In this podcast, Francesca Recchia sits down with Helidah Ogude Chambert to discuss the racism and xenophobia inherent in the United Kingdom’s immigration policies, where it stems from and which communities are particularly vulnerable to it and why.The Polis Project

Suchitra Vijayan in conversation with Elizabeth Baer about her book "The Genocidal Gaze."The first genocide of the twentieth century, though not well known, was committed by Germans between 1904–1907 in the country we know today as Namibia, where they exterminated hundreds of Herero and Nama people and subjected the surviving indigenous men, women,…

Suchitra Vijayan speaks to Darren Byler about his book Terror Capitalism: Uyghur Dispossession and Masculinity in a Chinese City. In Terror Capitalism anthropologist Darren Byler theorizes the contemporary Chinese colonization of the Uyghur Muslim minority group in the northwest autonomous region of Xinjiang. He shows that the mass detention of ove…

Twenty years after the Gujarat pogrom, Suchitra Vijayan speaks to Zahir Janmohamed about the moment, his experience on the ground and his work since. The conversation delves into the deep seated anti-Muslim sentiment in India and looks for ways to heal. The conversation was originally held as a Twitter Space session.…

In this conversation, Urvi Khaitan sits down with Mytheli Sreenivas to discuss her book, "Reproductive Politics and the Making of Modern India'. The book explores colonial administrators, postcolonial development experts, nationalists, eugenicists, feminists, and family planners all aimed to reform reproduction to transform both individual bodies a…

In this conversation, Suchitra Vijayan speaks to Arvind Narrain about his book India's Undeclared Emergency: Constitutionalism and the Politics of Resistance. They touch upon the provisions in the constitution that have been interpreted to shove India into an unofficial emergency situation, reflect on how this compares to India's emergency of the 1…

In this conversation with Francesca Recchia, Pakistani activist Ahmad Waqas Goraya speaks about the repercussions facing those who dare to criticize the military establishment in Pakistan, his own personal encounter with the institution and the subsequent experience of torture and exile.The Polis Project

Francesca Recchia speaks to Ashley Jackson about her book Negotiating Survival: Civilian–Insurgent Relations in Afghanistan.Based on over 400 interviews with Taliban and civilians, this book tells the story of how civilians have not only bargained with the Taliban for their survival, but also ultimately influenced the course of the war in Afghanist…

Suchitra Vijayan sits down with author Jessica Namakkal to discuss her book "Unsettling Utopia". The book presents a new account of the history of twentieth-century French India to show how colonial projects persisted beyond formal decolonization. Through the experience of the French territories, Namakkal recasts the relationships among colonizatio…

Suchitra Vijayan speaks to Prasanna S. about data privacy in India, the state's use of the Pegasus spyware to surveil voices of dissent and what it means for civil rights in the country. The discussion was originally held on Twitter Spaces.The Polis Project

Francesca Recchia speaks to Adrian Levy, co-author of The Forever Prisoner: The Full and Searing Account of the CIA’s Most Controversial Covert Program. Based on four years of intensive reporting, on interviews with key protagonists who speak candidly for the first time, and on thousands of previously classified documents, The Forever Prisoner is a…

In this podcast, Francesca Recchia speaks to Hassan Javid about the decision to introduce electronic voting machines in Pakistan for the general elections to be held in 2023. Javid explores the circumstances under which the legislation was passed, the viability of the plan and its impact on electoral transparency given the history of military inter…

In this podcast, Francesca Recchia sits down with Abbas Nasir to discuss the rapidly deteriorating press freedoms in Pakistan. They discuss the Pakistan military's intervention into the news media industry, news outlets that provide regular platform to state propaganda and the hope for the future.Abbas Nasir is a former editor of Pakistan's English…

In this episode, Suchitra Vijayan sits down with Dinesh Narayanan to discuss the formation of the RSS, its links with the BJP, its role in violence and the distortion of history to create role models out of RSS figures like V.D Savarkar.The Polis Project

In this episode, Suchitra Vijayan sits down with Abhishek Saha to discuss the xenophobic rhetoric around issues of migration and citizenship. What does belonging to a land look like? How is the way we imagine citizenship inherently violent? And how do state negligence and ill-intent come together to deny someone their right of existence in their ho…

