ON THEIR OWN TERMS: EARLY 21ST CENTURY WOMEN’S MOVEMENTS IN PAKISTAN BY FOUZIA SAEED — this book is an engaging introduction to the inner dynamics of women’s social movements in Pakistan. Pakistani women are often viewed as merely passive victims of heinous crimes. In this book, Dr Saeed shows how they can collectively assert their will to bring change in their own lives, and in the lives of others. The book provides details of four successful women’s movements since 2000: the provincial movements of the Punjab peasants and the Sindh ?sherfolk, and the nationwide movements of the lady health workers and AASHA, the movement against sexual harassment. The author carefully documents these movements to provide lessons that can be incorporated into ongoing initiatives and has included stories of courageous women who make us proud.
MEMOIRS OF RIAZUDDIN: A PHYSICIST’S JOURNEY EDITED BY FAYYAZUDDIN & M JAMIL ASLAM — this work brings to light Dr Riazuddin’s contributions to physics and the sciences in Pakistan. He was an eminent and prominent physicist, a student of Abdus Salam, specializing in High Energy and Nuclear Physics. He is considered to be one of the pioneers of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons and atomic deterrence development programmes. The book also provides insight into the development of institutions of higher learning and research, as well as the building of infrastructure for science and technology in Pakistan.
HINGLAJ DEVI: NARRATIVES OF IDENTITY & CHANGE AT AN ANCIENT TEMPLE IN PAKISTAN BY JÜRGEN SCHAFLECHNER — two hundred kilometres west of Karachi, in the desert of Balochistan, is located the shrine of the Hindu Goddess, Hinglaj. In Hinglaj Devi, Jürgen Schaflechner studies literary sources in Hindi, Sanskrit, Sindhi, and Urdu alongside extensive ethnographical research at the shrine, examining the political and cultural influences at work at the temple and tracking the remote desert shrine’s rapid ascent to its current status as the most influential Hindu pilgrimage site in Pakistan. Schaflechner introduces the unique character of this place of pilgrimage and shows its modern importance not only for Hindus, but also for Muslims and Sindhi nationalists.
AZAD JAMMU & KASHMIR: POLITY, POLITICS & POWER-SHARING BY JAVAID HAYAT — this book explores the opportunities and pitfalls of establishing democracy and legitimate governance in territories with disputed status, especially where governance systems are fragile and the process of democratization is hindered due to socio-political fault lines. The analyses in this study, adds clarity to our understanding of the status and sovereignty of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) by using a historical and constitutional perspective; for this purpose, it investigates political and constitutional evolution since 1947. It examines contemporary power-sharing theories and alternatives for the establishment of an autonomous governance structure in order to proceed towards conflict management and hence a stable democracy in deeply divided societies, with particular focus on AJK.
LOVE, WAR & OTHER LONGINGS: ESSAYS ON CINEMA IN PAKISTAN EDITED BY VAZIRA ZAMINDAR & ASAD ALI — has there been a ‘revival’ of Pakistani cinema? Or can the very question be put to scrutiny? Can we think beyond a national cinema, and instead simply think with films to explore the fraught politics and aspirations of our times? Love, War and Other Longings brings together historians, anthropologists, artists, and film-makers to offer new lines of enquiry that probe the tensions between cinema’s past and present, absences and the archive, seduction and respectability, class and consumption, as well as genre and censorship.
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