Written by Harshavardhan Srijay (Duke University, Class of '23)
Throughout our semesters taking Hindi, one thing I have always enjoyed are the efforts by instructors to bring in speakers/presenters to class to expose my peers and I to a new and interesting aspect of Indian culture.
One such effort was earlier this semester, when Kusumji brought in Anviksha Srivastava to our class. She is a student at UC Riverside with a passion for Bollywood dance and a fluency in Hindi. She came to teach us a few dance moves to a famous Bollywood song. When I was younger, I (along with many other students in the class, I assume) participated in Bollywood dance programs where we would learn how to dance to the song and perform. This experience brought me back to those days, and while I may have lost some of the nimbleness and dexterity of my younger self, I certainly enjoyed being re-exposed to Bollywood dance at this workshop. Anviksha made sure to teach us the moves slowly, so we could acquire the muscle memory required to replicate all the moves in succession.
In the beginning, it was a little difficult to remember all the moves, but as we practiced more and more throughout the class, it started to feel less like a class assignment that I needed to do well on, and more like us just having fun and dancing to a catchy song. I also appreciated that she spoke in Hindi a little slower, to allow us to take the requisite time to comprehend what she was saying. In the end, we were given some time for a Q&A session, where we were able to learn more about Anviksha and her passion for Indian dance, and dance in general by asking questions (in Hindi, of course).
In general, the workshop was a great way to break the monotony of lecture, and try to apply the skills and lessons we learned in class to the real world to converse with a real-world Hindi speaker, which I believe is extremely important when trying to learn any language. Also, in doing so, we are able to learn more about Indian culture, and specifically Bollywood, an aspect of the culture that I along with many others are exposed to quite a bit, and are thus really interested in learning more about.
Sponsored by Duke Service- learning
Co-sponsored by Asian and Middle Eastern Studies