THE RESENTMENT OF BORDERS IS A GUIDED EXPLORATION OF THE MORAL CLARITY THAT SELF-DETERMINATION REQUIRES. A CLOSED-LOOP PROTOTYPE OF SUBALTERN OPEN-ACCESS EDUCATION - the snake eats its own tail & we have always been here & prophecy means telling the truth.

“..like planes, trains and automobiles, the same technological vehicles of hormones and surgeries take people on different journeys in their lives—depending on whether their oppression/s is/are based on sex/es, self/gender expressions, sexualities, nationalities, immigration status, health and/or dis/abilities, and economic exploitation of their "labour.”

- Stone Butch Blues, Leslie Feinberg,

I’ve been an unmitigated admirer of Sinthujan Varatharajah for years, so it was an incredible honour to finally get to talk to & learn from them in this episode. Their confident voice and lyrical turn of phrase make this a quiet & intense yet listenable episode. Sinthujan's refusal to be pinned down or boxed in & their relentless intellectual courage (coupled with such kindness) is essential. We spoke about the complexities of family, the limits of solidarity, how liberation’s most central aspect is mobility & the doors to freedom that heterogeneity opens.

My secret is that I’m very good at school and like political science. I’m an obnoxious dialectical materialist & kind of the worst person to have in your tutorial. I’ve been thinking a lot about my university degree. I believe that what it afforded me (more than information or skills) was a deep understanding of learning, critical thinking & argumentation. So, EP 8 is also formatted how I speak - it drives my mother nuts because I tend to give a little thesis statement & then elaborate instead of the other way around. Hugely frustrating in regular conversations but great for teaching & facilitating.

It’s been a whole year since my last CBS episode (although this one has been in the works for almost two years. I’ve been adding readings, music, and sounds & removing them too. Informed by my foundation in political theory, Ambedkar’s Pakistan or Partition of India & a lot of poetry, it's been my perpetual stew. These are terrifying times but also of flux, the abyss yawning & the ground shifting under our feet. I think most people, regardless of identity & social privilege & political affiliation, are scared of freedom. Holding fast to group identity, nationalist pride & erroneous ideas of solidarity. Here's a hint - loyalty never looks like cowardice or moral policing or surveillance. Babasaheb was unique, apart from his prolific work & achievements, but because of how he stood. Singular. Uncompromising. Unafraid to question, transgress & committed to articulating his politic of wholeness. That's what integrity means.

The late Marxist writer & public intellectual Leslie Feinberg is of Ambedkar's ilk. In a film I quoted, he said, "I don't see myself when I look in the mirror. I see parts of myself. I see a combination of how the world sees me and how I see myself. And I'm always fighting to define my own reflection." In the mire of communal malaise (clinging, stagnant, consuming in its homogeneity), self-determination in pursuit of self-respect & wholeness (angry, resentful, hungry, clear-sighted) is the only way through. What could be more Ambedkarite than that?

CREDITS

Expert: Sinthujan Varatharajah

"Leslie Feinberg on Discovering Transgender History" from Alisa Lebow's 1994 film Outlaw

Leslie Feinberg brings Rainbow Flags to ' FREE MUMIA! – Workers World

Judith Butler: Your Behavior Creates Your Gender | Big Think

Twitter [FREE Download] Royalty-Free Beat

parai beat non-copyright | kuthu beat free download

I SHALL NOT WHOLLY DIE

It's Christmas 2022, and the persecution of Christians in this country is getting worse and worse; even as the terror rises, the apathy also seems to loom and grow. It seems obscene and inappropriate to be hopeful. I can't say I've experienced the worst of this hatred and bigotry, but where else can I locate my experiences and identity? Where else do I belong? Where else do I focus my anger than on behalf of those "among whom I was born?" 

It's the end of a long hard, confusing year. Looking to the future, looking to the result of the Supreme Court case on the expansion of SC status, even looking to the upcoming general elections - all of it seems too large to comprehend. Too big to face head-on. But I'm feeling a wind blow through that I haven't felt for years. I can stand up with my head held high because of Babasaheb, but that doesn't mean I want to convert to Buddhism. I'm a good Christian kid; we're taught that we only bow before God. 

