Mohan J. Dutta: Critical Insights on Culture and Society

It is interesting that Dawson talks about the shift in University funding from liberal arts disciplines toward biotech, “where professors also tend to be CEOs of start up firms flush with venture capital” (p. 78). I am not sure who or what the target of such criticism is. Is it the professor who seeks corporate funding for his research program, or is it the research program itself which needs such funding. Sure, corporate funding is the major source of funding outside of government agencies, and corporates would definitely have profit-based motives in mind when they fund research. But does that automatically negate the value of such research? Is the value of my friend’s research on aging and hearing diminished by the possibility that the fruits of his labor may be co-opted in the future by a corporate? It is perhaps feasible for graduate students and professors in the social sciences to conduct research that is untainted by grants but I am certain that is not the case in the physical s...

Now days I am trying to engage myself with various issues related to indigenous communities. As a part of academia it is a constant quest for all of us, how can we engage ourselves to make the world a better place to live. All the reading of this week addressed the aspects of reflexivity and engagement; and, one of them is an article by Zoller (2005) that discussed many aspects of activism, communication and social change. Though in his article he focused mainly on the health and related issues; I think we can use this framework (along with other frameworks like CCA) in other broad contexts, such as the context of indigenous lives, indigenous knowledge, science, technology, art, craft, and other infrastructural issues. Zoller (2005) perceived activism as a means for social change by challenging existing power relation. He mentioned different approaches of participation and emphasized on the aspects of community group mobilization for collective actions. In this context he discussed var...

As I was reading this week's pieces about the academy and its position as a site of resistance I was reminded of a saying in Malayalam, my native language, which essentially says "A greedy child wants to sit in his father's lap, and simultaneously wants to breastfeed off his mother". Now before we go arguing the logistics of it :) I would like to point out the its significance in terms of the academy for me as a scholar. I had some of the same thoughts as Saqib about Boyd's reading, particularly when I read the line "Is critical teaching [and scholarship] anything more than an intellectual game in such circumstances?" Admittedly that is a very powerful question which forces us to be reflexive and "turn the lens inwards" in Mohan's words. As I look deeper I expect to see a hypocrite and hide shamefacedly from the truth of the academic jargon being just that. However, throughout the course of the semester, as I have played tug-of-war with thi...

The readings sent a chill down my spine. Never did I expect the academe to be this biased and ruthless. The articles were revelationary, inspiring, infuriating and shocking at different times. All, Churchill, Prashad, Schueller and Dawson were revelationary, incisive and undeniably appealing. I however came to have a different line of thought than most of us have expressed at this forum. I think of solutions/ alternatives beyond the crossing of t’s and dotting of I’s. I also think of how impossible the sentiment of ‘co-opting their language’ looks to me now. If this is the language and grammar of the mainstream can we ever co-opt it for our own ends – I don’t think so. This very move would create lacunae that would be enough to negate any credibility on our part. The most heartening parts of all articles were referrals to solidarities that existed across student and faculty bodies. This perhaps is the resource that we can rely on. I think Critical Scholarship should take clear sta...

With hopes that I would be forgiven for resuming a slightly out of vein topic, I would like to draw attention to a topic that was touched upon in the last class. I talk here of Neoliberalism and its structure/ operationalization. While often times we seem to criticize the neoliberal project with confidence as castigate it for most of the evils that the planet is witnessing – in so doing this we cast the neoliberal project as a singular, monolithic, overarching influence that has its impact in practically every sphere of international activities. This being said, I want to refer specifically, to the taking of a similar stance in the American neoliberal interventions in the middle –east. While castigating the new empire we take for granted its absolute power and the control it exerts thereby in the region. I however happened to listen to talks by Tariq Ali and Arundhati Roy (both names were mentioned in the Schueller piece) where both maintained a line of thought that translated into...

