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April 2007
SARAI NEWSLETTER: APRIL 2007
Dear All,
This month we have a slightly lighter schedule at Sarai, but an interesting
one nevertheless, with films, a film-linked discussion and a talk.
In continuation with our 'Delhi Dialogue' series of events on urban space
and the environment, we present two new films by Pradip Saha's (produced by
the Centre for Science and Environment, Delhi) on the political economy of
defecation and how it impacts on sewage, sanitation and the cleaning up (or
not) of our rivers. These films, made in a humorous and provocative style,
are essential viewing for people concerned about the urban environment. The
screening will be followed by a discussion. (see details below)
We will also host a talk by Aditya Nigam, (CSDS) titled, "Geneolgies of
Globalization: Unpacking the Universal History of Capital" - which should
be of interest to students of political theory, political economy, history
and the social sciences in general, as well as to people associated with or
involved with social movements. Aditya Nigam brings the vision of an
independent left perspective to bear on contemporary globalization.
Please also see the call for applications for the second Digital Video
Image Masterclass by Kabir Mohanty to be held in July 2007.
Finally, we are happy to announce our revamped website, with many new
features and sections - the url remains the same - www.sarai.net. The
website has been worked on for quite some time by many of us at Sarai, and
we would be very keen to get your feedback and responses to the website.
Happy browsing, and do write to dak@sarai.net with your responses to the
new look, feel and content of the website.
We hope that this April, many of you will be able to make your way to
Sarai. :)
Warmly,
Aarti Sethi
[Outreach]
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
[[CONTENTS]]
FILM (as part of the 'Delhi Dialogues' series of events)
Film @ Sarai: Faecal Attraction - 2 Films on Sewage and Sanitation by
Pradip Saha
13th April, Friday, 5:30 pm at the Seminar Hall, CSDS
TALK
Geneolgies of Globalization: Unpacking the Universal History of Capital
Aditya Nigam, CSDS
27th April, Friday, 3:00 pm at the Seminar Hall, CSDS
CALL FOR APPLICATIONS FOR DIGITAL VIDEO MASTERCLASS
with Kabir Mohanty (in July 2008). Deadline for submission of applications
for places in the workshop - May 2nd, 2007.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
============================================
Delhi Dialogues
Film and Public Discussion @ Sarai: Faecal Attraction
============================================
Faecal Attraction (Parts I & II)
5:30 P.M., Friday, 13 March 2007
Seminar Hall, Sarai-CSDS
(In collaboration with the Centre for Science and Environment)
Part 1 : Political Economy of Defecation
A Film by Pradip Saha, Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi
32 minutes. 2007.
All rivers in India look like sewage canals, if they carry any liquid at
all! The stretches by the cities are worst. And urban middle class is
bothered about the lost beauty of their rivers.City fathers either evict
poor people living in 'illegal' shanties by the river, or they build
expensive sewage treatment plants.But the rivers are no cleaner than
before. We actually do not know how much sewage is generated, and whole
city is not connected to the sewage network, and there is not enough
electricity to run these treatment plants.
The state responds to rich peoples' water and sanitation demand. Poor
people get very little water, mostly unsafe water, pay more for it. Poor do
not get sanitation cover, and pay heavy price in terms of water-borne
diseases.The video shows the relationship between rich man's shit and poor
man's water. And it is funny.
Part II: Clean Up Your Act
A Film by Pradip Saha, Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi
43 minutes. 2007
The electro-mechanical urban sewage management, with miles of pipes and
hundreds of pumps have failed. But there is no reason to be depressed.Our
ignorance about the sanitation science makes us feel powerless. And if our
priority is sanitation, not cosmetic surgery on rivers, or dole to
contractors, then we should move towards decentralized, individual house,
or neighbourhood level waste management systems. The video travels through
Pune, Agra, Delhi, Ujjain, Indore and Pondicherry, to showcase a host of
systems that have been improvised over traditional septic tank soak pit.
These are not just ‘beautiful ideas’, an euphemism for killing any low
cost affordable technology, but being practiced by courageous citizens. In
fact, there are cheaper, sure-shot ways of cleaning polluted water bodies
like rivers and lakes.
There should be an immediate freeze on wasting any more money in the name
of sewage management system. After all, cheaper systems will not force
citizens of India to be indebted to multilateral banks and financial
institutes.