My favourite Biblical character is Gideon. The image of this least of sons, from the smallest of Judaic tribes, being charged with freeing his people from foreign oppression by an Angel, then doubting God’s hiring process, is so funny. So human. Of course, the minute he gets the all-clear, he takes on the righteous sword of God. Through divinely sanctioned deceit, he chases away the encroaching armies and then goes on a rampage, tearing down idols. The narrative of Gideon’s wholesale destruction of false gods was used during the Protestant Reformation as a comparison to the removal of effigies of  Catholic saints from the midst of churches.

I still believe that God's promises are starkly simple compared to back-alley deals made to a pantheon of thousands. I think he loves me exactly as I am, hard and hating, bitter and angry. And in Isaiah 53:1, my favourite tragic prophet asks, "Who hath believed our report? And to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed?" 

This coming year, I want to smash some idols. 

CREDITS

Parai drums: Parai Instrument Sound Effect (Royalty free)

A crowd of Hindus burnt down a church - https://freesound.org/s/541014/ - This work is licensed under the Noncommercial 4.0 License.

Aime Cesaire- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkTDayrLZq4

But I’m Talking About Faith - https://freesound.org/s/634813/ - This work is licensed under the Noncommercial 4.0 License.

Peter the rash: Gregorian Chants Vs. Modern Trap/Rap Beats [prod. Ryz]

I made the episode art; big up to the Commons, praise be!

Support the show

This is a conclusion to parts 1 & 2 of  Carceral Casteism. It is one of two, and you can listen to either or both, in any order as you please. I know I usually give these huge show-notes/accountings/missives for each episode, but, to be honest, you've all been following along, and they're both pretty conclusive, as listening experiences go.

CREDITS

This is a conclusion to parts 1 & 2 of  Carceral Casteism. It is one of two, and you can listen to either or both, in any order as you please. I know I usually give these huge show-notes/accountings/missives for each episode, but, to be honest, you've all been following along, and they're both pretty conclusive, as listening experiences go.

So, I'm just going to use this time + space to make my acknowledgements, and give thanks.
This series would not at all have been possible without the time & work that Nikita Sonavane, Sanjana Meshram & Rev Dr John Boopalan do. By this, I mean their scholarship & writings that I think everyone should read, and also their generosity in agreeing to share their expertise for this series. I really hope I was able to do their learning & labour justice.

I'm a total newbie to audio in the sense of formal training, but it's a medium that I also find to be really generative, & also shows the sheer breadth & depth of knowledge, media, art, analysis & conversations that influence  & guide my thinking & my convictions.
 
Music + Anthems
@lemonstandboys for RAKSHEESH
The call to prayer from Jama Masjid in Delhi & the doxology from some cc audio I found.
The Prince of Egypt's 'Deliver Us' performed by the excellent National Taiwan University Chorus. The story of the Prince with a Thousand Enemies from the Watership Down film.

Omair Bhat for letting me use his poem 'We Don't Fear Death Anymore'. Snehashish Das for the brilliant analysis in their wire article quoted here. @thecaravanmagazine journalist Sagar for his stellar piece on M*di's weaponised use of the gita as a symbol. @butchanarchy for their comprehensive essay Against Liberal Abolition. Tarushi Aswani @article14live interview of Comrade Sharjeel Imam. Begumpura (words & vision) by Sant Ravidas. Ursula le Guin as always. Scholar Mathew Kuriakose for his Dalit Marxism piece I quoted from. Theologians Emmanuel Levinas & Rubem Alves that Rev John introduced me to. Zia Sardar for his TWOTE 2009 forward, Achille Mbembe & @thetricontinental  dossier on Frantz Fanon.

Frantz Fanon texts drawn (lived, breathed, resuscitated) from:The Wretched of the Earth & Black Skin, White Masks

Ambedkar Texts drawn from: Waiting for a Visa, Untouchables & Untouchability, Ranade, Jinnah & Gandhi, What Path to Salvation, his speech to SC Federation Workers in Guddigam, Constituent Assembly Debates (17 Dec 1946) & a section from BAWS volume 17 part 2.

