Madhurima Class 9 Chapter 12, Cultural Connections Through Dance, shows how dance connects people across boundaries. Dandiya and Bhangra, for example, have travelled abroad with the Indian diaspora.
What Madhurima Chapter 12 Covers
Dance across borders: Dandiya and Bhangra travelled with the Indian diaspora. Bhangra now appears in flashmobs in Birmingham, NBA half-time shows in the USA, stage contests in Singapore, and Lohri at home in Punjab.
A dance for every occasion: Badhāī (Madhya Pradesh) and Sohar (Bihar) celebrate birth; Khoriyā (Haryana) and Chholiyā Nṛitya (Kumaon) belong to weddings; Naṭa-Saṅkīrtana is part of funeral rites in Manipur; Bārḍo Chham (Arunachal Pradesh) shows the journey from death to rebirth. Bihu and Hojāgirī are harvest dances, and in Goa’s Taraṅgmel dancers carry flags and shout ‘ho ho’ to keep time.
Keeping a tradition alive: Rani Machaiah received the Padma Shri in March 2023 for preserving the Ummattāṭ dance of the Koḍava community of Karnataka, which begins with an invocation to the river Kaveri.
Activities: journal the dances of your own state and of a state that does not border it, learn one dance from each, fuse them respectfully into a new piece, and interview a local dance artist as a podcast in three stages: pre-production, production and post-production.
One story, many renditions: Bāli-jātrā in Odisha recalls ancient sea voyages to Southeast Asia. The Rāmāyaṇa is danced as Ramakien (Khon masked dance) in Thailand, Sendratari Rāmāyaṇa in Java, Kecak in Bali, Yama Zatdaw in Myanmar and Singkil in the Philippines. In India, Rāmalīlā took its present form in the seventeenth century and is staged around Dussehra.
Exercises in Chapter 12
- Name a dance form with a global presence and say where it is performed and by whom.
- Match funeral rites, harvest, martial art and community joy with Naṭa-Saṅkīrtana, Bihu, Mayurbhanj Chhau and Garba.
- Explain why consent matters when you record an interview.
Read Madhurima Class 9 Chapter 12 Online
More Chapters
- Previous: Chapter 11: Dance as Visual Storytelling
- Next: Chapter 13: Dance Choreography
- All Art chapters and the other Class 9 books: Class 9 NCERT books 2026-27
FAQ
What is the Rāmāyaṇa dance tradition of Thailand called?
Ramakien, performed as Khon, a classical masked dance-drama.
Who is Rani Machaiah?
She received the Padma Shri in March 2023 for preserving and popularising the Ummattāṭ folk dance of the Koḍava community of Karnataka.