Cultural Guardianship and Knowledge Production: The Ephemeral Architecture of Jallikattu in Tamil Nadu

Thursday, June 12, 2025

15:45 - 16:15 GMT

Presenter(s)

KR

Karthik Prema Rajakumar
Independent Researcher, India

Poster Abstract: Jallikattu - a bull vaulting event set at multiple rural locations in Tamil Nadu, exemplifies how local communities produce, preserve, evolve, and transmit cultural knowledge across generations. Rooted in agrarian life, this tradition reflects a knowledge-making process through community participation, oral transmission, and experiential learning, standing in contrast to formal academic forms. In a post-colonial context, Jallikattu becomes a form of cultural guardianship, preserving an indigenous epistemology differing and distinct from Western notions.
While modern architecture prioritizes permanence, Jallikattu thrives on adaptable, ephemeral structures made from locally sourced materials and memories like Casuarina wood tied using Jute ropes for structures. These centuries-old practices have evolved to incorporate modern needs, such as press and media stages that digitally document and amplify public discourse. This approach to architecture is not only sustainable, but it also reflects the cultural significance of linking the people to their agrarian heritage.
Staging Jallikattu becomes an act of collective cultural expression, where the community constructs spaces that symbolize resistance to colonial modernity, often associated with resource exploitation. By focusing on non-elite, indigenous practices, Jallikattu’s architecture challenges colonial legacies by using materials techniques to preserve cultural memory and foster a collective identity that adapts to external pressures.
This case illustrates how indigenous practices create alternative, community-driven knowledge systems outside formal institutions, preserving identity in a rapidly changing world. Systems, words, and memories embedded in Jallikattu serve as a legacy shaped by architecture to be passed down to future generations as a symbol of identity, resilience, and cultural continuity.