Oral History Interview with Ian Iqbal Rashid (2015)
Salaam Toronto, politics, racism, social exclusion, Desh Pardesh, gay, South Asian
Ian Iqbal Rashid is a poet and writer, and one of the co-founders of Desh Pardesh. In this interview he discusses the conception of Desh, its original visions and its its manifestation into an internationally recognized event. Rashid was not involved extensively in programming or planning, but was instrumental to bringing together the necessary team to do so. Rashid also discusses race politics, race shame, and the political climate of Toronto from the late 1980s to late 1990s. He concludes with how Desh Pardesh shaped him as a South Asian artist and gay man.
South Asian Visual Arts Centre (SAVAC)
28-05-2015
Anna Malla
LGBTQ Oral History DIgital Collaboratory (Elspeth Brown, PI)
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License
PDF, MOV
English
Sound, Text
1980s Toronto, 1990s Toronto
Oral History Interview with Paramjit Rai (2014)
Activism, Organisations, Idenity, Politics, Desh Pardesh, South Asian, arts festival, oral history, race
Paramjit Rai was a volunteer and co-coordinator at Desh Pardesh for a number of years. She discusses her experience as a social policy worker and academic at the festival and how this role of “outsider” informed her perspective on the festival. She also discusses race politics and identity formation both in the Toronto political climate and specifically within the Desh Pardesh festival. Rai goes on to conclude that a Desh festival could recur in the modern day, but for it to happen there needs to be an urgency, a need for something by the modern youth.
South Asian Visual Arts Centre (SAVAC)
2014-11-24
Anna Malla
LGBTQ Oral History DIgital Collaboratory (Elspeth Brown, PI)
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License
PDF, WAV
English
Sound, Text
1990s Toronto