The final readings for this semester brought our discussion full circle as we return to our initial question of what is critical theory and what does a critical theorist do? Though not explicitly stated in the readings, questions of our place a critical scholars, as academicians, and as activist working with the structures that constantly oppress groups, were revisited in a large part. Churchill (2007) discussed the myths of academic freedom as he was targeted for “elimination” within an academically “free” department. Prashad (2007) reviews the ways in which the academy restrains students free thinking as well as their access to education simply by limiting the amount of available spaces to its incoming undergraduates. If these scenarios do not sound like that which takes place in corporate America, than I do not know what does. Reading such work has become a major eye opening experience as I once strongly believed in lofty ideas of free thinking and academic freedom. A majority...

I keep reading Horowitz's name. How is it possible that our entire pedagogical system is affected by one man (and several other with the same Right ideologies) and his power over society? How have we allowed this to happen? How can we break this cycle? The influence of politics and money has taken a direct hit on freedom of speech and academic freedom. We always talk about how deep the neoliberal project runs but, it is hard to think about its creepy claws inside my mind and surrounding my Beering Hall. What can we do? I think that this is a violence that has been ignored for long enough. This is something we must challenge. We cannot leave other scholars who strive to make changes and resist the conservative dominant ideology which has its grip on our knowledge and knowledge producing practices alone to fight the battle that silences scholars who speak out against this epistemic violence. We read in class about how to fight fire with fire. We read that in order to have a dialogue...

Transmogrification: Having read Churchill's and Dawson's articles, as well as Prashad's 'Teaching by candlelight', which is also on Blackboard, I am feeling distinctly uncomfortable and rather despondent about being so far away from home, and hurtling headlong into a space that is undergoing an ugly transmogrification. Academic vs. Real Worlds: In the light of these articles, I think the oft-repeated refrain that 'academics overstate their importance' or notions that 'practical' concerns are different from academic self-importance can now be safely thrown out of the window. Academics are not physically separated from the 'practical' real world, the ivory tower is not a seclusion for allowing the inhabitants of the towers to play irrelevant language games; the ivory tower, in fact it is meant to be protection from a potential backlash from the 'practical' world. The academy, and for those of us within it, is at the fulcrum of shaping...

Allow me to be a devil's advocate and speak for students who come form the "other"-ed cultural background, who were, and perhaps still are embracing multicultural imperialism in area studies, or in "inter-cultural communication" in this case. My point is, so long as the site of knowledge, and knowledge creation is West-centered, students from non-western backgrounds will face the difficult choice between co-optation and exclusion. As an international student, you are expected to "bring something different to the table", and the "table" can be a frustrating place: at best it will be in the form where the non-western culture that you represent is "seen as a rich storehouse of timeless wisdom from which the present had degenerated", at worst it will be a cultural freak show. I was shocked and deeply disturbed one time when a Chinese scholar invited to give a lecture on "culture" spent 15 minutes talking about "Chinese...

I find Boyd's account of his struggles within the university sphere both revelatory and sobering in many ways. In the article, he quotes Knoblauch's critical question, "Is critical teaching [and scholarship] anything more than an intellectual game in such circumstances?" Perhaps we all feel a certain tinge of dissatisfaction with the hypocrisy of enjoying the material benefits of a system that we wholly disagree with. Not to sound too critical of the article though, at a certain point it does read like a page of 'dear diary', but maybe that's just me. Perhaps this is symptom of overinflating the idea of the classroom as a site of resistance. Not that it can't be, but it has its limits. I feel that some academics may romanticize the classroom in the way certain conservatives romanticize the free market as a place where magic happens. Once you realize these limits, you may feel a sense of disenchantment that he echoes in his piece. As critical theorists...

she dies of bullets, of rape, of hunger she dies...and left alone I search for the violence

We spoke a little bit about violence and resistance in class yesterday, and questioned the necessity of violence in revolution. We read Schaff who believes that the words revolution and violence are often put together in reductive Marxist readings. I was listening to this poem by Piyush Mishra, the Hindi poet and lyricist, which I thought frames the idea of violence really well. This poem of his features in the film 'Gulaal' for those of you who've seen it; and quite ironically to our scenario, features in the film in the backdrop of college elections. I am putting up the Hindi version here. My apologies to those who cannot read Hindi (I'll translate it for you over a drink someday); my apologies also to those who CAN read Hindi, for I'm sure my Grammar is pretty bad. (Postcolonial ennui? No matter!). Read on! Shaunak आरम्भ - पियुष मिश्र आरम्भ हैं प्रचंड, बोल मस्तकों के झुण्ड आज जंग की घडी की तुम गुहार दो, आन बान शान या कि जान का हो दान आज एक धनुष के बाण पे उतार दो ...

