A first
glance / Families
of saris / Who made it happen?
/ Lectures
The theme that greets you when you enter the Goldstein
Gallery is "religious context".
Aspects of some sari drapes carry
religious significance for the wearer. The Aiyar Sari is one of
these drapes. It is worn by women of several communities found
mostly in the states of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh: Aiyar Brahmins,
Smarta Brahmins who follow the religious teacher Shankaracharya,
Gurukkal Brahmin priests serving temples to the Hindu god Shiva,
and members of the non-Brahmin Acari caste of craftsmen.
The sari must be nine yards long
and it must have borders contrasting in color, to highlight the
symbolism of the drape: The lower border crosses the front of
the body five times, five being sacred to devotees of Shiva. The
sari drape also has a male and female side, also symbolic of Shiva.
The lower left side of the sari is draped with kosu pleating inside
the back, a sari detail common to Tamil women, and the lower right
side is draped like a man's dhoti.
The artwork on the left portrays
Shiva in his Ardhnarisvara manifestation as half-man, half-woman.
Shiva and Sakti, the male and female elements necessary for creation,
have been worshipped in India through history. Ardhnarisvara is
the visualization of this union, as a symbol of creation.
The Three Drapes of Mudamalai
Nowadays, women tend to give
up their "traditional" costume and adopt either "higher
drapes", or the "Modern"sari. In this way, some
saris go down the "caste ladder" and are eventually
given up. Take, for example, the three drapes displayed here.
They are worn by three generations of women belonging to the same
Irula tribe, in the same village, Mudamalai, in North-West Tamil
Nadu.
Historically, women of the Irula
tribe cultivate and fish. For many of the older women today, this
is their sole occupation. Because these women do not have much
money, they dress in rags and old saris. They wear the Irula sari,
a simple tribal drape (left).
Many younger Irula women have
more contact with the rest of Tamil Nadu. They make their living
by catching rats (for which their excellence has earned them national
recognition), making bamboo screens, and/or selling fish. They
are able to make enough money to buy cheap cotton saris, and they
tend to copy the dress of nearby farmers with which they have
the most contact. These women wear the Pinkosu sari (center),
a drape that is still common in that region.
Still other young women have
greater experience with the "outer world". They may
catch rats, or be the wives of successful mahouts, transporting
elephants all over India, and/or acting as guides for tourists.
These women can usually afford mores expensive six-yard synthetic
saris, and wear the Nivi "Modern" sari (right). As in
this example, all over India drapes are being transferred and
discarded, replaced by the Modern sari. As styles change, several
generations within one family may be wearing different drapes.
Indian women are giving up the
garments that once marked out their caste and origin. Now, they
display their Indian heritage by wearing the Modern sari.
The exhibition mostly show traditional
saris, but has some room for fashion too!
This mannequin is wearing a fashionable
"ethnic chic" embroidered blouse with a coordinated
sari.
Some forms of sari drape, through
customary use, become mediums for communicating specific information
about the wearer. However, sari textiles and drapes are not rigidly
followed year after year. Both are subject to fashion innovation.
Consider the simple 5 1/2 yard
sari textile. Its color, design, weave, fiber, and layout of borders
and pallavs all change from one fashion period to the next.
Sari drape changes with fashion
as well. Consider the simple Nivi "Modern" drape. The
length of the pallav hanging down behind the left shoulder has
changed from one period to the next. Changes in this length also
determine how the end of the pallav is secured when the wearer
wants to free both her hands. Short pallavs can be pulled around
the right shoulder and tucked into the neckline of the blouse.
Long pallavs are pulled under the right arm and tucked in at the
waist.
The most noticeable fashion changes
occur in the sari's accessories. The "choli" blouse
style is particularly prone to fashion changes in its length,
sleeves, neckline, and closure.
A current fashion trend has been
dubbed "ethnic chic". Worn mostly by urban women, this
style incorporates regional rural and village textiles, embroidery,
and dress that were quite recently considered unsophisticated.
Indian fashion magazines today
reflect the dynamic mix of tradition and fashion in Indian women's
dress. Advertisements for Western style dress, salwar-kameez ensembles,
saris, and other traditional styles of dress, in a wide variety
of fashionable textile colors, prints, and surface designs, vie
for the attention of Indian women.
Activities and the Display of Skin
Practices regarding how much
of her body a woman covers or leaves visible varies along many
dimensions such as age, economic and marital status, or activity.
Religion and geographical region vary the effects of these factors
across India.
Some activities a woman engages
in are associated with increased exposure of the body. Manual
labor is the most significant factor increasing body exposure.
While upper class women make temporary adjustments to the drape
of their saris to facilitate household chores, working women tend
to drape their saris at least above the ankles and often much
higher.
It is the work of these women
-- whose arms, heads, calves, and sometimes thighs are exposed
-- that allows upper class women to wear their saris in drapes
that cover most of the body and get in the way of heavy work.
These mannequins are wearing
two forms of the same sari.
The first mannequin wears the
Rajim sari, a drape worn in various low-caste agricultural communities
in Southern Madhya Pradesh. The second mannequin wears the Koppla
Velam Sari, a slight variation of the Rajim sari. It is worn by
agricultural laborers in Eastern Andhra Pradesh. When doing hard
labor in the fields, the drape of the mundanai is changed to facilitate
this labor.
