Krishna kee bansi bhajay

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.13169/jofstudindentleg.2.2.0033
• Pages: 33-80
• Published date: 22 December 2022
• Date: 22 December 2022
• Author: Dominique Stewart
• Subject Matter: Nachania,bodily archives,pardesia,bidesia,folk performance,diaspora, Other texts,frock dance

Journal of Indentureship 2.2 December 2022

Krishna kee bansi bhajay

Body politics in the Indo-Jamaican folk

performance of Nachania

Dominique Stewart

DominiqueStewart is a former 2019–2021 interreligious research

fellow with the Jay Phillips Center for Interreligious Studies, at the

University of St. Thomas, Minnesota, USA.

ABSTRACT

Nachania (नचंनिया), translated as ‘female dancer’, refers to both a

traditional Indo-Jamaican folk dance that has local origins in inden-

tureship, and to those who perform it. The dance is characterized

by amboyant ailing hands, counterbalanced by acrobatic feats and

yogic moments synchronous with beat drops. Its unbound chore-

ography salvages important religio-cultural and historical narratives

through ecstatic paroxysmal dance often with sexual overtones. This

performance is important in ritualized and celebratory spaces to

entertain crowds. While performing, Nachanias would have money

launched at them, and they would sometimes engage men in dance.

The performers were, and still are, frequently men who assume

a different gendered role garbed in conscious ‘feminizing’ tech-

nologies such as make-up, jewellery and a frock. Especially during

indentureship and the period immediately after, it was ‘vulgar’ for

women to dance publicly or perform at religious ceremonies. Early

women Nachanias were read as tainted spectacles, some of whom

the archives record as professional ‘entertainers’. Inspired by the

author’s curiosity, Indo-Jamaican identity, observations of Nachania

and discourses with Ghanesh Maragh (one of the few contemporary

performers of this artform), this article casts Indo-Jamaicans into

the unbound erotic gendered tradition of Jamaica and indentureship

by (a) tracing the (inter)religious, gendered, and historical anatomy

of the lauded folk performance from the period of indentureship to

the present in Jamaica and the Indo-Jamaican diaspora; (b) exploring

themes ofbidesia; and (c) examining possible problems with situat-

ing Nachania within categories of queer.

DOI:10.13169/jofstudindentleg.2.2.0033

34 DOMINIQUE STEWART

Journal of Indentureship 2.2 December 2022

KEYWORDS

Nachania, bodily archives, pardesia, bidesia, folk performance, dias-

pora,Other texts, frock dance

‘Jamaica Pardes Chale’Hindi

राम लाल ज़माने वाले

Rām lāl zamāne wāle

माता-पिता के कथा सुनाए

Mātā-pitā ke kathā sunāe

अब बैकुण्ट चले

Ab baikunț chale

ताज मुलुक के तुम परिवार

Taj muluk ke tum pariwār

जमैका परदेस चले

Jamaica pardes chale

राए -बरेली कोई चर्चा सुनाए

पैसा फरत

Rāe-Barailī koi charchā sunāe

पैसा फरत पेड़ के डार

Paisā pharat peṛ ke ḍār

जमैका परदेस चले

Jamaica pardes chale

भला बुरा सब सजाए दहोमी

Bhalā burā sab sajāe dahomī

KRISHNA KEE BANSI BHAJAY 35

Journal of Indentureship 2.2 December 2022

कोई कोई बदले है नाम

Koī koī badle hai nām

ते खाना परदेस चले

Te khānā parades chale

पाँच बरस लौटइ के बइरी

Pānch baras lautai ke bairī

जाता रिजात फसाई

Jātā rijāt phasāī

बहुत नौकारी बेस

Bahut naukārī base.

Simplified translation

Rama’s children of the earth,

The story [katha] of your parents is being related,

Of how they went to heaven.

You left your family in the motherland,

To go to the foreign land of Jamaica

In the villages they heard rumours,

That money grows on trees there.

In order to go to the foreign land of Jamaica,

Good and bad all gathered on the ship,

Some changing their names and addresses,

All headed for the Promised Land.

On finishing a contract after five years,