Event Details:

Nathan L. M. Tabor is an associate professor in the Department of History at Western Michigan University.

City of Lyrics: Ordinary Poets and Islamicate Popular Culture in Early Modern Delhi chronicles the origins of a global poetry phenomenon. For centuries, Urdu-speaking poets and their audiences have gathered for mushairahs, literary competitions centered on spoken-word verse. Today, these gatherings draw audiences in the millions, both in person and online.

Tracing this tradition back to its origins, Nathan Tabor explores the popular emergence of the mushairah in eighteenth-century Delhi. Through the work of common and elite poets, these gatherings circulated lyrics, satires, and songs while shaping ideas of hierarchy, taste, and cultural expression.

Co-sponsors: James Madison College, Asian Studies Center, and the MSU Muslim Studies Program.