In this 21st century, when we are aspiring for Generation-Next lifestyle and more economic/ technological advancement/ sophistication; many people especially those from the third-world countries [though World Bank chief Robert Zoellick commented on 14th April, 2010 that, 'Third World' concepts no longer relevant '] are facing more and more challenges to earn their bread and butter. In most of the developing countries (if not all), economic inequality and injustice is increasing gradually. Yesterday (i.e. - on 17th April, 2010), Govt. of India finally released the BPL document (after prolonged bureaucratic procedure), according to which the percentage of people living below poverty level (BPL) is 37.2% [as per interim report of 2007 it was 27.5 %]. I believe, in many third-world countries the situation is even worse. Historically, we have noticed that, reaction/ struggle of people against inequality and oppression took both violent and non-violent forms. Few years back we h...

The white man called you Bhagat Singh that day, The black man calls you Naxalite today. But everyone will call you the morning star tomorrow. ( ‘Final Journey: First Victory’ by Sri Sri.) I have still not completed all the fascinating readings for this week but with the ones I deemed important and have read, I am sharing some strands of thought. Dutta and Pal (in press) wrote that the subaltern sectors of the globe who are historically silenced and disconnected from mainstream public spheres, constitute rich markets and sources of intellectual property for TNCs. This is very true and is constantly reinforced as we examine the patent applications and the various resistances mounted by activist groups against patenting indigenous knowledge. Further, the subaltern population also occupies some of land with the richest resources in the southern countries; their land has rare medicinal plants, rare varieties of rice/ wheat, Bauxite, minerals, teak wood, Agar wood, African black wood etc....

Zoller's piece on the TABD again slices through the notion of dialogue as a form of civic participation and legitimate tool for public progress. What can we expect from state and TNC operators, a body that eases the flow of capital between countries or that actually seeks to involve consumers and work for the public good? Dialogue as a term simply props up the oligarchs' status quo and anesthetizes any real resistive potential in the masses. There is a dialogue going on, but its not the dialogue that the public is interested in or dialogue that has any substance. As Zoller puts it, "TABD draws on this theory of dialogue to argue for a credible competition among civil society groups and business organization. The TABD invokes the concept of a pluralistic, democratic dialogue to justify its relationship to government." The TABD however in my opinion is not a mere front group with a placard of 'dialogue' but a facilitator for big business and governing elites. In...

I wanted to write something similar and on similar thoughts. So I felt it would be better to write it here not only as a follow up and comment wise on Prashant's post . I am certainly confused with this introduction of new concepts in my life. I read about the proletarians and the bourgeois class. And just when I thought I was getting some idea of what all this is about I read more into them and got myself even more confused I think. Industrial revolution. Key to all the foundation of Marxism. Is it not? My impression is that industrial revolution is blamed to a high extent for many of the problems in today's world. But was there an alternative to the industrial revolution? Similar to what HalfLife wrote above, is (was) innovation or competition unavoidable? For the need of the people, innovation was necessary. it may have come in terms of more productive looms for individuals, or industry defining looms for the world. Steam engines made way for the world we stand i...

Reading Mazumdar, I was struck by the risk of revolution being used as simply a placard without a substantial thought and method behind it. Mazumdar puts a distinction between revolution and revisionism. He describes revisionism as being, "wholly dependent upon the big leaders and, as a result, they end whenever those leaders belonging to the intelligentsia choose to withdraw them." I recall discussing this in class, about the possibility of a revolution occuring without leadership and at the time it seemed improbable to me. Since then, however, we have seen somewhat of a revolution occurring before our very eyes in Kyrgyzstan, a leaderless one at that, so this viewpoint has changed. Mazumdar seems to be pretty direct in saying that propagandizing should be the way to go to convince the masses to start a revolution from the bottom up. I am not sure how easy that would be in reality. Propaganda from what I know is usually a strategy employed by states with resources. In diffe...