In this episode, Francesca Recchia is in conversation with Reem Khurshid, a political cartoonist and illustrator based in Karachi.Reem Khurshid recently collaborated with Justice Project Pakistan to illustrate their latest project "Who is the murderer?" The project is an interactive fictional story surrounding the mystery of a murder, a subsequent …

In this episode, Francesca Recchia is in conversation with Mohammad Hanif, a fiction writer and journalist based in Karachi.Mohammad Hanif, an acclaimed name in South Asian literary circles, often uses fiction to reflect upon realities oft forgotten in the privileged mainstream. In this conversation, Hanif delves into reasons that motivate him to c…

In this episode, Francesca Recchia is in conversation with Fatima Zaidi, a journalist, activist and member of the Karachi Bachao Tehreek.Karachi Bachao Tehreek is a grassroots coalition of lawyers and activists who are concerned about the sustainability of the development projects in the city. They work in collaboration with community leaders in th…

In this episode, Francesca Recchia is in conversation with Arif Hasan, an architect, urban historian and activist from Karachi. Looking at the recent anti-encroachment drives that have targeted vulnerable communities the city, Hasan details how Karachi changed from a bustling multi-ethnic city after Independence to one blatantly favoring upper clas…

In this episode, Francesca Recchia is in conversation with Sandi Hilal on her project “The Living Room.” Reflecting on her experiences with refugees in Boden, North Sweden, Dr Hilal speaks of the passivity and agency of refugee lives and cultures as they navigate the manifestly European distinctions of the public and private space. How do refugees …

In this episode, Suchitra Vijayan is in conversation with Dr. Deana Heath about her book Colonial Terror. Focusing on India between the early nineteenth century and the First World War, Colonial Terror explores the centrality of the torture of Indian bodies to the law-preserving violence of colonial rule and some of the ways in which extraordinary …

This is the final conversation of this four-part series.Photographer and educator Rishi Singhal reflects on teaching photography and visual practice to a new generation of artists and practitioners who are committed to producing and creating socially relevant bodies of work. Music: Architect by Blue Dot Sessions (Creative Commons License)…

This is the third conversation of a four part series.Photographer and filmmaker Laura Saunders discusses her work on the US / Mexico Borderlands, by interrogating the multifaceted histories of migration; and the colonial violence of the border as a site that produces narratives of criminality. Laura is documenting the construction of the Mountain V…

This is the second conversation of a four-part series. Sinthujan Varatharajah is a political geographer, essayist, and researcher based in Berlin. Their work focuses on geographies of displacement and statelessness. In this conversation, they discuss the relationship between spatial politics, geographies of power, and statelessness. Music: Architec…

This is the first conversation of a four part series.Bombay-based photographer and author of The Red Cat and Other Stories Ritesh Uttamchandani and Suchitra Vijayan discuss her book Midnight’s Borders, as a continuation of their decade-long conversation about history, memory, and photography.Music: Architect by Blue Dot Sessions (Creative Commons L…

Last year, the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing had filed a lawsuit against Cisco on the grounds that a Dalit employee had been severely discriminated against by his ‘upper’ caste supervisors. While the US does not specifically have laws against caste discrimination, the California government used sections of the historic Civil …

In this conversation, The Polis Project’s Suchitra Vijayan discusses Prof. Craig Jones's recent book The War Lawyers: The United States, Israel, and Juridical Warfare. Over the last 20 years, the world's most advanced militaries have invited a small number of military legal professionals into the heart of their targeting operations and spaces that …

In 1964, Malcolm X wrote, “There is no system more corrupt than a system that represents itself as the example of freedom, the example of democracy, and can go all over this earth telling other people how to straighten out their house when you have citizens of this country who have to use bullets if they want to cast ballots.”Fifty-seven years late…

Since September, thousands of farmers have been protesting the new laws that aim to deregulate Indian agriculture.They have clearly stated that these neo-liberal laws will dismantle safeguards, create greater instability, severely affect their livelihoods, and put the country's food security at risk. While simultaneously creating an opportunity for…

Madhuri Sastry, freelance writer and the Marketing Director at Guernica magazine, hosts The Polis Project’s roundtable discussion “Leaders they want; leaders of nobody". Vice President-elect Kamala Harris is the first Black woman, and the first person of Indian descent to occupy this lofty position. While it is a moment of pride for Black and Brown…

