Swatee Sinha | IIT Kharagpur (original) (raw)
Papers by Swatee Sinha
Somatechnics, Aug 1, 2022
The accelerated use of technical prostheses as assistive devices has resulted in an externalisati... more The accelerated use of technical prostheses as assistive devices has resulted in an externalisation of the site of cognition outside the sensory-motor neural apparatus. This has in turn problematised the notion of embodied cognition and corporeal integrity. Bernard Stiegler in For a New Critique of Political Economy (2010a) states that human beings not only evolve and mature genetically but 'extragenetically' and 'epiphylogenetically', that is through artificial prostheses or means which are not organic. The 'exosomatization' (Stiegler 2019) of the cognitive processes of memory and desire through tools, language, artifacts and technical memory banks has resulted in the formation of hybrid milieus of cognition arising out of an enjambment of soma, that is the body with its neural circuits, and external technics or prostheses that are designed to augment neural receptivity through an amplification of sensory-motor experiences. If the act of memory entails a recapitulation and retention of the past, desire as protention involves a transmission of this past into the future. Such anticipations of the future are increasingly mediated through analogue and digital modes of transmission resulting in the emergence of trans-corporeal sites of cognition. As we adapt to the grammar of analogue broadcasting and navigate through grammes of computational data, we experience a heightened discretisation or fragmentation of the organic plane of consciousness into bits of information. This accelerated discretisation of our cognitive abilities results in a breakdown of the accretive nuances of memory and desire as embodied/somatic processes. Through a close reading of Salman Rushdie's novels Quichotte (2019) and Fury (2001), this article explores synaptic connections between the human and the non-human as parts of multi-componential apparatuses of memory and desire. It puts forward the thesis that the welding together of
In dire straits: COVID-19 and the politics of the border, 2020
This essay dwells on the notion of invisible borders and suggests that segregation as a practice ... more This essay dwells on the notion of invisible borders and suggests that segregation as a practice is infused within the urban infrastructure. Taking as its focal point the predicament of migrant labourers employed in the informal sector of the economy against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, it unravels a politics of the border which has always informed state policies. Migrants are often treated as parasites and as a social menace who flock to the cities and clog its civic space. While they are a much needed anomaly, bolstering the material infrastructure of the neoliberal economy by providing semi-skilled and skilled labour, they also pose a threat to its resilience. Redundant man power in the form of unemployed labour may bog down the economic momentum. Excess man power needs to be expelled to retain systemic efficiency. With the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, this miscellaneous crowd of undernourished and underpaid workers with their compromised immune systems suddenly transformed into a hot bed of viral escalation. In the absence of a clear cut logistics that could ensure food, shelter and social security for the unemployed labourers during the period of lockdown, the administration could only subject them to more rigorous drills as part of its sanitisation drive. The essay brings to the fore the voice of migrant workers mostly from the northern part of India who have emigrated to the ‘tech hubs’ of India in search of a livelihood and through their narration brings out their precarious positioning within the metropolitan civic space which treats them as a necessary menace. It is based on telephonic interviews with 25 displaced migrants in Bangalore, Delhi, Hyderabad, Telangana hailing from districts in UP and Bihar conducted between 24-29 April 2020.
