523 research outputs found
Plurality, Identity, Democracy, Globalization... A conversation with Sunil Khilnani
No full textabstract
Rossella Ciocca interviews Sunil Khilnani author of the much appraised The Idea of India: one of the best non-fictional introductions to the complexities of politics in contemporary India. The strengths and weaknesses of present-day uneven modernity are discussed around a few strategic topics. First of all plurality, which in its linguistic, cultural, religious, ethnic variety has been vindicated since Independence as a foundational value, is seen as the quintessential resource for achosen practice of syncretism but also in danger of becoming the very source of fragmentation and implosion in a country increasingly maimed by fundamentalism and fanaticism. Democracy is then interrogated between the comfortable perspective of the firmly established and normally operating mechanisms of democratic routine, on the one hand, and the flawsof a still dramatically unjust system of distribution of rights and opportunities, on the other. Identity politics is in turn analysed both in its positive action of mobilizing society around the problem of social upgrading and in its unwelcome side effects of increasing practices of rigid and restricted classification fomenting division and violent sectarianism. In the end Indian growing cultural appeal upon the globalized scene is questioned in its complex relationship with the country’s quest for a role of protagonist in political as well as economic affairs upon a new multilateral international stage
The Fight Against Government Secrecy
No full textLocal journalist and author Miranda Spivack has a new book out, Backroom Deals in Our Backyard: How Government Secrecy Harms Our Communities and the Local Heroes Fighting Back. Sunil Dasgupta talks to Spivack about the book, why transparency has been a persistent problem in government, and how the public can fight back. Music by Washington art-pop rock band Catscan!https://open.spotify.com/episode/1UrBdTiUInvcV3xXgjK1R
The Long and Continuing Fight to Save Public Education
No full textEpisode · I Hate Politics Podcast · With school boards around the country under attack from right-wing extremists, a veteran Silver-Spring based education reporter and author, Karen Chenoweth, has founded a resource to help school board candidates and school board members fight back. Sunil Dasgupta talks to Chenoweth about her website democracy-education.org and her mission. Music from Finster.https://open.spotify.com/episode/7gUiArNXgofhVTx1vweJE
On Barthes’ biography
No full textThis article presents an interview with Tiphaine Samoyault, author of Roland Barthes, Biographie (Éditions du Seuil, 2015). There is always a difficulty in approaching the biography of Roland Barthes, who famously gave us the thesis of the ‘death of the author’. Nonetheless, Samoyault’s lengthy study can be considered the closest thing to an ‘official’ biography. Unlike other biographers, she was given access to and granted permission to cite from a wide range of private papers and materials. This inside view has not stopped her from detailing some of the more sensitive sides of Barthes’ life, and importantly she has been able to reassess aspects of his writings and relationship to other key thinkers of the time and the wider politics. As part of the interview, various extracts from the biography are woven into the dialogue, allowing those unfamiliar with it to gain more direct access to the book itself
What AMZN HQ2 Search Tells Us About Government Transparency
No full textThere is a long tradition in political philosophy where democracy and transparency are equated. A new article in the Policy Studies Journal, by UMBC colleagues UMBC’s Eric Stokan, Ian Anson, University of Texas Austin’s Nathan Jensen studied the impact of government transparency on Amazon’s search for its second headquarters to find surprising conclusions: https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.70016 . Sunil Dasgupta talks with lead author Eric Stokan. Music by Frederick, MD,- based country-folk singer-songwriter Susanna Laird.https://open.spotify.com/episode/2bNPVzoK9pPWHkFYzINHU
A Bosnian refugee who became a great story-teller: Adnan Mahmutovic on what drives him as a person and author
No full textAdnan Mahmutovic is fast becoming a literary phenomenon across the Anglophonic world, courtesy a strong narrative voice that is unique and spotlights the human endurance in most extreme conditions, including war, ethnic cleansing and survival in new places as a refugee. His recent novel Thinner than a hair is in news; so is the collection of short fiction How to fare well and stay fair. Adnan has a PhD in English literature and an MFA in creative writing, and is currently a lecturer and writer-in-residence at the Department of English, Stockholm University. Fellow writer Sunil Sharma interviewed Adnan by email
The Case Against Localism
No full textThis year’s Fourth of July episode explores the ideology of localism, a foundational tenet of American political philosophy. Sunil Dasgupta talks with political theorist and author Trevor Latimer about his new book. Small Isn’t Beautiful, where he takes on the widespread presumption that the government closest to us is necessarily the best. Local news re LGBTQ+ book protests, Maryland opens to marijuana, and the Anacostia River opens to swimming after a half-century. Music from the band Finster. Their 2023 album, Crosswinds, now on vinyl: https://t.ly/-bAF. Latimer’s book: https://t.ly/YRjS. MD marijuana FAQ: https://t.ly/-CI6. Anacostia swim event: https://t.ly/KBDf.https://open.spotify.com/episode/7HziMV5wlstZ2D3higJl9
Can Grassroots Budgeting Save Democracy?
No full textAs the fall local government budget season comes up, Sunil Dasgupta talks with author Celina Su, professor of political science at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, and Brooklyn College, about her new book Budget Justice: On Building Grassroots Politics and Solidarities (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DXYB8K8P?ref=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_10HCHFRWJJD443Z3YWWS&ref_=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_10HCHFRWJJD443Z3YWWS&social_share=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_10HCHFRWJJD443Z3YWWS&bestFormat=true), where she uses the experience of participatory budgeting in New York, Barcelona, and Porto Alegre, Brazil, to create a different vision of the budget process and of democracy itself. Music by Drew Pictures and the Lead Extras.https://open.spotify.com/episode/6cpbFV4lg0NueAIUiUjyo
Schools: Leadership First, Then Budgets
No full textIn this episode, Sunil Dasgupta talks with education author Karin Chenoweth about her new book, Districts that Succeed, where she looks at five successful school districts that beat severe challenges, and with Richard Montgomery High School (MCPS) history teacher Jerome Price about how schools need to practice what they preach on anti-racism. Very local news. Music from The Airport 77s.https://ihppod.libsyn.com/schools-leadership-first-then-budget
Can Climate Action and Conservation Unite?
No full textTwo new books by local authors Paula Whyman’s Bad Naturalist and Mike Tidwell’s The Lost Trees of Willow Avenue grapple with the challenges and hopes of conservation and climate action. Sunil Dasgupta talks with climate activist and Takoma Park resident Tidwell and fiction-author-turned conservationist Whyman, a longtime Bethesda resident, about their approaches to saving the world. Books at Music by Washington art-pop rock band Catscan!https://open.spotify.com/episode/2wjaT48cLcxSUHS92ZSnZ
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