Cultural Labor : Conceptualizing the 'folk Performance' in India
Folk performances reflect the life-worlds of a vast section of subaltern communities in India. What is the philosophy that drives these performances, the vision that enables as well as enslaves these communities to present what they feel, think, imagine, and want to see? Can such performances challenge social hierarchies and ensure justice in a caste-ridden society?

In Cultural Labour, the author studies bhuiyan puja (landworship), bidesia (theatre of migrant labourers), Reshma-Chuharmal (Dalit ballads), dugola (singing duels) from Bihar, and the songs and performances of Gaddar, who was associated with Jana Natya Mandali, Telangana: he examines various ways in which meanings and behaviour are engendered in communities through rituals, theatre, and enactments. Focusing on various motifs of landscape, materiality, and performance, the author looks at the relationship between culture and labour in its immediate contexts. Based on an extensive ethnography and the author's own life experience as a member of such a community, the book offers a new conceptual framework to understand the politics and aesthetics of folk performance in the light of contemporary theories of theatre and performance studies.
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Cultural Labor : Conceptualizing the 'folk Performance' in India
Folk performances reflect the life-worlds of a vast section of subaltern communities in India. What is the philosophy that drives these performances, the vision that enables as well as enslaves these communities to present what they feel, think, imagine, and want to see? Can such performances challenge social hierarchies and ensure justice in a caste-ridden society?

In Cultural Labour, the author studies bhuiyan puja (landworship), bidesia (theatre of migrant labourers), Reshma-Chuharmal (Dalit ballads), dugola (singing duels) from Bihar, and the songs and performances of Gaddar, who was associated with Jana Natya Mandali, Telangana: he examines various ways in which meanings and behaviour are engendered in communities through rituals, theatre, and enactments. Focusing on various motifs of landscape, materiality, and performance, the author looks at the relationship between culture and labour in its immediate contexts. Based on an extensive ethnography and the author's own life experience as a member of such a community, the book offers a new conceptual framework to understand the politics and aesthetics of folk performance in the light of contemporary theories of theatre and performance studies.
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Cultural Labor : Conceptualizing the 'folk Performance' in India

Cultural Labor : Conceptualizing the 'folk Performance' in India

by Brahma Prakash
Cultural Labor : Conceptualizing the 'folk Performance' in India

Cultural Labor : Conceptualizing the 'folk Performance' in India

by Brahma Prakash

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Overview

Folk performances reflect the life-worlds of a vast section of subaltern communities in India. What is the philosophy that drives these performances, the vision that enables as well as enslaves these communities to present what they feel, think, imagine, and want to see? Can such performances challenge social hierarchies and ensure justice in a caste-ridden society?

In Cultural Labour, the author studies bhuiyan puja (landworship), bidesia (theatre of migrant labourers), Reshma-Chuharmal (Dalit ballads), dugola (singing duels) from Bihar, and the songs and performances of Gaddar, who was associated with Jana Natya Mandali, Telangana: he examines various ways in which meanings and behaviour are engendered in communities through rituals, theatre, and enactments. Focusing on various motifs of landscape, materiality, and performance, the author looks at the relationship between culture and labour in its immediate contexts. Based on an extensive ethnography and the author's own life experience as a member of such a community, the book offers a new conceptual framework to understand the politics and aesthetics of folk performance in the light of contemporary theories of theatre and performance studies.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780199490813
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Publication date: 10/01/2019
Pages: 332
Product dimensions: 5.82(w) x 8.79(h) x 1.29(d)

About the Author

Brahma Prakash is Assistant Professor at the School of Arts and Aesthetics, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. His works focus on the regional theatre and performance traditions of India and South Asia with relation to the questions of marginality, aesthetics and cultural justice.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Preface
Notes on Translation, Transliteration, and Transcription
Introduction
Historiography: Performance between Traces and Trashes
Landscape: Drumming the Land in Bhuyan Puja
Materiality: Bidesia against Erasure and Displacement
Viscerality: Have Guts to Perform Dugola
Performativity: Public and Hidden Transcipts in Resma-Chuharmal
Choreopolitics: Reclaiming Cultural Labour in the Act of Gaddar and Jana Natya Mandali
Conclusion
Glossary
Bibliography
Index
About the Author
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