Somatechnics, 2022
The accelerated use of technical prostheses as assistive devices has resulted in an externalisati... more The accelerated use of technical prostheses as assistive devices has resulted in an externalisation of the site of cognition outside the sensory-motor neural apparatus. This has in turn problematised the notion of embodied cognition and corporeal integrity. Bernard Stiegler in For a New Critique of Political Economy (2010a) states that human beings not only evolve and mature genetically but 'extragenetically' and 'epiphylogenetically', that is through artificial prostheses or means which are not organic. The 'exosomatization' (Stiegler 2019) of the cognitive processes of memory and desire through tools, language, artifacts and technical memory banks has resulted in the formation of hybrid milieus of cognition arising out of an enjambment of soma, that is the body with its neural circuits, and external technics or prostheses that are designed to augment neural receptivity through an amplification of sensory-motor experiences. If the act of memory entails a recapitulation and retention of the past, desire as protention involves a transmission of this past into the future. Such anticipations of the future are increasingly mediated through analogue and digital modes of transmission resulting in the emergence of trans-corporeal sites of cognition. As we adapt to the grammar of analogue broadcasting and navigate through grammes of computational data, we experience a heightened discretisation or fragmentation of the organic plane of consciousness into bits of information. This accelerated discretisation of our cognitive abilities results in a breakdown of the accretive nuances of memory and desire as embodied/somatic processes. Through a close reading of Salman Rushdie's novels Quichotte (2019) and Fury (2001), this article explores synaptic connections between the human and the non-human as parts of multi-componential apparatuses of memory and desire. It puts forward the thesis that the welding together of
Glocalism: Journal of Culture, Politics and Innovation, 2019
Nationalism as a theoretical category is a widely disputed and elusive concept. This is due to th... more Nationalism as a theoretical category is a widely disputed and elusive concept. This is due to the fact that the formulation of the nation-space across widely scattered geographies has now to take into account an altered dynamics of interaction and exchange. The relevance of literary language as an aesthetic register to corroborate the nation as "a powerful historical idea" and the need to formulate suitable analogies reveal the inadequacy of mapping the project through territorial credentials alone. The socio-cultural currency of the idea of the nation as a geographical continuum inserts itself into the pedagogical language of narration. The nation as an entity is not coterminous with its political cartography, in spite of the persistent efforts of all nationalist discourses to contain the narrative of the nation within an identifiable trajectory. To make a detour, to bypass and circumvent certain institutional codifications and create an audible register of displaced voi...
Glocalism: Journal of Culture, Politics and Innovation, 2020
The present essay through a close investigation of Salman Rushdie's The Ground Beneath Her Fe... more The present essay through a close investigation of Salman Rushdie's The Ground Beneath Her Feet (1999) and Fury (2002) looks into the challenges posed by global capitalism at the turn of the 21st century. The resilience of civilizations, in particular their cultural vocabulary and ethnic compositions, is explored in the face of the homogenizing drive of capitalist enterprise. The encounters between various ethnicities and cultures create liminal spaces of exchange where social innovation plays a critical role in shaping cross-cultural dialogues. Exchange takes place in terms of cultural values. Using the cultural dialectics of desire as a navigational compass the essay seeks to understand civilization(s) as a set of complex encounters. The multiplicity of civilizing processes at play on the global plane are scanned through the critical lens of "desire", which is given a psycho-social orientation. The endless possibilities of neural networking opened up by globalization...
Transcultural Humanities in South Asia, 2022
Educational Philosophy and Theory
This chapter, through a close reading of Nayeema Mahjoor’s novel, Lost in Terror, seeks to plot t... more This chapter, through a close reading of Nayeema Mahjoor’s novel, Lost in Terror, seeks to plot the entanglement of molar and molecular dimensions of power, the co-option of micro-regimes of desire in molar operations. The novel which engages with the fissures and traumatic rifts in the individual psyche lodged in a fractured political landscape wells up a host of affects which under the influence of ideological distortions ossifies into a congealed mass of violent sentiments. Under such circumstances, reengineering of the psyche in alignment with an inclusive social imaginary becomes integral in the liberation of the subjective consciousness from such inimical sentiments.
The present essay through a close investigation of Salman Rushdie's The Ground Beneath Her Feet (... more The present essay through a close investigation of Salman Rushdie's The Ground Beneath Her Feet (1999) and Fury (2002) looks into the challenges posed by global capitalism at the turn of the 21 st century. The resilience of civilizations, in particular their cultural vocabulary and ethnic compositions, is explored in the face of the homogenizing drive of capitalist enterprise. The encounters between various ethnicities and cultures create liminal spaces of exchange where social innovation plays a critical role in shaping cross-cultural dialogues. Exchange takes place in terms of cultural values. Using the cultural dialectics of desire as a navigational compass the essay seeks to understand civilization(s) as a set of complex encounters. The multiplicity of civilizing processes at play on the global plane are scanned through the critical lens of "desire", which is given a psycho-social orientation. The endless possibilities of neural networking opened up by globalization is born out of a legacy of conflict and interdependence. Two contrary trends emerge simultaneously; on the one hand there is an increasing tendency towards economic monopolization and Americanization and on the other hand there are decentralized and de-spatialized flows conducive to the growth of a hybrid cultural economy. Globalization at the turn of the century thus emerges as an economic and a cultural enterprise embracing plurality. The essay through the trope of desire explores the plural dynamics of globalization in the interaction, interdependence and contact between civilizations and cultures. It seeks to retrieve desire from the domain of market logistics and activate its ontological potential in terms of subjective empowerment and a critical aesthetics of change.
