https://soundcloud.com/shivani-das-983855902/dancing-bodies-claiming-spaces-pt1?si=99c1c9ac4c3e47dfb2a844f0665b47ae&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing
The episode "Dancing Bodies Claiming Spaces", focuses on claiming public and private space through dance while navigating moral policing and body shaming.
This episode is in Malayalam. The host for this episode is Aathira Gopi, a Gender and Sexuality consultant and the respondent for this episode is a performer and educator who has preferred to stay anonymous.
This podcast is created by Shivani Das and Shivani Sankhla, as part of the Ideosync UNESCO Information Felłowship, June 2021 special cohort on intersectional feminism and digital rights.
PART 1
(Intro music)
Aathira: Hello, everyone. Welcome to episode four of the Women’s emancipation terms and conditions applied podcast. I’m Aathira Gopi, your host for today’s episode, ‘Dancing Bodies Claiming Spaces’. This will be part one of this episode. The episode will be in Malayalam, and the subtitles will be displayed on the screen in English. The respondent of this episode is a performer in her daily and other parts of life. She is dancing around all of us, maybe she is just near you. The respondent has chosen to remain anonymous. She has completed her master's in performance studies and is currently working as a teacher. Today, we will discuss how our respondent resisted the moral policing challenges and restrictions from home and society through dancing during this covid 19 lockdown. Welcome to the Women’s emancipation terms and conditions applied podcast.
Aathira: What was the experience when you returned home during the covid-19 pandemic and how were the two experiences different?
Respondent: I was really excited when I had to return home because the last time I was home like this was when I used to return from Delhi during my graduation. And then during my Masters’ when I returned in between, I was happy because I was getting a lot of time to be at home and at this place and the joy of staying at home and attending the online classes. So thinking of the comfort space, I was happy. Also, the pandemic scene in Kerala was being handled much better than in Delhi with its strong pillars, which also made me feel safe. These were my factors of happiness and excitement. In the meanwhile, this was also the time I realised a few things. One of them was the reality of the classes I was attending online. Considering the kind of discussions happening in the classroom, the space of Delhi for me, was where people would understand and accept those. So at that point, academia or the kind of articles we discussed made me feel excited, I thought everything was perfect and that I could easily live the way I wanted to. But coming home was my reality. It is the place where I was born and brought up. It is the place that gave me the boundaries of what and what not to practice.
My ideologies when I went from Kerala were different from what I had when I returned. There was growth and for me, it was like time was paused back home. So even if feminism was discussed in the classroom in the morning, if in the evening I wanted to get out of home wearing shorts, I had to think a lot. This made me question what I am studying in the classroom if I am not able to practice it. I can’t go ahead and say that there was an article written about feminism here because that won’t be understood or accepted and that’s not the way. So should I practice it or even if I should make anybody else understand it, were some anxieties and frustrations in the time I spent in Kerala. These were some difficulties in the months later. So the general trouble was this gap in academia versus my reality.
Aathira: As a woman and as a performing artist, what were some of the challenges you faced during this period?
Respondent: As a woman, as I mentioned previously, the space of home had already drawn certain boundaries of expectations from me. In Delhi, there was certain anonymity that I lived in, and I found my safety and freedom. I could wear whatever I wanted to, there as nobody questioned me. But back home, freedom of clothing was an issue. Say if there were any functions here, I used to be worried and sit the day before thinking of what to wear so that people won’t notice or ask me any questions. Without the freedom of clothing, I used to have a lot of tension. Then came the freedom to travel. Wherever we wanted to go, in Delhi, the metro facilities are there. However, in Kerala, the place where I live is not ‘city’ like and if I wanted to go somewhere interior, the bus facilities were not there and autos for a long-distance would not be accessible. During these circumstances and in the usual scene back home where people go to bed quite early, it was difficult to commute. Be it any of these, here there is a constant feeling of people staring at you when you get out of your room. What are you wearing, why are you wearing this, what are you wearing your bindi so high and if you did not wear any bindi, why are you not wearing it? Is it something you learnt from Delhi? Did you cut your hair, why did you cut it? Where are you going, with whom are you going, when will you return? So these are questions that come up from people who know or do not know you. But they don’t have to, since it is my life and I should have the right to live it as per my desires. So this staring into my life was too much I felt, as a woman.
The same case with for a performer. I believe both these roles of woman and the performer are connected. As a performer, my time here in Kerala during the pandemic was when my ideologies started growing in their initial stage. The course I pursued also had helped me towards this. To think of performance as a protest was one of these. So home also became a space where I made this to practice. So definitely as these don’t follow the traditions, it became ‘wrong’, blindly for many around me. For me, this was a feeling of me against so many people. This was an anxiety-giving factor for me. At the same time in Delhi, since people who I knew who were accepting were there, some performance spaces were accessible for me compared to the difficulties in Kerala. In the latter case, there were certain expectations from me.
(Outro music)