Vol 9 No 1 - Page 4

Is Islamicate a genre? Looking at Popular Muslim Films through the Lens of Genre

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Asmita Das

Department of Film Studies, Jadavpur University.ORCID ID: orcid.org/0000-0002-7307-5818. Email: asmitadas85@gmail.com.

Volume 9, Number 1, 2017 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v9n1.17

Received February 25, 2017; Revised April 9, 2017; Accepted April 10, 2017; Published May 7, 2017.

Abstract

This essay engages with genre as a theory and how it can be used as a framework to determine whether Islamicate or the Muslim films can be called a genre by themselves, simply by their engagement with and representation of the Muslim culture or practice. This has been done drawing upon the influence of Hollywood in genre theory and arguments surrounding the feasibility / possibility of categorizing Hindi cinema in similar terms. The essay engages with films representing Muslim culture, and how they feed into the audience’s desires to be offered a window into another world (whether it is the past or the inner world behind the purdah). It will conclude by trying to ascertain whether the Islamicate films fall outside the categories of melodrama (which is the most prominent and an umbrella genre that is represented in Indian cinema) and forms a genre by itself or does the Islamicate form a sub-category within melodrama.

Keywords: genre, Muslim socials, socials, Islamicate films, Hindi cinema, melodrama

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Cinematic Sense of Place as a Window to Politics of Dominant Ideology, materialism and Morality in Tamil Cinema: A Case Study of the film Madras

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Indu Lakshman1 & Kalyani  Suresh2

1Independent Researcher

2Department of Communication, Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Ettimadai, Coimbatore, India. Email: suresh.kalyani@gmail.com

Volume 9, Number 1, 2017 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v9n1.16

Received January 19, 2017; Revised April 6, 2017; Accepted April 10, 2017; Published May 7, 2017.

Abstract

In the theoretical conceptualization of contemporary space, cinema not only focuses on story telling but also provides a window to the cultural and traditional practices of the place and people. The armamentarium of the transitions of Tamil cinema after the 1970’s to date has shown an upward swing in the conscious use of sense of place as part of the visual narrative. This article studies the anatomy of place as portrayed in the Tamil film Madras (2014) against the backdrop of the reality and ethos of the slums of North Madras. The Wall – the main protagonist in the film and the power and value given to it, is the fulcrum on which the sense of place is established. This article takes the North Madras community’s sense of place as a window to the politics of dominant ideology and materialism infused with morality, as articulated in the film.

Keywords: sense of place, Madras, Tamil cinema, ideology, materialism, morality

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African American Womanism Speaks To Dalit Feminism: Special Reference To Telugu Dalit Women’s Literature

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D. Jyothirmai1 & K. Sree Ramesh2

Adikavi Nannaya University in Andhra Pradesh, India. Email: jyothirmai.dakkumalla@gmail.com

Volume 9, Number 1, 2017 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v9n1.15

Received March 1, 2017; Revised April 6, 2017; Accepted April 27, 2017; Published May 7, 2017.

Abstract

‘Mainstream feminism’ in India remained substantially elitist in its concerns carrying the legacy of ‘western feminism’. As such it failed to appreciate, accommodate and represent the specific concerns of Dalit women. Consequently Dalit women are forced to lead a separate movement.  It is the premise of this paper that the nascent Dalit Feminism, which could not derive any theoretical and representational sustenance from the Indian Feminism, can draw from the African American womanist/feminist experiences as it shares a similar socio-historical environment. Further, it argues in favor of Dalit feminism as a more inclusive kind of feminism that challenges oppression of any form for women in India or elsewhere. As much of Dalit women’s writing is produced in Indian vernaculars a few short stories from Telugu Dalit writing, translated into English are analyzed to reflect different perspectives of Dalit women’s discourse.

Keywords: Feminism, Dalit Feminism, African Feminism, Untouchability, Education of Dalits

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Draupadi Jeopardizing Jurisprudence: A Critical Analysis of Dharma as Law in the Light of Draupadi’s Question(s) in the Sabha

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Komal Agarwal

Center for English Studies, School of Language, Literature and Culture Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Email: agarwal.komal.jnu@gmail.com

Volume 9, Number 1, 2017 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v9n1.14

Received March 1, 2017; Revised March 27, 2017; Accepted April 3, 2017; Published May 7, 2017.

Abstract

The character of Draupadi in the Maha?bha?rata has generally been read through the victim-perpetrator lens, where she is either seen as being at the receiving end or violence, or as an agent of questioning the very violence that is perpetrated on her, mostly by appealing to the morality of the men, warriors and kings present in the Assembly Hall, the scene of violence. The present paper reads the character of Draupadi in a new light: as a learned scholar and dialectician who is well-versed in the issues/debates of law, the legal code, and the codified system of ethics. The paper argues that it is her act of challenging and negating the prevalent, largely ‘masculine’ judicial system that she ends in pitting an alternative legal system against the then socio-judicial order. In so doing, she poses hair-raising questions against the abstract concept of ‘dharma’ and its drawbacks and the authority of the king on earth: thus unsettling the two pillars on which the society in the ancient times was based and sustained itself, both the cosmic principle which holds, and the kingly counterpart which executes. She marks a paradigm shift in and punctuates the masculine system of jurisprudence, thereby exposing its follies and its weaknesses, also anticipating the possible improvements in the present day legal set up in the country.

