Harmony Siganporia | Mudra Institute of Communication, Ahmedabad (original) (raw)
Papers by Harmony Siganporia
Oxford University Press eBooks, May 25, 2022
Questions of Culture in Autoethnography, 2018
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Introduction to The Performative Power of Cultural Products in the Making of Gender, Sexualities,... more Introduction to The Performative Power of Cultural Products in the Making of Gender, Sexualities, and Transnational Communities Normative notions of gender and sexuality, and the way they are contested, (re)-constructed, interpreted and articulated in practice, have been studied within the Humanities and Social sciences at both macro and micro level. Studies of social movements, resistance, organising and community building have been essential in regard to the expansion of this diverse field of knowledge. When scholars have explored communities that emerge as norms of gender and sexuality cross national borders and impact upon transnational spaces, they have often focused on human subjects, organisations, political groups, etcetera (Yuval Davies 2011). However, if we are interested in understanding the complex and dynamic processes behind the formations of communities of belonging in a transnational and digitalised world, we also need new starting points and innovative methodological tools. This special issue of Culture Unbound sets out to explore the function of cultural products in the negotiation and consolidation of transnational communities of belonging, gathering articles that are theoretically and methodologically based on an understanding of cultural products as performative, as boundary objects, floating signifiers, and as actants. The articles follow cultural products like the rainbow flag, the veil, manga, and elongated labia across local and transnational borders and contexts, paying attention to what such a methodological move can tell us about communities of belonging. The authors featured in this special issue acknowledge that cultural products can be used as tools for marketisation and neoliberalism, for religious and secularist purposes, as well as for political strategies, struggles and policies. Through following cultural products transnationally, the authors move in unpredictable directions, uncovering new perspectives and narratives. Cultural products come into being in complex entanglements with other materialities and discourses such as technologies, artefacts, subjects, norms, desires
The historical materialist cannot do without the concept of a present which is not a transition, ... more The historical materialist cannot do without the concept of a present which is not a transition, in which time originates and has come to a standstill. For this concept defines precisely the present in which he writes history for his person. Historicism depicts the 'eternal' picture of the past; the historical materialist, an experience with it, which stands alone. He leaves it to others to give themselves to the whore called 'Once upon a time' in the bordello of historicism. He remains master of his powers: man enough, to explode the continuum of history. (Walter Benjamin, quoted in Virno 2015: 3) The 20 th and 21 st Centuries have borne witness to several waves of movement across the globe, both within and across borders, owing either to a sometimes violent redrawing of them, or because of transnational flows which may or may not be read as a fall-out of what is known in short-hand as globalization. With these changes, we have seen notions of statehood and nati...
All Equally Real: Femininities and Masculinities Today
The International Journal of Religion and Spirituality in Society
Of the many cultural artefacts which lay claim to representing the cultures they emanate from, mu... more Of the many cultural artefacts which lay claim to representing the cultures they emanate from, music—especially within the Tibetan context—does it with great effect, because it straddles the realms of the sacred and secular with ease, and becomes a site where identity comes to be negotiated within the exile community. Building on this premise, this paper seeks to critically investigate an "incident" which has been reconstructed from the pages of the monthly journal 'Tibetan Review' for the months of May to October, 1982. It pertains to a particular performance which took place in the TIPA (Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts) auditorium that year when a 'local' Dharamsala rock band, comprising long-term British, Canadian and German residents, called the Vajra Hammer was invited to play a concert to commemorate the end of a six-month 'Enlightened Experience Celebration' organised by the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition, which sought to promote Buddhist teachings in the West. The concert, which saw the band performing to a packed crowd of Westerners and Tibetans " jumping up and down half the night, " was also attended by some of the monk initiates who had just completed this course alongside the many lay people in it. All was going to plan until, as columnist Tsering Wangyal puts it, " Tibetans looked in disbelief as a number of Western monks and nuns disrobed backstage, changed into T-shirts and jeans, and got on the dance floor with wild abandon " (Wangyal 1982, 11). News of this event spread across Dharamsala quickly, and the incident incited much excited comment in the Tibetan community, including criticism levelled against TIPA itself, for permitting such a " scandalous spectacle " to occur on campus. This article seeks to investigate the tensions of navigating the realms of sacred and secular practice –heightened by the fact of exile –which emerge from a close reading of this incident, and the heated debates it gave rise to within the exile and expat communities in Dharamsala.
