A voice for South Asia

South-Asian culture at Columbia most often finds its voice through Indian dance, music, and food. Club Dimensions’ Guria Benefit, for example, promises to be an “evening of Indian classical dance and music with a full sit-down dinner.” Hindu Students Organization’s and Ahimsa’s Diwali celebration in November will be a dinner accompanied by dance and music performances. cuBhangra's annual event features student dance teams on Roone Arledge Auditorium’s stage and more students bobbing to Bhangra on the floor. Club Zamana’s Tamasha, an annual spring culture show, also features a lineup of dance and music teams, with Indian food served during the intermission.
To be sure, these events represent some of the best programming on campus, and they promote a vital aspect of South-Asian culture. Still, it’s hard not to see an opening for a different kind of expression. Awaaz, a relatively new South-Asian publication on campus, attempts to fill this role. Twice a year, it publishes fiction, poetry, drama, creative essays, editorials, and academic scholarship related to South Asia. Starting this year, it is also organizing a South-Asian theatrical production. The fall semester play is a seventh-century Sanskrit farce that reflects playfully and intelligently on Buddhist philosophy.

Awaaz (“voice” in Urdu) attempts, first and foremost, to create dialogue about South Asia on campus. It takes seriously the idea that the political, social, and cultural issues affecting millions of South Asians are worth understanding and debating, even among the many challenges in the world that compete for our attention. Not everyone will have time to take a course in the MEALAC department, but everyone should at some point pick up a copy of Awaaz and get a sense of the issues on the table. In fact, Columbia’s Core Curriculum is built on similar beliefs. Not all of us can read Greek and Latin, but we can still appreciate Homer and Virgil for their reflections on the human condition. Similarly, the Core and Awaaz share the belief that the mere availability of information about a topic cannot replace the proper presentation and discussion of that information. A publication like Awaaz is necessary to present, frame, and contextualize debates for a Columbia audience.

Awaaz also attempts to provide a publishing space for Columbia students writing about South Asia, both in MEALAC and elsewhere. There are creative writers and researchers on campus with original thoughts about South Asia, but they have few opportunities to discuss their work with others. Awaaz’s theatrical production, meanwhile, serves as a physical extension of our publication’s written space, allowing discussion—this time between performers and audience members—to occur in real-time.

But why, after all, should anyone bother to read articles or see plays about South Asia? There are several reasons, starting with the fact that most will find South Asia a fascinating area of the world. A more important reason, however, may be that we cannot even choose to address a problem without first knowing it exists and understanding what it is. Sex trafficking is a good example. We know it’s happening, but what, exactly, is going on? What kinds of economic forces underlie the sex trade? What role can national governments or international organizations play in solving the issue? A good article in Awaaz might synthesize some of the available research on this topic and lay out in clear terms some of the major tasks at hand. Of course, information on South Asia need not always conform to current humanitarian topics. An equally good article might make sense of subaltern studies for a general audience, or discuss the Rigveda in the context of our modern world. Many Americans, and especially Columbia students, care about these issues. It not only affects their lives, but also helps them live more knowledgeably, sensitively, and responsibly.

With over a billion people living just in India, South Asia is one of the most populous regions in the world. When we include the South Asian diaspora population, the network of South Asians spans half the globe. New York alone is home to a quarter of the nation’s South-Asian population. A publication like Awaaz thus helps us understand not only the dynamics of the campus community, but of the entire city. Indian dance, music, and food can and should constitute important parts of South Asian student life, but there is a real need for a group like Awaaz.

Abhijit Nagaraj is a Columbia College senior majoring in classics. Mansi Mehta is a Barnard College junior majoring in English and economics.

An earlier version of this article used an incorrect name to refer to the annual cuBhangra event. We regret the error.