Pallabi Chakravorty teaches in the Department of Music and Dance at Swarthmore College, USA. She is a Visual Anthropologist, Kathak dancer, and choreographer, and the founder and artistic director of Courtyard Dancers (a contemporary Indian dance ensemble based in Philadelphia, www.courtyarddancers.org). Pallabi’s research and creative works reflect her long immersion in Indian classical dance, ethnographic method, and social theory. Her books include Bells of Change: Kathak Dance women and Modernity in India (2008), Dance Matters: Performing India (2009; co-editor and contributor), and Performing Ecstasy: Poetics and Politics of Religion in India (2009; co-editor and contributor). Her interdisciplinary research has been published in a wide range of journals including South Asia, Dance Research Journal, Visual Anthropology, Moving Worlds, Sruti, Dance Chronicle, and others. Her areas of research include expressive cultures in South Asia, globalization, embodiment, and processes of social change. Her current research focuses on the impact of new technology and media on traditional dance practices. She has been conducting fieldwork in Mumbai (Bombay) and Kolkata (Calcutta) for this project. A recently published paper in the journal Visual Anthropology is based on this research (Moved to Dance: Remix, Rasa, and a New India). Pallabi is the recipient of many grants and awards and serves on the board of the international journal Dance Chronicle. She has organized several conferences in the U.S. and India and regularly presents her scholarly and artistic works in conferences and festivals.
Publications: Books
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2008. Bells of Change: Kathak Dance, Women, and Modernity in India. Calcutta/London/Chicago: Seagull/Macmillan/University of Chicago
- Chakravorty Pallabi and Scott Kugle. Editors. 2009. Performing Ecstasy: The Politics and Poetics of Religion in South Asia. New Delhi: Manohar Publishers.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi and Nilanjana Gupta. Editors. 2009. Dance Matters. New Delhi: Routledge.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2009 (Forthcoming). “The Exalted Body in Indian Music and Dance” In Bhakti-Sufi, Editor Kavita Panjabi. New Delhi: Orient-Longman.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2009. Remixed Practice: Bollywood Dance and the Global Indian, in Dance Matters, Editors Pallabi Chakravorty and Nilanjana Gupta. New Delhi: Routledge.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2006. “Some Limits Of Orientalism: The Discourse of Heritage in Classical Indian Dance” In Reorienting Orientalism. Editor Chandrei Niyogi. New Delhi: Sage
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2004. “Kathak in Calcutta: A Story of Tradition and Change.” In Culture Studies: An Introduction for Indian Readers, Editor Nilanjana Gupta, Worldview Press: New Delhi.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2009. “Moved to Dance: Bhakti, Commodity, and a New India.” Visual Anthropology. Vol 22, Issue 2,3, P:211-228
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2007. “Dancing into Modernity: The Multiple Narratives of India’s Kathak Dance”. Dance Research Journal. Vol 38, No.s 1,2. Summer/Winter.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2005. “Bhakti in Modernity and Modernity in Bhakti: Kathak and Kabir”. Moving Worlds: A Journal of Transcultural Writings, Vol 5: 2
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2004. “Dance, Pleasure, and Indian Women as Multisensorial Subjects”, Visual Anthropology. March, Vol. 17 (1), 1-17.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2004. “In Search of a Past for the Present”. Pulse. Summer, Volume # 8, P: 20-22. U.K.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2003. South Asian Dance: Coming of Age in U.S Universities. Pulse. Winter, Volume # 4:14-15. U.K.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2002. Symposium on South Asian Dance (a report). Dance Research Journal 34/2, Winter, P:121-124.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2002. Dance Symposium on South Asia. Sruti August, Issue 215: 33-35. Chennai: India.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 1998. Dance, Hegemony, and Nation: The Construction of Classical Dance in India, South Asia 21: 107-120.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi (Editor). 2004. Dance in South Asia: New Approaches, Politics, and Aesthetics, Proceedings. Swarthmore College Cooper Publication .
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2004. “Agency in Tradition: Gendered Subjectivity through the Practice of Kathak.” In Dance in South Asia: New Approaches, Politics, and Aesthetics, Proceedings, Pallabi Chakravorty (Ed.). Swarthmore College Cooper Publication.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2002. Kathak in Calcutta: A Story of Tradition and Change. Society of Dance History Scholars Proceedings. June 2002, P: 15-20.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. Review of the book “At Home in the World: Bharatnatyam on Global Stage” by Janet O’ Shea. Dance Chronicle
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2008. Review of Film’s “Performing Konarak, Performing Hirapur” and “Interpreting and Reconstructing Indonesian Dance and Music” by Alessandra Lopez y Royo. Dance Research Journal, issue 40.1
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2006. Review of the Film “Guria, Gossip and Globalization” by Amelia Macizewsky for H-Gender-MidEast Review.
- Chakravorty, Pallabi. 2002. Review of the Film “Runaway Wives: Customary Divorce and Remarriage in Shivpuri District”. Visual Anthropology Review, Vol.18 (1-2).
