The generalists, realists, sentimentalists, cocksurists, dogmatists, and even (the worthy) specialists. They all have their 'methodology'. And then, there are a handful few who obsess only & only about The Os in Anthropology (#TOIA). Ohs.

#TOIA (The Os in Anthropology) --- SynTalk Album

Do you hate beggars? Can one think of the above-below topography using both perspective as well as relationality? Is there an invisibilisation and dispersal of the hegemons? What does it mean to be at the very bottom? Is there a social responsibility of capital? Why does the below always have a hidden character, & why is there no giving of dignity to a full corporeal person? Why does a musahar woman own a broken-up dis-assembled bicycle? Are we as a society actively at war against the destitute – why? Are we actively creating destitution (& dispossession)? Is there always a dialectic unity between prosperity and misery? Who is the primary client of the state? How do you view taxes? Do we need to identify with the below? Is it possible to lose the above below through a new imaginary? What are the limits of solidarity? Is solidarity expensive? Why do moral arguments have so little traction? What is the universe of those with whom we are willing to share? Why are there The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas? It’s all the same people, right? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions, about destitution in a general sense, using concepts from human rights (Harsh Mander, New Delhi), social anthropology (Prof. Shalini Randeria, The Graduate Institute, Geneva), and social theory & literature (Prof. Kumkum Sangari, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Milwaukee). Listen in....

#TVFB (The View From Below) --- SynTalk

Do you have others working for you? Is the need to work a curse? Or, is work life? Does work establish the relationship between the ‘body’ and nature, economy & society? Do we realize and socialize ourselves via work? Are work and leisure complementary (but only when work is socially configured)? What is leisure for the self employed? How & why is much of production ancillarized? Why are most jobs made idiot-proof? Is a life with only short-term flexible jobs meaningless? Can we, then, have an automatic society (where there is no need to work)? Was the labour in the 19th century more specialized than now? Also, is labour today recruited in a manner very different from (say) in the 19th century? Is much of work always defined by the demands of (mutable) capital? However, is capital neutral to how work is organized? What impact does this then have on personhood and morality? Should survival be contingent on the ability to work? Why is there a collapse globally of the working class? What is the future of jobs, and does this depend on the interrelationship between society and economy? How might (the non-economic) social labour be configured? &, might society be conceptualized as a factory? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from critical theory (Prof. Ranabir Samaddar, Calcutta Research Group, Kolkata), & social anthropology (Prof. A. R. Vasavi, ex-NIAS, Bangalore). Listen in....

#TNTW (The Need To Work) --- SynTalk

Why don’t you help all your relatives? Why do people marry? Do you know your pedigree? Can relatedness be measured or recognized with precision? Are close relatives the best organ donors? Who guarantees your loans? Who can the closest relative be? Do four first cousins equal one sibling? Would altruism evolve in the absence of kinship? Does the environment impact the benefit/cost of helping? Can organisms self reproduce? Is it possible for males to have neither a father nor a son? Do all off-springs have mothers? Do plants have relatives? Is incest prohibition the Universal Law of Kinship? Is there an elementary unit of kinship? Is outbreeding a ‘superior’ natural selection method? Does a certain kind of exchange economy and an idea of ‘difference’ emerge with marriage? Do phases of a-/sexual reproduction (equivalent to in-/outbreeding?) alternate in certain cultures and species? What is a joint family? Are identical twins clones? C/would we clone ourselves in the future? Does marriage have a great future? Would kinship stay relevant in the long run? If yes, where would it begin? In the petri dish…? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from sociobiology & ecology (Prof. Raghavendra Gadagkar, IISc, Bangalore), statistical genetics (Prof. Partha Pratim Majumder, ISI, Kolkata), & social anthropology (Prof. Deepak Mehta, Shiv Nadar University, Greater Noida). Listen in....

#TKAK (The Kith And Kin) --- SynTalk

Do you have a pain of 9? Do you malinger? 'Where' does it hurt, & when? Do you want to be admitted to a hospital? Do you want attention? Are you suffering from loneliness? Do you need morphine? Is pain subjective, & always multidimensional? Is the brain always a part of any pain experience? Is pain a disease? How can it be assessed? Can there be patients without diseases, and diseases without patients? Can groups experience pain? Is treating the pain different from treating the disease? Do only pain killers relieve pain? How does pain reinforce itself? Can social or economic or political problems be redressed at hospitals? How does torture work? Why do we suffer? Is our body socially constructed? Do you go to the gym? Can pain be addictive? Are inequality and pain really connected? Could changing the nature of work reduce pain in the world? Can self hypnosis work for unrelenting chronic pain? Might a woman’s endometrial pain (say) (sometimes) be called illegitimate, & why? What is the purpose of pain? Can one understand one’s own and others' pain via art or religion? Can pain be blocked off permanently? &, should one desire a pain free world as a right? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from palliative care (Prof. Mary Ann Muckaden, Tata Memorial Centre, Mumbai), sociology (Prof. Harish Naraindas, JNU, New Delhi), & history (Dr. Benjamin R. Siegel, Boston University, Massachusetts). Listen in....

