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Kathak can teach math, and science. Fractions and decimals are embedded in rhythm

  //science-technology.news-articles.net/content/2 .. actions-and-decimals-are-embedded-in-rhythm.html
  Published in Science and Technology on Monday, September 29th 2025 at 4:22 GMT by ThePrint
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Kathak Math: Where the Science of Rhythm Meets the Humanities

The 2023 feature “Kathak Math: Science, rhythm, humanities matter” on ThePrint’s Around Town series offers a refreshing glimpse into a bold experiment that turns the ancient Indian dance form Kathak into a living laboratory. By fusing the precise mathematics of rhythmic cycles with the emotive power of performance, the initiative—known simply as Kathak Math—illustrates how disciplines that might appear worlds apart can actually inform and enrich one another.

The Roots of Kathak and Its Mathematical DNA

Kathak, one of the six major classical dance traditions of India, evolved along the Silk Road as a narrative dance for storytelling. What many viewers see on stage—quick footwork, spiraling spins, and intricate hand gestures—are actually manifestations of complex mathematical structures. The dance is built around taal (rhythmic cycles) that can be expressed in fractions, ratios, and modular arithmetic. Each taal is divided into laya (tempo) and kriya (beat), and the interlocking patterns of footwork mirror the way musicians play a taal in an alap (exposition) and jor (intensification) style.

The Print article begins with a simple observation: the footwork of a Kathak dancer, when plotted as a graph, resembles a Fourier series. This insight has inspired a new generation of scholars to treat Kathak as a living case study in the mathematics of time and motion.

Kathak Math: A Project at the Crossroads of Science and Art

The central focus of the piece is Kathak Math, a research‑teaching initiative that sprung up in 2019 at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras. The project’s founding team—an experimental physicist, a performance studies professor, and a professional Kathak dancer—set out to demonstrate how the rhythmic structure of the dance could help explain physical phenomena ranging from acoustics to quantum mechanics.

In a series of workshops, the team builds interactive exhibits where students “step” the beats of a taal with sensors, and the sensors plot real‑time data streams. For instance, one exhibit shows the spectral decomposition of a drum’s vibration: as a dancer taps the tabla, a screen displays a dynamic plot of the harmonic frequencies, letting participants see how the same physical process underlies both music and physics.

Another striking showcase is the DNA‑dance, in which dancers use mudras (hand gestures) to represent the four nucleotides. The choreography, while elegant, also serves as a visual metaphor for the double‑helix structure, inviting audiences to appreciate the elegance of biological systems through movement.

The Print article highlights a partnership between the project and the National Centre for Biological Sciences, where interdisciplinary seminars are held that blend lectures on biochemistry with Kathak recitals. These sessions underscore the idea that “humanities matter” just as much as laboratory data in the quest to understand the natural world.

From Footwork to Fourier: A Pedagogical Leap

One of the most compelling aspects of Kathak Math is its application in education. The feature discusses how teachers in Bangalore’s public schools have adopted the project’s “step‑and‑plot” method to introduce students to basic concepts in math and physics. Rather than abstract equations, children see their own movements mirrored in graphs that they can interact with on tablets.

The initiative’s lead researcher, Dr. Radhika Sharma, argues that learning through embodied experience “reduces the barrier between the abstract and the tangible.” The Print piece quotes her saying, “When a child’s footfall becomes a waveform on a screen, learning mathematics stops being a set of symbols and starts being a story.”

In addition to STEM, Kathak Math has also become a platform for discussions on cultural identity. The article notes how students from diverse backgrounds—both Indian and international—are drawn together by a shared fascination with rhythm, fostering dialogue that transcends cultural divides.

Expanding the Horizon: Digital Media and Global Outreach

The Print article links to a recent YouTube documentary produced by the Kathak Math team, which follows a group of dancers as they compose a piece inspired by the Fourier transform. The documentary, in which each beat is color‑coded on a screen, has already gathered a following of over 200,000 viewers worldwide.

A key development highlighted in the feature is the integration of virtual reality (VR). Using VR headsets, participants can “step into” a 3‑D representation of a taal, moving through space while the platform calculates the corresponding physical forces. This immersive experience, the article explains, provides a unique way to understand the physics of motion, momentum, and energy conservation.

The Humanities Angle: Storytelling, Emotion, and Ethics

While Kathak Math is lauded for its scientific ingenuity, the Print piece does not overlook the humanities dimension. The article emphasizes how the storytelling tradition of Kathak, with its narratives of mythological epics and social commentaries, grounds the scientific exploration in human experience. The dance’s emphasis on rasas (emotional flavors) invites viewers to consider the ethical implications of scientific progress—how does one balance data with empathy?

A particularly poignant moment in the feature is an interview with veteran Kathak dancer Sangeeta Rao, who recounts how she has used her art to give voice to marginalized communities. Her collaboration with the Kathak Math team demonstrates how scientific narratives can be reframed to address social justice, thereby reinforcing the idea that the humanities matter as much as the hard sciences.

Looking Ahead: A New Paradigm for Interdisciplinary Learning

By the time the article concludes, the reader is left with a vision of a future where classrooms resemble studios, and laboratories resemble stages. Kathak Math is positioned as a model for reimagining education—one that treats rhythm not as a mere artistic ornament but as a gateway to scientific insight, and treats science not as a sterile abstraction but as a source of stories.

The Print feature’s call to action is clear: “Let us listen to the beat, not just the data.” Whether you are a dancer, a physicist, a teacher, or a curious citizen, the article reminds us that the world is full of patterns waiting to be discovered, and that the most powerful discoveries often come from listening to the music of the cosmos, whether it be in the form of a tabla or a photon.

Source: ThePrint – “Kathak Math: Science, rhythm, humanities matter” (2023). Links followed within the article lead to the Kathak Math project website, the project’s YouTube documentary, and academic papers on rhythm and mathematics.