Centre for Internet and Society

IRC19 - Proposed Session - #CallingOutAndIn

sumandro — 2018-11-26T13:13:43Z

Details of a session proposed by Usha Raman, Radhika Gajjala, Riddhima Sharma, Tarishi Varma, Pallavi Guha, Sai Amulya Komarraju, and Sugandha Sehgal for the Internet Researchers' Conference 2019 - #List.

Internet Researchers' Conference 2019 - #List - Call for Sessions

Session Plan

Lists are empowering; they offer a method of curating—things, experiences, people, events. As elements of an archive, they are a powerful tool for including and marking something as important. A list is not a neutral collection of objects; it comes into being within a specific logic, an articulated or unseen/unspecified rules, or criteria by which these objects are either included or excluded. In the context of the #MeTooIndia movement, lists have been weaponized by survivors of sexual abuse or harassment, serving to call out behaviours that for many years had been normalized, accepted, or simply ignored, but a patriarchal system. The list, in this instance, becomes a means around which survivors can rally and find support, while also being a tool for punitive action of various kinds, from legal to administrative to social. While “naming and shaming” (or naming to shame) was the purpose that gained currency in the popular discourse, we would like to explore the multiple meanings and experiences that underlie and are implicated by the act of listing. With specific but not exclusive attention to the list that is commonly referred to as LoSHA, the papers on this panel approach the logic and culture of lists and listing as modalities of feminist action.

To begin with, Usha Raman looks at calling out through listing as a meaning making, legitimating, even therapeutic act for those who participate in the creation of the list as well as those who engage with it in different ways. Radhika Gajjala, along with Riddhima Sharma and Tarishi Varma then go on to discuss the role of feminist digital narratives as evidence and the ways in which they could transgress and rupture institutional/legal/academic institutions and infrastructures. Following this, Pallavi Guha discusses the #MetooIndia movement as the second wave to #LoSha movement, which started in 2017, and points to who and what is still left out of the online narrative of sexual harrassment. Sai Amulya Komarraju applies Sara Ahmed’s ideas about affective economies to look at the responses of feminists and feminist organizations to the two waves of #metoo in India and at the responses of the state and the judiciary following incidents of sexual harassment at work. Finally, Sugandha Sehgal asks, in the context of #LoSHA and #MeTooIndia, how the digital list as spreadable and replicable social media content proliferates online, while also exploring the opportunities digital listing as a form of activism offers to contemporary feminist praxis in the Global South.

Session Team

Usha Raman, professor, Department of Communication, University of Hyderabad.

Radhika Gajjala, professor of Media and Communication Studies and American Culture Studies, Bowling Green State University.

Riddhima Sharma, is a doctoral scholar at Bowling Green State University.

Tarishi Varma, is a doctoral scholar at Bowling Green State University.

Pallavi Guha, assistant professor of communication and new media, Towson University, USA.

Sai Amulya Komarraju is a doctoral scholar in the Department of Communication, University of Hyderabad.

Sugandha Sehgal is a doctoral scholar in the Department of Arts & Aesthetics, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/irc19-proposed-session-callingoutandin

IRC19 - Proposed Session - #ButItIsNotFunny

sumandro — 2018-11-26T13:12:36Z

Details of a session proposed by Madhavi Shivaprasad and Sonali Sahoo for the Internet Researchers' Conference 2019 - #List.

Internet Researchers' Conference 2019 - #List - Call for Sessions

Session Plan

Exactly a year after #LoSHA (List of sexual Harassers in the Academia) was compiled by Raya Sarkar in 2017, the second wave of #MeToo began when writer Mahima Kukreja accused comedian Utsav Chakravarty of sending her unsolicited pictures of his private parts. This sparked a barrage of tweets by her with screenshots from other women who had been in similar situations with him, and in one case, also a minor.This was the beginning of the second wave of #MeTooIndia.

In this session, we propose to look at the implications of “List” being circulated in relation to the comedy industry in particular and study the discourse surrounding it. While Raya Sarkar’s was structured as a list and circulated on social media as one too (albeit a dynamic one), the second wave of the movement was nothing of the sort. Sarkar has still refused to divulge details of the assault as shared with her in the interest of those that came forward with their stories. The second wave, involving primarily the media and entertainment industry, was about naming and shaming the perpetrators, mainly by specifying details of every case of harassment while keeping the survivors anonymous. In this case, there was no physical, tangible list, but host of people on social media sharing screenshots of the accounts and retweeting the same. Each of the panellists will be presenting papers and engaging with the interpretative idea of “list” as they understand it in relation to the comedy industry in India.

