Lately, there has been a cultural trend where intentional “learning” has become cool. The resurgence of Substack and the ability to communicate to your audience, whether that’s hundreds and thousands of followers or just your 10 friends, signals that you are not a passive consumer in this era of content and information overload. You are paying attention. You are not complacent.
This trend has its pitfalls, but one positive outcome is that people are actively seeking spaces and platforms that recreate a classroom-like environment, places where you can listen to someone speak about a seemingly random topic, from why the sky is blue to why water is wet (yes, like the song from 'Rock On!!'). We are trying to train ourselves to be more curious, and curiosity feels especially pertinent at a time when we are constantly being fed and sometimes compelled to believe, whatever shows up on our feeds and timelines.
unLecture, a Delhi-based organisation, is refocusing attention on the pursuit of academia. By hosting a series of events and lectures at bars and cafés, they are bringing the kinds of questions and conversations we once associated with classrooms into people’s weekend plans.
unLecture’s events don’t stick to one domain. They range from science and art to philosophy, music, and public policy, with experts in each field leading the sessions. Every event is uniquely structured according to its subject. In some cases, they even provide prior reading materials, books or source texts that will be referenced during the lecture. Each session is broken down in detail in its description, giving attendees a clear sense of what to expect, almost like a course outline.
Among their upcoming events is a lecture by psychologist Utkarsha Jagga exploring the myth of soulmates, love, and how we are conditioned to feel lonely. They are also hosting a talk by Dr. Mahuya Bandhyopadhyay on the role prisons play in society, examining what confinement looks like from the inside out.
Organisations like unLecture, which engage audiences and communities in nuanced, layered discussions, help create an environment that fosters critical thinking and a culture that is not uni-directional. They help us slow things down, in a time where outrage and virality travel much faster than context and understanding. And yes, it is clichéd to say that learning is a life-long process and yes, studying can be boring but if we don’t how will we ever know the answers behind why two plus two isn’t five. (Consider that the full-circle Rock On!! moment.)
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