by Kenan Malik
I rarely set explicitly out to photograph lines or shapes. But the images are often defined by them. Perhaps I only notice the lines and shapes around me when I later look at the photographs. Here, though, is a somewhat random collection of photos from over the years defined by lines and squares and other shapes. And I will leave you to work out where each is from.
Categories: Photos • Tags: photography
by Kenan Malik
My latest monthly (and somewhat random) collection of recent essays and stories from around the web that have caught my eye and are worth plucking out to be re-read. . Donald Trump and the Myth of Mobocracy Robert Zaretsky, Atlantic, 27 July 2016 Terrorist bombs shattering lives and buildings. Waves of immigrants stirring popular fears and anxieties. Corruption and scandal staining the reputation of politicians. Commerce and industry convulsing amid dizzying and divisive change. Ambitious men with no political experience […]
Categories: Pandaemonium
by Kenan Malik
I recently gave a long interview to Dutch journalist Marco Visscher about Brexit, migration, democracy, politics, being offensive, growing up in racist Britian, and not being in a Hollywood movie. It was published in the Belgian magazine Knack (and a shorter version in the Dutch paper Trouw). The interview has been translated from English to Dutch then (roughly) back to English, so may not read very coherently in places. I have edited it lightly. It was published in Knack under […]
Categories: Britain, Kenan Malik • Tags: anti-racism, brexit, british politics, cultural diversity, democracy, european union, free speech, immigration, left, populism, racism
by Kenan Malik
This is in response to the decision of the University of Cape Town to ‘disinvite’ Flemming Rose, former cultural editor of Jyllands-Posten responsible for publishing the Danish cartoons, from giving this year’s TB Davie Lecture on Academic Freedom. Last year, I was honoured to be invited to the University of Cape Town to give the 2015 TB Davie lecture. It was a privilege to have been able to become part of the history that is the TB Davie lecture, a history of resistance […]
Categories: Academia, Free Speech, International • Tags: academic freedom, danish cartoons, flemming rose, free speech, islamophobia
by Kenan Malik
I took part last week in a ‘Talking Migration’ podcast with Rob Ford, Professor in Political Science at the University of Manchester, about the Brexit vote and the role within it of migration, and of hostility to migration. ‘Talking Migration’ is a podcast series produced by Clara Sandelind of the University of Huddersfield. (I sound in the podcast as if I’m standing in the middle of a cave and shouting – my apologies, I was obviously sitting in a highly resonant […]
Categories: Britain, Race & Immigration • Tags: brexit, british politics, europe, european union, immigration, racism, working class
by Kenan Malik
The Observer today ran a series of short comments on David Cameron’s legacy. Here is my take (the original, not the Observer‘s cut version, which made a short comment even shorter). Had David Cameron not won an election he never expected to win, he might not have lost a referendum he never expected to lose. Had the 2015 general election produced a continuation of the Coalition government, as many, including Tories, expected, it is unlikely that there ever would have been […]
Categories: Britain, Politics • Tags: brexit, british politics, conservative party, david cameron
by Kenan Malik
Consider the following quotes: I cannot doubt that our democracy will ultimately refuse consent to that liberty of propagating children which is now allowed to the undesirable classes, but the populace has yet to be taught the true state of these things. A democracy cannot endure unless it be composed of able citizens; therefore it must in self-defence withstand the free introduction of degenerate stock. . Francis Galton, Memories of My Life, p 311 . On the practicability or desirability […]
Categories: Justice & Liberties, Politics • Tags: brexit, democracy, donald trump, elitism, eugenics
by Kenan Malik
Two of my favourite contemporary photographers are Yener Torun and Damion Berger. Each transforms the way we look upon the world by using colour in almost opposite ways. Torun is not a professional photographer but an architect from Istanbul, whose work I have published before on Pandaemonium. His shots of Istanbul, usually taken on an iPhone, are of the city as few will have seen it, not the Istanbul of ancient buildings, grand mosques and tradition, but that of modernist […]
Categories: Photos • Tags: damion berger, photography, yener torun
by Kenan Malik
This is the full version of the article I wrote last month for the International New York Times on the debate about time limits for embryo research. (I cannot publish my INYT articles on Pandaemonium until a month after it is published in the newspaper.) It was originally published under the headline ‘Rethinking Embryo Research Rules’. Few areas of scientific investigation are more controversial than embryo research. Yet, few are more brimming with potential. The field promises valuable insights into early […]
Categories: Philosophy & Ethics, Science & Technology • Tags: abortion, embryo research, infanticide, peter singer, women's rights
by Kenan Malik
My latest monthly (and somewhat random) collection of recent essays and stories from around the web that have caught my eye and are worth plucking out to be re-read. It has been a extraordinary month, news-wise, from the Orlando shootings to Brexit, from South African riots to the Istanbul attacks. There were a dozen more articles to which I could have linked, so I may make this a more frequent post. . ‘The Energy of the Brexiteers and Trump is […]
Categories: Pandaemonium
by Kenan Malik
The decision by British voters last week to leave the European Union has brutally exposed two features of contemporary British politics. The first is the depth of popular disaffection with mainstream political institutions. The second is the paralysis of the political class in the face of this disaffection. The Brexit victory was buttressed by a coalition of disparate social groups. Traditional Conservative supporters in the shires and the suburbs have long been suspicious of the European project. Few were surprised […]
Categories: Britain, International, Politics • Tags: brexit, british politics, europe, european union, far right, front national, left, populism, ukip, working class
by Kenan Malik
It was, without question, a bloody nose for the political establishment, the biggest it has received for decades. And many have read the unexpected success of the Leave camp in the British EU referendum straightforwardly as a revolt against the political class and as a victory for democracy. Yes, it was a revolt against the political class in London and in Brussels. But the referendum result was also far more complicated than that. The anti-EU sentiment was not UK-wide. It […]
Categories: Britain, Politics • Tags: brexit, british politics, eu referendum, european union, labour party, left, populism, scotland, solidarity, working class
by Kenan Malik
Whatever the result of the Brexit referendum on Thursday, of one thing we can be sure: Britain will neither be invaded by marauding Turks, as anti-EU campaigners suggest might happen if the country votes ‘Yes’, nor will Western civilization collapse, as EU president Donald Tusk fears after a ‘No’ vote. There will undoubtedly be economic and political turbulence, but Britain will not be staring into the abyss, however it votes. But, if the world will not end for Britain, neither will the […]
Categories: Britain, International • Tags: boris johnson, brexit, british politics, democracy, european union, fortress europe, labour party, migration crisis, populism
by Kenan Malik
The Latvian capital Riga has a long and turbulent history, one that is, in a popular saying, as complicated as the Latvian language, and constructed out of as many influences. There existed a settlement on the site as far back as the second century CE. Its modern history begins in the thirteenth century with the arrival of German mercenaries and missionaries. German merchants had established an outpost from around 1158. Then, in 1201, the newly-proclaimed Bishop of Livonia, Albert, landed […]
Categories: Photos • Tags: churches, gothic churches, latvia, latvian national library, photography, riga, soviet architecture
by Kenan Malik
An excerpt from my latest column for the International New York Times, on the debate about time limits for embryo research. It was published under the headline ‘Rethinking Embryo Research Rules’. It is a debate with important consequences not just for embryo research, but also for wider debates over abortion and infanticide. At the heart of all this lies a central question: Where do we draw the line between a blob of cells and a human being with moral status? […]
Categories: Human, Science & Technology • Tags: abortion, embryo research, infanticide
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