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Bengal, Mysore, and the making of American independence by Mostofa Sarwar

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  Whenever we talk about the American War of Independence, our imagination conjures up images of the dusty roads of Lexington and Concord, the heated debates in the assembly halls of Philadelphia, and the rise of a nation fighting for its freedom. We generally view it as a local rebellion against British tyranny. Yet the deeper currents of history tell a different story. The birthlines of this nation were also drawn on the soil of the Indian subcontinent. Modern national identities had not yet formed. The distance was insurmountable. Consequently, there is no direct documentation of any Bengali or Indian warrior being present on American soil. However, India and America were already bound together by the invisible threads of economics, military strategy, and imperial politics. The fire of Bengal: Corruption, tea, and the birth of revolution After the Battle of Plassey, the East India Company seized the wealthy territory of Bengal. But through corruption, greed, and the devastating ...
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Message from Radwan Chowdhury - a democrat

  Dear Friends, As our nation celebrates its 250th Birthday , we honor an incredible journey that began with a bold declaration that freedom belongs to every individual.   Over the past two and a half centuries, America has endured enormous challenges—from the Revolutionary War to the Civil War, economic crises, social injustice, and moments that tested the very foundation of our Republic. Through every trial, the enduring principles established by our Founding Fathers and preserved in our Constitution have guided us forward. The Constitution has never promised perfection. Instead, it provides a framework that protects liberty, limits government, safeguards individual rights, and ensures that government remains accountable to the people. It reminds us that power belongs to "We the People."   America has made mistakes. There have been times when poor leadership and bad governance have divided our nation or taken us away from our highest ideals. Yet our history is also a s...
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Message from Maung Zarni

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  Racism wrapped in the language of community protection is still racism. Spotted in Jelan Kebun, Klang, Selangor, Malaysia: “We, the residents of Jalan Kebun, reject Rohingya squatters. For the future of our village/community. Dirty and destructive squatters do not deserve to… pic.twitter.com/epYLu0vNL4 — Shafiur Rahman (@shafiur) June 24, 2026 A recent petition titled “ Remove Rohingya from Malaysia ” on Change.org gathered more than 420,000 signatures before Change.org placed it under review, citing its Community Guidelines. At the time of writing, the petition is no longer accessible. In my previous piece at FORSEA on the Rohingya sea crisis, I wrote about how Rohingya are both forced and driven to take the deadly sea route to Malaysia. In this essay, I will explain what it means to demand the “removal” of genocide-fled refugees, and what lies behind calls to send them back. Why Rohingya genocide survivors leave The Rohingya migration to neighbouring countries has increased ye...
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Births of a Nation - Surveying Trumpism with Cedric Robinson by Robin D. G. Kelley

  Cedric Robinson was fond of quoting his friend and colleague Otis Madison: “The purpose of racism is to control the behavior of white people, not Black people. For Blacks, guns and tanks are sufficient.” Robinson used the quote as an epigraph for a chapter in Forgeries of Memory and Meaning (2007), titled, “In the Year 1915: D. W. Griffith and the Rewhitening of America.” When people ask what I think Robinson would have said about the election of Donald Trump, I point to these texts as evidence that he had already given us a framework to make sense of this moment and its antecedents. Robinson’s work—especially his lesser-known essays on democracy, identity, fascism, film, and racial regimes—has a great deal to teach us about Trumpism’s foundations, about democracy’s endemic crises, about the racial formation of the white working class, and about the significance of resistance in determining the future. Through the intervention of film, a new American social order was naturalized...
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Message from Emgage

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  Democracy in Action 250 Years of America, Carving Muslims into the Political Conscience    by Salimah Hagmagid, Emgage Action June 30, 2026   We often treat politics as a spectator sport–a distant drama of talking heads, polling data, and headlines of catastrophe that appear far more often than those of justice. However, this midterm season, my time observing the campaigns for Dr. Adam Hamawy, Darializa Avila Chevalier, Brad Lander, and Claire Valdez stripped away the noise, revealing something much more potent: the raw, unshakeable reality that when our community organizes, we are undeniable stakeholders on the contemporary American political scene. I saw neighbors stepping off the sidelines to shape their own future. These aren’t just campaigns; they are a masterclass in why, despite the cynicism of the moment, the effort to engage and organize within our political system, regardless of how many people want to silence us, is the most radical act of hope we have.  As w...
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