jungali bhindi grows to about ten feet, and is commonly found all over UP. Its trunk is used in the sugar purification process. The tree is cut, its trunk is pounded into a fine pulp, and soaked overnight in a tub of water. The pulp absorbs water and swells to twice its original volume, after which it is added to the sugar chasni (syrup) in place of sulphurous or choona (some recipes use both bhindi and sulphurous). The residue (termed gunne-ka gund with a directness that only the Jats can master) in this case, is great for rearing pigs. Long kept in the shadows, the Pigs of UP burst onto the national stage in 2005 with the outbreak of Japanese encephalitis. As the human toll rose, day on day, anxious members of UP's middle class demanded the elimination of pigs and piggeries – long seen to the host carriers of the deadly disease. To their surprise, the state, for once, took the side of UP's nearly 30 lakh pigs and vowed instead to eliminate the mosquitoes held responsible for transmitting the deadly virus to humans. Any good Jat will tell you that pigs and sugar-mills go together, and government statistics seem to agree. The lush sugar fields of UP that produce about 25 per cent of the country's sugar are also home to almost twenty percent of its pigs. Pigs and sugar, sugar and pigs. While pigs will eat almost anything, they gorge on the gunne ka gund combination of jungali bhindi and sugar residue. The arithmetic of pig-rearing is both, simple and exponential. With Rs 25,000 in the bank, you buy 5 sows. In six months, each sow shall give birth 10 piglets, and so in 6 months you have 50 piglets, and in one year you have 50 grown pigs, and another 50 piglets from your original stock of 5 sows. Some will be male pigs, which you sell to butchers for pork for about Rs 5,000 a pig, and some will be sows which you keep for still more piglets. And then the money just keeps coming. You buy another small sugar mill, and another 10 sows. You sell the seera for desi sharab. You use the residue to feed more pigs. You buy a few more acres of land – because pigs need space almost as much as they need gunna ka gund, and pretty soon you are the largest land owner, sugar producer and pig dealer in the village. Success! But not everyone can deal in pigs; some, like Ashraf, refuse to have anything to do with them. Ashraf, for his part, advocates the low road – for those who don't have the good fortune of starting with a few acres of land. The low road to success is designed for minimal starting capital and moderate to high returns. It starts at Yamuna Pushta and leads straight back to the gaon. Yamuna Pushta, home to much of Delhi's transient population, prone to suspiciously frequent fires, object of judicial ire, and source market for the long-eared Jamuna Par bakri. Though not as fecund and fertile as the UP sow, over the years the Jamuna Pari bakri has built a reputation for itself, making it an essential part of any farm portfolio. It is said that if you buy a goat the day your daughter is born, in 18 years you shall have a minimum of a lakh to give her on her wedding. It works like this. The day your daughter is born, you buy a laila for Rs 300. In a year's time, once your daughter is up and walking, the goat gives birth to 2 kids, and another 2 in 6 months. By the end of the year, you have 4 kids and one nanny goat. The female bakris you keep for further breeding, and the male bakras you sell to the butcher – thereby maintaining the natural cycle of life and death. If you are left with two bakris – keep one for yourself, and give the other on batai. Batai is a sytem where you give a bakri to a friend or neighbour for free, on the condition that he feed it and look after it. The bakri is always yours, but its kids are divided among the stakeholders. Thus, after the fourth year, you could have a whole flock of goats – some that you keep and look after, and some you lease out on batai. Keep the females, and sell the males for meat, and if you have no qualms about dealing in pigs, set aside some money and buy a few pigs, and look out for the High Road at the next intersection. From hpp at vsnl.com Thu Jul 6 19:06:58 2006 From: hpp at vsnl.com (hpp at vsnl.com) Date: Thu, 06 Jul 2006 13:36:58 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] Trees in Calcutta Message-ID: The city, trees & people - explorations in urban ecology K.C. Malhotra "In France and other sensible places too, they grow so many cherry trees that they fear neither thieves nor birds. There is no limit to the possibilities of such gardening, anywhere. That would be real wealth, real economics, vital industry. Thus you see how gardening comes to town, making the field gain on the street, and not merely the street on the field. True town planning begins with thus simply amending the surroundings of the people; and it may soon get inside their homes ... It grows on from small gardens and semi-public ones, and thence to parks and boulevards, and so to better houses for all upon their course or beyond it." Patrick Geddes Trees Working since 1974 at the Indian Statistical Institute, on Barrackpore Trunk Road in Calcutta, I must have passed the stretch from the Institute to Shyambazar hundreds of times over the years. There were numerous trees, on both sides of this stretch of road, and they formed part of the scenery that I had become familiar with, without paying any conscious attention. One day, while passing this stretch in my vehicle, I was quietly observing the trees somewhat closely, without anything particular in mind, when what I was seeing triggered off recollections of what had unconsciously filtered into my mind over the years - all this 'clicked', and with growing excitement I started discerning patterns in what had so far been merely background scenery! Being in the fortunate situation of working at a research institute, I quickly organised a short study, to look at all the trees, on both sides of the road, on the 4.6 km stretch of the B.T. Road from Dunlop Bridge to Taltola Bridge (just before Shyambazar). Every tree was identified: species, age and also the mutilations it bore. Our main interest was the human activity associated with each tree. This data was then analysed: species, by age; spacing densities per km; species diversity per km etc. We found that there was a wide range of human activities associated with the trees: worship - with the symbols ranging from simple markings, through humble images, to sophisticated deities; leisure, with trees having good canopy providing places of rest and recreation; in the absence of sheltered bus-stands, the trees provide shade and protection against sun and rain; parking spaces for rickshaws, tempos and hand-carts; economic activities - fortune-tellers, cobblers, barbers, shops selling paan, bidi, cigarettes, tea etc. Among our findings was that the tree density varied considerably over the surveyed stretch. The age of the trees also varied considerably - from mature trees, of about 40 years, to very young ones, a year old. Interestingly, there had been a shift in the species type over the years. The mature trees were banyan, pipal or neem, while the younger trees were sonachuri, akashmani, krishnachura etc. While the older trees were evergreen, with wide canopy, the younger trees were largely ornamental. When we checked why this shift had occurred, we found that there had been a conscious decision to plant these new varieties, but not on any rational grounds. It had simply been an arbitrary choice. These were the varieties made available by the Forest Department. Trees and People : A Symbiosis This was odd, because this choice of species seemed to ignore completely the existing relationship between the trees and the people in the urban setting, which was specific to the species. It became clear that people and trees exist together. Wherever there were shops or other establishments, the trees grew very well. In their absence the number of trees was rather low. If the trees along the road-sides had to survive, the involvement of the local people was absolutely necessary. People had an interest and stake in the trees. They protected and nurtured them - and had evolved sophisticated mechanisms for this: raised platforms to increase the soil at the base; fences around younger trees; religious symbols ... Trees in urban areas play an important role in fulfilling the religious needs of the people. This is a continuation of the human-tree relationship one observes in rural and indigenous communities of India. If the people worshipped a particular tree, its survival was totally assured. The greater the shade offered by the tree, the more the linkage with people. Thus, for instance, there would inevitably be more than one small entrepreneur working in the shade. The shaded spaces beneath the trees were not 'open' spaces; they were 'owned' by specific people - a barber, a cobbler, or a seller of sattu. A truly symbiotic relationship existed between the tree and the persons using its shade. If a new person desired to set up something in that space, this had to be negotiated with the 'owner'. Even the trunks of the trees were used extensively. A barber would, typically, fix his mirror on the trunk, and seat his client on a small stool in front of this. A range of small entrepreneurs and manufacturers, would use the trunk to advertise their products and services. Humble Folk Trees play a very important role in the life of the unorganised sector, of workers, humble people, people who cannot afford to own proper 'shops' or 'establishments'. Trees enable even these people to do an honest day's work and survive in the city. If these trees are cut - as they were, for the widening of the B.T. Road, just before our study - it drastically hits these humble people, who use the shade. Close to one of the entrance gates of the I.S.I. was a huge pipal tree. A sattu-seller set up shop under this around noon everyday, catering to the labourers working nearby. He had been here for donkey's years. When the road was being widened, this tree was cut down. I had spoken to him soon after this, and he had wept as he recalled his association with this tree, after whose felling he operated from under a ramshackle lean-to that he had put up. But this particular story has a happy post script. He planted two pipal trees on the edge of the widened road near where he earli er sat - and both these have now grown into fine, strapping trees, under one of which he sits today. In a city like Calcutta, where we have a large segment of society that has low incomes, this includes both suppliers and buyers of goods and services - who need each other. The humble seller and the humble buyer. And both of them are brought together under the protective shade of the tree. Poor people's connection to nature and to biodiversity is very strong. Urban Ecology Nature and human society converge in the city space. Trees are part of the social life of the city. And there is a remarkable persistence, over the years, of this human-tree association. I might digress a bit by recalling that many place names in Calcutta refer to trees - Nimtala, Bartala, Jhowtala, Bakul Bagan ... Old-timers in the city would also recall that different parts of the city had distinct fragrances, from the flowering trees there. Sadly, most of these are no more and the predominant olfactory feature of the city is its stench. It would be a wonderful programme for our city's children to have their elders remember these fragrant places, and then set about 're-aromatising' the city! This convergence of nature and society is the basis for 'urban ecology'. Unfortunately, in India as well as in the developing world as a whole, hardly any attention has been given to this vital area. Today, in the context of cities like Calcutta, we should be talking about common property resources in the city - which is what the shaded spaces under the trees on B.T. Road were! Since completing this study in 1986, I have had the opportunity of travelling extensively across the country, and made it a point to do 'rapid assessments' on this matter in various cities. It is quite clear that what we found on B.T. Road in Calcutta reflects the socio-economic condition of the place. Such a relationship will not be found in all parts of Calcutta. There would be a relationship between the trees and people, but of a different kind. Equally, one would not have this kind of relationship in, say New Delhi, or New York. But one would find exactly the same picture that obtains in B.T. Road in parts of other Indian cities; in the course of my travels, I have observed similar patterns in Patna, Ranchi, Bhagalpur, Pune, Ahmednagar, Kolhapur, Delhi and Rajkot. But sadly, our short study from Calcutta remains the only serious treatment of this subject to date. 'Greening' the City What all this suggests is that when trees are planted in our cities, we need to bear the tree-people relationship in mind, and enable maximal linkages and associations. Let the trees provide opportunities for activities. Specifically, this means that large canopy evergreen trees - instead of purely ornamental trees, conforming to someone's notion of 'aesthetics' - should be planted. The species that would appear to be best suited to serve all these functions is the native, evergreen, fast-growing banyan. Some ecologists have suggested that a mixed species plantation may serve ecological functions better than monospecies plantation. In that case, a mix of banyan, pipal and neem would be ideal. All these three species are also worshipped by people. They bear edible fruits for the birds, and provide excellent nesting facilities. Trees also need to be selected on the basis of their root type: they should be able to withstand storms. It is vital that these roots do not interfere with underground service lines, otherwise they would be cut down by the civic authorities. Similarly, the canopy should not interfere with overhead lines - and for this, instead of the all-too-frequent tendency to blindly cut down the whole tree, branches should be lopped and the tree's growth should be guided in the appropriate direction. An urban system that took this subject seriously, would study the growth rate of different species, and arrive at an optimal set of species that would best serve people's needs without interfering with anything else. We can also move from trees to biomass resources at large. For instance, in the large (green!) campus of ISI, a huge amount of grass grows. This is auctioned annually, and is bought by the goalas nearby. We have a variety of shrub that grows wild, which I have observed poor Bihari women of the area plucking. Our lady cook recently served us a delicious spinach preparation, and I learnt that it was this shrub that grows wild in the very campus I have worked in for so many years and not bothered about. There is a foul drain outside the campus, adjoining the B.T. Road. But along this, a type of amaranthus grows, again wild. This provides the cholai ka saag for the poor people of the area. Then there is fuelwood. Grazing. Nature provides a huge amount of subsidy to the poor, in the very heart of the city. Has anybody paid serious attention to the significance of the biomass resources of the city? Academicians, politicians and planners have all shown great concern over the colossal destruction and deterioration of life-support systems in the countryside. The crucial role of forests in maintaining the ecological balance is increasingly being realised. All this has lead to the formulation of forest policy and programmes to rehabilitate wastelands in rural areas. However, it is strange that while we have been concentrating our efforts on afforesting rural areas, practically no attention has been paid to the tree cover or to the people-tree relationship in our urban centres. Hardly any systematic studies are available for any of our cities, in terms of tree densities, total area under tree cover, the species planted and the role of the trees in the life of the city inhabitants - humans and birds, insects, animals reptiles etc. Participatory Planning Such concerns also lead one to the subject of participatory planning for the environmentally harmonious development of the city. Where does one start, and how far does one go? Unless those who have some sensitivity to the life and living conditions of the city's humble folk intervene in the planning process, the city's development can all too easily become inimical to their survival - all talk of 'participation' notwithstanding. Genuine participation should, by definition, involve all sections of the city's people. The poor are the strongest stakeholders in the green city. After our study on the trees, we had spoken to several people, peddlers and youth clubs in the area about taking up a meaningful tree-planting programme. The response was very enthusiastic. But these people need help and support to take this up. This has not been forthcoming from anywhere. We need to design forms of participation that will involve genuine people's institutions. By this I mean the apolitical, place-specific institutions that Calcutta, and more generally West Bengal, is so well-endowed with. In every corner of the city and the state are to be found 'clubs', and the most common name for these is sangha - meaning 'association', with its connotations of togetherness and community. The city is really divided into so many paras. Each para has its events and processes of bringing people together. This is a micro-world of human scale, where everyone knows everybody else, where matters are capable of being sanely comprehended and related to. Pujas are among the most important events of these micro-worlds. These pujas are not randomly organised. Each puja represents and relates to a specific territory. And all these territories are the mental worlds that the abstract, incomprehensible city is made up of. These small worlds are based on various factors: ethnicity, life-styles, activity patterns and so on. It is this para, or perceived mental world, to which ordinary people relate, that has to be the unit of participatory planning in the city. Here, local, people's institutions have to be identified, and mechanisms have to be evolved for their active participation in the city's planning. (1995) From mahmood.farooqui at gmail.com Fri Jul 7 00:27:34 2006 From: mahmood.farooqui at gmail.com (mahmood farooqui) Date: Fri, 7 Jul 2006 00:27:34 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Review of Irshad Manji's book In-Reply-To: <5D52CCAE-C854-4512-A1BE-F619FE402135@vsnl.com> References: <5D52CCAE-C854-4512-A1BE-F619FE402135@vsnl.com> Message-ID: Dear Shohini, I read your remarks on Vikhar's review with great interest... On to the question of whether Islam can be reconciled with homosexuality... We can approach it doctrinally or historically... If we approach the question doctrinally we would need to determine the doctrinal canon within Islam, how it came about, what are the central texts, how they have changed over time and so on... That might not be such a fruitful proposition, but when we approach the questin historically we might find that Islamic societies, that is to say societies where Islam was a promiennt religion, have been the great founts of homosexual relations....a predominant part of Persian and Urdu poetry deals, when it deals with personal emotions, with young men and boys...and girls in the case of women poets if we properly unearth them. Half our sufis, I somethimes think in my exaggeratef flights of fancy, became so because of their same sex love...it is part of the reason, at least Ralph Russell would think so, why Urdu poetry does not have a gender specific in its address...that is perhaps why, pace the mid 18th century travelogue of Delhi called Muraqqa-e Delhi, a male dancer could earn as much as a lakh Rs a night for his performance....also that is why the Arabs and the Afghans have been renowned, at least whatever renown they earned in our parts of the world, for their sexual predilections...but that is still a male world, admissibly... The seventy virgins might or might not have appealed to Rabia, one of the founders, perhaps THE founder, of Sufism, but irrespective of gender, she at least expounded for us the simple fact that desire has to sublimated for it to achieve itself truly...whether it is material or carnal... The question really is not homosexuality versus Islam...but institutionalisation of same sex relations in the modern world versus its 'suppression' in the pre-modern part of it... When I try and approach the question historically the choices before me, again, are whether I want a tacit co-existence or a blatant manifestation...then it is an issue of choosing the modes of suppression...which one pleases us... Whatever our choices may be, they do not, from the perspective of the contemporary modern that we inhabit, cease to be arbitrary... Best, Mahmood On 04/07/06, Shohini Ghosh wrote: > > Dear Vikhar Ahmad: I read your review of Irshad Manji's `The Trouble with > Islam Today' with great interest. I agree to a very large extent with your > comments about her (frequently naive) political stance on many issues, most > notoriously, on the Israel Palestinian conflict. Your review however > underplays the dillemma that she outlines very early in her book : "Can > Islam and homosexulaity be reconciled?" (Page 23) I think this idea is > pretty central to the book. Whether or not one agrees with her formulations, > it has to be taken seriously. Had you engaged with the powerful role that > desire plays - of which sexual orientation is an integral part - you may > have hesitated to conclude that "She [Irshad Manji] doesn't talk about > female suicide bombers and we can be sure that they don't blow themselves up > because of the seventy virgins in paradise". Well, we can't be so sure, can > we? Besides, how many better reasons are there to die? Warmly Shohihi > _________________________________________ > 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 shohini at vsnl.com Fri Jul 7 10:11:44 2006 From: shohini at vsnl.com (Shohini Ghosh) Date: Fri, 07 Jul 2006 10:11:44 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Thanks Message-ID: Dear Mahmood and Yousuf: Thank you both for your material on queerness and homosexuality. The question about whether or not homosexuality can be reconciled with Islam is really Manji's specific concern and not mine. But I have learnt much from what you both have sent. Thanks, Shohini -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060707/bb776ab6/attachment.html From ramansinha at indiatimes.com Thu Jul 6 14:04:30 2006 From: ramansinha at indiatimes.com (ramansinha) Date: Thu, 06 Jul 2006 14:04:30 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] =?utf-8?q?reader-list_Digest=2C_Vol_36=2C_Issue_8?= Message-ID: <200607060714.MAA26076@WS0005.indiatimes.com> reader-list at sarai.net wrote: Send reader-list mailing list submissions to reader-list at sarai.net To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/reader-list or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to reader-list-request at sarai.net You can reach the person managing the list at reader-list-owner at sarai.net When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of reader-list digest..." Today's Topics: 1. [Announcements] Open Mic/Open Screen (aarti) 2. [Announcements] Far Far Away - Book-launch and gifting (aarti) 3. Re: The Reservation of numbers (Shivam Vij) 4. News from the Daniel Langlois Foundation (CR+D) 5. Check out this blog (hpp at vsnl.com) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Tue, 04 Jul 2006 15:20:35 +0530 From: aarti Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Open Mic/Open Screen To: announcements at sarai.net Message-ID: <44AA39EB.7060006 at sarai.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" ===================================================================================================== Open Mic / Open Screen: An evening of Film, Video, Audio, Poetry, Spoken Word, Prose and Performance ===================================================================================================== 14th July 2006, Friday, 6:00 P.M. Sarai Interface Zone 29 Rajpur Road Civil Lines Delhi - 110054 The 5th Sarai Open Mic, and the 1st in our new cycle of 2006 events, is finally here! For those who have not attended them before, how it works is, everyone gets 1 - 10 minutes to screen/play video/audio works, and read/perform text based work. You can share video, audio,poetry, spoken word, a short prose piece, a performance, singly or in groups, in any language (though do be prepared to translate for those uninitiated :) The screening/performance is decided on a first-come-first-serve basis. Films, Video and Audio pieces should be between 1- 10 minutes long, and on DVD/VCD/CD format only. Alternatively you can also pipe from a laptop. You can share a complete work, parts of a work, a work in progress, even stills, in B/W and or colour. This time, while we will stay with our usual "bring-what-you-wish" ethic, we also have a special one hour thematic feature on - "Permament Address and Perpetual Motion: Dwelling In Delhi": what are the ways in which we can think through inhabiting this city we call "home"? Featured Performances/Screenings: - Nangla Maachi Lab, Cybermohalla - Aman Sethi: News of the World and Other Stories from Bara Tutti - Umang Bhattacharya: Curious Green - Anand V. Taneja: Letters to the Lord of the Djinns. - Gautam Bhan, Nigah Media Collective You can choose to address our theme for the evening, or not, and bring whatever you wish. Do come, to participate and listen, tell your friends and share an evening with us! Write to aarti at sarai.net for further details. _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements ------------------------------ Message: 2 Date: Tue, 04 Jul 2006 15:50:32 +0530 From: aarti Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Far Far Away - Book-launch and gifting To: announcements at sarai.net Message-ID: <44AA40F0.1000105 at sarai.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" Dear All, This Friday we will be hosting the book release and gifting by a young artist from New Zealand, Marnie Slater. She runs a non-profit artist-run gallery and performance space and has been travelling in India for the last few months. She has brought out a set of sketches which she will be releasing this Friday. Along with the launch, Marnie wishes to begin a discussion on the possibilities of independent and self-publishing, along with gifting a copy of her book in exchange for a copy of your own publication/s. It would be great if some of us who are in fact thinking through the possibilities and spaces for self-publishing in our own work could be there and contribute to the discussion. I'm enclosing below her concept note/blurb for the evening. Do pass this on to friends - those working with small books, catalogues, zines and broadsheets, designers etc - anyone whom you think would be interested. Do try and make the time to come. Hoping to see you there! Warmly Aarti +++++ ======================================================= Book-reading and discussion @ Sarai: "Far Far and Away" ======================================================= Far Far and Away: Book Reading and Discussion Marnie Slater 6:00 P.M., Friday 7 July 2006, Interface Zone What defines independent publishing? What are the conceptual possibilities provided by the medium of text, image and graphic? What are the practical avenues available to independent publishers? Self-publishing, whether it be in a collective or individually, comes with its own particular parameters and potential. Marnie Slater combines the launch of her recent publication FAR, FAR AWAY with an evening of conversation addressing some of the issues surrounding independent publishing. You are invited to bring along your own book, zine, magazine or catalogue and exchange them for a copy of FAR, FAR AWAY. All exchanged material will go into the developing library of Enjoy Public Art Gallery in Wellington, New Zealand. FAR, FAR AWAY is a collection of drawings made during Marnie's stay in India. Concerned with the historic documentation and exchange of the "exotic", FAR, FAR AWAY engages the book as a site of fiction, capable of inhabiting multiple locations simultaneously. (Marnie Slater is an artist, writer and curator based in Wellington, New Zealand and is a current trust member of the artist run project space Enjoy Public Art Gallery. Marnie has been living in Bombay for the last 5 months with the assistance of a Commonwealth Foundation Arts and Crafts Award.) _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements ------------------------------ Message: 3 Date: Tue, 4 Jul 2006 19:11:27 +0530 From: "Shivam Vij" Subject: Re: [Reader-list] The Reservation of numbers To: "sarai list" Message-ID: <9c06aab30607040641i10438316v63ef262ac6e7a75 at mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"; format=flowed Ah, Karan Thapar and his arguments! I'll tell you how the 27% figure was arrived at. It was forced by the hon'ble Supreme Court - the same hon'ble Supreme Court that now wants to know from the Union of India how the 27% figure was arrived at! The Mandal Commission used several statistics - most importantly, a huge survey conducted by itself - to conclude that 52% per cent of India's population (http://ncbc.nic.in/backward-classes/index.htm ) can be said to be "backward". What exactly is meant by backward? See http://ncbc.nic.in/html/guideline.htm The 1931 census was used to get an idea of the occupational sub-castes - and NOT their populations. Now, someone went to the Supreme Court on the issue of the "creamy layer" cornering the benefits of reservations. Creamy layer has been one argument against reservations, and that reserved seats lie vacant is another. But if the creamy layer takes away all the seats, why do seats lie vacant? That's just one of many contradictions in the anti-quota arguments that Karan Thapar won't ask on prime time TV. Anyway, so the hon'ble Supreme Court in the Indira Sahani judgement said that the total number of reservations can't exceed 50% seats in an institution - and institutions in the south have found innovative ways of bypassing this, btw. Already there was 22.5% reservation for SC/STs. So it was to keep the total number of reserved seats within the 50% bracket that the government decided to have 27% reservations for OBCs. But even that could not be implemented in central educational institutions as VP Singh's government fell. Did someone say something about statistics being lies? Okay, never mind. As for P. Chidambaram, he's finance minister and not the social justice minister. His job is to know the sensex and inflation numbers. As for Karan Thapar, his job is to get his facts right! From the same interview that you quote from, some ROTFL stuff: * Karan Thapar: Mr Chidambaram you are sitting in front of me advocating that reservations have improved the quality of education in Tamil Nadu. The truth is that you yourself didn't go to an institution where there is reservation for OBCs. You went to Loyala College where there is no reservation for OBCs and then you went to Harvard. Your son went to Don Bosco School, Texas University and Cambridge University. P Chidambaram: You got your facts wrong. I went to Presidency College, which has reservation. Karan Thapar: For your MA at which point in time affiliation to colleges were not important. P Chidambaram: Your facts are wrong. I went to Presidency College for my basic under graduate degree where there is reservation. I went to Law College for my law degree where there is reservation. I am not a beneficiary of reservation but I know that reservation brought in students to my class would otherwise have never got in. Karan Thapar: Mr Chidambaram your son went to Don Bosco School where there is no reservation. Then he went to the University of Texas where there is no reservation and then he went to Cambridge University. P Chidambaram: My son would have never got the benefit of reservation anyway. Karan Thapar: Did you not send your son abroad deliberately because you knew that the standard of education in Tamil Nadu had collapsed. P Chidambaram: No not at all. I am a beneficiary of the educational system in Tamil Nadu and I am proud about the educational system in Tamil Nadu. It can be better that is a different matter. Neither my son nor I are the beneficiary of reservations. * What empirical data does Thapar offer to support his contention that the quality of educational and the repute of an institution is inversely proportional to the quantum of reservations? All that Thapar knows about the Mandal report is from a speech by Rajiv Gandhi, who was leader of the opposition. Has he read the Mandal Report? Does he know about the National Commission of Backward Classes? Is anyone in for an informed debate or will it remain the farce that it is, to be decided on the terms of the meritorious doctors reading 'You Can Win' under the shade of a shamiana? So which college did you go to, friends? That may have a lot of bearing on this country's affirmative action policies. Best, s -- www.shivamvij.com | www.theotherindia.org mail at shivamvij dot com ------------------------------ Message: 4 Date: Tue, 4 Jul 2006 16:51:50 -0400 From: "CR+D" Subject: [Reader-list] News from the Daniel Langlois Foundation To: Message-ID: <57e6e8fa70a284102ff512058a2979ee at fdl-webmestre> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" New recipients of financial support from the Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art, Science, and Technology Strategic Grants for Organisations: Through this program, the Foundation supports non-profit organisations in their strategic development projects. To learn more about the 2006 projects that have received support to date under the Strategic Grants for Organisations program: http://www.fondation-langlois.org/flash/e/index.php?Section=proj&SousSection=pro&TypeIco=col&Annee=2006 Research and Experimentation Grants in Art+Science+Technology: Under this program, the Foundation receives proposals from artists and researchers who work in areas targeted by the Foundation. Each year, the proposal deadline is January 31. To learn more about the projects by artists and researchers selected by the Foundation for 2006: http://www.fondation-langlois.org/flash/e/index.php?Section=proj&SousSection=pro&TypeIco=ind&Annee=2006 The program's guidelines are available on the Foundation's Web site: http://www.fondation-langlois.org/flash/e/index.php?NumPage=515 ------------------------------ Message: 5 Date: Wed, 05 Jul 2006 03:15:17 +0000 (GMT) From: hpp at vsnl.com Subject: [Reader-list] Check out this blog To: reader-list at sarai.net Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear Friends http://cuckooscall.blogspot.com Great blog, from Calcutta! Lovely pictures. Rivetting content, with a literary flavour. Dr Mrinal Bose Calcutta ------------------------------ _______________________________________________ reader-list mailing list reader-list at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/reader-list End of reader-list Digest, Vol 36, Issue 8 ****************************************** hello, Reply: Quota reservations.. Students who joins any college on the benifit of quota are not at all upto the mark of general students.. what acctually happens is that, those who joins college for 1st year under quota,fails to even pass the 1st year exams and they eventually leave after first year,,leaving that seat vacent for the next years. instutes have to provide special classes to quota students,to bring them at a level of general students.. Raman delhi -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060706/d366b599/attachment.html From parismitasingh at yahoo.com Fri Jul 7 16:14:09 2006 From: parismitasingh at yahoo.com (parismita singh) Date: Fri, 7 Jul 2006 03:44:09 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Roses - I-Fellow Parismita's posting Message-ID: <20060707104409.48541.qmail@web52602.mail.yahoo.com> I-fellow Parismita's posting - To read the post with the visuals go to - http://parismitasingh.blogspot.com/ Hello everyone, Bit of a break between postings, but will make up this month. Five months into the I-fellow schedule, this is a good time for reflecting a little on work done (and undone).. As it happens, I have strayed quite a bit from my topic as I originally envisaged it. These things are difficult to predict ,but I'm quite happy with the 'shape' things have taken. The central concerns of race, gender, belonging, identity and memory remain but have taken unexpected forms.The surprise element ( well for me at least) was that they didn't even stay 'stories', veering towards other forms like meditations . Though I would not strictly categorise them as either. The building that was to be central to my stories disappeared.( The first blog piece ). And I watched in horror as the stories refused to be 'stories' and spilt out of the building into other spaces - streets, parks - and some of them are indeed homeless.Now, a few months later - I am even more surprised to see an 'unity' of sorts arise, and hopefully by August I will have what will be a 'series' of short pieces ( and extracts from a long piece) . (The rest of this post will not make sense unless you are looking at the visuals on my blog) I waited a bit before I put up this piece .Its a little too direct , the players all too familiar, violent, and a piece that if interpreted in a 'sentimental ' way , would be disastrous. Perhaps, it is unnecessary too...( I must restrain myself from holding forth on how it should not be read ).But a blog does give one the freedom to put up imperfect pieces ( and as imperfect pieces go , I do have a soft corner for this one!).And this way, I dont have to watch faces for a reaction or giggle nervously so here it is... Thanks! Parismita __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From ravikant at sarai.net Fri Jul 7 16:30:43 2006 From: ravikant at sarai.net (Ravikant) Date: Fri, 7 Jul 2006 16:30:43 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Gyan Prakash on cities... Message-ID: <200607071630.44084.ravikant@sarai.net> ....Bunty and Bubbly and Nangla Machhi. With apologies to those who have read it in India Today's issue dated 3 july 2003. cheers ravikant http://www.indiatoday.com/itoday/20060703/gs5.shtml&SET=T Counterfeit Modernity (Mass media encourages a voyeuristic consumption of the exploits of celebrities but it also allows for expansion of options for those hitherto denied access by a culture of high inequalities and low bandwidth.) Gyan Prakash Professor Princeton University, (USA) Whatever one may think of it as a film, the 2005 hit Bunty Aur Babli captured an important aspect of India's contemporary reality under globalisation-the cult of consumption and celebrity produced and circulated by the media. Rakesh and Vimmi flee their small-town lives in Uttar Pradesh and Punjab, respectively, to feed their ambitions. Desiring entrepreneurial success, Rakesh spurns a secure railway job, while Vimmi wants to compete in a beauty pageant to escape from a lifetime of making achaar. As the film shows them refashioning themselves into Bunty and Babli and taking to a life of crime, it brings into view the distance India has travelled from the Nehruvian era. For several decades after Independence, Hindi cinema was engaged in themes of modern social change and welfare, and the problems and inequities of urban life. The state-controlled radio and television functioned as pedagogic instruments, disseminating the lessons of modernisation and development. Outside the state-controlled media, the press functioned as the classic Fourth Estate, robustly performing its role as speaking truth to power. Not surprisingly, attacks on press freedom accompanied the 1975 declaration of Emergency. The situation changed in the mid-1980s when Rajiv Gandhi assumed power after Indira Gandhi's assassination. By this time, the Nehruvian consensus had unravelled. The failure of planned development and public sector-led growth to generate sufficient wealth and employment had caused widespread disenchantment. Mrs Gandhi's response to the crisis of state legitimacy with authoritarianism and populist politics only aggravated the problem. Rajiv Gandhi stepped in and won the admiration of the middle classes by promising consumption-led growth. Government and business interests advanced privatisation and a market economy as solutions to economic and political problems. With the loosening of import and state controls, the 1990s witnessed a rapid expansion of the consumption economy. New commodities and global brands and images flooded the market. Advertising and entertainment acquired unprecedented prominence, forcing venerable newspapers and magazines to provide "infotainment" and not just news. In addition, Karan Johar and Yash Chopra released a spate of Hindi films expressing the global and consumerist desires of the urban middle classes. Some lament the media's changing face as the demise of its function as the Fourth Estate. They grieve that the chronicles of Aishwarya Rai and Britney Spears appear to matter more than the violations of democratic rights and the condition of the poor. These are legitimate criticisms, for the media occupies a crucial place in a democratic society. The media's abdication of its responsibility to report "serious" news and bring the government to account is disturbing. But the situation is altogether more complex than a straightforward narrative of decline would suggest. Newspapers have steadily increased their readership, and are estimated to reach nearly 240 million people. Terrestrial television reaches over 50 per cent of the Indian population, and 80 per cent of urban residents; cable and satellite television figures are 20 and 46 per cent, respectively. India has nearly three million computer users, and Internet usage is expected to reach 100 million soon. But there is no denying the existence of mass media. We should understand its diversity and not dismiss it as trash. Visit any metro, and you will observe a media city of malls and multiplexes, cybercafes, televisions, mobile phones, newspapers, and magazines. Even provincial towns are beginning to acquire this circuit. So tight is the nexus between commodities, advertising, television, and celebritydom that cine idol Amitabh Bachchan achieved his rebirth as a TV star. Shah Rukh Khan, Aamir Khan and Sachin Tendulkar have become household names. Popular culture in urban India is media culture. Like everything else in India, the media experience is highly varied. If it produces global desires and images of consumption and upward mobility, it also generates a shadow world of what the Delhi-based media scholar Ravi Sundaram calls a "pirate culture." According to him, pirate culture is part of a dense transnational circuit that deploys versatile methods to reproduce and circulate music, video, and software in a society of "high inequalities and low bandwidth". It draws the urban population outside the globalising middle-class world into the realm of the consumption economy. Pirate culture also bleeds into the mainstream world when cable TV operators broadcast illegal versions of latest films. Piracy ensures that the culture of instant, immediate gratification becomes a commonplace urban experience. Pirate modernity is not optional. It offers no alternative to the media experience that saturates urban lives. But critical media is not lacking. The growing presence of the mediascape has also meant a proliferation of options. The expansion and availability of media technologies has produced an increasing number of critical documentaries and short films, Web-based communities and interactions, and alternative print and visual media in regional languages. The very extension of the media circuit, so that it reaches an ever-larger part of the population, means that it also generates off-mainstream and critical media practices. One example is the Mumbai-based Comet Media Foundation that produces and distributes innovative and non-traditional educational material in film and print. Yet another is Cybermohalla in the Nangla Maachi neighbourhood in Delhi. A collaborative project between Ankur, a Delhi- based NGO, and Sarai, a new media and urban research initiative, this initiative promotes an open-ended exploration of the digital and other media in a working-class neighbourhood setting. If this existing mediascape produces Bunty and Babli as counterfeits that affirm the mainstream images of consumption and upward mobility, it also includes something like Cybermohalla in which working-class children write blogs to voice democratic opposition to the demolition drive in their neighbourhood. From vikharjnu at gmail.com Fri Jul 7 23:49:05 2006 From: vikharjnu at gmail.com (Vikhar Ahmed) Date: Fri, 7 Jul 2006 23:49:05 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Review of Irshad Manji's book In-Reply-To: References: <5D52CCAE-C854-4512-A1BE-F619FE402135@vsnl.com> Message-ID: <3dd9e6810607071119k5cc5a946raebe45735d119132@mail.gmail.com> 7th July 2006 Dear Shohini Ghosh, I must thank you for taking interest and responding to my review and you raise an interesting question. "Can Islam and homosexuality be reconciled?" There is an interesting essay that answers this question partly in the book 'Because I have a Voice' edited by Gautam Bhan and Arvind Narain. An essay written by Ali Potia explores the experience of growing up gay and Muslim. Potia's argument in the essay is that Islam does not provide space to homosexuality and thus he chooses a simple way and walks out of Islam (It has been some time since I read this essay but I don't think I've forgotten his argument – but if I've got it wrong in any way I apologise). This would be an interesting place to start your exploration of the question whether Islam and homosexuality can be reconciled. Secondly, I will try to look at the primary source of Islamic Shariah, i.e., the Quran and try to give an answer to the question whether Islam and homosexuality can be reconciled. The caveat here is that I cannot even claim mild expertise on the shariah but hopefully my answer would be a semblance of the orthodox scriptural response to the whole issue. In the seventh chapter of the Quran, Al-A'raf Verse 81 strictly speaks out against homosexuality. The story of the Prophet Lot is common to the three semitic faiths and he was sent "…as a Prophet and warner to the people of Sodom and Gomorrah, cities utterly destroyed for their unspeakable sins". Chapter 7, Verse 80-81: We also (sent) Lut: He said to his people: "Do ye commit lewdness Such as no people In creation (ever) committed Before you? "For ye practice your lusts On men in preference To women: ye are indeed A people transgressing Beyond bounds". Chapter 26, Verse 165-166 says: "Of all the creatures In the world, will ye Approach males, And leave those whom Allah Has created for you To be your mates? Nay, ye are a people Transgressing (all limits)!" Thus, it is clear from these verses that the Quran considers homosexuality to be a transgression and there would not be place for homosexuality within Islam. There are also other verses in the Quran that speak about this theme. I remember having a conversation with Sanjay Kabir Bavikatte, a lawyer who studied in NLS, about this a long time back when he was doing some research on Islamic Liberation Theology. He was trying to reconcile Islam and homosexuality using these verses but I don't think interpretations of Islamic law can really alter this fundamental piece of Quranic evidence. About the point you make about the role of desire this should clear matters up a bit but I am also looking at some material on the psychology of suicide bombers. I will write to you again about that. Thirdly, I disagree with you when you say that the question of Islam and homosexuality is central to Manji's book. The central theme in Manji's book is her emphasis that there needs to be a reform within the contemporary understanding of Islam. Within this larger theme Islam's orthodox denial of homosexuality is one part. What I find very interesting about Manji is that she strongly identifies herself with Islam even though orthodox Muslims would not consider her to be a Muslim. Unlike Ali Potia she does not choose to abandon Islam. A fourth point that I would like to make would add on to Mahmood Farroqui's comments. Historically Islamic societies (I find that phrase slightly troublesome because can there be a society whose basis is primarily religious – Islamic in this instance- but let me use it in this case) have condoned homosexuality. I will cite two instances that this is shown. In Orhan Pamuk's 'My Name is Red' there is excessive reference to pederasty as an accepted form of sensual gratification in sixteenth century Turkey. At that point of time the Caliphate (which can in some senses be interpreted as a symbol of power more than a religious symbol) was with the Turks. Thus, it could be categorized as one of the more religious Islamic societies in the world at that time. There is a celebration of same sex love and the manner in which the miniaturist 'Butterfly' is described and the relationship between Master Osman and his apprentices alluded to without any sense of shame portrays same sex love beautifully. I found Pamuk's novel to be well researched historically and that is why I think this can be cited as a valid example. A second instance is that of Baburnama. This is a sixteenth century text again and is Babur's autobiography. Babur, unashamedly, describes his feelings of love for a boy in his adolescence. He writes about his feelings for the boy, "…before this experience I had never felt a desire for anyone, nor did I listen to talk of love and affection or speak of such things". Thus, I think I can (based on the limited evidence I could muster) conclude that historically Islamic societies have made no secret of the fact that homosexuality was accepted (Again, same-sex love between women is something that I do not have any evidence on). I have made an attempt to provide you with an initial idea of 'Islam and homosexuality' but I confess that I need to read up more on the issue myself. I will also keep you updated if I find any more relevant material about this. Bye, Vikhar Ahmed Sayeed. On 7/7/06, mahmood farooqui wrote: > > Dear Shohini, > > I read your remarks on Vikhar's review with great interest... > > On to the question of whether Islam can be reconciled with > homosexuality... > > We can approach it doctrinally or historically... > > If we approach the question doctrinally we would need to determine the > doctrinal canon within Islam, how it came about, what are the central > texts, how they have changed over time and so on... > > That might not be such a fruitful proposition, but when we approach > the questin historically we might find that Islamic societies, that is > to say societies where Islam was a promiennt religion, have been the > great founts of homosexual relations....a predominant part of Persian > and Urdu poetry deals, when it deals with personal emotions, with > young men and boys...and girls in the case of women poets if we > properly unearth them. Half our sufis, I somethimes think in my > exaggeratef flights of fancy, became so because of their same sex > love...it is part of the reason, at least Ralph Russell would think > so, why Urdu poetry does not have a gender specific in its > address...that is perhaps why, pace the mid 18th century travelogue of > Delhi called Muraqqa-e Delhi, a male dancer could earn as much as a > lakh Rs a night for his performance....also that is why the Arabs and > the Afghans have been renowned, at least whatever renown they earned > in our parts of the world, for their sexual predilections...but that > is still a male world, admissibly... > > The seventy virgins might or might not have appealed to Rabia, one of > the founders, perhaps THE founder, of Sufism, but irrespective of > gender, she at least expounded for us the simple fact that desire has > to sublimated for it to achieve itself truly...whether it is material > or carnal... > > The question really is not homosexuality versus Islam...but > institutionalisation of same sex relations in the modern world versus > its 'suppression' in the pre-modern part of it... > > When I try and approach the question historically the choices before > me, again, are whether I want a tacit co-existence or a blatant > manifestation...then it is an issue of choosing the modes of > suppression...which one pleases us... > > Whatever our choices may be, they do not, from the perspective of the > contemporary modern that we inhabit, cease to be arbitrary... > > Best, > Mahmood > > On 04/07/06, Shohini Ghosh wrote: > > > > Dear Vikhar Ahmad: I read your review of Irshad Manji's `The Trouble > with > > Islam Today' with great interest. I agree to a very large extent with > your > > comments about her (frequently naive) political stance on many issues, > most > > notoriously, on the Israel Palestinian conflict. Your review however > > underplays the dillemma that she outlines very early in her book : "Can > > Islam and homosexulaity be reconciled?" (Page 23) I think this idea is > > pretty central to the book. Whether or not one agrees with her > formulations, > > it has to be taken seriously. Had you engaged with the powerful role > that > > desire plays - of which sexual orientation is an integral part - you may > > have hesitated to conclude that "She [Irshad Manji] doesn't talk about > > female suicide bombers and we can be sure that they don't blow > themselves up > > because of the seventy virgins in paradise". Well, we can't be so sure, > can > > we? Besides, how many better reasons are there to die? Warmly Shohihi > > _________________________________________ > > 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: -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060707/87727849/attachment.html From shohini at vsnl.com Sat Jul 8 07:09:54 2006 From: shohini at vsnl.com (Shohini Ghosh) Date: Sat, 08 Jul 2006 07:09:54 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Review of Irshad Manji's book References: <5D52CCAE-C854-4512-A1BE-F619FE402135@vsnl.com> <"e3837d2206070611 57j60462736hd8f5c5dd9bdfe34e"@mail.gmail.com> <3dd9e6810607071119k5cc5a946raebe45735d119132@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <004a01c6a232$bd605770$5ce941db@admin> ----- Original Message ----- From: Vikhar Ahmed To: mahmood farooqui Cc: Shohini Ghosh ; Reader List ; Monica Narula Sent: Friday, July 07, 2006 11:49 PM Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Review of Irshad Manji's book 7th July 2006 Dear Shohini Ghosh, I must thank you for taking interest and responding to my review and you raise an interesting question. "Can Islam and homosexuality be reconciled?" There is an interesting essay that answers this question partly in the book 'Because I have a Voice' edited by Gautam Bhan and Arvind Narain. An essay written by Ali Potia explores the experience of growing up gay and Muslim. Potia's argument in the essay is that Islam does not provide space to homosexuality and thus he chooses a simple way and walks out of Islam (It has been some time since I read this essay but I don't think I've forgotten his argument – but if I've got it wrong in any way I apologise). This would be an interesting place to start your exploration of the question whether Islam and homosexuality can be reconciled. Secondly, I will try to look at the primary source of Islamic Shariah, i.e., the Quran and try to give an answer to the question whether Islam and homosexuality can be reconciled. The caveat here is that I cannot even claim mild expertise on the shariah but hopefully my answer would be a semblance of the orthodox scriptural response to the whole issue. In the seventh chapter of the Quran, Al-A'raf Verse 81 strictly speaks out against homosexuality. The story of the Prophet Lot is common to the three semitic faiths and he was sent "…as a Prophet and warner to the people of Sodom and Gomorrah, cities utterly destroyed for their unspeakable sins". Chapter 7, Verse 80-81: We also (sent) Lut: He said to his people: "Do ye commit lewdness Such as no people In creation (ever) committed Before you? "For ye practice your lusts On men in preference To women: ye are indeed A people transgressing Beyond bounds". Chapter 26, Verse 165-166 says: "Of all the creatures In the world, will ye Approach males, And leave those whom Allah Has created for you To be your mates? Nay, ye are a people Transgressing (all limits)!" Thus, it is clear from these verses that the Quran considers homosexuality to be a transgression and there would not be place for homosexuality within Islam. There are also other verses in the Quran that speak about this theme. I remember having a conversation with Sanjay Kabir Bavikatte, a lawyer who studied in NLS, about this a long time back when he was doing some research on Islamic Liberation Theology. He was trying to reconcile Islam and homosexuality using these verses but I don't think interpretations of Islamic law can really alter this fundamental piece of Quranic evidence. About the point you make about the role of desire this should clear matters up a bit but I am also looking at some material on the psychology of suicide bombers. I will write to you again about that. Thirdly, I disagree with you when you say that the question of Islam and homosexuality is central to Manji's book. The central theme in Manji's book is her emphasis that there needs to be a reform within the contemporary understanding of Islam. Within this larger theme Islam's orthodox denial of homosexuality is one part. What I find very interesting about Manji is that she strongly identifies herself with Islam even though orthodox Muslims would not consider her to be a Muslim. Unlike Ali Potia she does not choose to abandon Islam. A fourth point that I would like to make would add on to Mahmood Farroqui's comments. Historically Islamic societies (I find that phrase slightly troublesome because can there be a society whose basis is primarily religious – Islamic in this instance- but let me use it in this case) have condoned homosexuality. I will cite two instances that this is shown. In Orhan Pamuk's 'My Name is Red' there is excessive reference to pederasty as an accepted form of sensual gratification in sixteenth century Turkey. At that point of time the Caliphate (which can in some senses be interpreted as a symbol of power more than a religious symbol) was with the Turks. Thus, it could be categorized as one of the more religious Islamic societies in the world at that time. There is a celebration of same sex love and the manner in which the miniaturist 'Butterfly' is described and the relationship between Master Osman and his apprentices alluded to without any sense of shame portrays same sex love beautifully. I found Pamuk's novel to be well researched historically and that is why I think this can be cited as a valid example. A second instance is that of Baburnama. This is a sixteenth century text again and is Babur's autobiography. Babur, unashamedly, describes his feelings of love for a boy in his adolescence. He writes about his feelings for the boy, "…before this experience I had never felt a desire for anyone, nor did I listen to talk of love and affection or speak of such things". Thus, I think I can (based on the limited evidence I could muster) conclude that historically Islamic societies have made no secret of the fact that homosexuality was accepted (Again, same-sex love between women is something that I do not have any evidence on). I have made an attempt to provide you with an initial idea of 'Islam and homosexuality' but I confess that I need to read up more on the issue myself. I will also keep you updated if I find any more relevant material about this. Bye, Vikhar Ahmed Sayeed. On 7/7/06, mahmood farooqui wrote: Dear Shohini, I read your remarks on Vikhar's review with great interest... On to the question of whether Islam can be reconciled with homosexuality... We can approach it doctrinally or historically... If we approach the question doctrinally we would need to determine the doctrinal canon within Islam, how it came about, what are the central texts, how they have changed over time and so on... That might not be such a fruitful proposition, but when we approach the questin historically we might find that Islamic societies, that is to say societies where Islam was a promiennt religion, have been the great founts of homosexual relations....a predominant part of Persian and Urdu poetry deals, when it deals with personal emotions, with young men and boys...and girls in the case of women poets if we properly unearth them. Half our sufis, I somethimes think in my exaggeratef flights of fancy, became so because of their same sex love...it is part of the reason, at least Ralph Russell would think so, why Urdu poetry does not have a gender specific in its address...that is perhaps why, pace the mid 18th century travelogue of Delhi called Muraqqa-e Delhi, a male dancer could earn as much as a lakh Rs a night for his performance....also that is why the Arabs and the Afghans have been renowned, at least whatever renown they earned in our parts of the world, for their sexual predilections...but that is still a male world, admissibly... The seventy virgins might or might not have appealed to Rabia, one of the founders, perhaps THE founder, of Sufism, but irrespective of gender, she at least expounded for us the simple fact that desire has to sublimated for it to achieve itself truly...whether it is material or carnal... The question really is not homosexuality versus Islam...but institutionalisation of same sex relations in the modern world versus its 'suppression' in the pre-modern part of it... When I try and approach the question historically the choices before me, again, are whether I want a tacit co-existence or a blatant manifestation...then it is an issue of choosing the modes of suppression...which one pleases us... Whatever our choices may be, they do not, from the perspective of the contemporary modern that we inhabit, cease to be arbitrary... Best, Mahmood On 04/07/06, Shohini Ghosh < shohini at vsnl.com> wrote: > > Dear Vikhar Ahmad: I read your review of Irshad Manji's `The Trouble with > Islam Today' with great interest. I agree to a very large extent with your > comments about her (frequently naive) political stance on many issues, most > notoriously, on the Israel Palestinian conflict. Your review however > underplays the dillemma that she outlines very early in her book : "Can > Islam and homosexulaity be reconciled?" (Page 23) I think this idea is > pretty central to the book. Whether or not one agrees with her formulations, > it has to be taken seriously. Had you engaged with the powerful role that > desire plays - of which sexual orientation is an integral part - you may > have hesitated to conclude that "She [Irshad Manji] doesn't talk about > female suicide bombers and we can be sure that they don't blow themselves up > because of the seventy virgins in paradise". Well, we can't be so sure, can > we? Besides, how many better reasons are there to die? Warmly Shohihi > _________________________________________ > 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: -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060708/b7d94905/attachment.html From cymruwest at yahoo.com Sat Jul 8 07:44:35 2006 From: cymruwest at yahoo.com (Amy West) Date: Fri, 7 Jul 2006 19:14:35 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Launch of new Ethnic Minority journal---New Zealand Message-ID: <20060708021435.60937.qmail@web32403.mail.mud.yahoo.com> The AEN journal was launched on July 3rd , providing a space for intelligent and critical discussion on issues facing ethnic communities in New Zealand. Launched by Race Relations Commissioner Joris de Bres at the Human Rights Commission's Auckland Office and speakers included Dr Ashraf Choudry (Labour party MP), Pansy Wong ( National party MP), Ruth DeSouza and Andy Williamson (Editors) and the Reverend Mua Strickson-Pua. The journal features articles written by key thinkers in the ethnic sector in New Zealand and overseas. This open-access online publication offers a refreshing and challenging new perspective on what's going on in ethnic communities. Issue 1 of the AEN Journal is available http://journal.aen.org.nz includes a Guest Editorial by the Race Relations Commissioner and articles by Maori Party Co-leader Tariana Turia and Mervin Singham, Director of the Office of Ethnic Affairs. It features a viewpoint on the Palestine-Israel problem from a New Zealand Jew and a New Zealand Muslim. International contributions come from UK-based psychiatrist Suman Fernando, discussing racism in the mental health system, and US-based human rights writer Amy West. West challenges New Zealand to ensure our Immigration Act review is balanced; “changes made to protect borders from perceived terror threats come at a high cost to the safety and future of refugees.” Tze Ming Mok and Kumanan Rasanathan provide an edgy and humorous discussion on labels and how they can be used strategically to obtain resources but risk siloing and homogenising groups. Contributors to Issue 1 include: - Joris de Bres, Race Relations Commissionner - Tariana Turia MP, Co-leader of the Mâori Party - Mervin Singham, Director of the Office of Ethnic Affairs - Dave Moskovitz: The Israel – Palestine Problem: The perspective of a New Zealand Progressive Jew - Anjum Rahman: The Israel – Palestine Problem: The perspective of a New Zealand Muslim - Andy Williamson and Ruth DeSouza: Representing Ethnic Communities in the Media - Suman Fernando (UK): Stigma, racism and power - Amy West (US): Seeking Asylum - Kate Woodd: Cultural diversity and context -Tze Ming Mok and Kumanan Rasanathan: Should we be pushing for a Ministry of Asian Affairs, a Ministry of Ethnic Affairs, or neither? A ‘Socratic’ ‘dialogue’ between two ‘Asians’ - Rev. Mua Strickson-Pua aka REV MC: Pasifika Hip Hop Poetry Doing the Healing http://www.aen.org.nz/journal/1/1/AENJ.1.1.pdf --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Next-gen email? Have it all with the all-new Yahoo! Mail Beta. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060707/f1b4c089/attachment.html From shohini at vsnl.com Sat Jul 8 07:49:51 2006 From: shohini at vsnl.com (Shohini Ghosh) Date: Sat, 08 Jul 2006 07:49:51 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Follwing Irshad Manji's Book Message-ID: <8469B562-0E0A-4ECF-93AE-475833EAAE13@vsnl.com> Dear Vikhar: Thanks for your reply. The broad discussion of homosexuality and Islam is a different debate and much has been written on it already. You may already have read the following but I'd still like to recommend Same Sex Love in India by Ruth Vanita and Salim Kidwai, 2000 published by Palgrave in India and St. Matrtin's Press in the US. The feminist literature from Arab countries is very instructive because it challenges the idea of a homogenous Islamic society. An excellent collection of essays, stories and cartoons is Women and Sexualtity in Muslim Societies, A Publication of Women for Human Rights, New York.edited by Pinkar Ikkaracan. It shows how diiverse women's sexualities in Muslim countries are and its total import is far more radical then anything that Irshad Manji has written even though queer sexuality is not the only concern of the book. These women are not asking for reform-they are the reform. Since you are interested in suicide bombers and Muslim afterlife - there's the brilliantly funny Women in Muslim Paradise by Fatima Mernissi published by Kali for Women, 1986 (second edition 1988). The new English translation of Chocolate and Other Stories of Male-Male Desire by Pandey Bechan Sharma Ugra (OUP 2006) with an absolutely wonderful introduction by Ruth Vanita (also the translator). She talks about how Hindu nationalist writer Ugra, while ostensibly condemning homosexualty in Chocolate, actually makes a case for it. Written in 1927, Chocolate had created a public furore in which even Gandhi and Premchand had joined in. The book shows how complex and clever the negotiation between religion and non- conformist ideas can be. Wishing You all the Best Warmly Shohini -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060708/6da7f9c0/attachment.html From neerajbh at vsnl.net Sun Jul 9 12:16:21 2006 From: neerajbh at vsnl.net (neerajbh at vsnl.net) Date: Sun, 09 Jul 2006 11:46:21 +0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Invite to 8th Osians Cinefan Message-ID: Dear Cinema Lovers Greetings Thanks a lot for having patience and sending us tremendous queries regarding the tickets, finally the schedule is online. For full schedule please log on to http://www.cinemaya.net/c8-sch.asp I hope you will enjoy films at 8th Osian’s Cinefan festival of Asian Cinema. Regards Neeraj Bhasin Sale of Tickets Advance tickets for 14-18 July for all shows/venues are available at 42-Annexe, Golf Links, New Delhi from 9-13 July (10am- 8pm) Visual Art Gallery, India Habitat Centre, New Delhi from 9-18 July (10am- 8pm) All tickets including advance tickets for 19-23 for all shows/venues are available at Siri Fort from 14-23 July (8:30 am- 8:00pm) Alliance Francaise (only Alliance Francaise shows) Price Rs. 20 only Complimentary- Ask for complimentary tickets for these shows. (Maximum 4 tickets per person per show) Paid Tickets - (Maximum 4 tickets per person per show) Free entry into Siri Fort Complex. Entry into auditorium only with ticket . Sale of tickets will be subject to availability. To avoid disappointment please get your tickets in advance. For more information log on to www.cinemaya.net or email neeraj at osians.com Please note: Programme subject to modification From daljitami at rediffmail.com Sun Jul 9 13:58:37 2006 From: daljitami at rediffmail.com (daljit ami) Date: 9 Jul 2006 08:28:37 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Celluloid and Compact Disks in Punjab Message-ID: <20060709082837.16343.qmail@webmail52.rediffmail.com> Rendezvous with Mahboob; Content and audience are important Meeting Mahboob Brar and talking about the recent trends in film making in Punjab turned out to be very good experience on more than one account. He is 23 years old Punjabi Documentary filmmaker. His debut film, The Golden Curse, is about agrarian crises in Punjab which received critical acclaim. He has recently taken the exams of Masters in Mass Communication from regional campus Jalandhar of Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar. His views are of a documentary filmmaker, young urban student and concerned Punjabi being. He is serious about filmmaking and is aspiring for admission in Film and Television Institute, Pune. Mahbood had just finished a short film as assistant with a debut filmmaker, Shiva. This upcoming film, Alia, seems to be different from the ongoing trend. Mahboob told that it is based on a story written by Mohinder Singh Sarna. Alia is a period film which belongs to pre-partitioned Punjab. We need to wait for this film. Mahboob let Shiva know that we are waiting for his film. Mahboob shared his views about the recent Punjabi films, short as well as full length feature films. Mahboob feels that this trend of short films is not serious about film as it is mere commercial venture. He feels that profit making is an integral part of the filmmaking but it is not the end in itself. He asserts, “Content is very important. It should be sensible. When these films set the standards it makes audience used to meaningless entertainment.” He goes on and questions, “What about film as a medium, its constructive role and developmental communication?” Mahboob thinks of films as visual literature which should be long lasting and thought provoking. When it is the issue of audience Mahboob has a responsibility which he feels that every filmmaker should carry. “Apart from solutions and catharsis the filmmaker should make sure that audience does not feel cheated.” he adds, “Solutions and ideologies are must. If you claim to make entertainer it should be pure entertainer.” Talking about celluloid in Punjabi Mahboob feels that Manmohan Singh made trend setter in the form of ‘Jee Aya Nu’ but after its success they are just repeating the same formula. Mahboob sees versatility in South Indian cinema and feels that it is possible in Punjab also which is not short of talent and ideas. He is off the opinion that new maker are capable of executing the change. A change that is sensible and serious about film as medium. Only new initiatives can change the content and make issues more important in addition to film as serious engagement. Film is an important tool for him that enables the maker to interact with larger audience. While comparing the short and full length films Mahboob analyse the similarities and dissimilarities. He thinks that catering masses, entertaining and raising issues are the similarities while the content and market are different. He emphasise that celluloid is more professional, sensible and serious. When asked about the possible life of the trend of short films he replied that this is going to be there. Format can change to any new innovation as it has happened from VHS to Compact Disk now it can be from CD/DVD to any thing new. It is high time to edit the scattered thoughts of Mahboob in a coherent idea. It sounds certain that we have a thinking filmmaker in the making. All the best, Mahboob. Daljit Ami -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060709/f59a6c20/attachment.html From kumartalkies at yahoo.com Sat Jul 8 23:08:59 2006 From: kumartalkies at yahoo.com (pankaj kumar) Date: Sat, 8 Jul 2006 10:38:59 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Documentary screening - 3 men and a Bulb Message-ID: <20060708173859.23547.qmail@web56406.mail.re3.yahoo.com> VIKALP SCREENINGS Date: Friday, July 14 Time: 6:30 pm Venue: Bhupesh Gupta Bhavan Directions: take first left after Siddhivinayak Mandir (Dadar) and go past Ravindra Natya Mandir. Its diagonally opposite Ravindra Natya Mandir, Prabhadevi, Mumbai. NINE MINUTES TO NIRVANA (9mins) Director: Naren Multani 3 men and a Bulb (74mts) Director: Pankaj Rishi Kumar Screenings followed by Q&A with the filmmaker. Entry is free Please fwd the mail to other film enthusiasts. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3 Men and a Bulb by Pankaj Rishi Kumar SYNOPSIS 3 Men and a Bulb is a story of 3 men who earn a livelihood from their gharat (watermill) in foothills of Himalayas (Uttaranchal), India. The life led by these 3 men is meager, having access neither to electricity nor employment that brings regular income. Farming is very arduous, as supply of water is scarce. The gharat becomes a site, which each character wants to own and sometimes disown, in the quest for a better life. The story documents the 3 men’s personal hopes, anxieties and dreams set against the rustic life in the mountains. The narrative traverses their changing relationship with self and each other, offering exciting insights into human nature. It is a story of Rawat, Satya and young Harish. What happens when a rural economic system with a lot of promise is cracked up by administrative inconsistencies and individual enmity? What happens when 3 men who could have run the gharat and earned a comfortable livelihood, are moved by the inner voice telling them to leave and find a better source of income, a better life. 3 Men and a Bulb is a story about earning a good living, and a story about all the larger forces at work that don’t allow one to do so. Directors Statement This film began as an offshoot of my previous film, Gharat. It was a functional documentary film highlighting the potential of and the need for reviving the Gharats (watermills) as efficient indigenous technology. In strange and curious ways, the more time I spent with Rawat and his Gharat, I was convinced that my previous film could have been treated in a different manner both in form and content. The anger was both a frustration and a release. The frustration reflected in the fact that the issue based documentary form, which I was so used to, was insuffient to capture the essence in 28 minutes dictated by television. On the other hand, the release was accompanied by exploring a different form --a form that allowed me to test the boundaries of Truth, the real and unreal. 3 Men and a Bulb shatters the optimistic note plucked by the previous film, and depicts the stark microcosmic reality of one particular gharat, one particular village, and 3 men who are or will be earning their income from the gharat. For a year (6 visits of 10 days each) I documented the life of these 3 men, unaware of what will happen ...what is the drama in store... People do all sorts of unimaginable things to earn one square meal daily. Rawat, Satya and Harish should be thankful that they have a genuine and efficient way of earning a livelihood. But some things clearly might ruin it for them – total lack of government interest in gharats, and as Rawat says, the ignorance of HESCO in periodically supervising the schemes. Add to this the personal insecurities of the 3 men, and a perfectly valid source of income, bulb, could go bust. A fiction film with roots in documentary; a documentary which unravels as fiction. The film is an attempt to construct a fictional narrative capturing the drama of everyday mundane life. The cinema verite style of documentary has been purposefully merged with the dramatic expressive style of fiction. www.upperstall.com/3men_and_bulb.html Awards/Festivals At the annual IDPA (Indian documentary producers association) awards "3 men and a Bulb" was awarded the Best Documentary prize for "its sensitive construction of a discourse on displacement and infrastructure imbalances, done with meditative aplomb at an extraordinarily restrained pace." The film was in the competition at Mumbai Doc Festival and Dokfest’ Munich -2006. Crew Production Company: KUMAR TALKIES Producer/Director/Camera/editing Pankaj Rishi Kumar Location Sound Pankaj Rishi Kumar & Narendra Mishra Sound Design Pankaj Rishi Kumar & Pritam das Sound Mix Pritam das Production Narendra Mishra & Shreyas beltangdy Associate director T Madhavi Assistant editor Shreyas beltangdy Filmography Pankaj Rishi Kumar graduated from FTII in 1992 where he specialised in Film Editing. He began his film career in 1993 as an assistant editor on Sekhar kapur's "Bandirt Queen" . He edited documentaries, and TV serials before turning to making films himself. Pankaj Rishi Kumar has movies in his blood. His late father turned an old factory into the town of Kalpi's only cinema, Kumar Talkies. His first documentary, “Kumar Talkies”, offered a cinéma vérité portrait of people of Kalpi’s relationship to their only picture show and an examination of the consciousness-shaping role of local cinema in a globalised and digitised world. Made with support of Hubert Bals fund and India Foundation of The Arts, the film won critical acclaim. (screened at 40 festivals and won Best Film-L'alternative Barcelona, Special Jury at Zanzibar and Indian National awrd for Best Sound. ) The film has been recently been blown up to 35mm and will be released theatrically in 2006. His second film “Pathar Chujaeri” (The Play Is On) was about the survival of folk theater in war strife kashmir. (The film was screened at 25 film festivals and won Unesco Prize for Best Film at MITIL, Bronze Remi at Houston and a special Jury at Karachi, and Dallas South Asia festival.) His third film'The Vote" looked at the intricacies of the electoral politics. The film premiered at the Asia society in New York and picked up a special jury prize at Dallas South Asian film festival. Pankaj is currently working on his new project -- a documentary on women boxers in India. The film is being made with support from Majlis foundation, Sarai and Jan Vrijman fund. --------------------------------- Want to be your own boss? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060708/cc3f6200/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From isouweine at gmail.com Mon Jul 10 20:24:05 2006 From: isouweine at gmail.com (Isaac souweine) Date: Mon, 10 Jul 2006 10:54:05 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] Noam Chomsky vs the World Cup In-Reply-To: <34bf33330607100745g6cddb8a1o266532fb10cc951d@mail.gmail.com> References: <34bf33330607100745g6cddb8a1o266532fb10cc951d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <34bf33330607100754q67ba8a66q8c9c792bb251cf6e@mail.gmail.com> Hi all: Please follow this link to read my attempt to rationalize a month of soccer obsession. http://www.opednews.com/articles/life_a_isaac_so_060706_noam_chomsky_vs_the_.htm Text also pasted below. Cheers, Isaac ----------------------------------------------------------------- Noam Chomsky vs. The World Cup by Isaac Souweine Noam Chomsky killed my World Cup buzz. For three weeks, everything had proceeded to plan. Announcers shouted GOALA!, bars opened before noon, strikers hit heart-stopping goals into the upper 90. Then, days before a climactic European powers final, came a Netflix night with Manufacturing Consent, the 1992 Chomsky biopic. And two hours into the flick came a Chomskian riffon professional sports left my Cup world in tatters. "*Sports*" began Chomsky with a smirk that was suddenly really annoying, is " *another crucial example of the indoctrination system*." Already the man was inching onto sacred ground. "*Sports offers people something to pay attention to that's of no importance*". Now on sacred ground and preparing to defile it. In fact, sports are " *training in irrational jingoism*". Pants unzipped, defilement in progress. Relax, you say; 'tis nothing more than compensation for getting picked last on his Zionist youthsoccer team. Maybe so, but having sports fandom trashed by an intellectual idol as Cup fever surged was still a serious bummer. The problem wasn't that my pastime might be vapid and regressive. The problem was that my sports-enabled communion with the culture industry was under attack. Heed Chomsky's sports bashing and I would be just like any other Frankfurt-school Marxist elitist - shouting slogans about the rise of the underclass while turning my nose up at their alienated viewing habits. By the end of the film, I knew I had no choice. About NY Times coverage of East Timorese massacres , let Noam control the ball. But when it came to the Cup, I would try to dictate play. No matter that my opponent's discipline-changing linguistic theory, superbly researched anarchist diatribes and enigmatic low-key delivery make him one of the world's few intellectual super-pimps. If the US could blank Britain fifty-six years ago; if Cameroon could beat Italy in Milan in '90; well, you get the point. My first runs looked to exploit Chomsky's weakest link: the equation of sports with jingoism. I have argued elsewherethat sports are deeply integrated into the violent international order. The problem, however, with strict sports-equals-jingoism reductionism, is that while sports simulate and even stimulate violent nationalism, they also sublimate it by channeling the nation-state's favorite urges-competitiveness, aggression, and belligerence toward outsiders-into a rule-based game with systems for limiting violence and encouraging respect. Of course, sometimes sublimation fails, in which case you have hooliganism or Brian McBride's face gushing blood. But this is not the failing of the sport as much as it is the victory for the dark sides of humanity, which wage darker victories in other quarters. At their best, sports and sports fandom even ameliorate human nastiness. At one level, this occurs through the discourse of sportsmanship. Players desperate for victory still kick the ball out of bounds when an opponent is down and exchange jerseys after the match. At a deeper level, however, soccer especially diminishes small-mindedness through a universal language of achievement. Goals, crosses, headers and saves create a vocabulary that transcends language and culture. Once equipped with this common tongue, ethnocentrism of any kind is hard to maintain, for excellence so clearly transcends any restricted social grouping. Feeling that at I had at least created a dangerous chance in Chomsky's box, I decided to pursue his rather unsporting claim that sports "offer people something to pay attention to that's of no importance". To do so I first had to withstand the inevitable Frankfurt school set piece: capitalist democracy is not just about forcing people to sell their labor in the market; it is about propaganda systems that generate uninformed, apathetic consumers distracted from their potential for self-determination. Distracted by, among other things, ninety minutes of soccer viewing, plus an equal or greater amount of prep and debrief time, multiplied by three to twelve beers and seventeen commercials. In hopes of imposing *my* qualityin return, I replied to the sports-fandom-is-time-wasted volley with a low-culture counter. Like the critical theoristsupon whose work he builds, Chomsky interrogates the role of mass culture in co-opting the lower classes. This is fair enough, to a point. But if low culture can be politicized, it also deserves the same aesthetic protection afforded the high culture of the bourgeoisie. Freed of low-culture bias, the World Cup reveals itself as a rich artifact of global culture. Like all sport, it generates a rich aesthetic by using formal rules as a platform for physical improvisation. Dance-like sporting exhibitions are further enhanced by character development and narrative tension in a theater whose outcome is by definition unknown. Add in a devotional audience-performer relationship, an extremely limited engagement and the ability to view the show in a bar and you get basically the coolest art-form known to man. Nor is soccer's status as capitalist low-culture simply an aesthetic liability. When one billion people follow an art form, quality in every area actually tends to be high. Monetary and fame rewards bring the world's most gifted performers. Fan connoisseurship is taken to heights at once neurotic and sublime. And on flat screen, the media borg chips in with unmatched production values, especially in HD. All of which sounds way better than season tickets to the Met. Like the Mexico-thrashing US side in '02, I was now ready for the big Allemagne: the Cup's role in the dreaded "indoctrination system". The challenge was obvious. The current world cup is expected to generate $1 billion in advertising revenue. That's $1 billion worth of sexualized, falsely aspirational consumerist schlock. Or, as Chomsky might put it, $1 billion worth of bad ideas about what human beings should value. Unfortunately, just like the tired English, the outclassed Brazilians, and the overachieving German hosts, I knew the final push was beyond me. Maybe my defense was strong enough to shelter the purer forms of sport played by amateurs, (though even that seems unsure). But an event worth billions to host-country capitalists and billions more to FIFA and the rather nastysporting goods industry just had too many folks I wouldn't want at my party. Knowing victory was out of reach, I decided to try to salvage a tie. In New York City, all World Cup games are shown on *Telemundo*, a Spanish channel that features commercials I don't understand and a halftime shows so lacking in big media shine that even the cleavage showing girls seem wholesome. Since an ebullient Spanish commentator beats Marcelo Balboa any day of the week, Channel 47 is really the perfect back door out of the indoctrination big top. When you can't beat them straight, I figured, keep the score knotted; once you get to penalty kicks, even Noam Chomsky is vulnerable. Isaac Souweine is a software producer and occasional freelance writer living in New York City. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060710/e472a42c/attachment.html From nirupama.sekhar at gmail.com Mon Jul 10 10:53:30 2006 From: nirupama.sekhar at gmail.com (Nirupama Sekhar) Date: Mon, 10 Jul 2006 10:53:30 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Urban Stories-posting Message-ID: <87927e9c0607092223v2d381d8en3aa34e9d59e106f8@mail.gmail.com> Urban Stories: A Collection of Graphic Essays on Mumbai Posting 6 Please view updates,pics and works in progress at http://mumbai-urbanstories.blogspot.com/ THE project is taking shape.. and so far, learnt a lot about the city, good and bad. Most of the last week or so, its been either the rain or the riots in Mumbai, so just been stuck at home. With regards to graphic design, its been satisfying to actually have the time to work and experiment.. To try and break cliches, playing with colours and forms. Currently, each graphic essay is a stand alone piece.. covering a range of topics from sexuality to urban identities to architecture.. (stil workin on them..)What needs to be done is linking them up, making them part of a cohesive whole with text and classification (temporal aspect). That should take shape once all the pieces are ready.. Looking at about 18-20 pieces right now, some are very detailed, some not so detailed.. with the post modern view especially evident in the text/ typo on each piece.. I see the final presentation also as something that one can experiment with..work creatively with.. Though for a project like this, reseach has been very specific to each piece..nevertheless have learnt a lot about the city..mainly photography and print media reserach have been key. Hope to upload finished pieces in the near future..and get feedback to further refine each graphic essay. -- Nirupama -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060710/d498861a/attachment.html From labor at buchsenhausen.at Tue Jul 11 22:08:07 2006 From: labor at buchsenhausen.at (buchsenhausen.labor) Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2006 18:38:07 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] buchsenhausen.air 2007 - call for submissions Message-ID: <44B3D3EF.1010701@buchsenhausen.at> international fellowship programme for visual and media arts call for submissions our apologies for cross-posting. kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen invites visual and media artists, theorists and art critics to apply for a fellowship in 2007. the closing date for submissions is september 1, 2006 (postmark). below please find the full announcement. kind regards, andrei siclodi director kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ )))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))) international fellowship programme for visual and media arts call for submissions )))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))) ........... institution kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen is an international centre for production, research and discussion in the fields of visual and media arts. the kunstlerhaus provides a forum that facilitates direct exchange between artists, theorists, art critics and curators from the region and abroad. the institution also promotes young, innovative talents and presents their work. künstlerhaus büchsenhausen is an institution affiliated to the “tyrolean artists' association”. ......... programme with its fellowship programme kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen actively promotes an internationally pertinent art production, research and discussion in the region of tyrol. in the framework of the programme every year 4 visual / media artists and 2 theorists / art critics receive a fellowship and reside in innsbruck for a period of 5 months. the fellows selected by expert jurors find excellent working conditions at kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen, while the city of innsbruck and its surrounding area offers an interesting setting in terms of art, culture and landscape. the grant and the residency allow fellows to work on the proposed project but also gives them the chance to experiment and to reconsider their current practice. furthermore, they have the opportunity to directly familiarise themselves with the work of other fellows and professionals in the region, to exchange plans and ideas and to also carry out joint projects. usually, there are 3 fellows (2 artists and 1 theorist / art critic) and 6 tyrol-based artists working at kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen at the same time. ........ location the building – the eastern wing of the buchsenhausen castle, built in the middle of the 17th century and situated in the city of innsbruck, not far from its centre – houses 9 studios and a project space. 3 apartment studios are used by fellows of the international residence programme for visual and media arts . 6 studios are available to artists based in tyrol. kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen also has a large project and presentation space equipped with multimedia facilities. the space was designed by atelier van lieshout. .......... fellowship + a stipend of eur 650,-- / month for covering the living and material expenses + individual studio for working and living furnished with a large shared kitchen + free use of the available multimedia production equipment in ; free dsl/wlan internet access + a production budget for the realization of the proposed project + public presentation of the project developed and produced in ........... eligibility professional artists, theorists and art critics in the fields of visual and media arts from all over the world are eligible for the fellowship. the residence of the candidates must be outside tyrol. the fellows must spend a minimum of two thirds of the allocated fellowship time at künstlerhaus büchsenhausen. working knowledge of german or english language is required. the requirements include the submission of a project proposal. the project has to be developed during the residency and to be presented at its end. apart from the concluding presentations at the end of the fellowship in june 2007 respectively january 2008, fellows are expected to give lectures and/or organize further events related to the topics of their individual work or research. in 2007, kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen offers 4 fellowships to artists and 2 felowships to theorists / art critics. there are two periods for which candidates can apply: term 1: february 1 - june 29, 2007 term 2: september 3, 2007 – january 31, 2008 ......... selection the selection is made by expert jurors and based on the quality and relevance of the project proposal and the work samples submitted by the applicants. members of the jury are the director of the kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen, a member of the board of the “tyrolean artists' association”, and one external theorist, art critic or curator. jury 2007: maren richter, andrei siclodi, annette sonnewend there is no legal right to be awarded a fellowship at kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen. therefore, the jury is under no obligation to justify decisions. the decision of the jury will be communicated in written form. applicants not selected in the current selection process can reapply a maximum of two more times. ..................... application procedure applications must include the following documents: + the project proposal (max 1.000 words, 3 copies) + a visual portfolio / documentation of recent work (artists: max 2 catalogues, max 10 photos or slides, 1 dvd or 1 cd-rom or 1 vhs-cassette; theorists / art critics: max 3 recent writing samples) + a curriculum vitae (3 copies) + a filled application form download the application form from http://buchsenhausen.at, fill it in and send it together with the required material mentioned above to: kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen, ref.: "air 2007" weiherburggasse 13/12, 6020 innsbruck, austria *********************************************************** closing date for submissions (postmark) : september 1, 2006 *********************************************************** for additional information please contact: office at buchsenhausen.at, phone +43 512 278627-10, fax -11 -- kunstlerhaus buchsenhausen weiherburggasse 13/12 6020 innsbruck, austria phone +43 512 278627-10 fax +43 512 278627-11 office at buchsenhausen.at http://buchsenhausen.at From rana at ranadasgupta.com Tue Jul 11 18:12:36 2006 From: rana at ranadasgupta.com (Rana Dasgupta) Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2006 18:12:36 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The myth of the new India - Pankaj Mishra Message-ID: <44B39CBC.5070403@ranadasgupta.com> The myth of the new India Pankaj Mishra The New York Times THURSDAY, JULY 6, 2006 LONDON "India is a roaring capitalist success story." So says the latest issue of Foreign Affairs; and last week many leading business executives and politicians in India celebrated as Lakshmi Mittal, the fifth richest man in the world, finally succeeded in his hostile takeover of the Luxembourgian steel company Arcelor. India's leading business newspaper, The Economic Times, summed up the general euphoria over the event in its regular feature, "The Global Indian Takeover": "For India, it is a harbinger of things to come - economic superstardom." This sounds persuasive as long as you don't know that Mittal, who lives in Britain, announced his first investment in India only last year. He is as much an Indian success story as Sergey Brin, the Russian- born co-founder of Google, is proof of Russia's imminent economic superstardom. In recent weeks, India seemed an unlikely capitalist success story as Communist parties decisively won elections to state legislatures, and the stock market, which had enjoyed record growth in the last two years, fell nearly 20 percent in two weeks, wiping out $2.4 billion in investor wealth in just four days. This week India's prime minister, Manmohan Singh, made it clear that only a small minority of Indians will enjoy "Western standards of living and high consumption." There is, however, no denying many Indians their conviction that the 21st century will be the Indian Century just as the 20th was American. The exuberant self-confidence of a tiny Indian elite now increasingly infects the news media and foreign policy establishment in the United States. Encouraged by a powerful lobby of rich Indian-Americans who seek to expand their political influence within both their home and adopted countries, President George W. Bush recently agreed to assist India's nuclear program, even at the risk of undermining his efforts to check the nuclear ambitions of Iran. As if on cue, special reports and covers hailing the rise of India in Time, Foreign Affairs and The Economist have appeared in the last month. It was not so long ago that India appeared in the American press as a poor, backward and often violent nation, saddled with an inefficient bureaucracy and, though officially nonaligned, friendly to the Soviet Union. Suddenly the country seems to be not only a "roaring capitalist success story" but also, according to Foreign Affairs, an "emerging strategic partner of the United States." To what extent is this wishful thinking rather than an accurate estimate of India's strengths? Looking for new friends and partners in a rapidly changing world, the Bush administration clearly hopes that India, a fellow democracy, will be a reliable counterweight against China as well as Iran. But trade and cooperation between India and China is growing; and, though grateful for American generosity on the nuclear issue, India is too dependent on Iran for oil (it is also exploring developing a gas pipeline to Iran) to wholeheartedly support the United States in its efforts to prevent the Islamic Republic from acquiring a nuclear weapon. The world, more interdependent now than during the Cold War, may no longer be divided up into strategic blocs and alliances. Nevertheless, there are much better reasons to expect that India will in fact vindicate the twin American ideals of free markets and democracy that neither Latin America nor post-Communist countries - nor, indeed, Iraq - have fulfilled. Since the early 1990s, when the Indian economy was liberalized, India has emerged as the world leader in information technology and business outsourcing, with an average growth of about 6 percent a year. Growing foreign investment and easy credit have fueled a consumer revolution in urban areas. With their Starbucks-style coffee bars, Blackberry- wielding young professionals, and shopping malls selling luxury brand names, large parts of Indian cities strive to resemble Manhattan. Indian tycoons are increasingly trying to control marquee names like Taittinger Champagne and the Carlyle Hotel in New York. "India Everywhere" was the slogan of the Indian business leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, this year. But the increasingly common, business-centric view of India suppresses more facts than it reveals. Recent accounts of the alleged rise of India barely mention the fact that its per capita gross domestic product of $728 is just slightly higher than that of sub- Saharan Africa and that, as the 2005 United Nations Human Development Report puts it, even if it sustains its current high growth rates, India will not catch up with high-income countries until 2106. Nor is India rising very fast on the report's Human Development index, where it ranks 127, just two rungs above Myanmar and more than 70 below Cuba and Mexico. Despite a recent reduction in poverty levels, nearly 380 million Indians still live on less than a dollar a day. Malnutrition affects half of all children in India, and there is little sign that they are being helped by market reforms, which have focused on creating private wealth rather than expanding access to health care and education. Despite the growing economy, 2.5 million Indian children die annually, accounting for one out of every five child deaths worldwide; and facilities for primary education have collapsed in large parts of India (the official literacy rate of 61 percent includes many who can barely write their names). In the countryside, where 70 percent of India's population lives, the government has reported that about 100,000 farmers committed suicide between 1993 and 2003. Feeding on the resentment of those left behind by the urban-oriented economic growth, Communist insurgencies (unrelated to India's parliamentary Communist parties) have erupted in some of the most populous and poorest parts of north and central India. The Indian government no longer effectively controls many of the districts where Communists battle landlords and police, imposing a harsh form of justice on a largely hapless rural population. The potential for conflict - among castes as well as classes - also grows in urban areas, where India's cruel social and economic disparities are as evident as its new prosperity. The main reason for this is that India's economic growth has been largely jobless. Only 1.3 million out of a working population of 400 million are employed in the information technology and business processing industries that make up the so-called new economy. No labor-intensive manufacturing boom of the kind that powered the economic growth of almost every developed and developing country in the world has yet occurred in India. Unlike China, India still imports more than it exports. This means that as 70 million more people enter the work force in the next five years, most of them without the skills required for the new economy, unemployment and inequality could provoke even more social instability than they have already. For decades, India's underprivileged have used elections to register their protests against joblessness, inequality and corruption. In the 2004 general elections, they voted out a central government that claimed that India was "shining," bewildering those who had predicted an easy victory for the ruling coalition. Among the politicians whom voters rejected was Chandrababu Naidu, the technocratic chief minister of one of India's poorest states, whose forward- sounding policies, like providing Internet access to villages, prompted Time magazine to declare him "South Asian of The Year" and a "beacon of hope." But the anti-India insurgency in Kashmir, which has claimed 80,000 lives in the last decade and a half, and the strength of violent Communist militants across India, hint that regular elections may not be enough to contain the frustration and rage of millions of have-nots, or to shield them from the temptations of religious and ideological extremism. Many serious problems confront India. They are unlikely to be solved as long as the wealthy, both inside and outside the country, choose to believe their own complacent myths. Pankaj Mishra is the author of "Temptations of the West: How to Be Modern in India, Pakistan, Tibet and Beyond." From shahzulf at yahoo.com Tue Jul 11 22:21:48 2006 From: shahzulf at yahoo.com (Zulfiqar Shah) Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2006 09:51:48 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: Cultivasian magazine launched Message-ID: <20060711165148.4703.qmail@web38815.mail.mud.yahoo.com> From: Savita Vij [mailto:savita.vij at cultivasian.org] Sent: 06 July 2006 16:50 To: Bala Thakrar Subject: Background Information about Cultivasian Hi, We are launching an online fortnightly magazine (July 2006) CultivAsian where minorities can be the source of debates about everyday society, culture and politics. This will be subscribed to by academic researchers, actors, artists, charities, entrepreneurs, environmentalists, policymakers, think tanks and individuals looking for creative and stimulating events/information about a wide-range of issues. There are a number of ways in which you can contribute. v Becoming a regular editorial contributor and writing comment pieces around 500 words on topical issues for a section called “In Conversation With”. v Sending in ad hoc observation pieces between 500-1000 Words for “In Conversation With”. v Provide details of interesting campaigns, debates, exhibitions, festivals, literature, shopping experiences etc. for our events guide. v Post regular 150-200 word critical reviews on debates, exhibitions etc. v Pass on information about this site to others you know may be interested. I’ve provided some background information about the site below and will send out a link to the test site in two weeks time. If you would like to write for us or have any other queries please contact me. Kind regards Savita Vij Editor CultivAsian Email: savita.vij at cultivasian.org Moile: 07930365934 CULTIVASIAN We want to embrace the multitude of ways in which complex and even contradictory everyday cultural identities are expressed: You can be a Satyajit Ray film lover and still be a fan of Amitabh Bachchan. You can be an avid follower of news in the subcontinent yet a campaigner for civil liberties in Britain. You can read Meera Syal or Gabriella Garcia Marquez Most of us, however, don’t have immediate access to information about a wide-ranging number of campaigns, events, literature, etc. More importantly we just don’t have time. CultiVasian will provide a free comprehensive up-to-date information guide to books you won’t want to put down, cultural events you want to share information about to charity events you will want to participate in. We hope that this can liven up your journey, give you an opportunity to meet new travellers and maybe even take a diversion or new direction. WHAT ARE WE CULTIVATING? A platform to EXPRESS wide-ranging ideas about everyday art, culture and politics. A space to EXPLORE events, literature, research opportunities etc. A medium to ENGAGE with artists, activists and thinkers across cultural, community, discipline and ethnic/faith borders. WHY ARE WE DOING THIS? To open up creative and INDEPENDENT spaces for thinking and responding to current affairs. To allow greater scope for individuals to PARTICIPATE in and SHAPE civil society. To ENRICH public debate and action by facilitating dialogue between thinkers from across different backgrounds. HOW ARE WE GOING TO DELIVER? Providing LISTINGS information about things to do, see, listen to i.e. events, music, campaigns, courses, films etc. Developing a DATABASE of academics, activists, artists, journalists, researchers etc. Providing LINKS to organisations, projects and institutions that you can get involved with i.e. reading/ writing groups, development work, social campaigns, film festivals etc. Invite readers to post critical REVIEWS on books, films, lectures etc. Creating a forum for you to post and respond to regular editorial OPINIONS on issues that matter to you. ********************************************************************** Presentation is a leading Social Investment Agency - committed to investing in communities. ********************************************************************** Confidentiality Notice: This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom they are addressed.If you have received this email in error please notify your Systems Administrator. 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If you are not the intended recipient, be advised that you have received this email in error and that any use, dissemination, forwarding, printing, or copying of this email is strictly prohibited. --------------------------------- How low will we go? Check out Yahoo! Messenger’s low PC-to-Phone call rates. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060711/8e0f7f9f/attachment.html From shahzulf at yahoo.com Tue Jul 11 22:25:09 2006 From: shahzulf at yahoo.com (Zulfiqar Shah) Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2006 09:55:09 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: Oxford Recognition Opens New Window on Hindu Culture Message-ID: <20060711165509.73298.qmail@web38805.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Fwd. massage ------------------ Oxford Recognition Opens New Window on Hindu Culture Oxford University has granted the status of Recognised Independent Centre to the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies (OCHS) - the world's leading centre for the study of Hindu traditions. OCHS is the younger of the first two institutions to be granted this status by Oxford University. It comes after just seven years of teaching, publishing and conducting research about all aspects of Hindu culture. The new formal status, "Recognised Independent Centre of Oxford University", has been created by Oxford University to acknowledge independent institutions that are working with the University in research and teaching. Prof Gavin Flood, Academic Director of the Centre, spoke of the significance of the Centre's new status: "Recognised Independent Centre of Oxford University is a title we are proud to bear. It is an official recognition by Oxford University that we are its principal provider in the field of Hindu Studies, and thus a duly constituted member of the University's community." He added: "This development is important because culture and religion are of fundamental public concern as we move into the twenty-first century. We see this concern particularly in questions of identity politics, the degree to which diverse communities share common values, and the ways in which ethical codes interact with secular law." This new recognition is one of a growing number of creative partnerships between independent centres and universities. It is a response to the need for new resources and perspectives in the academic world. The recognition also shows that the academic world is now acknowledging its need for help from centres that can link distinct communities and cultures with scholars, government and media in a critically sophisticated way. This comes at a time when funding commitments to higher education are of national and international concern. By establishing this new status Oxford University is continuing its commitment to innovation and co-operation in scholarship, but also affirming a support for greater diversity. The Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies is one of the world's leading academic centres for the study of Hinduism. It attracts students from all over the world, including many practising Hindus. It marks the beginning of a vibrant association of scholars in Hindu studies. This may prove to be an important model for enabling emerging communities to face issues of modernity and globalisation - one of the great challenges of the twenty-first century - in an intelligent, constructive way. It allows communities to contribute to their study rather than simply being subjects of study. The Indian High Commissioner, His Excellency Kamlesh Sharma, said, "The rising profile of India and the remarkable success of the worldwide community of Indian origin has increased interest in the foundations of India's culture and traditions. The affiliation with Oxford University advances the work of the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies in providing serious academic focus on Hindu culture and its depth of wisdom and creativity for a wide audience. It is a significant gain for Oxford." The Chancellor of Oxford University, Lord Patten of Barnes, said, "The development of the field of Hindu Studies at Oxford is very exciting. It is an important addition to Oxford's wealth of resources on India and Indian religions. It fits in well with our ambitions to be the best in this field. The new official association provides a platform for the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies and Oxford University to move forward together in teaching, research and publishing." A benefactor of the Centre, Alfred Ford, great-grandson of Henry Ford, stated, "With greater mobility, accelerating development and an increasing emphasis on global trade, audiences both internationally and within India, need to be ever more clear about Hindu culture; its interpretation can and does affect a large and economically significant population. Indeed, international business and politics now demand a much richer, more multi-faceted view of India. By facilitating young intellectuals we will help to preserve and develop understandings of Indic culture between traditions." Sir Mark Tully, writer and broadcaster said, "There has perhaps never been more confusion about religion - much of it dangerous confusion. Yet with globalisation and the spread of multifaith societies there has never been a greater need for understanding of the different world traditions. That is why I am delighted that Oxford University has granted this recognition to the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies. This will encourage the spread of knowledge about a great culture which the West has found difficult to understand because of its unique diversity and philosophical breadth." As India's importance on the world stage grows, a rigorous, scholarly approach to Hindu Studies will allow it to preserve its cultures, take pride in its heritage, and understand how to accurately project its identity on the international stage. The Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies marks a significant development in Indian Studies at Oxford. In the nineteenth century, Indian Studies were aimed at giving missionaries and administrators a background knowledge of India before their departure. These studies focused on Indian history and languages. The OCHS has added Hindu Theology and Philosophy to the field. In 1830, Colonel Joseph Boden of the East India Company endowed the Boden Chair in Sanskrit to further Christian missionary work in India. An interesting mark of how the relationship between Oxford and India has matured is that Prof Richard Gombrich, emeritus Boden professor in Sanskrit, has been a member of the OCHS Board of Governors since its inception. For more information please contact: Shaunaka Rishi Das Director, OCHS 077 66 488 583 shaunaka at ochs.org.uk www.ochs.org.uk A number of speakers will be available for interview on the day including: Lord Navnit Dholakia, Governor of the OCHS Prof Richard Gombrich, Emeritus Prof of Sanskrit, Oxford Prof Gavin Flood, Theology Faculty, Oxford Shaunaka Rishi Das, Director, Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies Notes to Editors: OCHS is the only academic institution in Europe dedicated to studying Hindu traditions in all their breadth and depth. Pictures of the Oxford Centre are available online at: www.ochs.org.uk/media As part of its outreach programme, the Centre is developing as a resource for scholars, media, and the business community seeking reliable information on Hindu philosophy, culture, and practice. The OCHS has introduced the only accredited adult education course in Hindu Studies in Europe. OCHS is currently teaching this course at five locations around the country and is due online in October 2006. Oxford's Indian Institute Library has the largest collection of Sanskrit manuscripts outside of India. In 2001 the Centre conducted the only Hindu youth survey conducted in this country. Report at: www.ochs.org.uk/research/youthsurvey.html The British Hinduism Oral History Project, funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund and conducted by the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies is the only oral record of the first generation of Indian immigrants to the UK. The OCHS is funded by public subscription. -------------------------------------------------- For information on courses, lectures and seminars, publications, research and downloads please refer to our website www.ochs.org.uk or contact us at info at ochs.org.uk __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060711/111244bf/attachment.html From delhi.yunus at gmail.com Wed Jul 12 18:55:26 2006 From: delhi.yunus at gmail.com (Syed Yunus) Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2006 18:55:26 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] experimental method:Asahaye Mahanagar VIII Message-ID: Experimental Research: Just to share that I am trying to collect some data from my respondents ( helpline workers) through photographs and my first learning is that ,no matter how right and open questions you ask , respondent have a lot more to ask from you . So for the purpose of getting open response ,I gave a hot shot camera to one of the worker and asked him to click pictures of his interest related to his work . he has been taking snaps for quite some years for the sake of keeping records of cases in helpline and to record events like meetings , awareness programs or evidence etc, but he was a little curious to know why I have bought a new camera and confused about what type of pictures he is supposed to take and he asked me a number of questions. Making him a little bit comfortable and leaving him sort of 'open' for his ideas I told him my purpose and suggested to take snaps of significant part of his work life .few days back he handed me the camera with the exposed film , a sense of responsibility and a brief sharing of his experience. he said that the experience was both refreshing and troubling at times. Refreshing because he got to do some thing out of the 'stress' of helpline. He said that he was very conscious while taking each snap that there should be some 'logic behind them'. But he enjoyed doing it and curious to see the results. In a light mood he also shared that while taking snaps of GRP police ,he faced a little problem because the police man was skeptical about why he is taking pictures. He also gave reasons of why he has shot photographs of girls at Pulse polio booth and that I should not think of any ulterior motive ( I haven't ask so far about any thing) . I will get back to him once the photographs are developed to get is comments on them. In the meantime i have given the camera to another respondents (after facing another round of questions and getting refused by two of them). hope to share the findings soon, Yunus From indlinux at gmail.com Thu Jul 13 07:59:08 2006 From: indlinux at gmail.com (G Karunakar) Date: Thu, 13 Jul 2006 07:59:08 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] world e-book fair Message-ID: <773e2c260607121929u6db0d1c5qe7eb3360aec223df@mail.gmail.com> hello all, World e-book fair is on at http://worldebookfair.com/ "You are encouraged to participate in The World eBook Fair, by downloading any of the 1/3 million eBooks provided here for personal use. The World eBook fair is currently scheduled for the next few July and August periods as follows: 2007 1/2 Million eBooks 2008 3/4 Million eBooks 2009 One Million eBooks The World eBook Fair, Project Gutenberg, and World eBook Library, along with our other participants, join together to encourage you to assist in bringing many entire libraries to the general public and to encourage ever increasing levels of literacy and reading. We hope the invention of eBooks will advance the world as much as did the invention of The Gutenberg Press, and look forward to the Neo-Industrial Revolution following the advent of eBooks, just as the invention of The Gutenberg Press undoubtedly led to the first Industrial Revolution, and your participation can help bring this new revolution in reading and libraries to the world." world ebook fair is on for free access to the public from July 4th to August 4th, in celebration of Project Gutenberg's 35th Birthday • Full Full Text Search of 330,000+ PDF eBook Titles in 100+ Languages. • No Membership Required for Access to eBooks from 07-04-06 to 08-04-06. -- Regards, Karunakar -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060713/52764add/attachment.html From aarti at sarai.net Wed Jul 12 13:08:57 2006 From: aarti at sarai.net (aarti at sarai.net) Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2006 09:38:57 +0200 (CEST) Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Vanishing Acts: Reading by Ranjit Hoskote Message-ID: <1125.61.246.29.185.1152689937.squirrel@mail.sarai.net> ================================= Reading @ Sarai: "Vanishing Acts" ================================= Sarai-CSDS and Penguin Books invite you to a reading by Ranjit Hoskote 6:00 P.M., Tuesday, 18 July 2006, Sarai-CSDS seminar room Ranjit Hoskote will read from his new collection of poetry, "Vanishing Acts: New and Selected Poems, 1985-2005", Penguin Books India, 2006. Shuddhabrata Sengupta will introduce Ranjit Hoskote and moderate the discussion. ‘It is the way he hangs on to a metaphor, and the subtlety with which he does it, that draws my admiration (not to mention envy)… Hoskoté’s poems bear the “watermark of fable”: behind each cluster of images, a story; behind each story, a parable. I haven’t read a better poetry volume in years.’—Keki N. Daruwalla, reviewing The Sleepwalker’s Archive in The Hindu "Vanishing Acts by Ranjit Hoskoté, winner of the Sahitya Akademi Golden Jubilee Award 2004, brings together some of his best poetry, drawn from his three published collections, along with a substantial body of new poems. While continuing to explore the interplay between the epic, devastating sweep of historical events and an intimate, often vulnerable, self, his new poems dwell on emigrants, fugitives, interpreters, double agents - survivors who walk the fragile border between eternity and transience. Experimenting with a variety of forms - ranging from the canticle to the cycle, the adapted sonnet to the passionate apostrophe — Hoskoté expresses the anxieties and delights of a transitive self that constantly shifts location, and evokes strikingly the worlds that can open up at the edges of memory, identity and language." [Ranjit Hoskote is a poet, cultural theorist and independent curator. He is the author of ten books; most recently, of The Crucible of Painting: The Art of Jehangir Sabavala (Eminence Designs/ National Gallery of Modern Art, 2005), Baiju Parthan: A User’s Manual (Afterimage, 2006) and Vanishing Acts: New and Selected Poems, 1985-2005 (Penguin, 2006). His poems will appear in German translation later this year, as Die Ankunft der Vögel (Hanser Verlag, 2006). Hoskote has curated numerous exhibitions of Indian and Asian art, including a mid-career retrospective of Atul Dodiya (Japan Foundation: Tokyo, 2001) and a major retrospective of Jehangir Sabavala (National Gallery of Modern Art: New Delhi & Bombay, 2005-06). Hoskote was a Fellow of the International Writing Program of the University of Iowa, USA (1995). He has also held a writing residency at the Villa Waldberta, Munich (2003). A recipient of the Sanskriti Award for Literature (1996), Hoskote was honoured with the Sahitya Akademi Golden Jubilee Award by India’s National Academy of Letters, in 2004.] _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From ravikant at sarai.net Thu Jul 13 14:29:14 2006 From: ravikant at sarai.net (Ravikant) Date: Thu, 13 Jul 2006 14:29:14 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Shahid Amin on 1857 Message-ID: <200607131429.14778.ravikant@sarai.net> It addresses issues of history, memory and memory management in the context of the Indian state's plans for commemorating the event in a big way. Apologies for X-posting ravikant http://www.telegraphindia.com/1060713/asp/opinion/story_6461478.asp OF MANY PASTS - The 1857 celebrations raise questions Indians must confront SHAHID AMIN (The author is professor of history, University of Delhi) Such are the pulls of appropriating History for the Nation that amidst a busy July schedule - interim report of the oversight committee, negotiations with the IAEA, keeping the allies and tomato prices from going over the top - the prime minister will find time on July 13 to chair a 68-member committee to commemorate 150 years of 1857. That's a lot of Indians - former prime ministers, politicians, satraps, bureaucrats, and some historians to boot. One may be proven wrong, but most of them, including the two historians who have declined, would not be entirely comfortable distinguishing a barkandaz from a tilanga sepoy, or be familiar with say the ballad of Kunwar Singh of Shahabad or the shikasta script of rebel communication. One could even wager that some of them might even falter reciting little more than the refrain "Khub lari mardani… Jhansi wali rani…" Yet a group of ministers has gone ahead and cleared Rs 150 crore of public money for a major commemoration, beginning, we are told, August 2007. And there lies the rub, for what dreams have propelled the August inauguration… we know. It is the dream of annexing the events of 1857 to our freedom from Britain almost to the month. But though crucial for 1942 and again 1947, August was not a particularly good month for us Indians in 1857, especially in Delhi, which fell to the vengeful firangis soon afterwards. If true, the August inauguration to the celebrations of 1857 raises an important question that we who people this nation - historians, politicians, public - face about our pasts. As elsewhere, so in India, school books, street-names, and jubilee celebrations - all seek to construct a sense of an uncluttered national past. Opposition to the idea of a national-plural is common to most nationalists, for it disorders a national past which is simultaneously considered historical and singular. Swimming against the tide enables us to ask a different set of questions: is there something inherent in the ways of nation-states that makes it difficult for citizens to relate to history outside a mainstream, accredited version of the past - the national past? Can we at all remember without commemorating? Can we recollect without celebrating, recall without avenging? Why are national histories thought of invariably as time-resistant capsules buried for ever, and in constant play at the same time? San-sattavan! In northern India, this incomplete chronological slice, sans the century, encapsulates in its pithiness the many things that went into the making of that Great Event. San-sattavan can only be 1857; it can not be 1957, or even 1757, though in some contemporary prophesies, British rule was to end within a hundred years of the battle of Plassey. Be that as it may, 'san sattavan' stands resplendent in perhaps the most well-known poem on the Ghadar by Subhadra Kumari Chauhan: "Chamak uthi san sattavan mein, woh talwar purani thi." The sword unleashed to push out the firangis, had not been moulded in or wrested from colonial armouries; it was the very old sword of an 'aged Bharat' which, rejuvenated, had now stood up to claim this equally old land for itself ("burhe Bharat mein aayi phir-se nai jawani thi"). Let's stay a bit longer with the stirring opening stanza of this epic poem on 1857, on which we will have a surfeit of songs, dramas, marches, exhibitions in the year to come. Let's recall that this great nationalist poem places the 'value of lost independence' and 'the resolve to throw the firangi out' in every Indian heart. And yet the Bharat of 1857 is already old, 90 years before the birth of the Indian nation-state. Let's now cut to a folk song about Jhansi-wali Rani, popular in district Etawah and its environs in Uttar Pradesh before the more famous Chauhan version that has been bequeathed to us as a nation: "O, the Rani of Jhansi, well fought the brave one/ All the soldiers were fed with sweets; she herself had treacle and rice/… Leaving morcha, she ran to the lashkar, where she searched for but found no water, O! The Rani of Jhansi well fought the brave one." Here in a local folk song, to be sung in the Dadra vein, we sure find the Rani's sacrifice and valour, but no intimations of a well-entrenched and reactivated sense of Indian nationalism. To adapt the opening sentence of Anna Karenina: all nations are new, but each claims its antiquity in its own way. This is clearly in evidence in the spirit behind the forthcoming official celebrations of 1857, as it is in that famous nationalist poem on Rani Jhansi by Subhadra Chauhan. It is a feature of nationalist consciousness, that the nation whose 'making' requires large doses of energy, action and sacrifice, that very nation is made available to us fully-formed - like a mannequin in a shopping window - merely awaiting a change of (nationalist) attire. Only an informed public debate can stem the wastage of money and effort on mere window-dressing: the sprucing up of an 1857 structure at one place, the gouging out of a colonial memorial stone at another, ersatz purabiya sipahis knocking at the Rajghat gate of the Red Fort, Big B daring you to go 50-50 or phone a friend on a mega-Ghadar quiz, the launch of a desi fizz-drink with the spirit of 1857 bottled evanescently in it. The contrast with the centennial of the Ghadar in 1957 is instructive. A lot of us midnight's children were too young to recollect the hoopla, but the long-term gains for historical understanding and democratizing access to the events of 1857 still continue to be felt. Two noted scholars, very different in orientation, produced two different accounts of those times; a considerable amount of primary source material, largely from official records, was published, notably the five volumes of Freedom Struggle in Uttar Pradesh by the indefatigable S.A.A. Rizvi, distributed gratis till the Eighties to bona fide scholars. This has encouraged a whole crop of histories of the Ghadar in different districts and regions written in the medium-sized university towns in North India. Other material connected with the late-19th-century freedom struggle was brought out, for instance, for Maharashtra, or lies unpublished in provincial archives. And all this was made possible by advanced planning, and hard work by those adept, by training, to delve into and narrate the past. It would be said that commemoration is too serious (or political) a business to be left to historians: poets, publicists, politicians, playwrights all must contribute. It may well be that historians have to cease being just whistle-blowers in such matters, telling others where they have got their facts wrong. They must be concerned not just with what happened in times past, but equally with how memory, indeed state memorialization, plays on the certitude of facts. The new multimedia exhibition at Tees Janvari Marg is an eye opener about how non-official collaboration between historians, Gandhians and IT-savvy graphic and sound artists can infuse excitement into a hoary and usually unimaginative presentation of the ideas and legacy of Mahatma Gandhi. The prime minister will be well advised to try and get the 1857 committee to bankroll a similar venture for that Great Uprising, hangama, insurgency and effervescence, aggregation and disorder, plebeian anger and state-terror, regional groupings and wider alliances, atavistic proclamations and radical stirrings, all on display for us to make sense, warts and all. To hang the story of the Ghadar by a single thread would amount to hanging its myriad rebels twice over. From hpp at vsnl.com Thu Jul 13 15:24:57 2006 From: hpp at vsnl.com (hpp at vsnl.com) Date: Thu, 13 Jul 2006 09:54:57 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] Collateral damage in development Message-ID: Collateral damage in development >From The Statesman, Kolkata, 13 July 2006 The Left Front government should consider the directive principles of state policy while taking action at Singur, says D BANDYOPADHYAY In the lexicon of war, particularly in limited war, there is an internationally accepted concept ~ that of “collateral damage”. The meaning of the term as given in the Concise Oxford Dictionary (2004) is “inadvertent casualties and destruction in civilian areas caused by military operations”. A missile that misses its target and lands elsewhere causing death and destruction is an example of this. In such an exercise, unintended damage is caused to non-combatant parties. In a limited war, hostile parties try to avoid such damages in order to reduce the possibilities of reprisals on their own non-combatant civilian population and property. Generally, the party that causes such damage owns up and expresses regret. In the development game, however, there is no such concept. Development connotes upgradation of the well-being of all stake holders. The idea of some gaining and many losing in the process is not in keeping with the concept of development. No one can deny the need for land for industrialisation and urbanisation. It is also accepted that the state should intervene for spatially planned development so that these processes cause the least possible environmental, human and economic damages. The state’s role is thus crucial for the elimination of “collateral damages”. It cannot abandon its judgement while using coercive powers in favour of a few to the detriment of many. In West Bengal, a controversy is raging on the topic of the acquisition of 1,000 acres of land near the Dankuni-Durgapur Expressway for a private company that wants to set up an automobile manufacturing unit. The government has said that the private company chose that particular area for setting up its unit. A private company is fully justified in choosing a site that will give it the maximum locational advantage for the optimisation of internal economics. After all, it is interested in reducing its costs and maximising its gains to ensure a high rate of profit. This is what market economy is all about. So far so good! But it would have been better if the company could have been advised to buy up the required land in the open market by paying open market prices. The moment the company goes into the market, prices would shoot up ~ this might have upset the anticipated profit and loss calculation of the company. Hence, it wants the land to be acquired by the state through the coercive land acquisition law. The state can acquire land only in the “public interest”. What should constitute public interest should be derived from Article 39 (Directive Principles of State Policy) of the Constitution. This Article states that certain principles should be kept in mind by the state while making policy decisions. These would include, inter alia, “(a) that the citizens, men and women equally, have the right to an adequate means of livelihood, (b) that the ownership and control of the material resources of the community are so distributed as best to serve the common good, (c) that the operation of the economic system does not result in the concentration of wealth and means of production to the common detriment.” These principles are not pious wishes of some old fathers who believed in the “redundant” idea of ensuring the greatest good for the greatest number in the conduct of the affairs of the state. These principles are “fundamental in the governance of the country and it shall be the duty of the state to apply these principles in making laws.” (Art 37) Does the proposed action of the Government of West Bengal in compulsorily acquiring 1,000 acres of good agricultural land, thereby extinguishing the direct livelihood of about 1,400 peasants and rural households, pass the litmus test of the Directive Principles of State Policy? If yes, then the state should go ahead. If not, it should pause and ponder. Having had the honour and privilege of serving under such stalwarts like Hare Krishna Konar and Benoy Chowdhury, one has an eerie and weird sensation seeing a government that proclaims adherence to Marxism but acts as the local agent of the international and comprador bourgeoisie. (The author was Secretary, Government of India, ministries of finance [revenue] and rural development, and Executive Director, Asian Development Bank, Manila.) From eye at ranadasgupta.com Thu Jul 13 23:27:23 2006 From: eye at ranadasgupta.com (Rana Dasgupta) Date: Thu, 13 Jul 2006 23:27:23 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] If there were any doubts that Zidane was a hero, there are no longer Message-ID: <44B68983.4050201@ranadasgupta.com> Dany Laferrière is a francophone novelist from Haiti now living between Montreal and Miami. His commentary on the Zidane "header", which I found on the blog of Alain Mabanckou, a wonderful Congolese novelist - http://www.congopage.com/article.php3?id_article=3791 - is radical and fascinating, so I've done a rough translation. Read the comment too. ********** http://www.ranadasgupta.com/notes.asp?note_id=69 I did not sleep much last night for trying to understand Zidane’s gesture, especially since all the opinions I heard resembled each other as if only one person had watched the match. The more there are of us, the more we’re inclined to have the same opinion. I am always suspicious of a crowd that speaks with one voice. And everyone was feeling sorry for Zidane. An unworthy end to the career of a great champion. It’s strange, but this commentary seemed far too bourgeois to me. In fact people weren’t really sorry for Zidane: they were only speaking for themselves. Zidane was only a character from the fairy story they told themselves each night before going to bed. Hardly a month ago, Zidane was only an old, tired player. Now he’s a fallen knight. In the old, more bloody fables of the Brothers Grimm, a red card ending was acceptable. But today, in this strange epoch when all humans seem to have drunk Disney milk in their childhood, only rosy endings are acceptable. Everything must finish happily. Our heroes must be loveable. Before putting them away in the cupboard of our happy memories. So what does that leave for Zidane? Zidane, the exemplary father, the discreet man who has led a faultless career? These are the descriptions people have stuck on him like medals. Maybe it’s true, but what gets lost? What did he have to swallow before that fateful moment? What did he have to endure without ever saying anything before taking his life in hand again? Before becoming once again the young proud boy who played in the streets of Marseille? The one whom one could never insult with impunity about his mother or his race? Marseille is not a joke. The National Front is not far away. And Zidane is a child of that epoch. Has Zidane ever believed in the adulation of the crowd? That monster that kills what it loves. At one moment, he knows he will find himself looking at a man he left behind long ago for money and fame, and that man is himself, Zinedine Zidane. I don’t believe that the Italian player said to him anything that he could stand hearing. Simply, he felt that this was the moment. His last match, the finale of the World Cup, at the last moment. It was this moment or never. Otherwise, he had sold himself for ever. Don’t speak to him of dignity. Dignity is precisely that gesture that he made to recover some of his honour. This was his moment. He had already given everything to his team. Now it was for himself. Eight seconds out of a career of nearly twenty years. Because if he didn’t do it then, it would all be over. Anyway, he was exhausted, and the team could do without him. I think that there are some moments in life which belong only to those who live them. And to no-one else. The moment when one refuses to play is always stupid in the eyes of others. But what value has the image of the pride claimed by the collectivity in the ace of the intimate pride of the individual? Because there are lots of people watching a game, they all believe that it’s only a game. Zidane’s act was the intrusion of weighty reality into the game. Zidane is not playing anymore. He breaks the codes with a blow of his head. I remember the moment of Charlebois’s death-blow, when he threw his drums at the French public. In France, everyone was astonished by such behaviour. In Quebec, Charlebois instantly became a counter-cultural icon. They sensed something liberating in his gesture. For Zidane, it will be the same thing. Young rappers will surely introduce into their video clips the eight seconds where Zidane left the game to re-enter their stifling reality. For once, Zidane, who was legendary for never allowing his temperature to rise, embraced all those who do not know how to behave in public. His brothers from the street whose blood is still boiling. Comment by "Sami" “If there were any doubts about the fact that Zidane was one of the best players in the history of football, after the final there can be no more!” wrote the popular Russian daily, Komsomolskaia Pravda, before adding, “Only an epic hero, a titan, a Hercules could depart like that.” Dany Laferrière’s commentary, with his very personal sensibility, echoes that of many journalists around the world. Nine seconds which make an absolute human out of a being whose shoulders would have been crushed by the image of a god that was hung on him. The beauty of that gesture and its deep meaning are worth a world cup. For me, this entire World Cup could have been organized only so that we could see this unexpected coronation: this header that sought not the goal but a chest from which poisonous words flowed. For that alone, Zidane deserves the immortality that had already been predicted for him. As for the disappointment of others, they can do with it whatever they wish. They are truly some moments when others come after yourself, for they are not the essential. Especially when you understand their talent for condemning their instrumentalised heroes to absolute solitude. ********* Rana Dasgupta www.ranadasgupta.com From eye at ranadasgupta.com Fri Jul 14 09:16:47 2006 From: eye at ranadasgupta.com (Rana Dasgupta) Date: Fri, 14 Jul 2006 09:16:47 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Zidane - read this version Message-ID: <44B713A7.4010109@ranadasgupta.com> sorry was doing this late at night, and there were several mistakes in last version. corrected here. R ********** Dany Laferrière is a francophone novelist from Haiti now living between Montreal and Miami. His commentary on the Zidane "header", which I found on the blog of Alain Mabanckou, a wonderful Congolese novelist - http://www.congopage.com/article.php3?id_article=3791 - is radical and fascinating, so I've done a rough translation. Read the comment too. ********** http://www.ranadasgupta.com/notes.asp?note_id=69 I didn't sleep much last night for trying to understand Zidane’s gesture, especially since all the opinions I heard resembled each other so much it was as if only one person had watched the match. The more there are of us, the more we seem to have the same opinion. I am always suspicious of a crowd that speaks with one voice. And it seemed that everyone was feeling sorry for Zidane: an unworthy end to the career of a great champion. It’s strange, but this version seemed just too bourgeois to me. In fact people weren’t really sorry for Zidane: they were only speaking about themselves. Zidane was just a character from the fairy story they told themselves each night before going to bed. Hardly a month ago, Zidane was only an old, tired player. Now he’s a fallen knight. In the old, more bloody fables of the Brothers Grimm, a red card ending was acceptable. But today, in this strange epoch when everyone seems to have drunk Disney milk in their childhood, no one tolerates anything but rosy endings. Everything must finish happily. Our heroes must be loveable before we will file them away in the cupboard of our happy memories. So what does that leave for Zidane? Zidane, the exemplary father, the discreet man who has led a faultless career? These are the epithets people have stuck on him like medals. Maybe it’s true, but what gets lost? What did he have to swallow before that fateful moment? What did he have to endure silently before deciding to take his life back again? Before becoming once again the proud young boy who played in the streets of Marseille? The one whom one could never insult with impunity about his mother or his race? Marseille is not a joke. The National Front is not far away. And Zidane is a child of that epoch. Has Zidane ever believed in the adulation of the crowd, that monster that kills what it loves? There will come a moment when he knows he will find himself looking at a man he abandoned long ago for money and fame, and that man is himself, Zinedine Zidane. I don’t believe that the Italian player said to him anything that he couldn't stand to hear. Simply, he felt that this was the moment. His last match, the finale of the World Cup, at the very end. It was this moment or never. Otherwise, he had sold himself for ever. Don’t speak to him of lost dignity. This gesture was precisely about dignity, and he made it to recover some of his honour. This was his moment. He had already given everything to his team. Now it was for himself. Eight seconds out of a career of nearly twenty years. Because if he didn’t do it then, it would all be over. Anyway, he was exhausted, and the team could do without him. I think that there are some moments in life which belong only to those who live them, and to no-one else. The moment when one refuses to play always appears stupid in the eyes of others. But what value has the pride of the collectivity when compared to the intimate pride of the individual? Just because there are many people watching a game, they all believe that it’s only a game. Zidane’s act was the intrusion of weighty reality into the game. Zidane is not playing anymore. He breaks the codes with a blow of his head. I remember the moment of Charlebois’s death-blow, when he threw his drums at the French public. In France, everyone was astonished by such behaviour, and yet in Quebec, Charlebois instantly became a counter-cultural icon. They sensed something liberating in his gesture. For Zidane, it will be the same thing. Young rappers will surely introduce into their video clips the eight seconds where Zidane left the game to re-enter their stifling reality. For once, Zidane, who was legendary for never allowing his temperature to rise, embraced all those who do not know how to behave in public. His brothers from the street whose blood is still boiling. ********** Comment by "Sami" “If there were any doubts about the fact that Zidane was one of the best players in the history of football, after the final there can be no more!” wrote the popular Russian daily, Komsomolskaia Pravda, before adding, “Only an epic hero, a titan, a Hercules could depart like that.” Dany Laferrière’s very personal commentary echoes that of many journalists around the world. Nine seconds which make an absolute human out of a being whose shoulders would have been crushed by the image of a god hung on him. The beauty of that gesture and its deep meaning are worth more than a gold trophy. For me, this entire World Cup could have been organized only so that we could see this astonishing culmination: this header that sought not the goal but a chest from which poisonous words flowed. For that alone, Zidane deserves the immortality that had already been predicted for him. As for the disappointment of others, they can do with it whatever they wish. They are truly some moments when others come after yourself, for they are not the essential. Especially when you understand their talent for condemning their instrumentalised heroes to absolute solitude. From jassim.ali at gmail.com Thu Jul 13 15:42:53 2006 From: jassim.ali at gmail.com (Jassim Ali) Date: Thu, 13 Jul 2006 14:12:53 +0400 Subject: [Reader-list] Shahid Amin on 1857 In-Reply-To: <200607131429.14778.ravikant@sarai.net> References: <200607131429.14778.ravikant@sarai.net> Message-ID: <271ece9c0607130312s76dded82n9d97d988087cf6e9@mail.gmail.com> This maybe out of context but I guess we need to mobilise effort amongst ourselves to update the wikipedia/other entries on the Indian subjects so that there could be a universally accessible and (if need arises) flexible information in the public domain cheers jassim On 7/13/06, Ravikant wrote: > > > It addresses issues of history, memory and memory management in the > context of > the Indian state's plans for commemorating the event in a big way. > Apologies > for X-posting > > ravikant > > > http://www.telegraphindia.com/1060713/asp/opinion/story_6461478.asp > > OF MANY PASTS > - The 1857 celebrations raise questions Indians must confront > SHAHID AMIN > (The author is professor of history, University of Delhi) > > Such are the pulls of appropriating History for the Nation that amidst a > busy > July schedule - interim report of the oversight committee, negotiations > with > the IAEA, keeping the allies and tomato prices from going over the top - > the > prime minister will find time on July 13 to chair a 68-member committee to > commemorate 150 years of 1857. That's a lot of Indians - former prime > ministers, politicians, satraps, bureaucrats, and some historians to boot. > One may be proven wrong, but most of them, including the two historians > who > have declined, would not be entirely comfortable distinguishing a > barkandaz > from a tilanga sepoy, or be familiar with say the ballad of Kunwar Singh > of > Shahabad or the shikasta script of rebel communication. One could even > wager > that some of them might even falter reciting little more than the > refrain "Khub lari mardani… Jhansi wali rani…" Yet a group of ministers > has > gone ahead and cleared Rs 150 crore of public money for a major > commemoration, beginning, we are told, August 2007. And there lies the > rub, > for what dreams have propelled the August inauguration… we know. > It is the dream of annexing the events of 1857 to our freedom from Britain > almost to the month. But though crucial for 1942 and again 1947, August > was > not a particularly good month for us Indians in 1857, especially in Delhi, > which fell to the vengeful firangis soon afterwards. If true, the August > inauguration to the celebrations of 1857 raises an important question that > we > who people this nation - historians, politicians, public - face about our > pasts. As elsewhere, so in India, school books, street-names, and jubilee > celebrations - all seek to construct a sense of an uncluttered national > past. > Opposition to the idea of a national-plural is common to most > nationalists, > for it disorders a national past which is simultaneously considered > historical and singular. Swimming against the tide enables us to ask a > different set of questions: is there something inherent in the ways of > nation-states that makes it difficult for citizens to relate to history > outside a mainstream, accredited version of the past - the national past? > Can > we at all remember without commemorating? Can we recollect without > celebrating, recall without avenging? Why are national histories thought > of > invariably as time-resistant capsules buried for ever, and in constant > play > at the same time? > > San-sattavan! In northern India, this incomplete chronological slice, sans > the > century, encapsulates in its pithiness the many things that went into the > making of that Great Event. San-sattavan can only be 1857; it can not be > 1957, or even 1757, though in some contemporary prophesies, British rule > was > to end within a hundred years of the battle of Plassey. Be that as it > may, 'san sattavan' stands resplendent in perhaps the most well-known poem > on > the Ghadar by Subhadra Kumari Chauhan: "Chamak uthi san sattavan mein, woh > talwar purani thi." The sword unleashed to push out the firangis, had not > been moulded in or wrested from colonial armouries; it was the very old > sword > of an 'aged Bharat' which, rejuvenated, had now stood up to claim this > equally old land for itself ("burhe Bharat mein aayi phir-se nai jawani > thi"). > Let's stay a bit longer with the stirring opening stanza of this epic poem > on > 1857, on which we will have a surfeit of songs, dramas, marches, > exhibitions > in the year to come. Let's recall that this great nationalist poem places > the 'value of lost independence' and 'the resolve to throw the firangi > out' > in every Indian heart. And yet the Bharat of 1857 is already old, 90 years > before the birth of the Indian nation-state. Let's now cut to a folk song > about Jhansi-wali Rani, popular in district Etawah and its environs in > Uttar > Pradesh before the more famous Chauhan version that has been bequeathed to > us > as a nation: "O, the Rani of Jhansi, well fought the brave one/ All the > soldiers were fed with sweets; she herself had treacle and rice/… Leaving > morcha, she ran to the lashkar, where she searched for but found no water, > O! > The Rani of Jhansi well fought the brave one." Here in a local folk song, > to > be sung in the Dadra vein, we sure find the Rani's sacrifice and valour, > but > no intimations of a well-entrenched and reactivated sense of Indian > nationalism. > > To adapt the opening sentence of Anna Karenina: all nations are new, but > each > claims its antiquity in its own way. This is clearly in evidence in the > spirit behind the forthcoming official celebrations of 1857, as it is in > that > famous nationalist poem on Rani Jhansi by Subhadra Chauhan. It is a > feature > of nationalist consciousness, that the nation whose 'making' requires > large > doses of energy, action and sacrifice, that very nation is made available > to > us fully-formed - like a mannequin in a shopping window - merely awaiting > a > change of (nationalist) attire. > Only an informed public debate can stem the wastage of money and effort on > mere window-dressing: the sprucing up of an 1857 structure at one place, > the > gouging out of a colonial memorial stone at another, ersatz purabiya > sipahis > knocking at the Rajghat gate of the Red Fort, Big B daring you to go 50-50 > or > phone a friend on a mega-Ghadar quiz, the launch of a desi fizz-drink with > the spirit of 1857 bottled evanescently in it. > The contrast with the centennial of the Ghadar in 1957 is instructive. A > lot > of us midnight's children were too young to recollect the hoopla, but the > long-term gains for historical understanding and democratizing access to > the > events of 1857 still continue to be felt. Two noted scholars, very > different > in orientation, produced two different accounts of those times; a > considerable amount of primary source material, largely from official > records, was published, notably the five volumes of Freedom Struggle in > Uttar > Pradesh by the indefatigable S.A.A. Rizvi, distributed gratis till the > Eighties to bona fide scholars. This has encouraged a whole crop of > histories > of the Ghadar in different districts and regions written in the > medium-sized > university towns in North India. Other material connected with the > late-19th-century freedom struggle was brought out, for instance, for > Maharashtra, or lies unpublished in provincial archives. And all this was > made possible by advanced planning, and hard work by those adept, by > training, to delve into and narrate the past. > > It would be said that commemoration is too serious (or political) a > business > to be left to historians: poets, publicists, politicians, playwrights all > must contribute. It may well be that historians have to cease being just > whistle-blowers in such matters, telling others where they have got their > facts wrong. They must be concerned not just with what happened in times > past, but equally with how memory, indeed state memorialization, plays on > the > certitude of facts. The new multimedia exhibition at Tees Janvari Marg is > an > eye opener about how non-official collaboration between historians, > Gandhians > and IT-savvy graphic and sound artists can infuse excitement into a hoary > and > usually unimaginative presentation of the ideas and legacy of Mahatma > Gandhi. > The prime minister will be well advised to try and get the 1857 committee > to > bankroll a similar venture for that Great Uprising, hangama, insurgency > and > effervescence, aggregation and disorder, plebeian anger and state-terror, > regional groupings and wider alliances, atavistic proclamations and > radical > stirrings, all on display for us to make sense, warts and all. To hang the > story of the Ghadar by a single thread would amount to hanging its myriad > rebels twice over. > _________________________________________ > 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: -- -- Jassim Ali Revolutionist / Poet/ Manager / Prisoner / Escape-artist / Acrobat / Weaver / Rain Maker / Bio-scope Wallah ! Strategic Planning & Business Development OMD Digital Al Thuraya Tower, 19th Floor Dubai Media City PO Box 121428, Dubai, UAE Mobile: +97150 3425980 Telephone: +9714 360 4182 (direct) Facsimile: +9714 36 88 230 Website : www.omd.com Blog: www.tefloncoatedyuppie.blogspot.com "Those that danced were thought mad by those who could not hear the music" -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060713/ddec121b/attachment.html From tushar_bhor at yahoo.com Thu Jul 13 19:28:07 2006 From: tushar_bhor at yahoo.com (tushar bhor) Date: Thu, 13 Jul 2006 06:58:07 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Where does rehabilitated slum dwellers get water from? Message-ID: <20060713135807.61704.qmail@web51906.mail.yahoo.com> 6th Posting: Working Title: WATER LENSES Prelude for new imagination for urban water of Mumbai. Where does rehabilitated slum dwellers get water from? A story of private society: The monthly maintenance and periodicals of the housing society is recently undertaken by the women's group living in the housing society itself. This particular society is located in Kausa (in Thane district of Mumbai Metropolitan Region). There are 84 units in the housing society, all shifted from the near by slums or dilapidated chawls into 1 Rm + Kitchen accommodation with the help of community based organization. As claimed by one of the women member that in past there were only elderly male members involved in the managing committee. The main concern with the society now is to clear the pending due of couple of lakhs, out of which large amount was incurred towards the electric bill for the pumps installed for supplying water within the premise. In addition to the pump used for pumping water from underground to overhead tank, suction pump is installed directly on the municipal water supply pipeline. The reason being, low pressure in the main line and according the members it is a normal practice of installing suction pump in the entire area. The society also has a water operator and his work is to maintain and operate the water supply system within the society. The women's committee is now working on collection of the due from the residents thru effective management system and accounting process, where as the tools like suction pump and actor like water operator has become integral part of the system for routine life. A story of SRA scheme: Daily between 8-10 AM and 7-10 PM, the residents of Bldg No. 8 at Vashi Naka (located North of Mumbai and at the threshold of New Mumbai) queue up for water collection. The queue is not at the community tap, but for the private water vendor, who makes daily visits to the premise for providing water to the residents. It cost's them around Rs.1/pot and in case if the residents are not in a position to carry the water upstairs, an extra of Rs.3-5 /pot is charged by the vendor. The building faces this problem since its establishment under the Slum Rehabilitation Association (SRA) scheme (under the government of Maharashtra). The building is provided by the physical infrastructure of pipelines to individual houses and also overhead and underground tank, but does not have the municipal water supply. One of the main reasons is that this SRA scheme is developed on the higher level and therefore the municipal water does not reach the site thru gravitational force. The society also gets some water from the nearby well situated in the masjid, where the owners of the well are kind enough to give water without any charges. On other hand the enterprise of water vendors is largely prospering, where BMC provided community connection becomes the source of supply and employed water vendors ride the pots on the bicycle to the needed site. cheers TUSHAR BHOR ARCHITECT and INDEPENDENT RESEARCHER. Residence Address: 10/60, Madhu Sadan,Sion(w),Mumbai–400022,Maharashtra,India. Tel. No: +91 22 24083828. Mobile: +91 98190 35176. E mail: tushar_bhor at yahoo.com --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Get on board. You're invited to try the new Yahoo! Mail Beta. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060713/6d6b2ae5/attachment.html From lindrasi at yahoo.com Fri Jul 14 03:27:09 2006 From: lindrasi at yahoo.com (L. Simhan) Date: Thu, 13 Jul 2006 14:57:09 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] I-Fellow posting Message-ID: <20060713215709.68489.qmail@web52201.mail.yahoo.com> This is our extremely late, second posting. But here is what we've been up to over the past few months. Over the course of three weeks during the month of May we talked with eleven street vendors in New Delhi. Most of these conversations took place in or around Nehru Place, Hanuman Temple, and Jama Masjid. We talked to men who worked in the following professions: Cobbler, Key Maker, Ear Cleaner, Forehead Reader, fruits/vegetable sellers, Medicine Man, Sweets Seller, Goatskin water Seller , Tattooist, Barber, Astrologer. In almost every case people were sort of warily happy to talk about their work, in many cases we learned a something about the technical side of these trades, though much of the knowledge seemed amorphous and not easily explained, and occasionally we got a sense of a person's character or personality. What didn't work well in these conversations was primarily a function of language difficulties and time. As neither of us are very good at Hindi, a friend of our's generously offered to accompany us and assist in these conversations. Unfortunately, this also brought the size of our group to three people, which in addition to our note taking, made these conversations seem a little more formal, and turned the whole thing into a bit more of a spectacle, than we would have liked. Additionally, had we talked to less people, but talked several times with them, we undoubtedly would have been able to have gone into the technical side of the professions in greater detail. So we now have a body of research; consisting of our visual and written notes, and we have spent the last month trying out different approaches towards working this 'data' into comic book form. Given the research based nature of the fellowship we initially kept feeling pulled into taking a journalistic, or even sociological angle towards the comic book, though neither of us felt quite natural in those shoes, especially when trying to express our findings graphically. Our initial interest in this project stemmed for a desire to learn more about these informal professions and how they survived, which was somewhat successful. So, after several false starts, we are currently approaching the project much more loosely. Rather than build a strict encyclopedic format which we then try to cram each street vendor into, we are attempting to build different stories, whose structures come out of the individual conversations. Jacob & Lakshmi --------------------------------- Yahoo! Messenger with Voice. Make PC-to-Phone Calls to the US (and 30+ countries) for 2¢/min or less. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060713/93574df3/attachment.html From shuddha at sarai.net Fri Jul 14 17:24:05 2006 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Fri, 14 Jul 2006 17:24:05 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] South Asian Entries on Wikipedia Message-ID: <44B785DD.5040403@sarai.net> Dear All, This is following Jassim's excellent suggestion of updating, writing, intervening in entries on South Asian culture, history, geography, biography in Wikipedia, as well as on other matters that might be of interest to people on this list. I endorse this suggestion, and perhaps this list could be a forum where areas that are weak in Wikipedia can be listed and discussed, and suggestions of how to improve them made. I have found Wikipedia very useful, but recognize that it too is under a great deal of pressure to amend the way it is sustained. People on this list would be ideally the kind who should get their foot in through the wikipedia door (or should I say portal) and make their presence felt, while the time and space to do that remains, Any takers? Shuddha From mail at shivamvij.com Fri Jul 14 17:40:54 2006 From: mail at shivamvij.com (Shivam Vij) Date: Fri, 14 Jul 2006 17:40:54 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The origin of "Salaam Bombay" Message-ID: <9c06aab30607140510o252955e0v1a61b1807f39acf3@mail.gmail.com> A New York State of Mind By Vivek Kamath New York and Mumbai. Mumbai and New York. They have so much in common. Both cities are vertical in their architecture and in their ambition. Both have a phenomenal work ethic. And both are as vulnerable as an ice cube in a volcano. Last week's attack on New York brought back memories of Mumbai's serial blasts in 1993. Everyone has a story to tell about the blasts. Here's mine: I was working at Trikaya Grey whose offices were at Kala Ghoda. When the stockmarket bombs went off, we heard a muffled thud and thought someone had dropped the photocopier on the mezzanine. Then, someone came in from lunch and said, people were bleeding on the street and stories of other blasts started doing the rounds. Some true, others unfounded. There were no mobile phones or Net connections then. The landlines were jammed by anxious family members and friends. After the riots of December 1992 and January 1993, fear covered the city like shroud. But unlike December and January, these attacks were the handiwork of an outsider who was trying to destabilise Mumbai. And Mumbai refused to cower under the attack. In an overwhelming show of tenacity and resilience, the citizens of Mumbai pitched in to help the victims of the blasts. BEST buses doubled up as ambulances and sped the injured to the shelter of a hospital. Near the stock market, restaurant owners put up drums of drinking water. There were queues of blood donors at hospitals and by 9 pm, blood banks were full. Outside the passport office, people had formed a ring around the blast site and onset of set of volunteers helped the injured while one set diverted traffic. One of Trikaya Grey's clients was on his way home from the airport when he saw the devastation outside the passport office. But he also saw the spirit with which ordinary, everyday people were helping out. He got home and called Ravi Gupta (now no more but then the MD of Trikaya Grey). He told Mr. Gupta to do a campaign that saluted the spirit of this city. Use print, outdoor, radio, TV, T-shirts, buttons. Do what you must, he exhorted. But highlight these seemingly isolated instances of courage and bind them together in a campaign that unites the city and makes us proud to be a part of it. But while he was willing to pick up the tab for the exercise, the client was clear that he did not want his logo on the campaign. He felt any ring of sponsorship around this message would smack off crass commercialization and dilute the message. Mr. Gupta called a meeting of six people (creative, client servicing and media) and briefed them. Don't give me an "I love New York" kind of campaign, he said. I want pride, not love, he emphasized. He told us we would meet every two hours to review progress. In less than 24 hours, the Salaam Bombay campaign was born. The strapline was It's my Bombay. I'm proud of it. Billboards and print ads highlighted how, despite the serial blasts on Friday, there was 92% attendance in offices on Saturday. Of how trading resumed at the stock market on Monday. Armed with a blanket permission letter from the CM, six camera crews shot footage of the devastation and contrasted it with images of the city getting back on its feet. Kids at traffic lights sported Salaam Bombay T-Shirts. College kids distributed car stickers which motorists, for once, gladly put up. The campaign made its point and sent out a signal. At least six multinats asked for copies they could send overseas so their headquarters knew Bombay was safe. Through it all, the man who initiated the entire exercise remained quietly in the background. But today, eight years later, I am taking the liberty of naming Mr. NS Sekhsaria of Gujarat Ambuja Cement. Because as the destructive footage of last week's events started to steam in. As economies collapsed and there was talk of war, I thought of Mr. Sekhsaria and I was filled with hope. Because if New York and Mumbai have so much in common, there must be someone like Mr. Sekhsaria in New York. The world needs them right now. Quite, strong men of steel and vision, who always look at the silver lining. And think constructively even in the most destructive of times. [ Got it from here: http://aforangst.blogspot.com/2006/07/no-clever-title-for-this-one-my-head.html ] From lawrence at altlawforum.org Sat Jul 15 11:17:43 2006 From: lawrence at altlawforum.org (Lawrence Liang) Date: Sat, 15 Jul 2006 11:17:43 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Response to the Proposed Copyright Amendment Message-ID: The Indian Government is planning to introduce a significant amendment to the Copyright Act 1957. A few of the key proposed amendments include: 1. Introduction of Digital Rights Management (DRM) 2. Amendment to Sec. 52(1)(j) on Œversion recordings¹ 3. Introduction of provisions enabling access for persons with visual disability A few of us have been working on a response to the proposed amendments, as well as revisiting some of the existing provisions from a public interest perspective. It is important to note that India is under no legal obligation to introduce some of the proposed amendments including DRM. We also note that it is important for the government to recognize and rely on flexibilities of the Berne Convention and the TRIPs agreement which enable access to knowledge and information, by ensuring easy access to copyrighted materials in respect of educational, private or general use, and via any media or form. For instance, we note that the present amendment seeks to promote greater access to knowledge and information for persons with any sensory disabilities. This is a welcome move, especially if enacted with a thorough review of the details of the need, and the enabling provision thereof. Another very important section is the one that enables the making of versions recordings in India. This provision has extensively enhanced the Indian music landscape. It has led to a transformation in the distribution and creation of cultural goods. One significant economic aspect of these provisions is worth noting: in the early 1980s, as audio cassettes proliferated, a number of small companies were able to use Section 52(1)(j) to produce and sell vast numbers of so-called Œversion recordings¹ in hitherto under-served languages and genres. It is also the section that has resulted in the Œremix¹ culture that we have witnessed in the past few years. The proposed amendment significantly increases the cost of making a version record. This document has been sent to the Government, and is endorsed and supported by a number of educational and research institutions, consumer groups and disability rights organizations. For more details please see To download a copy of the document Achal Prabhala Nirmita Narasimhan Lawrence Liang (Reviewers) From ravikant at sarai.net Sat Jul 15 13:58:04 2006 From: ravikant at sarai.net (Ravikant) Date: Sat, 15 Jul 2006 13:58:04 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] South Asian Entries on Wikipedia In-Reply-To: <44B785DD.5040403@sarai.net> References: <44B785DD.5040403@sarai.net> Message-ID: <200607151358.04699.ravikant@sarai.net> Dear Shuddha and All, In my off the list response to Jassim, I suggested we could start with at least a nice biblio on 1857, which will be good for students, fresh teachers and journalists in general, to say nothing about the unprofessional curious mind. There is indeed very little content on History, especially, south asian history on wikipedia. And as we all know, wikipedia can be done in any language that is unicode supported. Anyway I will start a page on 1857 biblio and circulate the link, then everybody can pitch in. The annotation to books can carry further conceptual, factual notes. Post google: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_rebellion_of_1857 There is actually a page on 1857 and a biblio, too. But it is a small one. I paste the biblio below: Cheers ravikant 1. ^ Eric Stokes “The First Century of British Colonial Rule in India: Social Revolution or Social Stagnation?” Past and Present №.58 (Feb. 1973) pp136-160 2. ^ Seema Alavi The Sepoys and the Company (Delhi: Oxford University Press) 1998 p5 3. ^ Christopher Hibbert The Great Mutiny (London: Allen Lane) 1978 pp51-4 4. ^ Memorandum from Lieutenant-Colonel W. St. L. Mitchell (CO of the 19th BNI) to Major A. H. Ross about his troop's refusal to accept the Enfield cartridges, 27 February 1857, Archives of Project South Asia, South Dakota State University and Missouri Southern State University 5. ^ Sir John Kaye & G.B. Malleson.: The Indian Mutiny of 1857, (Delhi: Rupa & Co.) reprint 2005 p49 6. ^ 7. ^ Qizilbash, Basharat Hussain (30th June 2006)The tragicomic hero. The Nation. Nawai-e-Waqt Group. Available online at [1] [edit] Further reading * Raikes, Charles: Notes on the Revolt in the North-Western Provinces of India, Longman, London, 1858. * Russell, William Howard, My Diary in India in the years 1858-9, Routledge, London, 1860, (2 vols.) * Trevelyan, Sir George Otto, Cawnpore, Indus, Delhi, (first edition 1865), reprint 2002. * Khan, Sir Syed Ahmad, Asbab-e Baghawat-e Hind 1859; Translated as The Causes of the Indian Revolt, Allahabad, 1873. * Kaye, Sir John & Malleson, G.B.: The Indian Mutiny of 1857, Rupa & Co., Delhi, (1st edition 1890) reprint 2005. * Roberts, Field Marshal Lord, Forty-one Years in India, Richard Bentley, London, 1897 Forty-one years in India, available freely at Project Gutenberg * Innes, Lt. General McLeod: The Sepoy Revolt, A.D. Innes & Co., London, 1897. * Fitchett, W.H., B.A.,LL.D., A Tale of the Great Mutiny, Smith, Elder & Co., London, 1911. * Sen, Surendra Nath, Eighteen fifty-seven, (with a foreword by Maulana Abul Kalam Azad), Indian Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Delhi, 1957. * Barter, Captain Richard The Siege of Delhi. Mutiny memories of an old officer, London, The Folio Society, 1984. * Hibbert, Christopher, The Great Mutiny : India 1857, London, Allen Lane, 1988. * Roy, Tapti, The politics of a popular uprising : Bundelkhand 1857, Delhi, for the Oxford University Press, 1994. * Stanley, Peter, White Mutiny: British Military Culture in India, 1825-1875, Christopher Hurst & Co., London, 1998. * Taylor, P. J. O., What really happened during the mutiny : a day-by-day account of the major events of 1857 - 1859 in India, Delhi, for the Oxford University Press, 1999. * Rizvi, Syed Khurshid Mustafa: 1857 - History of the Indian Struggle for Freedom, Raza Library, Rampur, 2000 [in Urdu]. * Mukherjee, Rudrangshu: Awadh in Revolt 1857-1858, Permanent Black, Delhi, 2001. * Saul David, The Indian Mutiny : 1857,Penguin Books, 2003. * Farrell, J.G. "The Siege of Krishnapur", New York Review of Books, 2004. Friday 14 जुलाई 2006 17:24 को, Shuddhabrata Sengupta ने लिखा था: > Dear All, > > This is following Jassim's excellent suggestion of updating, writing, > intervening in entries on South Asian culture, history, geography, > biography in Wikipedia, as well as on other matters that might be of > interest to people on this list. > > I endorse this suggestion, and perhaps this list could be a forum where > areas that are weak in Wikipedia can be listed and discussed, and > suggestions of how to improve them made. > > I have found Wikipedia very useful, but recognize that it too is under a > great deal of pressure to amend the way it is sustained. People on this > list would be ideally the kind who should get their foot in through the > wikipedia door (or should I say portal) and make their presence felt, > while the time and space to do that remains, > > Any takers? > > Shuddha > _________________________________________ > 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 amitrbasu50 at yahoo.co.in Fri Jul 14 21:28:24 2006 From: amitrbasu50 at yahoo.co.in (Amit Basu) Date: Fri, 14 Jul 2006 16:58:24 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Reader-list] South Asian Entries on Wikipedia In-Reply-To: <44B785DD.5040403@sarai.net> Message-ID: <20060714155824.73075.qmail@web8515.mail.in.yahoo.com> good suggestion and challenge suddha. i am a weak taker. amit Shuddhabrata Sengupta wrote: Dear All, This is following Jassim's excellent suggestion of updating, writing, intervening in entries on South Asian culture, history, geography, biography in Wikipedia, as well as on other matters that might be of interest to people on this list. I endorse this suggestion, and perhaps this list could be a forum where areas that are weak in Wikipedia can be listed and discussed, and suggestions of how to improve them made. I have found Wikipedia very useful, but recognize that it too is under a great deal of pressure to amend the way it is sustained. People on this list would be ideally the kind who should get their foot in through the wikipedia door (or should I say portal) and make their presence felt, while the time and space to do that remains, Any takers? Shuddha _________________________________________ 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: --------------------------------- Find out what India is talking about on Yahoo! Answers India. So, what’s NEW about the NEW Yahoo! Messenger? Find out. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060714/fe27ed48/attachment.html From debjanisgupta at yahoo.com Sun Jul 16 17:54:48 2006 From: debjanisgupta at yahoo.com (debjani sengupta) Date: Sun, 16 Jul 2006 05:24:48 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] july posting from delhi Message-ID: <20060716122448.29120.qmail@web54206.mail.yahoo.com> Refugee City: Ghoti, Bangal, Football and Other Divides of the Self. The city of Kolkata still has an invisible divide that goes deep into the psyche of the city today - it is the ghoti-bangal divide, between the East Bengalis and West Bengalis. In undivided Bengal, before Partition, the city of Kolkata had offered education and jobs for the middle classes from East Bengal. Hindu College, Ripon College, Presidency, Scottish Church College were filled with students from the East while the merchant and trading houses, the government departments had many workers who hailed from East Bengal. Every year they traveled back home, crossing the Padma, waking up the sleepy villages with tales of the multihued city. In return they carried back to the city their language, the nostalgia for their land, the smell of their rivers Buriganga, Dhaleshwari, Padma, Meghna, the tug and pull of memories. Living in cramped mess 'bari', or rented rooms, they dreamt of making it in the city. (Satinather Bari Phera) Even though they lived and worked in Kolkata, it was never home; in their minds there always existed a division of culture, of landscapes, of food and flora and fauna. Calcutta, claustrophobic in its interiors, the mess room, the restaurants, the cinema halls were places of isolation. Posited against this was the community left behind, the village puja mandap, the laughter and the togetherness of family and friends. This juxtaposition of landscape and realities is seen brilliantly in a story by Prafulla Ray, 'Swapner Train.' (The Train of his Dreams) Twelve or fourteen years ago Ashok used to have a dream very often, early at dawn. It was a strange dream - he was sitting on a train. On both sides of the tracks were immense rice and wheat fields interspersed with shrubs of bet, shonal and jungles of pithkhira, hijal, bounya. As far as the eye went, the land was bathed in golden light. And drenched in that golden light, hundreds of birds flew about in the sky. So many kinds of birds - shalikh, sidhiguru, bulbul, kanibok, haldibona, patibok, wild parrots. They looked as if someone has strewn thousands of colored paper in the sky. Overhead, the clouds floated like cotton wool and from within their folds peeped the bright blue sky. Ashok used to wake up suddenly. In his sleepy state, he often forgot where he was. A little later when the dream train and steamer faded from his consciousness, he would see he was sitting on a three-legged bed, overspread with ragged, oily bedding, in a run down room at the end of a suffocating lane in North Kolkata. The room had no plastered wall, no whitewash and cobwebs hung from the corners. On one side was the bed, on the other a clothes-horse, next to which were piled trunks, broken suitcases, tin boxes. Under the bed was another pile of pots and pans, cane boxes and broken water jugs. The city room in its claustrophobic interiority and the wide, open space of Ashok's dream landscape is a contrast between what was real and what was distant. The dream landscape was characterized by a kind of munificience - the birds, shrubs, trees were all unique in their own ways. The evocation of landscape, the flora and fauna of East Bengal is also seen in Jibanananda Das's 'Rupashi Bangla' (1956) collection of poems, whose minutely observed, lovingly sketched portraits of Bengal's trees, dawns, dusks made this one of Das's most popular works till date. After the Partition, when it was increasingly clear to the East Bengali that they would never return, that distant dream fuelled the passion and the strength to negotiate the city, to make it home and to re-create in imaginative ways the forgotten villages. The reason why East Bengalis felt alien in the city was certainly contributed by the ghoti-bangal divide that existed as an invisible but strong line of separation in Calcutta. Dipesh Chakraborty writes of his adolescence in Kolkata: 'We had not heard about academic critiques of essentialism in those days, so bangals and ghotis proceeded to elaborate and ritualize their differences with the enthusiasm of peoples whom anthropologists sometimes call warring tribes. We both spoke Bengali, but with different accents; we loved the Hilsa fish, while they loved prawns; our songs were set to different tunes; our traditions of courtsey were different; and every act of intermarriage was noticed and commented upon.' The ghotis lived in the older part of Kolkata, the north, while the bangals, especially after the Partition made south Kolkata their home. Although the East Bengal gentlemen had made Kolkata his second home, the ghoti-bangal divide was palpable and quite open. After the Partition with the influx of thousands into the city, this divide became even more prominent. Historian Tapan Raychaudhuri, in his memoirs 'Bangalnamah' now being serialized in a prominent Bengali journal, states how he was ridiculed in Ballygunj Boys School as a bangal from the country who didn't speak in English. The figure of the bangal had always been a butt of jokes as early as Chaitanyamangal where we find jokes about the inhabitants of East Bengal. In the 50's and 60's Kolkata, the rivalry went up the notches of a barometer on the days of soccer matches. East Bengalis supported their club of that name while ghotis supported Mohunbagan. Even if one did not follow football, one knew which team had won by the price rise of particular fishes. East Bengal's icon was the Hilsa while the Mohunbagan supporters relished prawns. I remember many feasts of Hilsa from my childhood that my East Bengal supporter father initiated on the days of winning matches. Given this hostility and resentment against the bangals, the question then remains why, when hundreds and thousands of refugees invaded the city of Kolkata, what made the city accept the newcomers? Why was there no incidence of violent flare-ups in the nature of riots between the older inhabitants and the newcomers? In what ways did the city accommodate and accept this influx of population? In what ways did the newcomers negotiate the city that was largely alien? The answer is probably very simple: through comedy and football. Dipesh Chakraborty theorizes that the ghoti and bangal rivalry was an example of 'proximity', where one relates to difference 'in which difference is neither reified nor erased but negotiated.' This notion of proximity is opposite to 'identity' which is a mode of relating to difference in which difference is either concealed or congealed and claims of being identical are fore grounded. I see the ghoti-bangal rivalry, especially where football is concerned, as a means in which larger, more public crises were averted and nullified. In the 50's Kolkata, football had a unique place, which was to a large extent associated with ethnic identity. Manna Dey's song, 'Shob khelar sera Bangalir ei football' talks of the game as belonging to Bengalis but this homogenizing aspect of football was a myth. On the football grounds passions ran high and smaller violences were common. I like to think that by shouting and stone throwing in the Maidan, the bitterness and distrust of bangals and ghotis found a channel to express itself. Like warring tribes they fought their battles in the rituals of the football fields and not in Kolkata's alleys. The madness and enthusiasm of football is clearly indicated in the following extract from the sports pages of Desh, 21 May, 1955: 'Every year, in Maidan, the arguments, researches, rumours, excitements and enthusiams eddying around football are countless. The question of whether their favourite team will win is endlessly discussed in the field, outside it and inside homes. Mohunbagan and East Bengal supporters, mostly young colleagues in workplaces, begin with juicy arguments that often end in laughter actually it is very apparent that in the five months of football season, this game creates a huge tremor in the minds and hearts of Kolkata's citizens that few other games can create.' Identity politics is thus never important and the human interactions between the two groups are put to creative use as we can see in the films of that era. The ghoti-bangal divide and its associations with football is captured very evocatively in a film Ora Thakey Odhare (1954, directed by Sukumar Dasgupta) based on a story by Premendra Mitra and featuring Chobi Biswas, Molina Debi, Uttam Kumar and Suchitra Sen. The film revolves around two families, one bangal and the other ghoti. They are neighbours and often resort to bickerings and fights, trading insults about each others cultural characteristics. On the day of a football match between Mohunbagan and East Bengal a quarrel erupts as a lady of the house remarks, 'Why drag a quarrel of the football field into the house?' Their hostility ensures a budding romance between a grown up son and daughter of the two families are nipped in the bud. The film however has a strong message for the times. In the face of adversity, when the head of the ghoti family Harimohunbabu loses his job, the bangal neighbours come to his rescue. In the last scene, the families are united and they agree that 'we are two hands, sometimes raised in fists and sometimes brought together in a clap.' As in the film, the ghoti-bangal resentments were sorted out in the football fields, in cinema halls, in theatre, in other cultural fields. The culture industry after the Partition fed on a rich source of oppositions of the divide and films often had caricatures of the countrified bangal, a butt of well meaning jokes. Acceptance of the bangals, the refugees, thus came about through the medium of laughter. In hit films of the times like Sarey Chuattar, Bhanu Pelo Lottery and Bhanu Goyenda and Jahar Assisstant, the noted artist Bhanu Bannerjee and Jahar Roy formed a comic pair that were box office hits. Comedy and football were thus able to diffuse the tensions that in reality were often palpably felt in Kolkata. The large number of refugees, the huge number of unemployed, the scarcity of respectable jobs, lack of housing, high rents were adding to the civic crisis of the city. This crisis never reached boiling point, all the newcomers were accommodated and they in turn made a place for themselves. Kolkata became home to these countless millions as the East Bengali middle class began a creative new life in which the interaction between the ghotis and bangals changed the language, food and culture of each side. The assimilation of the bangals into Kolkata's mainstream is a whole new chapter in the social and cultural life of the city. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From aadityadar at gmail.com Sun Jul 16 15:25:19 2006 From: aadityadar at gmail.com (Aaditya Dar) Date: Sun, 16 Jul 2006 15:25:19 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] A letter from mumbaikar In-Reply-To: <1153033332.2.2835170244225605118.2@mail.orkut.com> References: <1153033332.2.2835170244225605118.2@mail.orkut.com> Message-ID: just wanted to share this mail forward i got: We don't know whether you are Hindu / Muslim / Christian / Indian / pakistani/ Afghanistani / Iraqi / American or from any part of the world but only name we can give you is terrorist. Even if you are not reading this we don't care. Time and again you tried to disturb us and disrupt our life - killing innocent civilians by planting bombs in trains, buses and cars. You have tried hard to bring death and destruction, cause panic and fear and create communal disharmony but everytime you were disgustingly unsuccessful. Do you know how we pass our life in Mumbai? How much it takes for us to earn that single rupee? If you wanted to give us a shock then we are sorry to say that you failed miserably in your ulterior motives. Better look elsewere, not here. We are not Hindus and Muslims or Gujaratis and Marathis or Punjabis and Bengaliies. Nor do we distinguish ourselves as owners or workers, govt. employees or private employees. WE ARE MUMBAIKERS (Bombay-ites, if you like). We will not allow you to disrupt our life like this. On the last few occassions when you struck (including the 7 deadly blasts in a single day killing over 250 people and injuring 500+ in 1993), we went to work next day in full strength. This time we cleared everything within a few hours and were back to normal - the vendors placing their next order, businessmen finalizing the next deals and the office workers rushing to catch the next train. (Yes the same train you targetted) Fathom this: Within 3 hours of the blasts, long queues of blood donating volunteers were seen outside various hospital, where most of the injured were admitted. By 12 midnight, the hospital had to issue a notification that blood banks were full and they didn't require any more blood. The next day, attendance at schools and office was close to 100%, trains & buses were packed to the brim, the crowds were back. The city has simply dusted itself off and moved one - perhaps with greater vigour. We are Mumbaikers and we live like brothers in times like this. So, do not dare to threaten us with your crackers. The spirit of Mumbai is very strong and can not be harmed. Please forward this to others. U never know, by chance it may come to hands of a terrorist & He / She can then read this message which is specially meant for him / her !!! With Love, >From the people of Mumbai (Bombay) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060716/5eda3ed9/attachment.html From shahzulf at yahoo.com Sun Jul 16 17:39:24 2006 From: shahzulf at yahoo.com (Zulfiqar Shah) Date: Sun, 16 Jul 2006 05:09:24 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Pakistan Needs More Democracy to Make it a Less Dangerous Place: The Ecnomist Message-ID: <20060716120924.19125.qmail@web38801.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Too Much for One Man to Do Pakistan needs more democracy to make it a less dangerous place, says James Astill THINK about Pakistan, and you might get terrified. Few countries have so much potential to cause trouble, regionally and worldwide. One-third of its 165m people live in poverty, and only half of them are literate. The country's politics yo-yo between weak civilian governments and unrepresentative military ones—the sort currently on offer under Pervez Musharraf, the president and army chief, albeit with some democratic wallpapering. The state is weak. Islamabad and the better bits of Karachi and Lahore are orderly and, for the moment, booming. Most of the rest is a mess. In the western province of Baluchistan, which takes up almost half of Pakistan's land mass, an insurgency is simmering. In the never-tamed tribal areas bordering Afghanistan, the army is waging war against Islamic fanatics. Nor is that all. Pakistan has nuclear weapons, and until recently was selling their secrets to North Korea, Iran, Libya and maybe others. During its most recent big stand-off with India, in 2002, Pakistan gave warning that, if attacked, it might nuke its neighbour. Mostly, however, in Kashmir, Afghanistan and its own unruly cities, Pakistan has used, and perhaps still uses, Islamist militants to fight its wars—including the confused lot it is fighting, at America's request, in the tribal areas. Several thousand armed extremists are swilling around the country. Thousands more youths are being prepared for holy war at radical Islamic schools. Osama bin Laden is widely believed to be in Pakistan. When General Musharraf launched his coup in 1999, it was not—or not principally—to clean up this mess. Instead, he wanted to save his career, having been sacked as army chief by Nawaz Sharif, then the prime minister. Mr Sharif had tried to subordinate the army—which in Pakistan is a parallel state, some say the only state—to civilian rule. But however unpromising his start, General Musharraf has generally proved much better at running the country than either Mr Sharif or Benazir Bhutto, Pakistan's other elected leader in recent times. He also remains more popular than either of them, though his support has recently been slipping. General Musharraf's shopping list General Musharraf inherited an economy in crisis. Shackled by sanctions and parched of capital, Pakistan had defaulted on foreign debts. He ensured that the country did what the IMF told it to do, and ended the crisis. Thanks partly to continued fiscal prudence and some sensible reforms, Pakistan has notched up average growth of 7% over the past three years, about the same as India. It also helped that after the attacks on America on September 11th 2001, General Musharraf decided to stop supporting the Taliban government in next-door Afghanistan and grant America access to airbases from which to fight it. The benefits have not been confined to a surge of American aid dollars that boosted the growth figures. Having joined the “war on terror”, the general reined in Islamist militants fighting India in the disputed Kashmir region. He then surprised many by throwing himself into peacemaking with India. Peace on the subcontinent is still hard to imagine, but it may be more possible than at any time since British India's bloody partition. This is encouraging. But a bigger concern for most Pakistanis is the state of their broken and predatory institutions, which have helped to make Pakistan unstable and prone to extremism. General Musharraf pledged to fix them, and to promote liberal values, or “enlightened moderation”. If he were to make serious progress towards either of those goals, history would smile on his coup. But this survey will argue that General Musharraf is unlikely to deliver on these crucial promises. He has introduced many sensible reforms, such as making the lowest level of the judiciary independent. But they have almost all been implemented only partially and corruptly. Part of the problem is that General Musharraf does not rule Pakistan by fiat, though he often seems to think otherwise. He rules behind a façade of democracy. Thus, for example, he has rewritten the constitution in his favour, allowing him to sack the government and impose martial law; but he needed political allies to vote through those changes. Such alliances have led to paralysing compromise. To sideline the mainstream parties, whose leaders he fears, General Musharraf has sought support from religious conservatives, so his liberal reforms have gone nowhere. With the same intent, he pandered to Taliban-friendly Islamic parties, helping them win unprecedented power. Moreover, General Musharraf has clung on to his job by the same undemocratic measures as his predecessors: by manipulating the institutions he had vowed to clean up. Only, unlike any civilian leader, he has the army behind him, which means he can do that much more damage. Whereas Mr Sharif and Ms Bhutto packed the Supreme Court with their supporters, General Musharraf sacked half its judges for refusing to swear allegiance to him. Pakistan is too big, too fractious and too complicated to be ruled so overwhelmingly by one man. General Musharraf has been lucky to survive three assassination attempts, and his succession is unclear. He has, moreover, limited time at his disposal to get to grips with an unlimited number of problems. His period in office has been littered with initiatives—a diplomatic proposal to India here, a promise to reduce the army there—that never got off the ground or fizzled to nothing for want of the general's attention. And even if he had unlimited time, he has limited understanding. In army fashion, he considers Pakistan's problems to be mostly practical. But they are invariably political. To deal with a mounting water crisis, for example, General Musharraf has decreed that three long-stalled dams will be built in Punjab and North-West Frontier Province. In Sindh province, the lower riparian, this has caused uproar. Sindhis say their water supply will be diminished by the dams; General Musharraf says it will not. He has no patience for the Sindhis' distrust of the Pakistani state. They complain, with good reason, that it is dominated by Punjab, Pakistan's most populous province, where most of the army is raised. Sindhis make up about a quarter of Pakistan's population, but hold only a couple of the top 50 jobs in the water ministry. If General Musharraf wants the dams built, he should start by increasing that number. Pakistan is torn by such grievances. Where people feel unprotected by their government, regional strife and Islamic militancy have bred. The longer they are allowed to fester, the more unstable Pakistan will become. Neither General Musharraf nor his obvious rivals for the leadership, Ms Bhutto and Mr Sharif, could heal these rifts. But then Pakistan does not need a saviour to become stable and well. It needs a sustainable political system, representing the majority of its people. General Musharraf has had some successes. But by sabotaging Pakistan's fragile democracy, he may well have made the country even more dangerous. http://www.economist.com/displayStory.cfm?story_id=7107838 --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Next-gen email? Have it all with the all-new Yahoo! Mail Beta. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060716/479c16af/attachment.html From shahzulf at yahoo.com Sun Jul 16 18:16:09 2006 From: shahzulf at yahoo.com (Zulfiqar Shah) Date: Sun, 16 Jul 2006 05:46:09 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] We Need to Kow, Gneral! Cowasjee on ISI Message-ID: <20060716124609.75303.qmail@web38805.mail.mud.yahoo.com> We Need to Kow, Gneral! By Ardeshir Cowasjee THIS is a follow-up and a follow on to last week’s column, ‘Not on, General.’ Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz causes much irritation and annoyance and resentment when he travels to Karachi or Lahore or to any city of Pakistan because of the current obsession with ‘security’ arrangements which in actual fact, in the event of an attack, would probably prove to be of no use. Many years ago, I wrote about another finance minister, Mahbubul Haq, who was provided top security when visiting Karachi, which in those days entailed one mobile carrying two policemen. One policeman casually remarked, while I was conversing with him on the matter of the minister’s security : “Ispay kaun goli barbaad kareynga,” the emphasis being on the word ‘barbaad.’ Asif Baladi, who was picked up by the Inter-Services Intelligence, remains missing, with his name still on the long list of persons ‘missing’ in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. The matter of Brigadier Mohammad Taj, who was insulted and assaulted by a plain-clothed major of the ISI, is still being investigated. The brave brigadier should not lose heart. Our systems make haste slowly and we are not alone. A headline in the July 13 issue of The Times (London) reads ‘100 years on, Chirac says sorry for persecution of Dreyfus.’ The day before, in the courtyard of the Ecole Militaire where Captain Alfred Dreyfus was publicly disgraced in 1895, President Jacques Chirac in a solemn address paid homage to the innocent Jewish officer and called for vigilance against intolerance. [Emile Zola was jailed in February 1898 for having written his open letter, ‘J’Accuse’, printed in L’Aurore, accusing the state of a crime against humanity.] My woman friend who was beaten up, slapped and pushed about on one of our main roads for accidentally brushing her car against another car is still waiting for the investigation into the matter to come to a close. An e-mail from a regular e-mailer, who calls himself Dr Alfred Charles, in my box on Friday tells me that her story was printed in that day’s Ummat and that “as usual they blamed you for your involvement and harassing others by means of using your contacts with high-ups.” On March 12 this year, I wrote on the subject of the ‘missing’ Dr Safdar Sarki, another victim “picked up by personnel belonging to Pakistan’s intelligence agencies.” An e-mail message sent earlier this year to a friend of mine in Pakistan by a friend of his in the USA warrants reproduction. “From the day I met Safdar Sarki in early 1990s as two immigrants would meet each other, we never agreed on politics. My early Marxist and humanist training would not accept the secessionist ideology of Jeay Sindh, he was an active part of. I believed, and still do, that only the civil society, the democratisation of Pakistan, would take us somewhere and believed that the dream of a free society in Pakistan was not dead yet. “He became an American citizen, so did his wife, his younger brother and two kids, now fifteen and ten. They have been living in Texas, the home state of President George Bush. “Two years ago he called me and told me that he was going back to Pakistan to pursue his nationalist political ambitions. I told him not to. A stubborn man, combined with a narrow ideology — a lethal combination, might I say. “This year, on February 24, he disappeared from Karachi. His driver, Munir Sarki, would later tell the press and the Sindh High Court that he saw Safdar blind-folded, handcuffed and beaten, picked up from his apartment in Gulshan-e-Iqbal, taken away by the people of the ‘agencies.’ Sindhi newspapers are full of the minute details as to what happened. “Since February, demonstrations, hunger-strikes, sit-ins, rallies, statements, press conferences, alerts, appeals by individuals, organisations, political parties, HRCP, Amnesty International and Asian Commission of Human Rights have been made, all to no avail. “His family, brother, wife, two sons (now all American citizens) have tried to reach the State Department, members of US Senate, Congress and US media — and all has fallen on deaf ears. Walls don’t answer. “Every other day his sons call me when I am at work asking me if I have had any news about their father. In the age of precision-guided bombing and information superhighways, I have no news to tell them. “My basic motivation stems from the premise that nobody deserves to be incarcerated, tortured, or killed because of his or her political beliefs, as erroneous as they might be. May be he committed crimes. But that is why we have courts and law. Everybody, including the people we loathe, deserve access to justice, fairness and fair play. “I am literally begging you to do something if you can. I don’t even know what to ask you for. Pick up your pen or phone? I don’t know. All those years I fought, challenged and contested his ideas. I did not know in the end I would have to beg for his life! Please do what you think is right.” He thought it right to pass it on to me, as I had already written on the subject of Dr Sarki’s strange arrest by the ubiquitous ‘agencies’ and his subsequent disappearance. Despite our numerous laws and legislations, despite our adherence to habeas corpus, Dr Safdar Sarki of Jeay Sindh remains untraced. Shortly after he was picked up, his wife circulated a letter via the internet, e-mail and otherwise, which also had no effect, elicited no reaction. Dr Sarki is a citizen of the United States, but if he holds dual nationality, if he is also a citizen of this country, then there is not much the US State Department or even George W Bush can do for him, as the non-laws of Pakistan will prevail. Our courts seem to be helpless. As reported in the Metropolitan section of this newspaper on July 12 under the headline ‘No operational control over ISI and MI, Defence Ministry tells court.’ Your Lt Colonel Khalid Iqbal Sahoo, Assistant Judge Advocate-General of your army, wearing your uniform, described as a ‘defence ministry official,’ when called to the hearing of six petitions regarding six missing detainees told the Sindh High Court that the task of locating and recovering missing persons did not fall within their purview and they did not have the mandate to ground-check in such cases. The ministry exercises only administrative control over the two agencies. Could you please tell us, general, who, just who, is responsible for the operational control of the ISI and all the other ‘agencies’? Who calls the shots when it comes to ‘picking up’ citizens of Pakistan, whisking them away, and keeping them incommunicado? We need to know. You are basically a good man, general, and like you as many of us (and I) still do, we would wish you to prove Mohammad Ali Jinnah wrong. A few months before he died in 1948, he one day predicted : “Each successive government of Pakistan will be worse than its predecessor.” The flip side is that he said it so definitively. He was endowed with great perspicacity and even greater foresight. E-mail: arfc at cyber.net.pk Daily Dawn, Karachi http://www.dawn.com/weekly/cowas/cowas.htm --------------------------------- Why keep checking for Mail? The all-new Yahoo! Mail Beta shows you when there are new messages. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060716/4a06ff47/attachment.html From jace at pobox.com Mon Jul 17 16:37:01 2006 From: jace at pobox.com (Kiran Jonnalagadda) Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2006 16:37:01 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] India censors the web again Message-ID: The Department of Telecommunications passed an order to ISPs Friday to block several websites. The list is confidential. ISPs have been slowly coming into compliance. SpectraNet, MTNL, Reliance, and as of this afternoon, Airtel. BSNL and VSNL have not started yet but likely will soon. The known list of blocked domains is *.blogspot.com, *.typepad.com and geocities.com/* Yes folks, the government has decided to censor blogs and refused to explain why. Shivam Vij managed to talk to Dr Gulshan Rai, director of CERT-IN, the only body authorised to issue a blocking directive. His response: "Somebody must have asked for some sites to be blocked. What is your problem?" I'm keeping a running log here: http://jace.seacrow.com/archive/2006/07/17/blogspot-blocked-by-indian- isps If you find several sites suddenly inaccessible today, please call your ISP and demand to know why. Another person is preparing to file an RTI application with DoT. If you can help, please join the coordinating group: http://groups.google.com/group/BloggersCollective -- Kiran Jonnalagadda http://www.pobox.com/~jace From hpp at vsnl.com Tue Jul 18 09:37:09 2006 From: hpp at vsnl.com (hpp at vsnl.com) Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 04:07:09 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] India censors the web again Message-ID: Dear Friends This is very alarming. A friend in the know told me that this must have been initiated by ministry of communications and instructions given by some bureaucratic, ignorant official, without any interaction with ministry of IT. We should try to communicate with Mr Karnik of NASSCOM for his effort to correct this absurdity. v ramaswamy calcutta cuckooscall.blogspot.com From shuddha at sarai.net Tue Jul 18 10:37:48 2006 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 10:37:48 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Bearded Men and Blogs at Risk Message-ID: <44BC6CA4.3090806@sarai.net> POST 7/11, GOVT TARGETS 'EXTREME' WEBSITES, BLOGGERS ON THE BLINK, says the Indian Express. Those on the Commons Law List will have seen this already, (where it was forwarded by Prashant Iyengar) as will those who read Indian Express. Goes to show that the first responses of power in a moment of crisis are also inevitably the clumsiest ones possible. Round up a few history sheeters, detain a man waiting to see a girl he loves deplane just because he had hidden himself in a burqa so that he could stand undetected by her chaperones. Send out eighteen crack investigation teams to look for men with facial hair. A bad time for bearded cross dressers. Were I the foot soldier sometimes identified as a terrorist I would buy gilette mach 3 and after shave in bulk, wear a baseball cap the wrong way round, and cheerfully whistle my way through the next bombing. And write innocous messages on postcards to my handlers, whosoever they may be. While the jackasses (patriotic hackers) of the outfit with the 'cool' title of Computer Emergency Response Team (India), a less than well known cabal in the ministry of telecommunications, cut a swathe through blogs, leaving blocked sites in their wake. So begins a morning in the information superpower. enjoy Shuddha -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- POST 7/11, GOVT TARGETS 'EXTREME' WEBSITES, BLOGGERS ON THE BLINK Source: The Indian Express http://www.indianexpress.com/printerFriendly/8719.html MUMBAI, NEW DELHI, JULY 17: The fast-growing community of online bloggers has borne the brunt of the government's decision to block some 20 websites in a post-Mumbai show of force. Some of the websites that have been blocked are Dalitstan.org, Clickatell.com, Hinduhumanrights.org and Hinduunity.com. But the most harried Internet users were the bloggers, who couldn't access Blogspot.com, Typepad.com or Geocities.com pages. Sources in ISPs in Delhi as well as Mumbai confirmed that the one blog government has asked them to block is Princesskimberly.blogspot.com. It seems the order posed technical problems, resulting in a blanket ban on all blogs. You cannot block a single page on blogspot.com, which is why all of them are getting blocked, said Neha Viswanathan, Regional Editor, South Asia, Globalvoicesonline.org from London. The Indian order was issued on July 13, sources in the Ministry of Telecom confirmed, though the Computer Emergency Response Team (India), part of a global cyber-security network set up three years ago, did not announce the bans officially. Only sources in several ISPs such as Spectranet and Airtel confirmed that they had received the site-blocking order. R Grewal, a spokesperson for Spectranet confirmed: We received a list of over 20 websites to block from the Department of Telecom, and this (Blogspot.com) was one of them. Apparently, all the websites blocked are said to express 'extreme religious views.' MTNL officials said they were handed a 22-page document detailing the sites to block a month ago. 'It came from the National Informatics Centre (NIC). It was the first time that they had done something of this nature,'' says RH Sharma, sub-divisional engineer for MTNL in Delhi. Government sources confirmed late in the evening that some websites have been blocked based on police reports that they were fuelling hatred. They denied that the Mumbai blasts had anything to do with censorship and that security checks on the blocked sites were on since before the terrorist attacks. http://www.nalsartech.org/tikiwiki/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=16897 _______________________________________________ commons-law mailing list commons-law at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/commons-law From penguinhead at linux-delhi.org Tue Jul 18 11:58:40 2006 From: penguinhead at linux-delhi.org (Pankaj kaushal) Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 11:58:40 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] circumvent the ban Message-ID: <44BC7F98.7080702@linux-delhi.org> Hello, A Wiki[1] has been setup by the fellow bloggers, please update and If your ISP has banned the domains which have been in the talk recently, here[2] are the ways to bypass the ban. You might also want to ask the govt. why the domains have been blocked? You can do so using the RTI act, here[3] is how. 1. http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/Bloggers_Against_Censorship 2. http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/Bypassing_The_Ban 3. http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/Blogs_and_RTI_Act P. -- Wir wollen dass ihr uns alles glaubt. From khergupta at hotmail.com Tue Jul 18 12:39:30 2006 From: khergupta at hotmail.com (subodh gupta) Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 12:39:30 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] UNSUBSCRIBE Message-ID: THANKS!! >From: >Reply-To: ritika at sarai.net >To: Yogi >CC: reader-list at sarai.net >Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Conflict versus Violence >Date: Tue, 20 Jun 2006 17:04:59 +0200 >MIME-Version: 1.0 >Received: from mail.sarai.net ([195.169.149.102]) by >bay0-mc11-f14.bay0.hotmail.com with Microsoft SMTPSVC(6.0.3790.2444); Tue, >20 Jun 2006 08:09:04 -0700 >Received: from localhost (rbl [127.0.0.3])by mail.sarai.net (Postfix) with >ESMTP id A72AF28DF88;Tue, 20 Jun 2006 17:05:28 +0200 (CEST) >Received: from mail.sarai.net ([127.0.0.1])by localhost (mail.sarai.net >[127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024)with LMTP id 02059-04-8; Tue, 20 Jun >2006 17:05:28 +0200 (CEST) >Received: from mail.sarai.net (localhost [127.0.0.1])by mail.sarai.net >(Postfix) with ESMTP id 0B4F928DAB3;Tue, 20 Jun 2006 17:05:21 +0200 (CEST) >Received: by mail.sarai.net (Postfix, from userid 1058)id EF33B28D9F4; Tue, >20 Jun 2006 17:05:02 +0200 (CEST) >Received: from mail.sarai.net (mail [195.169.149.102])by mail.sarai.net >(Postfix) with ESMTP id 0630E28D872;Tue, 20 Jun 2006 17:04:58 +0200 (CEST) >X-Message-Info: LsUYwwHHNt1BwKr9m2yCL2wfPTgK0BB/Ve0f2Qw5Nfk= >X-Original-To: reader-list at mail.sarai.net >Delivered-To: reader-list at mail.sarai.net >References: ><1225.219.65.11.196.1150653087.squirrel at webmail.xtdnet.nl><1d804b40606181444i41d04906h73053671bcd38afc at mail.gmail.com><1117.219.65.10.24.1150720845.squirrel at webmail.xtdnet.nl><1d804b40606200340p1c5db2e2i53253a514216584b at mail.gmail.com> >X-Mailer: Hastymail 1.4-CVS >X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.0.4 (2005-06-05) on mail.sarai.net >X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-105.6 required=4.5 >tests=ALL_TRUSTED,AWL,BAYES_00,NO_REAL_NAME,USER_IN_WHITELIST autolearn=ham >version=3.0.4 >X-Sanitizer: Mail Sanitizer >X-BeenThere: reader-list at sarai.net >X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.8 >Precedence: list >List-Id: "A list on Media and the City,Information Politics and >Contemporary Culture" >List-Unsubscribe: >, >List-Archive: >List-Post: >List-Help: >List-Subscribe: >, >Errors-To: reader-list-bounces at sarai.net >X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new-20030616-p10 (Debian) at sarai.net >Return-Path: reader-list-bounces at sarai.net >X-OriginalArrivalTime: 20 Jun 2006 15:09:06.0060 (UTC) >FILETIME=[791EFCC0:01C6947B] > >Yogi, anant and zainab.. > >if its really about providing solutions - there can be too many - if we >really want to help: call up the people from society for prevention towards >cruelty towards animals..which means keep the phone nos like these handy!! >I try and keep tofees in my purse and give it to boys and girls who come >begging..is it a solution? i don't know. Lot of people say don't give money >to beggars - they'll waste in drinking. So? How come our spending of money >on booze is 'lifestyle/luxury' and their drinking is 'not justified?' yes >one can give a moral argument and say - begging is bad...but i don't even >know how this person came to the city? maybe he was in debt in village, >maybe coca cola sucked up all the water and no water was left in his >village to till the soil, maybe the governemnt policy of reducing subsidy >spoilt to buy seeds, no (urban) doctors wanting to work in the villages... > >irresponsible, insensitive, random > >_________________________________________ >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 machine at zerosofzeta.com Tue Jul 18 12:52:39 2006 From: machine at zerosofzeta.com (Yogi) Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 12:52:39 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Reluctant rulers Message-ID: <1d804b40607180022q588a220agcbe2c869e6686a62@mail.gmail.com> "They(Hindus) were happy under Muslim rule for centuries. It is the British policy of divide and rule that made Hindus raise their head. Now that the white regime is over, the traditional Hindu-Muslim equation must be returned." Do opinions of Mr Mirza expressed below represent those of most Muslims in India? -Yogi From kaiwanmehta at gmail.com Mon Jul 17 16:33:50 2006 From: kaiwanmehta at gmail.com (kaiwan mehta) Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2006 16:33:50 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] A letter from mumbaikar In-Reply-To: References: <1153033332.2.2835170244225605118.2@mail.orkut.com> Message-ID: <2482459d0607170403w1b68adf7p2c6d4ddc15e54668@mail.gmail.com> Hi This is the second time I have received this highly 'spirited' and emotional mail. The other version of this letter conviniently assumes that the terrorist essentially sits in Afghanistan, Pakistan or Iraq. The front page of Indian Express, on 14 July, 2006... has a story on how the Courts in India doubted that the Blasts at the RSS head quarters and another city in Maharashtra were doctored from 'within'. And about the 'spirit of mumbai' the 'spirit' has now reached nauseating levels!! One day all of us will die in the assumed/presumed garb of 'spirit' of the city.... and what will be left is only 'spirit'..... yes read the Times of India, Times Review page in the Sunday 16 July, 2006 edition. Accept the fact... the city was jostled... the city was literally out of steam at least for two days after the blast. Where does our spirit go when tonnes of families and kids are thrown homeless brutally when the slums were demolished in Bombay/Mumbai itself? Where does ourr spirit go when people are thrown homeless, landless and jobless when they are evacuated for Dam constructions? Was my spirit sleeping when farmers are commiting suicides? Maybe I never had a spirit till the media gave me one, a week ago!! warm spirits... Kaiwan On 7/16/06, Aaditya Dar wrote: > > just wanted to share this mail forward i got: > > > > We don't know whether you are Hindu / Muslim / Christian / Indian / > pakistani/ Afghanistani / Iraqi / American or from any part of the > world > but > only name we can give you is terrorist. > > Even if you are not reading this we don't care. Time and again you > tried to > disturb us and disrupt our life - killing innocent civilians by > planting > bombs in trains, buses and cars. You have tried hard to bring death and > destruction, cause panic and fear and create communal disharmony but > everytime you were disgustingly unsuccessful. Do you know how we pass > our > life in Mumbai? How much it takes for us to earn that single rupee? If > you > wanted to give us a shock then we are sorry to say that you failed > miserably in your ulterior motives. Better look elsewere, not here. > > We are not Hindus and Muslims or Gujaratis and Marathis or Punjabis and > Bengaliies. Nor do we distinguish ourselves as owners or workers, govt. > employees or private employees. WE ARE MUMBAIKERS (Bombay-ites, if you > like). We will not allow you to disrupt our life like this. On the last > few > occassions when you struck (including the 7 deadly blasts in a single > day > killing over 250 people and injuring 500+ in 1993), we went to work > next > day in full strength. This time we cleared everything within a few > hours > and were back to normal - the vendors placing their next order, > businessmen > finalizing the next deals and the office workers rushing to catch the > next > train. (Yes the same train you targetted) > > Fathom this: Within 3 hours of the blasts, long queues of blood > donating > volunteers were seen outside various hospital, where most of the > injured > were admitted. By 12 midnight, the hospital had to issue a notification > that blood banks were full and they didn't require any more blood. The > next > day, attendance at schools and office was close to 100%, trains & buses > were packed to the brim, the crowds were back. > The city has simply dusted itself off and moved one - perhaps with > greater > vigour. > > We are Mumbaikers and we live like brothers in times like this. So, do > not > dare to threaten us with your crackers. The spirit of Mumbai is very > strong > and can not be harmed. > > Please forward this to others. U never know, by chance it may come to > hands > of a terrorist & He / She can then read this message which is specially > meant for him / her !!! > > With Love, > From the people of Mumbai (Bombay) > > _________________________________________ > 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: > -- Kaiwan Mehta Architect and Urban Researcher 11/4, Kassinath Bldg. No. 2, Kassinath St., Tardeo, Mumbai 400034 022-2-494 3259 / 91-98205 56436 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060717/ec995e63/attachment.html From kaiwanmehta at gmail.com Mon Jul 17 16:35:29 2006 From: kaiwanmehta at gmail.com (kaiwan mehta) Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2006 16:35:29 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Enough --- A letter from mumbaikar Message-ID: <2482459d0607170405q1a519b9bnefa8aa34013dde33@mail.gmail.com> ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: kaiwan mehta Date: Jul 17, 2006 4:33 PM Subject: Re: [Reader-list] A letter from mumbaikar To: Aaditya Dar Cc: "reader-list at sarai.net" , united_students at yahoogroups.com, kaiwanmehta at gmail.com Hi This is the second time I have received this highly 'spirited' and emotional mail. The other version of this letter conviniently assumes that the terrorist essentially sits in Afghanistan, Pakistan or Iraq. The front page of Indian Express, on 14 July, 2006... has a story on how the Courts in India doubted that the Blasts at the RSS head quarters and another city in Maharashtra were doctored from 'within'. And about the 'spirit of mumbai' the 'spirit' has now reached nauseating levels!! One day all of us will die in the assumed/presumed garb of 'spirit' of the city.... and what will be left is only 'spirit'..... yes read the Times of India, Times Review page in the Sunday 16 July, 2006 edition. Accept the fact... the city was jostled... the city was literally out of steam at least for two days after the blast. Where does our spirit go when tonnes of families and kids are thrown homeless brutally when the slums were demolished in Bombay/Mumbai itself? Where does ourr spirit go when people are thrown homeless, landless and jobless when they are evacuated for Dam constructions? Was my spirit sleeping when farmers are commiting suicides? Maybe I never had a spirit till the media gave me one, a week ago!! warm spirits... Kaiwan On 7/16/06, Aaditya Dar wrote: > just wanted to share this mail forward i got: We don't know whether you are Hindu / Muslim / Christian / Indian / pakistani/ Afghanistani / Iraqi / American or from any part of the world but only name we can give you is terrorist. Even if you are not reading this we don't care. Time and again you tried to disturb us and disrupt our life - killing innocent civilians by planting bombs in trains, buses and cars. You have tried hard to bring death and destruction, cause panic and fear and create communal disharmony but everytime you were disgustingly unsuccessful. Do you know how we pass our life in Mumbai? How much it takes for us to earn that single rupee? If you wanted to give us a shock then we are sorry to say that you failed miserably in your ulterior motives. Better look elsewere, not here. We are not Hindus and Muslims or Gujaratis and Marathis or Punjabis and Bengaliies. Nor do we distinguish ourselves as owners or workers, govt. employees or private employees. WE ARE MUMBAIKERS (Bombay-ites, if you like). We will not allow you to disrupt our life like this. On the last few occassions when you struck (including the 7 deadly blasts in a single day killing over 250 people and injuring 500+ in 1993), we went to work next day in full strength. This time we cleared everything within a few hours and were back to normal - the vendors placing their next order, businessmen finalizing the next deals and the office workers rushing to catch the next train. (Yes the same train you targetted) Fathom this: Within 3 hours of the blasts, long queues of blood donating volunteers were seen outside various hospital, where most of the injured were admitted. By 12 midnight, the hospital had to issue a notification that blood banks were full and they didn't require any more blood. The next day, attendance at schools and office was close to 100%, trains & buses were packed to the brim, the crowds were back. The city has simply dusted itself off and moved one - perhaps with greater vigour. We are Mumbaikers and we live like brothers in times like this. So, do not dare to threaten us with your crackers. The spirit of Mumbai is very strong and can not be harmed. Please forward this to others. U never know, by chance it may come to hands of a terrorist & He / She can then read this message which is specially meant for him / her !!! With Love, >From the people of Mumbai (Bombay) _________________________________________ 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: - -- Kaiwan Mehta Architect and Urban Researcher 11/4, Kassinath Bldg. No. 2, Kassinath St., Tardeo, Mumbai 400034 022-2-494 3259 / 91-98205 56436 - -- Kaiwan Mehta Architect and Urban Researcher 11/4, Kassinath Bldg. No. 2, Kassinath St., Tardeo, Mumbai 400034 022-2-494 3259 / 91-98205 56436 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060717/3eb65bd1/attachment.html From jassim.ali at gmail.com Tue Jul 18 12:57:55 2006 From: jassim.ali at gmail.com (Jassim Ali) Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 11:27:55 +0400 Subject: [Reader-list] Reluctant rulers In-Reply-To: <1d804b40607180022q588a220agcbe2c869e6686a62@mail.gmail.com> References: <1d804b40607180022q588a220agcbe2c869e6686a62@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <271ece9c0607180027s29b66765yacefabc275153829@mail.gmail.com> I guess both the communities lack the sense of nationhood,which is why they cant see beyond their religions.. besides how many devout hindu's and muslim's are involved in this tug of war ? On 7/18/06, Yogi wrote: > > "They(Hindus) were happy under Muslim rule for centuries. It is the > British policy of divide and rule that made Hindus raise their head. > Now that the white regime is over, the traditional Hindu-Muslim > equation must be returned." > > Do opinions of Mr Mirza expressed below represent those of most > Muslims in India? > > -Yogi > > > _________________________________________ > 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: -- -- Jassim Ali Revolutionist / Poet/ Manager / Prisoner / Escape-artist / Acrobat / Weaver / Rain Maker / Bio-scope Wallah ! Strategic Planning & Business Development OMD Digital Al Thuraya Tower, 19th Floor Dubai Media City PO Box 121428, Dubai, UAE Mobile: +97150 3425980 Telephone: +9714 360 4182 (direct) Facsimile: +9714 36 88 230 Website : www.omd.com Blog: www.tefloncoatedyuppie.blogspot.com "Those that danced were thought mad by those who could not hear the music" -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060718/3a017fc0/attachment.html From mail at shivamvij.com Mon Jul 17 19:20:16 2006 From: mail at shivamvij.com (Shivam Vij) Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2006 19:20:16 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Indian ISPs block Blogspot, Typepad and Geocities Message-ID: <9c06aab30607170650h7a6eb44fnf781b4c2e64f61be@mail.gmail.com> http://www.rediff.com/news/2006/jul/17blog.htm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060717/22afe9d5/attachment.html From chauhan.vijender at gmail.com Mon Jul 17 17:21:10 2006 From: chauhan.vijender at gmail.com (Vijender chauhan) Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2006 17:21:10 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] India censors the web again In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <8bdde4540607170451w44a1f81asa5d96a24a84aaf11@mail.gmail.com> Yes!! I just checked and realised that I am probably a threat to nation, so is Laltu and all bloggers on blogspot. My blog is inaccessible. Will anyone explain why??? vijender On 7/17/06, Kiran Jonnalagadda wrote: > > The Department of Telecommunications passed an order to ISPs Friday > to block several websites. The list is confidential. ISPs have been > slowly coming into compliance. SpectraNet, MTNL, Reliance, and as of > this afternoon, Airtel. BSNL and VSNL have not started yet but likely > will soon. > > The known list of blocked domains is *.blogspot.com, *.typepad.com > and geocities.com/* > > Yes folks, the government has decided to censor blogs and refused to > explain why. Shivam Vij managed to talk to Dr Gulshan Rai, director > of CERT-IN, the only body authorised to issue a blocking directive. > His response: "Somebody must have asked for some sites to be blocked. > What is your problem?" > > I'm keeping a running log here: > http://jace.seacrow.com/archive/2006/07/17/blogspot-blocked-by-indian- > isps > > If you find several sites suddenly inaccessible today, please call > your ISP and demand to know why. Another person is preparing to file > an RTI application with DoT. If you can help, please join the > coordinating group: > http://groups.google.com/group/BloggersCollective > > -- > Kiran Jonnalagadda > http://www.pobox.com/~jace > > > _________________________________________ > 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: -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060717/175c4a0a/attachment.html From jumpshark at gmail.com Tue Jul 18 19:05:44 2006 From: jumpshark at gmail.com (Prashant Pandey) Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 19:05:44 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] A letter from mumbaikar In-Reply-To: <2482459d0607170403w1b68adf7p2c6d4ddc15e54668@mail.gmail.com> References: <1153033332.2.2835170244225605118.2@mail.orkut.com> <2482459d0607170403w1b68adf7p2c6d4ddc15e54668@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Hi My cousin who once used to live in Mumbai and now working Delhi called me up and said," Mumbai has become a shit-hole". I remember when I had met him in Mumbai he would say " its the best city in the world..." I also remember a family trip to Siddhi Vinayak temple where he told me to pray to lord Ganesha...." say ive come here and will always seek your blessings" This phone call he sounded repentant and bitter. He has a big apartment in Mumbai but now he wants to settle in Delhi. "Its always raining problems in Mumbai." I dont know if he would have said the same thing if he was working here and had no option to move out to a different city. I have always suspicious of this spirit business. I was once travelling in the 2nd class compartment of the local train. It was unimaginably crowded. A man in 40s standing just beside me started sweating. He wanted to vomit. He started to gasp for air. I emptied my plastic bag and gave it him. In seconds he filled it with foul smelling vomit. Before disembarking I gave him a mint gum so that he feels better. Would you call it spirit ? No. I think this so called spirit is a myth, a construct. its rather a euphemism for may be a kind of a collective guilt, extreme form of self-survival instincts or selfishness. On 7/17/06, kaiwan mehta wrote: > Hi This is the second time I have received this highly 'spirited' and > emotional mail. The other version of this letter conviniently assumes that > the terrorist essentially sits in Afghanistan, Pakistan or Iraq. The front > page of Indian Express, on 14 July, 2006... has a story on how the Courts in > India doubted that the Blasts at the RSS head quarters and another city in > Maharashtra were doctored from 'within'. And about the 'spirit of mumbai' > the 'spirit' has now reached nauseating levels!! One day all of us will die > in the assumed/presumed garb of 'spirit' of the city.... and what will be > left is only 'spirit'..... yes read the Times of India, Times Review page in > the Sunday 16 July, 2006 edition. Accept the fact... the city was > jostled... the city was literally out of steam at least for two days after > the blast. Where does our spirit go when tonnes of families and kids are > thrown homeless brutally when the slums were demolished in Bombay/Mumbai > itself? Where does ourr spirit go when people are thrown homeless, > landless and jobless when they are evacuated for Dam constructions? Was my > spirit sleeping when farmers are commiting suicides? Maybe I never had a > spirit till the media gave me one, a week ago!! warm spirits... Kaiwan > > On 7/16/06, Aaditya Dar wrote: > > just wanted to share this mail forward i got: > > > > > > We don't know whether you are Hindu / Muslim / Christian / Indian / > > pakistani/ Afghanistani / Iraqi / American or from any part of the > > world > > but > > only name we can give you is terrorist. > > > > Even if you are not reading this we don't care. Time and again you > > tried to > > disturb us and disrupt our life - killing innocent civilians by > > planting > > bombs in trains, buses and cars. You have tried hard to bring death and > > destruction, cause panic and fear and create communal disharmony but > > everytime you were disgustingly unsuccessful. Do you know how we pass > > our > > life in Mumbai? How much it takes for us to earn that single rupee? If > > you > > wanted to give us a shock then we are sorry to say that you failed > > miserably in your ulterior motives. Better look elsewere, not here. > > > > We are not Hindus and Muslims or Gujaratis and Marathis or Punjabis and > > Bengaliies. Nor do we distinguish ourselves as owners or workers, govt. > > employees or private employees. WE ARE MUMBAIKERS (Bombay-ites, if you > > like). We will not allow you to disrupt our life like this. On the last > > few > > occassions when you struck (including the 7 deadly blasts in a single > > day > > killing over 250 people and injuring 500+ in 1993), we went to work > > next > > day in full strength. This time we cleared everything within a few > > hours > > and were back to normal - the vendors placing their next order, > > businessmen > > finalizing the next deals and the office workers rushing to catch the > > next > > train. (Yes the same train you targetted) > > > > Fathom this: Within 3 hours of the blasts, long queues of blood > > donating > > volunteers were seen outside various hospital, where most of the > > injured > > were admitted. By 12 midnight, the hospital had to issue a notification > > that blood banks were full and they didn't require any more blood. The > > next > > day, attendance at schools and office was close to 100%, trains & buses > > were packed to the brim, the crowds were back. > > The city has simply dusted itself off and moved one - perhaps with > > greater > > vigour. > > > > We are Mumbaikers and we live like brothers in times like this. So, do > > not > > dare to threaten us with your crackers. The spirit of Mumbai is very > > strong > > and can not be harmed. > > > > Please forward this to others. U never know, by chance it may come to > > hands > > of a terrorist & He / She can then read this message which is specially > > meant for him / her !!! > > > > With Love, > > From the people of Mumbai (Bombay) > > _________________________________________ > > 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: > > > > > > > -- > Kaiwan Mehta > Architect and Urban Researcher > > 11/4, Kassinath Bldg. No. 2, Kassinath St., Tardeo, Mumbai 400034 > 022-2-494 3259 / 91-98205 56436 > _________________________________________ > 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 gowharfazili at yahoo.com Wed Jul 19 10:43:14 2006 From: gowharfazili at yahoo.com (gowhar fazli) Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 22:13:14 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] In response to 'A letter from Mumbaikar' Message-ID: <20060719051314.73899.qmail@web60621.mail.yahoo.com> In response to the 'spirits' of Mumbai, I wish there was a view from Kashmir where as a civilian (u could actually add a militant, low a ranking army recruit) you are really fucked! (Please don't get me wrong. I am not saying Mumbai is not a hellhole!) But consider this... you have a state, which is hostile to you because you do not fit into its notion of an Indian (u r a potential threat) and you are bombed by the terrorists/militants/jihadists/state agencies (take your pick of suspects) to count as a figure in their list of atrocities. The 'spirit of Kashmir' is to continue with life and retain your humour despite all this. To humour the army fellow who is stranded and forlorn by your shop and occasionally sell him a shawl while knowing that next day he might kill you or set your house on fire! To continue with 'normal’ life while you judge from your living room... precise target of the blast or cross firing that is happening... while wondering if half an hours pause before you leave for the grocery is decently safe. You don't have a nation to share your suffering with. You have agencies all overlapping and interpenetrating. The distinction between militant and the state is very hazy. In this situation you have to be extremely dexterous to survive. You can't believe in your tormentors, any of them. You cannot possibly love them. You can't speak against them. You have nobody to protest to or demand justice from. See actually the larger political scenario is like this: You have taken on (vishal) Hindustan. Hindustan has taken on you. Pakistan has taken on Hindustan. Hindustan has taken on Pakistan. Fundamentalists have taken on Hindustan and rest of the world. Hindustan and rest of the world has taken on the fundamentalists... We are all at it very seriously in a ditch (the valley) 142 by 38 kilometers in dimension! Hale the glory!! Unfortunately, the balance of nature decrees that a super-abundance of dreams is paid for by a growing potential for nightmares. Love is an act of endless forgiveness, a tender look which becomes a habit. Peter Ustinov __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From faiz.ullah at adlabsradio.com Wed Jul 19 10:16:09 2006 From: faiz.ullah at adlabsradio.com (Faiz Ullah) Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 11:16:09 +0630 Subject: [Reader-list] A letter from mumbaikar Message-ID: <6a8ebcf4a03c9da8777e5a0443dfd0fe@adlabsradio.com> just to add to what prashant has written.. majority of people are pushed towards this city, and a sizeable minority of people like me are attracted towards it. a better part of the "spirit of mumbai" is the inability of the people to leave it once they land up here. mumbai the "financial capital" of this country, and mumbai "that contributes the most to the state exchequer" is also the city where people arrive with very big yet seemingly attainable dreams. if maharashtra government were to build a "jaali" at the Kurla, Andheri, or Mumbai central stations, we'll get to see the "200 families that are added to the population of mumbai everday" saying their first prayers there. they'll be found tying the customary piece of thread or piece of a cloth on it in a hope that they'll come and un-tie it the day their "mannat" comes true. but "mannats" are expensive in this city. 73% of the city's households live in 1-room tenements, shanties, kholis, etc. the "spirit" of hunger, and the "spirit" of hopelessness that prevails in parts of this country isn't "spirit"enough. the "spirit" of the "marqaz" that this city has become; of a million dying and already dead dreams, is no different from the the "spirit" that we saw rallying behind the "anti-fanaah" protestors in gujarat, and the meritorious "YOUTH FOR EQUALITY" forum( this deserves "upper case") at the AIIMS, the our armed forces in kashmir and the north-east. there are (vested) interests to protect and EMIs to pay. what are we going to celebrate and what are we going to condemn. and now that we are done with mumbai...a cheers also to the "spirit" of cities being pounded by apaches as i write. G8 summit is on, my friend can't access his own blog, and the power of CNN IBN has been seen by the world now. much regards, faiz -----Original message----- From: "Prashant Pandey" jumpshark at gmail.com Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 19:05:44 +0530 To: "kaiwan mehta" kaiwanmehta at gmail.com Subject: Re: [Reader-list] A letter from mumbaikar > Hi My cousin who once used to live in Mumbai and now wo> rking Delhi called me up and said," Mumbai has become a s> hit-hole". I remember when I had met him in Mumbai he wou> ld say " its the best city in the world..." I also rememb> er a family trip to Siddhi Vinayak temple where he told m> e to pray to lord Ganesha...." say ive come here and will> always seek your blessings" This phone call he sounded r> epentant and bitter. He has a big apartment in Mumbai but> now he wants to settle in Delhi. "Its always raining pro> blems in Mumbai." I dont know if he would have said the > same thing if he was working here and had no option to mo> ve out to a different city. I have always suspicious of > this spirit business. I was once travelling in the 2nd cl> ass compartment of the local train. It was unimaginably c> rowded. A man in 40s standing just beside me started swea> ting. He wanted to vomit. He started to gasp for air. I e> mptied my plastic bag and gave it him. In seconds he fill> ed it with foul smelling vomit. Before disembarking I gav> e him a mint gum so that he feels better. Would you call> it spirit ? No. I think this so called spirit is a myth,> a construct. its rather a euphemism for may be a kind of> a collective guilt, extreme form of self-survival instin> cts or selfishness. On 7/17/06, kaiwan mehta ta at gmail.com> wrote: > Hi This is the second time I hav> e received this highly 'spirited' and > emotional mail. > The other version of this letter conviniently assumes th> at > the terrorist essentially sits in Afghanistan, Pakis> tan or Iraq. The front > page of Indian Express, on 14 > July, 2006... has a story on how the Courts in > India do> ubted that the Blasts at the RSS head quarters and anothe> r city in > Maharashtra were doctored from 'within'. An> d about the 'spirit of mumbai' > the 'spirit' has now rea> ched nauseating levels!! One day all of us will die > in > the assumed/presumed garb of 'spirit' of the city.... and> what will be > left is only 'spirit'..... yes read the T> imes of India, Times Review page in > the Sunday 16 July,> 2006 edition. Accept the fact... the city was > jostle> d... the city was literally out of steam at least for two> days after > the blast. Where does our spirit go when > tonnes of families and kids are > thrown homeless brutall> y when the slums were demolished in Bombay/Mumbai > itsel> f? Where does ourr spirit go when people are thrown hom> eless, > landless and jobless when they are evacuated for> Dam constructions? Was my > spirit sleeping when farme> rs are commiting suicides? Maybe I never had a > spirit> till the media gave me one, a week ago!! warm spirits.