Nationalism as a theoretical category is a widely disputed and elusive concept. This is due to th... more Nationalism as a theoretical category is a widely disputed and elusive concept. This is due to the fact that the formulation of the nation-space across widely scattered geographies has now to take into account an altered dynamics of interaction and exchange. The relevance of literary language as an aesthetic register to corroborate the nation as "a powerful historical idea" and the need to formulate suitable analogies reveal the inadequacy of mapping the project through territorial credentials alone. The socio-cultural currency of the idea of the nation as a geographical continuum inserts itself into the pedagogical language of narration. The nation as an entity is not coterminous with its political cartography, in spite of the persistent efforts of all nationalist discourses to contain the narrative of the nation within an identifiable trajectory. To make a detour, to bypass and circumvent certain institutional codifications and create an audible register of displaced voices, is to interrupt the process of seamless narration and alter its constitutional chemistry. The nation as a barbed wire territory secured from the human contamination of the "other" -through paperwork, legal permits and manning of entry points -already hints at its fragile contours. The incongruent coupling of culture and polity, the increased involvement of armed forces along various corridors of cultural transaction, the enactment of geopolitics on a global scale, the susceptibility of culture to the tropes of power -all call into question the authenticity of the rhetoric of nationalism and its efficacy in healing differences and mending fractures. There is an increasing need to re-conceptualize the nation as a tentative space marked by an internal mobility of its constituents, where it is possible to articulate differences while dispensing with the abrasive rhetoric of fundamentalism. The nation thus becomes a fluid space of confluence and convergence, "a gestative political structure" gesturing towards a more inclusive space -perhaps exploring the possibilities that globalization has to offer in terms of pluralist cultural connotations.
Somatechnics, Aug 1, 2022
The accelerated use of technical prostheses as assistive devices has resulted in an externalisati... more The accelerated use of technical prostheses as assistive devices has resulted in an externalisation of the site of cognition outside the sensory-motor neural apparatus. This has in turn problematised the notion of embodied cognition and corporeal integrity. Bernard Stiegler in For a New Critique of Political Economy (2010a) states that human beings not only evolve and mature genetically but 'extragenetically' and 'epiphylogenetically', that is through artificial prostheses or means which are not organic. The 'exosomatization' (Stiegler 2019) of the cognitive processes of memory and desire through tools, language, artifacts and technical memory banks has resulted in the formation of hybrid milieus of cognition arising out of an enjambment of soma, that is the body with its neural circuits, and external technics or prostheses that are designed to augment neural receptivity through an amplification of sensory-motor experiences. If the act of memory entails a recapitulation and retention of the past, desire as protention involves a transmission of this past into the future. Such anticipations of the future are increasingly mediated through analogue and digital modes of transmission resulting in the emergence of trans-corporeal sites of cognition. As we adapt to the grammar of analogue broadcasting and navigate through grammes of computational data, we experience a heightened discretisation or fragmentation of the organic plane of consciousness into bits of information. This accelerated discretisation of our cognitive abilities results in a breakdown of the accretive nuances of memory and desire as embodied/somatic processes. Through a close reading of Salman Rushdie's novels Quichotte (2019) and Fury (2001), this article explores synaptic connections between the human and the non-human as parts of multi-componential apparatuses of memory and desire. It puts forward the thesis that the welding together of
In dire straits: COVID-19 and the politics of the border, 2020
This essay dwells on the notion of invisible borders and suggests that segregation as a practice ... more This essay dwells on the notion of invisible borders and suggests that segregation as a practice is infused within the urban infrastructure. Taking as its focal point the predicament of migrant labourers employed in the informal sector of the economy against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, it unravels a politics of the border which has always informed state policies. Migrants are often treated as parasites and as a social menace who flock to the cities and clog its civic space. While they are a much needed anomaly, bolstering the material infrastructure of the neoliberal economy by providing semi-skilled and skilled labour, they also pose a threat to its resilience. Redundant man power in the form of unemployed labour may bog down the economic momentum. Excess man power needs to be expelled to retain systemic efficiency. With the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, this miscellaneous crowd of undernourished and underpaid workers with their compromised immune systems suddenly transformed into a hot bed of viral escalation. In the absence of a clear cut logistics that could ensure food, shelter and social security for the unemployed labourers during the period of lockdown, the administration could only subject them to more rigorous drills as part of its sanitisation drive. The essay brings to the fore the voice of migrant workers mostly from the northern part of India who have emigrated to the ‘tech hubs’ of India in search of a livelihood and through their narration brings out their precarious positioning within the metropolitan civic space which treats them as a necessary menace. It is based on telephonic interviews with 25 displaced migrants in Bangalore, Delhi, Hyderabad, Telangana hailing from districts in UP and Bihar conducted between 24-29 April 2020.
