Different Sitas: A Critical Study of the Visual Enunciations of Sita

Abstract

This paper will examine how different visual enunciations of Sita across diverse modes of
reinterpretation leads to creation of not only newer images but also to newer meanings and
newer social relations. I will take up three instances of the re-reading of the legend of Sita,
across three diverse media of articulation, where-in the visual depiction of Sita plays a
significant part in the formation of new and different Sitas: (i) a graphic novel, Sita’s
Ramayana; (ii) a Malyalam feature film, Kanchan Sita; and (iii) an animated movie, Sita Sings
the Blues. Although it cannot be claimed that the visual representation of Sita in these
narratives gives a comprehensive account of position and role of women in the period that they
are derived from, these narratives do constitute evidence of how the feminine has been
perceived by the author of that particular narrative. I will examine how these creative
interpretations lead to transformations in Sita’s character and new subjectivities are formed
because of these re articulations.