Students learn Hindi through Bollywood dance class

Every semester, Kusum Ji always makes it her mission to provide students with fun and interactive activities to engage in the Hindi language and its culture. This semester was a little bit different due to the virtual environment of classes. Nonetheless, Kusum Ji made the impossible possible this semester with a virtual dance class with Rohini Thakkar from the Duke India Initiative.

The goal of Hindi 101 and Hindi 203 is to help connect students to the local Indian community and Hindi speakers, enhance the understanding of art and culture, and improve the ability to use Hindi for creating bonds with culture and community. This semester Rohini Thakkar ji, a Bollywood dancer and a native speaker of Hindi, created an authentic experience for our Hindi language students.

To prepare Hindi students for Rohini’s visit, she sent an introduction and answered a few questions.

roshi
Rohini Ji (above) has a dance studio in
Cary, North Carolina where she
specializes in Bollywood dancing.
She has choreographed and performed
for many famous celebrities in the
Bollywood industry.

Rohini Ji knew that our class would have people with varying backgrounds and dance experience, so she created an original and creative choreography that anyone could pick up easily. As someone with dance experience in college, I had no idea what kind of choreography to expect. Rohini Ji’s choreography challenged me in such new ways. She taught us the steps in Hindi the entire time. We got to learn about numbers and directions and body parts and so much more in Hindi. 

Our entire class was up out of their seats dancing to the choreography prepared by Rohini Ji. Even Kusum Ji was participating and dancing like a professional throughout the class! The entire class got to engage with each other in such an interactive way, and we all were sending each other encouraging messages throughout the practice. We got to engage with the Hindi language in such a new way even in a virtual format. At the end of the class, we got to ask Rohini Ji questions about her life experience and her passion for dance.  

Kusum Ji has this incredible ability to take the Hindi language and help us learn it in such a way where it feels fun to learn a new language. Our entire class had one comment about the Bollywood dance class. We ALL wanted the class to be longer. We are all so excited for the next Bollywood dance class and all of the unique ways to learn Hindi no matter the format or environment.

Here are a few comments from the students about the class:

“Since this is usually when fall break is, it was really nice to have a quick break and just dance in class. Rohini Ji was also very nice and enthusiastic. I enjoyed the visit a lot.”

 “I liked the class a lot because it educated me on the culture of India which I think is important to learn. The dancing was a fun and interactive activity that was nice and engaging. I also think that getting Hindi perspective from another Duke's person was insightful as well. Communicating with Rohiniji, was a good experience because it let me practice my skills.”

“Rohini’s visit was very enjoyable. It was great that she spoke in Hindi in a slow, clear way and often repeated that she said in English. The dance was also not as difficult as I’d been expecting, which was a relief for me as a total beginner. I also enjoyed getting to ask her questions and hearing listening to her in Hindi.”

“I thought it was a fun activity to do in class! I think it helped that she was speaking in Hindi, and even though she said words that we had not learned before, we could still use context to understand what the words meant. I think it was also good that we could ask questions in the end because that also exposed us to more Hindi than we have heard before which was nice.”   

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This workshop was sponsored and supported by Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, Duke Service-learning.