IUU-SOAS MUYA Presentation, Udvada, India
Kerman Daruwalla, Ruzbeh Hodiwala, Martina Palladino and Mariano Errichiello, four doctoral students of the MUYA team and of the Shapoorji Pallonji Institute of Zoroastrian Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, attended the Iranshah Udvada Festival (IUU 2019) programme held in Udvada, India from 27-29 December 2019.
The opening day of the event was marked by a presentation by Kerman Daruwalla on SOAS and its steadfast work on Zoroastrianism followed by the screening of a short video on the MUYA project. The presentation was attended by 700-800 delegates including media persons, prominent personalities of the Zoroastrian community from around the globe and key government officials. The highlight of the team’s presentation on the second day of the festival was MUYA’s Virtual Reality taster of the Yasna ritual. Brought to India for the first time through the festival’s platform, Ruzbeh Hodiwala hosted the viewing of the film pre-loaded on three 360° VR headsets, which he had carried to India for the purpose. More than a hundred delegates tried the demo which gives the user the completely immersive experience of being within the ritual. The students were also able to garner important feedback on the impact of the demo on the understanding of the ritual by the user. Around 70% of the delegates who viewed the 4D film expressed that they either knew nothing or only little about the ritual before taking the experience. 95% of delegates responded that the VR experience contributed to their knowledge and understanding of the ritual and would help them describe the Yasna ritual better. Out of the total delegates who participated, 83% identified themselves as Zoroastrians.
Moreover, the students had the opportunity to demonstrate the digitisation and cataloguing work done at the Dastur Kayoji Mirza Institute library in Udvada by the SOAS team of the Multimedia Yasna (MUYA) research project at the Shapoorji Pallonji Institute. The Udvada manuscript collection at the library was exhibited to the public for the first time during the festival, and it was visited by around seventy people. Kerman Daruwalla gave them a tour of the library, along with a brief overview of the digitization project completed by the SOAS team in January 2019.
MUYA’s principal investigator Prof. Almut Hintze and post-doctoral scholars Celine Redard and Mehrbod Khanizadeh were instrumental in helping the students to curate their presentations at the festival. SOAS-SPIZS participation at the festival received media coverage from the national, local and Parsi Press.
As reported by Kerman Daruwalla and Ruzbeh Hodiwala.
Press clippings:
Gujarat gears up for Parsi festival:
પારસી સમાજની 'યાસના વિધિ' અંગે ઉદવાડા ઈરાનશા ઉત્સવમાં 4D ટીઝર દર્શાવાયું:
Iranshah Udvada Utsav 2019 Lives Up To Its Promise Of Bigger And Better!!
‘The blessings of Iranshah’
