We are delighted to announce that Nadeem Farooq Paracha will be coming to LUMS, as part of the Mushtaq Ahmad Gurmani School of Humanities and Social Sciences' History Seminar Series, to launch his book, Points of Entry: Encounters at the Origin Sites of Pakistan.
Date: Friday, April 19, 2019
Time: 6:00 pm – 8:00 pm
Venue: Saeed Saigol Auditorium, Academic Block, LUMS
About the Author
Nadeem Farooq Paracha is a regular contributor to Pakistan’s leading English daily, Dawn. Writing on cultural themes, Mr. Paracha quickly established himself as a satirist and, to use his self-description, cultural critic. This book, third of its kind produced by Mr. Paracha, is a compilation of his various essays written during the last decade. While his theme is, broadly speaking, Pakistan’s history, its canvas is rather broad. Unlike statist narratives about the origins of Pakistan dating back to Arab and Turko-Mongol invasions of the region, Mr. Paracha sets out to decentre the very basis of such a narrative. For that, he draws upon literature, film, folklore, newspapers and so on.
Most importantly, it is through personal stories of the people he interacts with and that of his own that he weaves a counter-narrative. In other words, he is a self-taught cultural historian par excellence who is constantly engaged in a quest to write a people’s history of Pakistan – about their dreams, aspirations, struggles, frustration and constant resistance against oppression and exploitation. It is an intimate retelling of Mr. Paracha’s own quest to find answers and to make peace with the past that is alien but continues to haunt us.
Those who want to attend the event from outside of LUMS need to send their names and ID card numbers to dean.mgshss@lums.edu.pk
