Mohan Dutta: Culture-Centered Approach

Author: Mohan J. Dutta ( Mohan Dutta is Dean's Chair Professor at Massey University ) The far-right's targeting of academics has gained exponential momentum with the rise of authoritarian populism . From fascist Hindutva politics to white supremacy to far-right Zionism , the targeting of academics through disinformation-based hate campaigns drives both political markets and profits. These campaigns, building up and amplifying conspiracy theories , are largely funded by dark money , and mobilized through astroturfs , think tanks , and media influencers  (digital).  The power of the disinformation campaigns is held up by the networked structure , generating swarms , mobilizing   email campaigns and complaints targeting academics . Such swarm-based campaigns are accompanied by wild conspiracy theories , propaganda messages inciting violence, death threats and rape threats . Having experienced the targeted attacks of the far right across the three key drivers of disin...

This opinion piece is the third of a five-part series on the intertwined webs of the far right mobilised to attack communication and media studies pedagogy. This piece is written in solidarity with other Communication and Media Studies academics, researchers, and practitioners who have been targeted by the far-right.  The Far-Right wants to cancel Communication and Media Studies. The entire discipline. Yes, you read it right, the entire discipline! A platform titled "The Centrist" published the article, "Abolish communications and media studies (Karl du Fresne)," opening with: "Writer Karl du Fresne says abolishing the department of communications and media studies at every university will vastly ease the financial crisis of those unis while neutralising a key source of division in the culture wars." This irrational rant would be comical if not for the violence such rhetoric promotes, the direct effects of which are experienced by academics , particularl...

Planting and circulating disinformation is one of the key strategies of the far right.  Disinformation propels hate, often through the juxtaposition of information.  Juxtaposition in the context of disinformation places two pieces of information side-by-side, creating a frame that seeds doubt, manufactures ulterior motivations that seemingly drive the target of the hate, and places a label on the target.  In the attacks launched by Hindutva on me, my scholarship, and the work of CARE, I have witnessed closely the ways in which juxtaposition is deployed to create false frames, which are key ingredients in the mobilization of hate. Globally, we witness the deployment of juxtaposition by Hindutva trolls to target academics , activists , communities , and other dissenting voices .  The violence of Hindutva both online and offline, both in India and in the Indian diaspora, draws upon the strategic creation of frames that cast the targeted person as "anti-Hindu" " Hindupho...

  As a social scientist studying the effects of oppressive practices on the health and wellbeing of communities at the margins, I am struck by the ways in which power organizes to silence our scholarship. Voices of communities at the margins articulating their experiences of health, situating these experiences of health in relationship to the organizing of oppressive structures, and organizing to resist these structures threaten both economic and political power.  Power, therefore, resorts to a wide array of strategies to silence scholarship.  It does so through a wide array of communicative strategies that include fabricating lies, planting erroneous artifacts as evidence, deploying communicative inversions, and weaponizing offline-online networks to carry out attacks on academics. In the context of the authoritarian regime, power is threatened when voices of households negotiating poverty or voices of migrant workers foreground the exploitative conditions of work and li...

This is one recognition that is the closest to my heart, and I cherish it dearly.  The award citation states: "We are pleased to present this year’s B. Aubrey Fisher Mentorship Award to Dr. Mohan J. Dutta. The multitude of voices represented in his nomination praised his mentorship as characterized by a selfless spirit, a principle of committed care, a nurturing approach to working with his students, and a deep commitment to social justice. These voices conveyed genuine appreciation for helping them navigate the obstacles and hierarchies frequently encountered in the academy, and they expressed gratitude for his gentle guidance in helping them see the importance of their work in helping those in communities outside of academics. As his nomination states, “The discipline is more inclusive today, to a large part because of Mohan’s tireless advocacy. Mohan’s courage in questioning consistently disciplinary #Whiteness is one of most powerful testimonies to his mentorship. This mentor...

For anyone that has been to a Durga Puja in Singapore, the account I offer here is both familiar and often accepted as normative.  Durga Puja is a celebration of Bengalis, a five-day festival that celebrates the victory of the Goddess Durga over Mahishashura (the asuras are synonimized with evil) in upper caste Hindu narrative (inverting the narrative of violence carried out by upper caste Hindus over the indigenous peoples, as voiced in Santali narratives of the festival). In Bengal, Durga Puja is celebrated over a period of five days although the preparations for the festivities take place often over two months. The celebrations of the Durga Puja in Singapore take place in two distinct registers, narrativizing the trajectories through which caste and class in the Bengali context travel through Singapore.  The puja of the expatriate, upper caste, upper class Hindu Bengalis, mostly from West Bengal (henceforth referred to as expat), and the puja of the working class Bengali mi...