Random Thoughts To Share...

I had been procrastinating for a long time about reading Nine Lives by William Dalrymple. It is a travelogue, telling the tale of nine people who are carrying on their lives in the path of traditions that are many centuries old despite the onset of a wave of 'modernistic' living and thinking. But for me, it is more about W.D, celebrating nine people practicing their art, & though in one of the nine stories, the Stapathi clearly says, that "making idols may be a form of art for a lot of people but for us it is a way of devotion towards the almighty." I agree with the Stapathi too, in India it really is difficult to describe carving idols as someone practicing art, it would be degrading for those who do that as a form of devotion to their beloved God/Godess. But when I refer to it as 'practicing art,' I only refer to the part where centuries of practice transforms itself into skilled architects of Hindu dieties. The rest & everything around it is devotion, I believe in that. How else can someone explain the fact for generations one family continues to master it (leaving apart the politics of dominion over a form of earning a living, ofcourse). But being oblivious of politics is always a simpler & naiver way out.

But that is not what I really wanted to think aloud here. What caught my attention, was the reconfirmation of the fact that for almost all the Hindu Vedas & all Hindu philosophies, the four main goals of life are Dharma (virtuous living), Artha (material prosperity), Kama (aesthetic & erotic pleasure), & Moksha (liberation). The first three are believed to be aims of everyday life, while Moksha is the release of one from the cycle of birth & death. If these seem to be true then how & when did sex or Kama become such a taboo? I don't think it would be wrong if I argued that India pioneered the use of sexual education through art & literature. Remember Kama Sutra, written during the 1st-6th centuries :)

Infact, The Tantric school of Indic/Hindu philosophy formed at some point, during (1st & 6th centuries) the same time the KamaSutra or the Vatsyayana Kamasutra was written, and part of the philosophical system was the idea that sex, as a basic and powerful desire experienced by all humans, could be utilized as a way of achieving enlightenment. Some ardent devotees of this system for example might deliberately break sexual taboos that were ridiculed, such as extramarital sex, to master human nature and achieve greater understanding of the universe, their soul.

On the otherhand, the early Vedas had a more structured view on Kama. These mostly were moral perspectives on sexuality, marriage, & fertility prayers. Even then, nudity & sexual education or depiction of sexual postures was considered acceptable in art. Ajanta & Khajuraho temples are the living examples of the same. But this kind of lewd descriptions in art could also be debated as realistic depictions of the time & age. As in most countries with tropical climates, India being one, did not need to wear clothes, and other than for fashion, there was no practical need to cover the upper half of the body. This is supported by historical evidence, which shows that men and women in many parts of ancient India mostly dressed only the lower half of their bodies. Whilst this has changed in modern times, it is likely that taboo against nudity was not present in many Asian, African and South American civilizations.

It is mind-boggling to see how the Indian values have altered, almost to the opposite most time, so much overtime, & for me with the little reading that I could manage to get before this post, it looks like the invasion of the Mughals had only a little to do with the change, what with their Purdah system. We might think that the strict manner in which the Mughals followed the Purdah system, it might have infected the entire Indian populace, but there has been no apparent evidence that it was forced to the Hindu women. Also, the fact that Purdah did not affect men, leaves a lot to think about.

So, the only alternative, the British invasion on India with their Lords & Ladies, seems to have brought to India, ship-loads of clothing & bodice :). With the British Raj being ushered to direct rule, all Indian customs & mannerism started being ridiculed at. Victorian values stigmatized India sexual liberalism. The pluralism of Hinduism & its liberal attitudes were condemned as barbaric & the proof of inferiority of the East. The result, it led some & later some more Indians wanting to conform their religious practices and moral values to Victorian ideas of "high" civilization. There the end of free & happy sex to the invention of virginity locks :P

But that's not the end of it all, countries such as India became more conservative after being influenced by European ideas. At the same time, translations of the Kama Sutra and other 'exotic' texts became available in Europe, where they gained notorious status, and ironically may have triggered early foundations of the sexual revolution in the west. Irony as they say life is...

I know, I am stating the obvious, but it was just very fascinating to recall all this & share with all. Hope you guys have fun reading it...