Reading through Lenin's chapter on Imperialism I cannot help but note the uncanny similarities between the economic situation he describes in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and the economic situation of 2010. Today, nations at different levels of development with respect to the means of production aspire to export capital. The location of production seems to override the demands of local labor and location is in fact determined by large corporations that justify particular locations in the name of increased efficiency. The pattern of economic boom periods followed by crises can be found in the early 1900s and the 2000s. The establishment of monopolies across different fields of enterprise in the name of vertical integration and improved management of the supply chains mirrors Lenin's description of the consolidation of power in the hands of cartels. From lysine to oil and petroleum products to pharmaceuticals - price fixing and manipulation of production rates and level...

Gosh, I have no idea where to start. I’m well aware that most of what we’ve read this week will resonate more strongly with some people than with others simply through personal experiences of racism and such. At this point I’m truly speechless. Fanon and Cesaire leave me feeling so sad, so disheartened, so…incapable. Not simply as a victim of colonialism as part of a group colonized, because as Cesaire explains, we have all fallen victim to its venomous injection of a not-so-bright future, but more importantly how every single one of us is stuck with the current problems left by our predecessors. And even still we support, even when we do not intend to, the very same structures that continue to oppress other human beings. After reading these works I feel it is important to revisit our earlier class discussion where Saqib and Christine introduced the dichotomous tensions between selfishness and selflessness. I’m beginning to think there is more substance to this concept than the c...

I love reading Fanon; he makes no excuses and he says what he thinks with no holding back. He blames those who should be blamed and does it with no fear. I love it. In reading Fanon, however, I always feel beyond sad. His words move me because they are genuine and heavy. The story exists and continues to do so. The idea of racial or ethnic betrayal has been swimming in my head for weeks. This is mostly due to the fact that when I was in Mexico, many of the migrants told me that when they get to the U.S., they are treated the worst by Mexicans who are already there or are second generation, documented Mexicans. These thoughts were brought to the forefront while reading "Black Skin, White Masks". This whole idea is brought back by the stories of black women who will only marry white men because they see black men as severely inferior. I begin to think of the poisons of colonialism. To being, you have an enemy who you will forever hate. However, colonialism poison is strong eno...

The readings of this week deal with identity, rights, struggle and negotiation, in individual and collective spaces. Discrimination in its many forms still prevalent in this 21st century and there is no easy or quick escape from it (at least in the near/ immediate future). Therefore, it is crucial to continue our fight against any form of discrimination and marginalization (racial, cast-based, gender-based, sexual orientation –based, etc.). As a student of communication, I am noticing instances/applications different strategies of negotiation in addressing/ handling these crises. It is true that there is no “True”/ right/perfect/ ideal way of negotiation with these crises; but oftentimes, I think (at least in my limited personal domain) these various strategies leads to dichotomy (may or may not be contradictory). Some of them are: Revolution and Reform: e.g. - In the fight for Black right, we have seen non-violent movements led by Dr. King and the ‘extremist’ politics of Malcom X and ...

Reading Malcolm X's speeches, it is clear that he points to a historical trend in the process of obtaining independence from tyranny. In other words, history shows that people must be committed to overhauling the system and prepared to sacrifice for a great cause. The trouble comes in overcoming the anesthetization of the natural impulse that people have to change their surroundings. I feel that this is incredibly difficult in the modern world when entire industries have been created for the sole purpose of distraction and self-indulgence. Has that impulse changed? Is it still there? Sometimes I think that when people become so self-absorbed and ignorant of rampant injustice, they will only react when its too late. For instance, there have always been economic disparities but public anger only sets in when their houses are foreclosed and savings wiped out. Revolution then becomes the last refuge of the hopeless. Is there any point to calling for revolution when the only precursor t...

As I was reading the material this week, it struck me how airtight some of the categories for racism seemed. What I mean is, there seems to be an implication in most places that people of color (any color) are discriminated against by "the white man". However, one of the issues I am sure has been written about is the fact of racism even among people of color. There is a fascinating example of the people of the Cherokee nation, whose history is very non reflective of the fact that they too had African slaves. In fact, today there are quite a few examples of African Americana people who consider themselves part of the Cherokee nation because they have been a part of the Cherokee culture for generations. However, this right is denied to them by the Cherokee people based on the race distinction, due to which they are considered non-Indian. The question is, if people have belonged to a particular culture for generations would they be considered part of that culture? By current sta...

