August 2007
Issue No. 403
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The Majority World looks back
Shahidul Alam makes the case for fair trade in imagery.
Belongings: felt, presented, challenged
Images from Bangladesh, Iran, South Africa and Sri Lanka.
A true Pathshala
The story of an extraordinary school, told by Sameera Huque and Shahidul Alam.
Lifecycle: with a few exits
Images from Nepal and Bangladesh.
Coping with pain
Images from India and Bangladesh.
Lifestyles: disappearing and aspired
Images from Bangladesh and Japan.
Action on Majority World photography
Contacts and websites for agencies that hold or promote Majority World photography.
News, views, and & voices
NI Special Feature
The long wait for peace
After 20 years of war, Northern Uganda could be on the verge of a deal to end the violence. But will it enable the region’s displaced and terrorized women and children to rebuild their lives? asks Rebecca Wearn.
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from
THIS MONTH'S EDITOR
New Internationalist editor Dinyar Godrej’s email asking us to participate in the 400th issue of the magazine a few months ago was a great opportunity. But with Dhaka in flames and our own struggles to ensure some semblance of fairness in the elections, we passed it on to other activists.
Vanessa Baird’s subsequent email suggesting an issue of the New Internationalist based on our organization – the Drik photo agency and Pathshala photography school – as an example of how some of us in the Majority World are challenging the global information flow, came as an unexpected reprieve.
Our immediate political problems in Bangladesh hadn’t gone away. An activist had been brutally killed by the army, and a journalist friend who had been courageously reporting on military misrule had been picked up in the middle of the night.
So things were far from easy on the home front, but writing about, and showing, what had been our central struggle over the last 20 years was an opportunity we couldn’t miss. We had all lived it. More importantly, with our majorityworld.com site up and running and slowly beginning to get pictures into print, we weren’t just talking about change. We were witnessing it taking place.
This issue of the magazine could hardly have been better timed. Majority World photographers embraced the idea: from the small studio of VAST – a voluntary artists association in Bhutan – to a crammed office room in Santa Cruz, Bolivia; from the enthusiastic Photo Circle in Kathmandu to a hotel lobby in Dili, Timor Leste.
Our FTP site has been busy and the pictures – some of which are featured in the pages of this issue – have been flowing in. After years of trying to persuade others, Majority World photographers have taken things into their own hands. Watch this space.
Shahidul Alam, Drik/Pathshala for the
New Internationalist Co-operative
shahidul@drik.net