M.F. Hussain & The Qatar Nationality

I am perhaps not big on patriotic sentiments, but I do get teary & goose bumpy when I hear the national anthem, or the Ai mere watan ke logon, or when a Sachin scores a 200, or even when the Armed forces looses one of its heroes. But definitely, I am not patriotic enough, because I really fail to understand the reason why a painter like Hussain should have to live in exile & be a fugitive.

Perhaps, India no more celebrates art, but more keeps it in the shackles of dirty & petty politics. Even then, I guess, politics gains more keeping Hussain an Indian. They could have boasted of having one of the finest painters of modern India, who has painfully given to the world few of the best pieces of art. I guess, India could not see, what the queen of Qatar could, who commissioned him to do a series of paintings depicting Islam. It's disheartening really to see something like this happen. While we are still bragging to be the worlds biggest democracy, we could not give an artist the space to paint in his own country.

I do not claim to understand how sad/happy Mr. Hussain might be, but it really would suck for me if my parents would ask me to not come home one day, only cause I had made a mistake...really what could be worse than that.

है बातों में दम? (A Google Contest)

Sharing your thoughts in Hindi on the web has never been easier! Google and LiveHindustan.com bring you the 'Hai Baaton Mein Dum?' Contest. If you've ever wished that there was more great Hindi content online, here's your chance to spill your heart out about the things that matter the most to you: entertainment, sports, travel, health and politics. Brick by brick, you'll be building the web in Hindi, sharing your knowledge of these topics and showing your flair for this beautiful language. 


So, go ahead and visit the 'Hai Baaton Mein Dum?' Contest Site and click the 'Submit your entry' button next to the topic you want to write about. You stand to win some amazing prizes like laptops, gift vouchers and free internet subscriptions! There is no limit to the number of entries per contestant. Let your imagination run wild and spread the joy of sharing your thoughts in Hindi on the web! 

P.S - I took the liberty to copy the content from another friend blogger - Musings.

I did it coz I wanted to spread the word to all those who read my blog too, but she put it so well, I didn't bother writing about the contest in my own words. So, thanks Musings.

Something Interesting

'Fat clubs' thriving in America

American nightclubs catering specifically for fat people are proving a hit with plus-sized partygoers looking for acceptance.

Club Bounce in Long Beach, California. The club is specifically aimed at attracting overweight individuals Photo: AP

Venues like Club Bounce and The Butterfly Lounge in California are aimed at people who may be made to feel unwelcome at certain fashionable nightspots because of their size.

Such clubs are a relatively new development, with a handful scattered across California, mainly in coastal cities such as San Diego and San Francisco.

She said: "I don't think fat is a bad word any more. I think a lot of people embrace it now.Lisa Marie Garbo, who opened Club Bounce five years ago, said she did it for herself and others who were tired of being "the only fat girl at the local nightclub".

"I'm not a gain-weight advocate or anything like that. My message to people is live your life no matter what size you are."

Club Bounce, with a capacity of 400, attracts relatively equal numbers of men and women. However, while about three-quarters of the women tend to be heavy, only a quarter of the men are.

The existence of such venues has raised healthquestions in a country where, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one-third of adults are already obese.

But Lynn McAfe, of the Council On Size and Weight Discrimination, said: "It's nice to have a place to go where you can do a little flirting and maybe bring your thin sister or somebody from work who isn't fat, and they'll be in your world for a while."

"That's an amazing experience for a lot of people who aren't fat, to spend a day or night in a world of fat people."

Vanessa Gray, a Club Bounce customer, added: "When you're not what they consider ideal and you're out there trying to get your dance on at those other places, you get the looks, the stares. But not here. Everything's accepted here."

I took the free ColorQuiz.com personality test!""Has a strong desire to contribute and influence o..." Click here to read the rest of the results.

Unbelievable If This Is True

Unable to attract even a single girl, frustrated man sues Axe

New Delhi. In what could prove to be a major marketing and legal embarrassment for Hindustan Unilever Limited (HUL), a 26-year-old man has filed a case against the FMCG company, which owns the Axe brand of men grooming products, for ‘cheating’ and causing him ‘mental suffering’. The plaintiff has cited his failure to attract any girl at all even though he’s been using Axe products for over seven years now. Axe advertisements suggest that the products help men in instantly attracting women.

