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This looks interesting... Can anyone provide some context as to how these signs are used / what they communicate exactly?
Here's a short video depicting some of these mudras as used in Bharatanatyam (a form of classical dance from Southern India): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4FtwU2MVoE
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First, I appreciate this emphasis on shapes of the hands, which is not something you see emphasized in modern dance, and also not in any classical Western dances I am aware of. Yet the hands are very dextrous, so why not? In our mind-map they probably take up a lot of space.
Related, I find it enjoyable how some forms that westerners think of as being for "shadow puppets" or children's games have been elevated here to respected parts of an art form. It's great.
And even if some parts are intentionally silly, or humorous -- well, great! Comedy is necessary.
Second, it's an example of a taxonomy or ontology, which is something I have been thinking a lot about these days. Very clearly there is a continuous space of hand poses, but certain discrete points in that space have been selected to convey meaning.
Finally, it's an escape from the current Culture, which I find exhausting. Yes, please do give me thoughts from a time and place where other thoughts were thought.
Like, imagine the mental state that is required to invent this taxonomy. You'll get some of that by thinking about it. It's like a breath of fresh air.
If you are wondering how a gesture can mean multiple things, then I must tell you it all depends on the context. And truly master dancers and composers know how to tell two or more stories with one dance!
I regularly read something called "Vaishnava Padavali" which are ancient Bengali poems about Krishna and Chaitanya, but at the same time they convey very deeper meanings.
And it is not like metaphors in other languages, where one meaning is "hidden", the second (or third) meaning hides in plain sight.
If you interpret the meaning of a word in one way, you get one meaning, and if you do it another way, you get another. And you can string together multiple storylines and messages from one piece of text.
Let me give you an example- "Varshaa" in Sanskrit means monsoon. And "Varsho" means a year- it means the amount of time in which there is one monsoon. And again, "Varsho" are also mountains where clouds collapse to and brings monsoon. So, depending on the context (or multiple), "Varsho" could either mean a mountain or a year.
A man took it up a notch- Sandhyakar Nandi, who wrote a whole epic, which is a retelling of the Epic Ramayana on one interpretation, but is the life of Pala Emperor Ramapal on other.
In the same way, dance gestures can mean multiple things based on your interpretation. And different interpretations run parallely, together.
Sanskrit is a language with metaphors built-in in the language.
The entry barrier is extremely high, but Sanskrit poems, plays, and epics are one of the most profoundly intellectually stimulating pieces of text in the world.
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Here is my take: Mudras are an elaborate form of encoded symbolism with a long history in culture that influences a large part of the world. People trained in classical Indian dance will be able to decode a story based on these gestures, whereas someone who doesn't know much about it won't get the meaning. If you think about it like that, it's quite similar to code. At the end of the day, computer code is also just symbolism - so we as practitioners of this particular kind of symbolism can always learn about other forms of symbolism to improve our craft.
This was a fascinating read. And this information about Indian dance gestures should not be seen separately from ancient Indian languages like Sanskrit. If you are wondering how a gesture can mean multiple things, then I must tell you it all depends on the context. And truly master dancers and composers know how to tell two or more stories with one dance! I regularly read something called "Vaishnava Padavali" which a…
This was a fascinating read. And this information about Indian dance gestures should not be seen separately from ancient Indian languages like Sanskrit. If you are wondering how a gesture can mean multiple things, then I must tell you it all depends on the context. And truly master dancers and composers know how to tell two or more stories with one dance! I regularly read something called "Vaishnava Padavali" which a…
Lol what? Can you please name a dancer who can do this mysterious thing?
Ps - indian classical dancer here
This looks interesting... Can anyone provide some context as to how these signs are used / what they communicate exactly?
At 58:25, there's english explanation along with mudras. I hope that gives you some idea.
This is how it looks in Mohiniyattam, a different form -- https://www.facebook.com/shaaledotcom/videos/502594377555050 . The dancer depicts a scene where Indra (a god) comes to visit the wife of a sage. He comes in the disguise of the sage (when the actual sage is away) and the wife sees through that and laughs at him.
This is Odissi -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYHAUGX1L5U .