Somatechnics, 2022
The accelerated use of technical prostheses as assistive devices has resulted in an externalisati... more The accelerated use of technical prostheses as assistive devices has resulted in an externalisation of the site of cognition outside the sensory-motor neural apparatus. This has in turn problematised the notion of embodied cognition and corporeal integrity. Bernard Stiegler in For a New Critique of Political Economy (2010a) states that human beings not only evolve and mature genetically but 'extragenetically' and 'epiphylogenetically', that is through artificial prostheses or means which are not organic. The 'exosomatization' (Stiegler 2019) of the cognitive processes of memory and desire through tools, language, artifacts and technical memory banks has resulted in the formation of hybrid milieus of cognition arising out of an enjambment of soma, that is the body with its neural circuits, and external technics or prostheses that are designed to augment neural receptivity through an amplification of sensory-motor experiences. If the act of memory entails a recapitulation and retention of the past, desire as protention involves a transmission of this past into the future. Such anticipations of the future are increasingly mediated through analogue and digital modes of transmission resulting in the emergence of trans-corporeal sites of cognition. As we adapt to the grammar of analogue broadcasting and navigate through grammes of computational data, we experience a heightened discretisation or fragmentation of the organic plane of consciousness into bits of information. This accelerated discretisation of our cognitive abilities results in a breakdown of the accretive nuances of memory and desire as embodied/somatic processes. Through a close reading of Salman Rushdie's novels Quichotte (2019) and Fury (2001), this article explores synaptic connections between the human and the non-human as parts of multi-componential apparatuses of memory and desire. It puts forward the thesis that the welding together of
Glocalism: Journal of Culture, Politics and Innovation, 2019
Nationalism as a theoretical category is a widely disputed and elusive concept. This is due to th... more Nationalism as a theoretical category is a widely disputed and elusive concept. This is due to the fact that the formulation of the nation-space across widely scattered geographies has now to take into account an altered dynamics of interaction and exchange. The relevance of literary language as an aesthetic register to corroborate the nation as "a powerful historical idea" and the need to formulate suitable analogies reveal the inadequacy of mapping the project through territorial credentials alone. The socio-cultural currency of the idea of the nation as a geographical continuum inserts itself into the pedagogical language of narration. The nation as an entity is not coterminous with its political cartography, in spite of the persistent efforts of all nationalist discourses to contain the narrative of the nation within an identifiable trajectory. To make a detour, to bypass and circumvent certain institutional codifications and create an audible register of displaced voi...
Glocalism: Journal of Culture, Politics and Innovation, 2020
The present essay through a close investigation of Salman Rushdie's The Ground Beneath Her Fe... more The present essay through a close investigation of Salman Rushdie's The Ground Beneath Her Feet (1999) and Fury (2002) looks into the challenges posed by global capitalism at the turn of the 21st century. The resilience of civilizations, in particular their cultural vocabulary and ethnic compositions, is explored in the face of the homogenizing drive of capitalist enterprise. The encounters between various ethnicities and cultures create liminal spaces of exchange where social innovation plays a critical role in shaping cross-cultural dialogues. Exchange takes place in terms of cultural values. Using the cultural dialectics of desire as a navigational compass the essay seeks to understand civilization(s) as a set of complex encounters. The multiplicity of civilizing processes at play on the global plane are scanned through the critical lens of "desire", which is given a psycho-social orientation. The endless possibilities of neural networking opened up by globalization...