Keywords: Draupadi, Maha?bh?arata, dicing, law, dharma.

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The Problem of Being Black in Zora Neale Hurston’s Color Struck

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Hana Khalief Ghani1 & Istbriq Talib Joody2

1College of Arts, Department of Translation, Al-Mustansiriyah University. Email: h.horizons2013@gmail.com

2College of Education for Women, Department of English Language, University of Baghdad.

Volume 9, Number 1, 2017 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v9n1.13

Received March 3, 2017; Revised March 27, 2017; Accepted April 3, 2017; Published May 7, 2017.

Abstract

Human physical features such as skin color usually play an important role in defining who the person is. In many societies skin color contributes to determining social status and self-worth. This problems becomes more acute in case of women whose markers of beauty like having lighter skin mean she can enjoy more privileges in terms of partner choice, work, and status than women of dark skin.  The present paper aims at exploring the impact of skin color on the life of Emma who is color stricken in Zora Neale Hurston Color Struck. Rather than discussing this issue in relation to the color-based discrimination by the white-dominated society against the black in Americ, the play focuses on the pernicious effects of internalizing the color-based feelings of inferiority among the black themselves. The paper argues that obession with one’s skin color is not conduisve to one’s well-being. Rather than happiness and empowerment, it leads to self-marginalization and life-long anxiety.

Key words: Hurston, Color Struck, Emma, inferiority.

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Octavia E. Butler’s Clay’s Ark: A Posthumanist Reading

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Manoj Kumar Behera

PhD candidate at the Department of English, Utkal University, Vani Vihar, Bhubaneswar and Lecturer in English, Kosala Mahavidyalaya, Kosala, Angul, Odisha, India. Email: behera.manoj8@gmail.com

Volume 9, Number 1, 2017 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v9n1.12

Received September 14, 2016; Revised April 5, 2017; Accepted April 11, 2017; Published May 7, 2017.

Abstract

This paper explores the possibility of posthuman subjects only in kinship and connectedness. By analyzing few characters from Butler’s novel Clay’s Ark I shall explore the continuous human effort that marginalizes non-humans in our world. I will also attempt to find out how few characters deny crossing species boundaries to remain in a state of pure humans. I use discourses like Animal studies and Posthumsnism to demonstrate that life exists in connection, kinship and symbiosis. We can find human qualities in animals and the animal qualities in humans. In the conclusion I suggest that we are always in a process of becoming and every subject needs to accept co-evolution, connectedness instead of autonomous identity in order to enter into a posthuman world.

Keywords: Animal studies, posthumanism, symbiosis, kinship, co-evolution, hybrid, enhancement.

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‘The Boy who Lived’ in the Cupboard: ‘Queer Readings’ and Rowling’s Harry Potter Series

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Oindri Roy

Department of Comparative Literature and India Studies, The English and Foreign Languages University, Hyderabad. ORCID: 0000-0003-1959-1413. Email: oindriroy.20@gmail.com

Volume 9, Number 1, 2017 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v9n1.11

Received March 1, 2017; Revised April 7, 2017; Accepted April 12, 2017; Published May 7, 2017.

Abstract

The paper argues that the articulation of non-normative identities, desires and meanings are possible even within literary representations that are also forms of deliberations to conform to (hetro)normalcy. A queer reading of the popular Harry Potter series created by J. K. Rowling is attempted to identify the understated proclivities of subversion in texts that have a non-esoteric readership. Certain ideations that have emerged from queer theoretical discourses are applied in the process of interpreting textual aspects, especially pertaining to the two important characters of Albus Dumbledore and Harry Potter. The aim is not to add to the significantly large amount of slash fiction that the series has generated and instead use the grounds provided by the author herself, purposively and otherwise, that bear affinities or may be read in terms of certain theoretical exercises in the field of queer studies.

Keywords: Harry Potter, queer reading, homosexuality and literary representations, non-conformity, heteronormativity.

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Art of Storytelling and the Role of Memory in the Novels of Morrison’s Beloved and Louise Erdrich’s Tracks

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C. L. Shilaja

Associate Professor, Department of English, Sathyabama University. ORCID: 0000-0003-4267-4719. Email: sherlinji@yahoo.co.in

Volume 9, Number 1, 2017 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v9n1.10

Received August 8, 2016; Revised March 3, 2017; Accepted March 10, 2017; Published May 7, 2017.

