UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA RIVERSIDE Performing Indian Dance in Malaysia A Dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Critical Dance Studies by Premalatha Thiagarajan September 2012 Dissertation Committee: Dr. Priya Srinivasan, Chairperson Dr. Marta Savigliano Dr. Anthea Kraut Copyright by Premalatha Thiagarajan 2012 The Dissertation of Premalatha Thiagarajan is approved: __________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________ Committee Chairperson University of California, Riverside ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS “Guru Brahma, Guru Vishnu, Guru Devo Maheshwaraha, Guru Saakshat Para Brahma, Tasmai Sree, Yoga Jnana Sitthar Om Sri Rajayoga Gurave Namaha.” I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my Spiritual Guru, His Divine Grace, Dato’ Seri Guruji. Over the past four years of my graduate studies in the University of California Riverside, Guruji has made me truly realize that nothing is impossible with yogic power, something that I thought I understood and I took for granted. Words cannot express the unconditional love, the emotional support, and the spiritual guidance extended to me by Guruji while I have been away from home and family, studying in California. I am truly indebted, Thank you “Dato’ Seri Guruji and Datin Sri G.” I would like to sincerely thank my Chair, Priya Srinivasan, for helping me to identify the direction of my research when I was initially overwhelmed with so many thoughts, for giving me the confidence to pursue the topic of my interest, and for pushing me to think through different research possibilities. I owe her special thanks for molding me into a better scholar and for influencing the way I approach dance scholarship now. I would also like to convey heartfelt thanks to my committee members, Anthea Kraut and Marta Savigliano, for supporting my work. Their insightful comments and critical guidance have enabled me to address certain shortcomings in this dissertation. I am also grateful to Esha De and Tamara Ho, my oral committee members, for the attention they have given to this project when it was first conceived and for their valuable suggestions in framing the project. I must also admit that life in Riverside would definitely have been very dull if not for Wendy Rogers. How can I forget the getaway iv trips to beaches, museums, dance concerts, and Malaysian restaurants? I am always grateful to her for the moral support she has extended to me, especially during the critical period of writing this dissertation. I would like to acknowledge the Malaysian Ministry of Higher Education and the University of Malaya for making my dream come true. Without their four-year financial support, this doctoral studies and research would never have been possible. I would like to specifically thank my mentors, Anis Md. Nor and Marcia Lloyd, for having the confidence in me and for encouraging me to pursue Ph.D. in the U.S. I would also like to express my sincere gratitude to all my informants in Malaysia. I thank all my gurus at the Temple of Fine Arts, the President of the Temple of Fine Arts – Kanagasivam, Chandrabhanu, Ramli Ibrahim, President of the Malaysia Bharatanatya Association – Indira Manickam, ASWARA, and to all other dance practitioners of Indian dance who have devoted their time to discuss their work with me. I also want to thank my colleagues and friends at the University of California Riverside who have been very supportive emotionally and intellectually. In particular, I thank Melissa Templeton, Anusha Kedhar, Hannah Schwadron, Tania Hammidi, and Alicia Cox for proofreading drafts of this dissertation and offering me critical comments on the chapters in this dissertation. I will always remember the so-called “therapy moments” and “weekly get-together rituals” I spent with my close buddy, Hye-Won Hwang. Those moments kept me sane and made my get through graduate student life less depressingly. Thanks also to Kristy Shih for her last minute support in formatting this dissertation. v Last but not least, I am truly indebted to my family members. My mother, Vasantha and my sister and brother, Komathy and Muthukkumaran, have always been loving, protective, and emotionally supportive. Not once have they doubted my capabilities, although I have sometimes doubted my own potential. They have stood strongly by my side managing my dance company and my other Malaysian endeavors during my absence in Malaysia. The word, thanks, is never sufficient for what they have done. vi ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Performing Indian Dance in Malaysia by Premalatha Thiagarajan Doctor of Philosophy, Graduate Program in Critical Dance Studies University of California, Riverside, September 