Poetry and Policy Studies Field

Poetry and Policy Studies

In International Affairs (at CU and Harvard), I have tried to study the crossover between policymaking and poetry, between politics and rhetoric, between political culture and literary arousal. I seek to understand the role of poetry in campaigning and politics during election times. Furthermore I (or my work) seeks to understand broadly the crossovers between art as an encompassing domain on one end and polity-convincing and policymaking on the other.

Various propositions studied are a) a biographical study of politicians and policymakers etc. who have simultaneously lived lives of poetry or as other kinds of artists, b) the use of certain poems by politicians to get votes during crucial junctures of nation-building, and election times, c) the resonance of poetry in the masses as believable and understandable in election times, d) the presence of poets in policy circles historically in Mughal courts of India, and in dialectical circles in Greece, and e) the current currency of poetry and policy as an inter-disciplinary field of public space existence in South Asia and Middle East.

The focus of these studies has been on South Asia and Middle East. A further look at Parliamentary debates in rhetoric and poetic forms is also being considered. Another paper also being considered is a proposal for the formation of a joint MIA-MFA program between SIPA and the GSA—MFA program, and as a functional joint inter-disciplinary degree in Poetry and Policy, in other schools as well. Finally, a proposal also being debated is the idea of looking at the historical and current UN Diplomatic circles to find overlaps of Poetry and Policymaking, in forms of Poet-Diplomats, Poetry as Diplomacy in Conflict Zones, poetry/arts as middle areas for conflict resolution, and broadly the roles that Arts have played in the United Nations goals formation, and daily functioning. And one may add the poet/artists posing as aid workers in the world (or genuinely working because of a commitment and/or calling) but many times to get by…

The coursework applied towards Poetry and Policy Studies from scholastic work is as follows—State and Society in the Developing World, Applied Conflict Resolution Workshop, Limited Wars and Low-Intensity Conflict, Readings in Urdu Literature, Advanced Persian, Managing the UN system, Managing Complex Emergencies, Harvard Summer Olympia Program, and Independent Research in Poetry and Policy Studies.

Afghanistan and Gender

Afghanistan has improved marginally in gender relations, even more marginally in living conditions, and not at all in true sustainability projections. Currently it is very dependent, has no real industry to sustain its economy, and only able to live these few moments of freedom and peace on the back of international presence providing a buffer against the hated (by Afghans), awful Taliban coming back. American and International games here are not ununderstood in terms of strategic and permanent bases and presence creation; however Afghans are happy to have Americans and Internationals here if it keeps the reviled Taliban, and even more reviled, Pakistanis, at bay.
Afghanistan, when ready and on its feet, will be a more progressive state than its neighbor Pakistan, more proud perhaps as a nation than its further neighbor India which still deals in its psyche with its post-colonial baggage, and an example for Central and West Asia possibly if it actually stands on its two feet democratically and survives a few, fair and real elections. Afghanistan also needs to start the process of initiating a more progressive, dynamic Islamic republic and not a secular one in the non-religious, state separated from religion flavor that we approach and try for in the West and in India and Japan among other places. For in Afghanistan, trying to separate Islam from governance is like trying to separate internet from our workplaces--it is now inextricrably intertwined. It is better to govern and understand religion into the way of life in tempered and progressive ways rather than trying to eliminate it out of sometimes, baseless fears.

Beauty that makes you cry--The Mountains of Buddha's Bamyan, and other stories of my time in Afghanistan

Afghanistan. That word alone evokes many emotions. It is a name. A name of a place. And Afghans--a name of its people, ALL its people. Andthat includes the Hazaras, the people living for centuries in the country's north in the Bamiyan province where the Buddha statue once stood; the Uzbek origin Afghans further north in the Balkh (Mazar-e-Sharif) region mostly; the Afghan Sikhs and Afghan Hindus mostly in Kabul who attend their temple in what is known in Afghanistan as the Dharamsaal (sic); and of course the majority which is Pashtoons currently concentrated in the South, a minority of whom are engaged in fighting as part of or alongside the Taliban. I state it to state the obvious again and again as I have to all I speak to--"Afghans" does not mean "Taliban" even though some Taliban members are indeed Afghan.

