Is It Possible the Brahmins of India Are Better at Cracking Foreign Cultural Codes?

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Is it possible the brahmins of india who come to america there better at cracking foreign cultural codes? They're more used to diversity. The complacency is taken away once they leave their country, because it's not just they have done well as leaders but in particular kind of leadership roles. Maybe i don't know enough, but i'm just really uncomfortable with that,. beyond saying there's a coincidence of money, social hierarchy, opportunity and education. I can't answer for why, you know, it would play out differently for, let's say, the white American male. But i hesitate to reinforce the essentialism of your question.

Growing up, Barkha Dutt was totally rootless. She spoke English, not her parent’s Punjabi. She devoured Enid Blyton and studied English literature during college, but read few Indian novelists. She didn’t even know her caste. This has opened her up to criticism as being a progressive elite who is out of touch with her heritage, and challenged her to be especially thoughtful in the way she examines the many overlapping values in Indian society. A successful broadcast journalist and columnist, she currently runs the YouTube-based news channel MoJo Story and recently published a new book, Humans of COVID: To Hell and Back.

Barkha joined Tyler to discuss how Westerners can gain a more complete picture of India, the misogyny still embedded in Indian society, why family law should be agnostic of religious belief, the causes of declining fertility in India, why relations between Hindus and Muslims seem to be worsening, how caste has persisted so strongly in India, the success of India’s subsidized institutes of higher education, the best city for Indian food, the power of Amar Chitra Katha’s comics, the influence of her English liberal arts education, the future of Anglo-American liberalism in India, the best ways to use Twitter, and more.

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Recorded May 5th, 2022 Other ways to connect

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