Resistance and Street Theatre:

Democratizing the Space and Spatializing the Democracy

Abstract

The present paper explores how the practice of street theatre by staging resistance not only exercises the right to resist but strengthens the democratic values and institutions. India’s independence and the acceptance of democracy were the results of simultaneous resistance against colonial power and the undemocratic, hierarchical, caste-class-ridden social structure. However, it didn’t end the phase of resistance. Values, such as resistance to injustice, anarchy, dominance and assertion of newly gained rights make democracy meaningful. Over the years the natures, aims, means, and modes of such values also change. Occasionally, it appears that the resistance has become unethical, technical, and ritualistic. Such developments however undermine the genuine and concerned articulations of resistance. The need is to strengthen the ethical, pragmatic, and representative deliverability of resistance. Thirst (2005), a street play by Telugu playwright Vinodini, stresses how street theatre could demonstrate resistance as a right and ethical duty. It puts rigours to show that resistance is not incidental, haphazard, and episodic but a sustained activity to achieve a durable goal of a democratic society as against the immediately bargained temporary goals. It argues constructively for distributive justice and decentralization in an organized, focused, and principled manner.