Saturday, September 26, 2026
AKSC 7ᵗʰ ANNUAL CONFERENCE
Democracy & Freedom: Promise vs Practice
How Culture, Law and AI Control the Narrative
Equality Through Collective Action
Our lives are regulated by legal and social codes. Legal codes, or laws, are written but often applied selectively. Social codes are unwritten but strictly observed. They manifest through cultural, religious, and social practices shaped by race, gender, caste, religion, and other identities. Emerging technologies, rather than reducing inequality, often reinforce it.
Legal and social codes interact to uphold the status quo. Social codes determine access to resources and opportunities, allowing inequalities to accumulate over time. People affected by these inequalities have responded through uprisings, as in the Civil War, or mass mobilization, as in the civil rights movement. At times, those in power have been pressured to introduce structural reforms, as in the New Deal.
When people facing systemic inequality demand equality, those benefiting from the system often claim that these demands violate their freedom and liberty. This tension is deeply rooted in legal and social codes. People secure their rights only through organized community, social, and political action. Understanding these challenges is essential to building an effective collective response.
AKSC’s 7th conference will examine these issues in depth through panels on law, culture, technology, and politics. AKSC firmly believes in organized collective action rather than individual, anarchic responses. This conference offers like-minded people an opportunity to come together, organize, and build a collective response.
We look forward to seeing you at our 7th conference!
Conference Sessions
Hindutva in America: Capturing Political Power and Controlling Cultural Narratives
Fighting Caste Discrimination at Work: A Practical Discussion
Living in the Age of AI: Technology, Labor, and Power
Register
Here
!
Register Here !
AKSC Annual Conference 2026
For over a decade, AKSC has built a grassroots movement where ideas become action. As we enter our next decade, we are focused on forging stronger alliances across movements to challenge caste, inequality, and all forms of exploitation- together.
What to Expect
Inspiring conversations with organizers, scholars, and movement leaders
Interactive sessions on building solidarity across struggles
Opportunities to connect, collaborate, and forge lasting partnerships
A welcoming space for anyone committed to justice, equality, and collective action
Registration Fee: $40
Includes: Lunch and Dinner
Join us as we build the relationships and alliances that will shape the next decade of collective action: to build cross-movement solidarity, with anti-caste politics at its foundation.
Get a special discount if you are:
20 or younger (100% discount)
Students (50% discount for UG/Masters/PhD)
Email us at akscsfba@gmail.com for the above discount codes
Lunch and dinner included in the registration fees
The Conference Schedule will be published soon!
Calling Student Presenters
!!!
Calling Student Presenters !!!
We invite submissions centered around the conference theme:
Democracy & Freedom: Promise vs Practice
How Culture, Law and AI Control the Narrative
This conference will feature three sessions focused on three forces that shape hegemony and supremacy today: culture, law, and AI. Each session will include an expert panel and student presentations. They will examine how culture and media (including election campaigns and curriculum politics), law (through courts, legislation, and legal systems), and technology (especially the rapid rise of AI) are going to shape the future of organizing. Importantly, the sessions will explore effective ways to challenge and resist the exploitative tendencies of these forces.
If you are working on any of these themes broadly- send in your abstracts!
Participants are encouraged to present work-in-progress, hypotheses and/or results relating to data-driven or qualitative research, or visual storytelling - presentations can take academic, activist, or artistic forms.
Submission Details:
Title and 150-200 word abstract
Name, affiliation (if any), and contact information
Deadline: 5pm PST, September 10, 2026 [Extended!]
Note: All presenters should register for the conference using the registration link
Presentations in 2025
| Name | Title | University |
|---|---|---|
| Dhananjay B | Indian Caste Bias in AI: Embeddings, Hiring, and Ethical Gaps | Stanford |
| Swagata B | Omissions and Assertions: Caste, Class, and Personhood in the Indian Diaspora | University of Buffalo |
| Monisha D | Could Belonging Portend Violence? The Impact of Hindu Nationalism on Support for Violence towards Dalit people | Stanford |
| Ashok K | Prohibiting Caste Discrimination Among South Asian Diaspora in Employment Under California Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA) | Indiana University, Bloomington |
| Rashmi K | Improbable transitions: unveiling chasms in rural India’s transition to cleaner cooking | UC Berkeley |
| Poojit H | Building a New Indian American Left: Diaspora Indians for Liberation | Stanford |
THE SPEAKERS
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Biju Mathew
Co-founder of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance and a founding secretary of the National Taxi Workers Alliance.
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Phil Horowitz
Veteran California Employment Litigator and Mediator
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Kara Brodfuehrer
Senior Counsel, California Civil Rights Department
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Ashok Kumar Pindiga
SJD Legal Scholar and Author
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Ann M. Noel
Workplace Rights Consultant and Former Executive Officer of the California Fair Employment Commission
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Pieter Friedrich
Investigative Journalist and Author on Global Transnational Repression
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Karthikeyan S
Software Engineer & Writer
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Usha Kumar
New York-Based Researcher and Political Commentator
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William R. Frey
Assistant Professor of Social Work and Technology Researching Digital Resistance and Ethics
AKSC Turns Ten!
AKSC is built on a decade of grassroots organizing.
Our conference is a unique anti-caste space where theory meets practice and ideas are tested on the ground.
After ten years of building an inclusive anti-caste platform, we are entering the next phase: forging lasting relationships across organizations to collectively challenge new forms of exploitation.
VENUE
Los Cerritos Community Center
3377 Alder Ave
Fremont, CA 94536