2012 Dr. Priya Srinivasan, Chairperson “Performing Indian Dance” is an interdisciplinary project that reveals the dynamics of ethnicity, gender, and sexuality in Malaysian Indian dance. I demonstrate that the emergence of prominent multi-ethnic male dancers in Malaysia is enabled by a unique configuration of “bumiputera” (“son of soil”) ethnic-based state discourse, cosmopolitanism (ability to move fluently across multiple spaces), Indian dance institutional structures, global capitalism, and gender mobility, which simultaneously overshadows the visibility of female dancers. I stress that the very conditions that enable the emergence of men dancers simultaneously affect women dancers and render them variously “invisible” on Malaysian stages. I posit that the discourses of ethnicity, gender, cosmopolitanism, community, and family come together differently for men and women, causing them to negotiate gender and sexuality in different ways. This research trajectory explores the ability of dance practitioners, particularly male dancers, to perform gender and sexuality fluidly, along a spectrum and in a way not possible in everyday life due to the local regulatory structures. vii Although the nation seeks ways to regulate marginalized gender and sexual identities, this dissertation demonstrates the ways in which male dancers claim agency through provocative choreographies onstage and the acts of embracing “deviant” gender and sexual practices offstage. This project identifies the policing of female sexuality in the increasingly Islamic state as the key to male artists’ hypervisibility. By examining gender relations and gendered division of labor, I argue in this dissertation that although female dancers may not always be visible as onstage performers, they assert power and authority through their backstage and offstage labor. I draw on ethnographic research in dance institutions located at western Peninsula/r Malaysia to interrogate gender relations, sexual politics, ethnic inequalities, cosmopolitan practices, and transnational dancing bodies. The examination of Indian dance practice, through the intersection of local and global discourses, from the South- East Asian context, is aimed at contributing new insights to the field of dance studies. viii TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements iv Abstract vii Introduction: “Performing Indian Dance in Malaysia” 1 Chapter One: “Performing Bumiputera and Gender” 38 Chapter Two: “Star Male Dancers in Malaysia” 88 Ramli Ibrahim 94 Mavin Khoo 115 Umesh Shetty 128 Conclusion 140 Chapter Three: “Male Dancers Questioning Masculinities” 147 Blurring Gender: Male Cross-Dresser 155 Complicating Gender: Transsexual Artist 165 Queer Desire: Homoeroticism 175 Conclusion 188 Chapter Four: “Women On and Off the Performance Stage” 190 Female Gurus Performing “The Labor of Rehearsal Spaces” 192 Principal Female Dancers 211 Female Producer of Dance Recitals 227 Conclusion 234 Conclusion 238 Bibliography 245 ix INTRODUCTION PERFORMING INDIAN DANCE IN MALAYSIA (May 2005) During a telephone conversation, a male teacher of Indian classical dance forms told me, “You young dancers and scholars think you can do anything. As long as you are my student, you have to follow my instructions and perform where and how I tell you to. If you want to act as you wish, get the hell out of my school. And, when you write about me, make sure you know what you are writing!” He slammed the phone down, preventing me from defending myself. (February 2007) In an Odissi expressive dance piece that depicted the love play between deity, Krishna and his female partner, Radha, two male dancers held hands, embraced each other and performed intense sensual movement sequences and poses with their bodies in close contact. A female dance teacher and my close friend, who was sitting next to me, felt disgusted watching the dance piece. She whispered to me, “Huh! What are they trying to do? Look at the movements! Krishnavum Radhavum ipadithan aduvangala? (“would Krishna and Radha dance like this?”). Have we performed like this in Bharata Natyam?” The choreography surprised me to the extent that I could not disagree with my friend. Despite the “shushing” of audience members seated beside us, our whispering continued until the piece ended. Later, one of the male dancers asked me about the piece, “What do you think?” I was in a dilemma, unable to decide whether to say, “Oh, I liked it, very unusual choreography” or “I was not prepared for that, it was shocking!” 1 (July 2009) Mark (pseudonym), a male student who had been diligently attending my dance classes, began training with an established male dance teacher in Malaysia (while I was in the United States pursuing my Ph.D.). When I returned