The screening will be followed by a discussion with the filmmaker, Pradip
Saha and a team of researchers from CSE who work on urban water, sewage
and sanitation - S V Suresh Babu, R K Srini, Bharat Seth and Bidisha Kumar.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
========================================================
Talk Discussion @ Sarai
Genealogies of Globalization: Unpacking the Universal History of Capital
========================================================
Genealogies of Globalization: Unpacking the Universal History of Capital
Aditya Nigam, Fellow, CSDS
27th April, Friday, 3:00 pm at the Seminar Hall, CSDS
The presentation is part of an ongoing research and is a preliminary
attempt to revisit the history of capital and capitalism with a view to
unravelling its supposedly universal character and so-called historical
inevitability. The investigation suggests
that notwithstanding the neo-liberal triumphalism of the last few decades,
capitalism and bourgeois property have simply not managed to colonize most
of the world.
Aditya Nigam is Fellow, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies,
Delhi. He is interested in issues of nationalism and identity and more
generally in modernity and notions of radical politics. He is the author of
Insurrection of Little Selves: The Crisis of Secular-Nationalism in India
(2006), and co-author with Nivedita Menon, of Power and Contestation: India
Since 1990, forthcoming from Zed Books under their "Global History of the
Present Series". Aditya Nigam has also written extensively in Hindi and
Bengali. and is one of the initiators of Kafila.org a collaborative blog on
politics, culture and society.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
========================================================
CALL FOR APPLICATIONS FOR DIGITAL VIDEO MASTERCLASS
with Kabir Mohanty (Video Artist and Filmmaker)
========================================================
A reflective workshop focusing on the role of the practitioner as composer
and instrumentalist of all of aspects of video - shooting, recording and
editing. A personalized masterclass with the video artist and filmmaker
Kabir Mohanty.
"...I have tried over these years to find ways of creating a palette of
certain keys to shooting video. It seems two stages of working with the
moving image are important. The first is everything that leads up to the
shoot and including the act of shooting. The second is post-shooting.
The first workshop I held at Sarai in 2005 dealt with the first stage. This
one deals primarily though not exclusively with the second stage. However,
this separation of stages is within one person. That is, it is one person's
work. It also means we could go from edited material to how one is
shooting. The workshop does not create the context of professional editors
or sound designers that work on others' material, yet attempts to imbibe
that rigour, because one has also lived those vocations. We shall look at
edited material closely, and treat sound recording in its fundamentals. I
imagine acoustics being brought in simply and we shall use Robert Bresson's
"Notes on the Cinematographer" and Michel Chion's "Audio Vision" as keys to
thinking about sound..."
(From Kabir Mohanty's Statement introducing the Workshop)
For More Details about the Workshop and the full text of Kabir Mohanty's
introductory text - see -
http://www.sarai.net/about-us/events/workshops/video-masterclass
DURATION
Four weeks, July 2-28, 2007. Final screening July 29th, Sunday.
Workshop meetings on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Saturday.
All meetings 4-8 pm unless otherwise noted.
PLACES AVAILABLE
There are 9 Places available for this intensive workshop. Of these 7 will
be devoted to the practitioners (people with some prior knowledge of the
moving image). These 7 will complete at least one short video during the
workshop.2 places are reserved for people who reflect on the practice of
the moving image (like 'rasikas' in music) and who can help the group take
their thinking forward.
SUBMISSION DETAILS
For the 7 practitioners - 30 minutes of solidly shot un-edited video
material. If someone does not have material ready to edit then the workshop
coordinator may consider submission of rushes from previously shot material
that the applicant may want to re-edit/re-visit.
For the 2 rasikas - a long written piece that demonstrates interest in
thinking about the moving image. A curriculum vitae.
SEND TO
Digital Video Masterclass
Sarai CSDS
29 Rajpur Road
Delhi 110054
E MAIL ENQUIRIES
If you have e mail enquiries about this workshop, write to Iram Ghufran,
Media Lab Sarai-CSDS <iram@sarai.net>
APPLICATION REQUIREMENTS
All applicants should submit a page on their involvement with the moving
image, their backgrounds. Very often this helps in a one-on-one engagement
within a small group.
DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSION
Video material on dvd and written material printed out, in Sarai by May 2nd.
Participants will be notified by May 15th.
Workshop fees should be paid to Sarai, 100 % in advance by June 1st.
EQUIPMENT RESERVED FOR THE WORKSHOP
One computer with editing software for image and sound.