> .. Kaiwan > > On 7/16/06, Aaditya Dar .com> wrote: > > just wanted to share this mail forward i> got: > > > > > > We don't know whether you are Hindu / M> uslim / Christian / Indian / > > pakistani/ Afghanistani > / Iraqi / American or from any part of the > > world > > > but > > only name we can give you is terrorist. > > > > E> ven if you are not reading this we don't care. Time and a> gain you > > tried to > > disturb us and disrupt our life> - killing innocent civilians by > > planting > > bombs i> n trains, buses and cars. You have tried hard to bring de> ath and > > destruction, cause panic and fear and create > communal disharmony but > > everytime you were disgusting> ly unsuccessful. Do you know how we pass > > our > > life> in Mumbai? How much it takes for us to earn that single > rupee? If > > you > > wanted to give us a shock then we a> re sorry to say that you failed > > miserably in your ult> erior motives. Better look elsewere, not here. > > > > We> are not Hindus and Muslims or Gujaratis and Marathis or > Punjabis and > > Bengaliies. Nor do we distinguish oursel> ves as owners or workers, govt. > > employees or private > employees. WE ARE MUMBAIKERS (Bombay-ites, if you > > lik> e). We will not allow you to disrupt our life like this. > On the last > > few > > occassions when you struck (inclu> ding the 7 deadly blasts in a single > > day > > killing > over 250 people and injuring 500+ in 1993), we went to wo> rk > > next > > day in full strength. This time we cleare> d everything within a few > > hours > > and were back to > normal - the vendors placing their next order, > > busine> ssmen > > finalizing the next deals and the office worker> s rushing to catch the > > next > > train. (Yes the same > train you targetted) > > > > Fathom this: Within 3 hours > of the blasts, long queues of blood > > donating > > volu> nteers were seen outside various hospital, where most of > the > > injured > > were admitted. By 12 midnight, the ho> spital had to issue a notification > > that blood banks w> ere full and they didn't require any more blood. The > > > next > > day, attendance at schools and office was close > to 100%, trains & buses > > were packed to the brim, the > crowds were back. > > The city has simply dusted itself o> ff and moved one - perhaps with > > greater > > vigour. >> > > > We are Mumbaikers and we live like brothers in tim> es like this. So, do > > not > > dare to threaten us with> your crackers. The spirit of Mumbai is very > > strong >> > and can not be harmed. > > > > Please forward this to > others. U never know, by chance it may come to > > hands > > > of a terrorist & He / She can then read this message > which is specially > > meant for him / her !!! > > > > Wi> th Love, > > From the people of Mumbai (Bombay) > > _____> ____________________________________ > > reader-list: an > open discussion list on media and the city. > > Critiques> & Collaborations > > To subscribe: send an email to read> er-list-request at sarai.net with > subscribe in the subject> header. > > List archive: > rmail/reader-list/ > > > > > > > -- > Kaiwan Mehta > Arch> itect and Urban Researcher > > 11/4, Kassinath Bldg. No. > 2, Kassinath St., Tardeo, Mumbai 400034 > 022-2-494 3259 > / 91-98205 56436 > ______________________________________> ___ > reader-list: an open discussion list on media and t> he city. > Critiques & Collaborations > To subscribe: sen> d an email to reader-list-request at sarai.net with subscrib> e > in the subject header. > List archive: > l.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/> > ___________________> ______________________ reader-list: an open discussion li> st on media and the city. Critiques & Collaborations To s> ubscribe: send an email to reader-list-request at sarai.net > with subscribe in the subject header. List archive: s://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/> This confidential and proprietary message from Adlabs Films Ltd. is intended only for the named individual. If you are not the addressee please do not disseminate, distribute, save, use or copy this e-mail. In case this e-mail is received in error, please notify the sender immediately by e-mail as also delete this e-mail (and attachments) from your system/s. E-mail transmission cannot be guaranteed to be secure or error-free as information could be intercepted, corrupted, lost, destroyed, arrive late, be incomplete or contain viruses. The sender therefore does not accept liability for any errors or omissions in the contents of this message, which arise as a result of e-mail transmission. If verification is required please request a hard-copy version. Thank you for your cooperation. From clifton at altlawforum.org Wed Jul 19 11:38:04 2006 From: clifton at altlawforum.org (Clifton) Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 11:38:04 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Book release - "Scarred" by Dionne Bunsha, 21st July, Bangalore Message-ID: <44BDCC44.6070108@altlawforum.org> Dear All, Aalternative Law Forum (ALF) and People's Union of Civil Liberties (PUCL-K) would like invite you to the Book release of 'Scarred', by Dionne Bunsha. Dionne Bunsha has been covering the Gujarat pogroms and its aftermath and the collection of her writings go to make up this very important book. For the occasion we thought it would be useful to reflect on the situation, four years after Gujarat also in the context of the rapidly changing situation in Karnataka.For this we have a panel comprising: Dionne Bunsha Gauri Lankesh, Lankesh and Komu Souharda Vedike Parvati Menon ( Frontline ) The discussion will be moderated by Clifton D' Rozario Date : 21.007.06 at 6.00 pm Place: Xavier's Hall, II Floor, Ashirwad, St Marks Road ( The small road next to the petrol bunk, Opposite SBI) 'Scarred' is an intense, moving narrative of the aftermath of the communal violence in Gujarat 2002, which etched deep faults in Gujarat's social landscape. It looks at both the larger as well as the closer picture to understand what happened in Gandhi's Gujarat. "Beautiful... Scarred is not dark, it is one assured step inside the darkness, to explore the light... It's straight-forward, honest to the core, a reporter's authentic notebook on the scars that have refused to heal." - Tehelka From faiz.outsider at gmail.com Tue Jul 18 20:42:03 2006 From: faiz.outsider at gmail.com (faiz) Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 20:42:03 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] A letter from mumbaikar Message-ID: <96c0bb200607180812u8774732yd54f472d712e5ae8@mail.gmail.com> just to add to what prashant has written.. majority of people are pushed towards this city, and a sizeable miniroty of people like me are attracted towards it. a better part of the "spirit of mumbai" is the inability of the people to leave it once they land up here. mumbai the "financial capital" of this country, and mumbai "that contributes the most to the state exchequer" is also the city where people arrive with very big yet seemingly attainable dreams. if maharashtra government were to build a "jaali" at the Kurla, Andheri, or Mumbai central stations, we'll get to see the "200 families that are added to the population of mumbai everday" saying their first prayers there. they'll be found tying the customary piece of thread or piece of a cloth on it in a hope that they'll come and un-tie it the day their "mannat" comes true. but "mannats" are expensive in this city. 73% of the city's households live in 1-room tenements, shanties, kholis, etc. the "spirit" of hunger, and the "spirit" of hopelessness that prevails in parts of this country isn't "spirit"enough. the "spirit" of the "marqaz" that this city has become; of a million dying and already dead dreams, is no different from the the "spirit" that we saw rallying behind the "anti-fanaah" protestors in gujarat, and the meritorious "YOUTH FOR EQUALITY" forum( this deserves "upper case") at the AIIMS. there are (vested) interests to protect and EMIs to pay. what are we going to celebrate and what are we going to condemn. and now that we are done with mumbai...a cheers also to the "spirit" of cities being pounded by apaches as i write. G8 summit is on, my friend can't access his own blog, and the power of CNN IBN has been seen by the world now. much regards, faiz , -----Original message----- From: "Prashant Pandey" jumpshark at gmail.com Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 19:05:44 +0530 To: "kaiwan mehta" kaiwanmehta at gmail.com Subject: Re: [Reader-list] A letter from mumbaikar > Hi My cousin who once used to live in Mumbai and now wo> rking Delhi called me up and said," Mumbai has become a s> hit-hole". I remember when I had met him in Mumbai he wou> ld say " its the best city in the world..." I also rememb> er a family trip to Siddhi Vinayak temple where he told m> e to pray to lord Ganesha...." say ive come here and will> always seek your blessings" This phone call he sounded r> epentant and bitter. He has a big apartment in Mumbai but> now he wants to settle in Delhi. "Its always raining pro> blems in Mumbai." I dont know if he would have said the > same thing if he was working here and had no option to mo> ve out to a different city. I have always suspicious of > this spirit business. I was once travelling in the 2nd cl> ass compartment of the local train. It was unimaginably c> rowded. A man in 40s standing just beside me started swea> ting. He wanted to vomit. He started to gasp for air. I e> mptied my plastic bag and gave it him. In seconds he fill> ed it with foul smelling vomit. Before disembarking I gav> e him a mint gum so that he feels better. Would you call> it spirit ? No. I think this so called spirit is a myth,> a construct. its rather a euphemism for may be a kind of> a collective guilt, extreme form of self-survival instin> cts or selfishness. On 7/17/06, kaiwan mehta ta at gmail.com> wrote: > Hi This is the second time I hav> e received this highly 'spirited' and > emotional mail. > The other version of this letter conviniently assumes th> at > the terrorist essentially sits in Afghanistan, Pakis> tan or Iraq. The front > page of Indian Express, on 14 > July, 2006... has a story on how the Courts in > India do> ubted that the Blasts at the RSS head quarters and anothe> r city in > Maharashtra were doctored from 'within'. An> d about the 'spirit of mumbai' > the 'spirit' has now rea> ched nauseating levels!! One day all of us will die > in > the assumed/presumed garb of 'spirit' of the city.... and> what will be > left is only 'spirit'..... yes read the T> imes of India, Times Review page in > the Sunday 16 July,> 2006 edition. Accept the fact... the city was > jostle> d... the city was literally out of steam at least for two> days after > the blast. Where does our spirit go when > tonnes of families and kids are > thrown homeless brutall> y when the slums were demolished in Bombay/Mumbai > itsel> f? Where does ourr spirit go when people are thrown hom> eless, > landless and jobless when they are evacuated for> Dam constructions? Was my > spirit sleeping when farme> rs are commiting suicides? Maybe I never had a > spirit> till the media gave me one, a week ago!! warm spirits.> .. Kaiwan > > On 7/16/06, Aaditya Dar .com> wrote: > > just wanted to share this mail forward i> got: > > > > > > We don't know whether you are Hindu / M> uslim / Christian / Indian / > > pakistani/ Afghanistani > / Iraqi / American or from any part of the > > world > > > but > > only name we can give you is terrorist. > > > > E> ven if you are not reading this we don't care. Time and a> gain you > > tried to > > disturb us and disrupt our life> - killing innocent civilians by > > planting > > bombs i> n trains, buses and cars. You have tried hard to bring de> ath and > > destruction, cause panic and fear and create > communal disharmony but > > everytime you were disgusting> ly unsuccessful. Do you know how we pass > > our > > life> in Mumbai? How much it takes for us to earn that single > rupee? If > > you > > wanted to give us a shock then we a> re sorry to say that you failed > > miserably in your ult> erior motives. Better look elsewere, not here. > > > > We> are not Hindus and Muslims or Gujaratis and Marathis or > Punjabis and > > Bengaliies. Nor do we distinguish oursel> ves as owners or workers, govt. > > employees or private > employees. WE ARE MUMBAIKERS (Bombay-ites, if you > > lik> e). We will not allow you to disrupt our life like this. > On the last > > few > > occassions when you struck (inclu> ding the 7 deadly blasts in a single > > day > > killing > over 250 people and injuring 500+ in 1993), we went to wo> rk > > next > > day in full strength. This time we cleare> d everything within a few > > hours > > and were back to > normal - the vendors placing their next order, > > busine> ssmen > > finalizing the next deals and the office worker> s rushing to catch the > > next > > train. (Yes the same > train you targetted) > > > > Fathom this: Within 3 hours > of the blasts, long queues of blood > > donating > > volu> nteers were seen outside various hospital, where most of > the > > injured > > were admitted. By 12 midnight, the ho> spital had to issue a notification > > that blood banks w> ere full and they didn't require any more blood. The > > > next > > day, attendance at schools and office was close > to 100%, trains & buses > > were packed to the brim, the > crowds were back. > > The city has simply dusted itself o> ff and moved one - perhaps with > > greater > > vigour. >> > > > We are Mumbaikers and we live like brothers in tim> es like this. So, do > > not > > dare to threaten us with> your crackers. The spirit of Mumbai is very > > strong >> > and can not be harmed. > > > > Please forward this to > others. U never know, by chance it may come to > > hands > > > of a terrorist & He / She can then read this message > which is specially > > meant for him / her !!! > > > > Wi> th Love, > > From the people of Mumbai (Bombay) > > _____> ____________________________________ > > reader-list: an > open discussion list on media and the city. > > Critiques> & Collaborations > > To subscribe: send an email to read> er-list-request at sarai.net with > subscribe in the subject> header. > > List archive: > rmail/reader-list/ > > > > > > > -- > Kaiwan Mehta > Arch> itect and Urban Researcher > > 11/4, Kassinath Bldg. No. > 2, Kassinath St., Tardeo, Mumbai 400034 > 022-2-494 3259 > / 91-98205 56436 > ______________________________________> ___ > reader-list: an open discussion list on media and t> he city. > Critiques & Collaborations > To subscribe: sen> d an email to reader-list-request at sarai.net with subscrib> e > in the subject header. > List archive: > l.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/> > ___________________> ______________________ reader-list: an open discussion li> st on media and the city. Critiques & Collaborations To s> ubscribe: send an email to reader-list-request at sarai.net > with subscribe in the subject header. List archive: s://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/> -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060718/935cb709/attachment.html From hpp at vsnl.com Wed Jul 19 13:39:19 2006 From: hpp at vsnl.com (V Ramaswamy) Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 13:39:19 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] This spirit thing References: <6a8ebcf4a03c9da8777e5a0443dfd0fe@adlabsradio.com> Message-ID: <010301c6ab1c$9fec8630$b6ba41db@Ramaswamy> hullo this spirit thing - is infantile emotionality, unconstrained by any wider or deeper reflection, unfettered by any other counsel. one doesn't doubt the real feeling experienced by these people - but that feeling is be ephemeral, transitory, inconsistent, selective. last night ndtv showed "countrywide" silent solidarity with the mumbai blast victims. the "full of feeling" small group of college youths at the candle-light vigil in front of victoria memorial in calcutta - reminded one of the recent anti-reservation agitationists. their professed feelings - ring so hollow. people get intoxicated in self-righteousness with their own feelings, and there is no one to guide them and help them advance to maturity. juvenile make-up of everyone around them, appreciating their spirit, only serve to make these "spirited" ones feel they are doing something tremendous. simply narcissistic. there's no outpouring of spirit - at the ongoing socio-economic blasts that everyday visit the lives of the labouring poor. From mamtam at aptech.ac.in Wed Jul 19 16:20:34 2006 From: mamtam at aptech.ac.in (Mamta M) Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 16:20:34 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The list of sites blocked as per Hindustan Times In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060719104645.B670E28D965@mail.sarai.net> The list of 17 sites that GOI wants blocked: (From Hindustan Times epaper) 1. www.hinduunity.org 2. mypetjawa.mu.nu 3. pajamaeditors.blogspot.com 4. exposingtheleft.blogspot.com 5. thepiratescove.us 6.commonfolkcommonsense.blogspo t.com 7.bamapachyderm.com 8.princesskimberley.blogspot.com 9.merrimusings.typepad.com 10. mackers-world.com 11.www.dalistan.org 12. www.hinduhumanrights.org/hindufocus.html 13. www.nndh.com 14.bloodroyaltriped.com 15. imagesearchyahoo.com 16. www.imamali8.com 17. www.rahulyadav.com Apparently the last one www.rahulyadav.com has a picture, some links and the following explanation for the picture. "Welcome to my website. This site has been designed around the theme of fall (Autumn). The image at the top simbolizes open windows which lets nature touch you, just an exploration of how a top image with slightly exceeded boundaries "opens" the whole page. Usually, I'm a big fan of simplicity, if I could, I would just put black letters on a white background. Feel free to browse around and find out more about me." Click on 'About Me' and you see these lines. "My name is Rahul Yadav and I'm currently doing my Masters in Information Science at Indiana University - Bloomington. My hobbies include listening to music (Hindi, rap, hip-hop, techno), DJing events, playing basketball and soccer, designing websites, and hanging with friends. I'm the webmaster for the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) at Indiana University as well as a member of Vishwa Hindu Parishad-America (World Hindu Council of America) and the American Hindu Awareness Committee (AHAC)." Apparently, his website has been targetted because he is a member of Vishwa Hindu Parishad-America. -Mamta Unless indicated otherwise, the information contained in this message is privileged and confidential, and is intended only for the use of the addressee(s) named above and others who have been specifically authorized to receive it. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this message and/or attachments is strictly prohibited. The company accepts no liability for any damage caused by any virus transmitted by this email. Furthermore, the company does not warrant a proper and complete transmission of this information, nor does it accept liability for any delays. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender and delete the message. Thank you. From hight at 34n118w.net Thu Jul 20 11:59:21 2006 From: hight at 34n118w.net (hight at 34n118w.net) Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 23:29:21 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] was asked how the current climate of war "feels different"........thought I would share my response Message-ID: <56066.70.34.241.32.1153376961.squirrel@webmail.34n118w.net> The difference is everywhere and nowhere. It informs sounds, shapes, colors, fragments of conversations. The media images are confetti, scatterings, small bits of controlled color and uncertain textures captured together; they are details and pieces of something, but are so small, so not of a whole. The walk past a television or a news display reveals war in so many other ways, in infusions of anger in piles of paper to be collected as though the clutter is of something more, and the futile tiny feeling that at least this can touched with my hands, sorted. It reveals feelings of helplessness among something so much larger than the puny geometry of a human life and its ephemera. The spectre of some unfound context looms in years ahead when whatever this leads to reveals itself in books, documents with zebra stripes of what will never be known, in the cooling of magma that comes in time in terms of what this all will be seen as , and what we are not being told. It makes history seem to reach with bony hands from texts and seem to be given patches of flesh, to seem to violate laws of time and seem so prescient and fused to "now" and all it entails. The air is the same, a rind of orange tastes the same, salt falls on eggs in the same trajectories as before, but something looms, is nestled in pauses in conversations, in unsaid things, and at times breaks volcanic in hot frustrated jets or oozes out slow in narcotized black discussions as though from the grave itself. These are our times. From shekhar at crit.org.in Thu Jul 20 13:50:54 2006 From: shekhar at crit.org.in (Shekhar Krishnan) Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2006 13:50:54 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Mumbai in White, 26 July 2006 Message-ID: <1153383654.16583.362.camel@localhost> OBSERVE "MUMBAI IN WHITE" ON 26 JULY 2006! College students, and all citizens of Mumbai! Wear white on July 26th. White for peace and a memorial to the dead. If you wear uniform, or you don't own anything white, wear a white band! The seven blasts on suburban trains on July 11 shocked Mumbai and the world. Yet Mumbaikars not only kept calm, they went out of their way to help the injured and the families of the dead. Despite Mumbai's inherently cosmopolitanism and its peaceful character, we must actively take measures to ensure that this spirit of resilience and generosity endure. There are always communal elements that will try to vitiate the atmosphere by attempting to target innocents. Mumbai needs to stand together and defeat the attempts of terrorists and communal forces to grind down the city's sense of unity. We must make certain that no more innocent lives are lost. Colleges and citizens' organisations of all hues and sectors have united to urge that we observe July 26, the first anniversary of the floods in which 447 Mumbaikars lost their lives, as a day on which to say "Salaam Mumbai". We appeal to every citizen to wear white on WEDNESDAY 26 JULY 2006, to work, to go anywhere, in memory of those who lost their lives in the blasts as well and to express their commitment to peace. On that day, students from more than 30 city colleges in Mumbai will read a Pledge of Peace in all colleges at 3.00 P.M. exactly. There will also be two public meetings at colleges held at 2.30 P.M. 1. National College, Linking Road, Bandra (West), Mumbai 400051 2. Burhani College, Nesbitt Road, Mazgaon, Mumbai 400010 We request colleges, organisations, NGOs, offices, temples, churches and mosques to please spread the word. Please come to the public meetings and read the pledge of Peace wherever you are. Please remember to wear white on that day! Dr Subadra Anand Principal, National College, Bandra +91.22.2646.1424 Dr. Sabira Dossa Principal, Burhani College Ms Ferrukh S. Waris Burhani College +91.22.2371.2449, +91.93234.69013 Representatives of all colleges in Mumbai Varsha Rajan-Berry Peace Mumbai +91.22.5582.1141/51, +91.98206.03704 -- Shekhar Krishnan 9, Supriya, 2nd Floor Plot 709, Parsee Colony Road no.4 Dadar, Mumbai 400014 India http://www.crit.org.in/members/shekhar http://www.mit.edu/~shekhar http://www.goosebumpgraphics.org From ysaeed7 at yahoo.com Wed Jul 19 20:52:25 2006 From: ysaeed7 at yahoo.com (Yousuf) Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 08:22:25 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] a different twist to cyber blocking Message-ID: <20060719152225.35785.qmail@web51407.mail.yahoo.com> Here is another explanation about Indian govt's cyber-blocking, provided by Indian consulate in New york: From: MikeGhouse at aol.com Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 10:59:20 EDT Subject: Muslim leadership X-DEFANGED-Date: [2] 's action From: A.R.Ghanashyam Subject: Blog Issue in India July 19, 2006 Dear Sree: Reference our discussions and correspondence on the issue of blocking of blogs in India, we had taken up the matter with the authorities concerned in the Department of Telecommunications in the Government of India and the facts are as under: A two-page write up containing extremely derogatory references to Islam and the holy prophet which had the potential to inflame religious sensitivities in India and create serious law and order problems in the country appeared in a blog facilitated by well known search engines. The matter was immediately taken note of by our CERT (Computer Emergency Response Team) and the Department of Telecommunications (DOT) was informed of it. The DOT took up the matter forthwith with the search engines and instructions were also issued to all Internet providers to block the two impertinent pages. Because of a technological error, the Internet providers went beyond what was expected of them which in turn resulted in the unfortunate blocking of all blogs. Department of Telecommunications have now clarified the issue and the error is being rectified and it is expected that normalcy in respect of blogs will soon be restored. This is for your information. A.R. Ghanashyam Deputy Consul General New York --------------------------------- Talk is cheap. Use Yahoo! Messenger to make PC-to-Phone calls. Great rates starting at 1¢/min. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060719/e3c427ae/attachment.html From shahzulf at yahoo.com Thu Jul 20 11:21:17 2006 From: shahzulf at yahoo.com (Zulfiqar Shah) Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 22:51:17 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] On the Road to Santiago, 1986: Paulo Coelho Message-ID: <20060720055117.34745.qmail@web38806.mail.mud.yahoo.com> On the Road to Santiago, 1986 Paulo Coelho “This cloud has to come to an end”, I thought while struggling to discover the yellow marks on the stones and trees along the Road. For nearly half an hour the visibility had been close to zero, and I went on singing to chase away the fear while waiting for something extraordinary to happen. Shrouded in the fog, all alone in that unreal atmosphere, once again I began to see the Road to Santiago as if it were a film, right at the moment when you see the hero doing what nobody would do, while in the audience you think that these things only happen in the cinema. But there I was, living this situation in real life. The forest was growing quieter and quieter and the fog was beginning to clear up. Maybe it was coming to an end, but that light confused my eyes and painted everything around me in mysterious and terrifying colors. All of a sudden, like in a magic trick, the fog lifted completely. And there in front of me, driven into the top of the mountain, was the Cross. I looked around, saw the sea of clouds from which I had emerged, and another sea of clouds way above my head. Between these two oceans, the peaks of the highest mountains and Cebreiro peak with the Cross. I felt a great urge to pray. Despite the desire, I did not manage to say anything. A hundred meters beneath me, a village with fifteen houses and a small church began to turn on its lights. At least I had somewhere to spend the night. A stray lamb climbed the hill and placed itself between me and the cross. It looked at me, somewhat afraid. For a long time I stared at the nearly black sky, the cross and the white lamb at the foot of the cross. “Lord”, I finally said. “I am not nailed to that cross, nor do I see You there. This cross is empty and so it shall remain for ever, because the time of Death has passed. This cross was the symbol of the infinite power that we all have, nailed and killed by man. Now this Power is born again to life, because I have walked the path of common people and in them I have found Your own secret. You too walked the path of common people. You came to teach all that we were capable of, and we did not want to accept this. You showed us that Power and Glory were in everyone’s reach, and this sudden vision of our capacity was too much for us. We crucified You not because we are ungrateful to the son of God but because we were very afraid to accept our own capacity. With time and tradition, You again became just a distant divinity, and we returned to our destiny as men. “There is no sin in being happy. Half a dozen exercises and an attentive ear are enough to make a man realize his most impossible dreams”. The lamb rose and I followed it. I already knew where it was leading me, and despite the clouds the world had grown transparent for me. Even though I was not seeing the Milky Way in the sky, I was certain that it existed and showed everyone the Road to Santiago. I followed the lamb, which was heading in the direction of the small village – also called Cebreiro, like the mountain. A miracle had taken place there once – the miracle of changing what you do into what you believe. The secret of my sword and the strange Road to Santiago. As I climbed down the mountain I recalled the story. A peasant from a nearby village came up to hear Mass in Cebreiro one day amid a heavy storm. That Mass was celebrated by a monk of little faith who within himself disdained the peasant’s sacrifice. But at the moment of the Consecration, the host transformed into the body of Christ and the wine became his blood. The relics are still there, kept in that small chapel, a greater treasure than all the wealth of the Vatican. I went to the small chapel built by the peasant and the monk who had begun to believe in what he did. No-one knew who they were. Two nameless headstones in the cemetery nearby mark the place where their bones are buried. But it is impossible to know which is the monk’s grave and which is the peasant’s. Because, in order to for there to be a miracle, the two forces had to fight the Good Fight. Since then, whenever I am faced with an important challenge, I remember the story of the miracle of Cebreiro. Faith sometimes has to be provoked before it can manifest itself. And this year I am celebrating the twentieth anniversary of my pilgrimage - which changed my life. Next week, on the 25th of July, we commemorate Santiago de Compostela Day. If you can, offer up a prayer in homage to the saint. Warriors of the Light --------------------------------- Why keep checking for Mail? The all-new Yahoo! Mail Beta shows you when there are new messages. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060719/8969a1e4/attachment.html From jeebesh at sarai.net Thu Jul 20 15:10:40 2006 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2006 15:10:40 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] On laughter Message-ID: "To hear myself speculating on military and political matters makes me laugh, as much as it makes me laugh to listen to Syrian, Lebanese, Jordanian, Palestinian, and other Arab leaders. I am thinking again of Jalal Toufic when he writes: "All I ask of this world to which I have already given three books is that it become less laughable, so that I would be able to laugh again without dying of it. And that it does so soon before my somberness becomes second nature. This era has made me somber not only through all the barbarisms and genocides it has perpetuated, but also through being so laughable. Even in this period of the utmost sadness for an Arab in general, and an Iraqi [and Lebanese] in specific, I fear dying of laughter more than of melancholic suicide, and thus I am more prone to relinquish my guard when it comes to being sad than to laughing at laughable phenomena." Walid Raad, Beirut From geert at desk.nl Thu Jul 20 21:33:24 2006 From: geert at desk.nl (geert lovink) Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2006 18:03:24 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] Out of Beirut: Exit Stamp July 17 2006 (Nat Muller) Message-ID: <545f72e9d95f94420db855097d3063b0@desk.nl> > From: "nat muller" > http://siegeoflebanon.blogspot.com/ > > Out of Beirut: Exit Stamp July 17 2006 > > My Lebanese exit stamp reads July 17th; it was supposed to read August > 4th. It wasn’t till the next day, Tuesday July 18th that I arrived with > the second flight of the Dutch evacuation convoy via Aleppo at the > military airbase in Eindhoven. My friends and family were relieved to > see > me “out of Beirut”, and escaping the violence. The flurry of smses > with > these 3 simple words “are you out?” keep coming in till today, July > 20th. > It is strange how an exit can take on different connotations, what is > deemed a lucky escape in one context, is an artistic export product in > another: “Out of Beirut” is the name of an exhibition recently held at > the museum of Modern Art in Oxford. I had made a mental note to ask my > artist friends in Beirut to borrow the catalogue from them. There was > no > time. Nor was there time to say goodbye to friends; it all happened so > quickly. > > I had only registered with the Dutch embassy on Friday July 14th; noone > was picking up the phone so J. and I decided to go there. Very few > people > there, just one obviously distressed Dutchman of Lebanese origin. “I > haven’t been back since 26 years, and now this”, he tells me. The > lady at > the counter copies my passport and asks me for phone numbers. She > reassures me that now we have only reached “Phase I”, and that no > evacuation plans are being made. She advises me to stay in Beirut, and > not attempt to go to Syria by myself, since the embassy cannot vouch > for > my safety. Fine, I wasn’t thinking of leaving to Syria, despite the > many > phone calls of Swiss friends urging me to join them just across the > border > in Tartus. > > In the meanwhile the situation keeps escalating, and bombs keep > pounding > infrastructure, the South, and the Dahiyeh; the casualties mount. We > move > from Qasqas to a friend’s place in Achrafieh. By now electricity is on > and > off. We see the first refugees wandering around bewildered in the > streets > of well-to do Achrafieh. Whenever electricity is on, we are glued to > the > TV. I joke that the only new Arabic word I learned this time around is > “khabar ajil” (breaking news). One wonders when news stops being news, > how long it will take the world this time to turn its head away with > bored > media saturation; how many more atrocities have to be committed before > something can be viewed as “news”. There’s a paralysing silence on the > part of the international community, especially the EU: no official or > strong condemnation of the disproportionate use of force, absolutely > nothing. > > I am in the middle of an interview with Belgian national radio Sunday > night, fulminating at how biased the media coverage is, when an sms of > the > Dutch embassy shows up on my phone: “Evacuation at 5.30 am at the Dutch > embassy; bring money, passport, food, one piece of luggage.” I panic: > to > stay/to go; how can I say goodbye to my friends? I only have hours. > In > the middle of my panic someone from Foreign Affairs in The Hague calls > me. > His voice is so calm and friendly, as if he rehearsed the words and > tone > to perfection. He inquires whether I had received the sms, whether I > was > fine and had any additional questions. “Is the crossing to Syria > safe”, I > ask him. It takes him a few – obviously very composed moments of > silence > to answer me. “ Well, we cannot guarantee that.” “So the only thing > safeguarding us, are a few flags attached to the buses?” “Well, yes, > but > don’t worry. Do you have any further questions, Ma’am?” > > July 17th, 5.30am. J. and I make it to the Dutch embassy. The scene is > surprisingly orderly. This has certainly changed over the past few > days, > as more and more foreign nationals are trying get out of the country. > While queuing up to register I meet my friend Raed, an artist and > musician, but now free-lancing as a cameraman for foreign TV stations. > I > break down in sobs; he tries to calm me down…to no avail. “We will > meet > again soon, Nat, in Amsterdam or in Beirut, inshallah.” I wish I could > believe him. Later on, I chide myself for crying: I don’t have a right > to > tears, with people’s lives being torn apart, their houses and > businesses > destroyed, their loved ones gone. Where on earth do I get the > arrogance to > weep? My goodbye to J. is very short. “See you soon”, he says as he > kisses me. I feel a pang; time has become suspended. Who knows when > “soon” will be. We were supposed to leave together on August 4th for a > holiday in Holland, now my travel companions are about 250 other Dutch > nationals, many of them carrying dual citizenship. > > We only manage to leave around 7.45 a.m. The coordinators had decided > last > minute that probably it would be a better idea to attach the Dutch > flags > on the roofs of the busses, rather than have them in front. Well yes, > the > roof is definitely a better idea for aerial vision than the windscreen. > The whole flag operation takes about an hour. The irony of it all: > only a > week before had we smiled upon the Lebanese passion for football during > the World Cup, and the exuberant flag parade in the city of favourite > teams (Italy, Brazil, Germany, you name it). We had joked how easy and > playful the bearing of a flag was: if your team loses, then you just > pick > another. How exclusive and devoid of choice the bearing of a flag has > become now: it can mean your ticket out, and your only guarantee of > safety, or it means you cannot get out and are fully exposed to the > spoils > of war. > > We slowly make our way out of Beirut, passing familiar places. Many > people > weep; it’s heart-breaking. Once in the bus, I start hearing stories. > One > Dutch woman, fluent in Arabic, had come to the embassy with absolutely > nothing…just the clothes she was wearing. She had fled her house in > Dahiyeh with her kids, not knowing whether it was still standing. > Another > family had been living in Lebanon for over 5 years; doing relief work > in > the Palestinian camps. The decision to leave was extremely hard, but > they > just didn’t want their kids to go through the trauma. And then of > course > the Lebanese-Dutch, who leave family and friends behind. But there are > also a bunch of back-packers and tourists who are pragmatically sober > and > unaffected about it: they aren’t leaving anyone behind. My neighbour > turns > out to be something of a distant colleague; he’s an art professor > teaching > at the art academy in Enschede where I did a few guest lectures. He > just > left his Lebanese girlfriend behind; they only managed to have one day > together before she moved out of the Southern suburbs, to the safety of > mountains. The trip takes ages, in Tripoli we see the bombed out police > station or army HQ, I cannot remember. At the border we hear Tripoli > was > bombed again, moments after we passed it. We get held up 5 hours at the > border, which seems nothing in comparison with the 9 hours of the > Italians, the previous day. I see refugees pushing wheelbarrows filled > with suitcases over the border; people just clutching flimsy plastic > bags, > with no possessions whatsoever. The line of busses and cars keeps > getting > longer and longer, the Lebanese as the Syrian officials have no way of > coping with this. How can bureaucracy matter in times like these? At > the > Dutch embassy in Beirut they had distributed copies of the exit forms > to > us. The Lebanese officials didn't accept the copies; they wanted us to > fill in the proper forms. More delay and agitation in the heat of the > midday sun. Then the Syrians make a fuss about the transit visa…I > become > exasperated: it was better in Beirut. We finally make it to Aleppo > around > 8.30pm. More bureaucracy, this time Dutch. They flew in an evacuation > team. The boys of the Dutch “Koninklijke Marechaussee” (the Royal > Constabulary) look fresh and cleanly-shaven. We on the other hand, are > exhausted, hungry and dirty. At 3.30am, I am finally allowed to board > the > second plane to the military base of Eindhoven. The first plane took > the > elderly, families with small children and pregnant women. The Dutch > have > chartered a Turkish charter with a Turkish crew, since it was > impossible > to get a Dutch carrier on such sort notice due to the holiday season. > The > hostesses are made up and dressed impeccably; they smell of expensive > French perfume. It seems so absurd to me. They beam benevolent smiles > upon us as we scramble for seats. 4,5 hours later we land in Eindhoven. > “Ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to Eindhoven. Thank you for flying > Freebird Airlines; we wish you a pleasant stay.” The protocols of > decorum > seem absolutely grotesque when thinking about what’s happening in > Lebanon. > Everything seems trivial and meaningless, and even words have become > reduced to rubble. > > Nat Muller From diya at sarai.net Fri Jul 21 14:14:25 2006 From: diya at sarai.net (diya at sarai.net) Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2006 10:44:25 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] Govt. seeks to amend/cripple RTI Act Message-ID: <07fc62e24effcd5f570d264e635e89ee@sarai.net> Govt gives in to babus, cripples RTI ALOKE Tikku New Delhi, July 20 File notings put out of bounds, as sought by bureaucrats; activists say it will ‘take life out of the law’ THE CABINET on Thursday gave its nod to an amendment to restrict access to file notings under the Right to Information law, a move that RTI activists say has the potential to practically kill the infant law. "It'll take the entire life out of the law; it's unfortunate," said O.P. Kejriwal, member, Central Information Commission (CIC). Corruption can only be detected in file notings — records of the government's decision-making process. Without them, it will never be revealed who took the decision and on what grounds. The bureaucracy had been quietly pushing the amendment since last year, determined to pull back the iron curtain lifted by the RTI Act when it came into force in October. So quietly that when HT reported the controversial plan in April, RTI activists criticised the plan but hinted that the political leadership would not take the "retrograde" step within months of enacting the law. On Thursday, the cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh caught them off-guard, permitting access to file notings only on plans, schemes, programmes and projects that relate to development and social issues. Earlier, the bureaucracy had interpreted the existing provisions to have barred access to file notings. The CIC had, however, rejected this view. Restricting access to file notings implies that under the RTI law citizens can at best seek what decisions were taken —almost never why. This is why Aruna Roy — among the ones who started the 'right to information' campaign a decade ago — says the government has bowed to pressure from the bureaucracy and the people in power. She said if the amendment was carried through Parliament, "it'll give protection to corruption and the arbitrary use of power. Both these things can be understood in total only if you look at the way decisions are being made." The government had sought to take away half of what it gave a year ago, she said, pledging to "fight every inch" to prevent the cabinet decision from getting parliamentary approval. From amc at autonomous.org Fri Jul 21 20:56:50 2006 From: amc at autonomous.org (amanda mcdonald crowley) Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2006 11:26:50 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] Eyebeam Fellowships 2006-07: Call for Applicants Message-ID: <50E8F072-5A4D-43D6-B2BA-581C97CCD453@autonomous.org> Eyebeam 540 West 21st Street, NY, USA http://www.eyebeam.org Eyebeam is currently calling for Fellowship applications in all three of our lab environments. The application deadline is Aug. 14 at 12pm EST. Up to six Fellowships will be granted for 2006/07. Fellowships will be offered in the R&D OpenLab, the Production Lab and for the first time, in the Education Lab. The focus of the Fellowships varies depending on the tools and skills available and the creative objectives and philosophy of each Lab. For all of the Fellowships we are seeking applications from artists, hackers, designers, engineers and creative technologists to come to Eyebeam for a year to undertake new research and develop new work. The ideal Fellow has experience working with and making innovative technological art projects and/or creative technology projects and has a passion for collaborative development. Fellows will bring this experience and working approach to their own independent projects, projects initiated by other resident artists or Fellows and projects conceived collaboratively during the Fellowship period. SUPPORT The program duration is for 11 months, running from October to August. Fellows are selected from an open call. International applicants are welcome to apply although we do not have the resources to cover travel and accommodation. We are happy to work with selected applicants, where required, to help them to secure funds to cover these expenses. Fellows receive a $30,000 stipend and health benefits during their stay. They are able to take on additional external teaching or consulting work, but there is an expectation that Fellows will be working at Eyebeam a minimum of four days a week. Please read the guidelines for each of the Fellowships carefully. Each working environment has different sets of tools and different mentors/trainers for these tools, so applicants should consider which environment will best suit their own needs and experience. However, all artists, technologists and residents have access across the lab environments and programs. SHARING Working connections at Eyebeam will be fostered though group critiques, discussions and projects, within and between the lab environments and residency programs. Fellows also benefit from critiques, lectures and workshops by external practitioners chosen for their relationship to subjects and projects being worked on in the Labs. All Fellows are encouraged to share their skills and knowledge with the larger Eyebeam community by conducting formal and/or informal workshops with others in the Labs as well as possible workshops open to the public. There are also opportunities to develop work for performance, events, seminars, exhibition or other public programming in the Eyebeam galleries (and beyond) during the term of the fellowship. Core to our principle at Eyebeam is the brokering of relationships between artists, hackers, coders, engineers and other creative technologists and the contexts we provide. The intention is to foster and facilitate relationships whereby technologists and artists can come together to germinate and hothouse their ideas, develop new processes and create new works through a period of immersion in a social context which is rich in technology, expertise and ideas. During 2006 we are also establishing research groups to bring together creative practitioners working at Eyebeam as well as expert external participants to develop new research leading to possible public outcomes including seminars, public discussion and exhibition. LAB ENVIRONMENTS Production Studio http://www.eyebeam.org/production/production.php?page=midfellows R&D OpenLab http://www.eyebeam.org/production/production.php?page=rdfellows Education Studio http://www.eyebeam.org/production/production.php?page=edfellows RESEARCH Themes for 2006/07 include (though will not be limited to): - Energy, Technology and Sustainability; - Urban research, urban interventions and media in public space. Artists and creative technologists interested in these research areas are particularly encouraged to apply for 2006/07 Fellowships. TO APPLY: http://www.eyebeam.org/production/production.php?page=felcall Founded in 1997, Eyebeam is an art and technology center that provides a fertile context and state-of-the-art tools for digital experimentation. It is a lively incubator of creativity and thought, where artists and technologists actively engage with the larger culture, addressing the issues and concerns of our time. Eyebeam challenges convention, celebrates the hack, educates the next generation, encourages collaboration, freely offers its output to the community, and invites the public to share in a spirit of openness: open source, open content and open distribution. Eyebeam's programs are made possible through the generous support of Atlantic Foundation, Time Warner Youth Media and Arts Fund, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, Alienware, the Jerome Foundation, the Helena Rubinstein Foundation, the Greenwall Foundation, the Bay Branch Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, the David S. Howe Foundation, the Lerer Family Charitable Foundation and the Sony Corporation. Location: 540 W. 21st Street between 10th & 11th Avenues Hours: Tuesday - Saturday, 12:00 - 6:00pm Bookstore: Tuesday - Saturday, 12:00 - 6:00pm From amc at autonomous.org Fri Jul 21 21:50:33 2006 From: amc at autonomous.org (amanda mcdonald crowley) Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2006 12:20:33 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] Eyebeam Residency Fall 2006-07: Call for Applicants Message-ID: <08DE4986-9692-4B54-9513-45CC3BADE1CA@autonomous.org> Eyebeam 540 West 21st Street, NY, USA http://www.eyebeam.org Eyebeam is currently calling for applications for five-six month Residency opportunities. The application deadline is Aug. 21 at 12pm EST. Artists, hackers, designers, engineers and creative technologists are invited to apply to be Residents at Eyebeam, to work for six months on projects or research of artistic endeavor or creative expression. The ideal Resident has experience working with and generating innovative technological art and/or creative technology projects and has a passion for interdisciplinary exchange. Residents will be selected from an open call, based on the work being proposed, the availability of the necessary tools and skills to support them, and in consideration of the overarching research themes and activities of the organization. International applicants are welcome to apply, although we do not have the resources to cover travel or accommodation. We are happy to work with selected applicants, if required, to help them secure funds to cover these expenses. Residents receive 24/7 access to Eyebeam’s Chelsea facility in New York City, including equipment and technical expertise from Eyebeam staff and Fellows, a $5000 honorarium, the potential for collaborative exchange with other Residents as well as support from interns. The program term is approximately from September to February and March to August with the potential for extension and/or re- application. Group discussions and interdisciplinary projects, within and between the lab environments and organizational programs foster connections with other artists and staff. Residents also benefit from critiques, lectures and workshops by external practitioners chosen for their relationship to subjects and projects being worked on in the Labs. All Residents are encouraged to share their skills and knowledge with the larger Eyebeam community by conducting formal and/or informal workshops with others in the Labs as well as possible workshops open to the public. There are also opportunities to develop work for performance, events, seminars, exhibition or other public programming in the Eyebeam galleries and beyond during the Residency term. Fostering relationships between artists, hackers, coders, engineers and other creative technologists is central to Eyebeam’s mission. The intention is to facilitate relationships whereby technologists and artists can come together to germinate and hothouse their ideas, develop new processes and create new works through a period of immersion in a social context which is rich in technology, expertise and ideas. Looking forward, we are also establishing research groups to bring together creative practitioners working at Eyebeam with expert external participants to develop new research leading to possible public outcomes including seminars, public discussion and exhibition. Research Themes for 2006-07 include (though will not be limited to): - Energy, Technology and Sustainability - Urban research, urban interventions and media in public space Artists and creative technologists interested in these research areas are particularly encouraged to apply for 2006/07 Residencies. Please read the descriptions for the Labs carefully. All Residents and Fellows have access to shared resources across the lab environments. Creating programs and collaborations across the Labs is encouraged. However, each lab environment at Eyebeam has different sets of tools and different mentors/trainers for these tools, so applicants should consider if and how these environments suit their needs and experience. TO APPLY for a Fall 2006-07 Residency please visit http://eyebeam.org/ production/onlineapp/ ** Please note Fellowship applications are also being accepted in the R&D OpenLab, the Production Lab and the Education Lab. The application deadline for Fellowships is Aug. 14 at 12pm EST. Please read all Fellowship and Residency opportunities thoroughly before selecting the application which you would like to submit. Founded in 1997, Eyebeam is an art and technology center that provides a fertile context and state-of-the-art tools for digital experimentation. It is a lively incubator of creativity and thought, where artists and technologists actively engage with the larger culture, addressing the issues and concerns of our time. Eyebeam challenges convention, celebrates the hack, educates the next generation, encourages collaboration, freely offers its output to the community, and invites the public to share in a spirit of openness: open source, open content and open distribution. Eyebeam's programs are made possible through the generous support of Atlantic Foundation, Time Warner Youth Media and Arts Fund, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, Alienware, the Jerome Foundation, the Helena Rubinstein Foundation, the Greenwall Foundation, the Bay Branch Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, the David S. Howe Foundation, the Lerer Family Charitable Foundation and the Sony Corporation. Location: 540 W. 21st Street between 10th & 11th Avenues Hours: Tuesday - Saturday, 12:00 - 6:00pm Bookstore: Tuesday - Saturday, 12:00 - 6:00pm From rana at ranadasgupta.com Sat Jul 22 19:51:06 2006 From: rana at ranadasgupta.com (Rana Dasgupta) Date: Sat, 22 Jul 2006 19:51:06 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Chomsky on Lebanon/Gaza Message-ID: <44C23452.5060603@ranadasgupta.com> http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article14081.htm R Rana Dasgupta www.ranadasgupta.com From paulo.hartmann at mobilefest.com.br Sat Jul 22 21:28:11 2006 From: paulo.hartmann at mobilefest.com.br (paulo.hartmann) Date: Sat, 22 Jul 2006 12:58:11 -0300 Subject: [Reader-list] Mobilefest - call for papers and projects Message-ID: MOBILEFEST 2006 SYMPOSIUM CALL FOR PAPERS & PROJECTS MOBILEFEST is the First International Festival of Mobile Art and Creativity, and will take place in September, in Sao Paulo, Brazil. In its first edition, it aims to discuss the sociological, cultural and esthetics implications that mobile phones and their technologies have been promoting globally. In fact, the global transformations the world has been gone through have modified the way we realize, interpret and represent reality. Nowadays the great majority of people worldwide make use of numerous mobile devices, and artists, engineers, technologists and civil society propose new applications daily for the use of this recent technology. Therefore, within this context comes MOBILEFEST - International Festival of Mobile Art and Creativity, a Brazilian project that consists of the realization of an international symposium, awarding of the best national works that involve mobile technology and educational workshops. MOBILEFEST 2006 seeks paper and presentation proposals responding to the Symposium themes: How can Mobile Technology contribute to democracy, culture, art, ecology, peace, education, health and third-sector? SUBMISSION PROCEDURE FOR OPEN CALLS: Submissions should be sent by July 31st 2006 via email to papers at mobilefest.org, papers at mobilefest.com.br including the following information: Complete name: Age: Country: City: Telephone number: Mobile number: University (optional): University level (optional): Proposed category (democracy, culture, art, ecology, peace, education, health and third-sector): Papers submitted are limited to 30 minutes. Paper presenters will be grouped thematically according to the proposed category. Submissions should include a brief description of the proposed presentation (up to 200 words) inclusive work and participants along with appropriate documentation. (rtf, doc or pdf) Send your submission to: papers at mobilefest.org or papers at mobilefest.com.br All selected presentations will be Webcast live and also available as podcasts immediately following presentation. DEADLINES - IMPORTANT DATES: Submission of proposal abstracts: July 31th, 2006 Notification: August 10th, 2006 For help or questions: festival at mobilefest.org or festival at mobilefest.com.br http://www.mobilefest.org Versão em Português -------------------------------------------------------------------> MOBILEFEST 2006 SIMPÓSIO CHAMADA DE TRABALHOS: O MOBILEFEST, o primeiro Festival Internacional de Arte e Criatividade Móvel, será realizado no mês de setembro em São Paulo. Em sua primeira edição, discute as implicações sociais, culturais e estéticas que os celulares e as tecnologias móveis vêm promovendo em escala global. As transformações tecnológicas recentes vêm modificando as maneiras de percebermos, representarmos e interpretarmos a realidade. Hoje, grande parte da população mundial já faz uso dos inúmeros dispositivos móveis. Artistas, engenheiros, tecnólogos e a sociedade civil propõem diariamente novas aplicações para a utilização dessas tecnologias. É neste contexto que surge o MOBILEFEST, Festival Internacional de Arte e Criatividade Móvel, um projeto brasileiro, fundamentado na diversidade cultural, composto por simpósio, premiação de projetos que utilizam dispositivos móveis e workshops educativos. O MOBILEFEST 2006 está aberto para o recebimento de propostas de projetos e trabalhos que respondam aos seguintes temas: Como a Tecnologia Móvel pode contribuir para a democracia, cultura, arte, ecologia, paz, educação, saúde e o terceiro-setor? PROCEDIMENTOS PARA INSCRIÇÃO: As inscrições devem ser feitas até dia 31 de julho através de email enviado para papers at mobilefest.org, papers at mobilefest.com.br com as seguintes informações: Nome completo: Idade: País: Cidade: Telefone: Celular: Universidade (não obrigatório): Nível de graduação (não obrigatório): Categoria proposta (democracia, cultura, arte, ecologia, paz, educação, saúde e terceiro setor): As apresentações enviadas deverão ter duração de até 30 minutos. Os projetos enviados serão selecionados por categorias, indicadas no formulário de inscrição. As inscrições deverão incluir uma breve descrição da apresentação proposta (200 palavras no máximo), informações técnicas e participantes envolvidos, em formato rtf, doc ou pdf. Envie seu trabalho para: papers at mobilefest.org ou papers at mobilefest.com.br Todas as apresentações selecionadas serão transmitidas ao vivo através da internet e estarão disponíveis em podcast em seguida. PRAZOS – DATAS IMPORTANTES: Envio de projetos: 31 de julho de 2006 Notificação: 10 de agosto de 2006 Em caso de dúvidas, escreva para: festival at mobilefest.org ou festival at mobilefest.com.br http://www.mobilefest.org Paulo Hartmann 5511 94531314 ((((((MOBILEFEST)))))) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ www.mobilefest.com.br 5511 30401668 Rua Helena 280, 1107 04552-050 Sao Paulo Brazil From machine at zerosofzeta.com Sun Jul 23 12:09:56 2006 From: machine at zerosofzeta.com (Yogi) Date: Sun, 23 Jul 2006 12:09:56 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The list of sites blocked as per Hindustan Times In-Reply-To: <20060719104645.B670E28D965@mail.sarai.net> References: <20060719104645.B670E28D965@mail.sarai.net> Message-ID: <1d804b40607222339j7dcf809ei65d7288d90310bd3@mail.gmail.com> This is absolutely ridiculous. I went to a few of these websites using a proxy and found absolutely nothing worth censoring. I see more potentially offensive stuff in the newspapers everyday. -yogi On 7/19/06, Mamta M wrote: > The list of 17 sites that GOI wants blocked: > (From Hindustan Times epaper) > > 1. www.hinduunity.org > 2. mypetjawa.mu.nu > 3. pajamaeditors.blogspot.com > 4. exposingtheleft.blogspot.com > 5. thepiratescove.us > 6.commonfolkcommonsense.blogspo t.com > 7.bamapachyderm.com > 8.princesskimberley.blogspot.com > 9.merrimusings.typepad.com > 10. mackers-world.com > 11.www.dalistan.org > 12. www.hinduhumanrights.org/hindufocus.html > 13. www.nndh.com > 14.bloodroyaltriped.com > 15. imagesearchyahoo.com > 16. www.imamali8.com > 17. www.rahulyadav.com > > Apparently the last one www.rahulyadav.com has a picture, some links and the > following explanation for the picture. > > "Welcome to my website. This site has been designed around the theme of fall > (Autumn). The image at the top simbolizes open windows which lets nature > touch you, just an exploration of how a top image with slightly exceeded > boundaries "opens" the whole page. Usually, I'm a big fan of simplicity, if > I could, I would just put black letters on a white background. Feel free to > browse around and find out more about me." > > Click on 'About Me' and you see these lines. > > "My name is Rahul Yadav and I'm currently doing my Masters in Information > Science at Indiana University - Bloomington. My hobbies include listening to > music (Hindi, rap, hip-hop, techno), DJing events, playing basketball and > soccer, designing websites, and hanging with friends. I'm the webmaster for > the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) at Indiana University as well > as a member of Vishwa Hindu Parishad-America (World Hindu Council of > America) and the American Hindu Awareness Committee (AHAC)." > > Apparently, his website has been targetted because he is a member of Vishwa > Hindu Parishad-America. > > -Mamta > > > > Unless indicated otherwise, the information contained in this message is privileged and confidential, and is intended only for the use of the addressee(s) named above and others who have been specifically authorized to receive it. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this message and/or attachments is strictly prohibited. The company accepts no liability for any damage caused by any virus transmitted by this email. Furthermore, the company does not warrant a proper and complete transmission of this information, nor does it accept liability for any delays. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender and delete the message. Thank you. > > _________________________________________ > 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 mamtam at aptech.ac.in Mon Jul 24 09:11:22 2006 From: mamtam at aptech.ac.in (Mamta M) Date: Mon, 24 Jul 2006 09:11:22 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The list of sites blocked as per Hindustan Times In-Reply-To: <1d804b40607222339j7dcf809ei65d7288d90310bd3@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20060724033732.9AFDE28D732@mail.sarai.net> Exactly. But tell that to the Government and to the ISPs who blocked them. *They* certainly don't seem to think so. -Mamta -----Original Message----- From: pechkas at gmail.com [mailto:pechkas at gmail.com] On Behalf Of Yogi Sent: Sunday, July 23, 2006 12:10 PM To: Mamta M Cc: reader-list at sarai.net Subject: Re: [Reader-list] The list of sites blocked as per Hindustan Times This is absolutely ridiculous. I went to a few of these websites using a proxy and found absolutely nothing worth censoring. I see more potentially offensive stuff in the newspapers everyday. -yogi On 7/19/06, Mamta M wrote: > The list of 17 sites that GOI wants blocked: > (From Hindustan Times epaper) > > 1. www.hinduunity.org > 2. mypetjawa.mu.nu > 3. pajamaeditors.blogspot.com > 4. exposingtheleft.blogspot.com > 5. thepiratescove.us > 6.commonfolkcommonsense.blogspo t.com > 7.bamapachyderm.com > 8.princesskimberley.blogspot.com > 9.merrimusings.typepad.com > 10. mackers-world.com > 11.www.dalistan.org > 12. www.hinduhumanrights.org/hindufocus.html > 13. www.nndh.com > 14.bloodroyaltriped.com > 15. imagesearchyahoo.com > 16. www.imamali8.com > 17. www.rahulyadav.com > > Apparently the last one www.rahulyadav.com has a picture, some links > and the following explanation for the picture. > > "Welcome to my website. This site has been designed around the theme > of fall (Autumn). The image at the top simbolizes open windows which > lets nature touch you, just an exploration of how a top image with > slightly exceeded boundaries "opens" the whole page. Usually, I'm a > big fan of simplicity, if I could, I would just put black letters on a > white background. Feel free to browse around and find out more about me." > > Click on 'About Me' and you see these lines. > > "My name is Rahul Yadav and I'm currently doing my Masters in > Information Science at Indiana University - Bloomington. My hobbies > include listening to music (Hindi, rap, hip-hop, techno), DJing > events, playing basketball and soccer, designing websites, and hanging > with friends. I'm the webmaster for the Association for Computing > Machinery (ACM) at Indiana University as well as a member of Vishwa > Hindu Parishad-America (World Hindu Council of > America) and the American Hindu Awareness Committee (AHAC)." > > Apparently, his website has been targetted because he is a member of > Vishwa Hindu Parishad-America. > > -Mamta > > > > Unless indicated otherwise, the information contained in this message is privileged and confidential, and is intended only for the use of the addressee(s) named above and others who have been specifically authorized to receive it. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this message and/or attachments is strictly prohibited. The company accepts no liability for any damage caused by any virus transmitted by this email. Furthermore, the company does not warrant a proper and complete transmission of this information, nor does it accept liability for any delays. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender and delete the message. Thank you. > > _________________________________________ > 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: Unless indicated otherwise, the information contained in this message is privileged and confidential, and is intended only for the use of the addressee(s) named above and others who have been specifically authorized to receive it. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this message and/or attachments is strictly prohibited. The company accepts no liability for any damage caused by any virus transmitted by this email. Furthermore, the company does not warrant a proper and complete transmission of this information, nor does it accept liability for any delays. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender and delete the message. Thank you. From mail at shivamvij.com Mon Jul 24 22:57:42 2006 From: mail at shivamvij.com (Shivam Vij) Date: Mon, 24 Jul 2006 22:57:42 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The list of sites blocked as per Hindustan Times In-Reply-To: <20060724033732.9AFDE28D732@mail.sarai.net> References: <1d804b40607222339j7dcf809ei65d7288d90310bd3@mail.gmail.com> <20060724033732.9AFDE28D732@mail.sarai.net> Message-ID: <9c06aab30607241027q1b26ab01y4714420de84d2123@mail.gmail.com> (An edited version of this article by me has appeared in the Hindustan Times today. Comments welcome) Resistance is Futile In May last year, impressed with the idea of bloggers being allowed into press conferences in the US, India's Principal Information Officer Shakuntala Mahawal told The Economic Times that the government was considering doling out press accreditation to Indian bloggers. Far from impressed, Indian bloggers responded with conspiracy theories about how this could be a step towards regulation. In May this year, speaking in a seminar at Sarai-CSDS, lit-blogger Nilanjana S. Roy predicted a clash between bloggers and the Indian government in the next five years. She might as well have said five months, because in July the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) asked Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to block access to 17 websites, of which five were blogs, and the incompetent ISPs ended up blocking the entire Blogspot and Typepad domains, thereby censoring, in effect, hundreds of thousands of blogs from all over the world. The error was corrected a week later after bloggers created a lot of hullabaloo. In the list of seventeen, seven were right-wing American sites. Some of these contain considerable anti-Islamic venom of the Holy Book-flushing kind, but in the post 9/11 world you will find so many such webpages that it is practically impossible to block them all. They also blocked three NRI Hindutvawaadi sites. Some of these sites are thanking now thanking the Indian government for bringing them in the news and increasing their traffic. How do I know this? Simple: I can still read those sites via anonymisers like anonymouse.org. Let's get this straight, once and for all: You can't ban anything on the Net. Imagine the national furore if we were talking here about banning 17 books. As Indian citizens, many bloggers are planning to ask the government, through Right to Information applications, why these seventeen sites are being censored at all, and also challenge such censorship through public interest litigation. The issue has served as a moment of crisis, bringing bloggers together, working collaboratively from across five continents, to resolve the issue, exchange information, email people to ask for help and clarifications, and perhaps most importantly, to get the news into the mainstream media so as to put pressure on the authorities. The last time there was a comparable crisis with a clear 'enemy' was when a management institute was criticised by a youth magazine, the story linked to by the magazine's editor on her blog, and then by other bloggers, one of who said that the institute "screws around with peoples lives." Language that a newspaper would never use. The management institute sent the two bloggers legal notices to scare them into deleting the posts. They did not and the institute only made a fool of itself with adverse media coverage. When there is a tsunami or a terrorist attack, the 'help' blogs come into action, collating help and rescue information. There are also individual bloggers reporting their experience of such events first-hand on their blogs, a model that news channels are trying to replicate as 'citizen journalism'. Ordinary individuals as both producers and consumers of media is a done-to-death idea, coming as it is from the US. But the idea of collaborative online help sites in times of disasters is very much Made-in-India, replicated in events like Hurricane Katrina in the US, and the credit for this goes to the Mumbai-based communications consultant, Peter Griffin. Another aspect of such collaborative online fire-fighting is the appearance of angels who are otherwise not very active participants of the Indian blogosphere, such as Angelo Embuldeniya, a Bahrain-based geek. But crises strike only once in a while. Bloggers usually go about blogging as part of their daily routines. Bloggers write (usually) short 'posts' and create meaning constantly created through hyperlinks. They link to articles on websites and other blogs to discuss them; they link their favourite websites on their blogs' sidebar, and "blogroll" their favourite bloggers. Links are important because the more people link to your blog, the higher your site turns up in search engines, the more visitors you get, and the higher rank you get in Technorati, which is to bloggers what Google is to journalists. They install a 'sitemeter' on their sites by which they can see exactly who visited their blog, when and from which link. Just like other online media, people meet each other through blogging, people make friends and enemies, find soul-mates and jobs. Sitting alone behind a computer screen, writing away whatever they feel like in whatever language they want to, being read daily by at the most a few hundred people, bloggers often do not realise that their words are going to be on Google. Even when a blog is personal, it is very public. As a blogger grows in popularity, he realises the power of words, and with power comes responsibility. There is of course a lot of abuse ('trolling' and 'flaming') but that is par for the course. Anonymous blogs seek to push the limits of fearless speech. One Delhi journalist writes a chic-blog about her love and sex life. Can a woman do that under her own name in even a progressive English-language newspaper in this country? Considering it is such an ordinary activity, I wonder why blogging makes a sexy story. I was once on a TV channel talking about "pro blogging" and was shown writing a post as though I was an animal from the zoo, on public display. A fellow blogger-writer, Monica Mody, tells me that the marriage of alternative and mainstream media is not surprising because when the mainstream sees "something they don't understand, with people all smug and satisfied about it, they want to know what's going on." Some journalists resent bloggers for their distrust of mainstream media (MSM, in blogging lingo). But individuals have always been distrustful of big media, only that for the first time they have a place to express it. Once a journalist in a Delhi supplement did a story about "splogs" or 'spam blogs', and got his facts all wrong. A blogger called Saket Vaidya panned the story on his blog, calling the journalist a 'dolt'. The journalist responded by landing up at a public bloggers' meet in Delhi, posing as a lay observer, and then did a story the next day with lies about how these bloggers were praising themselves. Vaidya and others responded by permanently defacing the Google search on the journalist's name. The incident is fondly remembered as a 'sting operation' against bloggers. The blogs-versus-MSM balance gets complicated when you realise that so many of the prominent bloggers are themselves journalists. And so it was that a scurrilous blog called War for News came up in January this year, with loads of gossip and bitching about journalists in English news channels. It is said to be the handiwork of a print journalist in Delhi. How have the TV channels responded to it? Some of them have blocked it in their offices. http://hindustantimes.com/news/181_1751191,00120001.htm From anivar.aravind at gmail.com Tue Jul 25 01:06:02 2006 From: anivar.aravind at gmail.com (Anivar Aravind) Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2006 01:06:02 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Bangalore to Host the 4th International Conference on GPLv3 In-Reply-To: <35f96d470607241235t57016f7bxbf6ce7e409c02c1b@mail.gmail.com> References: <35f96d470607241230w7e7a3250mc4f08fb802c968c0@mail.gmail.com> <35f96d470607241235t57016f7bxbf6ce7e409c02c1b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <35f96d470607241236p1d1933fdp285be34921b69a51@mail.gmail.com> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Bangalore to Host the Fourth International Conference on GPLv3 India will host the Fourth International GPLv3 Conference in Bangalore, this August 23-24, 2006. A part of the world-wide drive to create awareness about the upcoming version three of the GNU General Public License (GPLv3), the two-day conference is expected to draw delegates from across the communities - legal, bureaucrat and academia. While the first day will see Richard M Stallman and Eben Moglen, the original architects of the GPLv3 license, communicating latest updates on the GPLv3 final draft, the second day holds panel discussions on localisation, awareness and adoption of GPLv3 and threat of Digital Restrictions Management (DRM). The event to be held at the Indian Institute of Management - Bangalore is a sequence to the Third International GPLv3 Conference that took place in Barcelona, Spain. Similar events have already been held in the USA and Brazil. The international GPLv3 conferences are part of a year-long public consultation process to update the GNU General Public License (GPL). The version 3 of the GPL, essentially, takes into account changes in terms of legal and technical environment, in which software licenses operate, and the need to increase protection against new threats such as software patents and Digital Restrictions Management (DRM). The worldwide awareness drive for GPLv3, is to ensure that, all users of software distributed under its terms, have the freedom to examine, share, and modify that software. For registration kindly visit GPLv3 conference website http://gplv3.gnu.org.in For Details, kindly contact: Arun M (FSF-I) arun at gnu.org.in Prof Rahul De' (IIM-B) rahul at iimb.ernet.in Abhas Abhinav (FSUG-Bangalore) abhas at deeproot.co.in Venue: IIM-B Date: 23, 24 August, 2006 Contact numbers: Abhas Abhinav (FSUG-Bangalore) #080-41124785 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- "Value your freedom, or you will lose it, teaches history. `Don't bother us with politics', respond those who don't want to learn." -- Richard Stallman Anivar Aravind http://movingrepublic.org From rahulpandita at yahoo.com Tue Jul 25 14:22:24 2006 From: rahulpandita at yahoo.com (rahul pandita) Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2006 09:52:24 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Reader-list] Skull and cotton candy Message-ID: <20060725085224.17684.qmail@web31710.