Selected Dance Works/Performance Text:
2006/7Replaced Rituals
A collaborative dance-theater piece with Bharatnatyam and Modern Dancer Daniel Singh. The work blends Kathak and Bharatnatyam (classical styles of India) to explore a new vocabulary of movements to give voice to the South Asian diaspora community. The key concept of this work is centered on the relationships between ritual, memory, body, and identity. By focusing on Hindu and Islamic rituals drawn from Bhakti and Sufi traditions, and through movement and gestures (from Bharatanatyam and Kathak) and day-to-day life, the work highlights what it means to be a south Asian today.
Venue: Community Education Center, Bryn Mawr College Faculty Dance Concert, Swarthmore College Faculty Dance Concert, Painted Bride Art Center (upcoming)
2005 Union/Dissolution
A collaborative dance theatre piece conceived and performed with theatre artist Ulla Denzer. It uses an eclectic blend of material adapted from Peter Weiss’ 1965 play Marat/Sade, 13th century Persian poet Iraqi’s Lama’at, and twentieth century Polish poet Anna Swir. Kabir’s verses (translated by Linda Hess and Sukhdev Singh) frame the entire piece and form its core.
Venue: Painted Bride Art Center as part of the Live Tradition / Contemporary Issues Performance Festival organized by The Asian Arts Initiative in Philadelphia, Swarthmore Faculty Dance Concert, Bryn Mawr College Faculty Dance Concert as a guest artist, PS 122 in New York.
2003 In Search of Sound
Based on Kathak and various pedestrian movements and gestures the piece choreographs the cacophony of sound and movement that surrounds us. Yet there is an eternal quest for clarity and sense of self that unites us as humans. This piece blends various percussion beats from tabla, taiko drums, and vocal tones.
Selected in the arts pick section of the Philadelphia City paper.
Venue: St. Joe’s College for the Philadelphia Women’s Studies Consortium. Swarthmore College Student Dance Concert. Pragati Bengali Association in Philadelphia.
2002 Threads: Story of a Sari from Labor to Market
This thirty-two minute performance piece, inspired by the weavers located in rural India, tells the story of the journey of a sari from villages to the global market. The dance vocabulary is a blend of Kathak interpretive work gestures, and contemporary movements.
Selected in the arts pick section of the Philadelphia City paper.
Venue: Kumquat Theatre, Philadelphia, for the Glue performance Series. University of Pennsylvania, Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.
2002 The Mahatma is Fasting
A twenty-five performance piece specifically created for Mahatma Gandhi’s birthday celebrations at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The piece uses song, dance and poetry to interpret his political and moral philosophy and presents his method of nonviolence as a tool for social change.
Venue: The Philadelphia Museum of Art.
2006/7Replaced Rituals
A collaborative dance-theater piece with Bharatnatyam and Modern Dancer Daniel Singh. The work blends Kathak and Bharatnatyam (classical styles of India) to explore a new vocabulary of movements to give voice to the South Asian diaspora community. The key concept of this work is centered on the relationships between ritual, memory, body, and identity. By focusing on Hindu and Islamic rituals drawn from Bhakti and Sufi traditions, and through movement and gestures (from Bharatanatyam and Kathak) and day-to-day life, the work highlights what it means to be a south Asian today.
Venue: Community Education Center, Bryn Mawr College Faculty Dance Concert, Swarthmore College Faculty Dance Concert, Painted Bride Art Center (upcoming)
2005 Union/Dissolution
A collaborative dance theatre piece conceived and performed with theatre artist Ulla Denzer. It uses an eclectic blend of material adapted from Peter Weiss’ 1965 play Marat/Sade, 13th century Persian poet Iraqi’s Lama’at, and twentieth century Polish poet Anna Swir. Kabir’s verses (translated by Linda Hess and Sukhdev Singh) frame the entire piece and form its core.
Venue: Painted Bride Art Center as part of the Live Tradition / Contemporary Issues Performance Festival organized by The Asian Arts Initiative in Philadelphia, Swarthmore Faculty Dance Concert, Bryn Mawr College Faculty Dance Concert as a guest artist, PS 122 in New York.
2003 In Search of Sound
Based on Kathak and various pedestrian movements and gestures the piece choreographs the cacophony of sound and movement that surrounds us. Yet there is an eternal quest for clarity and sense of self that unites us as humans. This piece blends various percussion beats from tabla, taiko drums, and vocal tones.
Selected in the arts pick section of the Philadelphia City paper.
Venue: St. Joe’s College for the Philadelphia Women’s Studies Consortium. Swarthmore College Student Dance Concert. Pragati Bengali Association in Philadelphia.
2002 Threads: Story of a Sari from Labor to Market
This thirty-two minute performance piece, inspired by the weavers located in rural India, tells the story of the journey of a sari from villages to the global market. The dance vocabulary is a blend of Kathak interpretive work gestures, and contemporary movements.
Selected in the arts pick section of the Philadelphia City paper.
Venue: Kumquat Theatre, Philadelphia, for the Glue performance Series. University of Pennsylvania, Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.
2002 The Mahatma is Fasting
A twenty-five performance piece specifically created for Mahatma Gandhi’s birthday celebrations at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The piece uses song, dance and poetry to interpret his political and moral philosophy and presents his method of nonviolence as a tool for social change.
Venue: The Philadelphia Museum of Art.
