Where does my story come from? Honouring the source in times of multiplicity
This year’s House of the West Wind College of Storytelling Christmas Lecture is with is Scottish Indian storyteller Gauri Raje.
We live in times of travel. Words travel, images travel, people move or are moved. And stories have always moved and shape-shifted.
So why is “where does my story come from'” an important question to ask?
Gauri will explore what oral cultures can tell us about honouring and acknowledging sources, with particular reference to South Asia.
She will also discuss how colonial legacies have influenced the notion of ‘acknowledging the source’.
We will begin with a talk from Gauri and then explore the contradictions and vexed conversations that arise when honouring sources of stories.
This event will be recorded and you will be emailed the recording within 48 hours.
Scottish Indian storyteller Gauri Raje tells stories in many languages including Urdu, Hindi, Gujarati, Marathi and English. She runs regular storytelling workshops for adults in India, and co-teaches on a three year course on orality, oral cultures and storytelling with the Anima Mundi School in the Netherlands. She holds a PhD in Anthropology for which she explored the storytelling of the Dangi communities in India.
Gauri’s work as a storyteller has taken her across the UK and India, facilitating dialogue within conflict-ridden communities and exploring the tales of Asian migrants to the UK. Her recent community story project Cooking Tales explored the stories, biographies and recipes of Asian women in 1950s and won a Spirit of Scotland award.
Many of her performance and directorial projects explore multi-lingual and cross-cultural aspects, including East of the Sun, West of the Moon; Tales of Exile and Sanctuary; Tales of Ice and Fire; Old Deccan Tales, and Rewilding Cinderella. She is currently collaborating with Scottish musician Mairi Campbell on a performance of the Indian epic of the Mahabharata exploring its connections to rhythms and stories from Scotland.
Find out more about Gauri on LinkedIn – Facebook – Web page