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Last night he came home quite late. He arrived in the car provided to him by the company since he happened to be a Senior Special Correspondent now. On the wind shield and on the rear glass of the car, they had pasted a channel sticker. On the traffic singal, when people saw those stickers, they would inadvertently peep inside the car. Many would even recongnise him. A lot of fan mail also arrived in the office. There was this letter from a girl who said she loved him because he looked very 'cute' on the Television. She had further added that if he also loved her then he should wear a sky-blue shirt while appearing on Television the next day. The girl had also sent a photo of hers. He looked at the photo. She looked like Mona Verma. When he was a Principal Correspondent in Lala Ji's channel, Mona Verma had joined then as an intern. In two weeks time, she was anchoring a morning bulletin. Whenever output editor Gaurav Sinha saw her, he would smile which almost qualified as a grin. But whenever he saw him, Gaurav would make such an ugly face as if Dracula had bitten his neck. Whenever he had to meet Gaurav Sinha, he would force his hands into the depths of his trousers' pockets. He feared that if his hands listened to his heart, he would pick up a chair lying nearby and break it on Gaurav Sinha's head. The same Mona Verma was the lead anchor of Phataphat channel now. In media circles, those days, anchors were a topic of discussion. Many were of the opinion that without reporting experience, putting someone on air as anchor was stupidity. Though nobody reached at any conclusion, the anchors became very conscious about this fact. So much so that they would try to grab a reporting assignment every now and then to prove themselves. That evening the same bug bit Mona Verma. She went to Gaurav Sinha and after throwing her typical 'Madhubala' sad smile at him, she managed to get herself an assignment. The Prime Minister was scheduled to launch an album of songs. The songs, based on his poems, were sung by a famous Ghazal singer. Mona was supposed to cover the event live. Mr. Prime Minister came, he cut open the album's first copy and dozens of camera bulbs flashed. At seven, Mona had to give a live chat from the location. The 7 pm bulletin began. Headlines were read and the anchor in the studio, who happened to be Mona's friend said: Aayiye ab aapko seedhe liye chalte hein Siri Fort auditorium jahan humari sanwaadata Mona Verma maujood hai. Mona, aapse jaan na chahenge ki is album mein Pradhaanmantri ji ka sabse pasand deeda geet kaun sa hai? Mona was in front of the camera, holding a mike in one hand and adjusting her ear-peice with the other. She nodded while the question was asked. Then she smiled and said: Ji Vaibhavi, waise to Pradhaanmantri ji ko saare geet unke niji jaddojehad ki yaad dilate hein, pur eik geet jo unhe sabse zyaada pasand hai, uski panktiyan mein darshakon ke liye dohra rahi hun: Kaal ke kapaas pur likh-likh kar mitata hun, geet naya gaata hun... The studio producer banged his head against the edit machine. He yelled through Mona's ear-piece: Kapaas nahi kapaal (It is skull, not cotton) Mona stood still for few seconds and then she said - maaf kijiye, panktiyan yun hein: Kaal ke compass pur likh-likh kar mitata hun, geet naya gaata hun... In the Yamlok, Yama, the God of death, laughed till he fell down from his buffalo. Then he remarked: Pradhaanmantri Ji, pehle is sundari ki bhasha ko sudharo, bade aaye kapaal pur likhne waale... The next day, he appeared on Television, wearing a deep red-coloured shirt. In the night he dreamt that the girl who had sent him a photo was writing something on his kapaal (skull) with a permanent marker. He woke up, startled, his whole body drenched in sweat. Rahul Pandita www.sanitysucks.blogspot.com Mobile: 9818088664 ___________________________________________________________ Try the all-new Yahoo! Mail. "The New Version is radically easier to use" – The Wall Street Journal http://uk.docs.yahoo.com/nowyoucan.html From arshad.mcrc at gmail.com Tue Jul 25 18:34:43 2006 From: arshad.mcrc at gmail.com (arshad amanullah) Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2006 18:34:43 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] views on the practice of homosexuality in the Muslim society Message-ID: <2076f31d0607250604lb9a1bafqc3d008f386809410@mail.gmail.com> Views on the practice of homosexuality in the Muslim society by: Arshad Amanullah Irshad Mnji's book 'The Trouble with Islam Today: A Wake-Up Call for Honesty and Change' (Imprint One, New Delhi, 2005) asks: Can Islam and homosexuality be reconciled? (P23). The subject of homosexuality is not new to the Muslim society. One may find recurring mention of the concept in its theological literature. The Quran has a chapter called 'Lot', after the name of a prophet, who had been sent towards people who openly used to practice homosexuality. The mission of this prophet was to persuade them to give it up. Being disappointed with the stubborn attitudes of the people, he invoked the Allah's wrath to turn their settlements upside down and Allah responded to his plea. Exegeses on the Quran written throughout history dealt with the issue and, thus, kept on adding, though homogenous in nature, to the body of the literature available on the theme. However, one may trace some murmurs among the exegetes regarding the interpretation of the word 'ghilman' used for those small beautiful kids who, apart from hoors, would be in the heaven to serve its residents. Likewise, the Hadis literature, being the explanation of the Quran, is replete with the references to homosexuality, denouncing it vociferously. I have a madrasa day memory. Once a lady asked for the opinion of the muftis about her husband who used to do only annul sex with her. The council of muftis at Jamia Salafia, Varanasi, unanimously advised her to seek khula from her husband if he does not improve his ways. In the corpus of jurisprudence, there are discussions about the fate of the person who does annul sex with animals, like donkeys and horses. >From a vintage point different from that of the Shi'a-Sunni divide, segregation between the sharia and tariqa is another significant division within Islam which paved the way for the emergence of a subculture within the Muslim society. It is this division which explains why the Sufis and ulema have been at the loggerheads through out the history of Islam. Sufis are on record to accuse ulema of being externalists, without understanding the kernels of the message of Islam. Urdu as well as Persian poetry is full of such themes. In a beautiful couplet, mocking at the obsession of Ulema with the externalities of an individual's behaviour, one Sufi poet says: Tar damani pe sheikh hamari na jaiyo Daman nichor den to farishte wuzu karen (O sheikh! Don't bother about the fact of being my attire drenched in liquor. Its holiness can be gauged from the fact that if I wriggle it, the angels will rush to do wuzu out of its drops.). On the other hand, ulema unfailingly used every opportunity to tell the public that Sufis in most cases are homosexual. They ad nauseam narrate how Sarmad was desperately in love with a Brahmin boy of Lahore and how he kept on wandering naked on the streets of the city. That's why, they justify, he was beheaded on the order of Aurangzeb who, unlike Dara Shikoh, was strongly opposed to the Sufi Islam. Am'rad, a widely used term in the madrasa circle, signifies those males who are yet to grow moustache and beard. Madrasa authorities and teachers are often accused of being 'amrad parast' for extending unusual help to those students who are amrad. In the madrasa lingo, they are also referred as golden or black golden, those who have dark complexion. They are often teased by their class-fellows or/and room mates, in case of boarding madrasa. Moreover, students normally look at golden or black golden with suspicion of being involved in homosexual activities. Cases of their being sodomised, by teachers or elder students, also sometimes, come into light. Subhashini Ali, the politician and social activist, once relegated an account of a small boy whom she admitted in a madrasa near Kanpur. After some days, the boy fled away from the madrasa due to being subjected to the sodomy. Subhashini furiously exclaimed: 'Had I arranged for the medical check-up of the boy, all maulvis would have been caught red-handed'. In some cases, having 'caught', the partners confessed how it had started as sodomy and, later on, transformed into the consented relationships. Here it should be born in mind that most of the ulema who teach in a madrasa with boarding facility, live within the campus, or in student's hostels as wardens, away from their family. The meager amount they get as salary is insufficient to meet the expenses of a full-fledged family. Also, coming from rural agricultural background, they need to keep their family at their ancestral place to look after the assets they have there. Historically speaking, people have been interpreting canons of Islam in many ways, different from the popular Islam of their times. Started under the Umayyads and culminated in the rule of the Abbasids in the Baitul Hikmah, translations of the books dealing with Greek philosophy from various languages into Arabic had taken place on an unprecedented scale. Though the emergence of Mo'tazalites marks the break of a dawn of reason and rationality in the history of Muslims, they had never been the part of the mainstream Muslim society. Before the advent of socialism, capitalism had already gained theological legitimacy. Likewise, shari'a has been interpreted to make socialism compatible with Islam in the last century and recently to substantiate feminism, democracy, etc. So, through out the history, and especially after the declaration of the death of the author by Rolan Barthes, one is free to interpret the text in any manner one wishes. Therefore, efforts at theorizing the interplay between Islam and homosexuality are welcome. There is really no obstacle in the process. What is really problematic is the social acceptance of a particular theory or interpretation in the mainstream Islam as all the mentioned versions of Islam flourished at the periphery, as the subculture. It would be interesting to mention here that Pedro Almodovar's Labyrinth of the Passion (1982) has a character Riza Niro (played by Imanol Arias) who is an Islamic terrorist and homosexual in his orientation. Being a son of a deposed Islamic shah who is a cancer patient, Riza has acutely developed sense of smell and a porky shrink bent on sleeping with a frigid gynecologist who is treating his stepmother, the ex-empress, for infertility. The question which sometimes arises in my mind is what the most pressing need of the Muslim community, say of India, at the moment is. Despite my fullest awareness of the role politics of desires plays in shaping the course of a human life, I would like to name 'survival' as the first priority. It is this concern for the survival of a Muslim which overshadows all of his other concerns. Though I don't give the canonical Islam a shit, I constantly live under the fear of being shot dead on the pretext of my so-called connection with any shadowy terrorist outfit. In this regard, my professional training in one of the most fashionable disciplines and even my denial of any compliance with the Allah of Bin Ladens, I stress, will not prove of any help to me against the anti-terrorism brigade. arshad amanullah 35,masihgarh, jamia nagar new delhi-25. From gupt0089 at umn.edu Wed Jul 26 10:28:42 2006 From: gupt0089 at umn.edu (Atreyee Gupta) Date: 25 Jul 2006 23:58:42 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Dr. Ghazi Falah arrested in Israel Message-ID: Dr. Ghazi Falah of the Dept of Geography and Planning at University of Akron (Ohio) was arrested earlier this month in Israel. Ghazi is a dual Israeli-Canadian citizen of Palestinian descent. He has a distinguished career as a geographer who has served on the editorial boards of Antipode and Political Geography, and is editor in chief of The Arab World Geographer. He is also active in the AAG specialty group on the Middle East. You can find Dr. Ghazi Falah's CV on: http://www3.uakron.edu/geography/faculty_staff/faculty_vitae/falah_vitae.htm Ghazi had gone to Israel this summer to be with his mother while she underwent brain surgery. While there, he made an excursion at a beach resort to take photographs. Like all of us in the academy, Ghazi is always trying to expand and update his collection of photos for teaching. He was detained while taking photographs - perhaps because the security forces did not like his taking photos (of a beach resort?), but it's hard to tell since no charges have been filed. Ghazi is currently being held in Israel without charges. He has not been allowed to speak to his family since his arrest. He was initially denied access to legal counsel. He now has a lawyer, but an Israeli judge has imposed a restraining order barring the lawyer from speaking about the case. The restraining order also prohibits the Israeli press from covering his case, though it has been covered in U.S. and Canadian media outlets. Here are two websites with information about the case and links to recent coverage. http://www.ghazifalah.com/ http://muehlenhaus.com/ghazi/ These sites also contain information about how you can help, including a message from Ghazi's department chair at the Geography and Planning Department at the University of Akron, Dr. Colin Flint, and a draft of a short message you can send to authorities in Canada, the US, and Israel who may be able help ensure that Ghazi is given fair treatment -- including, at the very least, the opportunity to know what the charges are against him and be given the opportunity to respond to those charges. Please stand up in Professor Ghazi’s support. His family is asking for a massive wave of letters. So please encourage people to write and show the authorities that we are not going away! The impression is that the judge is aware of the campaign’s pressure. Many thanks Atreyee Gupta University of Minnesota -- University of Minnesota Department of Art History Room 338 Heller Hall 271 19th Ave S Minneapolis, MN 55455 Office: 612-624-0573 Home: 612-379-7592 From jace at pobox.com Wed Jul 26 12:05:01 2006 From: jace at pobox.com (Kiran Jonnalagadda) Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2006 12:05:01 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The list of sites blocked as per Hindustan Times In-Reply-To: <20060724033732.9AFDE28D732@mail.sarai.net> References: <20060724033732.9AFDE28D732@mail.sarai.net> Message-ID: <3F1BE81D-5466-4398-AF83-8AE9C6633BB8@pobox.com> My sampling of the collective voices from last week: http://jace.seacrow.com/archive/2006/07/23/long-dawn We've got work to do re: government and ISPs. It will be hard, but it's not impossible. (If the oddball comments to that post make no sense, look at the next post.) ~j On 24-Jul-06, at 9:11 AM, Mamta M wrote: > Exactly. But tell that to the Government and to the ISPs who > blocked them. > *They* certainly don't seem to think so. -- Kiran Jonnalagadda http://www.pobox.com/~jace From jeebesh at sarai.net Wed Jul 26 17:18:59 2006 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2006 17:18:59 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Wrong medicine harms 1.5 m in US Message-ID: <46EBD3EC-F881-47B2-AB44-985D5F3494B1@sarai.net> http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1794342.cms Wrong medicine harms 1.5 m in US WASHINGTON: Medication errors harm 1.5 million people and kill several thousand each year in the US, costing the nation at least $3.5 billion annually, the Institute of Medicine concluded in a report released on Thursday. Drug errors are so widespread that hospital patients should expect to suffer one every day they remain hospitalised, although error rates vary by hospital and most do not lead to injury, the report concluded. The report, Preventing Medication Errors, cited the death of Betsy Lehman, a 39-year-old mother of two and a health reporter for The Boston Globe, as a classic fatal drug mix-up. Lehman died in 1993 after a doctor mistakenly gave her four times the appropriate dose of a toxic drug to treat her breast cancer. Recommendations to correct these problems include systemic changes like electronic prescribing and tips for patients to carry complete listings of their prescriptions to every doctor's visit, the report said. The incidence of medication errors was surprising even to us, said J Lyle Bootman, dean of the University of Arizona College of Pharmacy. The report is the fourth in a series done by the institute, the nation's most prestigious medical advisory organisation. The first report, To Err Is Human, was released in 1999 and caused a sensation when it estimated that medical errors of all sorts led to as many as 98,000 deaths each year -more than was caused by highway accidents and breast cancer combined. After the first report, health officials and hospital groups pledged reforms, but many of the most important efforts have been slow to take hold. Drug computer-entry systems, which are supposed to ensure hospital patients get the right drugs at the right dose, are used in just 6% of the nation's hospitals, said Charles B Inlander, president of the People's Medical Society, a consumer advocacy group, and an author of the report released Thursday. Electronic medical records can help ensure patients do not receive toxic drug combinations. The 1999 report urged widespread adoption of these systems. Thursday's report called for all prescriptions to be written electronically by 2010. Just 3% of hospitals have electronic patient records and few doctors prescribe drugs electronically. NYT News Service From jeebesh at sarai.net Wed Jul 26 17:36:33 2006 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2006 17:36:33 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Teen Loses fight to use alternative medicine... Message-ID: <22F1ACB3-919F-46CD-82D8-671E4CDCA865@sarai.net> More on modern medicine and it's continuing fight to keep itself viable.....b, j http://www.forbes.com/business/businesstech/feeds/ap/2006/07/22/ ap2897439.html Associated Press Judge Orders Teen to Cancer Treatment By SONJA BARISIC , 07.22.2006, 11:13 PM A judge has ruled that a 16-year-old boy fighting to use alternative treatment for his cancer must report to a hospital by Tuesday and accept treatment that doctors deem necessary, the family's attorney said. The judge on Friday also found Starchild Abraham Cherrix's parents were neglectful for allowing him to pursue alternative treatment of a sugar-free, organic diet and herbal supplements supervised by a clinic in Mexico, lawyer John Stepanovich said. Jay and Rose Cherrix of Chincoteague on Virginia's Eastern Shore must continue to share custody of their son with the Accomack County Department of Social Services, as the judge had previously ordered, Stepanovich said. The parents were devastated by the new order and planned to appeal, the lawyer said. Stepanovich said he will ask a higher court on Monday to stay enforcement of the order, which requires the parents to take Abraham to Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters in Norfolk and to give the oncologist their written legal consent to treat their son for Hodgkin's disease. "I want to caution all parents of Virginia: Look out, because Social Services may be pounding on your door next when they disagree with the decision you've made about the health care of your child," Stepanovich said. Phone calls to the Cherrix home went unanswered. The lawyer declined to release the ruling, saying juvenile court Judge Jesse E. Demps has sealed much of the case. Social Services officials have declined to comment, citing privacy laws. After three months of chemotherapy last year made him nauseated and weak, Abraham rejected doctors' recommendations to go through a second round when he learned early this year that his Hodgkin's disease, a cancer of the lymph nodes, was active again. A social worker then asked a judge to require the teen to continue conventional treatment. In May, the judge issued a temporary order finding Abraham's parents neglectful and awarding partial custody to the county, with Abraham continuing to live at home with his four siblings. From jeebesh at sarai.net Wed Jul 26 17:46:17 2006 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2006 17:46:17 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Judge lifts orders in teen's case Message-ID: http://www.timesdispatch.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=RTD% 2FMGArticle%2FRTD_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1149189600372&path=! news&s=1045855934842 Judge lifts orders in teen's case Cancer patient doesn't have to report to hospital; trial set next month to settle dispute BY SHAUN BISHOP TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Jul 26, 2006 Judge lifts orders in teen's case ACCOMAC -- A Chincoteague teenager's fight to use alternative medicine to treat his cancer will get another chance after a judge suspended an earlier ruling forcing him to undergo traditional treatment. "This is the best moment that I've ever felt in my life. I feel so happy," Starchild Abraham Cherrix, 16, said outside the courthouse. "Now I'm feeling free, I'm feeling like I have my rights back and I'm feeling like I'm in America once again," said the teen who has said conventional treatment made him so ill he never wants to go through it again. Attorneys representing the Cherrix family said the eventual outcome of the case could have broad implications for the decision-making powers of parents in Virginia. "This is a huge victory for this family, but as far as we're concerned, this is a huge victory for all Virginians," said John Stepanovich, an attorney for Cherrix's parents, Jay and Rose Cherrix, who support their son's decision. In a hearing yesterday, Accomack Circuit Judge Glen Allen Tyler suspended two key judgments the Accomack Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court made in the case last week. As a result: * Cherrix did not have to go to a Norfolk hospital yesterday afternoon and submit to tests and treatment prescribed by doctors, as ordered last Friday by the juvenile court. * His parents regained custody of their son. The juvenile court had given partial custody to the county's Department of Social Services, which supported requiring him to undergo the hospital treatment. It was an emotional victory for the Cherrix family, which has been fighting to allow Abraham to use an organic diet and herbal supplements as treatment for Hodgkin's disease, a cancer of the lymph nodes. The teen's case began after he sought the alternative remedy under advisement from a clinic in Mexico when the cancer returned in February. He had gone through chemotherapy when the cancer was first discovered a year ago. After his case was reported to the local Department of Social Services, Juvenile Court Judge Jesse E. Demps ruled last Friday that Cherrix would have to undergo treatment at Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters in Norfolk yesterday afternoon and ordered his parents to consent to the doctors' orders. Jay and Rose Cherrix appealed the rulings on Monday and were granted yester- day's hearing. "I felt like we had Abraham back and we were a family again," said Jay Cherrix, his father. Virginia Attorney General Bob McDonnell also filed a brief in the circuit court supporting the family's request to stay the juvenile- court judge's rulings. McDonnell filed a similar brief in juvenile court during their appeal Monday. Tyler set the trial date for Aug. 16 in Accomack Circuit Court to decide whether the social-services department can force the teen to undergo conventional cancer treatment. Attorneys for the Cherrixes said they plan to present expert witnesses, including clinicians from the Mexico clinic that is supervising Abraham's treatment. "It's being portrayed out there that he's just sort of waiting around on his deathbed," Stepanovich said. "He's under a treatment that he chose . . . and he's doing great." The case has attracted national media attention as Cherrix has appeared on CNN and NBC's "Today" show, among other programs. In court yesterday, Stepanovich said going to the hospital for chemotherapy would do irreparable, irreversible harm to Cherrix and would essentially render moot the family's right to appeal the order that he receive hospital treatment. Carl Bundick, a lawyer from the Department of Social Services, agreed that a stay would be appropriate given the circumstances, but urged the judge to schedule another hearing promptly. "We're wanting the child to be treated appropriately," Bundick said. A juvenile-court hearing two weeks ago was closed to the public, but Tyler said yesterday that since the family had been discussing the case with the media, he did not see a reason the Aug. 16 trial should be closed. Abraham Cherrix said he remains confident that he will get a favorable ruling, and he believes people around the nation are watching and hoping for a similar outcome. "This could happen to anyone," he said. "This is something the government can do, and you've got to let people know this can't happen." Contact staff writer Shaun Bishop at sbishop at timesdispatch.com or (804) 649-6578. From isouweine at gmail.com Thu Jul 27 09:33:09 2006 From: isouweine at gmail.com (Isaac souweine) Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 00:03:09 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] Wrong medicine harms 1.5 m in US In-Reply-To: <46EBD3EC-F881-47B2-AB44-985D5F3494B1@sarai.net> References: <46EBD3EC-F881-47B2-AB44-985D5F3494B1@sarai.net> Message-ID: <34bf33330607262103w538aa276p3198a505f02a56a8@mail.gmail.com> Jeebesh: Thank you for posting this. Over the past two years, my father has bravely and successfully battled leukemia. Of the many things I did not know about myself and the world before this experience, one of the most surprising was the incredible vigilance that is required to successfully navigate a high-tech allopathic medical system. Though medical technologies (radiation, chemotherapy, stem cell transfusions) and skilled practitioners are responsible for saving my dad, the quality of the care that he received is directly correlated to his and my mother's willingness to ask questions, offer up information and draw their own conclusions, which is to say, their unwillingness to blindly trust a system that is deeply prone to error. Best, Isaac On 7/26/06, Jeebesh Bagchi wrote: > > http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1794342.cms > > Wrong medicine harms 1.5 m in US > > WASHINGTON: Medication errors harm 1.5 million people and kill > several thousand each year in the US, costing the nation at least > $3.5 billion annually, the Institute of Medicine concluded in a > report released on Thursday. > > Drug errors are so widespread that hospital patients should expect to > suffer one every day they remain hospitalised, although error rates > vary by hospital and most do not lead to injury, the report concluded. > > The report, Preventing Medication Errors, cited the death of Betsy > Lehman, a 39-year-old mother of two and a health reporter for The > Boston Globe, as a classic fatal drug mix-up. > > Lehman died in 1993 after a doctor mistakenly gave her four times the > appropriate dose of a toxic drug to treat her breast cancer. > > Recommendations to correct these problems include systemic changes > like electronic prescribing and tips for patients to carry complete > listings of their prescriptions to every doctor's visit, the report > said. > > The incidence of medication errors was surprising even to us, said J > Lyle Bootman, dean of the University of Arizona College of Pharmacy. > > The report is the fourth in a series done by the institute, the > nation's most prestigious medical advisory organisation. > > The first report, To Err Is Human, was released in 1999 and caused a > sensation when it estimated that medical errors of all sorts led to > as many as 98,000 deaths each year -more than was caused by highway > accidents and breast cancer combined. > > After the first report, health officials and hospital groups pledged > reforms, but many of the most important efforts have been slow to > take hold. > > Drug computer-entry systems, which are supposed to ensure hospital > patients get the right drugs at the right dose, are used in just 6% > of the nation's hospitals, said Charles B Inlander, president of the > People's Medical Society, a > > consumer advocacy group, and an author of the report released > Thursday. Electronic medical records can help ensure patients do not > receive toxic drug combinations. The 1999 report urged widespread > adoption of these systems. > > Thursday's report called for all prescriptions to be written > electronically by 2010. Just 3% of hospitals have electronic patient > records and few doctors prescribe drugs electronically. > > NYT News Service > _________________________________________ > 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: -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060727/01058611/attachment.html From rakshat at gmail.com Fri Jul 21 03:53:17 2006 From: rakshat at gmail.com (rakshat hooja) Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2006 03:53:17 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] survey of 5 RWAs in Delhi Message-ID: <69a2e4550607201523g4c3318e5s23df756997c9ad4a@mail.gmail.com> In this post I will try to briefly summarize the quick readings of qualitative findings of the first part of a questionnaire based survey undertaken in 5 Resident Welfare Associations (RWAs) of New Delhi/ Delhi (C-8 Vasant Kunj, GK II, Self Financed Flats Shiekh Sariai Phase 1 and Self Financed Flats Mukherjee Nagar. The second part of the survey consisted of more qualitative interviews which I will cover in the next post along with more detailed analysis of the qualitative data collected. Also I have not created tables in order to stick to the text format of the mailing list. ****C-8 Vasant Kunj**** This is 15 year old RWA where membership charges are Rs 1100 per annum or Rs 100 per month. Members of the RWA among the sample – 87.5% Percentage satisfied with the civic amenities in the colony/residential area – 50% Percentage satisfied with the electric supply in the colony/residential area – 87.5% Percentage satisfied with the water supply in the colony/residential area – 0% Percentage satisfied with security in the colony/residential area – 0% Percentage that vote in the RWA elections – 87.5% (100% among the members) Percentage that has had to complain/deal with Delhi Jal Board/Electric Utility/MCD in the recent past – 87.5% ( 100% have complained individually, 50% have also complained with the help of the RWA, 1 respondent had complained with a independent resident group other than the RWA) Percentage that felt that the RWA was useful/had empowered them in their dealing with the various government agencies/ utilities – 75% NOTES (nowhere near exhaustive at this moment, just some things that caught my eye while quickly glancing through the questionnaires) – 1. Women are a majority in the executive council on the RWA. 2. RWA runs a community center, gym, badminton court, TT table in the colony BYTES (these are some of the quotes by residents. All the questionnaires were filled by the respondents in their own hand writing so as to avoid loss in translation) K Gulati (C 8/ 8011 Vasant Kunj) "The benefits have reached only few people, but we have been able to voice our difficulties through the Resident Welfare Association. The RWA has not been of any help in improving water supply except for areas where elected members live." SS Kapur (C8/8060 Vasant Kunj) "RWAs impact on civic facilities and other essential requirements depends on the enthusiasm of its members. Every election of RWA brings in change for good or worse. ****SFS Flats Sheikh Sarai**** This is 22 year old RWA where membership charges are Rs 800 per annum Members of the RWA among the sample – 100% Percentage satisfied with the civic amenities in the colony/residential area – 100% Percentage satisfied with the electric supply in the colony/residential area – 87.5% Percentage satisfied with the water supply in the colony/residential area – 100% Percentage satisfied with security in the colony/residential area – 42.8% Percentage that vote in the RWA elections – 100% Percentage that has had to complain/deal with Delhi Jal Board/Electric Utility/MCD in the recent past – 87.5% (Most residents complain individually as well through the RWA office) Percentage that felt that the RWA was useful/had empowered them in their dealing with the various government agencies/ utilities – 87.5% NOTES (nowhere near exhaustive at this moment, just some things that caught my eye while quickly glancing through the questionnaires) – 1. Women members are active but most are co-opted and not elected 2. Facility for paying electricity, water and telephone bills and property tax is provided by the RWA. Advise on property tax is also provided. BYTES (these are some of the quotes by residents. All the questionnaires were filled by the respondents in their own hand writing so as to avoid loss in translation) A P Sexena (C-476 SFS Flats Sheikh Sarai) "Defective tubewells have been made operational, security guards have been appointed, roads have been improved" D C Tayal ( C- 238 SFS Flats Sheikh Sarai) "RWA organizes health camps, walks, servant verification camps, car check up camps etc." ****A 14 Kalkaji Extension**** This is 22 year old RWA where membership charges are Rs 100 per month Members of the RWA among the sample – 71.5% Percentage satisfied with the civic amenities in the colony/residential area – 28.5% Percentage satisfied with the electric supply in the colony/residential area – 86%% Percentage satisfied with the water supply in the colony/residential area – 43% Percentage satisfied with security in the colony/residential area – 28.5% Percentage that vote in the RWA elections – 71.4% Percentage that has had to complain/deal with Delhi Jal Board/Electric Utility/MCD in the recent past – 71.4% (only 14% of the sample had complained through the RWA) Percentage that felt that the RWA was useful/had empowered them in their dealing with the various government agencies/ utilities – 71.4% NOTES (nowhere near exhaustive at this moment, just some things that caught my eye while quickly glancing through the questionnaires) – 1. There are no women in the RWA committee. 2. Election process is by show of hand. 3. RWA conducts many functions on festivals and national days. BYTES (these are some of the quotes by residents. All the questionnaires were filled by the respondents in their own hand writing so as to avoid loss in translation) T Nag (5B – A 14 – Himgari Apts. Kalkaji Extension) The only use of the RWA is that is serves as a platform for developing new acquaintances and friendships among the members. B Banerjee (10A- A 14- Himgari Apts Kalkaji Extension) "I complain individually because the RWA is defunct functionally in our colony." **** GK II**** This is a 38 years old RWA where membership charges are Rs 700 for life. Members of the RWA among the sample – 100% Percentage satisfied with the civic amenities in the colony/residential area – 88.8% Percentage satisfied with the electric supply in the colony/residential area – 100% Percentage satisfied with the water supply in the colony/residential area – 88.8% Percentage satisfied with security in the colony/residential area – 55.5% Percentage that vote in the RWA elections – 100% Percentage that has had to complain/deal with Delhi Jal Board/Electric Utility/MCD in the recent past – 100% (33.3% through the RWA, rest individually) Percentage that felt that the RWA was useful/had empowered them in their dealing with the various government agencies/ utilities – 100% NOTES (nowhere near exhaustive at this moment, just some things that caught my eye while quickly glancing through the questionnaires) – It was with the help of the RWA and other associated RWAs the colony was able to achieve the following: 1. Lowering the category for the colony from A to B for the purpose of calculation of house tax. 2. Roll back of the tariff hike of electricity by the government. 3. Freezing of the cable TV rates ****SFS Mukherjee Nagar**** This is 10 year old RWA where membership charges are Rs 100 per month. Members of the RWA among the sample – 62.5% (one respondent said that the RWA did not exist in his colony!) Percentage satisfied with the civic amenities in the colony/residential area – 50% Percentage satisfied with the electric supply in the colony/residential area – 75% Percentage satisfied with the water supply in the colony/residential area – 62.5% Percentage satisfied with security in the colony/residential area – 37.5% Percentage that vote in the RWA elections – 50% (one respondent said that there was no need to vote as the elections are unanimous) Percentage that has had to complain/deal with Delhi Jal Board/Electric Utility/MCD in the recent past – 87.5% (37.5% complain via the RWA) Percentage that felt that the RWA was useful/had empowered them in their dealing with the various government agencies/ utilities – 87.5% NOTES (nowhere near exhaustive at this moment, just some things that caught my eye while quickly glancing through the questionnaires) – 1. There are no women in the executive member in the RWA BYTES (these are some of the quotes by residents. All the questionnaires were filled by the respondents in their own hand writing so as to avoid loss in translation) K S Shukla (346 SFS Mukherjee Nagar) "The RWA can only be useful if the executive members show sincerity …. Rather than occupy the seats. They should stop the infighting." S K Chauhan (126 SFS Mukherjee Nagar) "RWA is most essential for a colony because some work can not be undertaken by individuals." -- -------------- Please use Firefox as your web browser. Its protects you from spyware and is also a very feature rich browser. www.firefox.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060721/560a8ecc/attachment.html From le.deseo at gmail.com Fri Jul 21 11:24:22 2006 From: le.deseo at gmail.com (Anurag Tyagi) Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2006 11:24:22 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Enough --- A letter from mumbaikar In-Reply-To: <2482459d0607170405q1a519b9bnefa8aa34013dde33@mail.gmail.com> References: <2482459d0607170405q1a519b9bnefa8aa34013dde33@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: There's so much been written on the 'spirit' of Bombay after the 11th July blasts. Similar kinds of emotional oupourings were witnessed after the 26th july deluge last year. Interestingly, on both occasions i was in Bombay...i've been here for 2 years now, so i don't think i can call myself a mumbaikar! On both occasions, i was unscathed, like many others i know. Last year, it was the first time i saw something like that happen to a city and i was quite overwhelmed by it. By the event itself, by what people had to go through, by the fact that a mega-city like this can just collapse in a few hours, communication can come to a stand-still, etc...the spirit of Mumbai was at it's best! and so was the media...despite everything around coming to a halt, the news channels just went on and on and on.... I work with a news channel now and i can imagine that it must have been both heroic and hellish for those reporters who went out in that crazy situation, just so that the rest of the country could witness what really was happening. But i guess situations like these have a strange kind of addictive quality about them. You may be a little apprehensive to go on the site of calamity, but once you get there, there's no stopping you. There's so much enthusiasm, there's so much heroism, there's such a sense of responsibility, there's competition, there's self-righteousness, there's patriotism, there's emotion, there's crowds to fight, there's a sense of journalism, there's a hint of self-pity and above all there's performance! Despite the gravity of the event and the location, you have to get your PTC (piece-to-camera) right. Unless you go live, there's time for you to go for a second or a third take, until you get it right. There's somrthing about the whole business of this 'spirit' of Mumbai that's also disturbing. At one level, it's amazing the way people can come out and help each other and literally go out and take charge of things without waiting for the bureaucratic structures to show up. At another level, it's just baffling! Within a few hours of the 7 blasts, the city is back to being 'normal'! How? Is it the spirit, is it the necessity to get to work at the stake of your life or is it just another performance! Sometimes i wonder how anyone would get to know of this spirit if there were no video cameras...would this spirit still be the same, if people who are part of generating it would know that there are no cameras around, religiously recording their actions? I'm not sure. I have no right to condemn what people do to help each other in times of a calamity like this....afterall i did nothing much myself except look at the frenzy and yet another collapse of the city (I was stuck at the Hilton, on a shoot), but maybe i'm just a cynic. hopefully, the governement of this city and the powers to be will not, not do anything for this city just becauise they think, nothing can ever crush its spirit...so let things be the way they are...people will cope and move on... On 7/17/06, kaiwan mehta wrote: > > > > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > From: kaiwan mehta > Date: Jul 17, 2006 4:33 PM > Subject: Re: [Reader-list] A letter from mumbaikar > To: Aaditya Dar > Cc: "reader-list at sarai.net " , > united_students at yahoogroups.com, kaiwanmehta at gmail.com > > Hi This is the second time I have received this highly 'spirited' and > emotional mail. The other version of this letter conviniently assumes that > the terrorist essentially sits in Afghanistan, Pakistan or Iraq. The front > page of Indian Express, on 14 July, 2006... has a story on how the Courts in > India doubted that the Blasts at the RSS head quarters and another city in > Maharashtra were doctored from 'within'. And about the 'spirit of mumbai' > the 'spirit' has now reached nauseating levels!! One day all of us will die > in the assumed/presumed garb of 'spirit' of the city.... and what will be > left is only 'spirit'..... yes read the Times of India, Times Review page in > the Sunday 16 July, 2006 edition. Accept the fact... the city was > jostled... the city was literally out of steam at least for two days after > the blast. Where does our spirit go when tonnes of families and kids are > thrown homeless brutally when the slums were demolished in Bombay/Mumbai > itself? Where does ourr spirit go when people are thrown homeless, > landless and jobless when they are evacuated for Dam constructions? Was my > spirit sleeping when farmers are commiting suicides? Maybe I never had a > spirit till the media gave me one, a week ago!! warm spirits... Kaiwan > > On 7/16/06, Aaditya Dar < aadityadar at gmail.com> wrote: > > > > just wanted to share this mail forward i got: > > > > We don't know whether you are Hindu / Muslim / Christian / Indian / > pakistani/ Afghanistani / Iraqi / American or from any part of the > world > but > only name we can give you is terrorist. > > Even if you are not reading this we don't care. Time and again you > tried to > disturb us and disrupt our life - killing innocent civilians by > planting > bombs in trains, buses and cars. You have tried hard to bring death and > destruction, cause panic and fear and create communal disharmony but > everytime you were disgustingly unsuccessful. Do you know how we pass > our > life in Mumbai? How much it takes for us to earn that single rupee? If > you > wanted to give us a shock then we are sorry to say that you failed > miserably in your ulterior motives. Better look elsewere, not here. > > We are not Hindus and Muslims or Gujaratis and Marathis or Punjabis and > Bengaliies. Nor do we distinguish ourselves as owners or workers, govt. > employees or private employees. WE ARE MUMBAIKERS (Bombay-ites, if you > like). We will not allow you to disrupt our life like this. On the last > few > occassions when you struck (including the 7 deadly blasts in a single > day > killing over 250 people and injuring 500+ in 1993), we went to work > next > day in full strength. This time we cleared everything within a few > hours > and were back to normal - the vendors placing their next order, > businessmen > finalizing the next deals and the office workers rushing to catch the > next > train. (Yes the same train you targetted) > > Fathom this: Within 3 hours of the blasts, long queues of blood > donating > volunteers were seen outside various hospital, where most of the > injured > were admitted. By 12 midnight, the hospital had to issue a notification > that blood banks were full and they didn't require any more blood. The > next > day, attendance at schools and office was close to 100%, trains & buses > were packed to the brim, the crowds were back. > The city has simply dusted itself off and moved one - perhaps with > greater > vigour. > > We are Mumbaikers and we live like brothers in times like this. So, do > not > dare to threaten us with your crackers. The spirit of Mumbai is very > strong > and can not be harmed. > > Please forward this to others. U never know, by chance it may come to > hands > of a terrorist & He / She can then read this message which is specially > meant for him / her !!! > > With Love, > From the people of Mumbai (Bombay) > _________________________________________ > 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: < https://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/ > > > > > > -- > Kaiwan Mehta > Architect and Urban Researcher > > 11/4, Kassinath Bldg. No. 2, Kassinath St., Tardeo, Mumbai 400034 > 022-2-494 3259 / 91-98205 56436 > > -- > Kaiwan Mehta > Architect and Urban Researcher > > 11/4, Kassinath Bldg. No. 2, Kassinath St., Tardeo, Mumbai 400034 > 022-2-494 3259 / 91-98205 56436 > > _________________________________________ > 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: > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060721/09db08a9/attachment.html From jeebesh at sarai.net Wed Jul 26 22:44:08 2006 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2006 22:44:08 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] from beirut Message-ID: <9E8F66EB-29ED-445B-90D6-BE1372594F3D@sarai.net> From: anandpat at gmail.com Subject: [vikalp] from beirut Date: 26 July 2006 7:45:39 PM GMT+05:30 To: vikalp at yahoogroups.com, vikalpmum at yahoogroups.com Reply-To: vikalp at yahoogroups.com Dear all Sometimes the words of a single witness can reach through and touch you like no statistics ever can. These are a series of ongoing mails from Beirut. They were forwarded to me by Avi Mograbi an Israeli docu maker who was supposed to come to Delhi and Bombay last week but cancelled his trip to stay back and do his bit to bring sanity and humanity to the people of Israel and to all those who still do not grasp what is actually going on in the Middle East. We've shown Avi's films in Vikalp. Avi's son is a refusenik who refused to fight in the Israeli army and was jailed for it. I know this is primarily a film related space and what is below goes far beyond film, but please do read this. Anand ----- Original Message ----- From: Oz Shelach To: Yael Lerer ; Sami S. Chetrit ; nawaf Sent: Saturday, July 15, 2006 7:32 PM Subject: fwd: letter from beirut From: Rasha Date: 10:37:28 GMT-04:00 14 July 2006 Dear All, I am writing now from a cafe, in West Beirut's Hamra district. It is filled with people who are trying to escape the pull of 24 hour news reporting. Like me. The electricity has been cut off for a while now, and the city has been surviving on generators. The old system that was so familiar at the time of the war, where generators were allowed a lull to rest is back. The cafe is dark, hot and humid. Espresso machines and blenders are silenced. Conversations, rumors, frustrations waft through the room. I am better off here than at home, following the news, live, on the spot documentation of our plight in sound bites. The sound of Israeli warplanes overwhelms the air on occasion. They drop leaflets to conduct a "psychological" war. Yesterday, their sensitivity training urged them to advise inhabitants of the southern suburbs to flee because the night promised to be "hot". Today, the leaflets warn that they plan to bomb all other bridges and tunnels in Beirut. People are flocking to supermarkets to stock up on food. This morning, I wrote in my emails to people inquiring about my well- being that I was safe, and that the targets seem to be strictly Hezbollah sites and their constituencies, now, I regret typing that. They will escalate. Until a few hours ago, they had only bombed the runways of the airport, as if to "limit" the damage. A few hours ago, four shells were dropped on the buildings of our brand new shining airport. The night was harrowing. The southern suburbs and the airport were bombed, from air and sea. The apartment where I am living has a magnificient view of the bay of Beirut. I could see the Israeli warships firing at their leisure. It is astounding how comfortable they are in our skies, in our waters, they just travel around, and deliver their violence and congratulate themselves. The cute French-speaking and English-speaking bourgeoisie has fled to the Christian mountains. A long-standing conviction that the Israelis will not target Lebanon's Christian "populated" mountains. Maybe this time they will be proven wrong? The Gulfies, Saudis, Kuwaities and other expatriates have all fled out of the country, in Pullman buses via Damascus, before the road was bombed. They were supposed to be the economic lifeblood of this country. The contrast in their sense of panic as opposed to the defiance of the inhabitants of the southern suburbs was almost comical. This time, however, I have to admit, I am tired of defying whatever for whatever cause. There is no cause really. There are only sinister post-Kissingerian type negotiations. I can almost hear his hateful voice rationalizing laconically as he does the destruction of a country, the deaths of families, people with dreams and ambitions for the Israelis to win something more, always more. Although I am unable to see it, I am told left, right and center that there is a rhyme and reason, grand design, and strategy. The short- term military strategy seems to be to cripple transport and communications. And power stations. The southern region has now been reconfigured into small enclaves that cannot communicate between one another. Most have enough fuel, food and supplies to last them until tomorrow, but after that the isolation of each enclave will lead to tragedy. Mayors and governors have been screaming for help on the TV. This is all bringing back echoes of 1982, the Israeli siege of Beirut. My living nightmare, well one of my living nightmares. It was summer then as well. The Israeli army marched through the south and besieged Beirut. For 3 months, the US administration kept dispatching urges for the Israeli military to act with restraint. And the Israelis assured them they were acting appropriately. We had the PLO command in West Beirut then. I felt safe with the handsome fighters. How I miss them. Between Hezbollah and the Lebanese army I don't feel safe. We are exposed, defenseless, pathetic. And I am older, more aware of danger. I am 37 years old and actually scared. The sound of the warplanes scares me. I am not defiant, there is no more fight left in me. And there is no solidarity, no real cause. I am furthermore pissed off because no one knows how hard the postwar reconstruction was to all of us. Hariri did not make miracles. People work hard and sacrifice a lot and things get done. No one knows except us how expensive, how arduous that reconstruction was. Every single bridge and tunnel and highway, the runways of that airport, all of these things were built from our sweat and brow, at 3 times the real cost of their construction because every member of government, because every character in the ruling Syrian junta, because the big players in the Hariri administration and beyond, were all thieves. We accepted the thievery and banditry just to get things done and get it over with. Everyone one of us had two jobs (I am not referring to the ruling elite, obviously), paid backbreaking taxes and wages to feed the "social covenant". We fought and fought that neoliberal onslaught, the arrogance of economic consultants and the greed of creditors just to have a nice country that functioned at a minimum, where things got done, that stood on its feet, more or less. A thriving Arab civil society. Public schools were sacrificed for roads to service neglected rural areas and a couple Syrian officers to get richer, and we accepted, that road was desperately needed, and there was the "precarious national consensus" to protect. Social safety nets were given up, healthcare for all, unions were broken and coopted, public spaces taken over, and we bowed our heads and agreed. Palestinian refugees were pushed deeper and deeper into forgetting, hidden from sight and consciousness, "for the preservation of their identity" we were told, and we accepted. In exchange we had a secular country where the Hezbollah and the Lebanese Forces could co-exist and fight their fights in parliament not with bullets. We bit hard on our tongues and stiffened our upper lip, we protested and were defeated, we took the streets, defied army-imposed curfews, time after time, to protect that modicum of civil rights, that modicum of a semblance of democracy, and it takes one air raid for all our sacrifices and tolls to be blown to smithereens. It's not about the airport, it's what we built during that postwar. As per the usual of Lebanon, it's not only about Lebanon, the country haparadigmatically been the terrain for regional conflicts to lash out violently.. Off course speculations abound. There is rhetoric, and a lot of it, but there are also Theories. 1) Theory Number One. This is about Syria, Hamas and Hezbollah negotiating an upper hand in the negotiations with Israel. Hezbollah have indicated from the moment they captured the Israeli soldiers that they were willing to negotiate in conjunction with Hamas for the release of all Arab prisoners in Israeli jails. Iran is merely providing a back support for Syria + Hamas. 2) Theory Number Two. This is not about solidarity with Gaza or strengthening the hand of the Palestinians in negotiating the release of the prisoners in Israeli jails. This is about Iran's nuclear bomb and negotiations with the Europeans/US. The Iranian negotiator left Brussels after the end of negotiations and instead of returning to Tehran, he landed in Damascus. Two days later, Hezbollah kidnapped the Israeli soldiers. The G8 Meeting is on Saturday, Iran is supposed to have some sort of an answer for the G8 by then. In the meantime, they are showing to the world that they have a wide sphere of control in the region: Afghanistan, Iraq and Lebanon. In Lebanon they pose a real threat to Israel. The "new" longer-reaching missiles that Hezbollah fired on Haifa are the message. The kings of Jordan and Saudi Arabia issued statements holding Hezbollah solely responsible for bringing on this escalation, and that is understood as a message to Iran. Iran on the other hand promised to pay for the reconstruction of destroyed homes and infrastructures in the south. And threatened Israel with "hell" if they hit Syria. 3) Theory Number Three. This is about Lebanon, Hezbollah and 1559 (the UN resolution demanding the disarmement of Hezbollah and deployment of the Lebanese army in the southern territory). It stipulates that this is no more than a secret conspiracy between Syria, Iran and the US to close the Hezbollah file for good, and resolve the pending Lebanese crisis since the assassination of Hariri. Evidence for this conspiracy is Israel leaving Syria so far unharmed. Holders of this theory claim that Israel will deliver a harsh blow to Hezbollah and cripple the Lebanese economy to the brink of creating an internal political crisis. The resolution would then result in Hezbollah giving up arms, and a buffer zone between Israel and Lebanon under the control of the Lebanese army in Lebanon and the Israeli army in the north of Galilee. More evidence for this Theory are the Saudi Arabia and Jordan statements condemning Hezbollah and holding them responsible for all the horrors inflicted on the Lebanese people. There are more theories... There is also the Israeli government reaching an impasse and feeling a little worried out by Hezbollah and Hamas, and the Israeli military taking the upper hand with Olmert. The land of conspiracies... Fun? I can't make heads or tails. But I am tired of spending days and nights waiting not to die from a shell, on target or astray. Watching poor people bludgeoned, homeless and preparing to mourn. I am so weary... Rasha. (DAY 2 of siege) from Rasha in Beirut Dear All, It is now night time in Beirut. The day was heavy, busy with shelling from the air and sea, but so far the night has been quiet in Beirut. We are advised to be bracing ourselves for a bad night, although most analysis is more reading tea leaves at this stage. I received a wide array of comments regarding my email yesterday. The comments stayed with me all day. I visited friends this morning at their house, people now gather in homes, most cafes In "West Beirut" are closed, streets are quiet. In times like these, the city huddles on its neighborhoods, main thoroughfares are avoided, side roads and back streets are trekked. Gatherings shift to the house of the member of the group whose neighborhood has electricity, whose elevator works, and who has elusive enough familial obligations to house an antsy crowd eager for social exchange. Amongst that group, I was the only one who seemed to have experienced the weariness, to be genuinely frustrated with having to face another round of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Everyone seemd resigned to endure this dark and sinister moment. Everyone was busying themselves with analysis, speculation. Mind games, fictions, chimeras. I regretted expressing my weariness with the fight, with having to summon the energy to face Israel and defy the destruction of Lebanon. I felt I betrayed a principle, a value, disrespected people's pain and suffering. I know a great great number of people in Lebanon share my sentiments, and the political debates on TV seem to return to the question tirelessly. But still, I felt "smaller" than the historical moment demanded. I wanted to write this, I needed to come clean to you all. I need to let you know that if you were intrigued/discomforted by the pettiness of my spirit. The cause of this is partly my refusal to acknowledge the gravity of the moment. I don't feel I am strong or courageous enough to face it, to take it all in. Last night something quite fantastical happened. By this morning, the mood in the country and city was palpably changed. Sometimes it is hard for me to believe that the leadership of Hezbollah are not acquainted with "The Society of the Spectacle". Last night was a turning point in the confrontation between Hezbollah and the Israeli army. I ought to have drafted a note right after that moment, but I could not find the mental energy to do it. I was so scared and anxious that I became sucked into the pull of minute by minute news reporting and finally succumbed to exhaustion. You probably all heard about the Israeli warship that was drowned. I am convinced that all of you not privvy to Arab media missed the spectacular staging of the drowning of that warship. The "showcase" began with Israeli shells targetting Hassan Nasrallah's home in the southern suburbs. As soon as the shells exploded, the media reported them and waited to confirm that he and his family had survived. About half an hour later, the newscaster announced that Hassan Nasrallah planned to adress the nation and the Arab world by phone. I never thought he was charismatic. A huge majority of people do. He's very young to hold the position of leadership that he does. He's a straight talker, not particularly eloquent, but speaks in an idiom that appeals to his immediate constituency in Lebanon but is also compelling to a constituency in the Arab world that harbors disillusionment, despondency and powerlessness with the failed promises of Arab nationalism to defeat Israel and restore dignity. He is not corrupt, he lives simply, and displays a bent on spartan ascetism. Although he's neither charismatic nor captivating, he has cultivated an aura of sorts, particularly since his son was martyred at age 18 in a commando operation in south Lebanon when it was occupied by the Israeli military. He survived the Israeli attempt on his life last night, and addressed the nation by phone, thirty minutes later. His speech was pragmatic, again spoken in his habitual simple (almost simplistic) idiom from within the Hezbollah rhetoric, obviosuly. The speech was intended to deliver a number of specific messages, answer back to pronouncements by regional leaders and clarify Hezbollah's strategy in the face of the unexpectedly barbaric Israeli attack. He began by declaring an open war to Israel's assault. He summoned the Lebanese people to unite in this moment of confrontation, transcend petty divisions and rise to the occasion. He promised to deliver victory, based on the long record of victories by Hezbollah. Most powerful and compelling was his response to the Saudi, Jordanian and Egyptian statements issued earlier that day, blaming Hezbollah for bringing the tragedy on Lebanon. The Saudi statement had referred to Hezbollah's actions as "adventurous", the Jordanian as "irresponsible" and the Egyptian as something in both these veins. All three had invoked the pressing need to act reasonably. Nasrallah's response basically said that he is the leader of the only Arab and Muslim political movement to have defeated Israel militarily and forced it to withdraw, the only Arab leader to have been able to shell Israel and pose a serious military threat from without its borders. If his actions were "adventurous" he argued, they were certainly reasonable, but they did not comply to the reason that guides Arab leaders and Arab regimes, rather the reason that animates the common folk on the streets, the reason that defies defeat, the reason that brings victories, saves dignity and does not fear the enemy no matter how powerful his arsenal and allies. He called onto the Arab and Muslim world to stand in solidarity with the Lebanese as they faced, once more, the savagery of the Zionist machine. His third message was to the "Zionist enemy". He reiterated that Hezbollah did not fear an open war. That they have long been prepared for this confrontation. Interestingly, he claimed that they possessed missiles that could reach Haifa, and "far beyond Haifa, beyond, beyond Haifa", thereby admitting that it was Hezbollah that fired the missile fired to Haifa (until then they denied having fired them). It is not clear what he meant by "far beyond Haifa". Did he mean Tel Aviv? It is not THAT far from Haifa. Did he mean Israeli interests and missions abroad? It was not clear. More terrains for speculators. His conclusion was all about the showcase... In his message to the Zionist entity, he reminded his audience that he had promised to deliver many "suprises". And now the time has come for the first of the many surprises they have in store for the Zionist enemy, namely the warship that had bombed the southern suburb the night before and was casually sailing in the bay of Beirut was now in flames and its personel was drowning. "Look at it!", he said, this is one of the many surprises we have saved for the Zionist army... And he fell silent. There is no film footage of the warship being hit because all the cameras had their lenses directed inland, focused on scouting for shells, destruction, victims and tragedy writ large. By the time he had spoken his words, it was too late to catch sight of the warship being hit, all that cameras captured was a huge ball of fire in the open sea, but not much else was clear. Rescue flares flew into the sky from around the ship. Ultimately, it would turn out that all except for 4 from the crew would be rescued/recovered. The Israeli media began by denying the report, then confirming the warship had been hit, then claiming there were no losses, then admitting four sailors were missing, then claiming the ship was towed to the Haifa port, then admitting it had sunk in the sea where it was hit. This morning one of the three bodies was uncovered by Hezbollah. The news of the downed warship spread fear in our hearts. We were sure the retaliation would be numbing in violence. Then Hezbollah fired rockets on some settlements in the Galilee and we were all bracing ourselves for a night of hell. Nothing happened in Beirut. The south was shelled, the north was shelled the Beqaa was shelled. Surgical assaults on roads, bridges and the communication network. Slowly but surely, in cold blood the country was being dismembered, ligament after ligament, inland, on the coast, and in the mountains. In Beirut, the night was quiet. I could not understand how one downed Israeli warship could throw disarray into a military as powerful as the Israeli military. Nasrallah's calls for solidarity resonnated loudly the next day. Immediately after the spectacular showcase, Hezbollah television was showered with phone calls from Saudi Arabia expressing their support. There were protests supporting him and his mission in almost every Arab city. They contrasted sharply with the reactions from Arab officialdom. He had won his first round against Israel and against the slothful, debilitated and stunted Arab leaderships (Day 3 of the Siege) Today was a bad day. The shelling started from the morning countrywide and has not let until now. It was particularly brutal in the south. Marwaheen, a village in the south that had been under siege was showered with leafets from airplanes urging its inhabitants to flee because it would be bombed to the ground two hours later. As people gathered up stuff and began to flee, a few were not spared from the shelling, 12 children perished, burned alive on the road walking out of the village. A group amongst the fleeing villagers panicked and saught refuge at a UNIFIL (UN peacekeeping force) base on their road out of the village run by French army volunteers, but they were refused shelter and turned back. I don't know how unprecedented this is but it is certainly shocking. Nearly all Lebanese ports were shelled today, Beirut, Tripoli, Sidon, Tyre, Amshit and Jounieh. Christian areas are not being spared. The alternative road to Syria (via Tripoli and Homs) was shelled. Bridges in the north of the country and the south of the country were shelled and rendered unusable. Tonight the shelling is again focused on the southern suburbs, Haret Hreyk and Bir el-Abed. The first neighborhood is where the headquarters of Hezbollah are located. They have been targetted several times and there is extensive damage. The leadership has not been harmed. A great number of the inhabitants have been evacuated, but the afternoon shelling targetted residential areas. I am up, anxious, writing. As if it served a purpose of sorts. Foreign diplomatic missions are making plans to evacuate their nationals. They had planned to evacuate people by sea, but after today's shelling of the ports, they may have to rethink their strategy. Should I evacuate? Does one turn their back on a "historic" station in the Arab-Israeli conflict? If there is no cause that animates me, how do I endure this? (I could not give two rats' ass about the Iranian nuclear bomb or Hezbollah's negotiating power). I was shamed this morning for having these thoughts... And now, at 1:30 am, as the Israeli airplanes fill up my sky, I am writing them again. There was much diplomatic activity today, almost all of it secured moral high ground for Israel to proceed with "scorched earth" policy, re-occupy the south to secure its own borders, and disarm Hezbollah after a fatal blow. The meeting at the UN security council yesterday provided Israel with a green light to pretty much do whatever it wished in this country. (My favorite was Bolton, who was focused on the necessity to "take down" Khaled Masha'al -Hamas representative- in Damascus.) Then there was an emergency Arab League meeting that pretty much determined that the peace plan of the Quartet was defunct and the region was at the brink of an explosion and that they will call for a UN security council meeting at once. If international law was not respected, then the Arab League would resort to other means (and "arms" was not eliminated as an option). Did the Arabs declare war? We don't know, did they intimate war? It would be the most prudish, skiddish, repressed intimation ever in the history of wars. For now it seems that the battle will take about two to three weeks to wane.. There are stated aims and they are within the paradigm of 1559, namely that Hezbollah should give up its arms, and the southern Lebanese border with Israel be secured by the Lebanese army. Hezbollah are not suicidal, unlike the Bin Ladens of the world and other radicals, they want to negotiate a bigger share of the pie in Lebanon. They are aware that in the final count, they will have to give up something, so until a cease-fire seems like an amenable solution to them, they need to register as many victories as possible. The rockets that can reach Haifa is one such victory, because Haifa is an important petro-chemical base in Israel. The Israeli Patriot missiles planted on Haifa that seem not to work are also another small victory for Hezbollah. The drowned warship is another victory. Israel's strategy is not only to dismember this country and cripple communication, but also to challenge internal support for Hezbollah. People like me for example, complaining about how my life is a small hell and I can't take it anymore, yesterday and maybe a little bit today, well I was an agent of Israel. I was executing the Israeli strategy to break the spirit of the valiant Arabs. In fact the Israeli ambassador to the UN quoted two Lebanese MPs citing how little support for Hezbollah there is in Lebanon. This is the rhetoric. But in point of fact it is true, that Israel has not spared an area at this stage, whether Hezbollah stronghold or not and they want to make us pay for housing Hezbollah in our parliament. Maybe they prefer an Iraqi scenario? Forgive me if I am losing my mind. I need to end this long diary entry. I would like to end it by congratulating the president of Iran, to whom a nuclear bomb (like the president of Pakistan) is by far more important than his people walking barefoot, illiterate and hungry. But the kind and generous president of Iran "assured" the world that if Israel hit Syria, Iran would show them hell. Never mind Lebanon burning! Until Day 4 of the Siege. Love, R. (DAY 4 of siege) another account from Rasha in Beirut Dear All, Things seem to heating up. Missiles hit Haifa and the shelling on the south and southern suburbs is unrelenting. Scorched Earth Policy Ehud Olmert promised scorched earth in South Lebanon after missiles hit Haifa. Warnings have been sent to inhabitants of the south to evacuate their villages, because the Israeli response to Hezbollah will be "scorched Earth".. As major roads are destroyed and the south has been remapped into enclaves, it is not clear how these people are supposed to evacuate. And where to. It seems the "sensitivity training" that the IDF went through for evacuating the settlers from Gaza is really paying off, even on the "civilians" because Ehud Olmert offered the hapless inhabitants of the south shelter in Israel. Now that's leadership! Will they be sprayed by DDT as did the jewish populations shuttled from Iraq, Morocco and Egypt in the 1950s and 1960s? Will there be Maabarot (transit camps) ready for them? They want the 20 kilometers buffer zone and they will burn, destroy and maime to get it. Maybe they should build another wall? Video-Clip Al-Manar TV has a video-clip of possible, potential hits to Haifa. Impressive. A missile is loaded, the camera travels over arial views of occupied Palestine and stops at Haifa. The port. Zoom on the petro- chemical reservoirs.. Cut to a hand pressing on a green button. The images are accompanied with text in Arabic and in Hebrew. They are conducting their war in images and video-clips. Proud to be an Arab I am still in awe with the response from Arab regimes, how utterly proud I am to be an Arab. From Abou Mazen, to the several moral and physical dwarf kings and queens (the Abdullahs and whatevers) to the un-democratically elected representatives, "chapeau"... I think of all the streets, those who are watching Gaza, Iraq, and now us. Do we not deserve their outrage? Do we not deserve mass mobilizations? Should not Moubarak, and his band of bandits and thieves deserve to be put to shame for their endorsement of the Israeli response. How does it feel, my beloved friends, Arabs and non-Arabs to watch Beirut go up in flames? Meanwhile wall-to-wall coverage is only from al-Jazeera, al-Arabiya and the Lebanese TV stations. The "war" is only a news item on Abou Dhabi, MBC, and the other Arab stations... The Lebanese predicament So Hezbollah dragged us without asking our opinion into this hell. We are in this hell, caught in this cross-fire together. We need to survive and save as many lives as possible. The Israelis are now betting on the implosion of Lebanon. It will not happen. There is UNANIMITY that Israel's response is entirely, entirey, UNJUSTIFIED. We will show the Arab leadership that it is possible to have internal dissent and national unity, pluralism, divergence of opinion and face this new sinister chapter of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Dictatorships produce mute sheep and sheepherders and radical ideologies. Rasha. From: Rasha To: undisclosed-recipients: Sent: Monday, July 17, 2006 3:01 PM Subject: Day 5 of the Siege- part 1 (it's gonna be a long one...) Dear All, A quiet night in Beirut, more or less, compared to what the inhabitants of Tyre and the south and the Beqaa and Tripoli experienced. They were shelled from the air and sea with little respite. Tyre is in tragically dire situation. 30,000 displaced, the mayor was on TV screaming for help, his voice choking with despair. They are out of supplies, they have more wounded than they can handle and the city's reserves in fuel and other basic amenities are pretty much depleted. (The IDF wants to "clear" three provinces in the South: Tyre, Marja'uyun and Bin Jbeil, in preparation for the "20 km buffer zone") The port of Tripoli was bombed, the port of Beirut was bombed. The range of targets has expanded to new zones of hurt: civilians, civilians, civilians, and reservoirs of fuel (Jiyyeh, power station feeding the south, and the airport again), storage facilities of vegetables and fruits in Taanayel (Beqaa) and in the south, and Lebanese army barracks. The roster of martyrs of this war now includes poor soldiers, reservists who were stationed in their posts, watching idly the country go up in flames. The intention? Probably to cripple the population even further, to make survival harder and harder and to corner the Lebanese army. The promise of "scorched earth" did not really happen yesterday, I mean the inhabitants of the south were served a good dose of Israeli virility, but not to the level of "shock and awe". Maybe it will come in small calculated doses (The IDF are a "calculating" military, not like us, rogues, we don't calculate). Who knows? Who the fuck knows? What makes sense anymore... Dementia is slowly creeping in... Slowly, surreptitiously. At the rate of news flashes. This is how we live now, from "breaking news" to "breaking news". A sampling: I have been in the cafe for one hour now. (The cafe is an escape from home, but in itself another island of insanity... will get to that later at some point). OK, I have been in the cafe for one hour now. This is what I have heard so far: 1) A text message traveled to my friend's cell phone: A breaking news item from Israeli military command. If Hezbollah does not stop shelling Galilee and northern towns, Israel will hit the entire electricity network of Lebanon. 2) Hezbollah shells Haifa, Safad, and colonies in south Golan. 3) A text message traveled to my other friend's cell phone, from an expat who left to Damascus and is catching a flight back to London. "All flights out of Damascus are cancelled. Do you know anything?" 4) Israeli shell fell near the house of the bartender, his family is stranded in the middle of rubbble in Hadath. He leaps out of the cafe and frantically calls to secure passage for them to the mountains. 