On June 12, Iranians will go to the polls to elect a President. On the ground, this is one of the most contentious elections in the thirty-year history of the Islamic Republic. With glitzy campaign videos, a so-called green wave taking the over Tehran’s streets, nightly riots between the supporters of the two frontrunners, and brazen accusations of corruption and lies unfolding on the first-ever televised debates between candidates, election fervor has gripped Iran.

As much as President Obama’s speech in Cairo has been branded as one “to the Muslim world”-whatever that might mean-it is certainly a speech whose audience spanned across a much larger swath of the world. In terms of signaling substantive policy changes for the peoples of that world, there is not much to count on. Much of the lip service is the same as that of the Bush era. We are not fighting Islam, but rather extremists-yes, Bush said that. We want the Muslim world to prosper-yes, Bush said that. We care about the oppressed sectors of your society-women, religious minorities, etc. Yes, Bush said that too. The main difference thus far is that not enough time has yet passed for the disparity between words and action to become irreconcilable (the disparity between words and words, though, is another story, as Obama dubbed the misogynist and racist monarch of Saudi Arabia to be full of wisdom just a single day before he went to Cairo).

Special blog contribution by film maker and journalist Arshad Khan. His observations during the filming of his latest project, Daraar: Fault Line, are chronicled in this piece, Health Diagnosis Pakistan: Obvious psychological pathology however complete and utter denial of any and all problems.

We will regularly be presenting a featured artist, writer or performer who is exploring questions of identity and personal narrative through their medium of expression.

The map is your representation. No rigid lines, no defined routes. You direct it on your own account.

We will regularly be presenting a featured artist, writer or performer who is exploring questions of identity and personal narrative through their medium of expression.

The map is your representation. No rigid lines, no defined routes. You direct it on your own account.

The Sheikh’s Batmobile is the product of pop-culturalist Richard Poplak’s two-year search for hallmarks of North American culture – “pop songs, sitcoms, Hollywood movies, shoot ‘em up video games, muscle cars and punk music” – in the least likely of places: the Muslim world.

The recent burst of mass mobilizations by sections of the Canadian-Tamil community in Toronto has brought to the fore several contradictions concerning the conflict in Sri Lanka and its presence in and connection to Canada. Mainstream media’s responses to the protests have been overwhelmingly racialist, exposing many of the limits of Canadian multiculturalism.