Page 239 - Communication Processes Volume 3 Communication Culture and Confrontation

214 Hema Rairkar

but they would not directly convey to him such sweet feelings. Songs
are the best way to express them. Young housewives have to face
troubles at their in-laws’; this harsh experience is better articulated
and denounced through impersonations of Sita’s character and life.
Grindmill songs prove one of the best roundabout ways to convey emo-
tions as much as to carry out social and cultural analyses of women’s
problems in an inhibiting patriarchal rural setting.

Bridging Communication Gaps

A host of students in urban and rural colleges equally mindlessly turn
their back on their mothers’ past experiences. On the other hand, mod-
ern intelligentsia sometimes looks for moorings. The urban and rural
divide adds to the generation gap. Grindmill songs can contribute by
throwing a bridge across so many rifts for the next generations to draw
upon the heritage of their ancestors. With this in view, contacts are
established with mofussil colleges in various parts of Maharashtra for
giving lectures to college students on the cultural relevance of grindmill
songs. A team of VCDA animators, male and female, hardly educated,
who participate in the valorization programme in Pune district narrate
their own personal experience in front of hundreds of college students.
This contributes in many respects to bridging several communication
gaps at a time. In general, students show a genuine interest and attend
in large numbers; some volunteer to collect songs. Lectures are always
followed by lively discussions.
Among questions raised by students, one is worth quoting:

We are confused. Everybody tells us to fight against superstitions,
that tradition is a burden that keeps backward. We are asked to look
forward towards the twenty-first century by relinquishing backward
ideas and practices, and concern ourselves with ideas of develop-
ment. But you tell us to follow and strengthen the tradition. What
is true and whom to follow?

Discussions are on in many progressive circles about ‘people’s super-
stition’ that social workers are vehemently engaged in fighting against.
Generally any traditional belief or behaviour can be labelled as super-
stition under the spell of concepts of rationality used in Europe at