Professor Mukherjee, the head of a department and advisor to student groups when I was once a student, lived a life full of privilege, in the deeply held belief that he was intellectually and culturally superior and therefore, should rightfully command respect from his students. Professor Mukherjee was a special breed of Professors, Professors that came from well-to-do upper caste, upper class Bengali families in Kolkata to the small town.Many of these Professors came from Bengali Zamindari families and they ensured that the town knew of their Zamindari lineage. Professor Mukherjee's sense of superiority was embedded in his long-ingrained sense of Brahminical privilege, mixed in with a sense of ownership of high culture. In the faith that he was the chosen one, that his was the job of protecting the aesthetic aspirations of the academy, Professor Mukherjee made sure that he performed the task of extracting respect from his students. His studied seriousness formed the
This blog offers Mohan Dutta's reflections on the theoretical framework of the culture-centered approach, examining the interplays among Structure, Culture, and Agency in shaping marginalisation and the ways in which communities at the margins challenge structures. Writings on the blog are continually being revised to reflect the organic analysis of structure and agency.