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Wednesday December 04, 2024
Aziz Ali Dad
Aziz Ali Dad

  • February 20, 2019

    From keywords to passwords

    Raymond Williams is an important figure in cultural history and the history of ideas. He was in Cambridge University in the 1930s, and joined the...

  • November 19, 2018

    A candle in the dark

    Since the dawn of civilisation, ideas about demons and evil forces have occupied the human mind. It is this preoccupation with demonic forces that...

  • October 31, 2018

    Truth and the media

    Asia encompasses diverse countries and regions – in terms of religion, culture, language, ethnicity and history. However, the region has remained...

  • October 15, 2018

    Memory and cultural psychiatry

    The writer is a fellow of Asia Leadership Fellow Program, Tokyo, Japan.T S Eliot in his poem ‘The Wasteland’ deals with the theme of memory and...

  • September 27, 2018

    Nomads of knowledge

    Edward Said was one of the seminal public intellectuals in the post-colonial period who gave a voice to forgotten voices and suppressed histories...

  • August 22, 2018

    The desert of the real

    The year 1991 is remembered for the disintegration of the Soviet Union; the end of the cold war; the Gulf War; and the triumph of the liberal...

  • June 13, 2018

    Hegemony and its malaise

    Human society is different from biological organisms or animal kingdoms because the former cannot be explained through universal laws, whereas the...

  • May 06, 2018

    Economic geology of CPEC: Part - II

    The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor did not appear in a historical vacuum, but rather emerged from the womb of historical continuum. Building upon...

  • May 05, 2018

    Economic geology of CPEC

    Like other parts of High Asia, the region of Gilgit-Baltistan has also served as a pivotal link between Central and South Asia for centuries....

  • March 19, 2018

    The struggle with suicide

    Gilgit-Baltistan forms a single cultural unit because of its shared geography, historical memory and collective unconsciousness. The cohabitation...

  • February 28, 2018

    Impediments to philosophy

    The 20th century was unique because of the drastic changes and ruptures it witnessed in every sphere of life, including knowledge. It seems that...

  • February 14, 2018

    The insanity of sanity in Gilgit-Baltistan

    The Ghizer district in Gilgit-Baltistan is in the local media’s limelight, and one of the most favourite topics for researchers nowadays is the...

  • January 13, 2018

    The zone of nonbeing

    Since October 2017, Gilgit-Baltistan has witnessed massive protests against the imposition of taxes in the region by the government of Pakistan. The...

  • November 19, 2017

    Poetic madness and modernity

    The 140th birth anniversary of Allama Muhammed Iqbal saw many articles and essays being published in national dailies about the different facets of...

  • October 22, 2017

    Obscurantism and extremism

    Ibne Insha in his famous book ‘Urdu ki aakhri kitab’ explained the state of affairs in Pakistan through the metaphor of a circle. He...

  • October 11, 2017

    Manufacturing ignorance

    The Enlightenment was among the turning points in the history of thought that emancipated the mind from theological reason, teleology and the...

  • September 13, 2017

    From the Great Game to the game-changer

    Gilgit-Baltistan has historically remained at the peripheries of the power centres of Central Asia and South Asia. This relative isolation enabled...

  • August 23, 2017

    Perils of cultural alienation

    The culture of Gilgit-Baltistan has evolved over the centuries within a mental framework or worldview that is unique to the region. Likewise, the...

  • July 17, 2017

    The sectarian spectre in Gilgit-Baltistan: Part IV

    Sectarian differences were politicised in Gilgit-Baltistan for the first time in the election of the erstwhile Northern Areas Council in 1988. The...

  • July 15, 2017

    The sectarian spectre in Gilgit-Baltistan: Part III

    An important development during General Ziaul Haq’s period was the opening of the Karakoram Highway in 1979. The route connects...

  • July 13, 2017

    The sectarian spectre in Gilgit-Baltistan

    Part - II Though there was no serious confrontation between different sects in Gilgit-Baltistan during the British period, there were latent...