Apart from such “controversial” issues being brought forth in the media, comedy, or comedians have not necessarily featured as a genre of academic study in India. Although the content performed by the stand-up comedians today has been about challenging the status quo with regard to questioning hegemonic narratives, the idea that at the end of the day “it is just a joke”, unfortunately leads to dismissal of comedy as serious business. It is with this objective as well that we want to foreground the stand-up industry and the ways in which it contributes to dominant progressive as well as regressive discourses especially with respect to gender.

The session is intended to be a panel discussion that would foreground the multivalent possibilities of what “The List” entails with respect to comedy. Both the panelists would be presenting individual papers followed by a discussion of their findings with each other as well as to be thrown open to the audiences.

Paper 1: Sexual harassment in comedy: When Twitter threads are treated as “legitimate” testimonials [Madhavi Shivaprasad]

In my paper, I will be focussing on the characteristics of “The List” circulated by Mahima Kukreja and the reasons people began to consider that the #MeToo movement had “arrived” in India.

There are two main aspects to the way in which it played out in India. At first, it was mainly about showing solidarity with other women, make people aware of the “magnitude” of the problem, the pervasiveness of it. The second was the naming and shaming in the hope of taking away the power harassers hold over the women, banking on their silence.

However, there is also a third aspect to it that needs to be considered with much seriousness: that of the details of the sexual assault itself. These accounts were circulated widely and in reading these details is where the “virality” of the posts lay. It was almost as if digital media houses were having a field day reporting one harassment case after another. Thanks to unimaginable speeds of the internet, reports would be filed within hours of posting the tweet online. New names were being added every day, new lists being made.

It is also interesting that it was the “lack” of a conventional list that ended up making the list of comedians accused of sexual harassment go viral. The list here manifests in the form of multiple Twitter threads by different people associated with the comedy industry. So much so that it became difficult to keep track of who was saying what.

In this paper, I ask questions such as what specific characteristics of the stand-up industry made it possible for it to become the first to come to the limelight. At the same time, I speculate about effect of the #MeToo movement for the men and women who are a part of the comedy industry today. What does it mean for their careers now that some have been outed as harassers? How are the women dealing with the threat, and at the same time comfort of having #MeToo as a resort to made their concerns public?

The questions I ask therefore are these: How does the “List” initiated through Twitter threads become pervasive in its absence as a conventional sequence of items? Is it just the solace afforded by what the list represents that encouraged women to make their stories public? What other structures were in place which made it effective at such a magnitude? What implications does it hold for the larger feminist movement in the wake of so many comedians being dropped off the rosters of large media conglomerates such as Amazon Prime?

Paper 1: The list on YouTube: An analysis of the comments manifested by the Indian stand-up routines on street assaults [Sonali Sahoo]

There has been a shift from the mainstream idea of the essentials of a comic woman (Tuntun, Upasana Singh, Archana Puran Singh on the celluloid and Supriya Pilgaonkar and others on television) who are portrayed from the point of view of the male (for the script has always been written by males). The essentials of the comic woman shall be elaborated upon by tracing the evolution of the idea of the female comic on various settings such a films and television, live performances posted online during the discussion. Today, the noticeable shift has been the female comedians have not remained just the face in a comedic plot but also the voice along with the face (the stand-up comedian writing and performing her own script) in a comedic setting. However, the female stand-up comedians have faced a rebuttal at this juncture. They have been called out for not aligning to the dominant ideals of the topics to be included in a stand-up routine. Their issue-based humour associated with the body, and hegemony politics has been openly reprimanded on Twitter, other social media. One tweet invited a lot of criticism in December 2017 which said “female content bra, boobs, period.” People were agreeing with it but also disagreeing and defending it by saying “so what?” In this paper, though, the scholar in not interested not in the Twitter conversational list rather, she is looking at the comments section on YouTube to understand the reactions people have to content posted by these comedians on their YouTube channel. Following is the explanation of the objective of the discussion.

The list has existed in various forms, here I intend to look at the comments section on YouTube as a list, and look at the implications of it through over a period of 2 to 3 years. (on the YouTube channels of Radhika Vaz, Vasu Primlani, Daniel Fernandes, Karunesh Talwar amongst a few others) To be particular, how are the commentators influencing the comedians or are they really?

