Performing Histories: Enduring Dyes and Waterways in Artisanal Lives

Abstract

Water and waterways encircle the coastal community lives and the dyeing practices in the Coromandel region in Southern India. The dyeing practices in this region have transformed over time but the dependence on water resources for dyeing has remained. Whereas the brilliant dyes of early modern Coromandel textiles are widely studied, the significance of coastal water resources and the artisanal knowledge in practicing dyeing remain undertheorized. Both water and artisanal life stories were too fluid to be contained in the early modern travelers’ tales or early colonial scientific expeditions. These studies set a methodological direction where artisanal practices are considered technical and divorced from intellectual knowledge, and this approach has shaped the more recent studies on Coromandel textiles to a great extent. I argue, the insights of the dyer communities in Polavaram, in the Coromandel region, allow us to consider the relevance of salt and sweet water resources, in order to reconstruct the history of Coromandel textiles and to extend our understanding of the multiplicity of historical resources. Master dyer Mukkantieswarudu Rao and the dyers’ first-hand narratives serve as a counter to the early modern traveler W. H. Moreland, colonial botanist William Roxburgh, and dyer Thomas Wardle’s scholarship on dyestuff. My study is based on the triangulation of artisanal knowledge, object analysis, and archival studies. This methodological approach not only calls for the agency of artisans but also suggests how artisanal knowledge can effectively inform the studies on textile, craft, and historical material culture.

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