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Ardhanarishvara,
the Androgyne With the metrosexual man in
India today busy pruning and preening himself, in anticipation of a
future where genetic coding-decoding will deliver his/her chosen shade
of fe/maleness, Alka Pande's Ardhanarishvara, the Androgyne is
apt and timely. The book is delightful for the ease with which it makes
the linkages and transgressions between the sacred and the profane, high
and low art, representation and reality. The book is very much in the
genre of contemporary remixes — extremely palatable and appetising in
its eye-catching and synthetic packaging. The added glamour of images
stems from the obvious connotations with the "icons", the
sleazy glitz of street culture and the unacknowledged, unexposed
underbelly of society. The gloss and glamour does not take away the
merit of the well-researched and well-documented content that Pande has
put together so assiduously. Centred around the Ardhanarishvara myth
and image, the book is replete with literary, textual and visual
references from the past and present. While tracing the iconic evolution
of the image, it unveils a sublimated acknowledgement and acceptance of
sexual ambiguity, duality and non-conformist gender identities inherent
in communities and societies down the ages. In the union of man and
woman, the image of Ardhanarishvara, when viewed in the elements of Siva
and Shakti, underscores the lines in the battle between the sexes. In
concept and reality, its ambivalence also proves its status as
"neither or nor". However, it is in the process of
transformation, metamorphoses and transgression from one gender to
another— both in the myth as well as in practice — that the various
nuances and categories of gender identities are made visible. For
instance, narrated from the Mahabharata is the story of Aravan,
son of Arjuna. Aravan was required to sacrifice his life but he did not
want to die a bachelor. Since no father was willing to knowingly lead
his daughter to certain widowhood, Krishna, incarnation of Vishnu,
transformed himself into Mohini and married Aravan. To this day,
Aravan's wedding to Mohini is enacted every year at Koovagam and
Pillaiyarkuppam in Tamil Nadu. Transsexuals, transvestites and eunuchs
don the bridal wear for the holy marriage ceremony, only to exchange it,
the following morning, for the widow's attire amidst much mourning.
Involved in the event is an entire spectrum of gender identities — the
hijras or the Alis who identify themselves with Vishnu/Mohini,
the heterosexual dangas who become women for the duration of the
festival, the kothis or the effeminate and passive of the male
partners, and the panthis who are the masculine of the male
partners and are sexually given to both men and women. In this melange
of unstereotyped and socially unaccepted identities is inserted a
poignant query, voiced by an individual — "So where is the room
for the males, hermaphrodites, drag queens, transsexuals,
transgenderists, cross-dressers and all other forms of gender-benders,
blenders and breakers in our "spectrum" of sexual
orientation?" The subsequent chapters in the book discerningly
and sympathetically construct and put in contemporary perspective the
concerns of the ambiguous, nonconformist identity in history,
visual/plastic and performing arts, multimedia, sports and social
psychology. Given the blurring of genders and the range of choices in
present-day lifestyle, fashion, society and the arts, gender hopping
combined with genetic engineering may well become a lifestyle choice for
the inherent, compulsive or willing aberrant in future. |
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