At a time in which the word ‘occupy’ has become synonymous with social movements, the threat of closure to The Women’s Library is a crucial reminder that women’s history must also occupy its own space in order to maintain the public profile of women's activism in Britain.
"I felt there was no space for me to express grief at my son's disability". The grief of those who care for people with a disability is betrayal of the Cause. Rahila Gupta asks: how do you value disability at the same time as mourn the loss of ability?
Georgia’s capital is undergoing a massive rebuilding programme, with shabby historical buildings being replaced with facsimiles, complete with plastic ornamentation. But, as documentary filmmaker Salomé Jashi writes, an iconic square in old Tbilisi is being threatened with an even more radical rem
As Jubilee celebrations die down in the short period of calm before the Olympics, questions arise about what all this means, what Britain and Britishness is, and what the future might be for both.
Reaction inside Russia and further afield to the imprisonment of 3 members of a punk rock girl band after their performance in one of Moscow’s cathedrals has been by turns outraged and baffled. The girls are still on remand, awaiting trial for hooliganism (maximum sentence 7 years). One can only h
The children of Indian citizens living in Norway may have been taken on the pretext of the rights of the child, but Norway’s handling of the issue reveals the dark side of paternalism as a fig-leaf for xenophobia
We are at a point in the drugs policy debate now where it is no longer heretical to critique conventional wisdom; that is, to critique a policy which bears virtually zero relation to medical and sociological evidence. How many more women have to beaten, raped, or murdered before we finally see sen
A recent documentary, “The Desert of Forbidden Art”, tells of a cultural and social phenomenon hidden in the deserts of Uzbekistan. The museum has miraculously preserved rich collections of Soviet avant-garde art, but will it be able to survive under new – completely different, but no less threate
It is difficult, if not outright impossible, to talk about Pakistan without also talking about the politics of the region. As such Granta Magazine's latest issue, Pakistan, is perhaps the magazine's most political work to date. openDemocracy's Luke Heighton responds to the issue's highly political
The Guardian once referred to the Shanghai Bienniale as the Chinese government’s effort to “co-opt contemporary art to advertise the productivity and tolerance of a new China.” As the art world co-opts another Chinese dissident perhaps we should ask what is being advertised in return?
openDemocracy's Discourses series is currently taking artistic submissions for our next event, The architecture of war, opening on January 6, 2011.