Global South Ethnographies, 2016
A man was found in Kollegaal refugee camp in Karnataka’s Mysore district. He wore a Chuba, and wa... more A man was found in Kollegaal refugee camp in Karnataka’s Mysore district. He wore a Chuba, and was clearly drunk. He was unkempt and would occasionally “expose” his genitals, letting himself hang loose. People were revolted by him. He lived with, among, and like the stray dogs: children would call him names and throw stones at him. Sometimes though, he would come to be surrounded by people.
Culture Unbound: Journal of Current Cultural Research, 2016
The historical materialist cannot do without the concept of a present which is not a transition, ... more The historical materialist cannot do without the concept of a present which is not a transition, in which time originates and has come to a standstill. For this concept defines precisely the present in which he writes history for his person. Historicism depicts the 'eternal' picture of the past; the historical materialist, an experience with it, which stands alone. He leaves it to others to give themselves to the whore called 'Once upon a time' in the bordello of historicism. He remains master of his powers: man enough, to explode the continuum of history. (Walter Benjamin, quoted in Virno 2015: 3)
Journal of Creative Communications, 2014
Sunetra Sen Narayan, Globalization and Television—A Study of the Indian Experience 1990–2010. New... more Sunetra Sen Narayan, Globalization and Television—A Study of the Indian Experience 1990–2010. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. 2014, 328 pages, ₹ 945.
Oxford University Press eBooks, May 25, 2022
Questions of Culture in Autoethnography, 2018
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Oxford University PressOxford eBooks, May 25, 2022
Introduction to The Performative Power of Cultural Products in the Making of Gender, Sexualities,... more Introduction to The Performative Power of Cultural Products in the Making of Gender, Sexualities, and Transnational Communities Normative notions of gender and sexuality, and the way they are contested, (re)-constructed, interpreted and articulated in practice, have been studied within the Humanities and Social sciences at both macro and micro level. Studies of social movements, resistance, organising and community building have been essential in regard to the expansion of this diverse field of knowledge. When scholars have explored communities that emerge as norms of gender and sexuality cross national borders and impact upon transnational spaces, they have often focused on human subjects, organisations, political groups, etcetera (Yuval Davies 2011). However, if we are interested in understanding the complex and dynamic processes behind the formations of communities of belonging in a transnational and digitalised world, we also need new starting points and innovative methodological tools. This special issue of Culture Unbound sets out to explore the function of cultural products in the negotiation and consolidation of transnational communities of belonging, gathering articles that are theoretically and methodologically based on an understanding of cultural products as performative, as boundary objects, floating signifiers, and as actants. The articles follow cultural products like the rainbow flag, the veil, manga, and elongated labia across local and transnational borders and contexts, paying attention to what such a methodological move can tell us about communities of belonging. The authors featured in this special issue acknowledge that cultural products can be used as tools for marketisation and neoliberalism, for religious and secularist purposes, as well as for political strategies, struggles and policies. Through following cultural products transnationally, the authors move in unpredictable directions, uncovering new perspectives and narratives. Cultural products come into being in complex entanglements with other materialities and discourses such as technologies, artefacts, subjects, norms, desires
The historical materialist cannot do without the concept of a present which is not a transition, ... more The historical materialist cannot do without the concept of a present which is not a transition, in which time originates and has come to a standstill. For this concept defines precisely the present in which he writes history for his person. Historicism depicts the 'eternal' picture of the past; the historical materialist, an experience with it, which stands alone. He leaves it to others to give themselves to the whore called 'Once upon a time' in the bordello of historicism. He remains master of his powers: man enough, to explode the continuum of history. (Walter Benjamin, quoted in Virno 2015: 3) The 20 th and 21 st Centuries have borne witness to several waves of movement across the globe, both within and across borders, owing either to a sometimes violent redrawing of them, or because of transnational flows which may or may not be read as a fall-out of what is known in short-hand as globalization. With these changes, we have seen notions of statehood and nati...
