Identity Hunters
By Layla Al Dabel Longing, affection, and sentimentality for the past. Nostalgia comes from Greek nostos (return home) and algos (pain) (1). Originally described as a medical condition of homesickness, nostalgia today represents a sentimental yearning for an idealized past (2). For nationalist movements worldwide, this emotional longing isn’t just incidental – it’s a fundamental rhetorical strategy that transforms […]
By Sukhmani Dev “And of course, we’re starting with the darkest shade first. “Transition shades”? Terrifying. Probably because it’s got the word trans in it. But hey, who needs soft gradients when you’re too busy fighting culture wars and Making America Great Again, one heavily contoured eyelid at a time?”[1] This viral statement from a […]
Assia Djebar (1936-2015) is an Algerian author who wrote the novel : ‘The Disappearance of the French Language’. This article explores the way in which the theme of the politicisation of language by nationalist politics is expressed in this novel. It ends with a suggestion as to how its ambiguous title might be interpreted. The main character Berkane an […]
By Lorraine Lambert Delalbre When a generation of children first encountered the story of Pocahontas through Disney’s colourful lens, they absorbed a narrative far removed from the tragic realities of colonization, one that continues to shape perceptions of history, identity and indigenous struggles. Romanticization of History Disney’s movie released in 1995, Pocahontas, presents a sanitized and […]
By Sukhmani Dev Hrant Dink, a Turkish Armenian intellectual, was assassinated on 19 January 2007 in Istanbul. Soon, a song by the nationalist folk singer Ismail Türüt, released later in the year, sparked controversy when a YouTube video linked the lyrics to Dink’s assassination in a celebratory manner. In 2017, Zabit Kişi, a critic of […]
By Aron Tisoczki The theatrical partnership of dramatist W. S. Gilbert and composer Arthur Sullivan gave rise to a series of comic operas that have enjoyed broad success ever since their inception between 1871 and 1896. The success of these “Savoy Operas” in the English-speaking world has endured well into the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. […]
By Aron Tisoczki The British Museum’s ‘Enlightenment Gallery’ aims to introduce visitors to an experience reminiscent of an eighteenth-century museum, replicating an environment that visually and tangibly evokes the Georgian era. However, the museum’s eighteenth-century worldview establishes Britain as intellectually superior. The gallery not only seems to celebrate British expansionism as triumph of knowledge and […]
The history of hawker culture in three images taken in 1907, 1965, and c.1980 respectively: Source: Roots.Gov.SG By Jing Kai Lee and Ashley Tan The story that often comes to mind in discussions of Singapore today is its economic miracle—an outpost founded by the East India Company in 1819, moving from Third World to First […]
And Why She Gets Away With it. By Liv Sinnes No same-sex marriage, no adoption for same-sex couples, and removal of queer representation in media and education perverting the youth – reads the anti-queer agenda of the AFD, Germany’s popular far-right and aggressively anti-immigration party. The leader and face of the party? Alice Weidel, a […]
Identity Hunters 