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or is it a post modern condition with nihilism as its central imperative are blogs conversations or are they the foundations of forming virtual communities media theorist and internet activist geert lovink formulates a theory of the weblogs and concludes that it is this state of ongoing affairs as a media observer that causes nihilism and not revolutions to occur caught in the daily grind of blogging there is a sense that the network is the alternative it is not correct to judge blogs merely on the basis of their content media theory has never done this and should also in this case shy away from this method blogging is a nihilistic venture precisely because the ownership structure of mass media is questioned and then attacked blogging is a bleed to death strategy implosion is not the right word implosion implies a tragedy and spectacle that is not present here blogging is the opposite of the spectacle it is flat and yet meaningful blogging is not a digital clone of the letter to the editor instead of complaining and arguing the blogger puts him or herself in the perversely pleasurable position of media observer the commenting on mainstream culture its values and products should be read as an open withdrawal of attention the eyeballs that once patiently looked at all reports and ads have gone on strike according to the utopian blog philosophy mass media are doomed their role will be taken over by participatory media the terminal diagnosis has been made and it states closed top down organizations no longer work knowledge cannot be managed today s work is collaborative and networked however despite continuous warning signs the system successfully continues to dys function is top down really on its way out where does the hegelian certainty come from that the old media paradigm will be overthrown there is little factual evidence of this and it is this state of ongoing affairs that causes nihilism and not revolutions to occur posted by readerswords at 19 01 3 comments labels blogging kisan bhai lage raho in 2007 too kisan bhai lage raho in 2007 too this new year resolution is a macabre comment on the continuing farmer s suicides in vidarbha and elsewhere link via andolan posted by readerswords at 11 17 0 comments labels agriculture india sunday december 31 2006 the year gone by 2006 picture of the year a halloween buddha see note at end of the post the most significant book that one read this year was undoubtedly one china many paths it brings out the tumultuous changes happening in china and generally ignored by popular media that is too focussed on the neo liberal paradise that china apparently is the book not only indicates the reversal to capitalism and a most horrendous one at that that is being accomplished under the chinese communist party but also that this neo liberal euphoria rests on a rather slippery base the diversity of contributors and that of their ideas makes me feel that some very important developments in the realm of ideas is likely to come from china it is mind boggling to see the sources that the chinese who are in their thirties and forties are able to draw from including but not limited to the marxist tradition the other book on china was andre malraux s classic la condition humaine written after the failed 1927 communist uprising in shangai in a metaphorical way this could well be about the china of the 1990s andrey platonov s grim allegory in the foundation pit confirms the universality of the work the grotesque picture that he paints is based on the forced collectivization under stalin in the 1920s but the conclusions seems to be as relevant today when something similar is being attempted by the onslaught of neo liberalism in the novel the character voshchev is discharged from his job in a machine factory because of his increasing loss of powers and tendency to stop and think amidst the general flow of work something that is continuously sought to be acheived not by a propagandistic state but by the increasingly proliferating entertainment industry the most pleasant experience in the year was my discovery of three writers from argentina the well known manuel puig kiss of the spider woman eternal curse on the reader of these pages whom i read for the first time tomás eloy martínez all three novels published till date in english the peron novel santa evita and the tango singer the last one published earlier this year and cesar aira his an episode in the life of a landscape painter 2006 roberto bolano s distant stars and to a lesser extent his collection of short stories published earlier this year last evenings on earth did not surprise with his ability to weave the political tapestry of chile in the aftermath of the coup in 1973 in indian fiction asomiya writer indira goswami s under the shadow of kamakhya reaffirmed for me her stature as a major indian writer oriya writer fakir mohan senapathy s six acres and half considered to be the first modern oriya novel in a series of short funny delectable chapters he paints the social structure in orissa in the 19th century amitav ghosh s the shadow lines showcases ghosh s talent for writing and for creating some memorable characters but on the basic idea the inadequacy of the nation state in defining identity it was disappointing the treatment remains for most part at an emotional level pv narasimha rao s 6 december 1992 gave the then prime minister s views on the run up to the destruction of the babri masjid and much else without shedding any new light though one ends this long year on a cloudy rainy evening with some books still unfinished mulk raj anand s untouchable juan rulfo s the burning plain andre malraux s anti memoirs and salvoj zizek s the parallax view each in it s own manner was not completed by the deadline that i set for them words it seems refuse to follow calendars related post the year gone by 2005 bibliophil link for the list of books that i read this year about the image a halloween buddha i found it interesting that someone should use buddha for halloween does it still remain halloween posted by readerswords at 17 25 5 comments labels book reviews saturday december 30 2006 sewer divers of mumbai dalits and technology technology is rarely seen as liberating for dalits most discussions are around social distinctions and of late around reservations and violence against dalits mulk raj anand in his novel untouchable written in 1935 had opined the use of technology like the usage of water closets and a drainage system to do away with many of the jobs that dalits do 70 years on the situation has not changed dramatically while people will discuss about the 100 dollar laptop no one will talk about simple technologies that impact those doing the most unproductive if not filthy jobs it was this post by ka muston writing at daily kos that led me to this observation looking at technology from the point of view of the dalit is something that is matter of fact for an american not so for those writing on dalits in india from whatever perspective each year about one hundred dalit men across india die from breathing methane or drowning in filthy water there are no figures collected on the dalit women who empty the thousands of village cesspits worse there is no count of the workers who die from respiratory diseases urinary tract skin and eye infections gastrointestinal ailments and lung cancer fewer than 14 of them live to the age of 50 what a backward people the