CREDITS
Experts: Rev. Dr John Boopalan
I made the episode art; big up to the Commons
Opening theme & additional score: @jide_o

"ENDURE PAIN, FIND JOY & MAKE YOUR OWN MEANING BECAUSE THE UNIVERSE CERTAINLY ISN'T GOING TO SUPPLY IT. ALWAYS BE A MOVING TARGET. LIVE. LIVE. LIVE".
- Lois McMaster Bujold, Cordelia's Honour

This is a conclusion to parts 1 & 2 of  Carceral Casteism. It is one of two, and you can listen to either or both, in any order as you please. I know I usually give these huge show-notes/accountings/missives for each episode, but, to be honest, you've all been following along, and they're both pretty conclusive, as listening experiences go.

So, I'm just going to use this time + space to make my acknowledgements, and give thanks.

This series would not at all have been possible without the time & work that Nikita Sonavane, Sanjana Meshram & Rev Dr John Boopalan do. By this, I mean their scholarship & writings that I think everyone should read, and also their generosity in agreeing to share their expertise for this series. I really hope I was able to do their learning & labour justice.

I'm a total newbie to audio in the sense of formal training, but it's a medium that I also find to be really generative, & also shows the sheer breadth & depth of knowledge, media, art, analysis & conversations that influence  & guide my thinking & my convictions.

STANDING ON GIANTS' SHOULDERS: Journalist Jyoti Punwani for her @article14 piece 'The Young Woman Who Would Not Cry'.
@suraj.yengde for an interview of his that I quote from. A description of Begumpura by Gail Omdvedt.

Ambedkar Texts referred to: Ranade, Jinnah & Gandhi, Castes in India, Buddha & Karl Marx, & audio pulled from his speech on 20 June 1957, in Katmandu, Nepal for the 4th World  Conference of Buddhism (which is also where I got the title of this Conclusion from.

Music + Anthems:
Smash the new Peshwai - Kabir Kala Manch
Bhimacha Killa - Yewle Brothers

CREDITS
Experts: Nikita Sonavane & Snjana Meshram
I made the episode art; big up to the Commons
Opening theme & additional score: @jidee 

Carceral Casteism has two parts and 2 choose-your-own-adventure Endings that will release staggered over the next few weeks. This project is meant for Learning & Feeling but not for ease or comfort.

Part 2 is about invisibilisation, isolation & Social Order. It’s about how the spectres of the State play out in our classrooms, our nice residential colonies/neighbourhoods, our intimate relationships & our minds. Social Order creates criminals from the underclass & ensures a supply of surplus population to extract labour & resources from.  There's no rational reason why savarnas should ever want to abolish it.
 
Part 2 is a Harrowing.
Part 1 was about fear & why we feel it.
But Part 2 is about facing up to it. 

Indian Christians often grow up rootless, invisible in our whole identity to the larger system, occluded even to ourselves. We need to face up to caste, what it means to be a minority under attack, & what it means that half of our population is Dalit. Showing us how, is Rev Dr John Boopalan, drawing from his family's stories, his theological education, his fantastic paper Doing Constructive Theology with B. R. Ambedkar, & his irreverently joyful sense of humour.
As he says, some Christians are so heavenly-minded that they are of no earthly use.

When it comes to power relations & material conditions, you can't just pray, leave it up to God & peace out. You can't optimise, rationalise, or reform your way out either. Depoliticization may make the world seem safe, ordered, & under control. But that's not reality.
Religion does soften life’s hard edges. It provides a framework for relating to others, guidance through difficult situations, a sense of community & purpose.
But that's not faith.

India has this whole PR rep as the birthplace of so many religions, but why did so many of these traditions form, catch fire, & sustain HERE?
We know the stats, the facts, & our Fundamental Right to Profess, Practice & Propagate (subject to terms & conditions ofc) - we learn them in school. But it was reading Gail Omdevet's Seeking Begumpura showed me how to See the thread of liberation throughout the subcontinent's history.

Seeking moral clarity, abolishing prison, annihilating caste  - we have a lot to learn but no one person has All the Answers. But, when we make meaning of our own identities (like Nikita did), when we assert ourselves wholly (like Rev John does), when we shift the gaze that violates us (which Sanjana says is crucial to do) - we're arming ourselves & creating new paths. 

Their mad monk is making a killing field. 
The Ganga was swollen w bodies last summer. 
Our government refused to count our dead. 
If no one lost their lives from oxygen deprivation, who are all these ghosts around me? All the zoom funerals I attended, all the names my mother wrote down, all the grief we carry. 

