Unfinished Gestures: Devadasis, Memory, and Modernity in South IndiaUniversity of Chicago Press, 23.11.2011 - 312 Seiten Unfinished Gestures presents the social and cultural history of courtesans in South India who are generally called devadasis, focusing on their encounters with colonial modernity in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Following a hundred years of vociferous social reform, including a 1947 law that criminalized their lifestyles, the women in devadasis communities contend with severe social stigma and economic and cultural disenfranchisement. Adroitly combining ethnographic fieldwork with historical research, Davesh Soneji provides a comprehensive portrait of these marginalized women and unsettles received ideas about relations among them, the aesthetic roots of their performances, and the political efficacy of social reform in their communities. Poignantly narrating the history of these women, Soneji argues for the recognition of aesthetics and performance as a key form of subaltern self-presentation and self-consciousness. Ranging over courtly and private salon performances of music and dance by devadasis in the nineteenth century, the political mobilization of devadasis identity in the twentieth century, and the post-reform lives of women in these communities today, Unfinished Gestures charts the historical fissures that lie beneath cultural modernity in South India. |
Inhalt
1 | |
1 Producing Dance in Colonial Tanjore | 27 |
2 Whatever Happened to the South Indian Nautch? Toward a Cultural History of Salon Dance in Madras | 70 |
Marriage and Masculinity in the Discourse of Devadası Reform | 112 |
Remembering Devadası Dance at Viralimalai | 161 |
Aesthetics and Selfhood in Coastal Andhra Pradesh | 189 |
Gesturing to Devadası Pasts in Todays Chennai | 222 |
Selected Documents from the Files of Muthulakshmi Reddy | 227 |
The Madras Devadasis Prevention of Dedication Act of 1947 | 235 |
Notes | 237 |
271 | |
297 | |
Andere Ausgaben - Alle anzeigen
Unfinished Gestures: Devadasis, Memory, and Modernity in South India Davesh Soneji Eingeschränkte Leseprobe - 2012 |
Unfinished Gestures: Devadasis, Memory, and Modernity in South India Davesh Soneji Keine Leseprobe verfügbar - 2012 |
Häufige Begriffe und Wortgruppen
abhinaya aesthetic Andhra Pradesh anti-nautch artists associated Bhairava Bharatanatyam Brahmin caste chapter Chennai coastal Andhra Pradesh composed compositions contemporary context courtesan courtesan dance courtly cultural Dalit dance masters dancers dancing girls darbār dāsīs debates dedicated Devadasi devadāsī communities devadāsī dance devadāsī reform drama East Godavari district elites example female genre Hindu Hymavathi icai vēļāļar jāti jāvaļi jogatis kalāvantula community kalāvantula women King Kotipalli kuravañci legislation lives Madras Devadasi Madras Presidency male Marāṭhā marriage meļam memory modern Modi Moḍi records moral Murukan music and dance musicians Muthulakshmi Reddy Muttukkannammal Muttukkannammal's Nattuvanar naṭṭuvaṇārs nautch nineteenth century non-Brahmin padam palace pallavi Pillai political practices professional dancing women prostitution Pudukkottai rāga Reddy's region religious repertoire ritual salon performances Sanskrit Saride Serfoji Serfoji II sexual social songs South India Sundaram Tamil Nadu Tamil-speaking Tanjore Tanjore court Telugu Telugu-speaking temple Thanjavur tion Tondaiman tradition troupe TSML Tuļajā varṇam veśyās Viralimalai woman