SynTalk

Are you in (deep) passionate love? Or, have passions calmed down? Do revolutions happen spontaneously, & what maintains them? How do we keep various commitments? Do you imagine yourself as an object? What bores you? Could we, sometimes, experience boredom in a deep kind of way? Can human relationships be authentically mediated by objects? Is consumerism itself a revolution? Do most of us not have a systematic view of the world? Do (only) individuals fall in love? Do we become more revolutionary merely if we suffer more? What role do narratives play? What is the future of – the idea of – pure love? ‘Should’ a sense of moral duty be invoked to keep marriages together? Would anything be lost if we are found to be superficial beings? Is the appeal for individualized consumption less in societies that have collective social aims? Does consumerism work because it taps into our ability to love? Do consumer culture and religiosity go together? Do we need both theory and memory? Would the sites of boredom keep changing? &, would the notion of commitment become more flexible in the future, even as we continue to fall in love? But why? SynTalk thinks about these & more questions using concepts from cultural theory & intellectual history (Prof. Craig Brandist, The University of Sheffield, Sheffield), philosophy (Prof. Raja Halwani, SAIC, Chicago), & sociology (Prof. Sanjay Srivastava, IEG, New Delhi). Listen in...