How is the list formulated by the commentators different in concern to male and female stand-up comedians when they incorporate street assault or harassment against women in their stand-up routines? (a common ground)
How does it bring out the ideology of the commentators?
Discussion of the impact factor determined through its reach by referring to various newspaper articles that apparently are the voice of a collective group of people in the Indian society.

Hence, the whole point of the scholar is to look at the “list” of YouTube comments as deeply rooted misogyny in the society which have come to the limelight only due to the female stand-up routines on street assaults.

In the end of this session the scholar would discuss the potential of stand-up industry as an important medium to start the discourse on the sexual assault. These comedic routines can also be looked at as to be the first of the incidences discussing their personal accounts of harassment on the comedic stage.

Session Team

Madhavi Shivaprasad is currently a Ph.D scholar in the Advanced Centre for Women’s Studies at TISS, Mumbai. She also teaches full-time in the English department at Mount Carmel College Bangalore. Her areas of interest include gender and studies, humour studies, as well as disability studies.

Sonali Sahoo has an M.A. in English language and literature from St. Joseph’s College for women, Vizag. She is currently pursuing an M. Phil in English studies from Christ (Deemed to be University). Her area of interest include cultural, gender and humour studies in particular.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/irc19-proposed-session-butitisnotfunny

IRC19 - Proposed Session - #AyushmanBhavah

sumandro — 2018-11-26T13:09:41Z

Details of a session proposed by Arya Lakshmi and Adrij Chakraborty for the Internet Researchers' Conference 2019 - #List.

Internet Researchers' Conference 2019 - #List - Call for Sessions

Session Plan

One of the earliest known forms of organised administrative list making in the modern history began with the census. Undeniably, from collection of taxes to understanding power dynamics of a diverse population, lists determine the administrative chain of command, from an era of data documentation to the brand new world of big data. Recently, we have been witnessing the increase in the volume of data and constant formulation of new techniques of list making. However, considering lists as a new infrastructure of knowledge, it is highly important to understand, study and scrutinize their legitimacy, politics, political and cultural economy, authority they fall under, and most importantly their targets.

Indian healthcare is a convoluted administration. There is a need for the healthcare system to effectively permeate into the lowest rungs of society, thereby replacing the existent maladroit structure. This session takes Ayushman Bharat – a Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PM-JAY), as an admirable example which is based on a foundation of a series of lists, prepared for an administrative apparatus, in this case, the public health sector. However, not all reviews of this policy have been favourable to the cause, and the effectiveness to address health at all the primary, secondary and tertiary levels have oftentimes been met with crude skepticism and sardonic critiques. According to Young, a list is not just an organised and processed data, but it is also recorder of a data format that has multiple meaningful relations within its content while also being a window to the economy of selection and exclusion criteria adopted by societies in favour of “the social action it facilitates”. Currently being a crucial policy that involves serious list-making procedures on a large population of India, the need to scrutinize the cultural techniques behind list-making for Ayushman Bharat cannot be unseen.

Lists and network primarily serve in ways twain: the concept might be looked at as a network of information that is systemized to answer the epistemological questions asked by organizations. Additionally, networks clarify the mechanics of progression of an organization by proclivity of head-points. The holistic performance of any organization run by data depends on how well data is predisposed, which is why careful architecture of lists is absolutely essential. For Ayushman Bharat, the creation of lists does not find a pragmatic foundation on which its mettle is rested. The question therefore remains, is the concept of list still a crucial component of the operational infrastructure of the computation and network proliferation of the much talked about universal healthcare system?

We aim to establish two sub-sessions (45 minutes each). In the first half, we aim to:

Begin presenting the paper on Ayushman Bharat- how various lists heavily feature in India’s largest healthcare policy, the mechanisms by which it works and what output it yields, the financial interests of the corporates in Ayushman Bharat (insurance companies, private banks and hospitals, for-profit enterprises providing medical services in collaboration with private hospitals, etc), user expectations and consumer behaviour, the problems behind the policy execution, misutilisation and exploitation of political interest groups whether it be businesses, parties or influential individuals.
Discuss issues pertaining to the operations of Ayushman Bharat - how political groups take to social media platforms to disseminate their message, how there exists a wide communication gap intentionally placed to avoid retortion, how logical fallacies in and reasoning mismatches between the displayed progress and actual progress came into the picture, and how they can be removed, or even how the programme affects one’s political participation?
Present findings - research is mainly reliant on secondary material, with the exceptions of verbal interviews that we aim to conduct for our research purposes. These pre-recorded interviews are merely personal opinions of the interviewee that serve to gauge the impact of our narrative and emphasize (or mask) the thesis on which our research takes shape.