I left for Afghanistan from New York after finishing my Master's in International Affairs in 2004. In my first few months, several interesting vignettes of daily life immediately showed me the great beauty of Afghan culture and also its stark difficulties that make an indelible impression on my mind. Once while working at the Prime Minister's Compound on secondment for the World Bank, a young Afghan who served tea and largely kept duties as a cleaner, came in and asked me if I would like tea. I consented, and upon serving me a cup, he served himself one as well and sat down right next to me on the couch and started to sip the tea. I was astounded as this marked my first introduction to a "class-less" society--not a society without class but one without its ugly, overt, discriminatory distinctions that I was used to from growing up in India. When I politely asked him what he was doing, he replied ever so politely that he was sipping tea :) It was an extraordinary moment in which I realized that he felt his job was that of a tea maker and cleaner, that in no way made him inferior or less worthy of the couch (as it very well shouldn't). During meal times, everyone from the Director to the managers to the cleaning staff to the drivers all sat together at the same table, in the same manner and ate the very same food.

Another time, my friend who was heading a French NGO and who I lived with in the house that Ahmad Shah Maasood grew up in, and I, were invited to the house of Ahmad Shah Masood's brother's dinner. In addition to being part of the family of the father of the new nation, he was also our landlord so we were really just simply accepting the invitation to dine at our landlord's house. We were aware of who were going to for dinner though--at the designated hour, my friend's driver dropped us off to Mr Maasood's house and we gave him some money for dinner somewhere and told him we will call him when we are close to being done with our dinner. Inside the house, Mr. Maasood greeted us warmly and we had beautiful pyalas or little cups of green tea and some lovely dry fruits. As he sipped tea, he asked where is our driver. We said we had sent him to eat dinner. He got so upset andasked us to call him. We were really quite surprised and sheepishly said we had sent him to have dinner. He took out his own cellphone, asked for his number from us, and called him directly asking him to come back and join us at the table for dinner. He reprimanded him (I understand Dari) saying do you not know what is the Afghan way and they are our foreign guests and if they didn't ask you, you should know who you came to. It was an extraordinary lesson in human dignity, one I will never forget, and one that informs all my interactions with all my colleagues of all levels ever since.

My last that I will narrate for now is the trip to Bamiyan. On the ten hour drive to Bamiyan from Kabul, we saw mountains with colors that if one saw them on a painter's canvas, one would imagine that the painter's imagination had gotten the better of him and yet the natural vista betrayed all of the madness of their maker. On the streets near the UNESCO sites of the Buddhas, many returning families lived in caves. So many of the policymakers struggled with limited resources to house and rehabilitate the returning families and the cultural preservation desire on the other hand. In the bazaar, I remember one wonderful hakeem or medicine man listening to all my stories of stomach illnesses and ailments I have suffered andoffering me understanding as the cure. It was incredible that he didn't try to cheat me or sell me the store's hundred potions. A last memory of that trip is awaking at 4 am and seeing the Buddha's from atop the hill and seeing beauty in the hollows where eyes were, and seeing beauty that really makes one cry not out of sadness but simply out of the grandness of their maker's plans. I wrote a poem that will be coming out as part of a book in 2010 on Bamiyan that I share...

CCXLVIII of Manuscript--The Sufi's Garland

A Tree in Bamyan—A Caravan of Witness to Taliban & Other Unbeknownst Friends of the Buddha

In the midst of such birch

Among rocks too hard and formed

To imagine

Stood he

Leave-less and Mutely Pained

To the Talibs and the Mujahids

To Dr. Najib and the Russkies

Him, stark, alone

The Grand Old Witness

To the cases

Always out of court

Of the Un-Islamic

Bamyan

This and many more experiences like these in Afghanistan kept me in this profession of international affairs since then. I have been in Liberia, in Kosovo, in New York and many parts since then but Afghanistan, and Afghans, still have my heart. I married someone from just north of there, from Uzbekistan, and together we are charting a way to come near to Afghanistan though perhaps now not quite just yet.