AHRC Funded Dance Research Matters Network Series: Episode 8: Reflections on the South Asian Dance Equity (SADE) network with Prarthana Purkayastha, Royona Mitra & Anusha Kedhar
In this episode, we explore the South Asian Dance Equity (SADE) project, a research collaboration examiningequity, inclusion and representation within British South Asian dance. In addition to asking how South Asian dance is marginalised by the wider arts sector in the UK, the project turns its attention inward, asking whose voices, practices and histories are centred—and whose remain overlooked. Theepisode explores how issues of caste, faith, gender, sexuality, disability and geography shape opportunities, visibility and belonging within the dance ecology. Reflecting on collaborative research and the challenges of navigating difficult conversations, Prarthana, Royona and Anusha discusswhat it means to approach equity as an ongoing practice of listening, care and critical reflection. This episode offers an insightful look at how research can create space for dialogue, challenge established narratives and imagine more inclusive futures for British South Asian dance.
South Asian Dance Equity (SADE)
SADE examines systemic inequities within British South Asian dance, focusing on five key areas of minoritisation: the dominance of Indian/Hindu dance forms and artists;LGBTQI+ artists; caste-oppressed artists; disabled artists; and folk and Adivasi (indigenous) arts and artists. The network aims to build a more equitable dance sector through exchanges between artists and scholars from South Asia and the UK.
Website: https://www.royalholloway.ac.uk/research-and-education/subjects/drama-and-theatre/research/sade/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/southasiandanceequity/
Contributor biography: Anusha Kedhar
Anusha Kedhar is an Associate Professor of CriticalDance Studies at the University of California Riverside. Her teaching interests include South Asian dance and diaspora, caste and performance, global political economy, and critical dance ethnography. She is the author of Flexible Bodies: British South Asian Dancers in an Age of Neoliberalism (2020). She is also the convener of the Caste and Corporeality conference, chair of the DSA South Asian Dance Studies Working Group, and a founding member of the University of California Collective for Caste Abolition.
Email: anusha.kedhar@ucr.edu
Contributor biography: Royona Mitra
Royona Mitra is Professor of Dance and Performance Cultures at Brunel University of London. She is the author of UnmakingContact: Choreographing South Asian Touch (2025, OUP) and Akram Khan: Dancing New Interculturalism (2015, Palgrave). Her research examines systems of oppression in dance and performance cultures at the intersections of bodies, social power regimes, and choreography asresistance. Royona was Co-Investigator on the AHRC funded #DanceResearchMatters “South Asian Dance Equity” project (2023-2025) alongside Drs Prarthana Purkayastha (PI, RHUL) and Anusha Kedhar (Co-I, UC Riverside).
Email: Royona.Mitra@brunel.ac.uk
Contributor biography: Prarthana Purkayastha
Prarthana Purkayastha is Reader (Associate Professor) in Dance and Performance Studies in the Department of Music, Drama and Media Arts at Royal Holloway University of London. She is the author of Indian Modern Dance, Feminism and Transnationalism (2014, Palgrave Macmillan) which won the 2015 de la Torre Bueno Prize and the 2015 Outstanding Publication Award from Dance Studies Association. Her second monograph is The Archives and Afterlives of Nautch Dancers in India (2025, Cambridge University Press) and she is co-editor with Anurima Banerji of the Oxford Handbook of Indian Dance (2026, OUP-New York).
Email: prarthana.purkayastha@rhul.ac.uk
AHRC-funded Dance Research Matters Networks
For more information, please visit:danceresearchmatters.coventry.ac.uk
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