Labels, Histories, Politics: Indian/South Asian Dance on the Global Stage

2008 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 223-243 ◽  
Author(s):  
AVANTHI MEDURI
Keyword(s):  
South Asian ◽  
First Century ◽  
Nation State ◽  
The South ◽  
Global Networks ◽  
Indian Nation ◽  
The 1950S ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
The Uk

In this paper, I discuss issues revolving around history, historiography, alterity, difference and otherness concealed in the doubled Indian/South Asian label used to describe Indian/South Asian dance genres in the UK. The paper traces the historical genealogy of the South Asian label to US, Indian and British contexts and describes how the South Asian enunciation fed into Indian nation-state historiography and politics in the 1950s. I conclude by describing how Akademi: South Asian Dance, a leading London based arts organisation, explored the ambivalence in the doubled Indian/South Asian label by renaming itself in 1997, and forging new local/global networks of communication and artistic exchange between Indian and British based dancers and choreographers at the turn of the twenty-first century.

Staging Beckett: Constructing Histories of Performance

2014 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna McMullan ◽  
Trish McTighe ◽  
David Pattie ◽  
David Tucker
Keyword(s):  
First Century ◽  
Research Project ◽  
The 1950S ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Victoria And Albert Museum

This multi-authored essay presents some selected initial findings from the AHRC Staging Beckett research project led by the Universities of Reading and Chester with the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. For example, how did changes in economic and cultural climates, such as funding structures, impact on productions of Beckett's plays in the UK and Ireland from the 1950s to the first decade of the twenty-first century? The paper will raise historiographical questions raised by the attempts to map or construct performance histories of Beckett's theatre in the UK and Ireland.

scholarly journals Sacred Spaces in a Holy City. Crossing Religious Boundaries in Istanbul at the Turn of the Twenty-First Century

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
pp. 34-56
Author(s):  
Méropi Anastassiadou-Dumont
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Diversity ◽  
Local Economy ◽  
First Century ◽  
Religious Practices ◽  
Nation State ◽  
Sacred Spaces ◽  
The 1950S ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
The City ◽  
Holy City

The article examines Muslim pilgrimages to Christian places of worship in Istanbul after the 1950s. It aims to answer whether and how the Ottoman heritage of cultural diversity fits or does not fit with the pattern of the nation-state. After a brief bibliographic overview of the issue of shared sacred spaces, the presentation assembles, as a first step, some of the key elements of Istanbul’s multi-secular links with religious practices: the sanctity of the city both for Christianity and Islam; the long tradition of pilgrimages and their importance for the local economy; meanings and etymologies of the word pilgrimage in the most common languages of the Ottoman space; and the silence of the nineteenth century’s Greek sources concerning the sharing of worship. The second part focuses more specifically on some OrthodoxGreek sacred spaces in Istanbul increasingly frequented by Muslims during the last decades.

Choreographers and Musicians in Collaboration, from the Twentieth to the Twenty-First Century

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephanie Jordan
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
South Asian ◽  
First Century ◽  
Contemporary Dance ◽  
Creative Processes ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
The Uk ◽  
At Home

Traditionally, dance has always needed music, although over the last century, this relationship has frequently been questioned. This chapter charts key historical shifts in choreomusical thinking, followed by a series of contemporary case studies demonstrating a range of approaches to, as well as commonalities across time in, the theories and practices of collaboration. Evidence shows increasingly independent, multidimensional, even oppositional relations between music and dance and a new fluidity in the behavior of artists, enabled partly by the advent of super-fast technology. In dance, relatively little information is available on the nature of creative processes, especially on musical issues. For the case studies, this chapter incorporates new interview material with choreographers and musicians based in the UK: Wayne McGregor, at home in both contemporary dance and ballet; Shobana Jeyasingh, who draws from South Asian classical and Western dance practices; and the performance duo Jonathan Burrows and Matteo Fargion.

Contested and Cemented Borders: Understanding the Implications of Overseas Indian Citizenship

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 365-380
Author(s):  
Ananya Kumar-Banerjee
Keyword(s):  
South Asians ◽  
First Century ◽  
Nation State ◽  
Indian Economy ◽  
Indian Origin ◽  
Indian Nation ◽  
Indian State ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Ruling Party

AbstractAlthough the Person of Indian Origin (PIO) and Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) schemes have existed for some time, they began to serve a political and economic purpose for the Republic of India with the arrival of the twenty-first century. The OCI status asserts “Indianness” as a legible quality in diasporic memory. It does the work of cementing political Indo-Pakistani and Indo-Bangladeshi borders, while coopting the language of transnationalism to bolster the fundamentally nationalist regime of capitalism at work in the Republic of India. The goal of this regime is to promote a functionally nationalist, and thus, anti-transnational reality. As more generations of South Asians live and grow up abroad, creating a legible “Indianness” functions as a service to the capitalist Indian economy. These individuals abroad are encouraged to identify as diasporic “Indians” who must engage with their “motherland.” Thus, the transnationalist discourse of decreasing territoriality is exploited by the Indian state to serve goals that function in ideological opposition to transnationalism. As this discourse of legible “Indianness” becomes more successful, there will be increasing incentives for the ruling party in India to further privilege OCIs. In the end, the language and capital of the OCIs affirms the powers of capitalism contemporary Indian nation-state.

scholarly journals Charulata 2011: Dramatizing the Glocal

2020 ◽  
Vol 73 (3) ◽  
pp. 545-557
Author(s):  
Rituparna Roy
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
South Asian ◽  
First Century ◽  
Anna Karenina ◽  
Madame Bovary ◽  
The World ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
Satyajit Ray

AbstractA lonely wife in Kolkata and a bachelor in London have a virtual affair, but are forced to re-think their relationship when they discover he is her brother-in-law. Charulata 2011 is an ingenious post-millennial adaptation of Tagore’s novella, Nastanir (The Broken Nest, 1901), already immortalized by Satyajit Ray in his classic Charulata (1964). This intertextuality, especially with Ray, lends an added dimension to the film, allowing Chatterjee to contrast two modernities in Bengal – the colonial and glocal – over the course of a century. Both these women gain temporary respite from their suffocating marriage through an affair, but their circumstances are vastly different. While Tagore/Ray’s heroine (like Anna Karenina, Madame Bovary and Lady Chatterley) could only bond with a man she knew, technology expands Charulata’s choice in 2011. She romances the strange and the unknown – an unseen tall dark stranger with a gift for words. While the nineteenth century Bengali heroine had to reign in her erotic impulse, her twenty-first century counterpart submits to it, though with an overwhelming sense of guilt. But there are similarities too – both are childless homemakers; have a literary sensibility; and though a 100 years apart, in both their cases, the lover eventually departs, and duty ultimately wins over passion, bringing back the duly chastened wife to the wronged husband. Charulata 2011 thus dramatizes a glocalized South Asian narrative, where the protagonist negotiates an uneasy juxtaposition of a globalized outlook on the world with the entrapment of age-old social obligations in her self.

scholarly journals Beyond Discipline: Evolving Design Practice and Design Education in the Twenty-First Century

2020 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lara Furniss
Keyword(s):  
Undergraduate Education ◽  
Design Education ◽  
The Body ◽  
First Century ◽  
Design Practice ◽  
Creative Processes ◽  
Ethnographic Studies ◽  
Current Design ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
The Uk

Since 2000, design practice in the UK has changed dramatically. Boundaries between design disciplines have dissolved, and many contemporary design studios now defy classification. These studios are reconfiguring the design landscape, yet a uni-disciplinary structure still dominates undergraduate education. This is creating a disconnection between practice and education and posing critical questions for the current design education system. This article outlines the findings of a PhD research study exploring this disconnection, and although situated within the UK, the findings have international relevance. An initial scoping exercise draws on interviews with leading commentators from the UK design sector, examining the evolution of design practice over the past 10 years, and possible future directions for undergraduate education. Findings highlight that UK policy for creative education has placed undergraduate design courses in potential crisis. Arguably, the current university system for design education is outdated. It is now necessary to redefine the skills and processes twenty-first-century designers need. The body of the research is situated within five internationally renowned creative studios which defy classification. In-depth ethnographic studies cross-analyse the creative processes of these studios and their views on education. Findings identify key components of each studio’s processes, while also exploring studio members’ educational experiences, and reflections on future implications for pedagogy. This article argues that this growing disconnect between practice and education calls for existing pedagogic models to be challenged, proposes alternative approaches and highlights the need for policymakers, practitioners and educators to work together to best prepare young designers to meet today’s challenges.

Women’s Cartoons and Comics in the Twenty-First Century

2020 ◽  
pp. 179-194
Author(s):  
Nicola Streeten
Keyword(s):  
Essential Element ◽  
First Century ◽  
Graphic Novel ◽  
Feminist Activism ◽  
Political Messages ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
The Uk

Streeten draws on Simone Lia’s graphic novel Fluffy (2005, Jonathan Cape) to demonstrate how humor combines with the comics form to address and quietly challenge assumptions around childcare, parenting, and masculinity. Streeten’s consideration is part of her wider thesis that the humorous cartoon and comic has been an essential element of feminist activism in the UK, supporting serious political messages. Her claim is that the structures built by feminist activity have made the buoyant position and visibility of women cartoonists in the UK today possible. The role of humor in this history, has been an essential, yet little recognized aspect.

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