indian people are george bush is right we have a moral responsibility to deliver these people out of ignorance and into the enlightened path of democracy when they first built the london sewer in the 1860 s large metal balls just a few millimeters narrower than the diameter of the sewers were periodically fed through the brick tubes driven by water current and driving all blockages before them these balls are still used to maintain the sewers in london and paris why couldn t the people of new deli sic now mumbai have come up with a similar system the answer is that in india people have always been cheaper than technology technorati tags dalit india technology posted by readerswords at 12 08 10 comments labels dalit india friday december 29 2006 the secret of mirza ghalib s poetry we now know the secret of the bard s poetry well it was the mangoes with his stunning memory and deep study of ghalib s life hali was the winner in proving that ghalib had in fact tasted most of the 4 000 varieties of mangoes grown in india this might be a funny incident but the truth is that ghalib was the one who loved eating mangoes in sweltering summers more than composing his couplets the varieties of mangoes that ghalib mentioned in 63 letters written to his friends are malda fasli chausa zard aaloo jahangir dasehri rehmat e khas sarauli malghoba aziz pasand mahmood samar sultan us samar ram kela bombay green ratol safeda mallihabadi dil pasand husan aara nazuk pasand kishan bhog neelam khudadad hamlet tota pari nishati zafrani sinduri khatta meetha barah masi langra alfonso fajri samar bahisht gulabakhsh bishop xavier rumani and badami ghalib had tasted all these posted by readerswords at 15 05 1 comments labels india poetry urdu thursday december 28 2006 understanding the spirit of indian politics this unusually long post was written at krish s blog in four parts the last part appeared today thanks to krish for having provided the space and opportunity to write there defining the ethos of indian politics indian politics after independence has to be seen in the context of the national struggle for freedom the indian freedom struggle was marked by few characteristics that ingrained a certain ethos or spirit that has continued for more than the past half a century though interrupted intermittently most powerfully in the six years under the shadow of the mushroom cloud that rose up in 1998 the key to this ethos was acceptance of india as not only a territorial concept but also one that was united by its common struggle against economic drain by british colonialism an acceptance of its unity in diversity and also of its identification with worldwide struggle against imperialism today much of this may sound as leftist banter but none of these were the product of the left in india which in its contemporary marxist incarnation came into being only in the 1920s and acquired some political organization in the aftermath of the civil disobedience movement which also coincided with the worldwide crescendo of the marxist left in the aftermath of the depression what the left provided was a deeper and stronger thrust on these elements and a firmer theoretical basis based on lenin s analysis of imperialism as the highest stage of capitalism it was the indian nationalists starting with dadabhai naoroji and rc dutt who pointed to the economic basis of un british rule in india than indulging in a xenophobic or religious phobia it s acceptance of unity in diversity was articulated by mahatma gandhi himself sometimes going to the other extreme for example during the khilafat movement but what stands out is the inclusiveness that permeated gandhiji s vision it was accepted only to differing degrees within the indian national congress leadership itself a conglomeration of various forces and groups more of an umbrella organization rather than a political party its identification with other movements against imperialism came admittedly only after 1927 after jawaharlal nehru attended the brussels congress against imperialism but the opposite that is the participation of non indians in the inc had been a reality since much earlier i need not list the names but some of them come instantly to mind are madame blavatsky cf andrews meeraben within the inc leadership it was jawaharlal nehru who above all and almost single handedly carried forward this ethos in all respects he differed fundamentally with mahatma gandhi on many issues but most strategically on the question of modernization while gandhiji advocated an essentially narodnik or back to an idealized village economy approach jawaharlal advocated an uncategorical acceptance of modernization dams are the temples of modern india jawaharlal s own fascination of socialism specially under the influence of professor harold laski was clear even if shifting in its stress at various times the 1955 avadi session of the inc outlined our basic approach in order to realise the object of the congress as laid down in article i of the congress constitution planning should take place with a view to the establishment of a socialistic pattern of society where the principal means of production are under social ownership or control production is progressively speeded up and there is equitable distribution of the national wealth on the five year plans the resolution read the first five year plan was based on a public sector and a private sector the public sector must play a progressively greater part more particularly in the establishment of basic industries in reality the socialistic pattern came to mean no more than nationalization that is state ownership of industries jawaharlal insisted that increasing productive capacities of the nation in the making had to be built before the question of distribution could be taken up this model was called mixed economy which referred not so much to the question of distribution that the state was on the whole to ignore during his reign but merely to the question to ownership socialism was a vague intent for the state socialistic pattern not even socialism and not a matter of policy for the government the idea was to nurture indian capitalism by channeling public funds to build a state owned industrial base this was an experiment that had been carried out in socialist ussr a model then for all industrially backward countries indeed the ussr s model gave rise to many variants and with the benefit of hindsight the indian model of mixed economy was rather creative combining planning within a capitalist framework more on this later at this point it is sufficient to make the point that of all the congress leaders only jawaharlal had given enough thought to the economic foundation of the country gandhiji s own ideas on this articulated most pithily in his hind swaraj were at best ignored by all except his least influential admirers it is no coincidence that post 1947 this fringe of gandhians were left with practically no agenda after independence had been won the only other persons in the inc who were modern in their outlook were mohammad ali jinnah and subhas chandra bose that jinnah fell victim to communalism and indeed became the muslim league s nationally acceptable face is a sad story that needs separate treatment altogether i am not sure what subhas chandra bose s ideas on economic development were possibly they were close to nehru s but he was not in the picture during the decisive years of 1947 55 all other major leaders like vallabhbhai patel c rajgopalach...