There can be no answer for this. 

There's only us & what we choose to do. 

CREDITS
Experts: Nikita Sonavane & Sanjana Meshram & Rev. Dr John Boopalan
I made the episode art; big up to the Commons
Opening theme & additional score: @jide_oj_
Production: @cartel.contra & @sansfuccs

"...MADE GLORIOUS SUMMER..."
- Shakespeare, Richard III

1 "...FROM WHENCE COMETH MY HELP. MY HELP COMES FROM THE LORD, WHICH MADE HEAVEN & EARTH" 1-2

- Psalm 121: A song of ascents//

yah, it's been a while. Still, I'm happy 2 say that this SERIES (yeah u, read that right!) is worth the wait.
Carceral Casteism has two parts and 2 choose-your-own-adventure Endings that will release staggered over the next few weeks. This project is meant for Learning & Feeling but not for ease or comfort.
Because while people share BK16 infographics & write poems about Umar Khalid, there isn't a constructive public discussion about crime, punishment or policing in  India.

Part 1 is about politicking, Prison Acts, and political prisoners; we explore legislation and the ideals of Law & Justice. Guiding us through these frameworks are Advocates Nikita Sonavane and Sanjana Meshram from the phenomenal Criminal Justice & Police Accountability Project.
The CPA Project team are quite literally creating new vocabularies of justice through their work in building (researching, advocating, teaching, writing) accountability against the criminalisation of Vimukta communities in Bhopal, M.P.
If you read none of the links in my bio for this ep, that's fine as long as you read their paper Settled Habits, New Tricks: Casteist Policing Meets Big Tech in India.
Nikita and Sanjana are so incredibly creative, razor-sharp in their analysis and also extremely eloquent to boot; during my interview with them, I felt intellectually and morally challenged, and I'm looking forward to sharing their insights with you all over the next couple of weeks.

This episode is also about cops, who I hate. They are the heavy boots of the State; they serve greed & protect property; they're nothing but the Home Minister's private army. To me, and most of us, the police mean Fear, Rage, and blood on the streets. We can all agree that impunity and deep-rooted socially-accepted corruption are why our mechanisms work the way they do (and why they mostly don't).

That still isn't the WHY - because, for that, you need to take a moral stance and a material one based on more than GK facts. Everything related to the police is actually related to ideas of safety, stability, status quo preservation, weaponised fear of the Other etc so Facts are useless without changing the context. Not to mention the oversaturation of horrid masculinist Copganda. . Caste society is filthy. It gets worse the higher up you get in socioeconomic class. 

It's like the smog in Delhi. It's always there; it gets exponentially worse after Diwali; it's a self-aware inside joke. But it is actively killing us. We are losing literal years of our time, our lives. To quote journalist Vaibhav Vat, "we are seeing the simultaneous asphyxiation of both the lungs of Indian citizens & democratic institutions & process of the republic".

Are we seeing though? Both smog and caste are so hazy & hard to see clearly through. That's why I look to Ambedkar's speeches, my mother's common sense & abolitionist advice, the Black feminist thinkers who tenaciously paved such wide roads for us all, & who opened up the heavens.

CREDITS
Expert: Nikita Sonavane & Sanjana Meshram
The phenomenal episode art is by @kunal.png
Opening theme & additional score: @jide_oj_
Production: @cartel.contra & @sansfuccs

We're back from break!!!
Welcome to Part II of Dalit Feminist Futures - I'm so glad you're here!

While there may not be a guest expert featured in this edition, it is laden with the learnings, teachings, ideas, voices, art and rich imaginations of so so many experts.

Structurally, this episode is MY top-ten hits from scholar Gowri Vijayakumar's commentary and positioning of Italian feminist scholar Leopoldina Fortunanti's text The Arcane of Reproduction. Vijayakumar's essay “There Was An Uproar”: Reading The Arcane of Reproduction Through Sex Work in India"  is a bright, brilliant reading that eviscerates bad arguments and poor faith analogies usually employed in the mainstream conversation surrounding sex workers.
I highly encourage everyone to read it for themselves, but meanwhile, I've done my best to frame it in the immediate context of everything going on WHILE I was writing the episode - namely, the repeal of the Farm Bills, all the science fiction I was reading throughout the summer and the conversations I was having with my friends.
Speaking of friends, I'd also like to thank Priyanka Paul for letting me read out their truly eviscerating poem, and for being my friend in the first place!
And speaking of eviscerating, one of the people who doesn't come out of Vijayakumar's essay looking completely alright is Ambedkar himself. The reason I've not buried this aspect of it is that I think having a measured but still principled attitude towards our heroes' flaws and mistakes is central to the body of anti-carceral personal ethics I'm trying to build and work on.