5) Hezbollah down an F-16 Israeli plane into Kfarshima (near Hadath). Slight jubilation in a cafe that thrives on denial. Does the world make sense to anyone? It's not supposed to, I know, but these "surgical" military tactics are supposed to make sense to at least 15 people. And out of these 15 people, at least 14 disseminate the news, and since the world is about 6 degrees of separation removed, at some point, somebody has to know something... I started writing these diary notes to friends outside Lebanon to remain sane and give them my news. I was candid and transparent with all my emotions.. The ones I had and the ones I did not have. They were more intended to fight dementia at home, in my home and in my mind, to bridge the isolation in this siege, than to fight the media black-out, racism, prejudice and break the seal of silence. Friends began to circulate them (with my approval). By the third diary note, I was getting replies, applause and rebuke from people I did not know who had read them. It's great to converse with the world at large, but I realize now that candor and transparency come with a price.. A price I am more than happy to pay. However, these diary notes are becoming something else, and I realize now that I am no longer writing to the intimate society of people I love and cherish, but to an opaque blogosphere of people who want "alternative" news. I am more than ever conscious of a sense of responsibility in drafting them, they have a public life, an echo that I was not aware of that I experience now as some sort of a burden. I have been tortured about the implications of that public echo. Should I remain candid, critical, spiteful, cowardly, or should I transform into an activist and write in a wholly different idiom? There is off course a happy medium between both positions, but I don't have the mental wherewithalls to find it now. And I don't want to sacrifice candor, transparency and skepticism at the risk of having my notes distorted to serve some ill-intentioned purpose, or in the vocabulary of official rhetoric, "give aid and comfort to the enemy". The enemy does well without the aid of my rantings (they have a nuclear bomb, a hero soccer player form Ghana, the gift of democracy, fantabulous drag queens, and a right wing freak whose first name is BiBi). Notes from a hapless stranded thirty-something caged in Ras Beirut (ie the privileged of the privileged), I believe, will not really make a difference. I am reminded of the many, many, many e-diaries that Palestinians send when the Israelis want to secure peace and give them a virile dose of justice with sieges, shelling, checkpoints, sniping, maiming, beating, and all that Israel has developped in the vein of practices to strengthen its democracy and territory and off course contribute to the blossoming of the peace process. Well my rantings are far from the emails of my Palestinian brethren. They are charged with ambivalence and anti-heroics. In Palestine things are less complex, less dirty, more starkly contrasted and clear. What Israel is now administering to Lebanon is a small dose of what it delivers to Palestinians. Intense, condensed, but a small dose. However the complications of Lebanon's internal politics and the very, very complicated imbrications of Lebanon with regional politics renders enduring, witnessing, documenting this war more confusing. So bear with me. It's lonely being an anti-hero. My Palestinian friends are protesting that the Israeli campaign in Gaza has been eclipsed from the world's attention and concern. Beirut is now attracting attention. Don't look away from Gaza. The same canons are firing. The same children are orphaned, the same people are being displaced, shoved outside history and the attributes of humanity, rendered to integers in the logs of NGOs for donations of bags of flour and sugar. The same. By Day 5 of the Siege, a new routine has set in. "Breaking news" becomes the clock that marks the passage of time. You find yourself engaging in the strangest of activities: you catch a piece of breaking news, you leap to another room to annoounce it to family although they heard it too, and then you txt-message it to others. At some point in the line-up, you become yourself the messenger of "breaking news". Along the way you collect other pieces of "breaking news" which you deliver back. Between two sets of breaking news, you gather up facts and try to add them up to fit a scenario. Then you recall previously mapped scenarios. Then you realize none works. Then you exhale. And zap. Until the next piece of breaking news comes. It just gets uglier. You fear night-time. For some reason, you believe the shelling will get worse at night. When vision is impaired, when darkness envelops everything. But it's not true. Shelling is as intense during the day as it is during the night. There has been "intense" diplomatic activity between yesterday and today. UN envoys, ambassadors, EU envoys, all kinds of men and women coming and going carrying messages to the Lebanese government from the "international community" and the "Israeli counterpart". Officially they have led to nothing. But we are told, officially on the news, that the "secret" channels have started working, and these are the ones that work. The secret channels were launched when the Lebanese Prime Minister met with the US ambassador and the Lebanese head of parliament in a closed door meeting at the head of parliament's home. There is supposed to be some sort of press conference after that. And Jacques Chirac (Lebanon holds a special place in his heart) is sending handsome Dominique de Villepin to Lebanon this afternoon. He is scheduled to arrive at 5:00 pm. He's the genius who created the CPE, the genius who finally "listened" to the dark-skinned and maladjusted children of France during the last round of riots. I guess we should be glad he's not sending Sarkoczy? Or is the ugly Pole going to Israel? In the final count, we are a "banlieue" of France, the bad boys are at it again, burning cars and breaking the "fragile" status quo in the region. When de Villepin is here, we could have a lull in the shelling. Maybe. Maybe that's when they'll evacuate the "foreign nationals". The foreign nationals are a new issue now. With so many expats visiting for the summer, and with so many Lebanese holding dual nationality, it's been tough for the G8 to plan their evacuations. Two hundred thousand Canadians (8 of whom perished yesterday in the south)! Fifty thousand Frenchmen... What to do with all these bi- nationals? Create categories. Category A are the real, genuine, white- skinned, tax-paying valuable natives, Category B are the recently integrated, recently assimilated, brown-skinned, tax-paying not so valuable natives. The best evacuation plan is the American. They are directing their "nationals" to a website (ha! with electricty power cuts it's kinda funny) where they promise an airlift from the airport (although the air strips have been destroyed) to Cyprus. But the seriously unfunny part is that there is an evacuation fee. And for those with no money, the US government generously offers a loan. Isn't that brilliant? Loans and fees are processed in Cyprus. There are ultra-secret channeling mediated by the Germans too. The Germans negotiated the last round of prisoner exchange between Hezbollah and Israel.. "The Germans know their way with Hezbollah" noted a newscaster. Isn't it funny how these conflicts find their interlocutors and negotiators. I am obsessively thinking about these negotiators and diplomats. How they go through their day. How they initiate conversations, how they end them. Top on my list is Amr Moussa, Egypt's star diplomat and gift to the Arab League. His handling of the Lebanese crisis is stellar, and comes after his handling of the assault on Gaza and perhaps his crowning achievement is his handling of Darfur. How do these people receive dispatches that hundreds of people are dead and decide not to act? I am fascinated by how they structure their consciousness. Not conscience, consciousness. I guess they become numb. I guess they believe that the sweep of history spares them. They probably see the world in a different way, that some people are condemned to be in Gaza or in Tyre and they are supposed to live meaningless lives and die anonymous deaths. They don't. They believe they fashion history writ large. They go through their day, enjoying sleep and meals. Air-conditioned cars, private jets, tailored suits, who's coming to dinner, where to spend summer vacation. They are never to be held accountable for whatever they say or do. How did Amr Moussa go through the conversation with the Saudi envoy, for example? The tall Saudi minister of foreign affairs was firm, emboldened with an unusual surge of virility, he must have said to him, "Screw the Lebanese, the Hezbollah have to pay. We support the Lebanese government but we should publically condemn Hezbollah and demand a cease-fire. And Amr Moussa said what? "I agree with you." And felt good about agreeing with the Saudis. Did his stomach not writhe with a hint of an ulcer when he hung up? Did he not press on and say, "But the Arab League should take a vanguard role in ending this crisis as soon as possible and impose a cease-fire?" Off course his president, Hosni Moubarak had his own pep talk with the press. And it was inspiring. I think it's easier being Hosni Mobarak because he's senile. Senility is his understanding of freedom. He's a few inches away from absolute freedom. Egypt is waiting with abated breath when he comes out and dsiplays the joys of having absolutely not a single hint of remembrance or cognitive perception of the world around him. Meanwhile Lebanon was being shelled to rubble. And Amr Moussa must have felt "pressured" to offer something to the "Arab street" (aaah that elusive demon). The foreign ministers agreed in unanimity that the best course of action would be to raise the question at the UN security council meeting in September. To the embarassingly weepy mother of the decapitated child, to the embarassingly nagging child of the charred mother, to the "steadfastly valiant" Palestinians in Gaza and the "hapless" Lebanese in the south, they figured they owed them something, a statement to relieve them from their grief. And the groundbreaking insight said that "the Arab league officially deemed the "peace process to be dead." No one, no one expected such enlightening wisdom from the council of foreign ministers. I am still enraptured in its profundity. Breaking News: It's not clear Hezbollah downed a plane. The al-Manar TV is now describing it as a "foreign body". Will the Israelis add it to their list of casualties? Day 5 of the Siege is promising to be more enthralling. More mad ramblings tonight... Love to all, Rasha. To: undisclosed-recipients: Sent: Wednesday, July 19, 2006 10:08 AM Subject: Day 6 of the Siege (Dear All, The generator shut down before I could end this entry. It's noon the next day now...) Dear All, I am drafting this entry in this unusual diary at 11:30 pm, I have about half an hour before the generator shuts down. Most of Beirut is in the dark. I dare not imagine what the country is like. Today was a relatively calm day, but like most calm days that come immediately after tumultuous days, it was a sinister day of taking stock of damage, pulling bodies from under destroyed buildings, shuttling injured to hospitals that have the capacity to tend to their wounds more adequately. The relative calm allowed journalists to visit the sites of shelling and violence. The images from Tyre, and villages in the south are shocking. Images from Haret Hreyk (the neighborhood in the southern suburb that received the most "focused" shelling) are also astounding. The number of deaths is yet uncertain, it increases by the hour as bodies are pulled from the landscape of destruction. In the southern suburbs, some people may be trapped in underground shelters under the vestiges of their homes and apartment buildings. And yes, there is a problem of space in morgues in the south and the Beqaa, because none of the towns and villages are equipped to handle these numbers of deaths. The IDF has destroyed almost entirely the village of 'Aytaroun. Some of the surviving wounded are Canadian citizens. Like the 8 Canadians who died in the building in Tyre (a building that housed the red cross and civil rescue), the Canadian government has had very little regard for them. Evacuations, Privilege, Solidarity Today was a particularly strange day for me because I was granted an opportunity to leave tomorrow morning. I hold a Canadian passport, I was born in Toronto when my parents were students there. I left at age two. I have never gone back, for lack of opportunity and occasion, no other reason. I have the choice to sign up for the evacuation, but the European and North American governments have been so despicable, so racist that I don't want to subject myself to a discrimination of that sort. The Swedes, the Danes and the Germans have evacuated their patriots with blond hair and blue eyes. The immigrants that were given shelter to their countries "out of the kindness" of their governments have been systematically left behind; and the guest workers who stayed to enliven their economies and their babies who adjust the dynamism of their demographies, were left behind to fend for shelter under the shells. But I digress. The point I set out to make is that I refuse to be evacuated as a second tier denizen. I had the opportunity to leave tomorrow by car to Syria, then to Jordan and from there by plane to wherever I am supposed to be right now. For days I have been itching to leave because I want to pursue my professional commitments, meet deadlines and continue with my life. For days I have been battling ambivalence towards this war, estranged from the passions it has roused around me and from engagement in a cause. And yet when the phone call came informing me that I had to be ready at 7:00 am the next morning, I asked for a pause to think. I was torn. The landscape of the human and physical ravages of Israel's genial strategy at implementing UN Resolution 1559, the depth of destruction, the toll of nearly 250 deaths, more than 800 injured and 400,000 displaced, had bound me to a sense of duty. It was not even patriotism, it was actually the will to defy Israel. They cannot do this and drive me away. They will not drive me away. This is one of the most recurring mistakes that the IDF makes, this is how we see things: THEY have destroyed this country, THEY are taking an opportunity to turn it to rubble and to usher us into oblivion, if there is ambivalence vis-a-vis the wisdom of Hezbollah's capture of the two soldiers, there is unambiguous, unanimous solidarity to stand in the face of Israel's barbaric arrogance. Some people see more in this war, some people see a moment of where the logic/values of the policies of the Moubaraks, the Abdullahs of the Arab world, i.e. the defeatist, pragmatic corrupt sell-outs will be humiliated as well. And I am sure, other people see other things as well. The roads to Damascus are not safe. Its many different ways are shelled everyday. Drivers know what "calculated" risks to take, I am assured, but one never knows. Everyday the way out becomes more difficult. I decided to stay, I don't know when I will have another opportunity to leave. The first contingent of Britons was evacuated early this evening. There are two ships, but the evacuation will take place over 3 days. Same for the French and Americans, their evacuations will last for 2 days. While the evacuations are taking place, there was relative quiet. A welcome lull. There was activity in the street, even on the Corniche along the seaside. Refugees from the south, displaced from their homes and provided shelter in public schools strolled in Hamra, looking for a breath of fresh air. A break from the confinement in schools and other makeshift shelters. Imagine the horror, the sad, sad horror: we are on borrowed time and the only reason we are not under threat, under any serious threat is because the passport holders of some of the G8 countries are evacuating safely to safer harbors. With this relative calm, the sense of impending doom becomes almost palpable, time, space, light and movement are subsumed in an eerie stillness. It feels vaporous and fills the air. As it wafts from room to room, from apartment to apartment, as it turns a corner and moves to another neighborhood, every gesture, every act is a little delayed, slowed, surreptitiously lethargic, every thought lingers too long in the unfinished or inchoate state. This eerie stillness numbs the passage of time and the cognitive perception of things material. Objects seem both familiar and unfamiliar. They are familiar in that they were there the day before and seem not to have moved from their place. They are unfamiliar because they seem to belong to another time, another life. There was another life, I had another life that seems distant and foreign now. The morning is different, noon is different, sunset is different. Another Beirut has emerged. War time Beirut. War time Lebanon. War time mornings, war time noons. Siege time Beirut, siege time morning, siege time sunsets. Everyone else in the world is going about their day as they had planned it or as it was planned for them. The shakers and movers of this world, the fledgling middle classes of the developping world, the 11 million children workers in India, the good-doers and the evil-doers. We are in a different geography of time, of agency, we are besieged, captive, hostage. No chance of Stockholm syndrome this time. Our every move is monitored: every moving vehicle delivering food, fuel, or medicines is monitored, every phone call is listened on, every email read, every dream snarled at, every desire crushed. Israel has the right to explode it to smithereens. The shelling has not really let, don't get me wrong. It still goes on but it's more occasional, there are more "blank spaces" in between now. Hezbollah These "siege notes" have been receiving a number of reponses from Israelis. I have to say that most are of the annoying sort. First, they always begin by noting that I am intelligent and I get commended for my intelligence like Colin Powell gets commended for his English language speaking skills and you wonder what those making these observations expect from you and the world in the first place. Second, they systematically mistake expression of dissent and critique with Arab regimes and official discourse as some sort of a favorable disposition towards Israel. In other words there is, falsely, a tautology between regarding Israel as an enemy country and endorsing radical ideologies of Islamic fundamentalism or rabid nationalism. As if being a democrat, an egalitarian and a feminist implied that one could not have even more profound grounds for being critical of Israel and regarding that country as an enemy country that has sponsored and produced nothing but war, violence, wretchedness, misery, banditry and usurpation. And so heartened by my ambivalence towards this war they recommend that more conversations should take place between Israelis and I. Off course most propose that I make the effort to seek those Israeli interlocutors out. This extreme form of Habermas-mania, that assumes that deep conflicts can be "talked through" is the sumum of hubris. The experience of the peace process is telling: it is clear that Israelis cannot cannot cannot accept Palestinians as human beings whose humanity is of equal value as their own. This is the bottom line. And until that bottom line is changed, there is nothing that a member of a society that builds walls around itself to shut itself off from the world and shut the world from itself can tell me. Punto final. One of my impromptu (Israeli) commentators warned of my candor, despaired at my position vis-a-vis Israel, and took generously time and space to explain to me that Hezbollah he/she must be crushed because if they were to win, they would destroy Israel and me, because of my values and lifestyle. This view, along with other views salient in western media (particularly American) of Hezbollah betrays ignorance. It is fatal ignorance. The most gross miscalculation Israeli strategists are making is based on the assumption that Hezbollah is a) not a legitimate political entity in this country, b) its base is made up of extremists and c) its "elimination" would leave the Lebanese construct unscathed. In point of fact, pushing the Lebanese population to "rise up" against Hezbollah, or the scenario of a Lebanese implosion is the worst case scenario for all regional "parties", because the country would then become the jungle of violence and killing that Iraq is today. Because I am a staunch secular democrat, I have never endorsed Hezbollah, but I do not question their legitimacy as a political actor on the Lebanese scene, I believe they are just as much a product of Lebanon's contemporary history, its war and postwar as are all other parties. If one were to evaluate the situation in vulgar sectarian terms, when it comes to representing the interests of their constituency they certainly do a better job than all the political representatives presently and in the past. It would be utter folly (in fact it would be murderous folly) to regard Hezbollah as another radical Islamist terrorist organization, at least in the ideological and idiomatic vein of the American intelligentsia and punditry. (There is something about a stubbornness to misunderstand that betrays an intent to see a crisis linger or even escalate in the US. If Americans feel better being misguided idiots, Israelis should know better. If the Israeli intelligentsia wants to play deaf like Americans the only outcome will be an Iraq scenario, although I reiterate that Lebanon is not Iraq and the Lebanese are not and will not be Iraqi and will not be manipulated into the barbaric sectarian horror. We've tried that before and it does not work, and we are tired of fighting each other.) Hezbollah is a mature political organization (that has matured organically within the evolution of Lebanese politics) with an Islamist ideology, that has learned (very quickly) to co-exist with other political agents in this country, as well as other sects. If Lebanese politics was a representation of short-sighted petty sectarian calculations, the lived social experience of postwar Lebanon was different. Sectarian segregation was extremely difficult to implement in the conduct of everyday social transactions, in the conduct of business, employment and all other avenues of commonplace life. And that is a capital we all carry within ourselves, there are exceptional moments when the country came together willingly and spontaneously (as with the Israeli attacks in 1993 and 1996), but there are other smaller, less spectacular moments that punctuate the lived experience of the postwar that every single Lebanese can recall where sectarian prejudice was utterly meaningless, experienced as meaningless. When former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri was assassinated, the country seemed divided into two camps, the consensus was overwhelming however that we will not revert to fighting one another, to eliminating one another. If Israel plans to annihilate Hezbollah, it will annihilate Lebanon. Hezbollah and its constituency are not only Lebanese in the perception of all, they are also a key, essential element of contemporary Lebanon. Moreover the specifics of UN Resolution 1559 may have regional implications, but at heart and in essence they can only be resolved within the Lebanese consensus. Israel CANNOT take it upon itself to implement that UN resolution. There is off course sinister folly that Israel should implement any UN resolution considering its stellar record of snarling, snickering and shrugging at every single UN resolution that did not suit its sensibilities. Hezbollah are not al-Qaeda, Israeli and US propaganda will portray them as much, and that is the downfall of public opinion, that is the tragedy at the root of the consensus that agrees to watching Lebanon burn. In more ways than can be counted they are different political ideologies, groups and movements. First, they are not suicidal. Second, they are not anti-historical. Third, they are a full-fledged political agent at the center of a dynamic polity. Their ideology is not an ideology of doom, they represent as much petty interests of their constituency as they are imbricated in the fabric of regional politics. Israel, and Channel 2 I was watching Lise Doucet on the BBC interview one of Olmert's underlings yesterday after the speech. This is the folly of the Israelis, and I believe it will be their downfall, ultimately. He was lamenting that Hezbollah hit the "peaceful" city of Haifa, an Israeli city that he described as exemplar of coexistence between Jews, Christians and Muslims. Haifa! An Israeli city? Haifa? The name is Arabic. The jewel in the crown of Palestinian cities... A peaceful haven of coexistence between Jews, Muslims and Christians? My God! It took DECADES for Christians and Muslims to appear on the roster of "human beings" in the ledgers of the Israeli government. Decades of struggle, riots, pain and suffering. And they are still second class citizen, and they are still unwelcome, pushed out, day after day, crushed by the Israeli machine. This eloquent underling was making the argument that Hezbollah wanted to destroy the city of "coexistence". Off course, he does not care that the city the IDF has currently under siege, the city they are bombing to rubble, the city where the red cross and civil rescue headquarters were shelled to the ground, Tyre, is itself a gorgeous jewel on the Lebanese coast. That it is a GENUINE city of coexistence amongst Christians, Shi'ites and Sunnis. And the delightful town of Marja'yun is also a city where sects and religions co-exist, and Zahleh... and so on and so forth... But no matter, the Israelis have always done this, and eventually, it catches up with them, and in the end, they realize that their narrative is so far removed from reality they have to back track. The key to understanding Israeli's relationship to our humanity lies in a text by David Grossman, one of Israel's foremost novelists, essayists and writers. He wrote it around the time of the First Intifada. Israel was then beginning to come into reckoning that the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza was no longer tenable or sound strategy for the well-being of its democracy. By the second or third of these "siege notes", the emails reached Israel and Israeli blogs. A journalist from Israel's Channel 2 contacted me by email and asked for an interview. I was uncomfortable with the idea at first, for fear that my words be distorted and my genuine, candid sentiments quoted to serve arguments I do not endorse. Exposing oneself with transparency has its charm and price. That journalist seems like a nice person, but I have no reason to trust her and she understands my misgivings. My only defense is transparency. She sent me the set of questions below for me to answer so she can air them on TV or use them for some report. I decided to share them with you all. 1. How your day looks like from the morning. What you did today? did you have coffee? how do you get the news - television? radio? internet? The routine of our days is totally changed. We now live under a regimen of survival under siege. Those of us still not wounded and not stranded do whatever needs to be done to survive until the next day. Coffee, yes, I have coffee in the morning, and at noon and in the afternoon. Perhaps I have too much coffee. The passage of time is all about monitoring news, checking everyone's OK, and figuring out what has to be done to help those in distress. News are on all the time. All the time, whatever media works. There is a great need for volunteers to tend to the hundreds of thousands displaced now. 2. Can you describe the neighborhood you live in? So it will be bombed? No thank you. I live in a very, very privileged neighborhood, far from the southern suburbs. After the evacuation of foreign nationals (and bi-nationals) is complete, everyone is expecting doom and if Israelis decide to give us a dose of tough love as they did in the southern suburbs my life will probably be in serious danger as my family's and everyone who has decided to stay here. 3. Can you say something about yourself - like what you do for living, if you can say. I organize cultural events and I am a free-lance writer. I used to live in New York city and moved to Beirut Tuesday July 11th. I have no life at the present moment. I try to do a few things over the internet, but that's increasingly difficult. 4. Are you Lebanese or Palestinian? Both and it gets more complicated I have Syrian blood too. And Turkish and Bosnian. I am the product of the Ottoman empire, and I say it with pride. I know it ires a lot of people. But I am VERY proud to claim my lineage. My father was expelled from Jerusalem in 1948, he and his family lived in a gorgeous home in Talbiyeh. I think it is a day care school now. We own property in old Jerusalem as well and the Atlantic Hotel which was bombed by your "valiant" paramilitary pre-national militias in 1946. 5. In Israel our leaders think that by targeting Hezbollah and other places in Lebanon will make the rest of the local population against them. Is this true? It is pure folly, but even if it were true it is a terrible strategy, an imploded Lebanon is a nightmare to all, not only the Lebanese but to everyone, does Israel want an Iraq at its doorstep? There seems to be consensus now in Israel over the military campaign. It is because Israelis are not yet pressing their leadership and military the smart questions. Do you actually believe it would be possible to eliminate the Shi'i sect from Lebanon, and that it would go down easy in the region? If the Americans are advising you, duck for cover or move. Need I list their record of wisdom and foresight recently? Vietnam, Central America, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq. If you need to listen to imperialists, find less idiotic ones, at least who have a sense of history. Gold help us all if Rumsfeld is also in charge of your well- being. This war will bring doom to all. Stop, cut everybody's losses. Wars can be stopped before the body count is "intolerable" or an entire country has been reduced to rubble. 6. What is the atmosphere in the streets of Beirut, if you can tell. Beirut is quiet, dormant, huddled. We are caged, but there is tenacious solidarity. You have to understand that we see ourselves under an unwarranted attack from Israel. The capture of two soldiers DOES NOT justify Israel's response. There has been a status quo for the past 6 years that was well managed. Hezbollah was not in an impasse, the Olmert government was in an impasse. He ran on a campaign to solidify the "new" (illegitimate) borders, finish the wall and finalize the enclave and withdraw into the boundaries of that enclave. The Olmert government did not have the maturity or intelligence to know how to deal with the Hamas government. Your government was guided by arrogance. We, you and us, are here today because your political class is not up to the challenge. I am sorry, but the Hamas government was elected democratically, and there were myriad ways to deal with them. MYRIAD. But this is the stage of your destiny that you have reached, you build walls around yourselves (you to whom the Massada is a foundational trauma/myth!), and you chase barefoot, toohtless, illiterate, hungry people with state of the art military arsenal. And you insist that you are victims, and you insist that you are on the right side of history. All this bulllshit will catch up with you. 7. What is the atmosphere among your friends? The consensus is solidarity. Our country is under attack. Otherwise, we are an exceedingly plural society every one has a theory and a point of view, and we co-exist. Humoring one another. What do you do when you are under siege? Do you eat one another, cannibalize on one another, or stand in solidarity to weather the storm? 8. Can you go to work, or do you have to stay home? (because some of the workers in the north of Israel did not go to work today) The largest, largest majority do not go to work. Although it is a form of resilience. If the war goes on for longer, life will have to evolve a different routine. A large part of the work force is impaired from movement. And then there is the random shelling, it's also dangerous to go out. This has gone on from the first day of the siege. The south is now sinking in a humanitarian crisis. Beirut will soon. (The new regulation by your glorious IDF this morning is to shoot at all moving vehicles larger than SUVs. One was just shelled in Ashrafieh. New danger, new things to look out for.) 9. Whatever crosses your mind. Let's not go there... It's dark now, and I am too traumatized. I just want this to be over. I am waiting for a ceasefire. Are you? Is that too unmanly for your society? What do you need to see before you cease your fire? You want to hear me expire? You take down Hezbollah, and I am going down with them. Do you know when Hezbollah was born? 1982. Where were you? Was it an exciting summer for you? 10. I, for example, went to my gym class this morning. I am at home now, listening to the radio on one side, writing mails on the other side. Air-condition is on, since it is extremely hot and humid in Tel Aviv. I live in the center of the city. Later I will go to the office. I think life in my city continues but in a lower volume. Life as it were, or as previously understood, in my city has stopped. No gym classes, and I am accumulating cellulite, hence chances of finding second husband are lessened (can I make the IDF pay for that?). Air-conditioning is dependent on electricity or generator working. Power cuts are the rule now and the generator works only on a schedule. I like it when Israelis report their weather, it ought to have some cathartic virtue, because it's like a reality check one of the few reminders they are in this region and not in Europe. So yes, without air-conditioning and with power cuts, my "semitic" curls produce unruly coiffe and I have to admit, I am enduring siege with bad hair. I am on email, but that's intermittant between two bouts of "breaking news".. I hope you will wake up to the nightmare you have dragged us into. I hope you will want to have fire ceased as soon as possible. I hope you will deem our humanity as valuable as your own. Best, Rasha. To: fouadas at gmail.com Sent: Sunday, July 23, 2006 2:27 PM Subject: Day 8 of the Siege Dear All, I have to confess that writing is becoming increasingly difficult. Writing, putting words together to make sentences to convey meaning, like the small gestures and rituals that make-up the commonplace acts of everyday life, has begun to lose its meaning and its cathartic power. I am consumed with grief, there is another me trapped inside me that cries all the time. And crying over the death of someone is a very particular cry. It has a different sound, a different music and feels different. I dare not cry out in the open, tears have flowed, time and time again, but I have repressed the release of pain and grief. My body feels like a container of tears and grief. I am sure it shows in the way I walk. Writing is not pointless per se, but it is not longer an activity that gives me relief. The world outside this siege seems increasingly far, as if it had evacuated with the bi-national passport holders and foreigners. The past few days have been MURDEROUS in the south and the Beqaa Valley. The death toll has been increasing in a horrific exponential envigorated with the White House giving a green light for the military assault to persist. Beirut has been spared so far, but not the southern suburbs. Today is Day 12 of the war, the Israeli military has conducted 3,000 air raids on Lebanon in 12 days. Out of the total deaths so far, which range close to 400 (numbers are not definitive), almost 170 are children. The numbers of the displaced are increasing by the hour. Have you seen the pictures of the deaths? The mourners in Tyre? Have you seen the coffins lined up? And the grieving mothers. It is impossible not to grieve with them, it is impossible to shut one's ears to their wailing. It haunts me, it echoes the walls of the city, it bounces off the concrete of destroyed bridges and buildings. In trying to explain what drove Mohammad Atta to fly an airplane into one of the towers of the World Trade Center, someone (I forget whom- sorry facts-checkers) once said to me that Atta must have felt that "his scream was bigger than his chest". That description stayed with me, I don't know if I agree with it, or if that's how Atta felt in reality, but it comes back to me now because I feel that my grief is bigger than my chest and I have no idea how to dissipate it. The Southern Suburbs I accompanied journalists to Haret Hreyk two days ago. I suspect I am still shell-shocked from the sight of the destruction. I have never, ever seen destruction in that fashion. Western journalists kept talking about a "post-apocalyptic" landscape. The American journalists were reminded of Ground Zero. There are no gaping holes in the ground, just an entire neighborhood flattened into rubble. Mounds, and mounds of smoldering rubble. Blocks of concrete, metal rods, mixed with furnishings, and the stuff that made up the lives of residents: photographs, clothes, dishes, CD-roms, computer monitors, knives and forks, books, notebooks, tapes, alarm clocks. The contents of hundreds of families stacked amidst smoking rubble. A couple of buildings had been hit earlier that morning and were still smoking, buildings were still collapsing slowly. I was frightened to death and I could hear my own wailing deep, deep within me. I stopped in front of one of the buildings that housed clinics and offices that provide social services, there seemed to be a sea of CD- Roms and DVDs all over. I picked up one, expecting to find something that had to do with the Hezbollah propaganda machine (and it is pretty awesome). The first one read "Sahh el-Nom 1", the second "Sahh el-Nom 17". "Sahh el-Nom" was a very popular sit-com (way, way before the concept was even identified) produced by Syrian TV in the 1960s. It was centered on the character of "Ghawwar el-Tosheh", who has become a salient figure in popular Arab culture. I smiled mournfully, at the irony. Around the corner passport photos and film negatives covered the rubble. Haret Hreyk was a residential area. The residents, I was told by our driver who lived a few blocks away, were evacuated by Hezbollah to other places before the shelling began. Those who refused to leave then, left after the first round of shelling. Haret Hreyk is eerily ghostly, there are practically no people left in that neighborhood. In the two hundred meters radius removed however, life is on-going. Residents testified that Hezbollah was securing food, electricity and medicines to all those who stayed. Haret Hreyk is also where Hezbollah had a number of their offices. Al- Manar TV station is located in the block that has come to be known as the "security compound" (or "security square"), the office of their research and policy studies center, and other institutions attached the party. It is said that in that heavily inhabited square of blocks, more than 35 buildings were destroyed entirely. Hezbollah had organized a visit for journalists that day, as they had the day before. They provided security cover for the area for the international media cameras to document the destruction. There was a spokesperson greeting journalists. A small rotund man, dressed in a track suit, fancy sunglasses, a two-day old stubble carrying two state of the art cell phones. He spoke in concise soundbites and was affable. There was nothing menacing about his demeanor, in fact were it not for the destruction around him he looked more like he would be an assistant to Scolari (similar dress code and portend) than part of the media team of a "terrorist organization". The security apparatus of Hezbollah was also impressive, underscoring the identity of Hezbollah. They were all affable, welcoming, dressed casually and unarmed. They all held walkie-talkies, and when looming danger of another Israeli air strike seemed tangible, they all ushered the group of some 30 (and more) journalists to clear the area. They issued their warnings calmly and confidently. One of the buildings was still burning. It had been shelled earlier that day at dawn. Clouds of smoke were exhaling from amidst the ravages. The rubble was very warm, as I stepped on concrete and metal, my feet felt the heat. Israeli Warfare Mystery Doctors in hospitals in the south have testified on television that they a number of bodies that have reached them have an unusual, unfamiliar skin color. Some of surviving injured exhibit a pattern of burns that doctors have also never seen before. The question is beginning to get attention for the world community of physicians and human rights organization. Israel is suspected of loading its missiles with toxic chemicals. The fear, in addition to their toxicity being immediately lethal on its victims, is that the waters and earth may now be poisoned. The inhabitants of the south may have to suffer from Israel's wrath for a very, very long time, in chilling cold blood. The as-Safir newspaper, the second largest running daily in Lebanon, has taken up the task to investigate the question. Beyond the crime of toxic poisoning, the type of shells and bombs used is also astounding. I met a woman who was displaced from the borderig village of Yater. She is a native American, blue blood and apple pie, but with a hijab. She, her husband, her three babies and her husband's family, a total of 14 people were trapped in one room in their house in Yater. On the 6th or 7th day of shelling, she cracked and her kids could not longer handle the violence. Risking their lives, they jumped into their car, and decided to take their chance. They drove straight without stopping, taking circuitous ways when the main roads were impossible to tread. They expected to die on the road. After 14 hours of driving they made their way to the US embassy in the northeastern suburbs of Beirut. They were not aware of evacuations. They were lost on the way, and someone stole her husband's wallet with the 400$ in cash they carried (the totality of their fortune), his green card and her US passport. I came across her at the US embassy compound. She was trembling. She could barely tell her story coherently. She repeated over and over that she had seen houses fly, that the shells made the houses fly in the air and then collapse on the ground. She repeated that she ought not to have gone to the window, but she could not help it, she was curious, and she saw the houses fly. As a holder of US passport (and real native) she had been allowed into the embassy. Her husband, only a green card holder, was not. The US embassy changed their policy, I was later told by people and journalists, but at various stages in the evacuation, green-card holders were not included in the evacuations plan. Pardon me, in the plans for "assisted departures". I don't know what happened to the American mother from Portland Oregon and Yater south Lebanon. I know her babies are lactose intolerant and their only food was the stock of soy milk she had with her. She was very young, a face earnest, her skin transluscent white. In her pale blue eyes there was despair and fright that she will not recover from for a very long time. The Displaced The displaced have been dispersed in the country. They have been placed in schools, universities, government owned buildings. Aid is arriving, but still in chaotic manner. Volunteers are beginning to get tired. However nothing compares to the distress of the displaced. They are in a state of complete emotional upheaval. Their presence has already changed the habits and rituals of the neighborhoods where they have been placed. As the sun begins to set and the harshness of its rays begins to dim, you find families strolling on Hamra street (a main commercial thoroughfare in West Beirut). Shops are closed, sandwich shops are closed, cafes are intermittantly open, but the sidewalk provides an opportunity to escape the confinement from the shelter where they been relocated. You can see it in their walk, their body language. Their pace searches for peace of mind, not for a destination, their lungs expand drawing in oxygen to inspire quietude and calm, not for cardiovascular pressure. They have a deep, mournful, sorrowful gaze. They left behind their entire lives, maybe even their beloved. In Ras Beirut, small backstreets have come to life. To escape the heat of indoor confinement, displaced families relocated to old homes or government-owned buildings, have grown in the habit of placing plastic chairs and their narguiles on small front porches or entrance hallways of buildings. I had to walk home after a long day of working with journalists, two nights ago, and as I zigzagged through these back streets, I was comforted by their gentle presence. They chatted, softly, quietly, huddled in groups, watching the night unfold, fearful of the sound of Israeli warplanes. The ceaseless newscast from a radio kept everyone informed. It too sounded softly. It was a gentle summer night, and the families dispersed and uprooted surrendered to the gentleness of the night. On the next block, three young woman stood in line, queuing for access to a public payphone. That too has become a familiar sight in Beirut. People lining at public payphones. They stood, clearly tired but resilient. To my "good evening", I was greeted back with smiles and another "good evening". I was relieved to see that they felt safe, that they roamed the city at night without qualms. How long can they afford to pay for these phone calls is another question. There is a definite need for a long term plan. This emergency solution will soon reach a crisis, and state structures need to be prepared to face the anger and frustration of nearly 500,000 people. On the next block, a Mercedes car packed with people was parked at a corner, in front of the entrance of a building. The car's doors were flung open and the radio broadcast news. It was a visit. Two displaced families on a nightly visit. Everyone was gentle, and a soft breeze blew with clemency. ---- Original Message ----- From: RASHA To: undisclosed-recipients: Sent: Wednesday, July 26, 2006 2:02 PM Subject: Notes from the Siege 9&10 Dear All, My siege notes are beginning to disperse. I write disjointed paragraphs but I cannot discipline myself to write everyday. Despair overwhelms me. A profoundly debilitating sense of uselessness and helplessness. Writing does not always help, communicating is not always easy, finding the words, deciding which stories should be included, and which should not. The experience of this siege is so emotionally and psychically draining, the situation is so politically tenuous... I miss the world. I miss life. I miss myself. People around me also go through these ups and downs, but I find them generally to be more resilient, more steadfast, more courageous than I. I am consumed by other people's despair. It's not very smart, I mean for a strategy of survival. My day started today (in effect it is Day 13 of the War, but just another morning under siege in my personal experience) with news from Bint Jbeil, reported on al-Jazira. Ghassan Ben Jeddo, the director of the Beirut office was analyzing the situation on the southern front in Bint Jbeil. He announced flatly that Hezbollah had conceded to the military surrender of Bint Jbeil, that the IDF had besieged the town, and that the town had been almost entirely flattened to rubble. My breathing became tight. I knew well, and had been told for days, that military defeats and victories were very tricky to determine in this type of unusual warfare, because a conventional army has clear retreats and advances whereas a band of guerrillas behaves in an entirely different way. The military defeat in itself did not really matter enough to cause tightness in my chest, although I was a little worried about the IDF feeling empowered to proceed with "scorched earth" plans or some other nightmarish fantasy. My breathing became tight because I immediately thought about some 1,500 people, making up some 400 families whom I had heard the day before were trapped in Bint Jbeil. Some were displaced from villages around Bint Jbeil. They were trapped there in two buildings, one of which was a government school. I could not imagine what they were living. As the al-Jazira showed footage from around Bint Jbeil, there was a continuous soundtrack of pounding from Israeli tanks. I could only see them and hear that pounding: were they huddled together? Were they laid down on the floor, their hands over their heads? How does one survive 2 days of continuous shelling like that? Had they any hope of fleeing? They stayed with me, 1500 souls in Bint Jbeil. I went to the public garden where displaced people were now living, I went to the cooperative supermarket in Sabra, I went to an air-conditioned cafe with WiFi, and the 1500 souls were with me. I had lunch, tried to write, still with me. Until after sunset, a journalist friend told me he had interviewed the mayor of Bint Jbeil in the afternoon. The man had suffered a stroke this past Sunday and had been evacuated for treatment. By today he had recovered and was struggling to find a way to get the remaining 40 Lebanese-Americans trapped in Bint Jbeil. My friend allowed me to sigh with some relief, the trapped souls were 400 not 1,500 today... (Most of the residents of Bint Jbeil are Lebanese-Americans from Dearborn and Detroit Michigan.) Is there a point to relaying on to you the events of the past few days? I am still stuck to the television. I am still living from breaking news to breaking news. I now get things from the second-tier horse's mouth, so to speak, journalists whom I have taken to hovering around. Khiyam shall soon be rubble. As is Bint Jbeil. After Khiyam will be Tyre. The Beqaa has received pounding. Israelis targetted factories, some operational, others under construction. None were Hezbollah fortresses off course. They also hit a UNIFIL outpost last night killing UN international observers. This will be a long note because it is a cluster from the past few days. It will most likely be a tedious read. It reflects my encounters these past few days, conversations and discussions with friends journalists and analysts as well as vignettes from Beirut under siege. As I attempt to tie all of these sections together, I am back at the Cafe with WiFi. Yesterday they played the soundtrack from Lawrence of Arabia. I don't know if they were aware of the "post- colonial" and "postpost-colonial" dimension. Condi was in Jerusalem. The Bedouins were firing rockets at Haifa. And Faisal spoke late into the night, promising the rockets would go further than Haifa. Today, they have a Charles Aznavour playlist. Somebody with executive power in this cafe is a shameless sentimental. This is the first sign of a return to normalcy in my experience so far. I, an unrepentant sentimental as well, am very fond of Aznavour, this playlist has been the soundtrack to my convalescence from amorous setbacks, it is a first tangibe reminder that I had once a different life. Hezbollah, now the symbol It took a few days into this war for Hezbollah to acquire a new power of signification. The semiologists, the political sociologists, and hords of regional experts and policy advisors have to watch this carefully, they better at least, if they are to understand this moment and the new political idiom. And they have quite something to contend with, Hassan Nasrallah's pronouncements, al-Manar TV, the video productions, the manufacture of image and meaning. Hezbollah have now become the only Arab force to have refused to accomodate, even slightly, Israel's missives and caprices. They are undaunted by the military might of the IDF, its awesome ability to bring wretchedness to a people and a country and its ability to shrug at international laws regulating warfare, conflict and non- aggression. They are also undaunted by the moral highground provided by the US, and presently the Arab League and the International Community (whoever this construct stands for). In that, they have won the hearts and minds of Arab masses. The so-called Arab street (that vague beguiling force at once vociferous and inept that the western media have reified into a pressure valve of the potential/appetite for Terror â?"or anti-western sentiment) has been won in heart and mind by Hezbollah's retaliation to the Israeli assault. The Arab world is mesmerized by this movement that has developped the ability to fight back, inflict pain and for the first time in the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict pause a real threat to Israel. Hezbollah does not have the ability to defeat the Israeli army. No one in the region can and none of the Arab states is willing, in gest or merely using the power of suggestion, to challenge Israel's absolute hegemony. (I don't know whether Iran can or not, but in principle Israel's military abilities are superior to the Islamic Republic's conventional army.) In its careful study of a military strategy for defense, conducted in full cognizance of the movement's weakness and strength and of Israel's weakness and strength, Hezbollah has achieved what all Arab states have failed to achieve. Since the war broke out, Hassan Nasrallah has displayed a persona and public behavior also to the exact opposite of Arab heads of states, he may be in the "underground" for security reasons, but he is not discheveled, he speaks in a cautious, calculated calm, a quiet dignity. His adresses have been punctuated with key notions that have long lapsed from the everyday political vocabulary in the Arab world: responsibility (for defeat, victory and the toll on Lebanon), dignity, justice, compassion (for the suffering inflicted on people and for the Palestinian Israeli victims of Hezbollah shelling in Nazareth and Haifa). A stark contrast with the political class in the Arab world that speaks of "calculated retreats", "compromises for peace", and the real politik convictions that induce Amr Moussa to cast himself as the gesticulating pantomime for the Saudis and the Americans. In an interview with al-Jazira, Ahmad Fouad Najm, the famous Egyptian popular poet quoted a Cairene street sweeper who said to him that Hassan Nasrallah brought back to life the dead man buried inside him. This is the "pulse" of the much-dreaded Arab street. This too is a measure of Israel's miscalculation. Moreover, at the moment when Sunnis and Shi'as have been blinded in murderous rage in Iraq, when Idiot-King Abdullah of Jordan and a handful Barbaric Wahabi pundits babbled on about the dangerous emergence of a "Shi'i crescent" in the region, Israel's assault has brought to the fore a solidarity that transcends the Sunni-Shi'a divide in the Arab world, and consolidated a front of those who reject Israeli hegemony and those who cower to it in fear. This new symbolic power beyond the boundaries of Lebanon was willed by Hezbollah in the postwar, it peeked in 1996, when Israel conducted its notorious "Operation Grapes of Wrath". After the Israeli withdrawal from south Lebanon, Hezbollah claimed the credit for liberation. Some analysts saw the Israeli withdrawal from the occupied south as a strategic move to end the "Lebanon" file, and deprive Syria from a crucial hand in its negotiations with Israel (Hafez el-Assad died shortly after). Other analysts saw the Israeli withdrawal as Hezbollah's defeat of the IDF in a long, long war of attrition. Nevertheless, Hezbollah represented itself in its propaganda machine as the only armed force in the Arab and Muslim world to have in fact defeated Israel. In this present crisis, and from Hassan Nasrallah's first pronouncement (the radio/audio adress he delivered), the "open" belligerance that Israel is conducting on Lebanon has been represented as a turning point battle in the saga of the Arab-Israeli conflict. A saga replete with humiliating defeats for Arab armies, a turning point because Hezbollah promised to deliver a victory (as it has achieved many victories in the past). In other words, he transformed this present conflict from a "Lebanese" question into an Arab and regional conflict. The significance of defeat and victory is bearing a deep impact far and beyond the boundaries of Lebanon. This is one of the reasons Condoleeza Rice's notion of a "New Middle East" smacks of first rate hubris. The "New Middle East" is taking shape elsewhere, or the real new Middle East is here, and there is little the White House, Ehud Olmert, 23-ton shells autographed by the beautiful children of Israel (the pictures are quite astounding) dropped in the middle of refugee camps to unearth underground bunkers of "terrorism", can do about it. In the first few days of the Israeli assault on Lebanon, there was barely any movement in Arab capitals. The Arab world seemed content watching us burn on TV, our fate seemed sealed with the Arab League meeting. I remember writing my rage in one of these dispatches. However, after Nasrallah's first adress, which ended with the spectacularly staged shelling of the Israeli warship, Hezbollah's sustained ability to hold its fort and to shell cities as far as Haifa and Nazareth, in addition to the sight of Israel's sustained massacres of civilians and destruction of Lebanon, turned the tide. Hezbollah's position in the region and in Arab consciousness is etched with an empowering, envigorating significance. The New Middle East, Conspiracy and Hassan Nasrallah's televised adress Condoleezza Rice showed up in Beirut two days ago. The message she carries is that the US will not enforce a ceasfire. Israel estimates it needs an additional week before the atmosphere is "conducive" to a ceasefire. This means they need a week to achieve their aims. Their aims have changed over the past two weeks, although they have formulated a set of demands to the White House and the G8. Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Saniora on his way to the Rome conference said he did not expect the meeting to produce a ceasefire. Only Kofi Anan seems to expect that from this high-profile meeting. She did not speak of a New Middle East in Lebanon, in fact there were no public pronouncements made in Lebanon, but she did hold several press conferences in Israel, where reference was made to this new map. The "New Middle East" has not been officially unveiled by the Americans. It emerges at a moment when Israel has failed at undermining Hamas with all the means the world has afforded to support it: diplomatic pressure from the US and EU, an effective paralysis of Hamas' ability to govern, an internal conflict between Hamas and Fateh, the incarceration of cabinet members and parliamentarians, a humanitarian siege, and a full scale military assault on Gaza. The Palestinian population has yet to unseat Hamas or question the legitimacy of its position. This moment is also when Iraq seems to have effectively slipped into a civil war and the US and UK occupation forces are neck-deep in a quagmire with violence escalating to frightful scale. Civil conflicts and violence develop a momentum and logic of their own that create their own hell, and Iraq seems to be teetering at the precipice of this hell with no sign of decisive and effective intervention to bring it to a halt. This moment is also when the negotiations with Iran over the development of nuclear weapons are taking baby steps and in circles. With the war in Lebanon, the "moment" in which the "New Middle East" is unveiled is a moment where Hezbollah has emerged as a force that is able to humiliate the Israeli military on the field of battle, and represent the Israeli civilan leadership as reckless, confused and bloodthirsty. Hezbollah define their victory as maintaining their ability to deter Israel from assaulting Lebanon, namely, deterring a ground attack (the battle in a cluster of villages has been going on for 5 days now) but mostly firing rockets and missiles into the Israeli interior. In that regard, they are so far victorious. So the question is on what grounds are the US, Israel and the EU imagining the "New Middle East"? And how do they imagine its implementation? Past midnight last night, al-Manar television announced they would broadcast a pre-recorded adress by Hassan Nasrallah. He wanted to present his views and reactions to the diplomatic activity that has been taking place in the past few days. He also wanted to send a message to the nation, Israel and the wider world regarding Hezbollah's strategy in this conflict. For Nasrallah the "New Middle East" was the final indication that Israel's assault was premeditated (and part of a greater US plan) and that Hezbollah's victory would be the principal bullwark to thwarting the conspiracy of this "New Middle East". He also revealed that Hezbollah had now received information that Israel had planned the assault on Lebanon and Hezbollah for September or October. Israel planned to roll a massive ground force across the borders, with a cover from the air targetting Hezbollah leadership and roads and bridges that aimed at crippling the movement from responding. The element of surprise was key to the success of that military strategy. With the present conflict, Israel had proceeded with its plans, but without the element of surprise. And that is one of the reasons Hezbollah have the upper hand so far. And finally, he reiterated the "surprises" that Hezbollah had delivered to Israel thus far: the warship, hitting as far into Israeli territory as Tabariya, hitting as far as Haifa. He announced that Hezbollah was now ready to hit targets "beyond Haifa", at a time of their choosing. Did he mean Tel Aviv? Would he hit Tel Aviv? Was it his retaliation at psychological warfare? This morning, Olmert's office announced they had heard Nasrallah's threat and would respond accordingly. More on Being a Proud Arab Saudi Arabia pledged hundreds of millions of dollars in aid and whatever to help Lebanon in these tragic times. I wish the political class of this country had the spine and intelligence to reject this fortune or negotiate its political cost from the position of the empowered. Hezbollah is changing the terms, and unfortunately the cabinet of Fouad Saniora, as well as the Hariri movement is still behaving in total subservience to Saudi Arabia, protecting Saudi hegemony in this country and the region. The Jordanians sent us a plane load of emergency relief supplies. It just landed in our destroyed airport. The Israelis gave the Jordanian plane the security cover. Jordan and Kuwait are sending environmental experts to help us clean the sea from the oil and fuel spills that Israelis dumped. Did I mention this? Did I mention that after their warships retreated to a distance safe from Hezbollah's firepower, they spilled enough oil to cause an environmental disaster on our coastline? Did I mention that no one has been to fish a fish and that the shores are now pitch black? This said, I still cannot get over, or forgive the Saudi, Egyptian and Jordanian actions vis-a-vis the Israeli war on Lebanon. There was a chance to stand upright, to redress from the hunch of servility. For a moment there was an opportunity to salvage dignity and turn the tables for good. They chose to cower, to protect US and Israeli interest and extend moral cover for Israel to destroy this country. The Arab League is complicit in the destruction of this country. Fawwaz Traboulsi said it time and time again on television stations, they have a myriad means at their disposal to shake Israel and the US if only to impose red lines, to defend a notion of sovereignty. They could have withdrawn their ambassadors from Israel, they could have suspended the peace accords with Israel, they could have threatened a regional escalation during the Arab League meeting. Saudi Arabia could have used its hegemony over the oil market or its deposits in US banks. Instead, Amr Moussa opined that the road map for peace was defunct. This is servile complicity. Imagine how much they would have gained in the eyes of their societies and as regional actors, had they simply stood in one line- up in the face of Israel. Obviously, it is hubris on my part to imagine these heads of states capable of any action beyond humiliating subservience. This is one of the meanings of defeat. The total relinquishing of agency and dignity. The political culture that prevails in the Arab world has a very select cast of roles for officials (whether elected or not), at heart they are variations on three main roles: taxidermists, court-jesters and kitchen undercooks (the more accurate word is in French, "marmitons"). They resurrect dead effigies, brandish defunct ideologies, they gesticulate and throw fits to soothe, distract, and deter, or they slice and dice, pick-up the peels and clean-up in the "big kitchen" of regional politics. This too is a face of defeat. There has been much, much ink spilled on the impact of "defeat" on Arab societies, identity, political culture, etc. The other meaning of defeat is the inability to imagine political alternatives beyond the debilitating bi-polar pathology (and I use the metaphor with the psychic disorder in mind) of US/Israel vs. fundamentalist political Islam. These simply cannot be the two options for citizenship, identity, governance and political representation. (Perhaps it is impossible in Palestine because occupation is war, and war creates situations in extremis â?"and yet the Palestinians, Moslems and Christians, did not cower from electing Hamas into government, in cognizance of the costs). And so far, that "third" option (obviously not Blair's "Third Way") is not yet clear or cogent. In the present conflict, a secular egalitarian democrat such as I, has no real place for representation or maneuver. Neither have I and my ilk succeeded in carving a space for ourselves, nor have the prevailing forces (the two poles) agreed to making allocations for us. That is our defeat and our failure. In Lebanon, we are caught in the stampede and the cross-fire. As I noted in one of these siege notes, I am not a supporter of Hezbollah, but this has become a war with Israel. In the war with Israel, there is no force in the world that will have me stand side by side with the IDF or the Israeli state. It was my foolhardy hope, that the Lebanese front that emerged after the mass mobilization on March 14th would rehabilitate its nearly depleted political capital (depleted down to its most base and vulgar sectarian constituencies) and refuse to meet with Condoleeza Rice. Out of principle that the US and Israel are waging a war on one of the chief agents in Lebanon's political landscape. Instead, all these handsome men and women showed up at the US embassy, smiling, wearing their Sunday suits, aping the display of servility that the Idiot- Kings and Senile-Presidents-for-Life display at the Arab league meetings. She showed up at the embassy and enjoyed this band of court- jesters and taxidermists society while the Depleted Uranium Smart Bombs were delivered from the US military base in Qatar to Israel. Was I foolhardy to have once seen an opportunity for change when the March 14th mobilization swept the capital? Surely now, in light of this war. And you would think that by reading newspapers, this band of brothers (and sisters) would learn something. You would think that by watching what happened to their equivalent band of brothers in Fateh would inspire another behavior. To no avail. Look at the pathetic story of Mohammad Dahlan. Once a proud young man from Gaza, once a hero of the Palestinian resistance, once a prisoner in Israel's gaols, once a popular leader in the streets of Gaza. He was so corrupted by power, he became the US Foreign Secretary's Boy Toy. His street smarts became thuggery, his humble origins fed his appetite for cheap thrills: nice suits that he never hung well on his shoulders, fancy cars that he never had a chance to drive on decent roads, fine cuisine that he never knew how to order and first class tickets to capitals where he flew to surrender more and more and more servility. The story of Dahlan, although small and borderline insignificant should be told to children. I look forward to the day when he will not be able to walk in the streets of Palestine.. Why do I single out Dahlan when so many others like him roam the unpaved roads of Palestine, because for a brief moment I believed he was a man. A time long ago that I cannot recall now. In Lebanon, the Displaced, the Schizophrenia Within Lebanon, the situation is different. The White House and Israel are hedging their bets on an internal rift. The most dangerous would be a Sunni-Shi'i divide. So far the country has been united, but warning signs are let out everyday. The sectarian polarization is still cut grossly along the lines of the pro-Syrian and anti-Syrian camps, they cut across the conventional sectarian rifts that polarized the country during the civil war, and to some extent in the postwar. In every speech, Hassan Nasrallah has hailed and expressed gratitude for the fantastic popular support that has rallied around the resistance. The council for sunni religious associations met yesterday, reiterating their support for the resistance and condemning the silence and cowardice of the Arab world. It is compelling to see the hords of volunteers tend to the displaced. There are two main organizations channeling emergency aid and resources to the NGOs tending to the displaced, they are the Hariri Foundation and the National Relief agency. The management of relocating and lodging the displaced has been less than ideal, and I am of the opinion that the government has not really galavanized its full abilities to face up to the crisis. The Ministry of Social Affairs, the Ministry of Health and other concerned public agencies are coordinating efforts to bring some order into the chaos. However, there is increasing critique that they are not marshalled as they were in the past. True the scale of displacement is harrowing and keeps increasing everyday and the government has never had to contend with a challenge so tremendous. We now count 800,000 people who are displaced. Access to shelters, schools and other sites of relocation has been uneven. Problems have begun to emerge. I have made an effort to collect as many anecdotes as possible, to get an overall sense of the situation. So far, I have not been able to. The overwhelming question seems to be managing the distress and frustration of the displaced and the exhaustion of volunteers. The crisis seems to drag, and longer term solutions will have to be implemented because immediate emergency solutions are usually not sustainable over time. The anecdotes tell stories of everyday heroes and everyday greed and sectarian prejudice. It's a mixed bag. Unanimously however, the work that Bahia Hariri, sister of slain former Prime Minister Rafic Hariri, and parliamentarian from Sidon (the northernmost first city in south Lebanon), has been stellar. Using the arm of the Hariri Foundation in Sidon, she is housing 12,500 displaced from the south (mostly Shi'ites) and tending to all their needs.. There are ironic anecdotes too, for example schools in the Palestinian refugee camp of Ain el-Helweh have been opened to house Lebanese refugees. The brunt of this war are felt unevenly in the country. The eastern suburb of the city and significant areas in the mountains have been more or less spared from shelling and violence. Occasional Israeli air raids spread fear. The targetting of the broadcast tower for the major Lebanese television stations that claimed the life of an employee at the LBC (Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation) was a poignant reminder, but the astounding wretchedness inflicted on the South and the Beqa'a have not been inflicted elsewhere. This is not atypical of Lebanon's exprience of its civil war and of the postwar occupation of south Lebanon. This dysynchrony in "experiencing" the Israeli assault translates sometimes to a schizophrenia. There are people sun-tanning, partying, taking it easy while others are displaced. This too is part of the political class's engagement in the war. They could inspire a different mindset. In the Israeli invasion of 1982, I was in West Beirut. I was 13 years old. All my friends and classmates fled the siege of West Beirut. The political rifts were different then, but I remember that when I returned to school after the withdrawal of the Israeli forces that fall, I carried the burden of the trauma of the siege while my classmates had memories of fun and games of that summer spent in the mountains. While they recalled witnessing shells fall on Beirut from a distance, I recalled their sound as they exploded. I resented all the stories they told of that summer. They were all happy stories. I shut my ears when they recalled them. Until now, there are a set of songs that were popular then, that I cannot hear without feeling a pinch of anxiety in my stomach. It's the impact of that trauma. Part of the reason I cannot leave Beirut is that I don't want to become like them. It's like a pledge I made to myself. But this is happening again, on a smaller scale, because the shelling has reached beyond the southern suburbs of Beirut and the south. These distances that separate the people of this country have to be bridged somehow. The "united" front has to find a more cogent gel. We have everything to win if we are able to meet that challenge. We have our country to win. If we remain hapless victims who beg, and who remain beholden to the "charity" of Arabs we will never have full sovereignty... Hezbollah's victory can be articulated to become Lebanon's victory (this too might be naive folly on my part, but I need to believe this, at least for the next few days, so just humor me). Particularly now that the Syrians are making noises about plans to roll their rusted tanks and army of underfed and illiterate soldiers with its thuggish command back in the country. I am so weary of the return of Syrian control over Lebanon. The Syrian people, all those pictured cursing the Lebanese for their arrogance and lack of gratitude should protest against a re-entry of the Syrian military into Lebanon. And if the self-described "last fort of dignity of the Arabs" are inspired to fight Israel, they have the entire front of the Golan to do so. The Lebanese will not liberate the Golan, the Syrians will have to. You don't subcontract liberation. Moreover, Hezbollah has claimed time and time again that they are prepared for the long haul and don't need a bullet from any of the Arab states.This is another reason for the Lebanese political forces to band around the resistance and shield the country.We might have a chance to rebuild this country without owing a percentage of every contract to a thug from the Syrian junta, and that feels like humane relief. I will end this siege note with another of the obsessions that taunt me. People caught under rubble. In describing the surreptitious commonplace horror of the civil war in a televised interview perhaps ten years ago, the famous Lebanese novelist Elias Khoury drew the following scene. While everyday life was taking place, traffic, transactions, just the mundane stuff of life, and as you walked passed buildings, you knew that in the underground of that commonplace building, there might be someone kidnapped, waiting to be traded or simply held in custody for money or whatever reasons militias kidnapped for. And you walked by that building. I am haunted by the nameless and faceless caught under rubble. In the undergrounds of destroyed buildings or simply in the midst of its ravages. Awaiting to be given a proper burial. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060726/ef55bf69/attachment.html From anivar.aravind at gmail.com Tue Jul 25 01:06:02 2006 From: anivar.aravind at gmail.com (Anivar Aravind) Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2006 01:06:02 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Bangalore to Host the 4th International Conference on GPLv3 In-Reply-To: <35f96d470607241235t57016f7bxbf6ce7e409c02c1b@mail.gmail.com> References: <35f96d470607241230w7e7a3250mc4f08fb802c968c0@mail.gmail.com> <35f96d470607241235t57016f7bxbf6ce7e409c02c1b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <35f96d470607241236p1d1933fdp285be34921b69a51@mail.gmail.com> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Bangalore to Host the Fourth International Conference on GPLv3 India will host the Fourth International GPLv3 Conference in Bangalore, this August 23-24, 2006. A part of the world-wide drive to create awareness about the upcoming version three of the GNU General Public License (GPLv3), the two-day conference is expected to draw delegates from across the communities - legal, bureaucrat and academia. While the first day will see Richard M Stallman and Eben Moglen, the original architects of the GPLv3 license, communicating latest updates on the GPLv3 final draft, the second day holds panel discussions on localisation, awareness and adoption of GPLv3 and threat of Digital Restrictions Management (DRM). The event to be held at the Indian Institute of Management - Bangalore is a sequence to the Third International GPLv3 Conference that took place in Barcelona, Spain. Similar events have already been held in the USA and Brazil. The international GPLv3 conferences are part of a year-long public consultation process to update the GNU General Public License (GPL). The version 3 of the GPL, essentially, takes into account changes in terms of legal and technical environment, in which software licenses operate, and the need to increase protection against new threats such as software patents and Digital Restrictions Management (DRM). The worldwide awareness drive for GPLv3, is to ensure that, all users of software distributed under its terms, have the freedom to examine, share, and modify that software. For registration kindly visit GPLv3 conference website http://gplv3.gnu.org.in For Details, kindly contact: Arun M (FSF-I) arun at gnu.org.in Prof Rahul De' (IIM-B) rahul at iimb.ernet.in Abhas Abhinav (FSUG-Bangalore) abhas at deeproot.co.in Venue: IIM-B Date: 23, 24 August, 2006 Contact numbers: Abhas Abhinav (FSUG-Bangalore) #080-41124785 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- "Value your freedom, or you will lose it, teaches history. `Don't bother us with politics', respond those who don't want to learn." -- Richard Stallman Anivar Aravind http://movingrepublic.org _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From amc at autonomous.org Fri Jul 21 21:13:15 2006 From: amc at autonomous.org (amanda mcdonald crowley) Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2006 11:43:15 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Eyebeam Residency Fall 2006-07: Call for Applicants Message-ID: Eyebeam 540 West 21st Street, NY, USA http://www.eyebeam.org Eyebeam is currently calling for applications for five-six month Residency opportunities. The application deadline is Aug. 21 at 12pm EST. Artists, hackers, designers, engineers and creative technologists are invited to apply to be Residents at Eyebeam, to work for six months on projects or research of artistic endeavor or creative expression. The ideal Resident has experience working with and generating innovative technological art and/or creative technology projects and has a passion for interdisciplinary exchange. Residents will be selected from an open call, based on the work being proposed, the availability of the necessary tools and skills to support them, and in consideration of the overarching research themes and activities of the organization. International applicants are welcome to apply, although we do not have the resources to cover travel or accommodation. We are happy to work with selected applicants, if required, to help them secure funds to cover these expenses. Residents receive 24/7 access to Eyebeam’s Chelsea facility in New York City, including equipment and technical expertise from Eyebeam staff and Fellows, a $5000 honorarium, the potential for collaborative exchange with other Residents as well as support from interns. The program term is approximately from September to February and March to August with the potential for extension and/or re- application. Group discussions and interdisciplinary projects, within and between the lab environments and organizational programs foster connections with other artists and staff. Residents also benefit from critiques, lectures and workshops by external practitioners chosen for their relationship to subjects and projects being worked on in the Labs. All Residents are encouraged to share their skills and knowledge with the larger Eyebeam community by conducting formal and/or informal workshops with others in the Labs as well as possible workshops open to the public. There are also opportunities to develop work for performance, events, seminars, exhibition or other public programming in the Eyebeam galleries and beyond during the Residency term. Fostering relationships between artists, hackers, coders, engineers and other creative technologists is central to Eyebeam’s mission. The intention is to facilitate relationships whereby technologists and artists can come together to germinate and hothouse their ideas, develop new processes and create new works through a period of immersion in a social context which is rich in technology, expertise and ideas. Looking forward, we are also establishing research groups to bring together creative practitioners working at Eyebeam with expert external participants to develop new research leading to possible public outcomes including seminars, public discussion and exhibition. Research Themes for 2006-07 include (though will not be limited to): - Energy, Technology and Sustainability - Urban research, urban interventions and media in public space Artists and creative technologists interested in these research areas are particularly encouraged to apply for 2006/07 Residencies. Please read the descriptions for the Labs carefully. All Residents and Fellows have access to shared resources across the lab environments. Creating programs and collaborations across the Labs is encouraged. However, each lab environment at Eyebeam has different sets of tools and different mentors/trainers for these tools, so applicants should consider if and how these environments suit their needs and experience. TO APPLY for a Fall 2006-07 Residency please visit http://eyebeam.org/ production/onlineapp/ ** Please note Fellowship applications are also being accepted in the R&D OpenLab, the Production Lab and the Education Lab. The application deadline for Fellowships is Aug. 14 at 12pm EST. Please read all Fellowship and Residency opportunities thoroughly before selecting the application which you would like to submit. Founded in 1997, Eyebeam is an art and technology center that provides a fertile context and state-of-the-art tools for digital experimentation. It is a lively incubator of creativity and thought, where artists and technologists actively engage with the larger culture, addressing the issues and concerns of our time. Eyebeam challenges convention, celebrates the hack, educates the next generation, encourages collaboration, freely offers its output to the community, and invites the public to share in a spirit of openness: open source, open content and open distribution. Eyebeam's programs are made possible through the generous support of Atlantic Foundation, Time Warner Youth Media and Arts Fund, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, Alienware, the Jerome Foundation, the Helena Rubinstein Foundation, the Greenwall Foundation, the Bay Branch Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, the David S. Howe Foundation, the Lerer Family Charitable Foundation and the Sony Corporation. Location: 540 W. 21st Street between 10th & 11th Avenues Hours: Tuesday - Saturday, 12:00 - 6:00pm Bookstore: Tuesday - Saturday, 12:00 - 6:00pm _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From amc at autonomous.org Fri Jul 21 21:12:48 2006 From: amc at autonomous.org (amanda mcdonald crowley) Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2006 11:42:48 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Eyebeam Fellowships 2006-07: Call for Applicants Message-ID: Eyebeam 540 West 21st Street, NY, USA http://www.eyebeam.org Eyebeam is currently calling for Fellowship applications in all three of our lab environments. The application deadline is Aug. 14 at 12pm EST. Up to six Fellowships will be granted for 2006/07. Fellowships will be offered in the R&D OpenLab, the Production Lab and for the first time, in the Education Lab. The focus of the Fellowships varies depending on the tools and skills available and the creative objectives and philosophy of each Lab. For all of the Fellowships we are seeking applications from artists, hackers, designers, engineers and creative technologists to come to Eyebeam for a year to undertake new research and develop new work. The ideal Fellow has experience working with and making innovative technological art projects and/or creative technology projects and has a passion for collaborative development. Fellows will bring this experience and working approach to their own independent projects, projects initiated by other resident artists or Fellows and projects conceived collaboratively during the Fellowship period. SUPPORT The program duration is for 11 months, running from October to August. Fellows are selected from an open call. International applicants are welcome to apply although we do not have the resources to cover travel and accommodation. We are happy to work with selected applicants, where required, to help them to secure funds to cover these expenses. Fellows receive a $30,000 stipend and health benefits during their stay. They are able to take on additional external teaching or consulting work, but there is an expectation that Fellows will be working at Eyebeam a minimum of four days a week. Please read the guidelines for each of the Fellowships carefully. Each working environment has different sets of tools and different mentors/trainers for these tools, so applicants should consider which environment will best suit their own needs and experience. However, all artists, technologists and residents have access across the lab environments and programs. SHARING Working connections at Eyebeam will be fostered though group critiques, discussions and projects, within and between the lab environments and residency programs. Fellows also benefit from critiques, lectures and workshops by external practitioners chosen for their relationship to subjects and projects being worked on in the Labs. All Fellows are encouraged to share their skills and knowledge with the larger Eyebeam community by conducting formal and/or informal workshops with others in the Labs as well as possible workshops open to the public. There are also opportunities to develop work for performance, events, seminars, exhibition or other public programming in the Eyebeam galleries (and beyond) during the term of the fellowship. Core to our principle at Eyebeam is the brokering of relationships between artists, hackers, coders, engineers and other creative technologists and the contexts we provide. The intention is to foster and facilitate relationships whereby technologists and artists can come together to germinate and hothouse their ideas, develop new processes and create new works through a period of immersion in a social context which is rich in technology, expertise and ideas. During 2006 we are also establishing research groups to bring together creative practitioners working at Eyebeam as well as expert external participants to develop new research leading to possible public outcomes including seminars, public discussion and exhibition. LAB ENVIRONMENTS Production Studio http://www.eyebeam.org/production/production.php?page=midfellows R&D OpenLab http://www.eyebeam.org/production/production.php?page=rdfellows Education Studio http://www.eyebeam.org/production/production.php?page=edfellows RESEARCH Themes for 2006/07 include (though will not be limited to): - Energy, Technology and Sustainability; - Urban research, urban interventions and media in public space. Artists and creative technologists interested in these research areas are particularly encouraged to apply for 2006/07 Fellowships. TO APPLY: http://www.eyebeam.org/production/production.php?page=felcall Founded in 1997, Eyebeam is an art and technology center that provides a fertile context and state-of-the-art tools for digital experimentation. It is a lively incubator of creativity and thought, where artists and technologists actively engage with the larger culture, addressing the issues and concerns of our time. Eyebeam challenges convention, celebrates the hack, educates the next generation, encourages collaboration, freely offers its output to the community, and invites the public to share in a spirit of openness: open source, open content and open distribution. Eyebeam's programs are made possible through the generous support of Atlantic Foundation, Time Warner Youth Media and Arts Fund, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, Alienware, the Jerome Foundation, the Helena Rubinstein Foundation, the Greenwall Foundation, the Bay Branch Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, the David S. Howe Foundation, the Lerer Family Charitable Foundation and the Sony Corporation. Location: 540 W. 21st Street between 10th & 11th Avenues Hours: Tuesday - Saturday, 12:00 - 6:00pm Bookstore: Tuesday - Saturday, 12:00 - 6:00pm _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From iram at sarai.net Thu Jul 27 15:14:24 2006 From: iram at sarai.net (Iram Ghufran) Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 15:14:24 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: Re: Lebanon by Lena Jayyusi Message-ID: <44C88AF8.2000902@sarai.net> Subject: Re: Lebanon From: "Lena Jayyusi" Date: Sun, 23 Jul 2006 23:24:32 +0400 To: redaer-list at sarai.net A petition was circulated during the Crossroads in Cultural Studies Conference which was held at Bilgi University in Istanbul July 20-23rd declaring solidarity with our Lebanese and Palestinian colleagues who were unable attend the conference due to the current situation. Approximately 350 signatures were gathered. Attached please find a copy of the petition. A special meetıng was also called at the conference to dıscuss the sıtautıon and waht cultrual studıes practitioners could do: ıt was felt that circulating this as widely as possible was urgent in order to help break the silences around what is happening. Lena Jayyusı ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ *Association for Cultural Studies statement, July 23 2006 Istanbul* We are scholars, researchers and teachers from 53 countries gathered in Istanbul for the biannual Crossroads Cultural Studies conference. As members of the Association and Conference participants, We declare our solidarity with our colleagues in Lebanon and Palestine who could not attend the conference because of the current situation; We condemn the unjustifiable killings of civilians and destruction of vital infrastructure; We abhor the failure of international institutions and the flagrant disregard for international law; We call for an immediate end to violence and occupation; We demand respect for the sovereignty and self determination of the nations in the region. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Partha Chatterjee Center for Studies in Social Sciences Meaghan Morris Lignan University Ferda Keskin Istanbul Bilgi University Lawrence Grossberg University of North Carolina Bulent Somay Istanbul Bilgi University Ferhat Kentel Istanbul Bilgi University Alisa Lebow University of the West of England Lena Jayyusi Zayed University Süheyla Kirca Schroeder University of Bahcesehir Tori Silvio Academia Sinica İncilay Cangöz Anadolu University Gözde Onaran ASCA Goksun Yazici Assistant Night Queen Pankaj Banaras Hindu University Mutlu Binark Baskent University Fahri Aral Bilgi University Aycan Ak Bilgi University Ege Edener Bilgi University Mehmet Boran Evren Bilgi University Ceren Mert Bilgi University Kubilay Özmen Bilgi University Burak Ulusoy Bilgi University Nadir Operli Bogazici University Cana Ulutas Bogazici University Evren Akaltun Boğaziçi University Sanjay Sharma Brunel Univ. Deborah Philips Brunel University Radhica Mohanram Cardiff University Dmitri Papadopoulos Cardiff University Chris Weedon Cardiff University Hasibe Gezduci Catholic University Joyce Koreman Catholic University Tejaswini Niranjana Center for the Study of Culture and Society Sevgi Adak Central European University Nil Mutluer Central European University Hilal Özçetin Central European University Alexandra Szoke Central European University Shu-Chen Chiang Chiao Tung Univ. Chupa Chen Chu Lin Publishing Sujeong Kim Chungam National University Akiko Shimizu Chuo University Lena Karamanidou City University Kevin Robins City University Dogus Simsek City University Eylem Yanardagoglu City University John Erni City University of Hong Kong Elva Gomez De Sibandze City Varsity School of Media and Creative Arts Maria Del Pilar Lopez Columbia Univ. K. Murat Guney Columbia Univ. David Scott Columbia University Anthi Kavra Council EU Jon Stratton Curtin University of Technology Marie Thorsten Doshisha University Garret Allan Dublin Institute of Technology Cliona Barnes Dublin Institute of Technology Diane Nelson Duke University Charles Grant East Carolina University Panizza Allmark Edith Cowan University Atalay Gunduz Ege University Mehdi Semati EIU Sam Binkley Emerson College Elizabeth Whitney Emerson College Eva Naripea Estonian Academy of Arts Anja Schwarz Free Universitat Berlin An DeBisschop Ghent University Kris Rutten Ghent University Ronald Soetaert Ghent University Sofie Van Bauwel Ghent University Julia Mahler Goldsmiths College David Morley Goldsmiths College Yoshi Tezuka Goldsmiths College Francoise Verges Goldsmiths College Nirmal Puwar Goldsmiths College, University of London Catharina Landstrom Goteborg University Anette Hellman Gothenburg University Marie Nordberg Gothenburg University Lea Robinson Indep Daniala Gronold Independent Film Maker Smriti Nevatia Independent Film Maker Senem Aytac Independent Scholar Esin Caliskan Independent Scholar Selim Eyuboglu Independent Scholar Aysegul Kesirli Independent Scholar Anita Ogurlu Independent Scholar Christine Ogan Indiana University Behzad Dowran Iranian Information& Documentary Center Nergiz Aciksoz Istanbul Bilgi University Nihal Alemdaroğlu Istanbul Bilgi University Burak Alevcan Istanbul Bilgi University Ayse Boren Istanbul Bilgi University Yesim Burul Istanbul Bilgi University Selime Buyukgoze Istanbul Bilgi University Duygu Cavdar Istanbul Bilgi University Yonca Cingoz Istanbul Bilgi University Serkan Delice Istanbul Bilgi University Duygu Dolek Istanbul Bilgi University Zeynep Ekener Istanbul Bilgi University Cagri Ekiz Istanbul Bilgi University Burak Evren Istanbul Bilgi University Firat Genc Istanbul Bilgi University Orhan Inkoz Istanbul Bilgi University Murat Iri Istanbul Bilgi University Lewis Johnson Istanbul Bilgi University Burcak Kubilay Istanbul Bilgi University Evangelia Mastara Istanbul Bilgi University Ethem Ozguven Istanbul Bilgi University Yasemin Reis Istanbul Bilgi University Sonja Schandt Istanbul Bilgi University İpek Tan Çelebi Istanbul Bilgi University Ayşe Erek Istanbul Technical University Ezgi Keskinsoy Istanbul Technical University Asli Dadak Istanbul Univeristy Özlem Çiçek ITÜ Gulengul Altintas İstanbul Bilgi Univ. Ozgur Cicek İstanbul Bilgi Univ. Okan Karka İstanbul Bilgi Univ. Mine Olgun İstanbul Bilgi Univ. Elif Sogut İstanbul Bilgi Univ. Semra Somersan İstanbul Bilgi Univ. Latife Ulucinar İstanbul Bilgi Univ. Semih Yucel İstanbul Bilgi Univ. Sevgi Ucan Cubukcu İstanbul Univ. Tomas Saar Karlstad University Tony Jefferson Keele University Jiwon Ann Keene State College Ben O'Laughlin King's College, London Kim Soyoung Korean National University of Arts Saltanat Kydyralieva Kyrgyz-Turkish Manas University Olivette Otele La Sorbonne University Blair Kuntz Librarian Stephen Cha Lignan University P.K. Hui Lignan University Karin Becker Linkoping University Helene Egeland Linkoping University Johan Fornas Linkoping University Kyrre Kverndokk Linkoping University Anna Lundberg Linkoping University Soek-Fang Sim Macalester Collage Gonul Demez Marmara Univ. Merve Erol Marmara Univ. Nurcay Turkoglu Marmara Univ. Sevilen Toprak Alayoglu Marmara Universitesi Esengül Ayyıldız Marmara University Bahar Comert Agouridas Marmara University Bilge Gursoy Marmara University, Istanbul Yongwoo Lee McGill University Ulku Guney Metu / Essex Liz Moor Middlesex Univ. Donat Bayer Mimar Sinan University, Istanbul Gay Breyley Monash University Kaori Tsurumoto Nagoya University of Foreign Studies Amie Parry National Central University (Taiwan) Hsu Kuo Wen National Central University (Taiwan) Chang-de Liu National Chung Cheng University Fang-chih Yang National Dong Hwa University of Taiwan Jen-peng Liu National Tsing Hua University Leong Yew National University of Singapore Sumita Chakravarty New School Randy Martin New York University Shouleh Vatanabadi New York University Akis Garziilidis None Christina Weber North Dakota State University Övgü Gökçe Ohio University Ruhi Tabassum Khan Ohio University Sarah Baker Open University, UK Marie Gillespie Open University, UK Gozde Pelivan participant Taskin Pelivan participant Anna Adeniji PhD Student Andreas Gunnarsson PhD Student Ann Werner PhD Student Cindy Summeren Radboud University Michael Dwerett Rhodes University Erkan Saka Rice University Peter Allan RMIT University Kath Burton Routledge Jane Thergood Routledge Jinan Coulter Royal Halloway Graduate Aysegul Altinay Sabanci Univeristy Dicle Kogacioglu Sabanci University, Istanbul Teresa Heffernan Saint Mary's University Zae-Young Ghon Seaul National University Hee-Eun Lee Seaul National University Myungkoo Kang Seoul National University Subir Sinha SOAS Wendy Willems SOAS Ivaylo Ditchev Sofia University Kathleen A. Bergin South Texas College of Law Tracy McGaugh South Texas College of Law Chen Pei-Jean SRCS of Chiao-Tung Univ. Wu Pinhsien SRCS of Chiao-Tung Univ. Ayse Temiz State University of New York Anu Koivunen Stocholm University Altug Akin Stockholm University Hyunjoon Shin Sungkonghoe Univ. Mikyung Park SUNY at Buffalo Hande Kesgin SUNY Stovy Brook Ghassan Hage Sydney University Catherina Ruyu Zheng Taiwan National University Gulnara Kuzibaeva Tashkent University Emek Cayli Teaching Ass. Behnaz Dowran Tehran University Bahareh Jalalzadeh Tehran University Leen D'Haeneris The Catholic University of Leuven Basak Ertur The New School Martin Roberts The New School, New York Yoshitaka Mouri Tokyo National University Wang Hui Tsinghua Univ. Antonia Chao Tunghai University Tatiana Rybs UBC Lisa Taylor UBC Handel Wright UBC Stephanie Jo Kent Umass-Amherst Jung-yup Lee Umass-Amherst Lisa Lzum Umman University Sandra Idrovo Carlier Univ. Of La Sabana John Grech Univ. Of Macquire Niamh Stephenson Univ. of New South Wales Kathleen Dixon Univ. Of North Dakota Rashmi Varma Univ. of Warwick Graham Evans Univ. Westminster Sabrina Rahman Univeristy of California Berkley Adam Arvidsson Univeristy of Copenhagen Salvatore Scifo Univeristy of Westminster Gregory Lobo Universidad de Los Andes Adriano Romero Universidad de Los Andes Brian Elliot University College Dublin Andrew Blake University of Aberdeen Goze Dogu University of Alberta Ondine Park University of Alberta Mickey Vallee University of Alberta Bennet Weber University of Alberta Maissa Youseef University of Alberta Kumar Parag University of Allahabad Melis Behlül University of Amsterdam Sudeep Dasgupta University of Amsterdam Jeroem de Woet University of Amsterdam Nazan Haydari University of Amsterdam Ayşecan Kartal University of Amsterdam Donna Hill University of Arts, London Thomas Solomon University of Bergen Anouk Lang University of Birmingham Maren Hartmann University of Bremen Nico Carpentier University of Brussels Luisa Percopo University of Cagliari Ferruh Yilmaz University of California Peter Limbrick University of California Santa Cruz David Crane University of California, Santa Cruz Olga Lopez University of Colombia Zelia Gregoriou University of Cyprus Maria Hodjipavla University of Cyprus Krini Kafiris University of Cyprus Andreas Onoufrio University of Cyprus Roshini Kempadoo University of East London Reina Lewis University of East London Ashwani Sharma University of East London Ramsey Harris University of Georgia Glenn Jordan University of Glamorgan Thomas Düllo University of Hamburg Miia Collanus University of Helsinki Yonca Ermutlu University of Helsinki Inka Moring University of Helsinki Melani Budianta University of Indonesia Ozge Girit University of Iowa Loren Glass University of Iowa Vincent Miller University of Kent Elisabeth Niederer University of Klagenfurt Stefano Harney University of Leicester Ana Goncalves University of Lisbon Edia Pinho University of Lisbon Jorge Ramos do O University of Lisbon Gregor Starc University of Ljubliana Marusa Pusnik University of Ljubliana Ilija Tomanic University of Ljubliana Ksenija H.Vitmar University of Ljubljana Tanja Thomas University of Lueneburg Ursula Ganz-Blattler University of Lugano Garry Whannel University of Luton Jason Wilson University of Luton Chru Heary University of Melbourne Jo Littler University of Middlesex Gilbert Rodman University of Minnesota Emine Aksoy University of MN Seth Mayotta University of MN Christoph Jacke University of Muener Mark Driscoll University of North Carolina Rivka Syd Eisneer University of North Carolina Mark Hayward University of North Carolina Josh Smicker University of North Carolina Della Pollock University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Motoko Yabuki University of Osaka Boulou De B'beri University of Ottowa Adricane Shew University of Pennsylvannia Elizabeth Stephens University of Queensland Louise Tranekjaer University of Roskilde Gail Hershatter University of Santa Cruz Mohammad Rezaei University of Science and Culture Peter Jacobson University of Skovde Alexander Kiossev University of Sofia Stephanie DeBoer University of Southern California Randi Marselis University of Southern Denmark Nafiseh Hamidi University of Tahran Mikko Lehtonen University of Tampere Andrea Conner University of Technology Devleena Ghosh University of Technology, Sydney Mehdi Faraji University of Tehran Sasan Fatemi University of Tehran Abbas Varij Kazemi University of Tehran Vahid Shalchi University of Tehran Hyunjung Lee University of Texas at Austin Stelios Kraounakis University of the Agean Rosario Radakovich University of the Republic Jalani A. Niaah University of the West Indies Sonjah Stanley Niaah University of the West Indies Catherine Burwell University of Toronto Tomoko Shimizu University of Tsukaba Marianne Liljestrom University of Turku Elina Valovirta University of Turku Tom Cheesman University of Wales Bruce Burgett University of Washington Karen Levy University of West India Ien Ang University of Western Sydney Greg Nobel University of Western Sydney Winston Mano University of Westminster Herman Wasserman Universty of Stellenbosch Hillevi Ganetz Uppsala University Jane Arthurs UWE Maja Stolte Viadrina University Geoff Stahl Victoria University of Wellington Selmin Kara Wayne State Univ. Patricia Molloy Wilfrid Laurier University Dmitris Agouridas Yeditepe University Özge Ejder Yeditepe University Vanina Kutelas Yeditepe University Deniz Mumcuoğlu Yeditepe University Petra Haolser-Özgüven Yıldız Technical University Hetmut Klassen York University Bojana Videkonic York University Gulbin Firat YTU From freestspirit at yahoo.co.uk Thu Jul 27 16:07:00 2006 From: freestspirit at yahoo.co.uk (Bikram Jeet Batra) Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 11:37:00 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Reader-list] Query on Fellows posting In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060727103700.70644.qmail@web25302.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> Hi, Can anyone please let me know how I can get particular postings made by Independent Scholars. Do I have to mail someone at Sarai for them or can they can found on the web? I am looking for postings by Biswajit and Nilanjan in 2004-05. thanks a lot, Bikram ___________________________________________________________ To help you stay safe and secure online, we've developed the all new Yahoo! Security Centre. http://uk.security.yahoo.com From monica at sarai.net Thu Jul 27 17:34:12 2006 From: monica at sarai.net (Monica Narula) Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 17:34:12 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Query on Fellows posting In-Reply-To: <20060727103700.70644.qmail@web25302.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> References: <20060727103700.70644.qmail@web25302.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Hi Bikram The archive of all the mails past is available on https:// mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/ You can open mails by the month, and then read by author. best M On 27-Jul-06, at 4:07 PM, Bikram Jeet Batra wrote: > Hi, > > Can anyone please let me know how I can get particular > postings made by Independent Scholars. Do I have to > mail someone at Sarai for them or can they can found > on the web? > > I am looking for postings by Biswajit and Nilanjan in > 2004-05. > > thanks a lot, > Bikram > > > > ___________________________________________________________ > To help you stay safe and secure online, we've developed the all > new Yahoo! Security Centre. http://uk.security.yahoo.com > _________________________________________ > 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: Monica Narula Raqs Media Collective Sarai-CSDS 29 Rajpur Road Delhi 110054 www.raqsmediacollective.net www.sarai.net From franciska at skynet.be Fri Jul 28 01:59:47 2006 From: franciska at skynet.be (Franciska Lambrechts) Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 22:29:47 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] views on the practice of homosexuality in the Muslim society In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <07667b7c39ec738609db68692f3a4a1d@skynet.be> Sodoma and Gomorra comes from the Thora which ànd christianity ànd islam are based on. The pope in Rome has only recently sent a message to the world condemning homosexuality, in the centre of Europe there is hardly anyone who cares much about his opinions and I suppose this rather added to the feeling he's an anachronism though in other parts of the world his ideas might have a bigger impact. Oscar Wilde on the other hand was on trial in 1895 in London by a secular court on charges of homosexuality and spent two years in prison. I don't think it's a good idea to stare yourselves blind on religion, religion can institutionalize ways of thinking of course. I guess that in general every sort of sexuality that doesn't even pretend to be reproductional has been looked at with suspicion, the survival of the sort. It's maybe more interesting to find out in which circumstances the suspicion turns aggressive. And be careful not to get pedophilia and homosexuality mixed up. From t.ray at vsnl.com Fri Jul 28 05:59:26 2006 From: t.ray at vsnl.com (Tapas Ray) Date: Fri, 28 Jul 2006 05:59:26 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] from beirut References: <9E8F66EB-29ED-445B-90D6-BE1372594F3D@sarai.net> Message-ID: <00e001c6b1dc$e23df2f0$0a01a8c0@tapas> Jeebesh, Many thanks for forwarding the mails. They really do "reach through and touch you like no statistics ever can". Tapas ----- Original Message ----- From: "Jeebesh Bagchi" To: "Reader List" Sent: Wednesday, July 26, 2006 10:44 PM Subject: [Reader-list] from beirut From: anandpat at gmail.com Subject: [vikalp] from beirut Date: 26 July 2006 7:45:39 PM GMT+05:30 To: vikalp at yahoogroups.com, vikalpmum at yahoogroups.com Reply-To: vikalp at yahoogroups.com Dear all Sometimes the words of a single witness can reach through and touch you like no statistics ever can. These are a series of ongoing mails from Beirut. They were forwarded to me by Avi Mograbi an Israeli docu maker who was supposed to come to Delhi and Bombay last week but cancelled his trip to stay back and do his bit to bring sanity and humanity to the people of Israel and to all those who still do not grasp what is actually going on in the Middle East. We've shown Avi's films in Vikalp. Avi's son is a refusenik who refused to fight in the Israeli army and was jailed for it. I know this is primarily a film related space and what is below goes far beyond film, but please do read this. Anand From arshad.mcrc at gmail.com Fri Jul 28 10:28:57 2006 From: arshad.mcrc at gmail.com (arshad amanullah) Date: Fri, 28 Jul 2006 10:28:57 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] A peom from a madrasa journal in condemnation of the Taliban Message-ID: <2076f31d0607272158w15a789c4j780a7addfda178ff@mail.gmail.com> Some months ago, Taliban fanatics in Afghanistan brutally murdered an Indian engineer, Satyanarayana, who was working in that country, for no 'fault' other than his being an Indian and a non-Muslim. This poem, written by Ather Naqvi, appeared in the Urdu madrasa journal Jarida Tarjuman (Delhi). To the Taliban: Bi Iyye Zambin Qataltumuh <1> (In context of the murder of Indian engineer Satya Narayana) Into the deep darkness of your heart There are no rays of the light anywhere, Even your decomposed souls, being transformed into fiend, Are ecstatic in the dance of barbarism, at the land of death, Your sense is dead, Your conscience is lying lifeless, And your reason has already breathed its last, You are still leading life of Jahiliyya ,2>, in the dark ages bygone, You are a shame in the name of humanity, You have become catastrophe (azaab) for the followers of the true prophet, It's due to your brutality only that the ummah is condemned to a severe mental agony, Terrorism on your part has provided the West with the opportunity to defame Islam, the true religion, You have become the real brother of Narendra Modi, Like him, you too have stains of blood on your hands, of the innocent, But thou not are the descendents of Afghans, the brave and self-priding folks, As you got deformed into the dreaded idols of barbarism, When will come to a halt your madness of the blood-shedding? Thousands of innocent dead bodies Ask you Tell us: what was our crime, That you have slaughtered us in punishment of? Tell us: what was the mistake of Satyanarayana, That you murdered the innocent, without any hesitation? Have you been till the day ignorant of the divine command "Man Qatala Nafsan Be Ghaire Nafsin" ,<3> Having killed him, now you are declared the murderer of the whole humanity? When you will be asked on the Day of Resurrection: "Bi Iyye Zambin Qataltumuh",< 1> Tell me: what will be your answer? What will you say to the God Almighty? [This poem appeared in a fortnightly madrasa journal "Jarida Tarjuman", Delhi (1-15June,2006)]. . . <1> . A verse from the Quran: As a punishment of what crime you people murdered him? <2> The period which predates the advent of Islam and is supposed to be characterized with war, murder and lack of respect for the humanism <3> The period which predates Islam and is supposed to be characterized with war, murder and lack of respect for the humanism. . arshad amanullah 35,masihgarh, jamia nagar new delhi-25. From dripta82 at yahoo.com Thu Jul 27 23:35:58 2006 From: dripta82 at yahoo.com (Dripta Piplai) Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 19:05:58 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Reader-list] 6th posting, Dripta Piplai Message-ID: <20060727180558.30843.qmail@web37005.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Several little magazines, newspapers, journals have published articles on the debates regarding the changed tunes of Rabindrasangeet, Viswa Bharati’s role in the publication of notations, interviews with the veteran Rabindrasangeet teachers etc. In this posting, I shall try to review some of these articles –which can give some idea about the practice of Tagore songs and different aspects of it. In ‘Viswabharati Sangeet Parsad O Gayoker Shadhinota’ (Viswa Bharati Music Board and the performer’s freedom) published in ‘Kolkata’ (1974, Vol. 12), Anuttam Biswas has mentioned Music Board’s cancellation of two songs, which were sung by Debabrata Biswas-the legendary Rabindrasangeet artist. On 25th July, 1969, two songs sung by him ‘Puspa Diye Maro Jare’ and ‘Tomar Shesher Ganer’ were cancelled by the board for the reason of using ‘excessive Music accompaniment’ and as because the second song was ‘not sung according to notation’. As the most popular artist of Tagore songs were not allowed to record certain songs, investigation about the rules and regulation of the Music board were began at that time, which have been nicely discussed by Biswas in the article. The history of the Music Board has also been mentioned here, which is rarely available. Music Board was established in the year 1942. Initiatives were taken for it by Tagore himself and some other famous teachers like Indira Devi Chaudhurani, Santidev Ghosh, Shailajaranjan Majumdar, Anadi Dastidar etc. The main aim for establishing the board was to prevent the distortion, and the mastermind behind the establishment of the board was Indira Devi. A local advocate named Nripendrachandra Mitra was a member and a trustee later. Tagore songs were, at first, regarded as personal property and thus, after Rabindranath’s death, Rathindranath owned the copyright. After Tagore’s death, legal fights were started among Pratima Tagore and Mira Chattopadhyay. Viswa Bharati couldn’t declare the songs as their own property as these were private property. Pratima Tagore won the legal fight finally. And after that, the Music Board started functioning. As Biswas has pointed out in the article, the history of Music Board is almost unknown-only some scattered data are available. Almost nothing can be known about the history of Music Board from 1942 to 1970. For example, who were in charge of the board after Tagore’s death? Why Santidev Ghosh had resigned in the year 1952? These answers were never found. Biswas has said about his own experience in the Music Board, where the Board members had clearly informed him that they don’t want that this secret information will be published. Biswas has also mentioned about the newly designed board of 1970 where honorary teachers of Rabindrasangeet like Sailajaranjan Majumdar and Anadi Dastidar were not included in the board, which is, no doubt a big question. Another important thing Biswas has pointed out is that, Music Board has never given any objection to the artists of Santiniketan even if the have not sung following the notation. (The rule of Music Board was, any song which is not sung according to the notation, cannot be allowed to record). The song ‘Aha Tomar Songe Praner Khela’ by Nilima Sen was approved by the board even if the song does not have any printed notation. But on the other hand, Ritu Guha’s song ‘Din Furalo He Songsari’, in which she followed the tune of Sahana Devi was rejected by the board. From 1973, Music Board had announced a rule that, the songs which do not have printed notation cannot be recorded. Some more important things were mentioned in the article. For example, why notations of different varieties are not being collected and published in the notation-collections of Viswa Bharati? And why there is a silent fight between Santiniketani and non-Santiniketani artists? The article has pointed out many important issues, like the lack of proper documentation of the history of Music Board, prescription of notations, or Rabindrasangeet as a property which can help to understand the practice of the songs. The article ‘Rabindrasangeeter sur bodle jay kibhabe’ (how the tunes of Rabindrasangeet change) by Kiranshashi Dey which was published in the little magazine ‘Doroja’, Year-4, Vol. 1,1976, is also a very important article. The history of notation documentation by Viswa Bharati has been pointed out in the article. While Tagore was alive, the notations were available in different contemporary journals, e.g. swaralipis done by Jyotirindranath Tagore in “Swaralipi Gitimala’, by Kangali charan sen in ‘Bramhasangeet’, by Sarala Devi in Satagan etc. But the publication of some notations in ‘Swarabitan’ had started before Tagore’s death. But swaralipis were not published for some years after Tagore’s death. A new “Swaralipi Samiti’ was established in 1947.This samiti had changed many parts of the notations, only if they thought that it should be changed. Dey has mentioned that many teachers had argued that the changes are being done without any reason. For example- Shailajaranjan Majumdar hed mentioned the same. This unnecessary change of notation and the fights as a consequence has been discussed by Dey in the article, which is no doubt an important source of research. The article “Swattabihin Rabindranather gan’ ( Tagore’s song without copyright) by Subhash Chowdhury in ‘Surer Bhuban’, Year-1, Vol.-1, 1991 has mentioned that Viswa Bharati Music Board has systematically tried to formulate the rules and tried to give importance to the listener’s views. The notation-dependence of the board has been mentioned by him, too. And it has also been pointed out that, Rabindrasangeet is now a ‘commodity’, which is related to many people’s profession and there are chances of distortion after the copyright is not in use. In the article ‘Santiniketan Ebong Kolkatar Rabindrasangeet ki Alada Ghorana?’ (Are Santiniketan and Kolkata Tagore song schoolings different schoolings?) published in ‘Rabindranath Shudhu Rabindranath’, year-9, 1988, Calcutta based popular artist Dwijen Mukhopadhyay has said that Calcutta-based artists have accepted the dominance of Santineketan artists in a positive way. And he has said that, Dakhhinee, Gitabitan, Rabitirtha, Rabindrabharati, Viswa Bharati –all are same. The articles have discussed a number of important issues. The dominance of Santiniketan over Calcutta-based artists, Copyright and the role of the Music Board, the history of notation documentation and the different varieties-all the issues are important for the proposed research. Send instant messages to your online friends http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060727/38b24beb/attachment.html From shahzulf at yahoo.com Fri Jul 28 01:55:04 2006 From: shahzulf at yahoo.com (Zulfiqar Shah) Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 13:25:04 -0700 (PDT) Subject: The South Asians Story on Asif Baladi Message-ID: <20060727202504.1148.qmail@web38801.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Urge Peace with India, Kidnap Peace Activist in Pakistan While the Pakistani President talks about peace with India on one hand, peace activists working on Indo-Pak peace are under threat. One activist – Asif Baladi – has been kidnapped by ISI. President Musharraf cannot have it both ways – he cannot claim to be working for peace with India on one hand and on the other hand intimidate grass root workers and intellectuals who are trying to establish an environment in Pakistan for peace with India. A case in point is that of Asif Baladi. On May 21st, the Pakistani newspaper The Dawn reported a press conference in Hyderabad where Asif Baladi announced an “International Paigham-e-Sindh Conference” in March 2007 at the shrine of Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai in Bhit Shah, saying that the purpose of the conference was to streamline Sindh's essential message of peace, love and harmony to the rest of the world that alone offers stability and co-existence in the region. He said he believes in the unity in multiplicity of religions and equity of cultures, and is a follower of Ahinsa and that 100,000 earthen lamps would be lit at the shrine of the great Sufi poet Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai on the occasion of the conference. Ardeshir Cowasjee reported in the Dawn "Soon after this announcement he was picked up by ISI men while he was on the way to a friend in Karachi's Defence area." He goes on to add that "A Constitutional Petition No.1019/2006 filled, today, by Mr. Noorulldin Sarki, Mr. Gulam Mustafa Lakho and Mr. Ghulam Shah, Advocates, in the High Court of Sindh at Karachi for knowing the whereabouts of Asif Baladi on behalf of his son Jibran, which is fixed on 13th day of July 2006 for orders at Serial Number 10 before the Division Bench consisting of Mr. Justice Anwar Zaheer Jamali & Mr. Justice Muhammad Afzal Soomro." Leaders of the Sindh Nationalist Forum have threatened to launch a series of protest demonstrations if SNF chief Asif Baladi and other nationalist leaders were not released. They said that since the 80s state excesses had crossed all limits and many a leader of Sindh and Balochistan were being held incommunicado and subjected to torture. They said that the kidnapping of Asif Baladi and other nationalist leaders by agencies was a flagrant violation of human rights and warned that the consequences would be disastrous. They called upon the Sindhi nation, nationalist leaders, national and international human rights organisations to help secure the release of Asif Baladi and other nationalist leaders. They called upon friends of Sindh to evolve a joint strategy for launching a struggle against the arrest of nationalist leaders. They said that Mr Baladi was arrested as he had announced to convene the “Pegham-i-Sindh Conference” at the shrine of Shah Latif in March 2007. They said that his arrest was aimed at sabotaging the conference though its objectives were to promote peace, unity, mutual understanding and religious harmony. They said that the Pegham-i-Sindh Conference would be held on schedule despite the harassment and obstacles. They said that a peaceful protest movement would be launched in Sindh including protest demonstrations, sit-ins and hunger strikes to secure the release of Asif Baladi and other nationalist leaders. Meanwhile, the Sindh High Court issued notices to the federal and provincial attorneys for July 19 in a petition alleging illegal confinement of Sindh Nationalist Forum chairman and Jeay Sindh Tehrik activist Asif Baladi. Asif Baladi’s son petitioned that while in custody, he contacted his sister in Hyderabad asking her to send his passport and national identity card through one Sarwar, who would be visiting his Gulistan-i-Jauhar residence. The petitioner said Sarwar came to his residence with three or four people in a vehicle numbered AKD-583 on July 2. He introduced himself as a servant of Brig Saleem of the ISI but the petitioner did not deliver him that passport and the NIC. The petitioner said nothing was known about his father’s whereabouts since June 26 and no contact had been made by him after his phone call. He feared for the safety of the detainee and requested the court to order his recovery and production. The Gulistan-i-Jauhar police station had been informed of the disappearance but no case had been registered. A division bench comprising Justices Anwar Zaheer Jamali and Mohammad Afzal Soomro asked the deputy attorney-general and the advocate-general to seek instructions from the authorities concerned to ascertain the whereabouts of the alleged detainee and inform the court by July 19, when the petition would again come up for hearing. While various organizations are rallying for the release of a peace activist detained illegally by an arm of Musharraf’s government, the President himself contends to bring peace by making vacuous statements regarding the dynamics of South Asia, urging India to see long term beyond Mumbai blasts in its strategies. The President must understand that peace does not exist in a vacuum and strategies often break down when the realities of ground take over. And the ground reality is that much work needs to be done to break down stereotypes in India and Pakistan so that peace can be possible and be sustained – peace beyond the gimmicks of handshakes and press conferences. This is exactly what the ilk of Asif Baladi is working on in Pakistan – just like many of their counterparts in India. Creating a grass roots reality where people view their neightbors as friends, as co-inhabitants. Peace cannot be achieved by intimidating them. But maybe, Musharraf is not looking for peace. Maybe he is interested in ‘managing’ the forces of fundamentalism so that he can remain the man USA wants in Pakistan. So that he can stay in power by presenting the stick of extremism to the Pakistani society. That is the question Mr. Musharraf needs to answer to his own people and to the Indians. Is he truly for peace? In which case, he needs to prove that by his actions. Beginning with releasing Asif Baladi and supporting the Second Visa-free and Peaceful South Asia Convention, the International Paigham-e-Sindh Conference and other such grass roots efforts. Sanat Mohanty http://www.thesouthasian.org/archives/2006/urge_peace_with_india_kidnap_p.html --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Next-gen email? Have it all with the all-new Yahoo! Mail Beta. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060727/b815f56c/attachment.html From monica at sarai.net Fri Jul 28 12:07:29 2006 From: monica at sarai.net (Monica Narula) Date: Fri, 28 Jul 2006 12:07:29 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] CFP: Art in the Age of Technological Seduction Message-ID: <40BDE33B-A437-4592-A4C9-B3C0B8E3E2BA@sarai.net> CALL FOR PAPERS: DEADLINE mid-August, 2006 "Art in the Age of Technological Seduction" Fall 2006 issue of NMC media-N: journal of the new media caucus Guest editors: Legier Biederman & Joshua Callaghan http://www.newmediacaucus.org/media-n/call.htm The fall 2006 issue of Media-N, “Art in the Age of Technological Seduction,” is a collaborative platform, a diverse questioning, re- considering and re-imaging of what, when and how new media arts practice is viewed by artists, practitioners, theorists, critics and historians working in the field today. We seek a broad range of contributions discussing the scope, values, and definitions of diverse new media arts practices and hope that this issue of Media-N will be a departure as much as much as an arrival. Four general questions have been posed by the members of the new media caucus as points of entry for an engaging, vibrant discussion. The issue will be divided into two sections: The first section invites brief personal accounts and anecdotal responses addressing and/or expanding one of the four questions, and we encourage everyone to respond to this section, as we’d like to include as many responses as possible. The second section invites papers that address these questions in a more lengthy and detailed form. Four Questions: 1. Defining and Re-imagining: What are new media arts? Is it necessary that we define new media arts? How do we begin to discuss or teach new media arts? What sets new media arts apart from other disciplines or practices, or what connects them? What's (still) new about new media or what was, if anything ever was? What defines your work as new media art and why? How do you explain new media arts to your students and colleagues? What did or currently does attract you to new media arts practices? 2. Discourses on New Media Arts: What do the discourses do to the practice? How might one describe or define the discourse/s on new media arts? How does new media arts discourse relate to new media practices? In other words, what does the discourse/s do or attempt to do to new media arts? Are theory and practice being brought together in new media arts discourse, and if not, how might we begin to do so? What do you find interesting or problematic about new media arts discourses? Do you think there is a disjuncture between new media arts practice and the discourses on it? As a new media artist, do new media arts discourses affect your practice? 3. Authorship, Relationships & Relationality: Does your work maintain a traditional relationship between the artist/author/producer and the spectator/viewer? If not, how does it transgress these boundaries? Do you feel it necessary to challenge these boundaries? Do you consider relationality, the non-hierarchical intertwining of data, artwork, artists, and viewers etc., an important aspect of your work? In what context/s is your work shown and how does effect it. How do recombinatory practices commonly found in new media such as sampling, appropriation, and mash-ups, challenge traditional author/viewer conventions? While autonomy and relationality have long lineages in art history, how do they function within new media arts practices and discourses? 4. E-litism: Technospheres and the Everyday: How do notions of location, language, identity, and cultural understandings of communication inform or effect new media practices? Who is left out of, disproportionately under-represented, in the world of new media art practices? Is, as some have argued, the openness often associated with information technologies and new media practices, paradoxically, replacing the national politics of a past with the global connectivity of cosmopolitan tourism? How does your particular specificity (sexual, gender, ethnic, racial, class) affect your practice, your work or its reception? Event reviews: The editorial board also invites proposals for reviews of exhibitions/events/ festivals/conferences, etc. For more information: http://www.newmediacaucus.org/media-n/call.htm [] Send manuscripts via email to: Legier Biederman (lbiederm at ucla.edu) by July 30, 2006 [] For format information see the 'Submission Guidelines' link [] For Media-N author's agreement see 'Copyright Statement' link [] [] Questions: contact guest editors Legier Biederman (lbiederm at ucla.edu) and Joshua Callaghan (joshua at joshuacallaghan.com) Monica Narula Raqs Media Collective Sarai-CSDS 29 Rajpur Road Delhi 110054 www.raqsmediacollective.net www.sarai.net _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From iram at sarai.net Fri Jul 28 14:37:45 2006 From: iram at sarai.net (Iram Ghufran) Date: Fri, 28 Jul 2006 14:37:45 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Raqs Media Collective : 'There Has Been a Change of Plan' Message-ID: <44C9D3E1.1020009@sarai.net> Raqs Media Collective : 'There Has Been a Change of Plan' (Selected Works 2002-2006) Nature Morte Gallery, A 1 Neeti Bagh, New Delhi August 5 - 26, 2006 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Sometimes, adjustments have to be made. Schedules need calibration. There are contingencies, questions, obstinate demands, weak excuses, strong desires. You return to the city you never left. You pause, take stock. Sit still and let a conversation begin. Maybe? Around you, aeroplanes sit on wooden platforms in a wilderness like widows on a funeral pyre. Clocks measure fatigue, anxiety and modest epiphanies across latitudes. A door to nowhere stands obstinately against the sky. All your cities are a blur. "Do you like looking at maps?" Meanwhile, measures are taken, shoes lost and found, ghost stories gather, the city whispers conspiracies to itself, the situation is tense but under control. Someone offers you a postcard. Now: Let's see what happens. -- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Raqs Media Collective is pleased to announce its first solo exhibition in Delhi - 'There Has Been A Change of Plan' at Nature Morte Gallery. The exhibition features selected works (2002 - 2006) in the form of cross media installations with networked computers, objects, postcards, video, sound, prints and projections. Works exhibited include: 'Lost New Shoes', selections from 'A Measure of Anacoustic Reason', 'Location (n)', '28.28 N / 77.15 E :: 2001/02 (Co-Ordinates of Everyday Life, Delhi 2001-2002)', 'Erosion by Whispers', 'Preface to a Ghost Story' and 'There Has Been a Change of Plan'. (See Details in PDF attatchment with this mail) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - About Raqs Media Collective www.raqsmediacollective.net (Excerpt from the Wikipedia Entry on Raqs Media Collective - www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raqs_Media_Collective) Raqs Media Collective was formed in 1992 by independent media practitioners Jeebesh Bagchi, Monica Narula and Shuddhabrata Sengupta. Based in Delhi, their work engages with urban spaces and global circuits, persistently welding a sharp, edgily contemporary sense of what it means to lay claim to the world from the streets of Delhi. At the same time, Raqs articulates an intimately lived relationship with myths and histories of diverse provenances. Raqs sees its work as opening out a series of investigations with image, sound, software, objects, performance, print, text and lately, curation, that straddle different (and changing) affective and aesthetic registers, expressing an imaginative unpacking of questions of identity and location, a deep ambivalence towards modernity and a quiet but consistent critique of the operations of power and property. In 2001 Raqs co-founded Sarai (www.sarai.net) at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) in Delhi where they coordinate media productions, pursue and administer independent research and practice projects and also work as members of the editorial collective of the Sarai Reader series. For Raqs, Sarai is a space where they have the freedom to pursue interdisciplinary and hybrid contexts for creative work and to develop a sustained engagement with urban space and with different forms of media. _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From aziz.mansour at gmail.com Sat Jul 29 06:24:18 2006 From: aziz.mansour at gmail.com (Mansour Aziz) Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2006 03:54:18 +0300 Subject: [Reader-list] Lebanon Maps In-Reply-To: <22F1ACB3-919F-46CD-82D8-671E4CDCA865@sarai.net> References: <22F1ACB3-919F-46CD-82D8-671E4CDCA865@sarai.net> Message-ID: <40411C47-BB10-410B-A61B-1674E6BAC489@gmail.com> Dear friends, Please check lebanonupdates.blogspot.com I tried to send to this list the PDF version but it got bounced. We are working on an interactive Flash version that will include other statistics. Hugs, M. From janicepariat at gmail.com Sat Jul 29 11:30:15 2006 From: janicepariat at gmail.com (Janice Pariat) Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2006 11:30:15 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Post for The Notion of Home Message-ID: <72cca7600607282300v72cef2d6o70c3794e303792b1@mail.gmail.com> Hello! Have been doing better with the posts now. This story is called 'Night Journeys'. It is different from the others in the sense of setting I think. An important point that I did want to make was about the whole notion of 'Decorum' -- even though being a neo-classical principle of drama (the relation of style to the content in the speech of characters) somebody did point it out to me concerning the characters in my stories! I guess the only way I can explain it is that my characters are more vehicles of ideas than sticking strictly to 'decorum'. Finally, do hope you enjoy the story, The link is http://thefirstsixstories.blogspot.com/ Best Wishes Janice From hpp at vsnl.com Sat Jul 29 12:31:20 2006 From: hpp at vsnl.com (hpp at vsnl.com) Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2006 07:01:20 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] Tirupati Hindu zone Message-ID: Tirupati Hindu zone I read with great alarm and dismay in today's The Telegraph (Calcutta) about the "Hindu-only" zone that is going to be enforced around Tirupati, the place in south India where the Venkateswara (Balaji) temple is located. As an Indian, and as someone born in a Hindu family, whose family deity is the one in whose name this us purportedly being done - I am shocked and shamed. This also violates everything that I have understood the sacred deity (whose name my family bears) to signify. I sent an appeal to the President of India, through his website (http://presidentofindia.nic.in/). His e-mail id is: presidentofindia at rb.nic.in Respected Shri Kalam-ji I read with great alarm in today's The Telegraph (Kolkata) about the Hindu-only zone that is going to be enforced in Tirupati. As a citizen of India, I am shocked and shamed that this can happen in a secular democratic country. This is definitely utterly unconstitutional, violating Indians' right to life (livelihood), equality, residence and freedom of worship. It is an insult to non-Hindu Indians. And it is a sullying of the sacred names of Tirupati and Lord Balaji, by using them as the reason for this trampling on Indians' constitutional rights. As you are the custodian of our precious constitution, I have no recourse but to write to you to ensure that our invaluable secular heritage is protected. Yours respectfully Venkateswar Ramaswamy .................... Tirupati Hindu zone G.S. Radhakrishna Hyderabad, July 28: The constitutional guarantee of free religious expression will now be suspended across a 322.68-sq-km (80,628-acre) area around Tirupati's Balaji temple. No other religion can be preached - and no mosques or churches built - in this area spread across seven hills, the Tirumala Tirupati Dewasthanam said yesterday. The Dewasthanam till now controlled a 6,600-acre area that includes Tirumala - the small temple town housing 10,000-15,000 people, mostly temple workers - and the ban applied there. The Andhra government has now handedover to the Dewasthanam the rights to an additional 74,000 acres of surrounding hilly land, mostly a reserved forest. The move followed a report by a panel of religious heads and retired judges that Christian missionaries were distributing pamphlets and cassettes in and around Tirumala. A.P.V.N. Sharma, temple executive officer, said the entire area will be declared a religious and autonomous township. "Non-Hindus will no longer be employed in the service of Balaji," he added. The committee reported that 42 non-Hindus, living just outside Tirumala, were now engaged in peripheral temple-related services, such as transport and accommodation. Non-Hindu visitors will virtually be barred from the temple. "Even VIPs of other religions will have to sign a declaration that they have faith in Hinduism to gain entry," a spokesman said. The Dewasthanam took control of the earlier 6,600 acres six years ago by getting the state to forcibly resettle Tirumala town's 2,000 hereditary residents. Their properties have been converted into lease land for the temple. From aman.am at gmail.com Sat Jul 29 16:05:28 2006 From: aman.am at gmail.com (Aman Sethi) Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2006 16:05:28 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] wrong number in a small town Message-ID: <995a19920607290335v38387207r5b2a30b05fd4fb6c@mail.gmail.com> Satish Kumar, bed number 53 Rajan Babu Tuberculosis hospital, is dead. He was discharged on the 11th of July. They said his TB was in recession, they said he would make it. He died on the 13th of july 2006 at Sewa Ashram, Narela. No one at the mandi even knew when it happened. They still don't know. I found out today. I am preparing myself to tell them. A nurse at the Ashram told me that the last rites were performed at the electric crematorium at Rajghat. I found out when I went to the hospital and found someone else in his bed. Singh Sahib, right across in Bed 56, told me that the bed had been re-assigned to another patient. He told me that several people had been discharged in the same week. Singh Sahib and the gruff babuji down the hall are the only recognizable faces left. Singh sahib is an emaciated shell - TB has hollowed him out. Satish is only one of the many he has seen die around him. He has been in ward M-13 for almost four months without dying or being discharged – practically a record of sorts. He spends most of his time lying flat on his back, alternately calling up his "chandigarh walle sardarji," who doesn't pick up his calls, and castigating his family via telephone for not visiting him. It used to be a running joke in the ward that no-one who walked in with a cell phone could walk out without having dialed a number for Singh Sahib. But now there is no-one to laugh anymore. Everyone has left: Manoj the electrician in the yellow shorts who used to fill Satish's water bottles, Krishna the aspiring social worker who used to run down tot the STD to make calls for Satish, Pratap Singh – Satish's self appointed caretaker, and former colleague at Chunna Mandi, and even Ammi and her son Salil. Ammi who used to stay up nights nursing Satish's coughing with glucose solution. Singh Sahib says that, after a point, Satish just lost his will to live. Three months in hospital had worn him down. Then a young boy across the room died and someone else took his place. Then Pratap Singh was discharged and went home to his village. Then Krishna, then Ammi and Salil, and finally Manoj. Only Satish and Singh Sahib remained – staring blankly at each other across the narrow aisle. And then Satish left. Now there is only Singh Sahib in bed 56. Someone else has taken Satish's place - the same way he took someone else's. On the bedside table, Satish's earthen water pot is gone, as is his spare underwear that used to hang on the headrest. His pink plastic bowl and steel tumbler have been replaced by plastic pepsi bottles (now filled with water), a loaf of Harvest Gold bread, and a solitary boiled egg. The hospital authorities claim to change linen as often as possible, but the sheets still bear un-washable traces of their many previous occupants: sweat stains , grime, and flecks of blood. During what were to be his last days, Satish often vacillated between going home and staying back in the hospital. Some days he declared he wanted to leave for Beena by the next train. "Its a big junction ..Beena Junction.. everyone knows of it." He had a phone number- a simple six digit number with a bulky imposing area code. He last dialed it 10 years ago, He wondered if the number would be the same – so much had happened since he left home at thirteen. Ashraf often wondered why Satish left home .. What sin could have forced him out of the cozy sleepiness of Beena junction into the uncontrolled chaos of Delhi? What could he done at 13? Murder? Rape? Theft? While Satish spoke little of his motivations, Ashraf spent hours agonizing about the past of the quiet, deaf painter who reminded Ashraf of his own brother. "He must have stolen some money from his father's pocket, that could be the only thing," Ashraf concluded, "But how much could it have been? Now he will go home, and I will give him 500 rupees and even if his father doesn't forgive him outright, his mother will; and she will make his father forgive him!" But Ashraf never did convince Satish to go home. Satish just sat through Ashraf's remonstrations – smiling grimly, and occasionally shaking his head to indicate his disagreement. Satish borrowed a cell phone from someone in the ward, and dialed the number…07580-221083.. the phone rang for a while, and then disconnected – so the number still existed. Fortunately Beena was a small town, its phones insulated from the incessant violence of changing numbers and differing exchanges. He prefixed a "2" as with all phone-numbers in India, but the number itself seemed reassuringly solid. He dialed the number again and this time a strange voice picked up the phone .. "Hello, who is this?" "I'm calling from Delhi, I want to speak to Lallan Singh of Paliwal." "Sorry, you have the wrong number, there is no Lallan Singh here." "Wait, wait, is this Beena junction, Madhya Pradesh? I am calling from Delhi," "Yes it is, but.." "Lallan Singh is your neighbour. He doesn't have a phone. Please call him, I am his son speaking." "No, I'm sorry, Lallan Singh's not my neighbour. You have the wrong number." "No wait, one last question, I'm calling all the way from Delhi. Is this the kirane ki dukaan near the doodhwalla?" "No, it isn't. I'm sorry." Beena is small town, and the numbers don't change. But people do. People change and people move- from one house to another, from one mohalla to the next. Boxes are packed, trunks are brought out from under the beds, telephone numbers surrendered , security deposits collected, and the numbers, just like hospital beds, are transferred to other homes and families. They are circulated among new sets of relatives, new colleagues at work, new sons in different towns, new daughters now married and settled. But the sweat, grime and flecks of blood remain, forever staining the wires of the telephone exchange in a small town near a big railway junction; waiting to respond to the call that came ten years too late. "Hello I'm calling from Delhi, can I speak to Lallan Singh?" "I'm sorry, but this isn't his number From nr03 at fsu.edu Sat Jul 29 16:55:15 2006 From: nr03 at fsu.edu (Nicholas Ruiz) Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2006 07:25:15 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] Kritikos V.3 August 2006 Message-ID: <570hec$1ao2uoc@mxip27a.cluster1.charter.net> Kritikos V.3 August 2006 Will Biomedicine Transform Society?...(n.rose) http://garnet.acns.fsu.edu/%7Enr03/rose.htm An Era of Zoē and Bios? A conversation with Eugene Thacker...(e.thacker and n.ruiz) http://garnet.acns.fsu.edu/%7Enr03/thacker-ruiz.htm Nicholas Ruiz III ABD/GTA Interdisciplinary Program in the Humanities --Florida State University-- Editor, Kritikos http://garnet.acns.fsu.edu/~nr03/ Nicholas Ruiz III ABD/GTA Interdisciplinary Program in the Humanities --Florida State University-- Editor, Kritikos http://garnet.acns.fsu.edu/~nr03/ From ravikant at sarai.net Sat Jul 29 18:26:45 2006 From: ravikant at sarai.net (Ravikant) Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2006 18:26:45 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: Will to Life: My Tryst with MS Message-ID: <200607291826.45764.ravikant@sarai.net> Dear All, I wish to share a couple of remarkable and compelling mails from Sabitha, an ex-sarai/csds independent fellow, with the larger community. Inspiring stuff. cheers ravikant ---------- आगे भेजे गए संदेश ---------- Subject: One: My Tryst with MS Date: गुरुवार 27 जुलाई 2006 01:23 From: sabitha t p To: jeebesh at sarai.net, ravikant at sarai.net, raviv at sarai.net Dear Ravi, Jeebesh and Dr. Vasudevan, In the context of Jeebesh's recent readerlist postings on medical errors and alternative medicine, I thought I should share this with you three. Dear friends, I feel an immense need and responsibility to share with you all a few things that have been happening to me over the past six months. Some of you know some of it but I want to tell you the whole story so far. Here’s my story. Telling you this itself is a cathartic moment, a moment of acceptance that has been hard-fought. I was detected with possible Relapsing Remitting Multiple Sclerosis in January 2006 and it’s now been confirmed after my fourth relapse. Initially it began with numbness/tingling in both legs and severe backpain in late November,2005. The spinal cord MRI I was asked to do showed a lesion and was followed up with a brain MRI on December 15, which showed multiple lesions. When I and my partner, Nitin, saw the MRI report that said “the clinical assumption maybe multiple scelrosis (MS)”, the first reaction was one of disbelief, and a vague sense of foreboding. We soon got on the internet and read about demyelinating diseases and of course, there was a whole array of horrid things that could have been happening. I suspect Nitin broke down, but was not letting on. My reaction was one of shock, immense sadness and wanting to know more since the only image I had in mind about MS was of people in wheelchairs (we soon realized there’s a whole spectrum of MS consequences and all cases of MS needn’t be as severe as that). When we met the neurologist with the report, she confirmed it was MS, but said that it could be benign. It took me about 6 weeks to start feeling somewhat normal again and just as I was recovering, I came down with double vision, vertigo, nausea, complete loss of taste and was now walking like a drunk besides not being able to eat because everything tasted bitter and I could barely distinguish flavours. That was the first relapse. I recovered from these symptoms in about 6 weeks. My doctors didn’t put me on any medication since MS was still not confirmed. Again the same story repeated itself. I was getting a little better, double vision was more or less gone, taste had come back, I could walk, though not very confidently, and Nitin and I went out to celebrate these small triumphs over a walk and a dinner and I went out to a couple of music concerts. We also sat and made a daily regimen for me that was nutrition-oriented: wheat grass juice, grapeseed extract capsules, high doses of vitamin B12 tabs, fish oil capsules, certain enzymes, citric juices, several servings of salads, whole grains, the works. Generally tanking up on antioxidants. I was also on alternative therapy (ayurveda) which is nutrition-based. My father went to Kerala to meet the director of Kottakkal who is doing research on MS and I started following a rigorous ayurvedic routine along with all the other stuff. And I added one hour of yoga and pranayam to my schedule. I still am doing all that. Then the third relapse struck, this time in the form of optic neuritis and partial loss of balance in my legs in early March. I completely lost vision in one eye. Again no allopathic medication was done and my eyesight recovered almost fully and my balance too was more or less back to normal by May. My sister and I organised a big do for my father on his 60th birthday, an evening of poetry reading, wine, dinner and fellowship and it did wonders for my soul. I have always been fiercely independent and it was really hard to have been cooped up at home, not daring to go out, suffering pain and disability. It was important for my soul that I took my life back in my hands. Nitin and I went to Goa for a holiday and I stayed on in Goa on my own for 10 days in June (packing all my medicines, doctors’ phone numbers, a notepad, my laptop and some books). It was wonderful to feel confident of being on my own again, walking on the beach, going to art galleries, making new friends with artists, poets and musicians in Goa.I came back from there and then had a minor relapse (vision loss in one eye again) and had to come back to be put on intravenous steroids for the first time. (I am under the treatment of the head of neurology at AIIMS). I did 5 days of steroid drips and am now on oral steroids for a month. This is to control the damage each relapse can leave on the nerves of the concerned organ. It is the build-up of these damages (“deficits”) that may eventually lead to disability in the case of Relapsing Remitting MS patients. Since the last relapse happened after a gap of 4 months (the earlier ones were every 6 weeks) my doctor thinks it’s a good sign. And I am continuing with ayurveda, nutrition supplements and yoga (besides oral steroids) which possibly helped stabilize it to some extent. Now I am functional again. The vision in my affected eye is more or less back , I have no debilitating symptoms (one realizes the bare essentials one needs in order to be functional: clear vision in one eye, lack of pain, balance for walking) and have joined back in college after a traumatic hiatus. The support from Nitin, my family and friends has been tremendous and I can’t be thankful enough for that. But all of us have also been in a state of denial, the state where one thinks No, this can’t be true, this can’t be happening to me, my partner, my daughter, my friend. That is where sharing this experience with you helps - in trying to deal with it. Especially since it’s very difficult to communicate the fear, the sorrow, the resistance, the presence of MS always there in the background, occupying both the body and mind-space. Now I have made my peace with MS and have decided to take life in little doses. I read, write poetry, work on art-related projects, am planning a poetry society, and have been gearing up to join back in college with enthusiasm and complete faith. At some point through all this one realizes one has to go on, re-prioritise one’s life, do happy things, read, write, work, listen to music, have time to think and dream, have an occasional glass of wine. Cheers! May everyone stay well. Thank you all for listening and caring. Warmly yours, Sabitha. What is Multiple Sclerosis? Introduction Multiple sclerosis (MS) is one of the most common diseases of the central nervous system, Today over 2,500,000 people around the world have MS, though in India it is far less common than in the West.MS is the result of damage to myelin - a protective sheath surrounding nerve fibres of the central nervous system. When myelin is damaged, this interferes with messages between the brain and other parts of the bodySymptoms vary widely and include blurred vision, weak limbs, tingling sensations, unsteadiness and fatigue. For some people, MS is characterised by periods of relapse and remission while for others it has a progressive pattern. For everyone, it makes life unpredictable. Quick Facts . MS is a progressive disease of the nervous system, for which there is no cure. · An estimated 2,500,000 people in the world have MS. · MS is not contagious · MS is one of the most common diseases of the central nervous system in young adults. · There are four types of MS: benign, relapsing remitting, secondary progressive, primary progressive. · Sclerosis means scars, these are the plaques or lesions in the brain and spinal cord. · In MS, the protective myelin covering of the nerve fibres in the central nervous system is damaged. · Inflammation and ultimate loss of myelin causes disruption to nerve transmission and affects many functions of the body including motor co-ordination and vision. The severity varies widely. · While the exact cause of MS is not known, much is known about its effect on immune system function which may be the ultimate cause of the disease. · Some known triggers for relapses are: stress, exhaustion, extremes of weather and hormonal imbalances. · Life span is not significantly affected by MS. · There are a wide range of symptoms. Fatigue is one of the most common. · The incidence of MS increases in countries further from the equator. · There is no drug that can cure MS, but treatments are now available which can modify the course of the disease to some extent. They remain expensive and unreachable for most. · Many of the symptoms of MS can be successfully managed. · Please visit www.msif.org for more information. __________________________________________________________ Yahoo! India Answers: Share what you know. Learn something new http://in.answers.yahoo.com/ ------------------------------------------------------- From ravikant at sarai.net Sat Jul 29 18:27:24 2006 From: ravikant at sarai.net (Ravikant) Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2006 18:27:24 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: Two: Will to Life Message-ID: <200607291827.24705.ravikant@sarai.net> ---------- आगे भेजे गए संदेश ---------- Subject: Two: Will to Life Date: गुरुवार 27 जुलाई 2006 01:27 From: sabitha t p To: ravi kant , ravi vasudevan , jeebesh bagchi Dear friends, Just an update since the My Tryst with MS mail. I'm coping fine, have joined back work and am indeed more active than ever before.The positive thing is that MS has made me realize the value of time and intermittent good health a lot more and I'm a lot more active than even my pre-MS days. I'm working on two art-related projects (a global installation project in collaboration with Subodh Kerkar, a Goa-based artist, and designing a one-year certificate course in visual culture studies to be offered in Ramjas college, DU and open to university students next year). Also planning a poetry society with my dad, Keki Daruwalla, Vivek Narayanan and Jeet Thayil (My dad and I sat and wrote out the objectives of the poetry society while we were waiting for an MRI appointment!). Have been writing a lot of poems too and hope to be ready with my first collection within a year. Also writing a fellowship paper for ArtIndia magazine on Company Paintings and Patna Kalam in the 19th century. All in all my hands are full, I'm full of beans and have the Will to Life and Health. MS seems manageable now. I'm continuing with ayurveda and nutrition therapy and the last relapse was after a longer gap and was of lower intensity. My doc thinks it's beacuse of my alternative therapy. And the i.v. steroid drip for 5 days wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I just went every night for an hour, got the drip and came back home. Am on oral steroids now. It's giving me a little bit of muscle ache and some insomnia, otherwise I'm ok. Meanwhile a little extract from Nietzche's ECCE HOMO (I think; please correct if wrong). From a chapter called 'will to life' about his illness: “ I placed myself in my own hands, I restored myself to health: to do this first condition of success, as every physiologist will admit, is that the man be basically sound. A typically morbid nature cannot become healthy at all, much less by his own efforts. On the other hand, to an intrinsically sound nature, illness may even act as a powerful stimulus to life, to an abundance of life. It is thus that I now regard my long period of illness: it seemed then as if I had discovered life afresh, my own self included. I tasted all good and even trifling things in a way in which others could not very well taste them- out of my Will to Health and to Life I made my philosophy. For I wish this to be understood: it was during those years of most lowered vitality that I ceased from being a pessimist: the instinct of my self-discovery forbade a philosophy of poverty and desperation. Now how are we to recognize Nature’s most excellent human products? They are recognized by the fact that an excellent man of this sort gladdens our senses; he is carved from a single block, which is hard, sweet, and fragrant. He enjoys only what is good for him; his pleasure, his desire; ceases from the limits of what is good for him. He divines remedies against injuries; he knows how to turn serious accidents to his own advantages; whatever does not kill him makes him stronger. He believes in neither ‘ill-fortune’ nor ‘guilt’; he can digest himself and others; he knows how to forget- he is strong enough to make everything turn to his own advantage. Lo then! I am the very reverse of a decadent, for he whom I have just described is none other than myself.” Warmly, Sabitha. __________________________________________________________ Yahoo! India Answers: Share what you know. Learn something new http://in.answers.yahoo.com/ ------------------------------------------------------- From dilip.sarai at gmail.com Sun Jul 30 02:31:49 2006 From: dilip.sarai at gmail.com (Dilip D'Souza -- Sarai) Date: Sun, 30 Jul 2006 02:31:49 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The worst act Message-ID: <1a57bfd0607291401g67176ca1hc41c64ca47a15906@mail.gmail.com> July 29 Dear All, Here's my sixth article on my theme, "Village in the City". Though this completes the requirement, I have material for a couple more articles and I hope to share those when I get them done. (Which, I hope, will be before the August jamboree in Delhi). Best, dilip d'souza. (PS: a substantially different version of this was in Tehelka, issue of July 29). --- The worst act ------------- Dilip D'Souza Anywhere else, you cannot help thinking, the Irani Masjid would be a major tourist attraction. Here in Bombay, this gorgeous blue-tiled beauty sits on a nondescript road that meanders through Dongri, massage parlour on one side, tea shop on the other, apparently unknown outside this area. It's on my third visit that I find a side door open and a short friendly man who beckons. "This way!" says Mr Abid. "Come in and take a look!" Inside, it's reminiscent of Lucknow's Imam Bara, though on a far reduced scale. Neat courtyard, rooms lining the sides, long rectangular pond, mausoleum of sorts at the other end. Peaceful. I can't help that last thought, because this third visit is only days after the horrific train blasts of July 11, and I'm in the funk I get into from time to time. I'm so tired of the hatred and violence of the world I live in. A great big cosmic thought, sure, but in this little haven of calm -- and yes, in this obviously Muslim part of my city which I'm told is unsafe for being so -- it comes naturally. Just why isn't this place better known? Nearby, two men are sitting in their tempo. What're you doing, I ask. "Waiting for work," they say. "Since the blasts, nobody wants to hire us. Everything is down." ("Sab kuch down hai" are the exact words one of them uses to express this thought). And what are people here saying after the blasts, I ask, feeling that I simply must find a less naive way to ask this. "What will they say?" asks the younger man, Shahjahan. "Nobody likes it, everyone's frightened. Take me: I had to walk my daughter to school here all the way from Wadala, because the taxi drivers all refused to come." His companion, Nazeer, says: "See those policemen, sahib?" (There's a detachment of singularly idle-looking cops at the street corner). He goes on: "Only here! You won't find them in Umerkhadi, just across the street! I want to know, why do they trouble only the Muslims? You remember the 1992 riots, sahib? As much rioting in Umerkhadi as here! So why the policemen here? And do you know how many Muslims from here gave their clothes to cover the bodies?" No, I don't know. Shahjahan takes over: "And do you know what's happened since then? I now feel safe only in Muslim areas. Just like they feel in their areas." He doesn't say whom he means by that "they". Doesn't need to, of course. It's evident. "If I go to Dadar market," says Shahjahan, "I'm not sure I'll come back alive." I begin spluttering some homily about how there's no reason to feel that kind of fear. Nazeer ignores me and comes back to the blasts. "You know, people should understand that these terrorists are not Muslims. Nobody here considers them Muslims." That kind of sentiment, over and over again from person after random person in these parts. Sitting in nearby Cafe Khushali over delicious kawa coffee in an elegant little glass, looking out at a poster that advertises "Al-Serat Tours" to Iran/Iraq/Syria for Rs 49000, but "only Iran" for only Rs 25000 -- days after the blasts how much more normal can things be? -- sitting there, a fellow drinker says: "Look outside. See how few people there are?" Now to me, this seems like a bustling street -- plenty of walkers, vendors, handcart-pushers, idlers. So I say so. "No, no!" says the fellow drinker. "On normal days, the public goes past ba-ba-bum, ba-ba-bum! These blasts have scared everyone." (Now he switches to English) "This was the worst act! They are not Muslims!" That's certainly true. And on the door of the Cafe is a 4x6 green sticker that I later notice is also stuck on several other walls, windows, mirrors and doors, all over this neighbourhood. It reads: Don't Create Mischief on Earth (Al-Quraan Al-Baqarah 11) To Act Against Public Interest Spreading Terrorism, Killing Innocents, Destroying Properties is in fact, Creating Mischief. Then I stroll past a dilapidated building on a side street. I don't see the green sticker anywhere on it, but I do see a large black sign displayed prominently above its front door, and this is what it says verbatim: In this building any (Bachelor) are strictly restricted from purchase of room or on live license. Only Family is Allowed. Who was it, Cliff Richard who sang "I'll be a Bachelor Boy/Until my dying day"? No way we'd find him in this building. Nazeer and Shahjahan take a break from waiting for work and walk me to a roadside tea stall near the rear of the Dongri Children's Home. I'm struck immediately by what's on the wall behind the stove: images of Hindu gods. In these parts? The stall belongs to stocky Mohan Sharma, about 40, ex-Rajasthan by way of Nariman Point. Yes, he used to run a canteen in some Nariman Point office building. It folded when the clientele began asking for meat dishes. "The day that happened, I gave the keys back and came here. I'm a Brahmin, after all." He and his brother have run this place for the 20 years since. Yes, but why here, in this place occupied by those ... well, those other people? "These people are like my brothers. It's a very good atmosphere, and they take care of me." And what happened during those riots, Mohan-bhai, back in '92? "What happened? The people here told me, you don't worry, we'll protect you. Sahib, ten days they gave me food! This is my family." Walk on, to visit 79 year old Shaukatali (name changed) in his family's one-room tenement. The overwhelming impression in the room is of -- of all things -- cats. Back firmly to us, one is asleep up on a shelf. Another is asleep in a deep basket on the floor. Third walks nonchalantly in the door. Fourth peeks from under the bed. "And there are about ten more outside that we feed," says Shaukatali. Plus several stray dogs outside whom they also look after. That kind of family, one that cares for animals. I get more of a sense of that from the small plaque on the wall near the door: Allah bless our home Bless these walls wherein we dwell The trees and flowers too Bless the things that make our house. Bless those cats, yes. What do you think, I ask Shaukatali, about the blasts, what's it been like afterwards for you all here? His thirty-something daughter answers first: "What to do, people will suspect us! Because every time there's something like this there's some Mohammed-bhai Jaffer-bhai involved!" Shaukatali, a friend who's visiting, the daughter, her son, maybe even the cats -- they all burst into rocking, gasping laughter. Laughing and laughing at this state they are in, automatically suspect. "I'll tell you this," says Shaukatali, when he's stopped laughing. Serious now, so's his daughter. "Things were so much better in the past. Food was cheap, and who asked who's Hindu, who's Muslim?" Not quite what I had expected to hear, but by now, I know where he's coming from, why he's saying this. He must be tired and dejected -- every bit as much as I am -- with the faith-tinted glasses we all learn to wear. Which past are you talking about, I ask. "British! I was happier in British times. Nobody cared that I was Muslim. But after '47, everything has changed. Hindu this, Muslim that! We don't believe this killing is taught by any religion!" Yet the killings happen. And for too many of us, they come to characterize an entire