Mohan Dutta: Culture-Centered Approach

We have now said our goodbyes Comrade. Our fists raised, pointing to the skies, we say our goodbyes, our heads held high, so immensely proud of the journey you have traversed. In gratitude that we traversed some of this journey together, that you taught me the first lessons of performance work. Lessons you taught us will stay forever, deep in our hearts. Lessons of justice. Lessons of change. Lessons of the transformative power of culture work. In the working class struggles, in the feminist struggles of women within the Left, in the street theaters and revolutionary plays, in the echos of the songs of change, you will forever stay. That revolutionary song that we so often performed with "the waves will rise, the prisons will break" will forever seed the hopes of a revolutionary future. That you were my pishimoni, my aunt, my teacher, the anchor to my journey in performance work, will stay with the journey ahead.  Your teaching, "the difficulty does not mat...

In July 2019, when the Communication Studies discipline imploded, with the inner workings of the discipline rendered visible because of the decision of the leadership of the National Communication Association (NCA) to change how Distinguished Scholars of the discipline are selected and the subsequent backlash from the discipline's Distinguished Scholars, a number of us, scholars of colour, critically interrogated the racist ideology that forms the infrastructure of Communication Studies. I had responded with a series of blog posts , arguing that not only do scholars of colour have to excel many times over, but we also have to bear the pain of living through unequal structures. Much of our labour is erased, written off, denigrated. Our work is labeled as activist to delegitimize it. Our voices are framed as angry to undermine our concerns at the racism that inhabits the cellular structures of our disciplines, institutions, and organizations. When we speak out, we are targeted, ...