This thesis employs an interdisciplinary approach to articulate the gendered differences between men and women in the Jaffna Tamil diaspora in Malaysia. I argue that they are differentiated by their labour and women's cultural labour should be viewed as a mode of gender empowerment. I use a critical lens to understand the impacts of women's cultural labour on the diaspora at large. Finally, I extend the origins of identity beyond culture and rely on ancestry as an alternative mode for identity formation. Chapter 1 discusses Jaffa Tamil male labour in the government civil service. They were the colonial sub-elite who administered the extractive colonial machinery and they struggled to maintain their self-identity post-independence in 1957. Their high levels of education and business acumen enabled them to maintain their upper-middle-income socioeconomic status and avoid complete social marginalization. Crucially, Jaffna Tamil men were loyal citizens of the state who possessed limited political power. Chapter 2 discusses Jaffna Tamil women who do domestic work vis-à-vis cultural labour. In this thesis, I have understood Bharatanatyam as a conduit for Tamil culture writ large to uncover the multiple sites of identification it produces. I argue that their work is crucially important in a multicultural society contingent upon distinct cultural identifications for citizenship. Moreover, I discuss how this dance form empowers women in the margins and on stage. This is because the work requires active negotiations with power, resources, and relationships as it transmits cultural memory, collective history and affective belonging. I analyse the limitation of using a \"labour\" framework. But I conclude that it remains useful because it ascribes value to the dancer/dance teacher and avoids complacency in its reproduction. Similarly, I explore the limitations of gender empowerment in a dance form vis-à-vis cultural labour that has historically suppressed women. I conclude that these women practitioners make an agentive choice to reproduce culture and they subvert domesticity through their performances on stage. Chapter 3 explains my interdisciplinary methodology by combining historical and choreographic research processes. I discuss three key concepts I deployed to discover the impacts of embodying gendered labour and family history. They are \"ethnochoreography,\" \"closing the distance,\" and \"body as archive.\" I conclude this thesis with a discussion of ancestry and ancestor veneration as an intervention to concepts of time, memory and history.
"},{"label":"Degree","value":["Bachelor of Arts with Departmental Honors"]},{"label":"Author-supplied Keywords","value":["Gender empowerment","Cultural labor","Family history"]},{"label":"Administrative Note","value":"Drupal Node ID: 33913