Decolonising Research Series: Culture Across Borders

This series of podcast episodes will focus on Decolonising Research, and feature talks from the Decolonising Research Festival held at the University of Exeter in June and July 2022.

The fifth epsiode of the series will feature Pankhuri Singh from the University of Exeter and her talk 'Culture across borders'.

 

Music credit: Happy Boy Theme Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

 

Transcription

00:09

Hello, and welcome to rd in the in betweens. I'm your host Kelly Preece. And every fortnight I talk to a different guest about researchers development, and everything in between.

 

00:32

And today I'll be talking about cultural cross borders. Hello, everyone. My name is Pankaj Singh. I'm a second year PhD student in the Department of English and film studies. Now, what exactly is decolonization? decolonization is the process in which a country that was formerly a colony that was colonized by imperialism or by a par, they they go away and they make that country independent and they lose the stop controlling that country and that country becomes independent internal, this is the process of decolonization. Now, India became independent from the British Empire on the 15th of August 1947. Do it became a republic, it decided to be a part of the Commonwealth of Nations. Hence, it did not severe away all the ties from the British Empire by being part of the Commonwealth nations it accepted the honorary monarchy being being a part of the Indian constitution and in I'm sorry, not the Indian constitution, but of the Indian public in in, in the general terms, not talking a little bit about what the history of India and the UK share is, trade was established between two ringland and Mughal India in the 1600s. When elicited when Elizabeth to one granted the newly formed in East India Company Royal Charter by sending precious gifts to the Mughal court, Emperor of Akbar the trend following the Indian rebellion of 1857. When Indian sepoys rebelled against the British officers, the East India Company was dissolved. The assets of the British East India Company was so huge that the British government decided to step in, and after a series of military encounters established British dominion over India. Later, the English sought to consolidate their political control by taking responsibility to improve the lot of the masses by imparting modern Western education. They took over on themselves which is dubbed as the White Man's Burden, they took over that responsibility of making the Indian masses of socially religiously, morally economically, better human beings. A part of this being Lord Macaulay is minute on Indian education, which came out in the 18 clitic farm. He wanted to establish a class of persons Indian and blood and color, but English and taste, opinion, morals and intellect. According to him, these people would act as intermediaries between the British rulers and the masses that they were to. Indians, however, welcome this decision with open arms. They had their own perceived notions that this charter this minute would help them it was not just the freedom fighters, but also the social reformers who saw the benefits of this plan and how it would work in their own favor. reformers like Raja Ram and Ravi and others crap the opportunity to do away with the dogmatic and Orthodox religious rights, when they realized that is new scientific approach would be important to the Indian education and they would realize that these religions rights were dogmatic and not really something that should be followed. Similarly, the freedom fighters to grab this opportunity and part of collaborating with each other, from different parts of the country to to

 

04:39

to move forward the nationalist independence movement. Now why was that? It was because India was and still continues to be multilingual. It has 22 languages recognized in the HTML of the Indian constitution, and when Broadmoor collies minute came into being ink, then English became the lingua franca and freedom writers from across regions could actually connect and plans that would work for the very downfall of the British Empire that that brought home that had brought this English language into the country. While all of this was going on in the political front, in the literary front, Shakespeare as a playwright began to gain popularity he's his stories of creed, part, revenge and jealousy, the times and the new no borders. Even after independence, Indians continued to like his filmmakers took an opportunity to make films that were based on Shakespeare's plots. And they thought that his plots were timeless and they could actually adapt to them to the Indian culture. This brings me to my research topic, which is how paraglide trans culturally adapted to Elizabeth and drama to the Indian setting. Today, I will be talking about how the Elizabethan drama written by William Shakespeare in 16 104 that is Othello gets adapted into Ankara, which was a film that released in the year 2006. Cannot be bounded by geographical borders, the emotions of discontentment, jealousy, insecurity, are felt by all residing in any part of the world. Ha replied to spank on the Shakespearean play, and takes pride in being associated with the writer who wrote for the teaching, which ruled his country for centuries. The filmmaker however, does not blindly transform the Elizabethton play of Shakespeare into a film. Rather he adds the elements of Indian Ness in it, which makes the adaptation a unique process he adds in Hindu mythic elements and other features that are exclusive to India. The chief point of the play will tell you is that Otello belongs to a different race than Desdemona, the counterpart the female counterpart. This gets trans culturally adapted in the Indian setting, but how to judge many banks on the emotion of jealousy and insecurity. He bases his film on the very inhibition, which also happens to be a very famous Hindi dialogue in the Bollywood cinema, that a girl and a boy can never be just friends. This inhibition was the root cause for Omkara jealousy and the belief that dolly Desdemona might have cheated on him with case that is Casio. While in the play, Iago makes Roger equal believe that Desdemona loves Casio, he says that they have the same appearance and that will tell you is stop that bringing in the disparity of talent between the levels. In the film this gets adapted when dolly and que su are seeing together and they seem compatible, because they share the same educational background. The the, the issue of caste, the issue of column, never find the mention it is because they will educate together that they become compatible, thereby making Ankara jealous and insecure, that he is approved, and therefore, he is not as in par with the case who as he would have been had he been Western or modern educated. The second method of adapting the play is when Bhardwaj reimagined the character of into the Indian counterpart for Amelia, making her vengeful at Carly, who kills her husband Lambert yaki, the Iago figure for the misdeeds he had done. Thus, Bhardwaj birdwatcher takes a significant departure from the text, because while in the play immediate dies at the hands of Thiago and that is how we see that that's how Amelia is not really able to stand up for Desdemona. Into however, becomes the avenging mother who dresses the wrongs done to her.

