This collection of ten papers is the outcome of the Third International Würzburg Colloquium on Indian Studies on Changing Roles and Perceptions of Women Performers in Indian Culture, held at
the U. of Würzburg, Germany, in 2005. Although the contributors--anthropologists, folklorists, Indologists, sociologists, and theater scholars from India, Europe, and the US--adopt widely
varying approaches to analytical style and choice of subject matter, common themes that arise across the contributions include the minimization of female embodiment and mobility in Indian
performance, the complex negotiation process through which tradition and modernity are constructed by different performers, issues of agency for women performers in Indian society, and
differences in insider and outsider perspectives on female roles in Indian performance. Annotation ©2012 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