  • July 11, 2017

    The sectarian spectre in Gilgit-Baltistan: Part - I

    Part - I The issue of sectarian violence in Gilgit-Baltistan cannot be analysed through an idealised view that tends to paint the region as an...

  • June 07, 2017

    Sanity and suicide

    The society of Gilgit-Baltistan is on the cusp of change. It is under the influence of various forces, which are both internal and external, and a...

  • May 07, 2017

    A flight from thinking

    In today’s world, we cannot aspire for the kind of freedom enjoyed by Greek philosophers who remained independent from the necessities and...

  • April 19, 2017

    Psychopathology of violence

    There is gainsaying the fact that religious militant groups in Pakistan have turned the country into a sanguinary place – with common citizens...

  • April 11, 2017

    The abyss gazes back

    Since 9/11, the relationship between the Urdu media and the radicalisation of Pakistani society has become a burning question for the Pakistani...

  • March 07, 2017

    Pushing language to the margins

    The issue of official languages has remained a major irritant for the state in Pakistan from the outset. Since the state operates under a monolithic...

  • February 14, 2017

    The making of a witch

    Witches are believed to be creatures who live among human beings as representatives of evil spirits in human form. Since the dawn of civilisation,...

  • December 18, 2016

    Cultural ambivalence in Gilgit-Baltistan

    Humans are the only living beings that have succeeded in overcoming the limits imposed by instinct. This has helped them develop a worldview that...

  • November 27, 2016

    The great torpor

    In Pakistan, those who love wisdom are almost extinct. Gone are the days when the country had conferences on philosophy and engagements with...

  • October 09, 2016

    Provincialising Rumi

    Important events in history not only change the course of the future, but also bring about a change in our outlook towards the characters and ideas...

  • September 07, 2016

    Imitation and limitations of liberalism

    Untimely meditations In the aftermath of 9/11, the question about the compatibility of Islam with modernity, or to be precise liberalism, has...

  • August 03, 2016

    Intellectual senility and emerging reality

    Untimely medit3ations Over the last four decades social, cultural, economic and political developments in Pakistan has become so complex that...

  • June 05, 2016

    Infrastructure of fear

    Untimely meditations On the heels of the recently proposed bill by the Council of Islamic Ideology regarding permission for a husband to lightly...

  • May 22, 2016

    Culture affinity and borders

    Untimely meditations The process of state building in Pakistan has not followed a uniform policy; rather it is necessitated by contingent needs...

  • March 13, 2016

    Colonial transactions in Gilgit-Baltistan

    Untimely meditations For the last few months, news about making Gilgit-Baltistan a province of Pakistan has been making the rounds. This...

  • October 22, 2015

    Leap of a closed mind

    Untimely meditationsWith the end of the cold war and the triumph of liberalism over socialism there were high hopes that the world would enter the...

  • August 05, 2015

    A sadistic narrative

    Untimely meditations

  • June 12, 2015

    Sources of the self

    Part - IIIUntimely meditationsThe contours of the discourse on self, state and society started to change under the influence of different ideologies...

  • June 11, 2015

    Sources of the self

    Part - IIUntimely meditationsAlthough Sir Sayyed appropriated modernity to create a modern Muslim self, he compromised its purity in the process....

  • June 10, 2015

    Sources of the self

    Part - I...Untimely meditations

  • May 17, 2015

    Gilgit-Baltistan and the New Great Game

    Untimely meditationsThe famous Silk Route has witnessed many vicissitudes for more than two millennia. This route was disrupted many times because...

  • April 22, 2015

    Boundaries and identities in High Asia

    Untimely meditations

  • March 18, 2015

    Art in post-normal times

    Untimely meditationsIn the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, different states and societies resorted to various methods to curb terrorism and violence,...

  • January 29, 2015

    Violence and vilification

    Untimely meditationsIt is a strange irony of history that in the age of communication revolution dialogue has been replaced by monologue and the...

  • January 03, 2015

    Earth alienation

    Untimely meditationsAny major development in the field of science and the world of ideas leaves an indelible mark on the course of history and human...