Lifted by the unfettered hubris of helium, a balloon rises ponderously, meeting little resistance in its upward ascent... The smallest needle, with the slightest prick to the taught rubber membrane and... Pop! “What do you get out of this? School credit or something, right?” asked Roy toward the end of our interview. We were sitting outside a building on campus on an unseasonably warm and sunny day. The trees were all blooming pretty white flowers that smelled like decaying ass. “Yeah,” I replied matter of factly, “I do get credit for the course, and gain experience in doing interviews from talking with you about these kinds of things. But...” and I briefly went into the longer-term objective of the food insecurity project to help develop solutions with problems in getting food to the hungry. As I described this I felt the stinging discomfort from his probing of my academic motives fade away, and wondered if this was a sign of working through my positionality or the a...
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.