KUMARI TRADITIONS: A STUDY ON PERFORMATIVE ACTIVITY

Kumari is a prominent culture of Newari communities from their ancestors. However, it gets involved with different approaches of supportive as well as denial views in term of socio-cultural performance. The research is an effort to analyze that how the worship of Kumari or "Virgin Goddess" is a form of reproduction phenomenon practised in Kathmandu valley. It triggers people’s emotions and they believe in transformation from girl to Goddess and the Goddess to ordinary human beings. The article aims at showing how these unique traditions of Nepal associated with a pre-pubescent girl from a Shakya clan of Kathmandu selected as a Kumari has got the great significance in the nation. Based on the theory of Richard Schechner and other class notes related to Performance studies, the researcher tries to analyse the Kumari tradition and dig the hidden meaning of the present Kumari tradition with a rhetorical reproduction phenomenon which is full of per formative activity.