Feature

There are 25 computers at DUCC to provide Internet facility but it would be surprising if anyone ever saw all the computers running properly at the same time.

It is a common scenario that around 5 computers are always shutdown due to technical problems and almost 5 others do not have proper connection with the server. Moreover the speed is very poor.

DUCC is supposed to provide browsing facility regularly from 12pm to 10pm. But it does not always follow this rule. At least 3 days a week, it closed about 1 to 2 hours earlier than the scheduled time.

Users sometimes become bored and angry when the registered card does not help in logging on to the web. It is even more disgusting when one user logs off his card but the computer continues to count the valuable units.

The infrastructure as well as technical development of the DUCC is very urgent. At least 25 more computers should be allocated here. Moreover the students do not always get expected assistance from the appointed operators.

As DUCC is the only place where all the students of Dhaka University find web-browsing facility, the university authority should try to upgrade the centre.

Rakib Ahammed
Department of Mass Communication & Journalism
University of Dhaka

Nazia Ahmed

Shumon Jahan, a professional web developer and member of Bangladesh Education Reform group, in a meeting discussed the necessity of reforming our existing education system. His views mainly focused on the effects of Colonialism and how it has been dictating our mind and culture for ages that has made us susceptible to the concepts our colonial masters have planted in our minds from the very beginning. It's a cage without bars from which we have yet to be free.

Using the World Map as a symbol of control, we saw how different World maps project different concepts. We, never paying close attention, are subjected to those concepts without even being aware of them. He showed us a number of World maps formulated by professional Cartographers who project a paticular political agenda. The most familiar one was the Mercator Map. This is the map you'll see in most educational institutions, corporate and government offices. Greenland and Africa looked about the same size but it was surprising to discover that Africa is about fourteen times larger. We learned that the bias of this particular map is to diminish the size and importance of the developing countries in the tropics and show exagerrated prominance of the North.

Another map was the Peter's Map, also known as “the people's map”. It's an equal area map that represented the relative size difference between Greenland and Africa much more accurately. He said, the Mercator Map does not do justice to the landmass and is apparently done so intentionally so that visually the rulers looks big and the ruled looks small.

Also pointing to the four basic directions East,West, North, South, he questioned the concept of why North is considered upwards and South downwards and why North America & Europe is the West and Asia is the East. And while pointing that out he showed us a rather bizarre map, the Hobo-Dyer Map (with South up orientation) that shows the World upside down. He asks, why does that map seem upside down when a participant tried to reorient the map. Another one projected an image of the entire globe from space without coloring the political bounderies of different countries that made all the landmass look like islands. It's called the Dymaxion Map and the idea behind it is to see the World as a giant spaceship and all of humanity being citizens of a giant island. It's disorienting to say the least because the East, West, North, South construct totally fails to make sense. It is also made so that it could be folded into a globe that can have any direction as up the maker prefers.

With an example of an interesting game as Chess, he incorporated the age-old concept of conquering the center, be it the world map itself. With sheer sarcasm he says, “Over the years of working with activists who care about social justice, I've noticed that they don't know the history nor understand other religions. But regardless, they want equality for all. These are very special people who are simply good and need no reason to be fair to others. But they fail because their reason is yet to be developed because they do need to understand the differences to put Humpty Dumpty back together again.”

He insists that the future is not created by history but by our concepts. With a vision to reforming such concepts, Shumon thus reveals his idea of reaching out to the young generation and reeducate them to free their minds and ask them to come forward and make a difference through a change of the mindset. He believes that those nations that could symbolize their thoughts into simpler forms have been ruling the ones who are yet to understand their own potentials and formulate their own symbols. Their lies our hopes for true freedom.