Vaibhav Bedi, the petitioner, also surrendered all his used, unused and half-used deodorant sprays, perfume sticks and roll-ons, anti-perspirants, aftershaves, body washes, shampoos, and hair gels to the court, and demanded a laboratory test of the products and narcotics test of the brand managers of Axe. Vaibhav was pushed to take this step when his bai (maid) beat him with a broom when he tried to impress her by appearing naked in front of her after applying all the Axe products.

No girl ever asked Vaibhav to call her

“Where the Hell is Axe effect? I’ve been waiting for it for over seven years. Right from my college to now in my office, no girl ever agreed to even go out for a tea or coffee with me, even though I’m sure they could smell my perfumes, deodorants and aftershaves. I always applied them in abundance to make sure the girls get turned on as they show in the television. Finally I thought I’d try to impress my lonely bai who had an ugly fight with her husband and was living alone for over a year. Axe effect my foot!” Vaibhav expressed his unhappiness.

Vaibhav claims that he had been using all the Axe products as per the company’s instructions even since he first bought them. He argued that if he couldn’t experience the Axe effect despite using the products as directed, either the company was making false claims or selling fake products.

“I had always stored them in cool and dry place, and kept them away from direct light or heat. I’d always use a ruler before applying the spray and make sure that the distance between the nozzle and my armpit was at least 15 centimeters. I’d do everything they told. I even beat up my 5-year-old nephew for coming near my closet, as they had instructed it to keep away from children’s reach. And yet, all I get is a broom beating from my ugly bai.” Vaibhav expressed his frustration.

Vaibhav claims that he had to do go a lot of mental suffering and public humiliation due to the lack of Axe effect and wants HUL to compensate him for this agony. An advocate in Karkardooma court, who happened to mistake Vaibhav for some deodorant vendor when he entered the court premises with all the bottles, has now offered to take up his case in the court. HUL has been served a legal notice in this regard.

HUL has officially declined to comment on the case citing the subject to be sub judice, but our sources inform that the company was worried over the possible outcomes of the case. The company might argue that Vaibhav was hopelessly unattractive and unintelligent and didn’t possess the bare minimum requirements for the Axe effect to take place. Officially HUL has not issued any statement, but legal experts believe that HUL could have tough time convincing the court.

“HUL might be tempted to take that line of argument, but it is very risky. There is no data to substantiate the supposition that unattractive and unintelligent men don’t attract women. In fact some of the best looking women have been known to marry and date absolutely ghoulish guys. I’d suggest that the company settles this issue out of court.” noted lawyer Ram Jhoothmalani said.

An Excerpt From my MA Dissertation - Stereotyping Women In Lifestyle Magazines

When I was born, they looked at me and said: 'What a good boy, what a smart boy, what a strong boy!' And when you were born, they looked at you and said: 'What a sweet girl, what a beautiful girl, what a pretty girl!'" "What A Good Boy," The Barenaked Ladies. 

