anders deutsch

I have just re-read an aritcle I wrote twelve years back. It was not really a surprise. But I did notice my change in language. Then I still used terms like German, Indian or even foreigner, as if they described something essential. I was not able to distance myself from them, and thus I reproduced the underlying concepts. I still was held by the idea that there are 'cultures' and 'identities'.

Words limit what we can think. Things which can not be denominated can hardly be thought. Being caught in a language which essentialises identities, it is hard to form a concept of hybridity, of something changing, ambigious.

To form new ideas one has to cross the limits of the words.