First-Year Studies: Cultures and Arts of India

The Indian subcontinent hosts many diverse cultures grounded in Hindu, Buddhist, Islamic, secular, and unassimilated traditions. This multifaceted course explores the diverse cultural traditions of India through the visual and performing arts and through exemplary literature. Fiction and poetic narratives are studied in conjunction with nonverbal arts, as we explore modes of Indian thought and expression. Aesthetic, religious, economic, and political aspects of South Asian arts are viewed in light of transcultural theories of production and consumption. We study Hindu temple sculpture, Moghul miniature painting, and Dalit theatre, with attention to aesthetic principles, religious sectarian histories, caste hierarchies, and systems of patronage. Our inquiries address these questions: How do arts of the 21st century both reflect and transform traditional myths and images? What social agendas have led to conventional distinctions between “classical” and “folk” arts, and why are such definitions now widely rejected? Why does the Indian canon regard cuisine and body decoration to be classical art forms? Which arts were historically available to women? How did British colonial values influence South Asian artists’ identities and self-representations? Sources include the music of Ravi Shankar, films of Satyajit Ray and Mira Nair, and work of prominent photographers. The seminar culminates with readings from recent works of Salman Rushdie, Arundhati Roy, and other postcolonial writers who continue to inscribe images of India onto the global scene.