Research and Publications

Pallabi’s academic research focuses on dance and national identity, the anthropology of performance, processes of globalization, political economy, embodiment, gender, and the intersection of religion and performative practices. 

Pallabi has recently authored or co-edited three books. Bells of Change (Seagull, 2008) is the first critical study of Kathak, a classical Indian dance from North and East India.  The book traces two centuries of Kathak, from the colonial nautch dance to classical Kathak under nationalism and post-colonialism, to transnationalism and globalization.  She reorients dance scholarship to focus on the lived experiences of dancers from a wide cross-section of society, and places the history of Kathak from baijis and tawaifs to the global stage. She has also co-edited Performing Ecstasy (Manohar, 2009) and Dance Matters (Routledge, 2009).  Her current research focuses on dance television reality shows and the impact of Bollywood dance on contemporary Indian identity, democracy, and culture.  She has been conducting ethnographic research in Calcutta and Bombay for this work since 2006.   

Publications:

Books:

Chakravorty Pallabi and Nilanjana Gupta. Editors. 2009. Dance Matters: Performing India on Global and Local Stages. Routledge.

Chakravorty Pallabi and Scott Kugle. Editors. 2009.  Performing Ecstasy: The Politics and Poetics of Religion in South Asia.  Manohar.

Chakravorty, Pallabi.  2008.  Bells of Change: Kathak Dance, Women, and Modernity in India.  Seagull.

Book Chapters

Chakravorty, Pallabi, 2010 (Forthcoming).  “Dancing Identities: Media, Nation, and Consumer Culture” in A Companion to the Anthropology of India, Isabelle Clark-Deces, Editor.  Blackwell.

Chakravorty, Pallabi.  2010 (Forthcoming). “The Exalted Body in Indian Music and Dance” In Bhakti-Sufi, Editor Kavita Panjabi. New Delhi: Orient-Longman.

Chakravorty, Pallabi.  2009 “From Interculturalism to Historicism: Reflections on Classical Indian Dance" In Dance Studies  Reader (Second Edition, Routledge), Edited by Alexandra Carter and Janet O’ Shea (Reprinted from Dance Research Journal 32/2 Winter 2000/01: 100-111.)

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.

Journal Papers

Chakravorty, Pallabi.  2009. “Moved to Dance: Bhakti, Commodity, and a New India.” Visual Anthropology.  Vol 22, Issue 2 (3), 211-22,April. 

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. 2000. From Interculturalism to Historicism: Reflections on Classical Indian dance", Dance Research Journal 32/2 Winter 2000/01: 100-111.

Chakravorty, Pallabi. 1998. Dance, Hegemony, and Nation: The Construction of Classical Dance in India, South Asia 21: 107-120. 

Proceedings

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.

Reviews

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).

Other Writing

Chakravorty, Pallabi.  2006.  “Stitching it Together: A Report on the Live Tradition Festival”.  Celebrasia.

Chakravorty, Pallabi.  2005. “Letter to the Editor”.  Dance Research Journal. 37/1

Chakravorty, Pallabi.  1997.  “Readers Feedback”, Little India.

Numerous articles were published in The Telegraph where I worked as a dance critic. 

Ethnographic Film

Kathak in the City: Women of Calcutta Speak and Dance.  A 20-minute ethnographic film on the women practitioners of Kathak dance in Calcutta; in collaboration with Sanjoy Chakravorty and Cate Leonard.