Contemporary Pakistani Art @ Asia Society (NY)

A little over a week ago I had the fortune of visiting the Asia Society’s new exhibit, Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan. I found the works on display, from the likes of Rashid Rana (1, 2) and Zahoor ul-Akhlaq (1, 2), to be provocative and courageous. They tackled issues such as gender, militance and postcolonial mentalities in Pakistan. Above is a great discussion from the exhibit’s opening. Do try to make it to this wonderful exhibit if you are in New York—it runs until January 3rd.

Life, Slowed, Down

 

Ferris Wheel #1

 

As some of you know, I have been pretty sick for the last week. Rather than think of this as a freak occurrence, I would like to think of this last week as a down payment on my academic sanity.

Why, do you ask? In a school environment, there seems to be this itch. This slight discomfort under the skin, the kind you can pick at but not quite reach, a nagging point of ennui. Rather than be perfectly content with the freedom and the support to pursue the study of a particular issue, the choices available and the amount of intellectual production witnessed floors me from time to time. What is my reaction, and that of many of my colleagues? Ratchet up the output, work that much harder, and rack the brain, the library, and any tangential event happening for an idea that is both original and authentic.

Originality is all about living under the idea that this concept, this product starts with me, or you, or George Ferris. This drive for the first-of-a-kind is a positive attribute to a point, but it can drive you up a wall every time you discover another has expressed your idea or developed your concept.

Authenticity is even trickier. How do we produce that which helps us express the truest sense of who we are? Where is the place of our shifting identities (how we are slightly to completely different people with our family, with different friends, with our significant others)? Without certain answers, there’s a shared buy-in at working for authenticity in our lives. Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote that “no man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be true.”

Which brings me to my short-term changed pace of life and its insights. These two goals (originality, authenticity) can’t be rushed. We can’t hope to force that next breakthrough in Islamic historiography or literary theory by brute force. Music, arts and sciences need muses, dreams and interactions that can’t be planned—they just happen in the course of living with an open mind. I’m once again reminded of my course meandering its own way over yet another cup of tea, staring into a quiet night.

It’s My Label!

I would rather not prefer to be a indescribable, nameless entity, but sometimes a person becomes a little fed up with the territoriality and vindictiveness with which people hoard their labels. With every major identity group (e.g. religious, ethnic, racial, gender, sexual orientation, occupation), there are labels used in common parlance to help us drawing at least soft lines say what we are.

There are two aspects of note to this process that are inevitable and ever-frustrating. The first is that our labels are essentially positive labels; we define ourselves as who we are, rather than who we are not. So “I am a Christian”, “I am European”, or “I am an academic” are common statements of identity. Taking this construct to one of its natural conclusions, of the most psychologically jarring things someone can go through is involuntary being labeled as non-what-they-think-they-are. I would venture to call this identity excommunication: as with the religious version, its comes with all of the fun shaming, exclusion, and boxing.

The other process is comparing the ideal that a particular label represents and what its various manifestations in reality. If I were a perfect x-religionist, I would magically have insight into the interstitial meaning in scripture, the history of discourse on faith and practice, and all points of ambiguity would dissipate with my footsteps. If I were a perfect x-ethnicity, I would have a deep and wide understanding of my mother tongue, I would understand regional cultural vernaculars, and I would be able to make references to classical artistic expression in my culture relatively easily. If I were a perfect x-worker, I would know the office lingo, the human resources manual as well as exactly where the rules could be bent, and my career would be an incarnation of best practices. The reality is always short of the ideal, and claiming the mantle of “a true such-and-such” is dangerous, and dangerously common.

I think back to a time before people had last names, and where people of multiple talents were not highly specialized into efficient occupational groups. But alas, I live the labels I choose, and I would be loathe to let others exclude me.