#TKOP (The Kinds Of Pain) --- SynTalk

Can inequality kill you? Are poorer brains smaller? Is poverty (= inequality + deprivation) the mother of all diseases? Do the rich lead shorter lives in unequal countries? (Why) does Law, with its attempted neutrality, often criminalize poverty? How is theft by a rich person different? Can/should the State demand actions off the poor for them to access ‘benefits’? Is providing opportunity enough, or must inequality of agency also always be addressed? Would you drink water from any well? Are there economic benefits of having a socially cohesive society? Does our brain respond to the environment more than any other body part? Why are the poor kids in schools often not learning? Should poverty be defined within the context of communities (& not externally)? What do all the poor have in common? How can policy account for the heterogeneity of responses by different people to any given situation? However, can the poor be thought of as mere individuals? Can deprivation be eradicated in the future? Can striving for short term equality lead to long term efficiency? Must all children be fed and loved? Must every story be heard…? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from psychiatry (Prof. Vikram Patel, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts), economics (Dr. Vijayendra Rao, The World Bank, Washington DC), & law (Dr. Anup Surendranath, National Law University (NLU), Delhi). Listen in…

#TIOP (The Implications Of Poverty) --- SynTalk

Is it nonsensical to think that suffering is a part of the ‘human condition’? Are you a passive victim? Can you easily be more or less of yourself? Who suffers? Do we suffer because we are highly (self) conscious creatures? Are you forced to engage with the everyday? Does suffering have a duration, and can we live purely (& independently) in the present? Is violence inevitable in all lives? Can one voluntarily incur suffering? Does being a victim have any moral consequences? Can sacrifice be practised narcissistically? Is sacrifice a way of taking violence, and turning it inwards? Does everyone have something to sacrifice? Do those who do not suffer lead shallow lives? Do human beings differ in the amounts they suffer? Do you decide generically? Can the underprivileged be moral heroes, & when? Why does fasting-unto-death sometimes work? Are language and suffering very closely connected? How can one suffer better? Is vulnerability (or the performance of it) potentially a political force? Is a moral life fearless? Why do people with no hope of survival fight and die for everyone else? &, must one learn to die ‘appropriately’? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from history (Prof. Faisal Devji, University of Oxford, Oxford), sociology (Prof. Pushpesh Kumar, University of Hyderabad (UoH), Hyderabad), & philosophy (Prof. David Weberman, Central European University (CEU), Budapest). Listen in...

#TFOS (The Faculty Of Suffering) --- SynTalk

Can you do whatever you want at home? Do you own private property? Do you hold (private) opinions? ‘What’ do you care for? Why & how do boundaries shift between the private and public realms? Do you have a right to health (& to smoke?)? Does economic development influence how public-private distinction is thought of? Is the process of drawing lines always political? Does increasing GDP always work automatically for publicly desired outcomes? Must private property also (eventually) be seen as enhancing publicness? Do cities get made by plans? Are urban realms continuums of spaces and energies? How do practices create temporary private spaces? Is ownership necessary? Do you often cross into others’ private spaces? Why not? Is the modern State the only public mode? Are individuals at a technical disadvantage against the collectives? How might social and individual goals be aligned? Will we remain more hung up on our differences? Will we continue to become more cellularized? How will public norms (& Laws) change? &, is the future likely to be both highly cellularized and regulated (by public norms)? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from law (Prof. Sudhir Krishnaswamy, Azim Premji University, Bangalore), urban planning (Prasad Shetty, School of Environment and Architecture (SEA), Mumbai), & economics (Prof. Sebastian Vollmer, The University of Göttingen, Göttingen). Listen in...

#TPPP (The Public Private Puzzles) --- SynTalk

Do you (only) like people like you? Is belonging ‘necessary’? Are communities homogeneous? How do communities become political actors from being social entities? Are community identities a way of becoming legible for the State? Does the idea of nations pre-suppose the idea of communities? Conversely, how do countries or communities fall apart? Are societies modern, & communities pre-modern? Can communities self-determine themselves as such? How much can communities scale? How is the community enacted, & what keeps it going? Are they all kept together by (filial) feelings? What is the interplay between blood, language, religion, ‘culture’, trade, and subsequent social formations? ‘Where’ are self-interested strangers civil to each other? Is the State natural to human beings? Does language make us human? Are (all) individuals, therefore, social? Are all women a community? &, call centre employees? Do you want to be on the winning side? Are utopias scary? What happens when we turn within? Will communities persist in the future? Or, is the future unhomely and infinitely lonely? Would there be new modalities of drawing connections? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from political theory (Prof. Neera Chandhoke, ex-University of Delhi, Delhi), anthropology (Dr. Mathangi Krishnamurthy, IIT Madras, Chennai), & history (Prof. Gyan Prakash, Princeton University, Princeton). Listen in...