Leopoldina Fortunati, Thenmozhi Soundarajan, Edward Said, Nodeep Kaur, Audre Lorde, Priyanka Paul, Frantz Fanon, Osheen Siva, Silvia Federici, Vijeta Kumar, Edward Liger Smith, Asha Kowtal, Mimi Mondal - HOLDING UP THE SKY is a curation of some of my biggest inspirations and teachers. Arranged and interwoven in a way that gives listeners a 53-minute-long look at the inside of my head, complete with a soundtrack and oversaturated graphics.

This episode is my love letter to labour, materiality, the old (but still resonant) political ideologies that gave me centre and grip, the feminism I learnt at my mother's knee (my lever) and of course, to Ambedkar. He gave me a place to stand.  

CREDITS
The not bad (if I do say so myself) episode art is a series of collages that I made from open-source images from pixabay.com.
Opening theme: @jide_oj_
Production: @cartel.contra & @sansfuccs

Audio from live performances by:
Audre Lorde reading out her Uses of the Erotic
Kadubai Kharat performing Sonyane Bharli Oti

Thanks so much to the amazing artists from Lemonstand Boys for letting me use their phenomenal song 'RAKSHEESH'!

Admin note: The audio of this ep is a little funky in some places (&, yes, we’re working on it) so consider yourselves warned!  

Ok, y’all know it’s been a while. In my defence, I’ve been working on a massive two-parter on Dalit Feminism & this is the first half! 

In this edition, I talk to researcher, professor and writer Vijeta Kumar, who is just as delightful and wise as her wonderful essays & writing. Her blog Rum Lola Rum & her column for @thirdeyesocial reveal a passionate, principled & extremely talented artist that you all should read! We talk about art, about process and purpose and what it means to be an artist in these times and in this life. Because, after all, what is liberation work but the construction of new worlds, new ways of being & connection with one another?

While Vijeta’s name is the one that appears on the episode ft., throughout this 50+ min exploration of Dalit Feminism, we’re gonna hear from a multitude of Bahujan women and non-binary people - Riya Singh, Thenmozhi Soundarajan,  Sanghapali Aruna Lohitakshi, Seema Hari, Dr Roja Singh, Dr Shailaja Paik and my own sister! This really is the heart of Dalit Feminism, a multitude, diverse in thought & background, but all tilting towards collective liberation.

We also talk about the limitations and dangers of feminism of the 1% or liberal (white) feminism which at home is called savarna or sari-bindi feminism. I come from 2 Indias, you see, one full of monstrous fools & the other stocked full of cowardly hypocrites. But I digress.

I also shamelessly took the opportunity to fanboy about my recent literary obsession - Ursula Le Guin’s extraordinary writing, and casting her works in conversation with political theory has been absolutely enlightening. It has brought my own life so alive to me.  

The Ambedkar text that I refer to is his The Untouchables: Who They Were & How They Became Untouchables. It’s a lucid systematic text that is ostensibly a historical exploration but in reality defies the boundaries of academic discipline and genre. Rather like Ambedkar himself. 

Ultimately, Dalit Feminism is an essential lens that we all can and must use. It echoes and re-creates Ambedkar’s own politics of futurity, but you have to know where you’ve been to know where you’re going. 

CREDITS
Expert: Vijeta Kumar
The phenomenal episode art is by my frightfully talented sister @walnutgirl03
Opening theme: @jide_oj_
Production: @cartel.contra & @sansfuccs
I pulled the Shailaja Paik lecture from a talk organised by the University of Pennsylvania's Centre of Advanced Study of India 

“DOES THE WALKER CHOOSE THE PATH, OR THE PATH THE WALKER?”
- Sabriel, Garth Nix