Transcultural Humanities in South Asia, 2022
Educational Philosophy and Theory
This chapter, through a close reading of Nayeema Mahjoor’s novel, Lost in Terror, seeks to plot t... more This chapter, through a close reading of Nayeema Mahjoor’s novel, Lost in Terror, seeks to plot the entanglement of molar and molecular dimensions of power, the co-option of micro-regimes of desire in molar operations. The novel which engages with the fissures and traumatic rifts in the individual psyche lodged in a fractured political landscape wells up a host of affects which under the influence of ideological distortions ossifies into a congealed mass of violent sentiments. Under such circumstances, reengineering of the psyche in alignment with an inclusive social imaginary becomes integral in the liberation of the subjective consciousness from such inimical sentiments.
The present essay through a close investigation of Salman Rushdie's The Ground Beneath Her Feet (... more The present essay through a close investigation of Salman Rushdie's The Ground Beneath Her Feet (1999) and Fury (2002) looks into the challenges posed by global capitalism at the turn of the 21 st century. The resilience of civilizations, in particular their cultural vocabulary and ethnic compositions, is explored in the face of the homogenizing drive of capitalist enterprise. The encounters between various ethnicities and cultures create liminal spaces of exchange where social innovation plays a critical role in shaping cross-cultural dialogues. Exchange takes place in terms of cultural values. Using the cultural dialectics of desire as a navigational compass the essay seeks to understand civilization(s) as a set of complex encounters. The multiplicity of civilizing processes at play on the global plane are scanned through the critical lens of "desire", which is given a psycho-social orientation. The endless possibilities of neural networking opened up by globalization is born out of a legacy of conflict and interdependence. Two contrary trends emerge simultaneously; on the one hand there is an increasing tendency towards economic monopolization and Americanization and on the other hand there are decentralized and de-spatialized flows conducive to the growth of a hybrid cultural economy. Globalization at the turn of the century thus emerges as an economic and a cultural enterprise embracing plurality. The essay through the trope of desire explores the plural dynamics of globalization in the interaction, interdependence and contact between civilizations and cultures. It seeks to retrieve desire from the domain of market logistics and activate its ontological potential in terms of subjective empowerment and a critical aesthetics of change.
Nationalism as a theoretical category is a widely disputed and elusive concept. This is due to th... more Nationalism as a theoretical category is a widely disputed and elusive concept. This is due to the fact that the formulation of the nation-space across widely scattered geographies has now to take into account an altered dynamics of interaction and exchange. The relevance of literary language as an aesthetic register to corroborate the nation as "a powerful historical idea" and the need to formulate suitable analogies reveal the inadequacy of mapping the project through territorial credentials alone. The socio-cultural currency of the idea of the nation as a geographical continuum inserts itself into the pedagogical language of narration. The nation as an entity is not coterminous with its political cartography, in spite of the persistent efforts of all nationalist discourses to contain the narrative of the nation within an identifiable trajectory. To make a detour, to bypass and circumvent certain institutional codifications and create an audible register of displaced voices, is to interrupt the process of seamless narration and alter its constitutional chemistry. The nation as a barbed wire territory secured from the human contamination of the "other" -through paperwork, legal permits and manning of entry points -already hints at its fragile contours. The incongruent coupling of culture and polity, the increased involvement of armed forces along various corridors of cultural transaction, the enactment of geopolitics on a global scale, the susceptibility of culture to the tropes of power -all call into question the authenticity of the rhetoric of nationalism and its efficacy in healing differences and mending fractures. There is an increasing need to re-conceptualize the nation as a tentative space marked by an internal mobility of its constituents, where it is possible to articulate differences while dispensing with the abrasive rhetoric of fundamentalism. The nation thus becomes a fluid space of confluence and convergence, "a gestative political structure" gesturing towards a more inclusive space -perhaps exploring the possibilities that globalization has to offer in terms of pluralist cultural connotations.