Act for Your Life: Widows in Vrindavan Available to Purchase

To draw further attention to the notion of the physical body as a contested space, I observed widows in Vrindavan, India. Widows relocate to Vrindavan for a multitude of reasons, but, given certain performative theories of identity, this relocation marks the beginning of a distinct performance of widowhood, involving clothing, religious practices, commitments to religious institutions, and begging. Vrindavan's widows' survival depends on their performance of widowhood.