YAM '08

So I know I didn't say much, for one I think I articulate better in writing than in the spoken word. But besides that, what I want to say now has only just been articulated in my mind now. But it's still very relevant.
And I want to throw this in front of everyone.

So this has come out of not YAM alone, but out of earlier engagements, discussions, fights, insecurities, self-reflection, all before YAM, continued into YAM in a number of things i heard people say, a number of issues that came up, differences that arose in the sessions, multiple perspectives that people put forward, and got further articulated while I was narrating my 3-day escapade to people back home. The more I described, the clearer my thoughts got. Of course those damned thoughts are never completely sorted, but for the moment. Let's just leave it at that.

So this is what I think,
There are these popular categories of 'theory' and 'practice' that we're always talking of a balance between. Fair enough. But the moment we talk of 'merging' theory and practice, we've seperated them already. And fundamentally that's where my problem is. And I think it has very serious repercussions on how/where we locate ourselves..as also perceive the location of others. And it's this perception of others, closely related to where we locate ourselves, that very often causes very serious problems of miscommunication as also a complete lack of communication (read: lack of dialogue) between different...'sets'...of people

Let me now be more specific in what I'm trying to say. Having assumed that theory is distinct from practice, there is a moral legitimacy attached with those who practice...as against...those who read and write, those who simply theorize..in the abstract..just talk.
This often translates into the distinction between activism, those who do, and academics, those who theorize. Yes, activism and academics are two different things, but this analogy of practice and theory translating into activism and academics is misplaced.

This also brings up the problem of how we define activism.

But not getting into that right now,
what this further translates into is politics. Activism is political, or actively political, whereas academics is..well sort of like gramsci's armchair intellectual.
(as a disclaimer I'm not saying any of these things in any absolute or totalizing sense, but at a sort of generic level)

This is also very very closely linked to the question of class...this elite middle class activism. we often like to sit in our lovely airconditioned rooms and write award winning books, but how much are we really contributing to 'change'? how hypocritical are our lives?

There are 2 issues here,
one is are we really contributing to any change? what is the role played by acadmics? by research? yes there are reports and reports and papers and papers and conferences and conferences and people keep getting fat sums but what comes of it? no real change in the field they're studying. granted. but to write off academics instead?

That's taking academics for granted. to deny the role that critical inquiry plays? to disregard the process of talking, LISTENING, questioning, asking, thinking, and engaging... and to think that activism can exist outside of academics?!

and if it can't then there's little arguement for any sort of moral legitimacy of one over the other.
and this is at no time to claim the opposite - a moral legitimacy of academics over activism..or even to deny activism its own legitimate place.


ok so issue no. 2
middle class - elite - bourgeois.....such contempt these words invoke.
but can you de-class yourself?
Not even if I wanted to. Not because I don't want to, but because I'm SEEN as middle class. It's not about whether I have that airconditioner on or not, how much I get paid, where I'm working. It's about how I walk, how I wear my hair, how I wear my kajal, my body language, how I wear my clothes, not what I wear but HOW I wear it. I can easily change material things, stop buying big brands, etc etc, but not how i walk in those clothes.

And this isn't about me alone, it's not only about whether I have the strength to change these things or not, but about where I've been slotted in society, about also very much what labels have been attached to me, about not being able to get away from the fact that we live amidst a peoples where EVERYONE has a label.

I don't know how far what I'm saying is being grossly misunderstood as yet another sad middle class last attempt at trying to justify onself or one's life..
i'm not.... i'm engaging.... and out of engagement will emerge my understanding of where i stand and where i WANT to stand..my politics....

don't mistake what i'm saying for a sense of satisfaction and complacency with the middle class 'dhabba',

at no point am I precluding critique, self-critique, the need for questioning these labels, attempting to break these labels, rebelling, shattering stereotypes and breaking barriers

at no time am I claiming that there aren't problems

nor am I claiming that there doesn't exist a hypocritical or shallow convenient middle class understanding of a lot of issues that matter


but to disallow the possibility of a serious engagement of the middle class with issues that matter, while continuing to remain middle class..there is my problem.

I think these are things that people talk about with those they know would agree with each other, but never with those who would disagree
and there's such a gap, no dialogue, no communication, and most importantly no desire for communication between the two, because everyone has been labelled, and everyone's already assumed and decided what the other person's stand is

there are these imaginary conversations that we've had with each other in our minds which only drives us further away from moving anywhere that might really matter.


