Vivek's Info » Useful Links (by topics)

The art & craft of academic writing: Interviews & talks

Vivek S. — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 21:16:47 +0000

Unlike a lot of people, writing does not come to me naturally. It has been a slow and difficult learning process, and I had to contend with massive writing project as I started the dissertation. As it turned out, writing the dissertation was fun, but not always. It took me an year and a half to write the dissertation after the fieldwork, and in the process, it helped me to know what other writers had gone through. A lot of that advice came from the committee and from my peers at the University, and some of it came from webcasts on the art of writing.

These talks helped me reflect on writing: why I write, how to write, and what one goes through as a writer. It helped me anticipate that I will have to re-write again and again, and that there will be days when I will get stuck staring at a blank page or a half-written paragraph. It is not that these talks ensured that I did not get stuck, but it helped to know that it happens. More than anything else, they helped me remember that writing can be fun; something that a lot of us in the run to finish a long project forget.

Click on the list icon that looks like a stack of cards in the bottom to see the entire list of videos, or you can always visit my YouTube channel here.

Click here to view the embedded video.

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Best international news programmes: A list

Vivek S. — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 04:24:17 +0000

An effort to build a list of good international news programmes to get news from diverse perspectives

Over the last few years, I have developed an interest in international affairs. Unfortunately, International English news sources were dominated by channels in USA and Britain. BBC and CNN that were available widely had some high quality programmes but put forward highly circumscribed views. My earning for diversity of views got a fillip with online news channels. I am now trying to compile a list of good weekly programmes, documentaries, etc. that we can watch now and then to catch up with major issues in different countries. Without such a list, it would be impossible to keep up with all the new resources that are becoming available now through You Tube and other sources.

Your suggestions please

I will build a list and publish it here soon. In the meanwhile, I would appreciate your suggestions from mainstream or alternate channels from different regions. Some examples include:

NDTV (India): We the people
CNN-IBN (India): Devil’s advocate
Al Jazeera’s (Middle East): People & Power
Dawn News TV (Pakistan): Talk back
BBC (UK): Hard talk
PBS (USA): Frontline
CNN (USA): GPS by Fareed Zakaria
University of California Television (USA): Conversations with history
Fox News (USA): O’Reilly Factor (To say the least, this represents a point of view!)

I would like to expand this list and identify good sources for other areas including African countries, Latin America, etc. If you know of a good crisp TV programme that is available online, please let me know with a comment below.

Thank you.

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Babasaheb Ambedkar’s works online: Books, articles, talks

Vivek S. — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 00:02:47 +0000

A growing collection of Ambedkar’s works are available online at Ambedkar.org

Ambedkar is easily one of the finest Indian thinkers ever. Academically, he has a degree in law, a Masters in economics (from London School of Economics), and a doctorate in social sciences (from Columbia University). At Columbia he majored in sociology and economics for his M.A. with a smattering of anthropology, politics and philosophy as other subjects. He also had a stint at University of Bonn. His experience ranges from being a untouchable boy to the principal architect of India’s Constitution. He started and ran a political party and is arguably the most influential person ever in politicizing Dalits towards demanding a better lives for themselves.

This breadth of thinking and experience makes Ambedkar a fascinating and a purposeful writer. Many of his works are now available online at Ambedkar.org, and the collection is growing. This is a fantastic resource for anyone thinking of social issues in India today. Being a Dalit, a politician, lawyer and a framer of the most fascinating constitutiosn in the world, Ambedkar is specially interesting for those interested in the role of instituitons in development.

Babasaheb Ambedkar’s works online: Books, articles, talks A growing collection of Ambedkar’s works are available online at...
Early institutional theorists: Online resources There is a long tradition of discussing the role of...
Big list of Webcasts online: Documentaries, talks, television & other videos This is a huge list of lists of webcast sources....
Books and articles by Jean Dreze: A detailed bibliography (downloadable) This is a reasonably good list of books and articles...

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Designing a course on ID: Syllabus collection

Vivek S. — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 01:29:14 +0000

Any course on the role of institutions in development has to cross disciplinary barriers. Since most social sciences have something to say on this topic, there are a lot of resources to borrow from. This page presents a collection of syllabi from different universities that can inform syllabus design on institutions and development. This is an expansive list for exploratory purposes. A concise list with my ideal syllabus will be developed elsewhere.

Institutions, policies & development

This course combines development theories and institutional theories and offers a broad selection of topics on institutions and development. When I reviewed courses in 2008, this was one of the most broadly defined course, something that I strongly recommend.

