Petra: Lost City of Stone | Click here to watch
(54 min; 2015; English)
A PBS International 

More than 2,000 years ago, the thriving city of Petra rose up in the bone-dry desert of what is now Jordan. An oasis of culture and abundance, the city was built by wealthy merchants whose camel caravans transported incense and spices from the Arabian Gulf. They carved spectacular temple-tombs into its soaring cliffs, raised a monumental Great Temple at its heart, and devised an ingenious system that channelled water to vineyards, bathhouses, fountains, and pools. But following a catastrophic earthquake and a slump in its desert trade routes, Petra's unique culture faded and was lost to most of the world for nearly a thousand years. Now, in a daring experiment, archaeologists and sculptors team up to carve an iconic temple-tomb to find out how the ancient people of Petra built their city of stone. Meanwhile, scientists using remote sensors and hydraulic flumes uncover the vast city and its sophisticated water system. The race is on to discover how these nomads created this oasis of culture in one of the harshest climates on Earth.

https://www.documentarymania.com/player.php?title=Petra%3A+Lost+City+of…

Tesla: Master of Lightning (USA) | Click here to watch
(87 min; 2000; English)
Director: Robert Uth

Nikola Tesla invented or developed many of the electrical technologies which form the basis of modern life, including: alternating-current (AC) power transmission and electric motors; high-frequency (HF) communications, the basis for radio and television; neon lighting; remote radio-control; and X-rays. But his visionary genius and technical skill was countered by his lack of business acumen and eccentric personality. After dying penniless in 1943, his "missing papers" regarding the construction of a 'death ray' became the focus of international intrigue. His research on particle beam weapons led to several American and Soviet military research programs, including the Strategic Defense Initiative, known as SDI or "Star Wars".

https://watchdocumentaries.com/tesla-master-of-lightning/

Bach: A Passionate Life (UK)
(89 min; 2013; English)
Directors: Cesca Eaton, David Jeffcock

BBC documentary written and presented by the famous English conductor Sir John Eliot Gardiner. It is a rigorous biography that tries to show the man and the musician at the same time. Gardiner reveals an artist so complex and passionate; a family man both warm and cozy who must fight the hierarchies of the state and the Lutheran Church to accomplish her art.

Human, All Too Human was a BBC television documentary that originally aired in 1999. Taking its title from Nietzsche’s book of aphorisms Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits, the three-part series covers the lives and work of Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger and Jean-Paul Sartre. Although biographies, the overall theme was an exploration of the philosophy of Existentialism, as developed by these radical European thinkers.

Nietzsche: Beyond Good and Evil | Click here to watch
(49 min; English)
Director: Simon Chu

A brilliant young man, Friedrich Nietzsche was appointed professor at the University of Basel aged 24 having not even finished his degree. His evanescent philosophical life ended 20 years later when he went insane and died shortly afterwards.

Nietzsche’s argued that the Christian system of faith and worship was not only incorrect, but harmful to society because it allowed the weak to rule the strong – it suppressed the will to power which was the driving force of human character. 

However, without God he felt that the future of man might spiral into a society of nihilism, devoid of any meaning; his aim was for man to realise the lack of divine purpose and create his own values. 

https://documentaryheaven.com/nietzsche-beyond-good-and-evil/

PHYSICAL PROGRAMME

Conversations between a historian and his mother

Historians Lakshmi Subramaniam and G. Arunima explore the possibility of writing a history, at once professional and intimate, of the individual, family and society. Their reflections are occasioned by the release of Memories of a Malabar Lady: Sreekumari Vasudevan’s Reminiscences of Life with Justice K.S. Menon, 1926-1956, (Delhi, Manohar, 2022). This book emerged from conversations of over a decade or more, between the historian Hari Vasudevan, and his mother, Sreekumari Vasudevan.  Hari fashioned these into a biography of Sreekumari, her extended family, the places she studied and lived in, and the people she met. Hari brought the rigour of a professional historian and the empathy of a son to capture the perspectives of a young woman growing up in the company of her father, a legal professional, and their life in different cultural habitats, from the joint family estate in Malabar, the towns and cities of colonial South India, to the princely state of Jodhpur. 

This event also celebrates the memory of Hari Vasudevan (1952-2020). Hari was a highly respected scholar and much-loved teacher of Russian and European history. Educated in Nairobi and Cambridge, he taught for over forty years at the Department of History, Calcutta University, and served with distinction at the Academy of Third World Studies, Jamia Millia Islamia,and as Director, MaulanaAbul Kalam Azad Institute for Asian Studies. Hari died in May 2020, of corona virus, just a few months after Sreekumari passed away. The last of his books before his untimely death was In the Foosteps of Afanasii Nikhitin: Travels through Eurasia and India in the Twenty First Century (2014).  He is survived by his wife, Tapati Guha-Thakurta, their daughter, Mrinalini, and brother, Ravi. 

Presentations by 
Lakshmi Subramaniam
Visiting Professor, Birla Institute for Technology and Science Pilani, Goa Campus
&
G. Arunima
Director, Kerala Council for Historical Research
Professor, Centre for Women’s Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University

Introduced and chaired by Ravi Vasudevan, Honorary Fellow, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies

With the participation of Mrinalini  Vasudevan, Editor, Critical Collective

The 7th Symposium in the Literary Activism series presented by India International Centre; Centre for Creative and the Critical, Ashoka University; literaryactivism.com; and The Oxford Research Centre for the Humanities

As the mission statement says, one must wonder 'why modernity, the modern, and modernism – terms that are by no means interchangeable, but which are related to each other – have largely vanished, in India, from critical discourse and the quest for self-knowledge. There’s not only a deep hostility to, and nervousness about, the modern; it has, in a sense, slipped out of language.' This is true not only of India, but of other countries and contexts. They symposium hopes to generate a conversation about modernity and its elision.
 
The symposium is open to all. Please join us at this

link on 25th February 2022:

https://zoom.us/j/95739069170?pwd=T2YwR0pJZzdnc1J1TWVkZllrRHNxUT09

and on this link on 26th February 2022:

https://zoom.us/j/97888909349?pwd=b1pJK0dzVW1yV0FMWHNIbCt4S3ExQT09

On Not Mentioning the Modern: Schedule | Literary Activism