Shiv Visvanathan is one of the widely
acclaimed public intellectual and social scientists in India. He delivered a lecture on 'Reading the unpopular' on January 28, 2017 at Christ University. His works,
innovative stream of consciousness and critical insights were quite popular
even before the event began. The talk was witnessed by a full house gathering
consisting of students and faculty members.
Professor started off with his proposition
that of youth being the most overused brand of the present century. The
emphasis on youth and the act of turning a blind eye to the deformities of
youth was accused as the primary problems of concern.
What followed was a phase of providing
critical insights into the consciousness of the present day youth. The mere
silence of present generation was termed to be alarming. The acceptance of
‘order’ as uniformity was heavily critiqued upon. The phenomena of surveillance
and threats it possesses were explained in detailed. But the primary question was
how the youth had surrendered in good faith to this control mechanism. The
passive submission was questioned. Professor explained how the present
generation was susceptible for a despotic rule with their consent. This could
lead to a autocracy worst that the Nazi days.
The evils of modern day trending
philosophies were showcased. He spoke of how more refugees are generated due to
the construction of dams than all the wars put together. There was a systematic
deconstruction of the concept of ‘development'. Professor spoke of the mad race
that every youth aspires to join in. Thereby they are forgetting to exercise
his/her agency to dissent. So much is the inhospitality of defeat that no one
wants to risk any further failures through dissents.
Through various such though experiments,
the professor held the little finger of all the minds in the auditorium and directed
them towards the statue of a question mark. What followed was a spontaneous
change in audience towards dissent that could be seen in the Question and
Answer session that followed the suite.
The debates were intriguing, innovative and
multivariate. The wide variety of opinions and critical outlook towards many
common world problems were very refreshing and encouraging to see. The scope
for involving students in this process of thought experiments and providing
them half of the allotted schedule was commendable. It made the session more
inclusive and interesting. The witty humor, innovative strategies like vouching
for ethical startups sowed seeds for a different line of thought process.
Finally, Shiv Visvanathan did what all
speakers aspire to do: to interest, to involve and to inspire.
Reported by
Prajwal N
MA Applied Sociology
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