Pranav Kadambi & Devesh Turakane
In this elective, students were asked to think of what ‘disobedience’ meant. Is disobedience understood as a site of protests and revolutions? Where and why do they emerge? What is disobedient to society? Is it a subject of what is right or what is wrong, or a subject of taboo?
The discussion of 'Disobedient Subjects' started with mind mapping a concept or topic which we felt is disobedient, it could be either disobedient to society, a particular person, or oneself. We then created a mind map on each of these topics and looked at disobedience through the lens of why, when and how. Each individual mind map was then interlinked with common anchoring points of others’ mind map, to see how each individual idea of disobedience overlaps with one-another.
It made us reexamine human experiences & spatialities. It also helped us understand different perspectives and approaches to the same topic, and allowed us to open up on topics that would otherwise not be discussed openly. This allowed us to get a deeper understanding on our individual topics and where they originated from.
Reading and watching movies through the course, we critically analyzed them and attempted to decode what our biases are. There was a constant attempt of breaking away from prevalent societal constructs, and discussions did not hold back when talking about one’s opinion or societal issues.
Further on we discussed the Japanese idea of 'Kintsugi', and its concept of mending broken objects with the lacquer of precious metals, and related it to our lives. We generated writings about scars in one life, or in society that one has seen and experienced and how we learnt from it. We did this through a lens in which we were able to move away from the generic methods of thinking oneself as a victim. It helped us introspect the reasons,
Overall, the course helped us articulate & introspect our own biases. Words can be used as a powerful medium to change our perspectives and are a tool to make communities and individuals feel included or excluded.