6.5 The battle at Lanka

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來自 The University of Melbourne 的課程

Contemporary India

29 個評分

The University of Melbourne

Contemporary India

29 個評分

This course presents some important vignettes of a complex, highly diverse India that is also witnessing unprecedented changes since its formal independence in 1947 from Great Britain. The lectures revolve around social dimensions of change, the continuing influence of ancient texts on contemporary India, political democracy, economic transition from the state to the market, gender relations, India's economic globalisation and changing world view. While one of the objectives is to capture the multifaceted process of change, the course also critically examines some of the tensions inherent in these changes. For example, how does gender inequality play itself out in a changing Indian society, how do the modernist conceptions of art entailing market valuation challenge the more socio-centric values found in South India, what are the politics linguistic identities, and how might India address its myriad development challenges such as poverty and unemployment. No specific prior knowledge is required. However, it would be helpful if students are aware of the socio political dynamics at play in contemporary India and keep themselves abreast with current affairs and debates in the country to fully appreciate the various dimensions and contours if the subject matter in the course. This course is taught in English. View the MOOC promotional video here: http://tinyurl.com/hx8mhxb

從本節課中

The Ramayan

This week we will discuss one of India's ancient epics - The Ramayana. Here you will not just be introduced to the text but the various Ramayana traditions, which include a wide range of performance traditions, be it in folk theatre, women's Ramayana songs or shadow puppetry. At the core of these traditions is the idea of morality or dharma, which continues to find resonance in contemporary India even though it was written around 500BC. Because there are innumerable interpretations of the Ramayana, often the sacred becomes the source of controversy. But these disagreements often reinforce the relevance of the epic in the daily lives of Indian society.

6.1 Many Ramayanas: text and tradition12:35

6.2 Ram and Sita's wedding - part 110:10

6.3 Ram and Sita's wedding - part 214:15

6.4 The forest exile10:16

6.5 The battle at Lanka7:40

6.6 Many Ramayanas: the story continues9:54

與講師見面

Anthony D'Costa
Professor
School of Social and Political Sciences

Welcome back.

After Ram rids the forest of the demons,

the demon king Ravana takes revenge and

abducts his wife Sita and takes her to his kingdom in Lanka.

This is the central narrative event of the Ramayana.

It's the event that forces all the action to happen.

Ram enlist the help of the god Hanuman, leader of a monkey army, to rescue Sita.

The army of monkeys and bears is large,

and they're strong enough to build a bridge all the way to Lanka.

They tear apart mountains and use them for

the bridge construction materials.

This is the 17th century Rajasthani illustration by Sahibdin,

which depicts the ensuing battle between Ram's army and Ravan's demon army.

In the 19th century painting on the right, shows Ram and

final encounter with the ten-headed demon King Ravan,

during which Ram slays Ravan and rescues Sita.

Naturally, this battle is a feature of many performance traditions.

The final video we're going to watch in this lecture

tells of the army building the bridge of, of Hanuman's monkey army.

It's an army of monkeys and bears in the story.

So the monkeys and bears are bringing the bridge.

But in this,

in this performance, the performance focus on a much loved and

well-known story of a tiny squirrel who contributes to the best of her ability.

So this song was performed by a group led by Ram Sagar Singh,

my host in Banpurwa village.

And he'd been watching me work with various performers in the village, and

he showed a great interest in my recordings and in my transcriptions.

Ram Sagar's an accomplished musician himself.

He's the leader of a men's devotional Psalm group.

And one evening, he arranged for the group to perform at the house.

He attached a loud speaker to the, to the roof.

He attached a loud speaker to the roof, and

the group sang well into the night, until around 2 a.m.

So they broadcast their singing of various devotional songs,

including a series of Ramayana songs out to the whole neighbourhood in the village.

One of the songs was from a genre called kajali.

Kajali are songs performed during the rainy season, and

this was a Ramayana-themed kajali.

So you'll only hear an excerpt of this.

It's an excerpt from a longer performance that's about 20 minutes long.

And you hear that the monkeys and

the bears, they're strong enough to haul a huge mountain to break into pieces and

build a bridge for Ram to traverse the ocean to Lanka and rescue Sita.

But there's a forest squirrel arrives, and she's so small.

She's so small.

She doesn't how she can contribute.

How can I contribute to this giant task, she says.

When she does find a way,

this squirrel comes up with a way, she is rewarded by Ram for her devotion.

Ram arrives and sees what she's done and rewards her.

And he reminds her that the smallest among us can make great contributions.

So this was a message that Ram Sagar and his group wanted to broadcast to his

village via loudspeaker in the middle of the night, but

it's also message he wanted to communicate to me.

This is after he was observing all the song material that I

was collecting from his community over a period of months.

It was Ram Sagar's community that hired Surender Kumar and

Tulsi Kurkuriya drumming group to perform at Banpurwa village weddings.

Tulsi, Tulsi the joker, used his Ramayana related platform to highlight

issues of caste and issues of inequality.

These messages were heard by all present, and one wonders

what an extended ethnographic analysis of

of audience reactions would reveal in Bunpurwa, in the village.

Whatever those reactions are, we can be sure that they will be diverse.

They will be diverse and varied.

So as you listen to Ram Sagar's group sing about the contributions of the small and

the weak among their community, you may,

you might wish to consider this as one of many possible

village responses to Tulsi the joker's critique.

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