Dance in the City: Dirt, noise, traffic – contemporary Indian dance in the western city

A chapter in Dance in the City (ed. H. Thomas, London: Macmillan, 1997), a collection of academic writings relating dance practices to the metropolis. This paper is about human movement – relocation, travel, migration – and the maps that it crosses. It is also about another type of movement – dance – and how it too crosses those maps.

The starting point for Making of Maps was suggested by a medieval European map made in 1300. On this map, Jerusalem is placed at the centre of the world, with other locations, both historical and mythical, defined in relation to it. It suggests a symbolic map of the world in which the mapmaker lived, expressing his concerns and viewpoint. Jeyasingh took this idea and applied it to herself, as ‘an Indian dancer living in Britain’ (programme note, 1995).

 

Read the rest of the paper here: https://sanjoyroy.net/1997/10/dirt-noise-traffic-contemporary-indian-dance-in-the-western-city/