The Goddesses’ Call To Dance
**Events may have been canceled or postponed. Please contact the venue to confirm the event.
Date & Time
Sat, Sep 17 2:00 PM - 4:00 PM
Address (map)
1407 Chapala Street, Santa Barbara, CA
Venue (website)
Institute of World Culture
Saturday, September 17, 2022
2:00–4:00 pm Pacific Time in person and via live-webcast
Concord Hall, 1407 Chapala St., Santa Barbara, CA
Presenter: Shefali Vatsa
Navaratri (Nine Nights), is a Hindu festival that honors the many diverse manifestations of the Goddess over the course of nine days and nights. It occurs 4-5 times a year, with the spring and fall occurrences being the most well known. The fall Navaratri, Sharad Navaratri, in particular, is widely celebrated throughout India and within Indian communities around the world. The specific methods of honoring the Goddess during this time vary amongst the different regions of India, but all focus on puja, worship of the Goddess, and involve traditional chants and retellings of her divine exploits from the Devi Mahatmaya/ Chandipath. In the Indian western state of Gujarat, Navaratri is celebrated with nine nights of inclusive garba dance, where the entire community is invited to participate in circle dancing around images of the Divine Mother who welcomes all. The Sharad Navaratri festival will soon begin. In anticipation of this, details of garba dancing, rituals of Navaratri, and the spiritual significance of both will be explored as well as images and experiences of dancers. The hope is to awaken curiosity and answer questions about this long-standing spiritual method of cultivating personal and communal integration. There will be time at the end for discussion.
Shefali Vatsa is a graduate of UC Berkeley in history, and Pepperdine MA in clinical psychology, as well as her Ph.D. from Pacifica Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara. She has participated in the festival of Navaratri for most of her life, more consciously as an adult, and while studying at Pacifica she chose it as the focus of her dissertation titled, ‘The Goddesses’ Call to Dance: Experiences of Garba Dancers During Navaratri’.
There is no need to register. Masks are optional in Concord Hall
The program will be webcast live on the IWC YouTube Channel at 2:00 pm: https://www.youtube.com/user/iwcinsantabarbara/live
The program will also be recorded and posted to the same link for future viewing.