Clothing History

From The Wire

Present India often exhibits a curious contradiction. Popular cinema, advertising, and social media can be highly focused on physical appearance and sexuality, yet educational or artistic representations of the body provoke alarm. The latest incident is dressing up the Dancing Girl of Mohenjo-Daro in NCERT’s class 9 textbook.

The Dancing Girl is a tiny statuette that originally belonged to the ancient Indus Valley Civilisation of Mohenjo-Daro of 2500 BCE. The figure depicts a young girl standing in a confident, relaxed pose, with one hand resting on her hip and the other hanging by her side. She has numerous bangles on her arms and a necklace, while her hair appears to be gathered into a bun. What strikes you most is the vitality and self-assurance exuded by the girl.

However, NCERT decided that her nudity is what will strike our schoolchildren. So it dressed up the girl in its textbooks.

The female body attracts undue scrutiny in India (as well as many other conservative countries). A bare-chested male figure in art or mythology passes without controversy, while even partial female nudity can provoke discomfort. Doesn’t that imply that the issue is not nudity per se but female visibility?

The tendency to view any representation of the unclothed body through a sexual lens may raise certain pertinent psychological questions. Are Indians culturally conditioned to associate nudity with sexuality all the time? Would Freud say that Indians are disproportionately preoccupied with sex?

Khajuraho Temple Art

Historically, however, human societies including in India have represented naked or semi-naked bodies in many contexts: artistic, religious, heroic, maternal, etc. How can we ever forget the sculptures of Khajuraho and Konark Temples? Is it possible that India’s present inhibition with regard to nudity is a byproduct of the nation’s encounter with Victorian moral codes during the Raj?

When an ancient artifact becomes something that must be covered up, the implicit lesson is that the human body itself is somehow embarrassing. The simple truth is: children are far less troubled by ancient nudity than adults imagine. Of course, I am aware of the fact that today’s children are more like adults than in the pre-Smartphone era.

At any rate, there is a pedagogical issue here. History education is supposed to help students understand that different societies had different ideas about clothing, beauty, religion, and the human body. If we start dressing ancient statues according to contemporary sensibilities, where does it stop? Do we put trousers on ancient Greek athletes?  A T-shirt on Venus de Milo? A winter jacket on The Thinker?

Students shouldn’t be given the notion that the past must be edited to fit the present. They should understand the past as it was. Simplifying something is not the same as altering it. Simplifying means reducing the detail. For example, the Dancing Girl may be reproduced in the textbook as a line drawing leaving out certain details. But altering means changing the object itself.

The Dancing Girl of Mohenjo-Daro survived nearly 4000 years underground. It seems a little unfair that after enduring floods, droughts, invasions, and the collapse of a civilisation, she should be told now by some right-wing textbook editor: “Young lady, kindly dress properly before entering the 21^st century classroom.”

 

Konark Temple Art

My earlier posts on the Dancing Girl

Mohenjo-Daro’s Dancing Girl

Questions for the Dancing Girl

Dancing Girl and Pakistan