We will accommodate a slideshow to describe our thesis with examples from social media accounts of the National Health Protection Scheme and National Health Agency. The second sub-session instead will be more open to interactions and critical appreciations.

The piece of work is an evidence of collaborative effort in an interdisciplinary space of social science – Economics and Media. Both the co-authors hail from different disciplines that need to intertwine in order to address the topic of choice: The whatabouts of Ayushman Bharat. As a result of our diversity, we plan to address our areas of specialization respectively. For the next half of the session, we plan to interact with our peers, thereby preparing a report on the key-takeaways and suggestions of ideas identified in the session.

Session Team

Arya Lakshmi is a journalist and a media researcher. She has worked across India with various news media publications mostly covering politics. She completed her post graduation in Political Communication from Cardiff University, UK with her interests in Big Data, Internet and Electoral Behaviour. She is primarily involved in media research that revolves around internet and politics.

Adrij Chakraborty is an economics researcher. He is currently an economic analyst with Mumbai School of Economics and Public Policy, University of Mumbai and is researching with the Government of Maharashtra on the agricultural practices and labour market behaviour in Maharashtra. He attended Edinburgh University as a graduate scholar with the Scottish Graduate Programme in Economics. His interests lie in economic policymaking in Labour Markets, Migration and Political Economics.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/irc19-proposed-session-ayushmanbhavah

CIS r@w APU - Digital Labour - Call for Research Fellows

sumandro — 2018-10-31T11:11:42Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/jobs/cis-r-w-apu-digital-labour-call-for-research-fellows

Frequently Asked Questions about the Policy on Prohibition of Sexual Harassment

sumandro — 2023-09-05T10:11:10Z

Here are the answers to some of the frequently asked questions about the Policy on Prohibition of Sexual Harassment at the CIS. Please write to ic.cisindia[at]protonmail[dot]com for any further clarification, including other questions, as well as to submit a complaint.

Policy on Prohibition of Sexual Harassment

1. What constitutes sexual harassment?

Illustratively, physical harassment includes touching, hugging, kissing, pinching, blocking path, brushing against someone, invading someone’s personal space in a bid to attempt body contact.

Verbal harassment includes using obscenities, making suggestive comments or jokes, inappropriate humour, making threats, repeatedly making romantic propositions against a woman’s wishes, making sexual propositions, remarks on clothing or physical attributes.

Non-verbal harassment includes staring, obscene gestures, displaying/ sending sexual content on print/ computer/ phone/ other media, sexually suggestive glances.

However, if in pursuit of a legitimate professional objective or in the ordinary course of work it is necessary to carry out any activity, including discussion, viewing, reading or other handling of issues or material related to sex, sexuality, pornography or other activities of a sexual nature, such activity will not amount to sexual harassment provided that care is taken to ensure that such activity is carried out in a professional, respectful and dignified manner.

Finally, it should be noted that sexual harassment is made out from the experience of the aggrieved woman, and not by the intentions of the accused.

Under CIS’ policy, any woman can make a complaint against any such non-consensual acts or behavior. CIS has zero-tolerance for any kind of harassment.

For the purposes of this policy, woman refers to persons self-identifying as women, including cisgender and transgender women.

2. What is consent?

Legally, consent means an unequivocal voluntary agreement when a woman by words, gestures or any form of verbal or non-verbal communication, communicates willingness to participate in any sexually determined behaviour or pattern of conduct.

Consent must be ongoing and applies only to the specific sexually determined behaviour or pattern of conduct the initiator seeks to engage in.

Consent can be revoked at any point. Silence or lack of resistance cannot be construed as consent.

3. Who can make a complaint against sexual harassment? Can a third party file a complaint?

The policy applies to everyone at CIS’ workplace, and protects all women, whether employed contractually or not. CIS members and third-parties (women) can submit a complaint under this policy, against any CIS member or third-party to report an incident that occurred at the CIS workplace or committed via any other mode of communication. For the purposes of this policy, woman refers to persons self-identifying as women, including cisgender and transgender women.

Members include anyone engaged by CIS for any work, whether whether of regular, temporary or ad hoc basis, either directly or through an agent, including a contractor, with or without the knowledge of the Executive Director, whether for remuneration or not, or working on a voluntary basis or otherwise, whether the terms of employment are express or implied and includes a co-worker, a contract worker, probationer, trainee, intern or apprentice.

