From Oxford University Press: “This book is a journey of discovery into the famous red light district of the Shahi Mohalla (the Royal Bazar), or Heera Mandi (the market of diamonds). The phenomenon of prostitution coupled with music and dance performances has ancient roots in South Asia. The areas where the practice is centered have given birth for centuries to many well-known performing artists. The areas are hubs for creative productions as well as nurture the talents of poets, singers, actors, and the gurus, musicians and composers of classical music…In order to provide an understanding of the traditional practices of prostitution the book attempts to capture a more realistic picture of the phenomenon through the lives of the people who live in the Shahi Mohalla, the musicians, the prostitutes and their pimps, managers and customers…The book also highlights the contributions that the inhabitants of the Shahi Mohalla have made to our society and to the world of art at large. By breaking these myths that surround the practice of traditional prostitution, the book helps eradicate a blind spot in our understanding of the power relations associated with gender roles throughout our society.”
Month: January 2018
Soneji, Davesh, ed. Bharatanatyam: A Reader. Oxford UP, 2010.
From Amazon.com: “A dynamic, living cultural practice of modern South Asia, Bharatanatyam is widely recognized as one of the world’s fastest-growing dance forms. This reader brings together some of the most important essays on Bharatanatyam written over the last two hundred years. Drawing from history, dance studies, women’s studies, religious studies, and ethnomusicology, this reader shows how this dance form has generated complex social histories and varied aesthetic practices. The comprehensive Introduction provides a broad understanding of the historical, socio-political, and aesthetic issues in Bharatanatyam alongside a contextual mapping of the sources.”
Srinivasan, Priya. Sweating Saris: Indian Dance as Transnational Labor. Temple UP, 2011.
From Temple University Press:
A groundbreaking book that seeks to understand dance as labor, Sweating Saris examines dancers not just as aesthetic bodies but as transnational migrant workers and wage earners who negotiate citizenship and gender issues.
Srinivasan merges ethnography, history, critical race theory, performance and post-colonial studies among other disciplines to investigate the embodied experience of Indian dance. The dancers’ sweat stained and soaked sari, the aching limbs are emblematic of global circulations of labor, bodies, capital, and industrial goods. Thus the sweating sari of the dancer stands in for her unrecognized labor.
Srinivasan shifts away from the usual emphasis on Indian women dancers as culture bearers of the Indian nation. She asks us to reframe the movements of late nineteenth century transnational Nautch Indian dancers to the foremother of modern dance Ruth St. Denis in the early twentieth century to contemporary teenage dancers in Southern California, proposing a transformative theory of dance, gendered-labor, and citizenship that is far-reaching.
Sriram,V. The Devadasi and the Saint: The Life and Times of Bangalore Nagarathnamma. East West, 2007.
From Amazon.ca: The term ‘Devadasi’ evokes a mystical past, replete with devotion, and dedication of girls to deities, refrains of soaring music and sensuous dances that attracted the patronage of kings and commoners. The preservation and transmission of the arts largely rested with the Devadasis and they had a strong presence in South India, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Though the intellectual elite, the wealthy and the famous, encouraged and supported the Devadasi system, it fell into disrepute, causing public outcry and government reforms, which led to its gradual decline. Bangalore Nagarathnamma was an icon of that age, highly skilled in the arts and well regarded by connoisseurs of music. She was an exceptional woman, much ahead of her times, a champion of the rights of the Devadasis and of women in general. Her devotion to the poet-composer, Tyagaraja, is legendary and she is best known as the architect and benefactor of the shrine over his Samadhi in Tiruvayyaru. In this book, the rise and fall of the Devadasi tradition is intertwined with the life and times of Bangalore Nagarathnamma. From small beginnings, Nagarathnamma rose to become a stellar figure in the cultural firmament of Madras of the 1920s and 30s. This work is a tribute to her indomitable spirit and her unrelenting efforts to perpetuate the memory of her patron saint, Tyagaraja.
Viswanathan, Lakshmi. Women of Pride: The Devadasi Heritage. Roli, 2008.
From Google Books: Devadasi, raja dasi or kutcheri dasi – devadasis have acquired a variety of definitions and roles over the years. Women of Pride studies, in depth, the devadasi tradition and its transformation into a living cultural phenomenon in the context of Hindu tradition. The book brings into focus the activities and identities of the devadasis and examines the functions and forms of the devadasi tradition. The changing face of the tradition has been authenticated and given a voice by the author by featuring some of the most prominent devadasis of our times. The book also examines the devadasi reform movement in a political, religious, and social context.