Homecoming of common man or Ghar WaPasi of Aam Admi
An evening stroll along one of the alleyways in Calicut had me hearing a thought provoking political satire in India. A young man waiting for his pillion rider in his bike outside the latter’s office was asking him in his phone: ‘yaar isn’t it time for Ghar WaPasi?’ (shan’t we return home yet?) Anyone who […]
Is this the end of Iranian cinema?
I have had occasions to reflect on the fate of what we can now call a post-national cinema, a proposition not so outlandish in the heightened age of transnational globalisation. The idea is based on a conception of national cinemas, or any other national cultural movement, as predicated on national traumas. The leading Iranian film-maker […]
Politics for Future to Come
Books The Impossible State: Islam, Politics, and Modernity’s Moral Predicament By Wael Hallaq Recalling the Caliphate: Decolonisation and World Order By Salman Sayyid On the heels of Francis Fukuyama’s two books about political order, which maintains, even after the renowned author’s so-called spurning of neo-conservatism, that a strong, modern political order can ensure stability and […]
Azhar Usman: “A Clash of Two Worldviews”
Azhar Muhammad Usman is an American standup Muslim comedian, of Indian descent. A former lecturer, community activist and lawyer. His troupe “Allah Made Me Funny” consists of himself, Bryant “Preacher” Moss and Azeem Muhammad, who was later replaced by Mohammed “Mo” Amer. He has performed in 23 countries on five different continents. In 2008, […]
Prophet’s Childhood: Majidi’s Take the Talk of Tinseltown
The cinema world is waiting with bated breath to see MajidMajidi’s take on the Prophet Muhammad’s eventful life. The film had hogged limelight mainly for two reasons: first, the focus of his film is on the Prophet’s childhood; so it would be the first attempt to bring the childhood of the Prophet on screen. Also, […]
‘Guantanamo Diary’: An Account of Justice Detained
Casualties in the wake of war on terror and blind apprehensions in the name of detaining ‘terrorists’ have started to come out in the form of first person narratives. What makes Mohammsdou Ould Slahi’s Guantanamo Diary stand out from similar titles like My Guantanamo Diary: The Detainees and the Stories They Told Me (2008) is […]
The Colonial Lineage of Charlie Hebdo
In the 1995 neo-noir ‘The Usual Suspects‘, Kevin Spacey, playing the role of a con-man affected by cerebral palsy, rephrases Charles Baudelaire in a memorable one-liner: “The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist.” This line can be seen overtly rephrased again and again ever since 9/11 and is […]
The Caste History of Ghar Wapasi
Today there are a lot of debates and analyses on Ghar Wapasi and Love Jihad in the media. It is to be noted in this context that these are social phenomena that can be traced back to the late 19th century. It was around this time that the Brahmins and savarnas, who had stood along […]
I Am Not Charlie Hebdo
The journalists at Charlie Hebdo are now rightly being celebrated as martyrs on behalf of freedom of expression, but let’s face it: If they had tried to publish their satirical newspaper on any American university campus over the last two decades it wouldn’t have lasted 30 seconds. Student and faculty groups would have accused them […]
The legacy of Kufa
A’lamuKufa, (Masters of Kufa), an encyclopedic work by Iraqi historian Sayyid Mudar Al Hulw, covers a long sweep of history from the early seventh century, when the city became a bustling encampment town under the sway of the burgeoning Islamic Caliphate to its more recent history under the Ottoman Empire in the early 20th century […]
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