For each episode of 5 Objects, we ask a guest to choose five pieces or items that have influenced their intellectual life and work. These can be books, art, music, poetry, photographs, performance, a person, an event, or an experience. The choices of objects have ranged from books by Edward Said, Steve Biko, and Assata Shakur, music from Notorious …

In 2015 columnist Katie Hopkins published a piece in the British tabloid sun calling African migrants “cockroaches.” Ms. Hopkins is not alone.Speaking at election rallies in 2018, Amit Shah, India's Minister of Home Affairs, called Bangladeshi migrants “termites.” Shah’s spiteful rhetoric echoes authoritarian leaders, genocidaires, and war criminal…

In this podcast, Francesca Rechhia talks to Prof. Nosheen Ali, a Pakistani sociologist, author, and activist about the state of education in Gilgit-Baltistan, the threats to activism, and the influence of the military. Ali is a part of the Global Faculty in Residence at New York University's Gallatin School of Indivualized Studies. She works and wr…

Every Wednesday, leading up to the American Presidential elections, The Polis Project will host activists, organizers, writers, reporters, and progressive voices as a part of our Politics Podcast. They don’t just tell you what happened. They inform you of the issues, policies, and legislation that matter to their communities, beyond the headlines. …

Every Wednesday, leading up to the American Presidential elections, The Polis Project will host activists, organizers, writers, reporters, and progressive voices as a part of our Politics Podcast. They don’t just tell you what happened. They inform you of the issues, policies, and legislation that matter to their communities, beyond the headlines. …

Every Wednesday, leading up to the American Presidential elections, The Polis Project will host activists, organizers, writers, reporters, and progressive voices as a part of our Politics Podcast. They don’t just tell you what happened. They inform you of the issues, policies, and legislation that matter to their communities, beyond the headlines. …

Suchitra Vijayan in conversation with Prof. Romila Thapar about her new book "Voices of Dissent" and the history of dissent in India.The Polis Project

Every Wednesday, leading up to the American Presidential elections, The Polis Project will host activists, organizers, writers, reporters, and progressive voices as a part of our Politics Podcast. They don’t just tell you what happened. They inform you of the issues, policies, and legislation that matter to their communities, beyond the headlines. …

In this conversation, The Polis Project's Suchitra Vijayan and Vasundhara Sirnate, discuss Prof. Ravinder Kaur's new book Brand New Nation: Capitalist Dreams and Nationalist Designs in Twenty-First-Century India. Prof Kaur walks us through the transformation of the Indian nation-state into a neoliberal business enterprise and theorizes the process …

Earlier this year, Citizens Against Hate (CAH), a Delhi based collective, published “Everyone has been Silenced”: a comprehensive report on UP violence and its aftermath. In this episode of The Polis Project Conversation Series, Suchitra Vijayan discusses the report and places the violence in the context of institutional bias against the Muslim com…

Suchitra Vijayan speaks to the philosopher Olúfẹ́mi O Táíwò, Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Georgetown University. He completed his Ph.D. at the University of California, Los Angeles. Before that, he completed BAs in Philosophy and Political Science at Indiana University.His theoretical work draws liberally from German transcendental philosop…

“Consistent resistance” and the peaceful struggle for equality of the Pashtun Tahafuz-Movement by The Polis ProjectThe Polis Project

On dissent, building transversal solidarity and nurturing the will of the people: A conversation with Ammar Ali JanThe Polis Project

Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declared the "The Emergency" on 25 June 1975. It lasted for 21 month period from 1975 to 1977. This period is often referred to as the dark period and an aberration in India’s recent history. What if the emergency was not an aberration, instead it was an event that grew out of existing political traditions, histo…

A nation needs its anthems, flags, soldiers, and statues. But, the function of the writer is something else. Writers are the ones who capture the conflict, the dissonance, and often the lies we are constantly told over and over again. We’re all living through a remarkable moment, especially for many of us in South Asia, particularly in India. As we…

Francesca Recchia in conversation with Francesca Mannocchi. Francesca Mannocchi is a freelance journalist who covers migration and conflicts and contributes to numerous Italian and international newspapers (L'Espresso, Stern, Al Jazeera English, The Guardian, The Observer). She has produced reports in Syria, Iraq, Palestine, Libya, Lebanon, Afghani…

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