For several decades now, media critics and feminists alike have been examining the role of the media in creating and reinforcing stereotypical representations of women and femininity. But only recently have they expanded the research to consider how the media also constructs, informs and reinforces prevalent ideas about men and masculinity, which in the process also builds a stereotypical notion of femininity. Take for instance ‘Masculinity and Men’s Lifestyle Magazine’ a book by Beethan Benwell which deals in detail how stereotypes of masculinity are formed by the media or a book by Jonathan Bignell ‘Media Semiotics: An Introduction’ which talks about the semiotics of advertisements in both Men’s and Women’s magazines and how women are framed as sexual objects in this all male world of media.
. What remains my concern in this paper is to try to figure out the ways in which these magazines in the process of constructing a stereotypical masculine identity, continue to relegate women to the background and, in doing so, are examples of social backlash directed against specific gains made by women in the paid labor force, mass media industries and other professions. It is true that it is no coincidence that as women are achieving greater social, political and professional equality, these magazines symbolically relegate them to subordinate positions as sex objects and objects of recreation for men. And it is also true when we often complain that the pressure put on women through ads, television, film and new media to be sexually attractive—and sexually active—is profound, more perhaps today than during any other times. Is it then to say that women who have now begun realizing their potential, which for long had been suppressed, are threatening the long and well preserved superior subject positions occupied by men? This is however not to say that Men’s magazines deliberately and visibly try to undermine the gains made by women, yet to suggest that the way in which a woman appears in these magazines through there articles and their advertisements is such that the only aspect of her that can be highlighted is nothing but her body and her intelligence is often made fun of. There are recurrent articles in Man’s World about how 10 famous men in India rate such and such woman’s sex appeal, or who according to ten business tycoons are the five sexiest women India/world. These magazines also deride women by showing them in low light through cartoons, take for instance a cartoon where a woman come in with a packet of oil n complains to her husband saying the shopkeeper cheated her by not giving the 100% cholesterol free that is mentioned in the pack etc. and most importantly, how they handle women etc. What is interesting however in these magazines is that they take women to be this object available to be seduced by good looks and manners of men. The tone of the magazine especially in its ‘Dr. Know’ (a section that deals with the problems the readers ask) is such that it relegates women to this inferior objectified level. The tone in this section is always filled with sarcasm with this assumed cool attitude towards life, and a kind of rhetoric that is filled with wit and humour which never answers questions in a serious, responsible direct way.Whereas in a women’s magazine the problems whatever it may be is invariably dealt with more seriousness and concern even when the question is from a man. What can be the reason for such a wide difference in the treatment of almost the same issues? Here comes the question of stereotypes as in why do the men’s magazines mostly have this kind of a comic approach to questions relating to the private realm? Has it something to do with the fact of creating stereotypical identities of masculinity and feminity which exist in society – to say a silly, emotional, infantile female who needs to discuss such matter of fact things as against a more mature man who does not need such advices.

P.S - I am thinking on starting up again on my dissertation. May be I will begin with re-writing it and then take it further.

It's Sheer Blasphemy

While blog hopping (going from one blog to another), I came across a series of blogposts about Chyetanya Kunte's NDTV fiasco. My very first reaction, I really live the life of an ignorant fool, because how else do I explain my not knowing about this for such a long time. Second, third, and all the reactions that follow till I am exhausted are nothing but of shock and disgust. It's been quite sometime that I have been wanting to make a post about my personal opinion about 'The Ms. Barkha Dutta.' However, I think, after finding about CK and NDTV I am left with no words. I infact feel sad about the lady and the channel that flaunts itself raising the 'free speech' flag all the time. But reading about the Chyetanya Kunte's case, I am appalled at NDTV and at Ms. Dutt, more than I ever was.

I think may be, just may be, someone needs to clarify the meanings of 'free speech' and of 'double standards,' to both NDTV and Barkha Dutt. I agree Chyetanya Kunte's post 'Shoddy-Journalism' was not really professional and lacked facts, but it said nothing to evoke the kind of action that was taken by petty NDTV folks and Ms. Dutt. The apology surely stinks of the double standards that both the entities (NDTV & Dutt) reak of and presents the Indian Media in a new light. 

Hindi Movie Posters...

A coincidence it might be, but the topic seems to be swirling around my conversations with my  friends and cab mates off late. So, what better than making a post about it.

In our conversations, I realized that hindi movie posters seem to have come a long way. Going back to one of the first image-less posters of the film Raja Harishchandra to the recent glossy posters for the Rock Ons and the Gajni's of our times. I remember having seen some of the hand-painted posters of the movies from 60s through the 80s, all stained with paan. Be it then, the colourful and yet crowded posters, with every main character on it, for Mera Naam Joker or the sole strong face of Amitabh Bacchan dominating it for almost all of his films in the 70s. The hindi movie posters have indeed come a long way. 

When I was a kid, it was an awaited event for every thrusdays. When with my friends or cousins, I would take the most famous galees where the new movie posters would appear for the three cinema halls we had in our town back then. We would wait a minute or two staring at them, soaking in every detail, and only then would we continue our walk to see the same poster again in the next lane. Finally, we would come to decide on a day for watching. 

Now, when I am in hyderabad, a friend reminds me of those posters in a casual conversation, and in my 23 km drive from my house to my office, my eyes search longingly for a single movie poster in one of those forgotten  and wretched walls. To my surprise, the only posters I see are for the recent Telugu movies. Most of those are more like hoardings hung on huge billboards. I am forced to talk to my cab-mates about my fond memories of Amitabh, Mithun, or Govinda staring out of the old posters like Greek Gods, suited only for Indian fantasies. I remember, some of my girl friends staring longingly at them. Alas! I have to admit, the era for not just the hand-painted posters is gone, but so also the era for posters on every obscure wall is gone. Sadly enough, I only realized it far too late. I wonder, why such gradual disappearance, so sudden I surely can't call them?

