Navina Jafa's Performing Heritage: Art of Exhibit Walks is one of few books dealing with the process of conducting heritage and culture walks in India. But the subject is a rapidly expanding and lucrative field that – until now – has not been very well understood.
Jafa is a student of history, a trained classical dancer, a conservationist and a heritage activist. Normally those with their fingers in too many pies end up mixing their metaphors, but this author specialises in inventing her own – the title of this book, for instance. Performing artists, performing acrobats, performing monkeys are terms that all of us are familiar with, but the concept of heritage that performs is more unusual.
The text exists simultaneously on two planes. The first locates heritage walks in the realm of public performances, distinguishing them from exhibitions in controlled environments like museums and art galleries. The second is more illustrative, and is presented as an explanation of the arguments being advanced across the first strand.
The text posits the theory of 'heritage performance' as a discipline that is distinctly different from that of the droves of guides one encounters at all well-known Southasian monuments. Each time one aspect of heritage performance is touched upon, an example is presented to illustrate the point. This is always a description of a particular walk, provided for the purpose of helping the reader comprehend the difference between performing heritage and merely guiding tourists through monuments.