#TSOC (The Seeds Of Communities) --- SynTalk

Are you neutral? Is neutral inert? Do you practice hypocrisy? What does it mean to be (an) opposite? Are capitalism and socialism always incompatible? Do opposites always attract (even in natural systems) – why not? How might opposites be brought together? Are (certain) paradoxes culturally contingent? Can the cultural be told apart from the religious? Where did the very notion of religion emerge from? Does every enzyme always have a precise lock-key relationship with its specific substrate? How do proteins take their shapes, & what role do opposite charges/shapes play? Can certain mechanisms prevent extreme socio/political outcomes? Can democracy and authoritarianism co-habit? Is State the march of God on Earth? Might democracy be practised (merely) ritualistically? Why is social memory so poor? Is ‘balance’ fundamental to (only?) biological life? Can/must industries/we produce as efficiently as trees do? Does cosmopolitanism (truly) celebrate difference? Is living with true difference impossible? Do enzymes also vanish like how scripts do? What are we silent about? Is equilibrium worth searching for? What does the future hold…? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from chemistry (Prof. Kankan Bhattacharyya, IISER, Bhopal), history (Dr. Ananya Chakravarti, Georgetown University, Washington DC), & political science (Prof. Niraja Gopal Jayal, JNU, New Delhi). Listen in...

#TCOO (The Confluence Of Opposites) --- SynTalk

Do you talk to the Divine? Are feelings facts? Do you accept things as they are? What are you feeling at the moment? Are you agitated? Is sound the earliest primordial? However, do (say) colours, gestures, & silence also speak? Do emotions, fundamentally, emerge in cinema with the arrival of sound? How do we learn to say that we are not feeling well? Can emotions be thought of as objects? Which is the most ‘emotional’ part of the brain? Do words (& emotions) fall from heaven? How social or cultural are they? Is empathy (also) mediated by signs/words? Is the world consisting of words? Isn’t hook swinging barbaric? Are all saints, ?, schizophrenic? ‘How’ do you experience the death of a close person? When do you experience the deepest word-less emotions? Could you be unproductive? How do we become (or ‘avoid’ becoming) divine? Are we condemned to be self conscious? Do you experience fake emotions, & why? What is the ‘problem’ with acting? Can superheroes be melodramatic? Would there be more emotion-words in the future? &, will emotions continue to push us into the unknown world? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from anthropology & film-making (Dr. Ashish Avikunthak, The University of Rhode Island, Kingston), psychiatry (Dr. Amit Ranjan Basu, Shaheed Hospital, Dalli-Rajhara (Balod)), & philosophy (Prabodh Parikh, ex-Mithibai College, Mumbai). Listen in...

#TLOPE (The List Of Permitted Emotions) --- SynTalk

Do cheaters survive? Do you find joy in competing (& cooperating)? Are teams mechanisms or organisms? How do teams coordinate layers of emotions, energies, and purposes to acquire a coherent ‘personality’? What, then, keeps teams together? Is there scarcity of common purposes in the world? Is teaming essential for bacteria? Might teams, across scales, be both emergent as well as designed systems? How are cost-benefit analyses performed when group and individual goals diverge? Is your  life on the spot market? Might individual liberties be compromised when teams form? In what way are all team members equal; & not? Is it better to lose playing beautifully, than to win an ugly game? Why are only certain parts of economic supply chains formalized? Conversely, why are certain ’formal’ rules just ignored? Does unemployment rate fall with increasing education? Are ‘practice’ and ‘rehearsal’ games different? How is ‘arms-race’ style evolution different? Do all teams need models? When is governance necessary? Would problem solving depend more and more upon complex teams in the future? &, how would individuals remain important? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from philosophy (Prof. Daniel G. Campos, Brooklyn College (CUNY), New York), economic sociology (Prof. Bino Paul, TISS, Mumbai), & evolutionary biology (Prof. Milind Watve, Dinanath Mangeshkar Hospital, Pune). Listen in...

#TATT (The Attempts To Team) --- SynTalk

Are you a part of the underworld? Would you like the society to applaud you? Do you gamble? Or, consume illicit liquor? Is the disorderly the underbelly? Will you inherit property? How has dowry existed in many societies for centuries? What changes the valuation of grooms? Are the values of criminals and police often very similar? Is there something fundamentally criminal about sex-selective abortion? Why do (some) women prefer to have a son? Are there power hierarchies inside prisons? What is the State really? When is it important? However, are people also always undoing the State? Might ‘planning’ create disorder? How should people move? Don’t you find Paris lovely? Do bus stops increase land value? Does law always interact with norms & technologies? Do we understand how norms change? Are people rational agents? How are their preferences aggregated? Where must beggars live? Do you need the working class? Do slum dwellers prefer free houses? Can the State flout its own laws? Are the illegal/legal interfaces often economic? What is unauthorized about unauthorized colonies? &, what is the future of order, planning, State, and evasion? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from economics (Dr. S. Anukriti, Boston College, Boston), political science (Dr. Sushmita Pati, Azim Premji University, Bangalore), & social work (Prof. Vijay Raghavan, TISS, Mumbai). Listen in...

#TURU (The Un Regulated Underbelly) --- SynTalk

f(q) = Is soil a definitive sign of life? (#TCAFG)

SynTalk is a freewheeling interdisciplinary talk show with a philosophical approach to understanding the world from a long term perspective.