Preserving our heritage

Shahid Alam

Today the Bengali nation celebrates Pahela Baishakh. This particular rite of passage is another in a long line of cultural festivities that the Bengalis observe with gusto each year, year after year, from as long as recorded history, and, given the effervescent Bengali character, almost certainly further back in time. The singularity of Pahela Baishakh is that it is a cultural phenomenon that manages to highlight a plethora of Bangladesh's traditions and cultural heritage in one single day. As the years have gone by, some of the traditions have faded away, usually so unobtrusively that their absence is only noticed after a time by those who had enjoyed them in their days of pomp and glory, some are hanging on by the most tenuous of holds until the day inevitably arrives when they bow to the inevitable, still others show no signs of diminishing in their splendour or vigor, but, rather, display every evidence of drawing even more appreciative attention to themselves in the years to come, while a few make their debut at different times, their eventual fate to be known with the passage of time.

But such is life with culture and traditions. One can expect change with the changing of the generational guard, or even within a generation. In fact, a static culture would likely indicate a moribund nation; a culture that reinvents itself in phases could very well signify a dynamic nation, even one that could reach the comfortable stage of general material prosperity. That sage on the topic of culture, Jacques Barzun, once explained the phenomenon of mutation and transition from a civilizational standpoint: “Man's civilization is not identical with our civilization, and the building or rebuilding of states and cultures, now or at any time, is more becoming to our nature than longings and lamentations.” Some, in fact, many, of a generation would bemoan the loss of their comfort zone, the easy familiarity of a shared experience of one or the other cultural phenomenon, even if that particular expression or tradition is no longer compatible with the values and expectations of the next generation. To take recourse to Barzun for an analytical explanation: “…in every era some things in fact are dying out and the elderly are good witness to this demise. Manners, styles of art and politics, assumptions about the aim of life or the nature of man and of the universe change as inevitably as fashions in dress…. If…faiths and forms are considered good by a generation that grew up to value them, that generation will experience at their passing a legitimate feeling of loss.”

Ah, but does the wholesale changing of cultural traditions denote a triumphant march of civilization for a nation? Only the oddballs would hold that it does. A society is as much known by its culture as by any other attribute; the state of its culture often acts as a barometer of its own state, of the level of its sophistication. And, there can be no quibbling about a society, nation, or nation-state having to hold on to certain core values, traditions, and cultural norms and forms in order to be identifiable as that particular society, nation, or nation-state. These will have to be held on for dear life so that those holding them will be recognized for who they are. All the advanced nations of the world at any given time in history can proudly point to the essential cultural traditions that have showed up the various attributes that have made them enviable to the rest of humanity.

To cite examples from our own furious-paced, complex information-age era. Japan is equally at home in accommodating the iconic symbols of popular global culture, the coke and the Magna Mac, as it is of almost reverentially paying homage to its very own glutinous rice. Great Britain, steeped in tradition, seems to go the extra mile to preserve and present its varied cultural heritage as much as constructing state-of-the-art edifices eminently reflecting the contemporary age. While preserving and projecting William Shakespeare's legacy for now and forever, the British have also elevated The Beatles to the pantheon of the immortals, for future generations to reflect on the multifarious influence that the Fab Four has had on the generation they represented and much beyond. The United States, a relatively new nation-state with commensurate history of culture and tradition, does not lag behind in preserving and building on its heritage, even as it pioneers mass culture that has had a colossal impact, not all necessarily positive, beyond its territorial boundaries.

The countries cited are affluent, global leaders right at the top of the unwritten, but understood, hierarchy of nations in the international system, but there are many more states that, notwithstanding their relative material poverty, have rich traditions and culture. Bangladesh serves as a good example in this category. Pahela Baishakh is among the more prominent traditions that this country has been celebrating with gay abandon each year. As well as its citizens should. It is, lest one forgets, a new year, singularly representing the Bengali calendar, one that is restricted to the heart and ethos of a small fraction of the world's population, and, therefore, somehow more intimate to them than, say, the universal Gregorian calendar.

