Abstract: This study examines Himmati Mai (2022), a performance artwork by Bangladeshi artist Reetu Sattar, to interrogate the politics of sound, the construction of sisterhood, and the potential of artistic intervention in social transformation. The piece, featuring 70 women synchronously striking bamboo sticks and emitting the vocalization "hoo", creates a resistive auditory landscape that challenges the suppression of female voices in Bangladeshi society. The analysis reveals: (1) Sound operates as a medium of political expression, employing rhythm, acoustic resonance, and collective synchronization to metaphorically articulate gendered violence and acoustically reclaim public space; (2) The organizational process (participant selection, rehearsal dynamics) fosters cross-class and interreligious sisterhood, transmuting individual trauma into collective political agency; (3) A tension emerges between the ephemerality of performance art and the protracted nature of institutional change, yet the work's symbolic capital persists through media dissemination and social mobilization; (4) The practice expands Joseph Beuys’ "social sculpture" theory by integrating indigenous cultural symbols (bamboo sticks, saris) with acoustic politics, forging a dynamic mode of social intervention. The study argues that Himmati Mai constitutes not merely an artistic protest but an innovative feminist praxis, offering a creative paradigm for nonviolent resistance in South Asian contexts.
Keywords: sound politics; auditory landscape; collective memory; sisterhood; nonviolent resistance; social sculpture