CIS’ workplace includes its offices in Delhi and Bengaluru as well as any place or medium of interaction, nationally, internationally and virtually, where the members visit in the broad context of their work, during the course of employment and/or arising out of any form of engagement with CIS. The policy will also apply to all attendees for events organised by CIS.

4. What is the limitation period for making a complaint? In other words, how soon should the aggrieved woman make the complaint?

A complaint should be made within three months from the date of incident and in case of a series of incidents, within a period of three months from the date of last incident. A complaint may be considered if it falls in the scope of the Extraordinary Situations clause of the Policy.

We urge aggrieved women to make a complaint at the earliest.

5. How can an aggrieved woman make a complaint? Can another person file a complaint on behalf of the aggrieved woman?

An aggrieved woman may prefer a complaint, in writing, to the IC at ic.cisindia[at]protonmail[dot]com, or any member of the current IC (details given below).

Where the aggrieved woman is unable to make a complaint on account of her physical or mental incapacity or death or otherwise, her legal heir, relative, friend, co-worker, or any woman having the knowledge of the incident may make a complaint to the IC, any member of the IC.

Name	Location	Designation	E-mail
Yesha Paul	Bengaluru	Presiding Officer	yeshapaul[at]protonmail[dot]com
Laxmi Murthy	Bengaluru	External Member	murthy.laxmi[at]gmail[dot]com
Chiara Furtado	Bengaluru	Member	chiarafurtado.cis[at]protonmail[dot]com
Yatharth	Bengaluru	Member	yatharthCIS[at]protonmail[dot]com

6. Can CIS investigate incidents of sexual harassment in the absence of a complaint?

Yes, in the absence of a complaint, the IC shall have discretionary powers to conduct an inquiry into incidents that may amount to sexual harassment after obtaining due consent from the aggrieved woman, in writing.

7. Once a complaint is made, how will the inquiry proceed?

Once a complaint is properly received, the IC shall take cognizance of the complaint at the earliest and in any case within 10 working days of receiving the complaint. Once the complaint and reply (from the accused) are received, before initiating the inquiry the IC may take steps to conciliate the complaint between the aggrieved woman and the respondent. Conciliation shall be initiated only if requested by the aggrieved woman.

If the aggrieved woman wishes to proceed with the inquiry of the complaint, the IC shall conduct a prompt, thorough and impartial inquiry. Both parties shall be given the opportunity to appear before the IC and present their case and/or submit the name of any witnesses or documentary evidence substantiating their case. The IC shall have the power to call upon any such witnesses and record their statements. The proceedings shall be conducted in such language as may be familiar to the complainant and the respondent.

The quorum for Inquiry Committee will comprise at least 3 members, including a woman member. The quorum will not be changed throughout the process, except where a reasonable case is made regarding a member’s conflict of interest.

The Inquiry Report of the IC, including its decision and recommendations, and reasons for arriving at such a decision, shall be communicated to the concerned parties and the Executive Director, in writing, at the earliest and in any case within 7 days of completion of the inquiry.

The IC will make every effort to complete its inquiry within ninety working days of a report of sexual harassment.

If the allegations against the respondent are proved to be true, the IC shall also recommend the penalties or corrective action that may be taken against him to the Executive Director.

The Executive Director shall act on the recommendation of the IC within a period of 60 days from the date of the receipt of the Inquiry Report, unless an appeal against the findings is filed within that time by either party.

8. What protection and interim relief is the aggrieved woman entitled to during the course of inquiring into a complaint?

The identities of the parties, witnesses, statements and other evidence obtained in the course of the inquiry process, recommendations of the IC, and action taken by the Executive Director will be protected as confidential material, and never published or made known to the public or the media.

The IC shall also take note of the inherent power asymmetry and/or the vulnerability of the complainant in such cases and take steps to ensure that the complainant is not subjected to a hostile environment during the inquiry.

9. Does making a complaint bar the aggrieved woman from obtaining relief under criminal law, or resorting to another legal recourse?

No.

The aggrieved woman can alternatively choose to file a criminal case under sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), the Indecent Representation of Women (Prohibition) Act and/or file a civil suit. Depending on the facts of the incident, sections 294, 354A, or 509 of the IPC may be invoked. Further a suit claiming damages on grounds of mental anguish and harassment can be filed under tort law.

CIS is legally obligated to provide assistance to the aggrieved woman in filing such complaints, should they choose to do so. The aggrieved woman shall need to approach the police, if they wish to file a criminal case.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/policy-on-prohibition-of-sexual-harassment-faq