Each reading from this week made me go back to the negotiation of my own identities in life. As a non-resident alien in US, as a oriya Brahmin in India, as a middle class family, as a researcher with subaltern groups and so on. We all as Andalzua writes, live in borderlands, straddle them, look across the borders. We also form our own 'imagined communities' (Anderson) in those spaces. Our history, our ancestors lives, they define us, our paths whether we are conscious of it or not. This is so revealing when one reads the accounts of the Black folks and the successive movements that have brought this population, this country to where it is. (if John really comes home!!). The identity of being a Black in this country has a lot of history behind it which continues to shape and reshape the present and reflects on the social conditions with grievous results. Nonetheless, the framings and representations continue, as in Mississippi Burning or in Black auto-ethnographies or in music v...

I am not sure if I would've liked to read La Frontera before my trip to la frontera or afterwards. Nevertheless, this is an irreplaceable piece of work that I would recommend to anyone and everyone. Anzaldua's courage to voice and publish her struggles is enlightening and comforting. Her rich language and sentences reach out to me and caress a younger me. As a native Spanish speaker, I can understand why she did not translate so much of the text in her book. She has quite a talent for incorporating her Spanish without it seeming forced, as I opine some authors can do. Having come from the border recently with my mouth wide open and my heart heavy, it adds to my frustration to read lines such as "caught between being treated as criminals and being able to eat" (p. 34). This is what I heard at the border myself. If there is anything to be said about truths or Truths, this is it, unquestionably the situation that, 20 years later, continues to haunt and drive our brothe...

Malcolm X's speeches and the emphasis on speech in the events leading up to the Black Power movement were good examples of the role of rhetoric and it's connection to activist-driven social movements. For instance, in Malcolm X's phrase 'Ballot or Bullet', we see how publics are motivated towards collective consciousness. The phrase used is brief, is parsimonious, but more importantly, forces the audience to think about the inevitability of revolution. Similarly, Malcolm X at holds the Democratic Party responsible for the continued subjugation of the Black population. Once again, we see the power of rhetoric in this context, when he calls the Democrats 'Dixiecrats'. The term Dixiecrat is used to describe members of the States' Rights Democratic Party of the Southern US. This party was a segregationist party that emerged out of the Democratic Party, and gained control of the Southern factions of the Democratic Party. For sure, the reason for the Black Pow...

Something struck me about Gloria Anzaldua's book. I was leafing through the initial parts of it Friday night, and the next thing I know, it was 3 AM, and I could not get enough of it. I am still not sure about what it is was exactly that had me so enraptured in her writing. Inspired by the legacy of Brenda Allen, I am going to do a 'self-interview' about my own reactions to the book. Reflexivity and spontaneity are the goals here, but if nothing else, this way promises to be a way out of a severe writer's block. So here goes. What was it about the writing that struck you? Was it the constant mixing of codes, from Spanish to English, to Spanish again? I speak no Spanish, and was only sort of second-guessing when she went back and forth. It frustrated me, at times; there was an unsaid richness to the Spanish parts of the text that even to my incomprehensible eyes, was decidedly observable. For those amongst us who have grown up constantly switching between two, three or e...

I know its been weeks since we’ve read the Dana Cloud piece about the workers that went on strike in Decatur, IL, but I seem to have this reoccurring question that focuses on the definitions of critical theory and critical theoretical work. What is considered resistance and what resistance is more substantial than others? What are the goals of critical scholarship? How do you differentiate critical theory from its close cousin, interpretive work? I understand the tensions between the material and the symbolic and that both are necessary for structural change; however, I am still finding it hard to accept the line that is being drawn between the types of resistance that are considered most appropriate and acceptable when seeking structural change. I remember our discussion of “feet dragging” and how it should not be considered substantial resistance when compared to more materially based threats to the structure. I see the merit in this statement, but can’t help but wonder, are we s...