These questions, I think, need to be confronted headlong at forums like these, and not evaded, cautiously avoiding them

A belief system that has inculcated within it a space for self-criticism is the broadest and most open form of a belief system, of an ideology
And openness gives space for dialogue
And dialogue is most critical for maturity of an ideology

Of Tradition and Modernity

Those are two of the most complicated ideas of our times. Well, of all times i guess.
The idea of modernity is, to me, at the root..the absolute root..of all ideological differences.
What does it mean to be modern? What does it mean to modernize? Is it in direct opposition to all that is traditional? Can it be understood in its opposition to tradition, or does it have a life of its own?

Can modernity ever let go of tradition? Has it let go of tradition? Is America modern? Is the West modern? What makes them modern? Capitalism? What is tradition? Is tradition constituted by the past, and in a sense static then? Or is it defined by the past, dynamic? If it's dynamic, must it necessarily merge with the manmade category of modernity?

Is the purpose of the idea of modernity really in its accuracy?
Or is it more about breaking down social reality into categories, that are not about being accurate, but assist in attempting to understand it instead. Are tradition and modernity more useful to study in terms of their historiography? How has it been understood across time and space? How has its understanding changed? Why has it changed? What prompted such changes?

What is the politics of defining modernity as accurately as possible?

What is culture?
Does 'cultural' directly translate itself into 'traditional'? Does talking about the 'cultural' imply conservatism? Does talking about the cultural mean the material doesn't matter? Does talking about the cultural mean you're wasting your time, while more serious, more pressing issues of materiality are waiting to be addressed for the poor across the world? Can one study the material without addressing the cultural?? Does talking about the cultural directly translate into culture of the elite? Do the poor have a culture of their own? Is their culture constituted by their materiality? Or again, is it defined by their materiality? Are they the same thing, or is the first a distortion of Marx, and the second, derived from him?
Will materiality resolve cultural stand offs?

Does modernity not have a culture of its own? Is its relationship with materiality important only so far as it is a relfection of that materiality? Or is the relationship one that gives more insight than that on the world and conflict.

Is the study of culture the luxury of the elite? Or can it be as political as the material? Are the cultural and the material necessarily mutually exclusive? And if not, must the study of culture necessarily be constituted by the material alone? Does the study of culture in its political context, content and form, imply the study of materiality alone? Or can the political within the cultural, be cultural in nature, and remain political?

Is the culture of modernity devoid of rituals? rites?.....tradition?
Or are these remnants of 'tradition' yet to be purged out of modernity? Will they ever be purged out of modernity?

If modernity is not defined simply by what you wear and what language you speak, what of that 'modern' 'progressive' woman dawning the hijab? or does dawning the hijab automatically preclude her claims to modernity? if the hijab is symbolic of the 'un'-modern (traditional?), then what is the salwar kameez indicative of?

Is it really as simple as the material?

Isn't culture what complicates the material? Isn't culture shades and shades of grey? Isn't culture what makes the material grey?
And if the cultural makes the material grey, how can it be simply constituted by the material?

What can be made of tradition and modernity?

This one's for me

I hate being treated like a girl
I hate having my heavy bags picked up by boys
I hate being escorted home late at night
I hate being judged for drinking
I hate having to drink beer out of a wine glass coz I’m wearing a salwar kameez when my cousins wear suits and drink beer out of a bottle
But I won’t wear the suit

I hate being stared at when I wear a short skirt
I hate being started at
I love being flattered
It’s always fun to be hit on

I hate being told I’m a girl
I hate being reminded I’m a girl
I hate being aware that I’m a girl at every living moment
I love being pampered
I hate being taken for granted that I want to be taken care of because I’m a girl
But I love the skirt, I won’t wear the suit

I hate being told to do something because I should
I hate having to explain myself to people I don’t care for
I hate having to explain myself to people I do
I hate being treated like I have no feelings
I cry

I hate being helpless
I hate having to stand and watch
I hate being scared

I hate being reminded about what I never forgot

I hate having to listen when I don't want to

I hate peer pressure
I love being left alone
I hate being uncared for
I hate being put on a pedestal
I hate when my world is treated as a faraway land
I love my world