Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies
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SOAS Students Forum on Faiz Ahmed Faiz
Get PDFThis collection of thoughts from current students at SOAS attempts to go beyond academic debates surrounding Faiz through a subjective view of the impact he has had on their own views on the world. By exploring and presenting their own relationship with Faiz, these diverse authors raise questions about the multitude of meaning Faiz carries for young scholars of today
Politics and Pirs: The nature of Sufi Political Engagement in 20th and 21st Century Pakistan
Get PDFAlthough Sufism has exerted a powerful influence upon Islam in Pakistan, and with a majority of Pakistani Muslims identified as Barelvi, this Sufi-influenced religious identity has not served as a strong foundation for overt political action. However, somewhat dichotomously, Pakistani Sufism is deeply connected to the local and regional political hierarchies. This paper investigates the complex relationship between Sufi influences and political engagement within 20th and 21st century Pakistan. While local religious authorities have found themselves greatly enriched, politically and materially, by such traditions, Sufism has lent itself to a quietist political approach, manifested in a variety of locations, from the Tablighi Jama’at to Barelvi shrines. However, Barelvi Muslims have shown increasing civic organization and activism within the past two decades, in response to intensifying extremist pressure
War Game: A Panoptical Narrative of Terror
Get PDF In modern thought, (if not in fact) Nothing is that doesn’t act, So that is reckoned wisdom which Describes the scratch but not the itch. [1]  And hence is born a new form of war narrative namely war games_ a genre that heightens the action but not the motif, refutes historically of an event and politicizes the general consciousness, triggers hatred for the ‘other’ where this ‘other’ is a complete stranger for the player’s consciousness and finally a medium that not just challenges one’s sense of reality but also replaces it with desired panoptical tautology. This research article focuses on the complexity of war video games and studies them as a new and subtle visual medium of war narrative. It also proposes that a medium that infiltrates the most potent group of society (youth), that palters the sense of reality, that defines war in new terms needs much more critical scrutiny than it presently receives. For this purpose, three of the most famous and latest war games (Delta Force, Call of Duty, Medal of Honor) are analysed in pithy detail. Where most of the criticism on video games is based on their form or structure, this article attempts at exposing the significance and complex inter-relatedness of content and form. It is strongly implied here that the medium of video games cannot be thoroughly understood unless their criticism involves an objective analysis of the content and form. i. Marshall Mcluhan, Understanding Media: The Extension of Man (London: Routledge, 2001) 10
Sanctions as a Tool in US Foreign Policy: A Case Study of Pakistan (1990-2001)
No full textPak-US relations from the beginning have been developed between close friendship and serious friction-reflecting the change of international and regional politics. This nature of relationship can easily be observed with respect of US policy of sanctions against Pakistan, during the period of 1990-2001.
During Afghan War Pakistan as front line state, played a key role as an ally in US policy of containment of USSR. But after the dismemberment of USSR, and with the change of US interests in the region, US imposed sanctions against Pakistan
This study will evaluate the role of US sanctions in the course of relations between the two countries. US sanctions against Pakistan will be analyzed in the light of sanctions as a foreign policy tool and final result in achieving its policy objectives in Pakistan mainly nonproliferation.
The study will also give an understanding about the nature of relationship between a superpower having its global interests and a small state with only regional interests. The study will highlight change in US priorities with change in international situation and change in US policy towards Pakistan; and its domestic and international impact. This study will also explore whether the path of sanctions brings fruitful results or it hinders development of the target country
Abul Hashim: The Unsung Hero of the Freedom Struggle
No full textAbul Hashim was one of the greatest leading figures in the history of Bengal’s freedom struggle. Born in a time when the British Raj in India had begun to convulse under its own weight, Hashim’s political philosophy, though shaped by larger Muslim sentiments, was also marked by his independent thinking and sense of justice. He was no demagogue trying to rouse the emotions of his people by crying socialism,in fact, he took drastic measures to revamp the Bengal Muslim League and made it a party of the people. Very few leaders of the 20th century had the twin traits of loyalty of purpose and exceptional abilities to turn their goals into reality. Some succeeded, some perished in the struggle but it’s the struggle which makes man a hero.Abul Hashim’s life is also a tale of that struggle, first against the imperialist power then against the elite feudal industrialist coterie of politicians who dominated the Muslim League. This paper will try to prove that Abul Hashim was one of the most charismatic leaders of Bengal freedom struggle who not only revitalized the League by setting it free from elitist monopoly and opening its doors for the poor but also refused to toe the line of Central leadership over the provincial autonomy of Bengal
The Role of the Pakistani Mass Media in the Lawyers’ Resistance against the Musharraf Dictatorship, 2007-2009
Get PDFIn the present context, when the civil movements have shaken the Arab world with successes in Libya and Egypt, it is appropriate to look back at the triumphant lawyers’ movement against dictatorship in Pakistan. Pakistan has a long history of coup d'état by army generals who until now have ruled the country for more than three decades in three different rules. The lawyers’ struggle became a catalyst for one of the most memorable and incredible social movements in Pakistan’s history. There have been studies on various aspects of this movement, especially the lawyers’ leadership and organization, but not on the role of the mass media and its impact of this particular civil struggle. This paper analyses some aspects of the Pakistani mass media that contributed to sustaining the lawyers’ resistance against General Pervez Musharraf’s authoritarian rule. This paper focuses on the role of TV channels and internet in the civil resistance led by the lawyers during the period of 2007 and 2009
“Unwilled Choicesâ€: The Exilic Perspectives on Home and Location in the Works of Zulfikar Ghose and Mohsin Hamid
No full textFor many immigrants, geographical dislocations and cultural shocks often entail traumatic experiences. This is one of the many paradoxes of the contemporary world that, on the one hand, people live in an increasingly borderless world where cultural, economic and political frontiers are eroding due to global communications system and post-industrial technologies; and, on the other hand, since September-11, the world has been experiencing a new wave of xenophobia in public, and megalomania among many world leaders and politicians, resulting into the closing of borders and an irrational fear of the ‘other’ or the new “barbariansâ€. Until September-11 happened, American cultural production seemed to achieve what Ralph Waldo Emerson prophesied about in 1845: “In this continent – asylum of all nations – we will construct a new race, a new religion, a new state, a new literature which will be as vigorous as the new Europe which came out of the Dark Agesâ€. September-11 caused a sort of abortion of history – history moving in a linear, progressive fashion was disrupted with a jolt of epic proportions, creating hiatus in the Emersonian dream. In order to negotiate this disruption in the experience of the South Asian-American immigrants and investigate the issues of identity, exile, Home, and cross-culturality, in this study I have selected two writers of Pakistani origin: Zulfikar Ghose, with his rich experience of multiple exiles, is the prototype writer in exile; and Mohsin Hamid, an emerging voice in the post-September11 scenario. In his novel, The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2007), Hamid encapsulates the dilemma of American Muslims since that fateful day. By discussing the work of two writers who, despite being contemporaries, represent two different perspectives on ‘home’ and exile (September-11 being the cut-off point), I try here to establish the difference between the pre- and post-September 11 exilic perspectives by analyzing Ghose’s protagonist in Tripple Mirror of the Self, representing exile in the classical sense of the word, and that of Hamid as a divided, liminal figure trying to exist on the threshold of cultures and rediscovering his cultural roots in the wake of September 11 events