A camera with a microphone.
For a period a DAT recorder with a professional microphone.
WORKSHOP FEES
Rs.7,500 per person for the 7 'practitioners'. The 2 'rasikas' fee is
Rs.2,500 per person
ABOUT KABIR MOHANTY
(Adapted from the catalogue for 'Song for an Ancient Land'Â, Solo Show,
Gallery SKYE, Bangalore, October 29-Dec 2, 2006.)
Kabir Mohanty has been working in both film and video for some time now and
has made about ten films and videos. Most of his work has been shown in
film and video festivals in India and abroad including Oberhausen,
Rotterdam, Torino, Hawaii, World Wide Video Festival Amsterdam and
Bombay.He has also have been part of art shows like Sidewinder, which was a
residency cum exhibition, hosted by CIMA in 2001-02 where he showed a short
fiction film, titled - "and now i feel i don't know anything"Â.He has also
been part of a show on the tradition of experimentation in Indian film and
video starting with Dadasaheb Phalke, titled Cinema of Prayoga, which has
been shown at the Tate Modern, London
His training was at the University of Iowa where he obtained a masters in
filmmaking in 1986. His teachers included the great filmmaker Leighton
Pierce and film theorist Dudley Andrew, author of Major Film Theories, both
full-time faculty at Iowa.Over the years he has received international
grants and production awards in the form of the Hubert Bals Fund, Rotterdam
Film Festival, the Fond Sud Award from the Ministry of External Affairs,
France, an individual artist grant from the Prince Claus Fund, Netherlands
and a collaboration grant with sound designer, Vikram Joglekar from the
India Foundation for the Arts, Bangalore. From September 2002 till June
2004, Mohanty was a Visiting Artist in the Department of Art, UCLA, and in
residence for half that period.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
END OF NEWSLETTER
The Newsletter of the Sarai Programme,
29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054, www.sarai.net
Info: dak@sarai.net.To subscribe: send a blank email to
newsletter-request@sarai.net with subscribe in the subject header.
Directions to Sarai: We are ten minutes from Delhi University. Nearest bus
stop: IP college or Exchange Stores
See Calendar and Newsletter online:
http://www.sarai.net/calendar/newsletter.htm
Dear All,
This month we have a slightly lighter schedule at Sarai, but an interesting
one nevertheless, with films, a film-linked discussion and a talk.
In continuation with our 'Delhi Dialogue' series of events on urban space
and the environment, we present two new films by Pradip Saha's (produced by
the Centre for Science and Environment, Delhi) on the political economy of
defecation and how it impacts on sewage, sanitation and the cleaning up (or
not) of our rivers. These films, made in a humorous and provocative style,
are essential viewing for people concerned about the urban environment. The
screening will be followed by a discussion. (see details below)
We will also host a talk by Aditya Nigam, (CSDS) titled, "Geneolgies of
Globalization: Unpacking the Universal History of Capital" - which should
be of interest to students of political theory, political economy, history
and the social sciences in general, as well as to people associated with or
involved with social movements. Aditya Nigam brings the vision of an
independent left perspective to bear on contemporary globalization.
Please also see the call for applications for the second Digital Video
Image Masterclass by Kabir Mohanty to be held in July 2007.
Finally, we are happy to announce our revamped website, with many new
features and sections - the url remains the same - www.sarai.net. The
website has been worked on for quite some time by many of us at Sarai, and
we would be very keen to get your feedback and responses to the website.
Happy browsing, and do write to dak@sarai.net with your responses to the
new look, feel and content of the website.
We hope that this April, many of you will be able to make your way to
Sarai. :)
Warmly,
Aarti Sethi
[Outreach]
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
[[CONTENTS]]
FILM (as part of the 'Delhi Dialogues' series of events)
Film @ Sarai: Faecal Attraction - 2 Films on Sewage and Sanitation by
Pradip Saha
13th April, Friday, 5:30 pm at the Seminar Hall, CSDS
TALK
Geneolgies of Globalization: Unpacking the Universal History of Capital
Aditya Nigam, CSDS
27th April, Friday, 3:00 pm at the Seminar Hall, CSDS
CALL FOR APPLICATIONS FOR DIGITAL VIDEO MASTERCLASS
with Kabir Mohanty (in July 2008). Deadline for submission of applications
for places in the workshop - May 2nd, 2007.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
============================================
Delhi Dialogues
Film and Public Discussion @ Sarai: Faecal Attraction
============================================
Faecal Attraction (Parts I & II)
5:30 P.M., Friday, 13 March 2007
Seminar Hall, Sarai-CSDS
(In collaboration with the Centre for Science and Environment)
Part 1 : Political Economy of Defecation
A Film by Pradip Saha, Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi
32 minutes. 2007.