 

09:41

Not only her but also broadly, who she thinks to be her younger sister, or her child. The name into means moon and according to the Hindu mythology, the moon protects the inhabitants of the earth in in the night from the evil forces that look in the dark similarly, in the two dresses the drums metadata and Dolly balandra and the scenes take place in the light rail into as a protector of the good forces fight against the evil forces, which here are represented in Lanre and defeats him. You even though Indu is not the female protagonist here, her position in the development of the plot is of significant value. In the film, Iago is called Long long meaning lane, which attributes to another mythological figure, Shang. Shang is a planet that, according to the Hindu mythology, is a slow moving planet that revolves around the sun, and is associated with black collar and walks with a limp. This mythical trigger is associated with bad luck. And that's the drawing influence of lambda in Ankara. Light can be equated to the beginning of Ankara has done for since Shani said to be the God of karma or one's actions, it can be concluded that Ankara is himself involved in his own downfall. As he is unable to see the truth and false through the deceitful plans of flora. Shani is also associated with black color as a tall talked about he walks he can be seen in the film, in the form of long long walks in with a limb in the dark alleys. He is always shot in dim light, and he adds to the mystery which brings about a kind of mystical persona that holds some secrets within his heart, and that alludes to the dark intentions that he has. My argument is that while Iago becomes the green eyed monster in Othello, longer becomes the demonic figure associated with evil and dark horses, and black is the color associated with him. pilotage also seems to have borrowed from Rahman, when adapting Otello to the Indian context, as the basic fact remains that both in the epic so in the plane or in the film, where the main character are misled to distress the loyalty of their respective rights, just as in Roman law drum believes the words of a washer man and things got a Sita was not loyal to him. So does in the film, Ankara believe two words a camera and considers the dolly is having an illicit affair with case behind his back. The words of Brandon Turner who is destined Mona's father pelo. Look, look at have more if thou have eyes to see, she has deceived her father and me she did get an Indian adaptation to the word three archery three, three archery three is a term that is mentioned in MGS. Murthy, which is a religious, religious Hindu text. It refers to the mysterious character of women, which is translated or real translation stands as nobody knows about the character or tendency of a woman.

 

13:21

It is thus, a critical evaluation of how Shakespeare's plays were translocated and adapted into the Indian setting, along with aiming, rethinking and repositioning Shakespeare in 21st century intends cinematic setting, acting as a cultural bridge, joining the culture of two different countries to get this fighting with the past and thinking that things were different, and they would have been better if they were different. It is better if we see a future that knows no boundaries, and that where where we share and serving and a future where we share the same legacy and making a new history there, all of our cultures collaborate. My larger argument does is if we as New Age, researchers are able to strike a balance between the methods and means by which the old Pinocchio texts are read and analyzed. And that connection is established between the colonizing power not seeing it as a curse, but rather seen is at seeing it as a means of new forms of connection, a call a new area of decolonizing research will develop it will see literature as belonging to all it does not restrict it by borders or by geopolitics, or where the nations or the nationality of the author lies, but rather assimilating and making literature and music accessible to all.

 

15:03

And that's it for this episode. Don't forget to like, rate and subscribe. And join me next time where I'll be talking to somebody else about researchers development and everything in between.