Course blurb: ‘The quality of institutions’ is now said to exercise a crucial influence on the prospects for development, and this course aims both to interrogate this claim through analysis of different paths of economic growth and change across the developing world, and in regard to public administration and development management. The course examines development policies and institutional theories, the politics of institutions and state formation, and the relationships between political systems, institutions and patterns of development. Topics to be covered are: Arguments About Development: the Washington Consensus and After; Stories about Economic Growth; Ideas about Institutions; Institutions and Economic Development; Politics and Institutions; State-Building and Public Management; Democratisation; Democracy and Development; Decentralisation; Social Capital, Democracy and Development; States and Development: Case Studies.
Link: http://www.sfu.ca/internationalstudies/id_outlines.html

Field exam readings on political science

Department of political science, Yale University has posted the required readings for field exams in political science. These reading lists are well organised and comprehensive. Since they have a good selection of canonical readings on many important topics they offer an excellent starting point on political institutions. The lists cover political economy, philosophy, democratic theories, comparative politics and other topics.

Link: http://www.yale.edu/polisci/grad/readings.html

Institutional economics

Courses on institutional economics emphasise on different issues like institutional change and economic performance, economic history, game theory, transaction costs, organisational behaviour, international development, political economy, etc. A good collection of courses is available here.

Collective action

In my opinion collective action is the most important driver of institutional change. Collective action and social movement theories draw from many social science disciplines and so offer a rich perspective. Further, a lot of multimedia resources are available that can be used in teaching, which should make the course interesting for students. I recommend the syllabus by John Burdick for a quick introduction to collective action theories. The readings are easily accessible and cover many perspectives.

Course blurb: Drawing from anthropology, sociology, geography, political science, and other disciplines, this course will help you understand why, when and how collective action for social change occurs. The course will place a special emphasis on how collective action is generated by and reshapes culture at the local, regional, national, and transnational levels. A key part of the course is participation in an activist campaign role-play that develops over the course of two months.

Social choice and welfare

Institutions are fundamentally about social choice and collective goals. Amartya Sen has made seminal contributions to issues of social choice. A course he offers with Foster at Harvard University offers an excellent introduction to basic issues in social choice.

Course blurb: A basic course in social choice theory, its intellectual foundations, and its applications, particularly in welfare economics

Link: http://www.isites.harvard.edu/icb/icb.do?keyword=k40139&tabgroupid=icb.tabgroup61561

Sociological theories

Ideas of social theorists like Weber, Marx, Durkheim and Foucault have shaped thinking about institutions pervasively. It is impossible to escape their ideas. This course by Jackie Orr provides an introduction to social theorists who have shaped ideas in social sciences fundamentally. Unfortunately, the course does not cover theorists like Montesquieu, Tocqueville, and a few others who have been highly influential in ideas about institutions.

Course blurb: This course is both an advanced introduction to the animating concepts and questions in sociological theory, and an intellectual history that situates theories of society within concrete political, cultural, and economic contexts. Both these aims constitute impossible tasks for a single semester’s syllabus. So this course is a necessarily selective and incomplete attempt to be broad-ranging and comprehensive. Our focus is primarily limited to the works of European and North American authors over the last 150 years. Questions we will bring to the readings include: What role do ‘science’ and ‘objectivity’ play in the theoretical imagination of sociologists? What theoretical stories are told about the relations between individual bodies/experiences, and broader social structures or forces? How is power theorized? How does the theory address (or ignore) gender, racial/ethnic, class, sexual, or national differences? How are such differences theorized in relation to structures of power or the production of knowledge? What are the epistemological assumptions of the theory: what gets to count as ‘real,’ ‘true’ or ‘valuable’ knowledge, and why? What aspects of the social world does the theory make central and visible, and what aspects does it exclude, erase or render invisible? Finally, how can contact with this intellectual history usefully influence our own practices of research and sociological storytelling? And how do we begin to name the political and economic, cultural and historical, biographical and embodied contexts shaping our own theoretical desires?

I also recommend a course by Allan Macfarlane available in You Tube.

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Institutional ethnography resources

Vivek S. — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 01:20:57 +0000

Prof. Marjorie DeVault hosts a website on institutional ethnography (see URL below). To quote her, “Institutional ethnography (IE) is a method of inquiry that allows people to explore the social relations that structure their everyday lives. It was first developed as a “sociology for women,” by Dorothy E. Smith, and is now being used by researchers in the social sciences, education, human services, and policy research”. The website offers information on teaching resources and a brief look at people who use institutional ethnography in their work.