Various answers flash through my head, may be too many TV advertisements for the upcoming new movies, internet bookings, various resources we now have to find out about the new releases. But could it be also because of the changing spaces we live in today. Who did these posters cater to? Who were their audience...? The general mass....

Has there then been a disconnect then in what constituted earlier the general mass?Perhaps yes, we can now divide the mass of any metropolis into - the Urban and the not so urban mass. The urban, looks at the multi-plexes and the internet for movie information and perhaps the not so urban mass is fast catching up. But how about the telugu movies, I grudge them for having the very boisterous posters, though not so appealing to me, staring out and making me all the more nostalgic about my lovely old hindi film posters. Why do they continue having them, and not just posters, but hoardings too. Who is the then the audience for these films? Do they still remain the naive youngster or rather the teenager that I was a decade back? Apart from innocence and such facades that I just used for my past, I think, there indeed is a serius disparity between the masses that watch the telugu and the hindi movies in Hyderabad. Because, just like the telugu posters, back home we still have these occasional hindi movie poster being stained every minute.

I think, merely for the fact that I choose to live in a metro-city, I will have to say goodbye to those celluloid moments, captured for eternity in a frame and live sulking with the glossy, rich multiplex posters.

Kill Bill... an essay that I wrote in 11 mintues!

It is difficult for a person like me to pick and choose one movie over and above all the rest that I have seen in my entire life and say that ‘this was the best’. Perhaps it’s a difficult job for anybody, as it is for me. However, right now when I think of one movie that I really enjoyed watching the only name that I can think of is Quentin Torentino’s ‘Kill Bill’.

The movie is a relic we need to watch it to understand what the limits are that a director can reach up to in cinema. It is the height of creative imagination, something that normal human beings can only dream about. With the entire storyline based on a woman, Torentino definitely goes on to achieve what we would call the threshold of feminism and revolution. Uma Thurman, the protagonist does a near perfect job in bringing to life what the director only visualized and hoped for, be it her killing expressions, body language, or the fight sequences, Thurman masters the art of internalizing the character. The movie begins on a very serious note, but Torentino takes it to the realm of the unimaginable with Thurman like a devil slashing heads off, and blood oozing out like a fountain. All these details might seem gory but when you watch them, they are nothing but spectacular. The scenes are beautifully shot, and the technology used only ads to its perfection. I personally would suggest all movie buffs to watch the movie, if not for anything else but at least to understand what a spoof is all about and how a director can do it with so much style that the audience forgets all about the spoof and thinks about it as a classic piece of cinema.

this Is for All my Male Readers!

I Do sound as if I have ahuge fan following and I am some popular writer. But couldn't get a better title.
This Post is also for all those who are disgusted by the word "feminism".
This way I am also letting you deceide whether you want to read this or not...
This is a lilttle bit of information on about what feminism is not
1. Feminism to start with is not all/only about women out with lathis on the road, bashing up men at every opprtunity.
2. Feminism is also not exclusive of housewives and women who are introvert, non-modern rather traditional.
3. Feminism is also not only about women smoking and drinking.
4. Feminism is not just about "bra burning"
5. Feminism is not synonymous to not understanding things and making an issue out of it all the time.
6. Feminism is not inconsiderate.

and perhaps Feminism should not be a thing of the upper class/ caste women.

Feminism is a better way of living for women!

This and much much more human is feminism!

hope it helps all those who misunderstand it and me too.

Amen!

my reading of Derrida's Right to Philosophy...

In the very beginning I would like to define the term philosophy, because it is one of the terms around which the argument revolves through out the essay. The term philosophy derives from a combination of the Greek words ‘philos’ meaning love and ‘sophia’ meaning wisdom, therefore the word comes to mean ‘love for wisdom’. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the original meaning of the word encompasses all kinds of knowledge. Over time, however it gained the more specialized meaning of knowledge of the world, as contrasted with knowledge of the divine. For example, science was originally called "natural philosophy". Today, the word refers to the study of ultimate reality and the most general causes and principles of reality. Philosophy in the present context of Eurocentric definitions begins where the universal is comprehended as the all-embracing existence, or where the existent is laid hold of in a universal form, and where thinking about thought first commences.

