From: bkannan@HA07.ENG.UA.EDU (Balaji Kannan)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.indian
Subject: soc.culture.tamil
Date: 15 Apr 92 07:24:02 GMT


 
 
 A couple of days back there was an article about "Progress"
 on this net. The author, very pertinently, argued about the
 usefulness of this net if it stuck merely to finger-pointing.
 Inasmuch as I'd  hate to indulge in nitpicking, I am
 forced to ask Ms. Shyamala Parameswaran to explain away
 the inconsistency in her arguments between a Mar 18
 posting and an April 14 posting. It is entirely possible
 that the inconsistency itself is only an apparent one;
 probably there is a subtler shade to all those  statements
 that this reader finds it difficult to appreciate.
 Only parts of her article have been reproduced here.
 To me,this appears as a perfect example of "volte face".

 My apologies for having to go through this avoidable
 ritual.

 (Her article was in response to my earlier posting,
  a reproduction of a letter from "The Hindu" titled
 "Minority Syndrome".)
 
--------------------------------------------------------------- 
>Date: Wednesday, 18 Mar 1992 08:37:52 CST
>From: Shyamala Parameswaran <U15297@uicvm.uic.edu>
>Subject:    Living in a Cyborg World



>The letter writer, drawing on the grand Parksian concept of an
>intergrative-assimilationist model espoused in the theory of the
>melting pot, fails to see human collectivities as capable and
              ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>and intelligent, whose pursuit of happiness may well lie in
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>sustaining their cultural heritage.
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^


>Inasmuch as it is inhumane to deny a people their heritage
>or tradition for which reasons the melting pot is now an
>abandoned boat, it is symptomatic of an imperialistic
                 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>design in wanting that a subset/minority efface themselves
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>to please an ethnocentric majority. Further, the burning
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>desire to suppress a recalcitrant minority, the muslims in
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>Kashmir for example, epitomises a gross poverty in thinking.
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 

>Shyamala Parameswaran
-------------------------------------------------------------------

>Date: Tuesday, 14 Apr 1992 14:32:26 CDT
>From: Shyamala Parameswaran <U15297@uicvm.uic.edu>
>Subject:    soc.culture.tamil

>I think this is a bad idea. SCI has served as a wonderful receptacle
 --------------------------
>in fielding discussions of all kinds related to India. True, there
>are Tamils in Singapore and Malaysia, Gujaratis in Fiji and parts
>of Africa, Punjabis in England and Canada and so on...but citizenship
                                                       --------------
>does not preclude anybody from discussing anything Indian or common
 -------------------------------------------------------------------
>with India. There was some sort of a private tamil email net started
 -----------------------------------------------------------------
>by someone at Georgia Tech. I'd assume that should serve the needs
 ------------------------------------------------------------------
>for those wishing to exclusively discuss tamil, although I agree
 ----------------------------------------------------------------
>with N.S. Raja that such discussions are far more beneficial and
>and informative to an interested general readership on SCI.

>Shyamala
---------------------------------------------------------------------

  My question is this. If there are Tamils on the net that feel it
  would serve their interests better to discuss things  "closed
  -door",so that they are not heckled by numerous private mails 
  that request them to stop excessive use of a regional language,
  why should they be dissuaded from doing so?
 
  Secondly, it is possible that Tamils (at least the ones
  who have been requesting a separate newsgroup) do not find
  their identities tied to sci, then where is the question of
  requesting them to post articles on sci? (discounting for
  the silent majority that might have such feelings). Their 
  "pursuit of happiness" may well lie in having a separate 
  newsgroup and in not having to go through the trouble of 
  deleting all kinds of "junk" that has nothing to do with Tamil
  and the Tamil-Sub-Culture. It is possible that they have 
  inhibitions about posting more freely on sci because of a 
  need to give porportionate representation to the others.
  Why should the Tamils of Srilanka, Malaysia, Australia
  and Germany be forced to read articles about the Indian
  Caste System, North/ South and East/West debates, about
  the Nehru/Gandhi/Rajiv legacies if they think it is 
  irrelevant to their culture(Most of the time this is
  what goes on in SCI).
  
  Subscription to sci does not preclude Ms. Shyamala or anyone
  else from benifiting from postings on sct. Who is to
  decide that since there is already a private newsgroup that 
  caters to a particular language/culture/caste/religion started
  by someone at Georgia Tech, that it should  stop with
  just that?. Same holds for soc.culture.orissa, or soc.culture.
  gujarati or soc.culture.bengali or soc.culture.bahai and so on.

  Subscription to sci does not preclude Ms. Shyamala or anyone
  else from benifiting from postings on sct or sco or scg.
  Isn't this symptomatic of a imperialistic(only in this case
  it is linguistic imperialism) design in wanting that a
  subset/minority efface themselves to please an English/Mainstream 
  issues loving majority of sci. To me, this burning desire to suppress
  an unwilling minority,(Tamils who have been requesting a
  separate newsgroup), epitomises a gross poverty in thinking.  


Ps:
   (Any attempts to draw a parallel between what is beginning to
   happen here on sci and what is happening back in India is only 
   a result of a trick that our mind is playing on us.)
  

   Balaji Kannan
 


Xref: sparky soc.culture.indian:14457 soc.college.grad:971 soc.college.gradinfo:672