Written in the form of an historical fiction, this thesis explores the multiple influences that were active in the lives of temple dancers in Southern India from 1861 to 1947. It addresses the question of whether or not the devadasis were prostitutes, placing this debate in the context of conflicting colonial, Hindu and reform movement pressures, influences directing the decline and disappearance of the temple dancing tradition. In gathering information about this period, I have drawn from three main sources: colonial literature of the time, modern feminist research, and dance scholarship on the nature and history of the technical aspects of temple dancing. My aim has been to reconstruct, as accurately as possible, a close approximation of a devadasi's life, and to compare how it differs from those lived by previous generations of temple dancers.

Written in the form of an historical fiction, this thesis explores the multiple influences that were active in the lives of temple dancers in Southern India from 1861 to 1947. It addresses the question of whether or not the devadasis were prostitutes, placing this debate in the context of conflicting colonial, Hindu and reform movement pressures, influences directing the decline and disappearance of the temple dancing tradition. In gathering information about this period, I have drawn from three main sources: colonial literature of the time, modern feminist research, and dance scholarship on the nature and history of the technical aspects of temple dancing. My aim has been to reconstruct, as accurately as possible, a close approximation of a devadasi's life, and to compare how it differs from those lived by previous generations of temple dancers. / Arts, Faculty of / Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice, Institute for / Graduate

This thesis examines the representation of the lives and performances of tawa'if and rudali in South Asian cinema to understand their marginalization as performers, and their significance in the collective consciousness of the producers and consumers of Indian cultural artifacts. The critical textual analysis of six South Asian films reveals these women as caste-amorphous within the system of social stratification in India, and therefore captivating in the potential they present to achieve a complex and multi-faceted definition of culture. Qualitative interviews with 4 Indian classical dance instructors in Portland, Oregon and performative observations of dance events indicate the importance of these performers in perpetuating and developing Indian cultural artifacts, and illustrate the value of a multi-layered, performative methodological approach. These findings suggest that marginality in performance is a useful and dynamic site from which to investigate the processes of cultural communication, producing findings that augment sole textual analysis.