ABSTRACT
Teesri Dhun is a devised documentary theatre project about khwaja sira- transgender struggles in Pakistan that premiered in Lahore in 2015. Unlike many transgender narratives critiqued for their “autobiographical imperative” to satiate cis normative audiences, Teesri Dhun drew upon the autobiographical to address the underlying political and institutional issues and was not addressed exclusively to cis normative audiences but to the larger trans and khwaja sira community. Khwaja sira performances include dancing and singing at community and intra-community events, and in public sites: at wedding functions, circus and regional theatres, Sufi shrines, and at heteronormative households through badhai or toli. Cultivated in community lineages of gurus and chelas badhai or toli , participates in birth rites or other celebratory occasions through khwaja sira dancing, singing, prayers/ blessings and repartee. The tolis might not even be paid, but still, they give blessings.