 Abstract

Storytelling provides an emotional fulfillment both for the narrator and the listener. The paper aims to explore the significance of storytelling and the role of memory in selected works of recent American fiction of Louise Erdrich’s Tracks and Toni Morrison’s Beloved which speaks about the historical experience of Native Americans in dispossession and the long-term effects of slavery. In literary texts, memory often becomes a starting point for a painful therapeutic process of regeneration of one’s roots in order to survive. The painful memories of Afro-Americans and Native Americans as a result of racialized trauma are purged through storytelling and in recounting it as a collective experience between people. Storytelling brings them together engaging them collectively in the events of their lives. As the past and present often overlap with one another it enables them to retrieve their suppressed past. Retrieving the past and sharing their traumatic story gives the opportunity for recovery. Morrison and Erdrich perform the role of a storyteller in narrating the unaccounted through their text since modern communities have no access to the oral narratives of their own past. Storytelling unearths repressed memories in order to find ways of dealing with the pain they cause. Although the writings in the novels of Toni Morrison and Louise Erdrich depict two very different cultures, the Afro-American and the Native American, the trauma which damages the self in their characters is very much similar. This process of narration is essential for the survivors to come to terms with their experience. This narration ultimately creates a sort of emotional distance from the event and makes it less threatening for the characters to reflect upon.  It  is  to  be  remembered that the authors  make  use of this  technique  of storytelling not just to heal the fractures of the readers in the modern psyche but also to rewrite a part of history forgotten by preserving the historical data, their cultural values and the Afro-American and Native American ideas.

Keywords: Morrison, Erdrich, storytelling, memory, trauma.

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Insights of Feminist Epistemology in Some Selected Novels of Alice Walker

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Dolly Sharma1  & Jaya Dwivedi2
1Assistant Professor, Parthivi College of  Engg. & Mgmt. Bhilai, C.G ,India and Research Scholar in the Department of English at N.I.T Raipur, C.G, India. Email: dollyjayam2016@gmail.com.
2Assistant Professor in the Department of English at N.I.T, Raipur, C.G, India. Email: jdwivedi.eng@nitrr.ac.in.

Volume 9, Number 1, 2017 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v9n1.09

Received February 23, 2017; Revised March 24, 2017; Accepted April 1, 2017; Published May 7, 2017.

Abstract

Alice Walker as a radical feminist presented the issues related to Gender feminism through articulation of protagonists highlighting the racial and gender inequality.  The  feminist epistemology theory is applied which believes that knowledge claims are made from nowhere and are universally valid. African women took surface knowledge of American society and gained superior knowledge of human potential. Alice Walker’s various protagonists Meridian,Celie,Lissie and Tashi signify the situated knowers theory. They articulated their sufferings and attaining their own world of peace by changing the economic, political and moral status with love around them. Alice Walker   deals with female consciousness through various thematic motifs. The motifs are regeneration of self, exploration of ethics by preserving African culture and last motif is to raise voice against sexual politics. Walker through her selected novels tried to document the anguish, pain and inferiority that black women were subjected. In the end of selected novels for study these protagonists explore their journey of loneliness, oppression, guilt and self-doubt towards self-acceptance, empowerment and love. Alice Walker as a situated knower advocated for equal rights and believes that freedom, education and responsibility tent to develop a woman into a noble woman. Application of feminist epistemology theory justifies Walker’s  optimism that the game is not lost as  long as one plays it with the belief that it can be won.

Keywords: radical, feminist epistemology, situated knower, sexual politics,empowerment.

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Interrogating ‘Shakespop’: the Politics of Tasteful Pop Culture

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Laboni Bhattacharya

Department of English, Hindu College, University of Delhi. ORCID: 0000-0002-9758-3235. Email: laboni.bhattacharya@gmail.com

Volume 9, Number 1, 2017 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v9n1.08

Received February 24, 2017; Revised April 14, 2017; Accepted April 30, 2017; Published May 7, 2017.

Abstract

This paper will explore the phenomenon of Shakespop, or pop-cultural referentiality  to Shakespeare’s work (Lanier, 2002) as a category that seemingly unites Shakespeare’s authorial legacy and high cultural values with popular forms like TV, comics, YouTube videos, etc in a transgressive manner. Some examples I analyse are the Sassy Gay Friend Youtube series, Shakespeare breath mints and Neil Gaiman’s Sandman comics (1989 -). I examine them as cultural objects that deploy the dynamic tension between good taste and bad, the erudite and the base. Is the vigorous appropriation and parodic inversion of Shakespeare in popular culture a genuine deconstruction of his cultural significance? A celebratory attitude would argue that postmodernity has freed Shakespeare from his high-cultural moorings. Taking up Jostein Gripsrud’s theorization of ‘double-access’, I would argue that postmodern proliferation of Shakespop  is not an inherently democratizing phenomenon, but one that conceals its origins in access, material privilege and power.

Keywords: cultural studies, popular culture, Shakespeare, double access, class privilege, cultural capital.

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What is Performance Studies?

Richard Schechner Tisch School of the Arts, New York University  Download PDF Version Because performance studies is so broad-ranging and

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