Dr. Nandi Bhatia has written an excellent book on the topic, specifically as it pertains to theatre and dissent.<\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\nQuestions to Consider<\/strong><\/p>\n\n- Sardari Begum is a thumri singer, but is she a courtesan? Is\u00a0she a nautch girl? Is she a sex worker? Why do some characters speak about her as if she is? Where do these categories diverge? Where do they overlap?<\/li>\n
- Is the audience exposed to any other performing women? Are we encouraged to view performing women (including thumri singers, courtesans, nautch girls, etc.) as generally good and talented, or only certain types? Is Sardari Begum the exception or the norm?<\/li>\n
- What does this film do with the trope of the deceptive courtesan who profits from unsuspecting men?<\/li>\n
- In what ways do Sardari Begum and Tehzeeb try to emancipate themselves and those around them from the confines of their subject position? Do they succeed? Why or why not? Is emancipation possible?<\/li>\n
- Is Sardari Begum a strong-minded activist? Is she a contributor to her daughter\u2019s oppression? Can she be both?<\/li>\n
- Can we, the audience, forgive Sardari Begum for pushing her daughter into her own career and away from the marriage she desires? Can we forgive the mother lambasted by Sardari Begum for refusing a non-Muslim husband for her daughter? Which of these mothers were trying to protect their daughters? Which were trying to control their daughters? Can it be both?<\/li>\n
- Why is it significant that Sardari Begum is dead throughout the film? Who is telling her story? Who is interpreting it? Is Sardari voiceless?<\/li>\n
- What was the nature\/source of the riot during which Sardari Begum was killed? What does that nature suggest about Sardari Begum\u2019s relationship with the culture around her?<\/li>\n
- When Sadiq tries to influence Sardari\u2019s image to be more sexualized, she says \u201cTo sing lewd songs like nautch girls is not for me!\u201d How is the audience encouraged to view nautch girls? Does the film defend all female performers, or only those who are \u201cuntouched and pure\u201d? Who defines purity? Is the audience encouraged to agree with Sardari\u2019s views on sexuality or to question them?<\/li>\n
- What role do Muslim-Hindu conflicts play in this film? Is Sardari Begum party to these conflicts? Is the audience encouraged to support her role in inter-faith weddings?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
Exploitative vs. Generous<\/strong><\/p>\n\n- Many of the noteworthy men in Sardari Begum <\/em>exploit, deceive, and control the women around them.\n
\n- Hemraj seeks a kind of ownership over Sandari Begum and her art, insisting that she only perform for \u201cthose who could truly appreciate it\u201d\u2014him and his upper-class acquaintances.<\/li>\n
- Sadiq attempts to control all aspects of Sardari\u2019s career: he convinces her to leave her hometown, insists she quietly smile at auditions and let him do the talking, attempts to influence her to make more openly sexual music, and controls her finances behind her back, making investments and land purchases in his own name. Sandari to leave her home town, insists she quietly smile at auditions and let him do the talking, and controlled her finances behind her back, making investments and land purchases in his name. When Tehzeeb interviews Sadiq, he claims he doesn\u2019t know why Sardari left him, claiming that she simply became critical of him upon losing her \u201cmental balance.\u201d<\/li>\n
- Mark claims he\u2019ll leave his wife for Tehzeeb, but ultimately never does. He demeans and rejects Tehzeeb\u2019s ideas for news articles.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n
- <\/li>\n
- Contrastingly, Sandari Begum is consistently represented as generous.\n
\n- When her brother Jabbar asks her for a loan for Tehzeeb\u2019s education, she gives it to him as a gift<\/li>\n
- When she hears her father is ill, she insists on sending him a generous sum, despite believing he wouldn\u2019t want to see her in person<\/li>\n
- In her younger days, she shared her earnings with her Jabbar and the community<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
Tehzeeb’s Commentary\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n- When Jabbar, Tehzeeb\u2019s father and Sardari\u2019s brother, demeans and dismisses Sardari as \u201cany other prostitute,\u201d Tehzeeb openly resists patriarchal ideology:\n
\n- She attempts to focus the conversation on Sardari\u2019s talents<\/li>\n
- She says, \u201cI think [Sardari Begum] was an independent-minded woman, and our society cannot stand such women.\u201d<\/li>\n
- She asks, \u201cAll a woman can be is a good wife, an ideal daughter, or a self-sacrificing mother, isn\u2019t it?\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
Who Upholds the Patriarchy?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n- In some flashbacks, Sardari Begum is seen arguing with a young bride\u2019s mother and a priest, insisting that the bride should be allowed to marry who she chooses. The mother, contrastingly, regards choosing her daughter\u2019s husband to be her own right. Both the mother and the priest reject the daughter\u2019s choice of husband for being non-Muslim.<\/li>\n
- Sakina, Sardari\u2019s daughter, tells Tehzeeb that Sardari, who believed marriage would take away her daughter\u2019s freedom, refused to allow Sakina access to her choice in romantic partners, discouraged her from marrying, and pushed her into a life of music without considering her opinion on the matter. In a flashback, Sardari rips up love letters from Sakina\u2019s love interest, stating that \u201cthe best music comes from a heart that is untouched and pure.\u201d<\/li>\n
- When Sadiq pushes Sardari Begum to take on sexually-charged songs, Sardari responds, “To sing lewd songs like nautch girls is not for me!\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sardari Begum follows Tehzeeb, a young reporter covering the story of Sardari Begum, a popular singer and courtesan killed during a riot stemming from Muslim-Hindu tensions in Delhi. When Tehzeeb discovers her father among the mourners at Sardari Begum\u2019s funeral, she comes to learn that the singer was her aunt, who was disowned by her Read More …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[77,56,58,88,106,105,48,44],"class_list":["post-568","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-films","tag-bollywood","tag-courtesan-films","tag-film-tropes","tag-music","tag-muslim-hindu-conflict","tag-performing-women","tag-primary-source","tag-sex-work"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/courtesansofindia\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/courtesansofindia\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/courtesansofindia\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/courtesansofindia\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/courtesansofindia\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=568"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/courtesansofindia\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/courtesansofindia\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=568"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/courtesansofindia\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=568"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/courtesansofindia\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=568"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}