Exploring neoliberalism and changing aspirations in contemporary Dhaka
On 3rd January, the Department of Economics and Social Sciences hosted the seminar titled “Navigating Social Mobility with No Guard Rails: An Assemblage of Neoliberal Subjectivity in Dhaka” at the Seminar Room, with the guest speaker Dr Imran Jamal (Researcher and Ethnographer, BIGD) and discussant Dr Seuty Sabur (Associate Professor, ESS).
Dr Imran discussed his work in progress and thoughts on the shifting political, social, and class aspirations of the different groups that re-emerged in the last two and a half years since post-July Revolution. Due to the novelty and dynamic nature of the topic, he warns that it is more theoretical than ethnography-heavy. His main argument is about the process of ‘selving’ and how selfhood is emerging in moments of flux or rupture, borrowing from the Deleuzian theory of assemblage. He additionally described how neoliberalism needs aspirations to function, but it shapes the aspirations one can have and stated, “Within the neoliberal rubric, the ‘religious’ political order and the ‘secular’ political order don’t have a problem with the neoliberal system as it stands; they have a problem with how it is enacted and the personal freedoms.”
Photo: Rishov Aditya
Dr Sabur brought up the crucial question of what has really changed, except for the uprising and said, “The whole democratic regime was new for us, and we are making sense of that for a long period of time; we don’t know how to live under democracy, or we know, but our institutions are not able to catch up. We are always aspiring for something, but we’re not really there.” Moreover, she emphasises the importance of leaving behind the ideological binary and how subscription to the binary discredits the history made by different kinds of people.
The seminar concluded with an enlightening question-and-answer session that engaged both faculty members and students. One of the attendees, Ruhaima Ridita Ahmed (Senior, ESS), expressed, “It was interesting to know about novel concepts like cynical engagement by Lori Allen. This session really helped me to reconfigure my existing knowledge.”