Where, then, has this occurred? Where did it begin? That is a question of history.

And we clearly see from its definitions that it certainly did not begin in the East, because in the Eastern philosophy, definitely Mind indeed begins to dawn, but it is still true of it that the subject is not presented as a person as something absolutely concrete, but appears in the objectively substantial, which is represented as partly super-sensuous and partly, and even more, material, which is seen as negative. The conclusion to be derived from this is that no philosophic knowledge can be found here. To Philosophy belongs the knowledge of Substance, the knowledge absolute the Universal. The Eastern form must and has been therefore excluded from the History of Philosophy.

And perhaps this very shift in the definition of Philosophy from the ‘knowledge of the divine’ to the ‘knowledge of the world’ creates for a distinction between the philosophy of the East and that of the West, with more credibility associated to the Western Philosophy for its closer relation to ‘rationality’ and its ‘universal’ nature. However, what philosophy is, or should be, is itself a philosophical question that philosophers have understood and treated differently through the ages. However, when one uses the term "philosophy" in an academic context, it invariably refers to the philosophical tradition begun with the ancient Greeks. The "Eastern philosophies" are inevitably overlooked, and considered worthless for academic purposes.

It is at this juncture that Derrida voices his discomfort about how philosophy as a discipline has been institutionalized in a Eurocentric structure, which makes other philosophies, which do not follow its pattern, loose its authority as a discipline. In this essay he begins with questioning three particular axioms,

-One, is that of the right to philosophy, and the space, the platform where it can be discussed.

-Two, he asks philosophers to not take it for granted rather question the a priori philosophical mode of being of the institutes like the UNESCO. It is important to question the reasons for the existence of such institutes. He of course cites the reason Kant gives for the set up of these institutions of peace, yet he has his own reservations in accepting it.

-Three he refutes Kant’s notion of a universal, which Kant says after much struggle becomes a fact. For him the element of Universal is a problem in History and Philosophy.

He mainly draws his critique of this institutionalization of philosophy by posing the questions to ‘UNESCO’ as an institution of philosophy and also relies heavily on Kant’s “Idea of a Universal History from a Cosmo-political Point of View” in order to put forth his arguments as to show how is there an acceptance of the European model of philosophy as the Ideal philosophy, with a universalist understanding of philosophy and a unfretted faith on the Greco-European origins of philosophy without taking into account the conflicted nature of those origins. In his essay he ingeniously raises the question in the beginning as to who has and who does not have a right to philosophy? And "where does the question of the right to philosophy take place?”. And the questions that run as undercurrent are- Whether philosophy was only the concern of the West and if no other philosophies exist apart from the Western philosophy? If so what happens to the any other philosophy, the non-Western wisdom? Or the contention is that there is no other wisdom apart from the Western? Through out the essay the case that Derrida seems to be making is that he is interested in carving out a space for philosophies to emerge and be accepted from the non-Western contours of the globe. Derrida’s contribution in this essay is to recognise that, ‘truth’ can be expressed from what Kant calls the ‘barbaric’ regions as well, precisely because of the place philosophy occupies, rather than some special faculty of philosophy to apprehend eternal verities. He also enables us to consider the ways in which philosophy does serve to challenge the pretensions of those disciplines which deem themselves to be place-less, or regard themselves as em-placed in such a way as to simply combine their unique talents to solve a difficult problem.

The essay in one way follows Ranajit Guha’s argument about writing a Subaltern historiography, where he mainly argues against European teleological method of writing History which he feels does not work for the East, so also we see Derrida in a way making space for other philosophies and histories, rather than accepting just one way of looking at it. In this piece Derrida explains Kant’s obsession for a ‘universal element’ in history and philosophy, and how since the Greco-Roman discourse provides for such a narrative which embraces wisdom with a universal appeal, they become the Ideal for him. And as Kant explains that it is in human nature to be unsocial and nature in a way uses this evil force in them to align them into a more social form, to give a meaning to their lives to elaborate on this I quote from the text,