All rivers in India look like sewage canals, if they carry any liquid at
all! The stretches by the cities are worst. And urban middle class is
bothered about the lost beauty of their rivers.City fathers either evict
poor people living in 'illegal' shanties by the river, or they build
expensive sewage treatment plants.But the rivers are no cleaner than
before. We actually do not know how much sewage is generated, and whole
city is not connected to the sewage network, and there is not enough
electricity to run these treatment plants.
The state responds to rich peoples' water and sanitation demand. Poor
people get very little water, mostly unsafe water, pay more for it. Poor do
not get sanitation cover, and pay heavy price in terms of water-borne
diseases.The video shows the relationship between rich man's shit and poor
man's water. And it is funny.
Part II: Clean Up Your Act
A Film by Pradip Saha, Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi
43 minutes. 2007
The electro-mechanical urban sewage management, with miles of pipes and
hundreds of pumps have failed. But there is no reason to be depressed.Our
ignorance about the sanitation science makes us feel powerless. And if our
priority is sanitation, not cosmetic surgery on rivers, or dole to
contractors, then we should move towards decentralized, individual house,
or neighbourhood level waste management systems. The video travels through
Pune, Agra, Delhi, Ujjain, Indore and Pondicherry, to showcase a host of
systems that have been improvised over traditional septic tank soak pit.
These are not just ‘beautiful ideas’, an euphemism for killing any low
cost affordable technology, but being practiced by courageous citizens. In
fact, there are cheaper, sure-shot ways of cleaning polluted water bodies
like rivers and lakes.
There should be an immediate freeze on wasting any more money in the name
of sewage management system. After all, cheaper systems will not force
citizens of India to be indebted to multilateral banks and financial
institutes.
The screening will be followed by a discussion with the filmmaker, Pradip
Saha and a team of researchers from CSE who work on urban water, sewage
and sanitation - S V Suresh Babu, R K Srini, Bharat Seth and Bidisha Kumar.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
========================================================
Talk Discussion @ Sarai
Genealogies of Globalization: Unpacking the Universal History of Capital
========================================================
Genealogies of Globalization: Unpacking the Universal History of Capital
Aditya Nigam, Fellow, CSDS
27th April, Friday, 3:00 pm at the Seminar Hall, CSDS
The presentation is part of an ongoing research and is a preliminary
attempt to revisit the history of capital and capitalism with a view to
unravelling its supposedly universal character and so-called historical
inevitability. The investigation suggests
that notwithstanding the neo-liberal triumphalism of the last few decades,
capitalism and bourgeois property have simply not managed to colonize most
of the world.
Aditya Nigam is Fellow, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies,
Delhi. He is interested in issues of nationalism and identity and more
generally in modernity and notions of radical politics. He is the author of
Insurrection of Little Selves: The Crisis of Secular-Nationalism in India
(2006), and co-author with Nivedita Menon, of Power and Contestation: India
Since 1990, forthcoming from Zed Books under their "Global History of the
Present Series". Aditya Nigam has also written extensively in Hindi and
Bengali. and is one of the initiators of Kafila.org a collaborative blog on
politics, culture and society.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
========================================================
CALL FOR APPLICATIONS FOR DIGITAL VIDEO MASTERCLASS
with Kabir Mohanty (Video Artist and Filmmaker)
========================================================
A reflective workshop focusing on the role of the practitioner as composer
and instrumentalist of all of aspects of video - shooting, recording and
editing. A personalized masterclass with the video artist and filmmaker
Kabir Mohanty.
"...I have tried over these years to find ways of creating a palette of
certain keys to shooting video. It seems two stages of working with the
moving image are important. The first is everything that leads up to the
shoot and including the act of shooting. The second is post-shooting.
