Between Fame and Shame edited by Heidrun Brückner Hanne de Bruin and Heike Moser presents
twelve essays dealing with the role of women in various Indian performance traditions and in
different social contexts. The volume s contributions are intended to convey a better
understanding of the often troubled relation between women and public performances. The
cultural performances studied range from possession performed by women as a religious service
to a deity to on-stage performances by professional actresses representing different
performance genres. The regional focus is on South India especially Kerala and Karnataka. A
special feature of the book is the simultaneous internet publication of the audio audio-visual
and visual materials referred to in the articles. Some of the audio provide for the first time
samples of oral literary genres recorded in some cases as early as the 1970s. The authors of
the essays are anthropologists (Claus Schömbucher Guillebaud) folklorists (Rai) Indologists
(Brückner de Bruin Moser Johan Griebl Sommer) sociologists (Schulze) and theatre scholars
(Daugherty Pitkow) from India Europe and the USA.