All Equally Real: Femininities and Masculinities Today
The International Journal of Religion and Spirituality in Society
Of the many cultural artefacts which lay claim to representing the cultures they emanate from, mu... more Of the many cultural artefacts which lay claim to representing the cultures they emanate from, music—especially within the Tibetan context—does it with great effect, because it straddles the realms of the sacred and secular with ease, and becomes a site where identity comes to be negotiated within the exile community. Building on this premise, this paper seeks to critically investigate an "incident" which has been reconstructed from the pages of the monthly journal 'Tibetan Review' for the months of May to October, 1982. It pertains to a particular performance which took place in the TIPA (Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts) auditorium that year when a 'local' Dharamsala rock band, comprising long-term British, Canadian and German residents, called the Vajra Hammer was invited to play a concert to commemorate the end of a six-month 'Enlightened Experience Celebration' organised by the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition, which sought to promote Buddhist teachings in the West. The concert, which saw the band performing to a packed crowd of Westerners and Tibetans " jumping up and down half the night, " was also attended by some of the monk initiates who had just completed this course alongside the many lay people in it. All was going to plan until, as columnist Tsering Wangyal puts it, " Tibetans looked in disbelief as a number of Western monks and nuns disrobed backstage, changed into T-shirts and jeans, and got on the dance floor with wild abandon " (Wangyal 1982, 11). News of this event spread across Dharamsala quickly, and the incident incited much excited comment in the Tibetan community, including criticism levelled against TIPA itself, for permitting such a " scandalous spectacle " to occur on campus. This article seeks to investigate the tensions of navigating the realms of sacred and secular practice –heightened by the fact of exile –which emerge from a close reading of this incident, and the heated debates it gave rise to within the exile and expat communities in Dharamsala.
Global South Ethnographies, 2016
A man was found in Kollegaal refugee camp in Karnataka’s Mysore district. He wore a Chuba, and wa... more A man was found in Kollegaal refugee camp in Karnataka’s Mysore district. He wore a Chuba, and was clearly drunk. He was unkempt and would occasionally “expose” his genitals, letting himself hang loose. People were revolted by him. He lived with, among, and like the stray dogs: children would call him names and throw stones at him. Sometimes though, he would come to be surrounded by people.
Culture Unbound: Journal of Current Cultural Research, 2016
The historical materialist cannot do without the concept of a present which is not a transition, ... more The historical materialist cannot do without the concept of a present which is not a transition, in which time originates and has come to a standstill. For this concept defines precisely the present in which he writes history for his person. Historicism depicts the 'eternal' picture of the past; the historical materialist, an experience with it, which stands alone. He leaves it to others to give themselves to the whore called 'Once upon a time' in the bordello of historicism. He remains master of his powers: man enough, to explode the continuum of history. (Walter Benjamin, quoted in Virno 2015: 3)
Journal of Creative Communications, 2014
Sunetra Sen Narayan, Globalization and Television—A Study of the Indian Experience 1990–2010. New... more Sunetra Sen Narayan, Globalization and Television—A Study of the Indian Experience 1990–2010. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. 2014, 328 pages, ₹ 945.
This Season of Discontent: Understanding Student Movements in Neoliberal Times "There's a riot g... more This Season of Discontent: Understanding Student Movements in Neoliberal Times
"There's a riot going on": this is the title of Peter Doggett's exploration of the heady counter-culture movement which swept across large swathes of the world in and around the 1960s. Decades later, this phrase has acquired a new resonance; an almost prophetic quality, when it is used to describe what we have been witnessing across University campuses in South Africa, India, and a number of other countries since 2015. Increasing clamp downs on institutions of higher learning (ranging from state-run to private as well as rights-based organisations), and the unease manifest in the ways in which students have responded to what is now commonly identified as the commercialisation of higher education-the University embracing its role as arbiter and perpetuator of the neoliberal creed-are interrelated phenomena, and need to be understood in terms of what they mean for youth and student politics, as well as what these movements have done to disrupt the systematic inequities and violence/s configured into the workings of the institutions which house them.
This Thematic Issue aims to bring together contributions from countries currently in the throes of student movements world over; from Brazil to South Africa and India, in a bid to set these movements in conversation. Ever aware that these divisions between 'local' and 'global' are increasingly blurred, this issue aims to center narratives from the Global South in order to think through the myriad transnational movements articulating themselves in acutely different ways, in increasingly neoliberal modes, in various post-colonial contexts, together. It also seeks to complement our understanding of the nexus between the commoditisation of higher education and projects of nationalism.
In sum, this Section is an attempt to engage with the larger question of how we may, as scholars, educators and ethnographers, engage with and elucidate these student movements.
Culture Unbound: Journal of Current Cultural Research
Call for papers for special Thematic section (issue) of the journal Culture Unbound: 'Rupture & E... more Call for papers for special Thematic section (issue) of the journal Culture Unbound: 'Rupture & Exile: Permanent Liminality in Spaces for Movement & Abandonment'.
Submission deadline: September 15, 2015