“…Nature makes use of a detour of violence and of primitive, thus natural, unsociability in order to aid reason and thereby put philosophy into operation through the society of nations…”

And this is the reason he gives for the formation of institutions of peace like UNESCO that claim to serve humanity and how these institutions took it to themselves for creating and maintaining a culture of philosophy, whereas the more ‘barbaric’ (as they call it) nations and states needed to affiliate to them in order to devise themselves according to the European apparatus of “Modernity”, because this was the only available path for their resurrection. And one of the most able usages of these modern phenomenons is the creation of the concept of ‘Nations’ by them, because it is through this they devised to show to the East the difference between them and how they bettered. However, Derrida does not delve into discussing this, yet it seems very important for me bring in this borrowed concept of ‘nation’ along with the discussion of ‘Philosophy’ and ‘History’ and also to allow myself to get into some diversions, cause this unquestioned acceptance of Western philosophy as the only ‘philosophy’, and the concept of the ‘nation’ seem to be interrelated in an intangible knot. Now coming back to the concept of institutions, Kant’s argument for a universal history and philosophy to govern all man/ woman-kind seems to me to be based on his gross assumption, whereas Derrida argues that aspiring for an element of universality in any of the two concepts would only make it more like literature, making it open to imagination and fiction, with no grounds on reality.

Derrida explains and extends Kant’s notion of the ‘novel’ in philosophy, as something which does not agree/ accept the universality in philosophy, but Derrida rather suggests that this hope for a universal history/ philosophy is infact like a novel. Because this universalization brings in with itself elements of fiction, as it is nothing other than a gross assumption on behalf of the nations who had not been able to voice themselves.

Derrida then goes on to explain how realizing this danger, of philosophy turning to literature, Kant resorts to idealize the European philosophy and history, holding on to the thread of European history of reason and the Greco-Roman history of history. Derrida all this while argues for a Cosmo-political space for philosophy, but Kant’s resolution of the matter only fixes this Cosmo-political space in the hegemony of Europe. And this fixation then calls for a penetration, a downward movement of knowledge and understanding with Europe at the top, to the Eastern nations at the bottom, and this is what Derrida and his likes object as a problem. For them Philosophy cannot be determined by a program. Philosophy and History the two disciplines over which Europe mainly lays its claim are nothing more than recollections, a memory/ies of the past which has been( I Borrow the terms from the essay) ‘assimilated’ and ‘appropriated’, thus the important awareness that has to and needs to come along with this is that this memory of the events of the past is not and cannot be just one, universal thing.

Towards the end of the essay he makes certain arguments for the various problems that need to be encountered in order to develop the Cosmo-political point of view to the right to philosophy. The three main hindrances that need to be tackled are related to the hegemony created by the existing models of philosophy. For him it is necessary to first take into account the various philosophies arising out of various nations. It also becomes important for one to take into account the two given models of Europe and Anglo-American, but at the same time not take them as the Ideal. Thus, any claims to the right to philosophy from a Cosmo-political point of view needs not only to appropriate these two models but also in order to make the presence of other philosophies felt, deconstruct their hegemony.

Extending the argument further he says, that with the superlative models already available there is a dominance of the respective languages that has come to set in with them, and it is necessary for one to surpass this barrier and the authority language has come to achieve in the discipline of philosophy. Because philosophy cannot be restricted to the structures of language. But the very fact becomes important that with different idioms in play one gets open to different ideas.

And lastly he appeals for institutionalizing all possible philosophies, blurring the edges of nation, language, style etc. because ultimately it is through education and institutions that there is acceptance of things that are new and important. One needs to validate and accept the Eastern philosophies with it having equal heritage.

Derrida claims that what is happening at the present times is an attempt at deconstruction of the existing hegemony, and only with this can there be an emergence of the Cosmo-political philosophy which speaks also in non-European languages. As he says,

“…Not only are there other ways of philosophy, but philosophy, if there is any such thing, is the other way.”

It is true that philosophy cannot be explained tracing it back to anyone origin or memory, one in order to have a Cosmo-political platform for Philosophy, which is the need of the time, needs to amalgamate all the philosophies, only then is there any possible justice to the discipline of Philosophy as such, only then one can begin to create a platform that is available for a discussion of ‘The Right to Philosophy.’