URL: http://faculty.maxwell.syr.edu/mdevault/

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Babasaheb Ambedkar’s works online: Books, articles, talks

Vivek S. — Tue, 20 May 2008 10:54:22 +0000

A growing collection of Ambedkar’s works are available online at Ambedkar.org

Babasaheb Ambedkar’s works online: Books, articles, talks A growing collection of Ambedkar’s works are available online at...
Books and articles by Jean Dreze: A detailed bibliography (downloadable) This is a reasonably good list of books and articles...
Early institutional theorists: Online resources There is a long tradition of discussing the role of...
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India: Parliament & Legislative Assemblies search engine

Vivek S. — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 05:41:50 +0000

Search websites of Indian Parliament and most legislative assemblies in one go

About the search engine

This is a special search engine that searches websites of Indian Parliament, most state assemblies and other government sites that offer content on debates and other proceedings in legislative bodies. It also includes a few non-governmental sites. It enables us to check if something is going on relating to a specific issue (e.g. VAT) in various assemblies in one click. Google is not very useful in doing this since it would cover all websites that include “VAT” in its pages and often it pushes assembly websites really below. Its limitations include coverage since many states either don’t post transcripts online, or they have them in regional languages. Another limitation is that it does not have a system of sorting debates by date that would have been useful. If you use this search facility, I’d like a feedback about it that will help me improve the way it functions. Please leave your comments below.

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List of latest documentaries in Google Videos & You Tube (brief descriptions)

Vivek S. — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 14:42:28 +0000

Autogenerated list of latest documentaries in Google Videos available online totally free

Google video also has many category that are available only in advanced search. Using it, I have autogenerated a list of documentaries available. Please note that this is automatically generated using a search strategy, so some of the videos are not relevant, and many have views that are quite contrary to mine. This list will contain the latest videos that are categorized as "documentary" by the person uploading it. The descriptions are also given by the person uploading it. The list is given below, and for more click here.

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New York sight seeing: Low cost options for students

Vivek S. — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 19:08:32 +0000

Bookmarks I created on New York to enjoy the city on a low budget

Most things in New York are costly, atleast at the surface of it. But with some hard work one can find a lot of attractions in the city that one can catch up with in a student budget. I found the following online resources on New York useful. This is a small list that I hope to work on.

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Indian Parliament & Legislative Assemblies search engine

Vivek S. — Wed, 14 Mar 2007 06:00:55 +0000

Search debates, policies, laws, parliamentary questions, and other issues relating to policy, politics law and governance in India. Covers Indian Parliament and State Assemblies

For those with an interest in policy issues, following what happens in the parliament and the legislative assemblies can be crucial. All state governments and the Government of India have reasonably information websites these days. But it is a little painful if we have to look for a new education initiative in over 50 websites one by one. On the other hand a generic search in Google or other search engines will give a lot of irrelevant results. To make life easy, I've created a custom search engine that will scan the websites of Indian Parliament and most legislative assemblies. The website of Indian Parliament is quite detailed. It provides parliamentary questions, list of members, texts of bills, etc. But most states do not have such a detailed site providing extensive details about proceedings. To compensate for this, I've added some state government websites that will provide basic information about legislative business. Needless to say, the quality of search is as good as the quality content in these websites. Some states include a lot of materials, but some do not. In any case, I think this is a very useful way of searching to see what our legislators are upto. Please note that a lot of materials are in Hindi and other regional languages - the usefulness of this search engine is limited by this factor.

Who can use this search engine

The search engine is useful to get a hang of policy initiatives and debates across India within legislative bodies and in the government. Whether you are looking to see if any state has one-child policy, know questions raised by members of legislative assembly on fiscal reform, immigration policies or even anti-smoking policies - they can all be queried from this search engine. I'd like to remind you again that bills will be searched only if they are available online.

Limitations

Since some of the assembly sites do not have much information, I have included other associated government sites. Unfortunately, most state governments have different websites for different departments, making it difficult to get an exhaustive list of sites. So, the information in this will not be exhaustive. But this will give filtered information that is reasonably wide. Please combine this with regular google search available in the same page.

States covered

Apart from both houses of the Parliament the custom search engine covers the websites of the following states: Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Goa, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Orissa, Punjab, Rajasthan, Sikkim, Tamil Nadu, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Delhi and Pondichery. To access the search engine, click here.

India: Parliament & Legislative Assemblies search engine Search websites of Indian Parliament and most legislative assemblies in...
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