Feature

As the students lounged in their armchairs, the convener Mr. Saifuz Zaman, alumnus of Miami and York, warmed up the seminar by introducing everyone. Then the master of ceremonies, Dr Faheem Shahed, expounded the philosophy of the English Department. In his lucid speech, Dr Faheem mentioned the uniqueness of BA program, a discipline that encourages creativity, free-hinking and spontaneity. Transcendentalism if you will. Students were encouraged not to bind themselves unnecessarily to rigid patterns of thought and expression. Already some of the students present had expressed themselves through their hairstyles.

As Dr Faheem passed the mike to Saifuz Zaman, the interactive presentation began, which reflected the unorthodox yet imaginative nature of the Department. At first, the convener started conventionally enough by defining postcolonialism. After whirling round some postcolonial aftermaths, like post modernism, neo colonialism, globalization, marginalization, subaltern, cultural imperialism, feminism and so on, he made the seminar evolve rapidly from a didactic form into an informal discussion. Students and faculty members shared their postcolonial experiences. These experiences served as colorful illustrations to the often dry and rigid terms of postcolonialism. For example, when explaining hybridity, the convener remarked on the present culture of wearing shirts. He had observed that the habit of keeping the top buttons of a shirt undone was to be found among women in Western cultures whereas this same habit was quite prevalent amongst young Bangladeshi men. He then posed a question: how would such an observation be qualified as an example of hybridity? The seminar breezed through such similar light hearted yet educational illustrations and ended with a masochistic and Biblical reading of Kipling's “White Man's Burden”.

(The writer is a faculty of English Dept. in AIUB)

26th of march the Independence Day of Bangladesh ...

Tahsin Manzoor Hussain

TO begin with, I would like to wish all Bangladeshis 'shadhinotar shubhechcha' or, to put it in English, 'Happy Independence Day' !!! It was this day, 37 years ago, that Bangladesh was declared a free country. We fought, for what we wanted, we believed that we would get it, and thus we considered ourselves to be independent even before the heroic liberation war was fought for nine long months. I grief for all those mothers who lost their sons and daughters during the war, but it was because of those brave children of the country that we are independent today. Freedom shall be cherished. A free nation, a dream of millions. Many died with that dream in their hearts in 1971. I bow my head in respect to all those brothers and sisters, fathers and mothers of ours who fought, without fright or fear. They are lucky who lived to see this freedom, to see Bangladesh - a liberated country. On this day, I have a mere suggestion to give; it is for all of us who care.

I do not know if this will make a difference but just give it a thought, it's worth it. Let us all make an effort to make ourselves proud, make Bangladesh a better place to live, if everyone does their part, it will not be a problem for any of us. Poverty, corruption and inflation. We can fight it. Let's promise to ourselves and try to live up to it. Let's make a difference. Let's make our flag … proud.