While one can understand the concern with which religious scholars, newspaper columnists and talk show guests etc view the vexing question of Pakistani culture, this is not really a job for which they are qualified or over which they have rights (other than the right to have an opinion, of course). The task is best entrusted to ‘cultural institutions’ where the myriad issues may be explored practically and academically, and debated in the context of a region’s historical and political legacies.

As has been pointed out often, cultural identity is not a unitary entity that can be settled upon through consensus, conjured up fully-formed out of the thin air and then presented to people to take to their hearts. If it were that easy, decades of attempts to reduce Pakistani culture to a form dictated by the dominant religious ideology would have succeeded. Greybeard after greybeard has condemned practices such as Basant and mehndi rituals for being ‘alien influences’, ‘Indian’ or for having roots in religions other than Islam. Yet the practices survive, even flourish, for they speak to people at some bone-deep level that has little to do with religion and everything to do with being of a certain region.

If culture could so easily be identified and applied – pulled out of a can, preserved and easily digestible like Kraft Cheddar – Pakistani culture would not be characterised by the sort of contradictions that are today in abundant evidence. Canned culture dictates that any relationship between the sexes be unambiguous and morally (read: religiously) above board. How then can one explain the public acceptance of Begum Nawazish Ali, who takes ambiguity to the far side?

Culture that comes out of a can – the parroting of ideological sound bytes such as ‘Pakistan ka matlab kya’ or ‘Pakistan was born when Mohammed Bin Qasim first set foot in the subcontinent’ – is about as appetising as Cheddar that has sat on a shelf for a couple of years. Just as canned Cheddar is mass-produced by smoke-belching factories that have found ways of stripping the product of any grain of controversy – not a trace of an allergen, for example – canned culture is also mass-produced according to recipes constituted of the lowest identifiable common denominators, ie stereotypes: Pakistan = Islam, western dress = immorality etc. This sort of branded culture is stripped of all nuances of flavour, depth and practice, one specimen being virtually indistinguishable from the other. It has about as much to do with a real, living and breathing culture as canned Cheddar has with Roquefort (and as with cheeses, a living culture can cause the occasional allergy).

The fora best suited to exploring issues of culture and cultural identity – and all the contextual matters that come into play such as history, race, region, language etc – are ‘cultural institutions’ such as literature, poetry, drama, music, art, dance and cuisine. These fields collect the cacophony of various cultural histories and strands, create linkages and craft a melody from them. Sarmad Sehbai’s dramatic works, for example, draw upon sources from Marxist literature, anthropological and psychology texts, and work exploring rural-urban ideals to discuss modern Pakistan and citizens’ issues. The works of Bapsi Sidhwa, similarly, draw upon cultural influences and traditions rooted in Lahore, presented through the lens of an author both inside the system and out of it, and written in English. The very act of bringing together these disparate influences causes synthesis, and constitutes an exploration into the interconnectedness of cultural histories.

It follows, then, that if Pakistan is ever to reach cultural maturity worth the name, efforts be accelerated to set up universities and academies, mushairas and music conferences, theatres and cinemas, art galleries and museums, and all other possible avenues for cultural expression. Cultural debate takes place at such venues and events, and through them is built a cultural character emblematic of a people.

The setting up of such cultural institutions requires money, much of which must per force come from the state. It’s all very well to rely on donors and patrons but it is primarily the state’s responsibility to set up academies to train people in these fields, and then create venues where their work can be displayed.

If the culture ministry is concerned about Pakistani culture, why not get the Arts Councils in various cities to do the job they were created for: to support and subsidise work in the performing arts. Why not look into the Dramatic Performances Act of 1876, framed by the British to prohibit certain dramatic performances it deemed unsuitable, and still on the books in the Punjab over a hundred years later.

If the culture ministry is concerned, that is.

— hmumtaz@dawn.com