I wish to call attention to the dismissal of the postmodern line of inquiry that has surfaced in the prescribed readings and our class discussions. We seem to have adapted a line of thought that dismisses everything that is postmodern or that (over)emphasizes the role of discourses in constitution of realities. While I agree to the proposed centrality of Class, it should not come at the cost of omitting other dimensions from our analysis. Attention to the material should not be devoted at the cost of investigating the discursive. I totally agree with Cloud (2001), when she regrets the turn in Cultural Studies that has taken attention away from politics of material resources to other ‘discursive’ aspects, I also do not doubt the objective existence of class. Having said that, however, I do fail to understand what makes class more ‘objective’ than other forms of discrimination (race, gender and ethnicity for instance). Class is certainly a fundamental ground for inequity in contempor...

Indira Krishnamurthy Nooyi (from Tamil Nadu, India) is the chairman and chief executive officer of PepsiCo, the world`s fourth-largest food and beverage company.  According to Forbes magazine`s 2007 poll, Ms. Nooyi is the fifth most powerful woman in the world. She has been named the #1 Most Powerful Woman in Business in 2006 & 2007 by Fortune magazine [ source ]. Nooyi was born in Southern India, and went on to obtain degrees in chemistry, physics and math and master`s degrees from Calcutta`s Indian Institute of Management and Yale University. She came to the U.S. from India in 1978. Prior to joining PepsiCo in 1994, Nooyi did stints at the Boston Consulting Group and Motorola. "Being a woman, being foreign-born, you`ve got to be smarter than anyone else," she has said [ source ]. This week's reading portrayed a picture of women, primarily in the organization structure and analyzed the reasons why women feel [they are] oppressed. From a feminist lens we ...

In the contemporary scenario of global-recession it is important to study the life and struggle of workers of semi-organized and unorganized sectors of developing countries. In my personal opinion, one concept (i.e.-to consider class as one of the main basis of study organizational and societal process) and two approaches (i.e. - a bottom-up 'agentic' process of organizing and performing resistance; and application of subaltern studies framework to understand/organize the marginalized people) may be useful in this regard. These concept and approaches are not mutually exclusive; rather they may be applied in combined (partially or fully) form [as and when necessary]. Some of the social scientists have argued that, in this phase of New Economy and in the era of Information age, the traditional class based approach of understanding organizational processes is no longer relevant. On the contrary, scholars like Cloud (2001) emphasized on the importance of the role of power, structur...

In an influential article published in the Management Communication Quarterly in 1994, Patrice Buzzanell showed how multiple feminist theories can be integrated to provide insight into the consequences of gender interactions in everyday organizing processes. Buzzanell brought to the fore the powerful potential in feminist theory synthesis to shift the agenda and conduct of organizational communication research. She called for researchers to move beyond traditional organizational themes of competitive individualism, cause-effect linear thinking, and separation or autonomy toward feminist values of cooperative and collaborative community, connectedness and integrative thinking. Feminist theory encourages researchers and policymakers to examine how they themselves frame gendered notions of organizational processes and practices in their work. This action raises two fundamental questions about the meaning and purpose of work for researchers. First, is it feasible to decouple the conditions...

This week's readings were fascinating and specially Dennis Mumby's "Power and politics" as he laid down the relationships between power, communication and organization and traced the different perspectives on communication and organizational power. Applying to a health communication scenario there are many areas where it raises questions - a doctor-patient scenario, a health care organization (say a HMO), power relationship in a family where the mother-in-law or father-in-law or husband takes a health decision for the woman, power in the vulnerable populations searching for a better health, in typically "powerless" populations like migrant workers, foreign students, mestiza; people who live in borders, who defy classification and any classification would be an exercise in power. A critical question to engage with here is whether power inheres in the institutions, situations or in the individuals that manage the institutions (Foucalt) and if power can possibl...

