Exploring South Asian Resources at Perkins Library

Dr. Kusum Knapczyk’s Hindi class went on a library visit, and I had a great experience there. Our Hindi class met with Dr. Adhitya Dhanapal, the South Asian Studies librarian, who introduced himself and talked about Duke’s extensive collection of South Asian texts and materials. I had no idea Duke had such a vast collection, spanning multiple languages, regions, and historical periods. 

After his talk, we participated in several activities and practiced all four skills—reading, writing, listening, and speaking. We began by listening to Dr. Dhanapal’s introduction about the resources available in the library and then speaking to each other in Hindi, practicing an exercise about asking for and granting wishes. This made me more comfortable forming spontaneous sentences. We explored authentic materials such as old South Asian political posters, comics, and newspapers. After reading the posters aloud phonetically, Dr. Dhanapal explained their historical and political contexts. It was interesting to learn about the competing ideologies that shaped India in the decades after independence. 

Since it was Halloween, we also read “Chudail,” a South Asian ghost story about a witch. This spooky tale helped us learn new vocabulary and showed how folklore reflects cultural values. The activities were easy to follow and designed for an elementary level. We listed things we saw in the library and practiced the script we had recently learned, now applied to real-world materials. It was exciting to see different fonts and styles in authentic texts. We ended with a short writing reflection. My visit to the library helped me use my knowledge of Hindi as a gateway to learning South Asian history, politics, and culture. 

My classmates wrote that “we also had our library visit with Adithya Dhanapal where we did various writing, listening, and speaking activities.” Sarisma said, “our library visit was a nice change of scenery, and I liked meeting the librarian, Aditya. I think more interactive activities like that would be fun to do once in a while!” Yana mentioned, “I also enjoyed the library visit, and being able to practice my Hindi in a more advanced way through speaking and reading.” Aastha added, “there were a lot of unique activities, such as the guest appearances and library visit, that were a nice break from usual lessons.” Anagha shared, “we also got a chance to speak to a South Asian collection specialist in Perkins on Friday, which was really fun and a cool way to apply what we had learned in class to the real world.” Raaghav said, “the library visit was also good as we got to learn more about Hindi posters and stories which gave us a bigger picture.” Raj commented, “the library visit was fun and unique.” Anay wrote, “we also went to the library, and learned about the different resources the Perkins library has to offer in relation to historical Indian literature. This was very interesting to me, and it was cool to see the different types of comic books, newspaper articles, and photos from 20th century India.” Priyanka said, “this week in Hindi was super fun! We were able to learn more about the South Asian representation in Perkins.” Finally, Priyanka added, “it was particularly interesting to understand the exhibition in Perkins, especially because I have seen it many times without thinking about its subject.” 

This event was supported by Asian and Middle Eastern Studies.