This book explores India’s rich popular culture and provides illuminating insights into various aspects of the social, cultural, economic and political realities of contemporary globalised India. It is essential reading for courses on Indian popular culture and a useful resource for more general courses in the field of cultural studies, media studies, history, literary studies and communication studies.
The over-the-top musicals of Bollywood may be the most familiar aspect of Indian popular culture, but there are many more, all explored in this fascinating volume. Pop Culture India! Media, Arts, and Lifestyle follows the rise of modern India's pop culture world, especially since the 1980s, when relaxed censorship and economic liberalization led to an explosion in movies, music, mass media, consumerism, spiritual practices, and more. It is a captivating introduction to a diverse nation whose appetite for entertainment has led to some surprising twists and turns in recent history. How did a popular Indian television series spark a change in government and the rise of Hindu nationalism? Are some Bollywood film companies laundering money for organized crime, or even al Qaeda? What accounts for the overwhelming popularity of that quaint vestige of colonialism, cricket? The answers, and many more intriguing insights, await the reader in Pop Culture India!
As India celebrated the sixtieth anniversary of its independence, much praise was lavished on its emergence as a major player on the global stage. Its economic transformation and geopolitical significance as a nuclear power are matched by its globally resonant cultural resources. This book explores India’s rich popular culture. Chapters provide illuminating insights into various aspects of the social, cultural, economic and political realities of contemporary globalised India. Structured thematically and drawing on a broad range of academic disciplines, the book deals with critical issues including: - Film, television and TV soaps - Folk theatre, Mahabharata-Ramayana ,myths, performance, ideology and religious nationalism - Music, dance and fashion - Comics, cartoons, photographs, posters and advertising - Cyberculture and the software industry - Indian feminisms - Sports and tourism - Food culture Offering comprehensive coverage of the emerging discipline of popular culture in India, this book is essential reading for courses on Indian popular culture and a useful resource for more general courses in the field of cultural studies, media studies, history, literary studies and communication studies.
This book is a collection of incisive articles on the interactions between Indian Popular Cinema and the political and cultural ideologies of a new post-Global India.
Japanese Popular Culture and Globalization is the only concise overview of Japan's phenomenal impact on world pop culture available in English. Surveying Japanese forms from anime (animation) and manga (comic books) to monster movies and Hello Kitty products, this volume is an accessible introduction to Japan's pop creativity and its appeal worldwide. Written in an accessible style and illustrated with more than 20 photographs, Japanese Popular Culture and Globalization combines a historical approach to the evolution and diffusion of Japanese pop with interdisciplinary perspectives from anthropology, literary studies, political science, and the visual arts. Includes a useful glossary of terms and a bibliography of recommended readings.
Shanti Kumar's Gandhi Meets Primetime examines how cultural imaginations of national identity have been transformed by the rapid growth of satellite and cable television in postcolonial India. To evaluate the growing influence of foreign and domestic satellite and cable channels since 1991, the book considers a wide range of materials including contemporary television programming, historical archives, legal documents, policy statements, academic writings and journalistic accounts. Kumar argues that India's hybrid national identity is manifested in the discourses found in this variety of empirical sources. He deconstructs representations of Mahatma Gandhi as the Father of the Nation on the state-sponsored network Doordarshan and those found on Rupert Murdoch's STAR TV network. The book closely analyzes print advertisements to trace the changing status of the television set as a cultural commodity in postcolonial India and examines publicity brochures, promotional materials and programming schedules of Indian-language networks to outline the role of vernacular media in the discourse of electronic capitalism. The empirical evidence is illuminated by theoretical analyses that combine diverse approaches such as cultural studies, poststructuralism and postcolonial criticism.
The book focuses on the current contexts of popular visual culture. Both popular and visual as specific forms of modern culture have only recently received serious academic attention in India. Some of the factors which have supplied new frames to these cultural categories are the emergence of modern communication technologies - digital media, TV, and film - as well as emergent new disciplines such as cultural studies, visual studies, film, and media studies. The essays explore the role of popular imagery through various aesthetic streams in such diverse areas as religious and social symbolism, national identity, theatre backdrops, film poster art, photography, architecture and urban living.
At the start of the twenty-first century challenges to the global hegemony of U.S. culture are more apparent than ever. Two of the contenders vying for the hearts, minds, bandwidths, and pocketbooks of the world’s consumers of culture (principally, popular culture) are India and South Korea. “Bollywood” and “Hallyu” are increasingly competing with “Hollywood”—either replacing it or filling a void in places where it never held sway. This critical multidisciplinary anthology places the mediascapes of India (the site of Bollywood), South Korea (fountainhead of Hallyu, aka the Korean Wave), and the United States (the site of Hollywood) in comparative dialogue to explore the transnational flows of technology, capital, and labor. It asks what sorts of political and economic shifts have occurred to make India and South Korea important alternative nodes of techno-cultural production, consumption, and contestation. By adopting comparative perspectives and mobile methodologies and linking popular culture to the industries that produce it as well as the industries it supports, Pop Empires connects films, music, television serials, stardom, and fandom to nation-building, diasporic identity formation, and transnational capital and labor. Additionally, via the juxtaposition of Bollywood and Hallyu, as not only synecdoches of national affiliation but also discursive case studies, the contributors examine how popular culture intersects with race, gender, and empire in relation to the global movement of peoples, goods, and ideas.
The extreme diversity of Indian food culture—including the dizzying array of ingredients and dishes—is made manageable in this groundbreaking reference. India has no national dish or cuisine; however, certain ingredients, dishes, and cooking styles are typical of much of the subcontinent's foodways. There are also common ways of thinking about food. The balanced coverage found herein covers many states ignored by previous food writers. Students will find much of cultural interest here to complement country studies and foodies will discover fresh perspectives. From prehistoric times there has been considerable mixing of cultures and cuisines within India. Today, the endless variations in cuisine reflect religious, community, regional, and economic differences and histories. Sen, a noted author on Indian cuisine, consummately encapsulates the foodways in historical context, including the influence of the British period (the Raj). Among the topics covered are the restrictions of various religions and castes and the northern wheat-based vs. the southern rice-based cuisine, with an extensive review of each regional cuisine with typical meals. She characterizes the only-recent restaurant culture, with mention of Indian fare offered abroad. In addition, the Indian sweet tooth so apparent in the dishes made for many festivals and celebrations is highlighted. The roles of diet and health are also explained, with an emphasis on Ayruveda, which is gaining support in Western countries. A plethora of recipes for different regions and occasions complements the text.