The first workshop I held at Sarai in 2005 dealt with the first stage. This
one deals primarily though not exclusively with the second stage. However,
this separation of stages is within one person. That is, it is one person's
work. It also means we could go from edited material to how one is
shooting. The workshop does not create the context of professional editors
or sound designers that work on others' material, yet attempts to imbibe
that rigour, because one has also lived those vocations. We shall look at
edited material closely, and treat sound recording in its fundamentals. I
imagine acoustics being brought in simply and we shall use Robert Bresson's
"Notes on the Cinematographer" and Michel Chion's "Audio Vision" as keys to
thinking about sound..."
(From Kabir Mohanty's Statement introducing the Workshop)
For More Details about the Workshop and the full text of Kabir Mohanty's
introductory text - see -
http://www.sarai.net/about-us/events/workshops/video-masterclass
DURATION
Four weeks, July 2-28, 2007. Final screening July 29th, Sunday.
Workshop meetings on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Saturday.
All meetings 4-8 pm unless otherwise noted.
PLACES AVAILABLE
There are 9 Places available for this intensive workshop. Of these 7 will
be devoted to the practitioners (people with some prior knowledge of the
moving image). These 7 will complete at least one short video during the
workshop.2 places are reserved for people who reflect on the practice of
the moving image (like 'rasikas' in music) and who can help the group take
their thinking forward.
SUBMISSION DETAILS
For the 7 practitioners - 30 minutes of solidly shot un-edited video
material. If someone does not have material ready to edit then the workshop
coordinator may consider submission of rushes from previously shot material
that the applicant may want to re-edit/re-visit.
For the 2 rasikas - a long written piece that demonstrates interest in
thinking about the moving image. A curriculum vitae.
SEND TO
Digital Video Masterclass
Sarai CSDS
29 Rajpur Road
Delhi 110054
E MAIL ENQUIRIES
If you have e mail enquiries about this workshop, write to Iram Ghufran,
Media Lab Sarai-CSDS <iram@sarai.net>
APPLICATION REQUIREMENTS
All applicants should submit a page on their involvement with the moving
image, their backgrounds. Very often this helps in a one-on-one engagement
within a small group.
DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSION
Video material on dvd and written material printed out, in Sarai by May 2nd.
Participants will be notified by May 15th.
Workshop fees should be paid to Sarai, 100 % in advance by June 1st.
EQUIPMENT RESERVED FOR THE WORKSHOP
One computer with editing software for image and sound.
A camera with a microphone.
For a period a DAT recorder with a professional microphone.
WORKSHOP FEES
Rs.7,500 per person for the 7 'practitioners'. The 2 'rasikas' fee is
Rs.2,500 per person
ABOUT KABIR MOHANTY
(Adapted from the catalogue for 'Song for an Ancient Land'Â, Solo Show,
Gallery SKYE, Bangalore, October 29-Dec 2, 2006.)
Kabir Mohanty has been working in both film and video for some time now and
has made about ten films and videos. Most of his work has been shown in
film and video festivals in India and abroad including Oberhausen,
Rotterdam, Torino, Hawaii, World Wide Video Festival Amsterdam and
Bombay.He has also have been part of art shows like Sidewinder, which was a
residency cum exhibition, hosted by CIMA in 2001-02 where he showed a short
fiction film, titled - "and now i feel i don't know anything"Â.He has also
been part of a show on the tradition of experimentation in Indian film and
video starting with Dadasaheb Phalke, titled Cinema of Prayoga, which has
been shown at the Tate Modern, London
His training was at the University of Iowa where he obtained a masters in
filmmaking in 1986. His teachers included the great filmmaker Leighton
Pierce and film theorist Dudley Andrew, author of Major Film Theories, both
full-time faculty at Iowa.Over the years he has received international
grants and production awards in the form of the Hubert Bals Fund, Rotterdam
Film Festival, the Fond Sud Award from the Ministry of External Affairs,
France, an individual artist grant from the Prince Claus Fund, Netherlands
and a collaboration grant with sound designer, Vikram Joglekar from the
India Foundation for the Arts, Bangalore. From September 2002 till June
2004, Mohanty was a Visiting Artist in the Department of Art, UCLA, and in
residence for half that period.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
END OF NEWSLETTER
The Newsletter of the Sarai Programme,
29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054, www.sarai.net
Info: dak@sarai.net.To subscribe: send a blank email to
newsletter-request@sarai.net with subscribe in the subject header.
Directions to Sarai: We are ten minutes from Delhi University. Nearest bus
stop: IP college or Exchange Stores
See Calendar and Newsletter online:
http://www.sarai.net/calendar/newsletter.htm