Dis-Orient30 Music, Culture, Diaspora

Ashwani Sharma is a London based independent scholar. His interdisciplinary teaching, research and writing interests include: race, history and anti-colonial and black cultural theory; diasporic and global film and contemporary art; urban culture and music; open access publishing and radical study. He is a Visiting Research Fellow at Goldsmiths, University of London, an associate of the Research Centre for Transnational Art, Identity and Nation (TrAIN), UAL, and the Sonic Screen Lab, UAL. Ashwani is completing a book examining the political aesthetics of diasporic culture. He is the founding co-editor of darkmatter journal, and the co-editor of Disorienting Rhythms: The Politics of the New Asian Music (Zed Books). He is an advisor for the Inter-Asia Cultural Studies journal, and for Soundings: A journal on politics and culture. Ashwani writes and performs poetry. He has worked for the BBC and in independent film/sound, DJs, and has been an aeronautical engineer. Nabeel Zuberi is Associate Professor in Media and Screen Studies at Waipapa Taumata Rau / University of Auckland. His publications include Sounds English; Transnational Popular Music (University of Illinois Press, 2002), Media Studies in Aotearoa New Zealand 1 & 2 (Pearson, 2004 & 2010), Black Popular Music in Britain since 1945 (Ashgate/Routledge 2014), Synth-pop and its Repercussions (Bloomsbury, 2026), and articles and chapters on Black and Asian music media and cultures. Music, Media and Race after 9/11 is a monograph in progress for Bloomsbury. Nabeel is also a DJ, primarily in radio with Roots & Routes at KVRX-Austin (1993-95), The Basement at BASE FM Auckland (2004-2018), and Nick & Nabeel at TBC radio in Tāmaki Makaurau / Auckland since 2025. Sonia Mehta is a vocalist and cultural convenor. Her musical career shook the boundaries of Asian music with her band Salaam and Funk. Here she intentionally occupies space, performing in venues traditionally and historically denied to Black and Asian punters; using the stage as a site of resistance to experiment and honour the sounds of her parents and many migrants from the Indian Sub-Continent; holding each other in safety, community, joy and nostalgia. She has a feminist approach to her creative practice that led her to set up South Asian Women's Creative Collective London - SAWCC - sister to the NYC Collective - a platform for creative Asian women to centre their work in discussion and events. She has worked extensively with Asian Dub Foundation, as a vocalist and managing their music education wing - ADFED; Visionary Underground and the Nasha Collective. Sonia is on the Arts Advisory Board of Rich Mix London.