Can classical Indian dance become a language that allows us to critically engage with the world? How does caste interact with the dynamics of race as Indian dance becomes global? How do we acknowledge the brutal histories in dance forms such as Bharatnatyam? How do we encounter the somatically informed iteration of a form that upholds a nationalist agenda? What exactly is enshrined within a form? Where are the delineations between form and pedagogy? Can these forms exist within a secular framework? How does the question of access negotiate with the notion of specificity? How does the question of access meet the culture of commodification?
Watch a durational online session with Shivaangee Agrawal and Mandeep Raikhy discussing the embodiment of Indian dance in our current world. Based on their artistic practices and concerns, they invite diverse perspectives from guests across India and the UK, with contributions from Priyanka Chandrasekhar, Avni Sethi, Sandra Chatterjee and Navtej Singh Johar, and invite a dialogue revolving around the following questions, arriving at no neat conclusions.