Dissenting Counter-Publics in Pakistani Social Media and Cafe Culture

This book analyses how anti-state or counterpublics have emerged across mediated and physical spaces to respond to the state-led narrative of Pakistani identity. It aims to trace the rise of counterpublic spheres and anti-establishment discourses across different arenas—Twitter, YouTube, and local coffee houses. These spaces, both individually and collectively, offer unprecedented affordances that challenge traditionally immutable subjects such as the use of blasphemy as a political tool, nationalism, and national identity in Muslim contexts. As such, these counterpublic spheres have created opportunities for episodic deliberation on national identity and religion, and on how both shape the individual and collective identity of the Pakistani nation.