The idea of the power elite brings to my mind a pyramid structure of society with small number of individuals (the power elite) at the top making political and economic decisions through a middle level composed of lawmakers, lobbyists, and politicians that impact the entire nation including the masses who occupy the bottom portion of the pyramid. What is interesting is that the power elite are themselves a subset of the higher classes who exercise tremendous influence and control over the operation of major political, economic, civic, cultural, scientific, and legal institutions. The power elite thus operate as a caste within the upper classes and make decisions that affect the entire pyramid. The power elite are themselves not a homogeneous group but are in fact composed of individuals from different backgrounds and creeds. However, these individuals share certain attitudes and beliefs, and occupy similar positions at the top of major political, economic, military, industrial, and soc...

The Power Elite was an extremely interesting book for several reasons. I had to keep checking the date is was published throughout my readings. It offered a good history of power and its capacity for violence, but at the same time it served as a foreshadow to what we have today. Throughout the book, I kept thinking about power and what and who it erases. Women, for example were a very uncommon topic in this book. When mentioned, they were the socialites who were uneducated and looking to marry a rich man so that they could vacation in the Hamptons. This made me think of the number of educated women today, not only educated but members of the power elite, as Mills talks about. What are Mills' arguments about the power elite and gender? How different are things now? Where do people like Condoleezza Rice and Hilary Clinton fit into this equation? Where would they be situated in the power elite of Mills' book and where are they going? What does their rise to power say abo...

Reading Mills triggers in my mind the congruencies and contrasts with respect to some aspects of the two prominent democracies of the world – the US and India. The common denominators undercutting the power elite in the US are markers of property, heredity, fame, and status in the official machinery (echelons of political, military or corporate order). While none of these are entirely absent in the Indian context another very interesting variable undercuts most, if not all, elite that of Caste. Mohanty, (2004) states about caste, “Despite a degree of mobility and assimilation, the hierarchy and social oppression of confining people to social boundaries to perform defined roles and enjoy prescribed status in society persists throughout Indian history.” In many ways the caste situation in India is different from the elite hierarchies of the US. While the hierarchies of the US can profess a ‘secular’ character, the Caste based hierarchy of India – that continues to have privileges, b...

After more than five decades, the arguments of C W Mills still hold good to understand and analyze the present societal mechanisms. In the last half of twentieth century we have seen two major global trends- formation of a more uni-polar world and developments in Information technology and media. Mills discussed three main processes that influenced masses, namely roles of leadership/ politician, mass-media and structural trend of society. Though we have seen some changing faces of democracy and leadership; but the basic elements/ intensions remain the same (e.g. - the ancestors of Nehru family are still ruling India). With the change of time politicians have modulated and modified their leadership strategy; but the true voices of people still remain mostly unrepresented. On the other hand, mass media and other interactive media (e.g.- internet, mobile devices) influenced the whole society significantly. They practically dictate the information exposure/ awareness level, computational a...

Reading Mills' work, it becomes apparent that the abuse of power seems to come from two primary problems with the structure in place today: the concentration of power and the level of power afforded to those in charge. Regarding power concentration, the founders of the US certainly had a different system in mind when the Republic was started, with multiple checks and balances and the dissolution of power away from the hands of the few. Gradually, this system was corrupted. The essential dilemma now is that the wealth and size of the state has increased to the point where it is almost impossible to expect that those in the military industrial complex and Big Business are going to respect the separation of powers. I am wondering if a state/empire with this degree of wealth and might can ever be expected to remain corruption-free. In other words, a country of smaller size with less state power has a better chance for the people of the country to exercise democratic rights and pressure...

I just finished watching this video by Noam Chomsky and thought it is worth sharing with my colleagues in this class room.

This weekend I went an ethnography conference with several other scholars and was very interested in the topics covered through out the talks. Throughout the day, it became apparently clear that I had and am becoming more and more entrenched in the driving ideologies of critical theory, with reference to the symbolic vs the material. To further explicate my frustrations with some of the presentations I encountered, I thought this blog could serve as a possible outlet. Besides, the over arching ideas that were propagated at many of the presentations reflect broader ideas discussed in this weeks reading. For the sake of space (lol space), I will only provide one example that engendered major internal conflicts in me with reference to the material and the institutional control the shape the power structures in academia. So in the keynote address, there was a major professor from DePaul University who discussed alternative ethnographic methods that use radio diaries and sound recordings of...