Among the material symbols of that heritage are this country's folk art and the artisans who fashion them. Come with me, if you will, and if you are of that generation and the ones prior to it, to the days when our mothers, grandmothers, aunts, and other female relatives would, on a single piece of cloth, usually white, but, sometimes, black or of some primary colour, stitch birds, flowers, cottages, stylized trees, or some such simple everyday natural or created objects in an array of brightly coloured threads, and then, more often than not, put the finishing touch by stitching a line or two of a Bengali poem, or a popular aphorism, or a religious saying. Then they would be framed and hung up on a wall for visiting relatives and friends to view and admire. Sadly, this art is dying, if not already dead, because the march of time has brought about significant changes in the way we now lead our lives, which has probably left no room for the kind of leisurely pursuits like the one just detailed. And, that is sad, but maybe this is a heritage, otherwise rich, whose time has come to wither away.

But there are other folk arts, equally strong representations of our heritage, which are on display on Pahela Baishakh, but which are often removed from the public eye and run the risk of becoming footprints in the sand of time. And, with them, as a natural corollary, the artisans who created them. And so many of these artisans themselves are the progeny of several generations of the practitioners of their craft. Once the last artisan dies, the craft will die with him/her, and another heritage will terminate, possibly remaining only as museum piece for viewers to likely marvel at and wonder why such skill and mastery died out, or, was allowed to die out.

Since culture is a holistic concept, folk arts and crafts form just one aspect of it. And, what a splendid array of arts and crafts Bangladesh has possessed, including those that have been lost forever. The artisans who have fashioned them have used a wide variety of materials like bamboo, cane, grass, leather, fabrics, tree leaf, clay, conch shell, wood, ivory, bones, silk, and metal. The products they have created include dolls, earthenware pots exquisitely painted in rich colours, dhak, dhol, tabla, dugdugi, mondira, floor mat, shankhari ornaments, kasha, ektara, dotara, sarenda, megh dumbur, shanai, flute, nakara, kara, nakshi katha, and far more than have been identified here. Truly, it is a rich heritage, splendid in variety and usage. Many of them are on display at every Baishakhi Mela that accompanies Pahela Baishakh. Some, as indicated earlier, disappear, never to make an appearance except, perhaps, in museums or in the odd personal collection, a few are periodically added, while others are in everyday usage, manifesting often enough not to vanish from the public eye.

But so many others have gone for good, while several are barely surviving, but, paradoxically, they represent some of the richest folk art and craft that this nation has been proud to have possessed. If they cannot be revived as mass consumption goods, then the effort could be made to produce them on a limited scale, as much as for finding a longstanding place for them with those who can afford them and/or with the aesthetic taste to covet them as for preserving priceless cultural heritage and tradition. In the process, the artisans who make them and their skills may also be preserved. After all, the folk arts and crafts cannot come to life without the artisans creating them. Another option, that could, and possibly should, be considered, is to support the flourishing of villages, communities, and enclaves that have a history of specializing in the production of specific folk arts and crafts. For example, Manikganj has a long and rich history of having several areas that specialize in the production of folk arts and crafts. But Manikganj is one of several instances strewn across the country. The only problem is that some of them are losing their artisan character, and, with their passing, the loss of heritage accelerates.

Soon after Bangladesh was created, attempts were made, almost certainly deliberately, possibly with prescience, to promote the development of folk arts. Karika comes to mind as an early private enterprise, and others have come up with the same mission, some with more ambition than the others. Aarong, Kumudini, Nakshi Katha Kendro, and several other institutions and organizations have devoted their energy and resources to reviving, as the case may be, lost and dying folk arts and crafts, mass producing for both the local market and as export commodity, a considerable array of arts and crafts, and, either directly employing, or patronizing, artisans of those products, partly for passing along their skills to the next generation of practitioners. These efforts are encouraging, laudable, and should be supported, even if only by showing appreciation by all in this country who have a whiff of pride in their cultural heritage. Then there exist those institutions and organizations like the Folk Art Museum where one can view both the living and lost cultural heritage of Bangladesh. That, in a sense, is sad. It should serve as a stark reminder of the need to preserve our cultural heritage of which folk arts and crafts is a vital and vitalizing component, in order not to lose sight of who we are as a nation. Shuvo Nobo Borsho!

Photo: Amirul Rajiv

Head, Media and Communication department, Independent University, Bangladesh.