ACCESS

Hi and welcome to my website. 

 

A couple of weeks ago I received a letter from Sage India who had published the first five books that I authored informing me that they had decided to cease their operations in India. I was initially disappointed with the news although I rather quickly realised that this was an opportunity for me to do whatever I wanted with these publications, a privilege that hitherto was exercised solely by Sage. After having taught the politics of access to knowledge over many years, I now had an opportunity to practice it. The fact that I have the ‘Rights’ to some of my publications is a wonderful feeling. I am in a position that very few authors have experienced in their life-time. I must say that for all the egregious abuses of copyright that big publishing houses have a reputation for, I have not had any personal experience with this unwholesome side of publishing. I have had a great relationship with Sage India (I refused to read the fineprint!) and with successive Sage commissioning editors between 2007-2019. So I do owe them a debt for making my ideas and writings public. Having said this, I am happy to exercise the freedom to make available some of my writings. 

 

I have to thank my old mate from the Madras Christian College, Benny, for creating this website. We had a conversation over a cup of coffee at the Old Madras Bakery that is just from around the corner from where my brother lives in Anna Nagar, Chennai – and that was pretty much that.  

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Benny and I discussed the pros and cons of placing a ‘price’ on some of these books, especially the 2019 publication that is being used as a text-book in some courses on communications for social change although the hassle of dealing with bank accounts and transactions and everything else that accompanies a business just did not appeal to me. I am a great fan of ‘Creative Commons’ licensing although this too veers towards validations of the author as a creator with the power to exercise control over who and how creative works can be used. While CC has enabled the democratisation of rights for authors, going down this route would have added some distance between me as an author and those who just want to be able to download and read some of my writings.  Richard Stallman, the ‘free software’ evangelist has reminded us that the meaning of ‘free’ should be equated with the ideals and principles of ‘freedom’ rather than with the utopia of ‘free beer’. I am happy to say that some of the books on this website are free, gratis, available for no payment or charge, free beer for the mind.  The older I get and the more I write, I have realised that my writings really are part of a continuum, a following on in pathways that have been well-trodden by others. I owe a great debt to fellow academics - in the political economy tradition that has been my favourite framework for understanding the world, to my professors at the University of Leicester, Peter Golding and Graham Murdock, Stewart Hoover at the University of Colorado, Boulder in my work on religion and scholars in the critical social change tradition including Silvio Waisbord at Washington University, Clemencia Rodriguez at Temple, Cees Hamelink at the University of Amsterdam, along with innumerable other scholars. My thinking has been enriched by theirs and it is a good to feel that this website and its enabling of access will contribute to the public domain in some small way. 

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While I have written for ‘quality’ journals and appreciate the work that goes into maintaining quality – the worth of a journal is in my way of thinking is based on articles that not only are worth reading but that are broadly accessible. My greatest ambition as I began my career in academia was to write for the Economic & Political Weekly – why? Because my research focus has been on the media in India and the EPW has always provided the space for critical scholarship. The EPW is widely subscribed to in India and is available in many university libraries. And yet academic institutions based in the West have had a hard time making sense of/ranking the EPW because it is a weekly journal.

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The struggles over access are real and must be fought on many fronts. It is important that the pomposities and elitism of institutions, rankings, quality and the distinctions that accompany them are exposed for what they are – for the most part, waffle and piffle.

 

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We live in the era of the ‘copy’ and I am aware that there are many online repositories around the world that have made available academic writings available for no cost and often without seeking permission from publishing houses or authors. While I have tried to understand the dilemmas of the copy, the anarchic streak in me has got the better of me and contributed to this WTF moment.  

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I am only too aware that there are a large number of my writings that can only be accessed for a fee, bought over Amazon, available in an institutional library only for those who belong to that institution. This is also Life. I do look forward to a time when all my writings will become available for public access. This could be a pipe dream – but it is good to live in Hope.

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Pradip Thomas