Ancient stories find new life
Scenes from Mimi Evans’ manga recreation of the Indian epic Ramayana.
Hero-worship, a great love story and a demon disguised as a golden deer are the common themes appearing through the creative works of a small group of Asian Studies students.
In semester one this year McComas Taylor and Ashvin Parameswaran from the Faculty of Asian Studies led twelve students through a study of the two great Indian epics, Mahabharata and Ramayana – works McComas describes as the foundational world-making texts of South Asia.
Mahabharata tells the story of a civil war between two groups of cousins for the right to rule the kingdom while Ramayana follows Prince Rama as he fights an army of demons to rescue his kidnapped wife.
“These two works shaped the way Indian people think about themselves,” McComas said. “They are the source of morality, the source of role models for both men and women and the issues contained in them are still very much alive.
“The epics have been around for at least 2,000 years but the themes reverberate down the millennia. So while they are incredibly ancient they are still entirely relevant in a contemporary setting.”
It was the contemporary relevancy that students were asked to explore for their major piece of assessment for the course. They were to recreate episodes of the epics in any medium, so long as it wasn’t an essay.. The task may have caused much initial consternation but it revealed the hidden talents of the students.
The final projects included an original song, a manga comic, a magazine, several visual artworks and a composition by a part-time DJ of modern and contemporary music combined with dialogue from movie soundtracks.
“This year’s projects are sublimely wonderful and so completely different from last year,” McComas said. “Every student has a different strength so every cohort comes up with different projects.”
To hear Peter Olney’s original song Open Up Your Eyes visit http://www.myspace.com/peterolney
To see Mimi Evans’ manga visit http://ramayana.smackjeeves.com/
For a gallery of other projects visit [ANU News link TBA]
| Filed under: | On Campus, Features, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, Asia, Education, Students |
