Dr. B. R. Ambedkar Central Library
Jawaharlal Nehru University
cordially invites you to the 29th Library Lecture Series and Outreach Programme
“A Wonderful Folk Epic From South India”
Ms. Brenda Beck
Adjunct Professor, University of Toronto
President, Sophia Hilton Foundation of Canada
Producer: The Legend of Ponnivala (video series)
And related educational materials
Chairperson: N. Chandrasekhran, Assistant Professor, Tamil Chair, CIL/SLL&CS, JNU
Date: Friday, 10th November 2017 at 12.00 noon
Venue: Committee Room, Dr. B. R. Ambedkar Central Library, JNU
About the talk: The talk will introduce an almost unknown folk epic collected 52 years ago in the Kongu area of Tamilnadu. Since then the speaker has transcribed and published the audio text of the story, as well as animated it in thirteen hours of video. Later she saw this animation through to broadcast distribution, both in South India and in Canada. Since completing that work she has produced graphic novels, wall murals, an ipad ap and even a digital game that build on the story’s contents. Her passion is to share this marvelous folk tradition with a worldwide audience. Dr. Beck has been teaching the story in Canada for several years now, focusing of themes of interest to Canadians: e.g. tribal rights, immigrant experiences and Social Justice. All these themes are found woven through this unique forty-four hour legend known as the Annanmar Katai in Tamil. The lecture will be illustrated with about 50 visuals as well as a huge wall mural.
About the Speaker: Dr. Beck holds a D.Phil. from Oxford University. She has studied Tamil folk epics and folklore for more than fifty years. She has taught at several universities and is now located at The University of Toronto, in the Department of Anthropology. She is the author of five books and about fifty articles. She has won numerous awards for her work and lectured in universities around the world. Dr. Beck’s first book, Peasant Society in Konku, an ethnography of the area she first studied, has just been translated into Tamil and will be appearing as a separate published volume shortly.