religion, come to taint everybody who follows it. That's the profound reality of the Muslim areas of Bombay, the burden their residents must learn to carry. (Sometimes by laughing out loud at it). The feeling that an entire city, an entire country, maybe the whole world, sees them as responsible for terrorism. In Dongri, I spend a lot of time wondering what it must be to live like that. To know that whatever happens, the men and women around me are assumed to be apologists for, sympathizers with, terrorism. That's why the effort to introduce me to Mohan the tea-man. That's why the green stickers that are everywhere. That's why the large banner on Mohamedali Road: We want peace no terror Save humanity, condemn terrorism. In no other part of my city have I seen such a banner. Tells me a few things. From jcm at ata.org.pe Sun Jul 30 07:32:45 2006 From: jcm at ata.org.pe (Jose-Carlos Mariategui) Date: Sun, 30 Jul 2006 03:02:45 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] There has been a change of plan: Raqs Media Collective In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Dear Monica: Thanks for the information on the Raqs solo-exhibition in Dehli. I just must say that it is in my perspective strange to see that this is the first solo exhibit of Raqs in Dehli, taking into consideration that Raqs is Indian and that it has been exhibiting internationally for many years. Perhaps as in the case of many of us (that we face as non-westerns), it is more feasible to develop projects in Europe or the US. To which factors you attribute this situation? Has Raqs exhibited in other cities of India or in cities of neighbouring countries? How difficult is it? I am not criticising the situation but questioning it, because when we do 'something for abroad' it may dissociate the project with immediate reality. I believe there is a need (and an struggle) to present works in local and regional contexts and there may be strategies for its deployment. I had recently curated a screening of recent video art from Latin America (www.videografiasinvisibles.org) that went first to Europe too but now is going to be presented in all Latin America (thanks to the support of the Spanish Cooperation Agency's network of Cultural Centres of Spain in all Latin America). Sometimes these supranational organizations may be very useful (more than national organizations). Perhaps this would be an interesting topic of discussion during the Pacific Rim New Media Summit at ISEA 2006. Specially on how we can develop parallel networks in the Pacific Rim. All the best, Jose-Carlos on 7/29/06 2:33 PM, Monica Narula at monica at sarai.net wrote: > Raqs Media Collective : 'There Has Been a Change of Plan' > (Selected Works 2002-2006) > Nature Morte Gallery, A 1 Neeti Bagh, New Delhi > August 5 - 26, 2006 > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > ---------------------------------------- > Sometimes, adjustments have to be made. Schedules need calibration. > There are contingencies, questions, obstinate demands, weak excuses, > strong desires. You return to the city you never left. You pause, > take stock. Sit still and let a conversation begin. Maybe? > > Around you, aeroplanes sit on wooden platforms in a wilderness like > widows on a funeral pyre. Clocks measure fatigue, anxiety and modest > epiphanies across latitudes. A door to nowhere stands obstinately > against the sky. All your cities are a blur. > > "Do you like looking at maps?" > > Meanwhile, measures are taken, shoes lost and found, ghost stories > gather, the city whispers conspiracies to itself, the situation is > tense but under control. Someone offers you a postcard. > > Now: Let's see what happens. > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > ---------------------------------------- > Raqs Media Collective is pleased to announce its first solo > exhibition in Delhi - 'There Has Been A Change of Plan' at Nature > Morte Gallery. The exhibition features selected works (2002 - 2006) > in the form of cross media installations with networked computers, > objects, postcards, video, sound, prints and projections. > > Works exhibited include: 'Lost New Shoes', selections from 'A Measure > of Anacoustic Reason', 'Location (n)', '28.28 N / 77.15 E :: 2001/02 > (Co-Ordinates of Everyday Life, Delhi 2001-2002)', 'Erosion by > Whispers', 'Preface to a Ghost Story' and 'There Has Been a Change of > Plan'. (See Details in PDF attatchment with this mail) > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > ---------------------------------------- > About Raqs Media Collective > www.raqsmediacollective.net > > (Excerpt from the Wikipedia Entry on Raqs Media Collective - > www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raqs_Media_Collective) > > Raqs Media Collective was formed in 1992 by independent media > practitioners Jeebesh Bagchi, Monica Narula and Shuddhabrata > Sengupta. Based in Delhi, their work engages with urban spaces and > global circuits, persistently welding a sharp, edgily contemporary > sense of what it means to lay claim to the world from the streets of > Delhi. At the same time, Raqs articulates an intimately lived > relationship with myths and histories of diverse provenances. Raqs > sees its work as opening out a series of investigations with image, > sound, software, objects, performance, print, text and lately, > curation, that straddle different (and changing) affective and > aesthetic registers, expressing an imaginative unpacking of questions > of identity and location, a deep ambivalence towards modernity and a > quiet but consistent critique of the operations of power and property. > > In 2001 Raqs co-founded Sarai (www.sarai.net) at the Centre for the > Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) in Delhi where they coordinate > media productions, pursue and administer independent research and > practice projects and also work as members of the editorial > collective of the Sarai Reader series. For Raqs, Sarai is a space > where they have the freedom to pursue interdisciplinary and hybrid > contexts for creative work and to develop a sustained engagement with > urban space and with different forms of media. > > > > > Monica Narula > Raqs Media Collective > Sarai-CSDS > 29 Rajpur Road > Delhi 110054 > www.raqsmediacollective.net > www.sarai.net > > From clifton at altlawforum.org Sat Jul 29 17:14:48 2006 From: clifton at altlawforum.org (Clifton) Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2006 17:14:48 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Please write in support of Dalit Christians Message-ID: <44CB4A30.7070704@altlawforum.org> Dear All, As you are aware an urgent matter has been posted before the Supreme Court on the critical question of the status of 24 million Dalit Christians in India. Dalit Christians have been target of sustained discrimination at the hands of Government, society and the Church for many decades. Their fundamental rights including right to equality, freedom of religion and the right to a life with dignity have been continuosly violated. The State, on the basis that Christianity does not recognise or practice caste system, has denied recognition of Dalit Christians as Scheduled Castes. This, has meant that despite being subject to every form of discrimination and harassment by the dominant castes, dalit christians have not been officially granted SC status for the purposes of positive discrimination policies and protective laws. The fact that dalit christians do not come under the purview of the Prevention of Atrocities on SCS and STs Act, has meant that the dominant castes discriminate against dalit christians with absolute impunity. The Church on the other hand is also party to discriminative treatment meted out to dalit christians. There are separate churches for dalit christians and converts from upper castes. This Struggle has been going on for since the time of our independence, however their demands have fallen in deaf ears. This struggle has now been taken up to the Supreme Court as well. With regard to a petition that was filed by dalit christian activists, the Supreme Court has appointed the Ranganath Misra Committee to evaluate the economic and social status of dalit christians in India. The commission has been soliciting public opinion and it is with respect to this that we write to you. Kindly pledge your support as this is an urgent matter therefore, to kindly send your letters and documents to the Justice Ranganath Misra Commission in support of the demand of Christians of Dalit origin, to get this marginalized group its fundamental rights so brutally snatched from it by the Presidential Order 1950. The Commission’s Email Id is: _ncrlm2005 at rediffmail.com_ The postal address is: Member Secretary, NCRLM, Gate 30, II Floor, Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium New Delhi 110003 The Chairman’s postal address is: 31, Aurangazeb Road New Delhi 110001. The address of the Member secretary (a retired IAS officer of the rank of secretary to the Government of India) is: Mrs. Asha Das, D-297, Sarvodaya Enclave, G/F, New Delhi. The Email Id of member secretary is: _das_asha at yahoo.com_ We sincerely thank you for your interest and assistance! Mobilize as many letters and emails as you can in the next couple of days this is urgent! In solidarity, Manoranjini Alternative Law Forum, Bangalore Sample letter to Justice Shri Ranganath Misra Commission Justice Shri Ranganath Misra Chairman National Commission for Religious & Linguistic Minorities Gate No 30, II Floor, Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium Lodi Road, New Delhi – 110 003 Sir, Subject: Extension of Reservations to Dalit Christians. We are glad that the Commission headed by you has been requested to examine the justification for specification of Dalit Christians as Scheduled Castes for the purpose of reservation. Kindly permit us to submit the following for your kind consideration. In spite of various efforts made by the governments, caste discrimination and untouchability remain a major social concern specific to Indian Society. Although they are Christians, the Christians of Scheduled Castes Origin live and work along with Hindu Dalits. The stigma of untouchability and social ostracism haunt them wherever they go and whatever they do. Just because of being Christians, they are not spared from communal violence and abuse by upper and dominant caste communities. Nor are they treated equally by the upper caste Christians. That they continue to suffer from the same socio economic disabilities and that the change of religion does not alter their socio-economic status have been established by various commissions appointed by the governments from time to time and also by the many rulings by the Supreme Court. Moreover the discrimination against Dalit Christians based on the third para of the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order 1950 goes against many articles of the Constitution of India. It is discrimination on the basis of religion and it is sad to note that the violation is done by the State itself (Article 15) It also goes against Freedom of Religion (Article 25). The Order forces the Dalits to remain in a particular religion, allured by the socio economic privileges and fear of losing the same if they dare to choose a religion of their choice. The Dalit Christians, though they are Dalits, are deprived and denied of civil and legal safeguards and protection that are provided for Hindu Dalits under the Protection of Civil Rights Act 1976, Untouchability (Offences) Act 1955 and SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act 1989. Thus they stand vulnerable to the abuses and attacks of the dominant castes, without any possibility of legal redressal as Dalits. Besides, the Government has already amended the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order) 1950 twice: First in 1956 to include Dalit Sikhs and next in 1990 to include Dalit Buddhists in the Scheduled Castes. The Government has already considered the demand of the Dalit Christians and prepared the draft amendment bill in 1996. The Statement of Objects and Reasons of Bill NO17 of 1996 says: “Converts to the Christian religion, who are of the Scheduled Castes origin, are precluded from the statutory benefits and safeguards accruing to members of the Scheduled Castes. Demands have been made from time to time for extending these benefits and safeguards to the Christians of the Scheduled Castes origin by granting them recognition as the Scheduled Castes on the ground that the change of religion has not altered their social and economic conditions. Upon due consideration of these demands, it is proposed to amend the relevant Constitution (Scheduled Cates) Orders to include the Christian converts from the Scheduled Castes as the Scheduled Castes therein, hence the Bill.” It is clear from the above statement that the government is asserting that the ‘change of religion has not altered social and economic conditions’ and that it has ‘duly considered the demand and proposed to amend the Order’ and the statement holds good even now when caste violence is so open and the number is on the increase. Hence we request you to kindly recommend to the Government to include the Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin in the Scheduled Castes and provide them the same status as their counterparts in Hinduism, Sikhism and Buddhism. Thanking you, Yours Sincerely, Name, Address and phone number From aarti at sarai.net Sat Jul 29 13:44:52 2006 From: aarti at sarai.net (aarti at sarai.net) Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2006 10:14:52 +0200 (CEST) Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Live streaming at ISEA Message-ID: <1107.61.246.29.171.1154160892.squirrel@mail.sarai.net> hi, I hope there might be some on the Sarai list that might be interested in doing a remote presentation or deliverying a pre-recorded presentation for replay at ISEA. I have included the details below, please forward to the list if appropriate and anyone else you may think would be interested. Kind regrads adam ISEA (International Symposium on Electronic Art)2006, an international conference held in conjunction with ZeroOne San Jose: A Global Festival of art on the Edge, will be held in San Jose, CA, August 7-13 2006. Both events are "situated at the critical intersection of art and technology." ISEA2006 re:mote is a symposium within ISEA2006 and is issuing a Call for Proposals. ISEA2006 re:mote, August 10-12, 2006 International new media art discourse is stimulated by festivals and events like ISEA2006 which form temporary cultural centers to represent, present and discuss networked and digital technologies. However by forming temporary centers we also tacitly create a notion of a periphery - with temporary centers also come temporary peripheries. In new media culture this is a paradox as much new media art, theory, and discourse reflects on the network itself and the elusiveness and redundancy of centers and peripheries. ISEA2006 re:mote attempts to dissuade us from imposing these distinctions by providing a platform for artists, commentators, curators, performers and theorists to participate in ISEA 2006 via online and pre-recorded media. ISEA2006 re:mote Open Call ISEA2006 re:mote is inviting media spaces and individual artists, theorists, and curators from around the world to speak or perform via remote technologies to the audience at ISEA. Presentations to be directed at the four themes of ISEA 2006. Participants are invited to present or perform on topics included within the ISEA symposium, and onsite audience interaction with the presenters is also encouraged. ISEA re:mote will focus on presenting media spaces and people that would otherwise be excluded from presenting their work at ISEA due to financial, political, or logistical reasons. The length of each presentation can be negotiated, however, for now we have set the maximum time limit of 20 minutes. Technologies used will be up to each presenter, the premise is that the technologies should be easy for you to use and access and ISEA2006 re:mote will manage the corresponding technology requirements as much as possible onsite at ISEA2006. Live and pre-recorded material can be included. Live presentations could use any available technlogies including voice technologies such as Skype/OpenWengo/Gizmo/Linphone/Ekiga or other softphones, audio or video streams, video conferencing with softwares like ichatAV/Ekiga/Skype/OpenWengo, web cams, shared desktops using softwares like VNC/RemotePC or Remote Desktop, text chats such as irc or webchats, avatar environments, gaming environments, or even the telephone! In situations where your available bandwidth is limited or restricted, delivery of digital presentation material (audio/video) can be delivered electronically or posted by traditional mail. In all situations online presence of the presenters would be beneficial, this may take the form of IM, irc or other text based chat technologies if 'realtime' audio or video communications are not possible. Creative use of remote presentation technologies is encouraged! Time slots have to be negotiated, but we are willing to bend as much as we can to include as many people as possible from various time zones. Unfortunately there are no honoraria available for this event. ISEA2006 will feature four themes: Interactive City, Community Domain, Transvergence, and Pacific Rim. Please see the following links for further information on each on the themes: Transvergence http://01sj.org/content/view/25/71/ Interactive City http://01sj.org/content/blogcategory/23/68/ Community Domain http://01sj.org/content/view/23/69/ Pacific Rim http://01sj.org/content/blogcategory/25/70/ All proposals need only be a short paragraph outlining what you would like to present, a short bio (one paragraph), and the software, technology, or other delivery process you would like to use for the presentation. Please email this information to Adam Hyde at : adam at xs4all.nl ISEA2006 re:mote is a collaboration between ISEA2006 ( http://01sj.org/ ) and Adam Hyde ( http://www.xs4all.nl/~adam ) and is based on the re:mote series of events: re:mote auckland - organised by r a d i o q u a l i a and ((ethermap http://www.remote.org.nz/ re:mote regina - organised by r a d i o q u a l i a and soil media lab http://soilmedia.org/remote/ ======================================= -- Adam Hyde ~/.nl selected projects http://www.xs4all.nl/~adam the streaming suitcase http://www.streamingsuitcase.com r a d i o q u a l i a http://www.radioqualia.net Free as in 'media' email : adam at xs4all.nl mobile : + 31 6 186 75 356 (Netherlands mobile) _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements From mohaiemen at yahoo.com Sun Jul 30 18:11:40 2006 From: mohaiemen at yahoo.com (NAEEM MOHAIEMEN) Date: Sun, 30 Jul 2006 05:41:40 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Lebanon Map JPG In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060730124140.8385.qmail@web50302.mail.yahoo.com> I just posted JPEG version of the Lebanon Attack Map on this blog we set up for Rasha: http://rashasalti.blogspot.com __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From aziz.mansour at gmail.com Sun Jul 30 20:18:50 2006 From: aziz.mansour at gmail.com (Mansour Aziz) Date: Sun, 30 Jul 2006 17:48:50 +0300 Subject: [Reader-list] Lebanon Map JPG In-Reply-To: <20060730124140.8385.qmail@web50302.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060730124140.8385.qmail@web50302.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <03F27BF6-6737-4D18-94DC-C4FCDFCD544A@gmail.com> FYI, I'm uploading them immediately, as soon as they are done, both as JPG and PDF at: lebanonupdates.blogspot.com We are also working on setting up a special site, which will include an interactive map, at: maps.samidoun.org In solidarity, Mansour From shahzulf at yahoo.com Sun Jul 30 17:18:46 2006 From: shahzulf at yahoo.com (Zulfiqar Shah) Date: Sun, 30 Jul 2006 04:48:46 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Human rights abuses rampant in Sindh: Report Message-ID: <20060730114846.39713.qmail@web38809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Human rights abuses rampant in Sindh: Report By ANI Friday July 28, 01:45 PM Washington, July 28 (ANI): Human rights violations, including disappearance of political and human rights workers, lack of press freedom, violence against minorities and women and the bulldozing of villages, are rampant in the Sindh province. This has been disclosed in the World Sindhi Institute's bi-annual report on human rights violations (in the province) during the first half of he current year. The report cited the abduction of members of the Jeay Sindh Qaumi Mahaz, including that of Dr Safdar Sarki, Asif Baladi and Aakash Malah. Besides, three members of the press - Munir Sangi, Mukesh Rotena, and Sunjay Kumar - also lost their lives indicating lack of press freedom, the Daily Times quoted the report as saying. According to the report, death threats had been made against journalists Sarmad Kanrani and Mubarak Bhatti, while members of certain minorities, including Dr Mujibur Rehman Pasha of the Ahmediyya community, had been targeted for conversion. Dr Pasha was later murdered. Couples had been arrested under "draconian Islamic Hudood Laws", it added. The World Sindhi Institute also criticised the abduction, torture, and murder of political activists and human rights advocates, pointing out that members of the press in Sindh went in fear of their lives if they wrote articles critical of the government. Forced conversion of women and girls remains a common occurrence in Sindh, it added. (ANI) Source: ANI --------------------------------- Talk is cheap. Use Yahoo! Messenger to make PC-to-Phone calls. Great rates starting at 1¢/min. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20060730/bf4aa49c/attachment.html From monica at sarai.net Mon Jul 31 11:56:26 2006 From: monica at sarai.net (Monica Narula) Date: Mon, 31 Jul 2006 11:56:26 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] There has been a change of plan: Raqs Media Collective In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: dear Jose-Carlos Thanks for your mail. It opens up many questions. Some responses, far from 'explanatory' and perhaps starting strands of thought... - The art context in India is primarily around what is termed as the "visual arts". 95% of the works shown and transacted are paintings. Followed at a distance by sculptures/objects and then the rare photographic show. Photography has yet to find a stable space, though there is some important work being done in this domain. It is only in the last few years that there has been somewhat of a shift towards the showing of video works and some installation work. These works are emerging both from established and newer artists, and basically have a wider circulation outside India. - It is extremely difficult for someone with a non-visual arts background to enter the art context here. The reasons for this are yet to be researched and understood. The recent entry of some documentary practitioners in to this context is due more to their international presence rather than any serious rethinking of the values and consensus that run the art contexts here. (The documentary film on the other hand has had for many years a decent and at times controversial public presence, and a committed public around it.) - This situation will hopefully change over the next few years, with more diverse kinds of practitioners making interesting works and staking a claim in the art space - which we think has begun. This process will be interesting as it will mean changes in the ways 'art practice' sees itself in relation to other practices and also to ways in which new publics can and will emerge around the domain of the 'art context'. - We have shown our CD works (GVHM, No_des and Ectropy) in Delhi and Bangalore and these works have a circulation (also as cds). Also many of our works travel - lightly - through publications and the web. In terms of installation, we could not find a context to show (we have shown a few works within means affordable to us in Sarai). This is slowly going to loosen up over the next decade, as art contexts will probably become more curious to practices from other domains. - It is an interesting process how many of our installation works emerge, and expectedly a complex one. Works have emerged through conversations and the sharing of ideas and questions with some extremely curious and sharp people in many parts of the world. (I would not club them all together in any one idea of an institutional context.). In this let me share a recent interaction. A young curator located between Lithuania and Sweden has been in dialogue with us for more than two years. We share ideas, critiques, questions, resources etc. Over this period he has invited us to think on an idea that has been exciting and troubling him for some time. This process of thinking may find an expression in an installation to be first hosted in a place that he has access to, which will definitely by outside India. As a process, we find this exciting and challenging, along with our work here in Sarai/Delhi. And i do think that such an interaction - whether from a 'local' context or a 'global' one - deserves respect and engagement. - Some of our work has emerged from collaboration and in 'neutral' grounds. This made possible very intriguing dialogues and processes. Sometimes I do wish that we could ourself host a few of these unpredictable encounters. - We are yet fully to understand the complex processes that we are all part of in today's world and will give ourselves a few more years before we find ourselves able to speak definitively on 'publics' and 'places'. We have found very demanding and challenging interlocutors and viewers in many different ways and places. This has made our own map of the world more dense and knotty, and not merely defined by national borders. best M On 30-Jul-06, at 7:32 AM, Jose-Carlos Mariategui wrote: > Dear Monica: > > Thanks for the information on the Raqs solo-exhibition in Dehli. I > just > must say that it is in my perspective strange to see that this is > the first > solo exhibit of Raqs in Dehli, taking into consideration that Raqs > is Indian > and that it has been exhibiting internationally for many years. > Perhaps as > in the case of many of us (that we face as non-westerns), it is more > feasible to develop projects in Europe or the US. > > To which factors you attribute this situation? Has Raqs exhibited > in other > cities of India or in cities of neighbouring countries? How > difficult is > it? > > I am not criticising the situation but questioning it, because when > we do > 'something for abroad' it may dissociate the project with immediate > reality. > > I believe there is a need (and an struggle) to present works in > local and > regional contexts and there may be strategies for its deployment. > I had > recently curated a screening of recent video art from Latin America > (www.videografiasinvisibles.org) that went first to Europe too but > now is > going to be presented in all Latin America (thanks to the support > of the > Spanish Cooperation Agency's network of Cultural Centres of Spain > in all > Latin America). Sometimes these supranational organizations may be > very > useful (more than national organizations). > > Perhaps this would be an interesting topic of discussion during the > Pacific > Rim New Media Summit at ISEA 2006. Specially on how we can develop > parallel > networks in the Pacific Rim. > > All the best, > > Jose-Carlos > > > > > on 7/29/06 2:33 PM, Monica Narula at monica at sarai.net wrote: > >> Raqs Media Collective : 'There Has Been a Change of Plan' >> (Selected Works 2002-2006) >> Nature Morte Gallery, A 1 Neeti Bagh, New Delhi >> August 5 - 26, 2006 >> --------------------------------------------------------------------- >> --- >> ---------------------------------------- >> Sometimes, adjustments have to be made. Schedules need calibration. >> There are contingencies, questions, obstinate demands, weak excuses, >> strong desires. You return to the city you never left. You pause, >> take stock. Sit still and let a conversation begin. Maybe? >> >> Around you, aeroplanes sit on wooden platforms in a wilderness like >> widows on a funeral pyre. Clocks measure fatigue, anxiety and modest >> epiphanies across latitudes. A door to nowhere stands obstinately >> against the sky. All your cities are a blur. >> >> "Do you like looking at maps?" >> >> Meanwhile, measures are taken, shoes lost and found, ghost stories >> gather, the city whispers conspiracies to itself, the situation is >> tense but under control. Someone offers you a postcard. >> >> Now: Let's see what happens. >> --------------------------------------------------------------------- >> --- >> ---------------------------------------- >> Raqs Media Collective is pleased to announce its first solo >> exhibition in Delhi - 'There Has Been A Change of Plan' at Nature >> Morte Gallery. The exhibition features selected works (2002 - 2006) >> in the form of cross media installations with networked computers, >> objects, postcards, video, sound, prints and projections. >> >> Works exhibited include: 'Lost New Shoes', selections from 'A Measure >> of Anacoustic Reason', 'Location (n)', '28.28 N / 77.15 E :: 2001/02 >> (Co-Ordinates of Everyday Life, Delhi 2001-2002)', 'Erosion by >> Whispers', 'Preface to a Ghost Story' and 'There Has Been a Change of >> Plan'. (See Details in PDF attatchment with this mail) >> --------------------------------------------------------------------- >> --- >> ---------------------------------------- >> About Raqs Media Collective >> www.raqsmediacollective.net >> >> (Excerpt from the Wikipedia Entry on Raqs Media Collective - >> www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raqs_Media_Collective) >> >> Raqs Media Collective was formed in 1992 by independent media >> practitioners Jeebesh Bagchi, Monica Narula and Shuddhabrata >> Sengupta. Based in Delhi, their work engages with urban spaces and >> global circuits, persistently welding a sharp, edgily contemporary >> sense of what it means to lay claim to the world from the streets of >> Delhi. At the same time, Raqs articulates an intimately lived >> relationship with myths and histories of diverse provenances. Raqs >> sees its work as opening out a series of investigations with image, >> sound, software, objects, performance, print, text and lately, >> curation, that straddle different (and changing) affective and >> aesthetic registers, expressing an imaginative unpacking of questions >> of identity and location, a deep ambivalence towards modernity and a >> quiet but consistent critique of the operations of power and >> property. >> >> In 2001 Raqs co-founded Sarai (www.sarai.net) at the Centre for the >> Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) in Delhi where they coordinate >> media productions, pursue and administer independent research and >> practice projects and also work as members of the editorial >> collective of the Sarai Reader series. For Raqs, Sarai is a space >> where they have the freedom to pursue interdisciplinary and hybrid >> contexts for creative work and to develop a sustained engagement with >> urban space and with different forms of media. >> >> >> >> >> Monica Narula >> Raqs Media Collective >> Sarai-CSDS >> 29 Rajpur Road >> Delhi 110054 >> www.raqsmediacollective.net >> www.sarai.net >> >> > > > _________________________________________ > 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: Monica Narula Raqs Media Collective Sarai-CSDS 29 Rajpur Road Delhi 110054 www.raqsmediacollective.net www.sarai.net From editorial at himalmag.com Mon Jul 31 15:27:49 2006 From: editorial at himalmag.com (editorial at himalmag.com) Date: Mon, 31 Jul 2006 05:57:49 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] Himal August issue Message-ID: <380-22006713195749718@M2W025.mail2web.com> Himal Southasian's August 2006 issue is now available! www.himalmag.com COVER PACKAGE -- LOOKING BANGLADESH IN THE EYE As Bangladesh readies itself for elections in January, several questions come to mind: Will the polls provide release from political confusion, or drag the country further into the deltaic mud? Is the system of 'caretaker government' during elections all that it is made out to be? Himal's cover package also analyses the strengths of Bangladesh that we feel will carry it through the rough times ahead. Articles: * Corrupted democracy - Liz Philipson * The crippled caretaker - Ali Riaz * When we dead awaken - Rubana * Photo Feature: Looking the Urdu-speaking Bihari in the eye * Bangladesh the powerful - Editorial SALAAM MUMBAI: The August issue also presents a variegated run of articles on Bombay: .the experiences of women migrants to the city - Sonia Faleiro .documentaries about the city - Uma Mahadevan-Dasgupta .and an answer to the question: is Bombay just rude? - Naresh Fernandes In addition: * The Times of India's final frontier - Sukumar Muralidharan * Nathula and Southasia - Prashant Jha * The Maldives' failed roadmap - Mohamed Latheef, in exile in Colombo * Working in the informal sector - Rajashri, Renana Jhabvala * Sec 377 and same-sex desire - Gautam Bhan * World Bank report critique - Faisal Bari Plus: Commentaries, reflections, reviews and much more! Starting this month, Himal's Development Classifieds section offers a convenient bulletin board for vacancies in the development sector and related fields. While you are at www.himalmag.com, check out our extensive, fully searchable archive of back issues, as well as a daily selection of editorials from major Southasian news sources, and a weekly round-up of the issues that are making waves throughout the region. Himal is also available at fine bookstores throughout Southasia. For subscriptions, go to our website, rightmost column. Or write to subscription at himalmag.com -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From mail at shivamvij.com Mon Jul 31 16:19:55 2006 From: mail at shivamvij.com (Shivam Vij) Date: Mon, 31 Jul 2006 16:19:55 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The Vidarbha Jan Andolan Samiti Blog Message-ID: <9c06aab30607310349g1cf7e815k1e64f26fcdd32a91@mail.gmail.com> Dear all, The Vidarbha Jan Andolan Samiti has put up a blog - http://andolan.blogspot.com - as part of its campaign for statehood for Vidarbha as also the continuing farmers' suicides. Amongst other things there is a list of names of 655 farmers who have committed suicide since June 2005: http://andolan.blogspot.com/2006/07/vidharbha-jan-andolan-samiti-regi.html A group of farmers is planning a march to Delhi on 15 August. Imagine such a large number of people committing suicide in any other profession - say, in the BPO industry* - and imagine our response. It would be frontpage news in all national papers. It would occupy far more air time than on TV than what the continuing agricultural crisis in Vidarbha and Telangana is currently getting. There would be dedicated "campaigns" and people across the country would be sending money to the Prime Minister's Relief Fund. Ordinary people would come out to their rescue, companies would announce relocation packages. Between 1993 and 2003, a hundred thousand farmers in India have killed themselves, largely due to debt. Whether it is state control and lack of competition or the lessening of state support to agriculture that has caused the crisis is open for the ideological jury. What cannot be disputed is that it is a national shame and deserves far more attention from all of us. There is a lot to talk about what's happening in Vidarbha, and a lot is controversial. Bt Cotton, cotton subsidies in the west, the reduction of minimum support price by the government, the government's suicide compensation as an incentive to commit suicide, the state control over agriculture. Besides, imported cotton in India is cheaper than the cotton being produced in India. The government has not been raising the tariffs on imported cotton because India's textile industry would then suffer in its competitiveness in the global market. So either farmers suffer or the textile industry workers. Imagine a hundred thousand people in the textile industry committing suicide in a span of ten years*. Imagine. Whatever the reasons and debates be, the suicides must stop, and they must stop now. I urge those of you in the media to give the subject a lot more attention, and bloggers and writers to write about it. Also see http://www.theotherindia.org/index.php?tag=vidarbha Best, Shivam *I am not at all being insensitive here. I do wish the textile and BPO industries all the best, and long fruitful lives for all their employees. From vivek at sarai.net Mon Jul 31 17:43:44 2006 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Mon, 31 Jul 2006 17:43:44 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Rakshat Hooja: A survey of 5 RWAs in Delhi Message-ID: <44CDF3F8.2030106@sarai.net> ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: *rakshat hooja* > Date: Jul 21, 2006 3:53 AM Subject: survey of 5 RWAs in Delhi*To: reader-list at sarai.net * *In this post I will try to briefly summarize the quick readings of qualitative findings of the first part of a questionnaire based survey undertaken in 5 Resident Welfare Associations (RWAs) of New Delhi/ Delhi (C-8 Vasant Kunj, GK II, Self Financed Flats Shiekh Sariai Phase 1 and Self Financed Flats Mukherjee Nagar. The second part of the survey consisted of more qualitative interviews which I will cover in the next post along with more detailed analysis of the qualitative data collected. Also I have not created tables in order to stick to the text format of the mailing list. * * * *****C-8 Vasant Kunj***** * * *This is 15 year old RWA where membership charges are Rs 1100 per annum or Rs 100 per month.* * * *Members of the RWA among the sample – 87.5%* * * *Percentage satisfied with the civic amenities in the colony/residential area – 50%* *Percentage satisfied with the electric supply in the colony/residential area – 87.5%* *Percentage satisfied with the water supply in the colony/residential area – 0%* *Percentage satisfied with security in the colony/residential area – 0%* * * *Percentage that vote in the RWA elections – 87.5% (100% among the members)* * * *Percentage that has had to complain/deal with Delhi Jal Board/Electric Utility/MCD in the recent past – 87.5% ( 100% have complained individually, 50% have also complained with the help of the RWA, 1 respondent had complained with a independent resident group other than the RWA)* * * *Percentage that felt that the RWA was useful/had empowered them in their dealing with the various government agencies/ utilities – 75% * * * *NOTES (nowhere near exhaustive at this moment, just some things that caught my eye while quickly glancing through the questionnaires) – * * * 1. *Women are a majority in the executive council on the RWA.* 2. *RWA runs a community center, gym, badminton court, TT table in the colony* * * *BYTES (these are some of the quotes by residents. All the questionnaires were filled by the respondents in their own hand writing so as to avoid loss in translation) * * * *K Gulati (C 8/ 8011 Vasant Kunj) "The benefits have reached only few people, but we have been able to voice our difficulties through the Resident Welfare Association. The RWA has not been of any help in improving water supply except for areas where elected members live." * * * *SS Kapur (C8/8060 Vasant Kunj) "RWAs impact on civic facilities and other essential requirements depends on the enthusiasm of its members. Every election of RWA brings in change for good or worse. * * * * * * * *****SFS Flats Sheikh Sarai***** * * *This is 22 year old RWA where membership charges are Rs 800 per annum * * * *Members of the RWA among the sample – 100%* * * *Percentage satisfied with the civic amenities in the colony/residential area – 100%* *Percentage satisfied with the electric supply in the colony/residential area – 87.5%* *Percentage satisfied with the water supply in the colony/residential area – 100%* *Percentage satisfied with security in the colony/residential area – 42.8%* * * *Percentage that vote in the RWA elections – 100% * * * *Percentage that has had to complain/deal with Delhi Jal Board/Electric Utility/MCD in the recent past – 87.5% (Most residents complain individually as well through the RWA office)* * * *Percentage that felt that the RWA was useful/had empowered them in their dealing with the various government agencies/ utilities – 87.5% * * * * * *NOTES (nowhere near exhaustive at this moment, just some things that caught my eye while quickly glancing through the questionnaires) – * * * 1. *Women members are active but most are co-opted and not elected* 2. *Facility for paying electricity, water and telephone bills and property tax is provided by the RWA. Advise on property tax is also provided. * * * *BYTES (these are some of the quotes by residents. All the questionnaires were filled by the respondents in their own hand writing so as to avoid loss in translation) * * * *A P Sexena (C-476 SFS Flats Sheikh Sarai) "Defective tubewells have been made operational, security guards have been appointed, roads have been improved" * * * *D C Tayal ( C- 238 SFS Flats Sheikh Sarai) "RWA organizes health camps, walks, servant verification camps, car check up camps etc." * * * * * * * * * *****A 14 Kalkaji Extension***** * * * * *This is 22 year old RWA where membership charges are Rs 100 per month* * * *Members of the RWA among the sample – 71.5%* * * *Percentage satisfied with the civic amenities in the colony/residential area – 28.5%* *Percentage satisfied with the electric supply in the colony/residential area – 86%%* *Percentage satisfied with the water supply in the colony/residential area – 43%* *Percentage satisfied with security in the colony/residential area – 28.5%* * * *Percentage that vote in the RWA elections – 71.4% * * * *Percentage that has had to complain/deal with Delhi Jal Board/Electric Utility/MCD in the recent past – 71.4% (only 14% of the sample had complained through the RWA)* * * *Percentage that felt that the RWA was useful/had empowered them in their dealing with the various government agencies/ utilities – 71.4% * * * * * *NOTES (nowhere near exhaustive at this moment, just some things that caught my eye while quickly glancing through the questionnaires) – * * * 1. *There are no women in the RWA committee.* 2. *Election process is by show of hand.* 3. *RWA conducts many functions on festivals and national days.* * * * * *BYTES (these are some of the quotes by residents. All the questionnaires were filled by the respondents in their own hand writing so as to avoid loss in translation) * * * *T Nag (5B – A 14 – Himgari Apts. Kalkaji Extension) The only use of the RWA is that is serves as a platform for developing new acquaintances and friendships among the members. * * * *B Banerjee (10A- A 14- Himgari Apts Kalkaji Extension) "I complain individually because the RWA is defunct functionally in our colony." * * * * * * * ***** GK II***** * * * * *This is a 38 years old RWA where membership charges are Rs 700 for life.* * * *Members of the RWA among the sample – 100% * *Percentage satisfied with the civic amenities in the colony/residential area – 88.8%* *Percentage satisfied with the electric supply in the colony/residential area – 100%* *Percentage satisfied with the water supply in the colony/residential area – 88.8%* *Percentage satisfied with security in the colony/residential area – 55.5%* * * *Percentage that vote in the RWA elections – 100% * * * *Percentage that has had to complain/deal with Delhi Jal Board/Electric Utility/MCD in the recent past – 100% (33.3% through the RWA, rest individually) * * * *Percentage that felt that the RWA was useful/had empowered them in their dealing with the various government agencies/ utilities – 100% * * * * * *NOTES (nowhere near exhaustive at this moment, just some things that caught my eye while quickly glancing through the questionnaires) – * * * *It was with the help of the RWA and other associated RWAs the colony was able to achieve the following:* * * 1. *Lowering the category for the colony from A to B for the purpose of calculation of house tax. * 2. *Roll back of the tariff hike of electricity by the government.* 3. *Freezing of the cable TV rates * * * * * * * *****SFS Mukherjee Nagar***** * * *This is 10 year old RWA where membership charges are Rs 100 per month.* * * *Members of the RWA among the sample – 62.5% (one respondent said that the RWA did not exist in his colony!)* * * *Percentage satisfied with the civic amenities in the colony/residential area – 50%* *Percentage satisfied with the electric supply in the colony/residential area – 75%* *Percentage satisfied with the water supply in the colony/residential area – 62.5%* *Percentage satisfied with security in the colony/residential area – 37.5%* * * *Percentage that vote in the RWA elections – 50% (one respondent said that there was no need to vote as the elections are unanimous) * * * *Percentage that has had to complain/deal with Delhi Jal Board/Electric Utility/MCD in the recent past – 87.5% (37.5% complain via the RWA)* * * *Percentage that felt that the RWA was useful/had empowered them in their dealing with the various government agencies/ utilities – 87.5% * * * *NOTES (nowhere near exhaustive at this moment, just some things that caught my eye while quickly glancing through the questionnaires) – * * * 1. *There are no women in the executive member in the RWA* * * * * *BYTES (these are some of the quotes by residents. All the questionnaires were filled by the respondents in their own hand writing so as to avoid loss in translation) * * * *K S Shukla (346 SFS Mukherjee Nagar) "The RWA can only be useful if the executive members show sincerity …. Rather than occupy the seats. They should stop the infighting." * * * *S K Chauhan (126 SFS Mukherjee Nagar) "RWA is most essential for a colony because some work can not be undertaken by individuals." * * * * - -- - -------------- Please use Firefox as your web browser. Its protects you from spyware and is also a very feature rich browser. www.firefox.com - -- - -------------- Please use Firefox as your web browser. Its protects you from spyware and is also a very feature rich browser. www.firefox.com * - -- Vivek Narayanan Sarai: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29 Rajpur Road Delhi 110 054 Phone: (91-11) 2396 0040, ext. 22 Mobile: 98109 36654 From jcm at ata.org.pe Mon Jul 31 18:08:01 2006 From: jcm at ata.org.pe (Jose-Carlos Mariategui) Date: Mon, 31 Jul 2006 13:38:01 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] There has been a change of plan: Raqs Media Collective In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Dear Monica: Thanks for your detailed answer. Obviously the global side is not the one to be questioned, not only because to question some type of global process may be absolutely complicated since no clear specific rules apply. In this sense, a good word you use is 'neutral' grounds, since globalization cleans up local reality to much more unpredictable spaces, with universalized information loosing its contextualization and its former canonization and therefore a source of reality. Though globalization is a complex process, it may not be compared to a local process. Even in local terms, the processes may be more challenging and complicated since when you 'talk' to a global audience there is in deed a group of people that know your work and are willing to see what is the most recent work developed (there is an international audience). Though these avid group may seen interesting it is also 'neutral' and somewhat irrelevant to the specific local contexts. My reality, at least working for many years in Latin America is that few local people are interested in those global questionings (except obviously from a minuscule local group of cosmopolitan intellectuals and artist that are culturally versed). This is why the exploration of what happens in the city along with the local engagement is more difficult, silent, problematic (even erroneous) and usually unheard and unimportant for an international audience. I can put once more the case of Peru to clarify this much more: the VAE Festival ( www.festivalvae.com), which one of few constant annual new media art festivals in Latin America, does a lot of things outside the capital city, Lima. Those interactions are silent and inexistent to everyone in Lima (and obviously to the global audience). Nevertheless, these small things ('acts'), done with more difficulty, being more expensive (since there are no technical conditions), more problematic (not a steady audience if an audience at all) had been happening with some intensity for the last 3 or 4 years. Today we can say that some of those places are 'waiting' for the Festival to happen in their locality every year. So after some years of 'struggle' and allocating resources, there is a contribution to a local experience that through workshops and presentations may trigger new local practices and an expansion of their knowledge. This is today even much more important if we consider that young people are already 'digital natives' which means they use technology as a 'mother tongue' though quite unfortunately the content available (specially through TV) is very poor. In that sense, when you mean that it is difficult for someone with a non-visual arts background to enter the art context, I think that more than arts background we need people with 'media' background, which I believe a vast majority of young people are. One of our aims in involving artists from Peru and abroad in this local exchanges is questioning what the outcome is going to be. As I told you perhaps it will require many years to see something out there, but sooner or latter something may happen. I had found that with younger audiences the involvement in new media art is almost immediate, they are media ready (and I am not speaking here necessarily of the Internet, but other 'offline' media such as the TV or radio). So these local situations (transformations, change) are absolutely necessary and in my perspective, without trying to criticize too much, are usually unimportant to the international audience. So here I have new questions: If you mean there is not a local audience for your work (which I think is a very harsh statement), are you just thinking in a global audience? If from a local perspective these processes seem important, to what degree you think the experience could be mounted or duplicated to other realities? In my perspective it may be difficult but possible, thherefore to activate a group of peripheral projects and participants can led to interesting results. While you are refereeing to Raqs projects with international curators, if the purpose of working globally obviously resituates the people, what will be then the difference to work in Dehli or in New York, for example? I believe that Dehli and the Sarai centre are places of confrontation that had triggered many of your works and that is what is valuable. This is why I believe as much as the local gives to us, we must give back...don't you think? All the best, Jose-Carlos on 7/31/06 7:26 AM, Monica Narula at monica at sarai.net wrote: > dear Jose-Carlos Thanks for your mail. It opens up many questions. Some > responses, far from 'explanatory' and perhaps starting strands of > thought... - The art context in India is primarily around what is termed as > the "visual arts". 95% of the works shown and transacted are paintings. > Followed at a distance by sculptures/objects and then the rare photographic > show. Photography has yet to find a stable space, though there is some > important work being done in this domain. It is only in the last few years > that there has been somewhat of a shift towards the showing of video works > and some installation work. These works are emerging both from established > and newer artists, and basically have a wider circulation outside India. - > It is extremely difficult for someone with a non-visual arts background to > enter the art context here. The reasons for this are yet to be researched > and understood. The recent entry of some documentary practitioners in to > this context is due more to their international presence rather than any > serious rethinking of the values and consensus that run the art contexts > here. (The documentary film on the other hand has had for many years a > decent and at times controversial public presence, and a committed public > around it.) - This situation will hopefully change over the next few years, > with more diverse kinds of practitioners making interesting works and > staking a claim in the art space - which we think has begun. This process > will be interesting as it will mean changes in the ways 'art practice' sees > itself in relation to other practices and also to ways in which new publics > can and will emerge around the domain of the 'art context'. - We have shown > our CD works (GVHM, No_des and Ectropy) in Delhi and Bangalore and these > works have a circulation (also as cds). Also many of our works travel - > lightly - through publications and the web. In terms of installation, we > could not find a context to show (we have shown a few works within means > affordable to us in Sarai). This is slowly going to loosen up over the next > decade, as art contexts will probably become more curious to practices from > other domains. - It is an interesting process how many of our installation > works emerge, and expectedly a complex one. Works have emerged through > conversations and the sharing of ideas and questions with some extremely > curious and sharp people in many parts of the world. (I would not club them > all together in any one idea of an institutional context.). In this let me > share a recent interaction. A young curator located between Lithuania and > Sweden has been in dialogue with us for more than two years. We share ideas, > critiques, questions, resources etc. Over this period he has invited us to > think on an idea that has been exciting and troubling him for some time. > This process of thinking may find an expression in an installation to be > first hosted in a place that he has access to, which will definitely by > outside India. As a process, we find this exciting and challenging, along > with our work here in Sarai/Delhi. And i do think that such an interaction > - whether from a 'local' context or a 'global' one - deserves respect and > engagement. - Some of our work has emerged from collaboration and in > 'neutral' grounds. This made possible very intriguing dialogues and > processes. Sometimes I do wish that we could ourself host a few of these > unpredictable encounters. - We are yet fully to understand the complex > processes that we are all part of in today's world and will give ourselves a > few more years before we find ourselves able to speak definitively on > 'publics' and 'places'. We have found very demanding and challenging > interlocutors and viewers in many different ways and places. This has made > our own map of the world more dense and knotty, and not merely defined by > national borders. best M On 30-Jul-06, at 7:32 AM, Jose-Carlos Mariategui > wrote: > Dear Monica: > > Thanks for the information on the Raqs > solo-exhibition in Dehli. I > just > must say that it is in my perspective > strange to see that this is > the first > solo exhibit of Raqs in Dehli, > taking into consideration that Raqs > is Indian > and that it has been > exhibiting internationally for many years. > Perhaps as > in the case of > many of us (that we face as non-westerns), it is more > feasible to develop > projects in Europe or the US. > > To which factors you attribute this > situation? Has Raqs exhibited > in other > cities of India or in cities of > neighbouring countries? How > difficult is > it? > > I am not criticising > the situation but questioning it, because when > we do > 'something for > abroad' it may dissociate the project with immediate > reality. > > I > believe there is a need (and an struggle) to present works in > local and > > regional contexts and there may be strategies for its deployment. > I had > > recently curated a screening of recent video art from Latin America > > (www.videografiasinvisibles.org) that went first to Europe too but > now > is > going to be presented in all Latin America (thanks to the support > of > the > Spanish Cooperation Agency's network of Cultural Centres of Spain > in > all > Latin America). Sometimes these supranational organizations may be > > very > useful (more than national organizations). > > Perhaps this would be an > interesting topic of discussion during the > Pacific > Rim New Media Summit > at ISEA 2006. Specially on how we can develop > parallel > networks in the > Pacific Rim. > > All the best, > > Jose-Carlos > > > > > on 7/29/06 2:33 PM, > Monica Narula at monica at sarai.net wrote: > >> Raqs Media Collective : 'There > Has Been a Change of Plan' >> (Selected Works 2002-2006) >> Nature Morte > Gallery, A 1 Neeti Bagh, New Delhi >> August 5 - 26, 2006 >> > --------------------------------------------------------------------- >> > --- >> ---------------------------------------- >> Sometimes, adjustments have > to be made. Schedules need calibration. >> There are contingencies, questions, > obstinate demands, weak excuses, >> strong desires. You return to the city you > never left. You pause, >> take stock. Sit still and let a conversation begin. > Maybe? >> >> Around you, aeroplanes sit on wooden platforms in a wilderness > like >> widows on a funeral pyre. Clocks measure fatigue, anxiety and > modest >> epiphanies across latitudes. A door to nowhere stands obstinately >> > against the sky. All your cities are a blur. >> >> "Do you like looking at > maps?" >> >> Meanwhile, measures are taken, shoes lost and found, ghost > stories >> gather, the city whispers conspiracies to itself, the situation > is >> tense but under control. Someone offers you a postcard. >> >> Now: Let's > see what happens. >> > --------------------------------------------------------------------- >> > --- >> ---------------------------------------- >> Raqs Media Collective is > pleased to announce its first solo >> exhibition in Delhi - 'There Has Been A > Change of Plan' at Nature >> Morte Gallery. The exhibition features selected > works (2002 - 2006) >> in the form of cross media installations with networked > computers, >> objects, postcards, video, sound, prints and projections. >> >> > Works exhibited include: 'Lost New Shoes', selections from 'A Measure >> of > Anacoustic Reason', 'Location (n)', '28.28 N / 77.15 E :: 2001/02 >> > (Co-Ordinates of Everyday Life, Delhi 2001-2002)', 'Erosion by >> Whispers', > 'Preface to a Ghost Story' and 'There Has Been a Change of >> Plan'. (See > Details in PDF attatchment with this mail) >> > --------------------------------------------------------------------- >> > --- >> ---------------------------------------- >> About Raqs Media > Collective >> www.raqsmediacollective.net >> >> (Excerpt from the Wikipedia > Entry on Raqs Media Collective - >> > www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raqs_Media_Collective) >> >> Raqs Media Collective was > formed in 1992 by independent media >> practitioners Jeebesh Bagchi, Monica > Narula and Shuddhabrata >> Sengupta. Based in Delhi, their work engages with > urban spaces and >> global circuits, persistently welding a sharp, edgily > contemporary >> sense of what it means to lay claim to the world from the > streets of >> Delhi. At the same time, Raqs articulates an intimately lived >> > relationship with myths and histories of diverse provenances. Raqs >> sees its > work as opening out a series of investigations with image, >> sound, software, > objects, performance, print, text and lately, >> curation, that straddle > different (and changing) affective and >> aesthetic registers, expressing an > imaginative unpacking of questions >> of identity and location, a deep > ambivalence towards modernity and a >> quiet but consistent critique of the > operations of power and >> property. >> >> In 2001 Raqs co-founded Sarai > (www.sarai.net) at the Centre for the >> Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) > in Delhi where they coordinate >> media productions, pursue and administer > independent research and >> practice projects and also work as members of the > editorial >> collective of the Sarai Reader series. For Raqs, Sarai is a > space >> where they have the freedom to pursue interdisciplinary and hybrid >> > contexts for creative work and to develop a sustained engagement with >> urban > space and with different forms of media. >> >> >> >> >> Monica Narula >> Raqs > Media Collective >> Sarai-CSDS >> 29 Rajpur Road >> Delhi 110054 >> > www.raqsmediacollective.net >> www.sarai.net >> >> > > > > _________________________________________ > 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: > Monica Narula Raqs Media > Collective Sarai-CSDS 29 Rajpur Road Delhi > 110054 www.raqsmediacollective.net www.sarai.net ___________________________ > ______________ 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 mahmood.farooqui at gmail.com Mon Jul 31 21:46:30 2006 From: mahmood.farooqui at gmail.com (mahmood farooqui) Date: Mon, 31 Jul 2006 21:46:30 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] since many of us don't read the Biblio Message-ID: {This is the debut novel of C.P. Surendran, a Resident Editor with The Times of India. The novel is set in Wayanad and its Naxalite movement of 70s. The following is a review I've done when Biblio asked to do one. It is a critique on the way he portrayed Naxalite politics. Was wondering if you are interested to read it. Vinod} An Iron Harvest C.P. Surendran Reviewed by Vinod K. José As the Naxalite movement grew in strength by the 1970s, it was common for college campuses to be frequently raided by the Police. Anyone could be picked up on suspicion regardless of whether they had anything to do with the movement or not. One day, Rajan, a young engineering student at the Regional Engineering College, Kozhikode, was not only arrested but went missing in police custody. What exactly happened to Rajan, one still doesn't know. But all we know is that he died in police custody. It is widely believed that Rajan was brutally tortured by the police, killed and the body disposed off. Rajan's disappearance became the much talked about issue among the Malayali public at the time with Rajan's father, Echara Warrier, approaching the court with a habeas corpus writ petition. The court observed that the Government of Kerala had lied in its affidavit. This led to the resignation of Kerala Chief Minister and Congress leader, K. Karunakaran, who was the home minister at the time of the incident. However, with none of the politicians and policemen responsible for the murder punished even after 30 years, justice continues to be denied. Eventhough justice is still denied the custodial death of Rajan and the Naxalite movement continues to inspire Malayalam literary imagination. Numerous short stories, novels and plays have been written on it. Film makers have made internationally acclaimed films (For example Piravi, by Shaji N. Karun). In regular intervals, reports from investigations on how police disposed Rajan's body, testimonials by retired constables who have confessed that Varghese, one of the prominent leaders of Naxalite movement in Wayanad, was shot in a fake encounter, surfaces in the Malayalam newspapers. It is the same Rajan's story and the Naxalite movement that has inspired C.P.Surendran, a journalist, poet in writing his debut novel, An Iron Harvest, the book under review. John, the main protagonist of the novel is described as the 'young Che Guevara like leader of the Maoist organization Red Earth'. John, a student in the Regional Engineering College, Kozhikode, joined Red Earth and has led a guerrilla squad in many of its operations. Varkichayan, expelled from a mainstream communist party, is the main leader of Red Earth. Alongside the story of Red Earth, there is another story that enfolds. This is on the disappearance of a classmate of John, Abe, who according to the author is 'a political innocent', from police custody. It is believed that Abe was tortured and killed in police custody, and the body was then disposed off by the crime branch police, Raman, who heads the counter-Naxalite operations during the Emergency. Abe's father, Sebastian, knocked on many doors for justice, but in vein. Raman, being a close associate of the Home Minister, Shankaran Marar, was given protection from all his adversaries. During an attack on the police station, John and his men are caught. Raman takes John to a forest and shoots him and even gets a promotion for that. But, when the National Emergency is over, Sebastian approaches the court, and gets Marar and Raman convicted for his son's murder. Justice is delayed, but delivered finally. And the novel ends. In an interview to Deccan Herald, the author, C. P. Surendran echoing the middle class concerns on the movement which inspired him to write the novel says, 'An Iron Harvest comes from my friends in school and college who died for what was perhaps never there. Call it revolution, if you will. What was all that pain and courage for? Now I sleep in an air-conditioned room and flowers bloom over their graves. What is the value of heroism?' It is the deep middle class cynicism and individualism embedded in the above statement that prevents the likes of C. P. Surendran from going beyond the usual rhetoric that is often aired and making a more rational analysis of the Naxalite movement for what it was. When an author begins with the premise that the movement was an effort in vain, then one can expect where the novel would be heading. Besides, in Wayanad, where much of the plot in the novel enfolds, it was because of those on whose graves flowers bloom today that minimum wages began to be implemented; feudal lords stopped harassing the adivasis and tenants; practices like Vallikettal, whereby adivasis would be auctioned in wholesale at Valliyurkavu temple to work as slaves in the farms of landlords, came to an end; Kerala Scheduled Tribes Act that promised 'to restore all alienated land for adivasis' got passed. Naxalites fell short of achieving their goal, but if it had not been for them, issues such as the agrarian crisis in Wayanad (manifested in the alarming rate of farmers' suicides), alienation of land from the adivasis (the 2003 police firing on adivasis inside Muthanga Wildlife Sanctuary), large scale deforestation (the felling of trees in Wayanad by the Birlas since 1960s for their newsprint factory and the subsequent environment movement) etc. would have remained in oblivion. 'What was all that pain and courage for? Now I sleep in an air-conditioned room and flowers bloom over their graves'. May be the likes of C. P. Surendran would always pretend not to know what all that pain and courage was for. For the air-conditioned room has a way of quarantining one from the messy reality of the world. When a novelist claims that his work "is based on a true incident"—a claim that gives legitimacy to the book—one expects him to portray the period and its reality with some objectivity. But, in respect to the plot, the characterization and the many details on the period, An Iron Harvest proves to be contrary. His characterization leaves an impression that Naxalites were just some trigger-happy men, who drank and doped all the time, and who were brought together by mere personal affinities than any common understanding of politics. Nair is a dope supplier who runs his business in a pan shack at a busy street in Kozhikode. One day, during a protest that turned violent against government, he is knocked unconscious. Varkichayan, a Naxalite leader, saves him and takes him to a hospital. As a gratitude to Varkichayan, Nair becomes a Naxalite! Such is the callousness of the characterization that is done. If one is to read the biographies of people who were once part of the Naxalite movement (Eg. Ormakurippukal by Ajita) or talk to an elder in Wayanad, it becomes amply clear that Naxalites like Kisan Thomman, Sukumaran, Kunjaman, Joseph, Sankaran Master, Thettamala Krishnankutty, Maran, Choman Mooppan et al. were people with tremendous understanding of what they were doing and why they were doing it. They were farmers, union leaders, adivasis, school teachers or those who broke away from the mainstream communist parties, each of whom had a distinct history of political engagement. But, in An Iron Harvest, the author makes sure that none of these Naxalites are brought alive in the characters of Heston, Rajan, Mani and others. >From a novel telling Naxalite stories, one would at least expect the author to provide the readers with some accurate portrayal of how a guerilla squad carries out an operation. This is also lacking in this novel. The author seems to have done very little research on this matter and leaves much of it to his imagination. For example, this is how a decision is taken among the characters to attack a police station: 'I think we should conduct a raid,' John said. … 'We have to decide which police station to raid,' Nair said. 'Pulpally of course,' Heston said. 'It is too far away…,' John said…. 'Tirunelli is more accessible to us,' John said. And so, they attack Tirunelli station. But why do they attack? Do they attack out of boredom? Do they really target a police station according to how accessible it is to them? Why does the author remain silent about the politics behind such operations? Is it because, it would make it easier for him to parrot what the mainstream media and the intellectual class in our country today, are saying about the 'mindless violence' of the Naxalites? In 1968, close to a thousand poor farmers, mostly from Meenachil taluk in Kottayam district migrated to Pulpally Panchayat in Wayanad. When they started cultivation, the Pulpally devaswam (temple authority), claimed ownership over 27,000 acres of their land and asked them to vacate from those land. The Forest department initiated the process of eviction. Farmers resisted, and subsequently the Malabar Special Police (MSP) was called in (MSP was a colonial armed police force started by the British to crush the Mappila resistance and the numerous smaller resistances in Malabar. Post independence, MSP came under Kerala government. After the Naxalite movement, they conjoined MSP with Kerala Armed Police). MSP, camped in Pulpally Sitadevi temple, began to harass the farmers who continued cultivation. A memorandum from these farmers reached a group of Naxalites. They organized a couple of meetings with the farmers and decided to attack the MSP camp in Pulpally. According to the testimonials of the locals, this was how the 'Pulpally station attack' happened. It is in the light of this real incident that the author writes about the 'Tirunelli station attack'. There is however a difference. As far as the author is concerned the attack was just the outcome of the decision made by a bored group of six guerrillas who one fine day felt like attacking a police station and thereby, choosing the most 'accessible' police station in the vicinity. Whereas Pulpally station attack was done by a group of approximately hundred men and women, who were to be evicted from the land they lived. Of course, this kind of fact would not make it into a novel that completely misses out on the politics behind the Naxalite movement. To the credit of the Naxalites, the farmers finally got their land back in Pulpally. It is also important to take note of the role that the author assigns to women in his novel. Convicted in the 'Pulpally station attack', Ajita, a woman Naxalite leader, spent nine years in jail. Her mother Mandakini, a Gujarati and a former headmistress in a school in Kozhikode, had also joined the Naxalite movement. There were many other women who sympathized and conspired with the movement. However, the author portrays the Naxalite movement as a purely male affair, devoid of any participation of women. At the same time, the only woman who gets some amount of attention in the novel is Janaky, a childhood friend and a former lover of John. Janaky gets married to Raghu, who works in Dubai, and has a one year old child, Mohan, who suffers from progressive atrophy of the heart. She returns to Kerala and John goes to meet her after he receives a letter from her. After years of separation, the warmth between them lingers, leading to a clumsy, frantic lovemaking. Later in the day a conversation starts between them. Janaky tries to convince John who, in her words, has changed from 'my lover to the rebel of lost causes', about the worthlessness of his politics. John disagrees and tries to convince Janaky about the relevance of his politics. Getting nowhere, the conversation ends bitterly with Janaky grieving 'sometimes I feel bitter that you preferred politics to me. Guns to my roses'. The author gives the impression that women after all are not interested in 'politics', especially the one that is armed with 'guns', which also explains for the absence of any women Naxalites in the novel. Instead, he confines women to a world of 'roses', away from 'politics'. As a result, he reinforces the existing gender stereotypes. The author's research on the differences between Naxalite politics and the politics of mainstream communist parties are also poor. When the senior most leader of Red Earth, Varkichayan discusses politics with John, which by the way is the only instance in the novel where a top leader discusses politics with anyone, a distorted representation of the issues raised by the Naxalites in Wayanad is given. On the fundamental limitation of their movement, John says: '…And the fundamental limitation is that the mainstream communist parties have corrupted the worker's ideology to the point that he thinks that things will change through the ballot box. He is not entirely in the wrong either. The Land Reforms Act that the Communist ministry brought into effect gives him hope in parliamentary politics…As far as I'm concerned if we are able to unionize the workers in the plantation and ensure them a reasonable deal in terms of wages, that in itself is a big achievement. Revolution perhaps can wait.' 'Fair enough,' Varkichayan wheezed. To be fair to the Naxalites in Wayanad of the 70s, Land Reforms Act was the first thing that they attacked. Their numerous pamphlets talked of how land reforms failed to change the land ownership pattern, and how it provided loopholes for meeting the interests of the rich plantation owners. One such 'exemption' in the Kerala Land Reforms Act 1969, which was a boon for the rich farmers, stated, 'ceiling is lifted in the, case of rubber, tea and coffee plantations, private forests and patently non-agricultural lands and lands belonging to religious and educational institutions'. The Naxalite movement, which was more active in the agricultural hill areas of Kerala, 'exposed land reforms', convincing their constituency of poor farmers, agriculture laborers and adivasis of the need to take to a revolutionary path. The slogan of the mainstream communist parties, 'land to the tiller', and the electoral promise they made regarding redistribution of land in favor of the landless poor, were misnomers at least for the peasants in plantation districts like Wayanad. The National Sample Survey (37th round) has some interesting data on the land distribution in Kerala. Even after the land reforms, while 76.3 per cent of the Kerala population, owning merely 00.00—00.99 acres of land per household, hold merely 21 per cent of the total land in Kerala, 9.3 per cent of the population own a whopping 54.2 per cent of the land. It is quite clear from this that the land reforms in Kerala happened at a superficial level. When the main protagonist in the novel, John, is portrayed as convincing his leader Varkichayan, on the efficacies of Land Reforms, and opts not to raise the issues of land distribution in Red Earth's campaign, the plot moves far from the reality of the period, and the issues raised by the movement. And to one's surprise, the main leader, Varkichayan without a debate, seems to approve of John's line of argument. The real life story of Rajan and his father Echara Warrier is a story wrought with injustice and anyone who has followed the case would agree on that. Like many other court cases where political bigwigs and senior police officers are involved, nobody ever got punished for the murder and even Rajan's dead body remained undelivered to his family. A few months ago, Echara Warrier too passed away. Despite all this, the author would like to make it a success story in the novel. Sebastian, father of Abe, who approaches court soon after the Emergency, manages to sent Marar, and Raman to jail, thus 'restoring honor to his son'. According to a reviewer of An Iron Harvest in a newspaper, 'Sebastian nearly drowns in despair, but in the end emerges a winner, redeemed by what he so irrevocably has lost'. Is this act of twisting a story of injustice into a matter of celebration justified? The author rightly knows what the Unique Selling Proposition (USP) of the book is. Hence, he has identified it and tailored it around the context of a 'Maoist revolutionary organization', something that is exotic and sellable these days. Sadly, it is one of those works which has failed to objectively analyze Maoist politics, but one that reaffirms many of the earlier middle class prejudices. The blurb in the opening page of the book introducing C.P. Surendran declares him to be 'one of the most important poets of India.' Whether that is an exaggeration or not, his debut novel definitely would not make him 'one of the most important novelists of India.' The novelist fails to portray the spirit of the real life story, distorts facts, and gives an image makeover, perhaps, a consequence of writing it 'from the comforts he gets from his AC room', as he said, and forgetting to be truthful to his 'friends graves', and their stories. ************* Vinod K. José is the reporter in Delhi for Radio Pacifica Network, an American newscast. Vinod is from Wayanad, Kerala. He can be contacted at vinodkjose at gmail.com From cecilia at 802.com Mon Jul 31 12:00:51 2006 From: cecilia at 802.com (Cecilia Andersson) Date: Mon, 31 Jul 2006 08:30:51 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] [Announcements] Call for Participation Message-ID: <54CD44B0-07D1-44A2-B886-CC2ED058B215@802.com> Hi Sarai Hope you're well and having a good summer! Please excuse if you already received the below info. Would be great if you could please forward to people you think may be interested. Thanks and very best Cecilia Workshop with Carlos Garaicoa Studio University of Liverpool School of Architecture 21-25 August 2006 'ART IS NOT ENOUGH' FIVE DAYS OF WORKSHOP AND EVENTS AUGUST 2006 , WERK LTD PRESENTS Curator: Cecilia Andersson Artist: Carlos Garaicoa Lecturers: Lillebit Fadraga, Art Historian, Garaicoa Studio, Havana Jetter González, Architect, Garaicoa Studio, Havana Felipe Hernández, Lecturer in Architectural Design, History and Theory, University of Liverpool School of Architecture Special guest: tbc Havana based artist Carlos Garaicoa and his team proposes a workshop directed towards artists and architects of all ages. Garaicoa's starting point is that of an observer of urban decay The workshop will explore relationships between architecture, art and regeneration. This is an excellent opportunity to spend time with and share the visions of one of the most prominent artists working today. The aim of 'Art Is Not Enough' is to provide experiences that enable participants to, while combining theory and practice, work beyond traditional forms of art and architecture. The aim is also to facilitate contact and dialogue between various fields of creativity that shape our daily lives. Each day will be scheduled from 10am to 5pm and divided into morning and afternoon sessions. Communal lunches will be served around a large table. Weather permitting, in the park. The week will end with an open public event. The workshop can host up to 16 participants and will be held in the studios of the University of Liverpool School of Architecture where adjacent accommodation can be arranged. Participants will be selected on CV accompanied by letter of motivation. Official language is English. Admissions are open as of 5 July. Please send CV and letter of motivation to Cecilia Andersson c at ruc.com Tuition fee is £180, lunches and materials included. A limited number of places are available for free for non-waged and students. Carlos Garaicoa and members of his studio will be in residency at the University of Liverpool School of Architecture during August and September. The studios will be open for scheduled guided visits. To book a visit, please contact Cecilia Andersson c at ruc.com. Phone 07796 627 208. The residency is kindly supported by Arts Council England, Elephant Trust, Henry Moore Foundation and Metal. _______________________________________________ announcements mailing list announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements