India Studies Kathak Performance - Pallabi Chakravorty

The Indiana University India Studies Program presents,

Kathak Performance

Pallabi Chakravorty

Assistant Professor

Department of Music and Dance

Swarthmore College

Saturday, October 23 at 8:30 pm

Merrill Hall (Old Music Building)

1201 East 3rd Street

Recital Hall

Pallabi Chakravorty teaches Kathak dance and academic courses related to the anthropology of performance in the Department of Music and Dance at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, USA. Founder and artistic director of the ensemble Courtyard Dancers, she is an anthropologist, dancer, choreographer, and cultural worker. Professor Chakravorty studied Kathak and other classical and folk dance styles in Kolkata under renowned gurus, primarily Bandana Sen. She received her doctoral degree in Visual Anthropology from Temple University, Philadelphia. For her performance here at IU, Professor Chakravorty has selected some choreographic works from her dance repertoire to demonstrate how she integrates theory and practice in her creative work. This performance will help us explore how we can think about Indian dance, culture, history within a performative framework.

Kathak is one of the eight forms of Indian classical dance. This dance form traces its origins to the nomadic bards of ancient northern India, known as Kathaks, or storytellers, who specialized in recounting mythological and moral tales through dance. From the 16th century onwards the Mughal courts patronized the art form, which had by then absorbed features from Persia and Central Asia.