#Podcasts are current day oral archives. I am really petrified of amazing conversations which find a safe space in the realm of the digital, being lost in the absence of well thought out knowledge management frameworks especially in South Asia and the Gulf.

It would be generative to have good ones transcribed and edited into books. Knowledge production and dissemination is faster via podcasts. Atleast as raw data, they are fertile fodder for theory building, if not only for spreading the word aka PR.

I write everyday on social media, which is a never ending book; why should i go to a publisher? : @shekharkapur on @JLFLitfest on immersive non linear story telling. True, if one has the reach and the monetisation strategy – why pander to pompous lit agents?

Spatial Politics and Transient Migrant Workers in Global City Singapore’ talk at the LSE by Prof Brenda Yeoh, Raffles Professor of Social Sciences at the Department of Geography at the National University of Singapore.

Tuas View dormitory was mentioned, where i have been on research in 2016, many a time- a mega dorm. This is a different sort of a Global City Singapore.

This was one heck of a panel discussion on Desi Khaleeji: Transnational Subjects, Transitory Homelands with 5 other co panelists including Sana Quadri. Shukran Jazeelan Vani Saraswathi and Mira Al Hussein for the organising and the invite. Thank you to friends who joined in!

Saturday evenings are transnational and digital.

The recording will be shared later.

#DesiKhaleeji#Gulf#Migrants

The field trip to Geylang, the legal red light district of Singapore revealed many layers to the neighborhood. The tour facilitator Mr. Cai is a 30 year social entrepreneur who made the right connections at multiple levels from sex work to a slice of migrant life. The trip with fellow theorists and senior scholars was a unique experience. Having been a researcher in Singapore for many years, this was a great lens to view the city beyond the brand. The subaltern is also transnational in Singapore.

Getting better each day is a contact sport.
Fall, and get back to fight again.

For all the data first thinking, the data is often situated in context 🙂

It is not content, it is research, writing and art. Content is for SEO algorithms, not for insightful impact.

The problem with migrant narratives about the Khaleej, is people who grow up in the region are always imagining an exit due to the ‘structural transience’ (channelizing Shah on multigenerational migrants in Kuwait), which leaves a void for western tourist visa academics to carve the stories for us. I wish more muwateen write as well, along with kharjees.

The charm of the digital nature of tech vis-à-vis climate change and healthcare is the ability to solve problems through the creation of products which can be paid for. I think the key for the diffusion of anything is the formation of a product in an unit of ‘exchange value’.

The ability to circulate in a network and make money along the way is the key whether it is a thought system or a solution.