NOT REALLY BOLLYWOOD:A HISTORY OF POPULAR HINDI FILMS, SONGS, AND DANCE WITH PEDAGOGICAL APPLICATIONS FOR UNDERSTANDING INDIAN HISTORY AND CULTURE.
Creator
Nayee, Sanjana, Kaplan, Jeffrey, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description
Contemporary fascination with 'Bollywood' proliferates much of reality TV dance shows, media blurbs and other communicative outlets. These avenues homogenize India as 'Bollywood', while social and political outlets place Indians and people of South Asian descent into fitted stereotypes that are ridiculed and largely distorted. The intent of this thesis was to explore how the growing international intrigues of popular Hindi films exist beyond 'Bollywood'. This study is especially important... Show moreContemporary fascination with 'Bollywood' proliferates much of reality TV dance shows, media blurbs and other communicative outlets. These avenues homogenize India as 'Bollywood', while social and political outlets place Indians and people of South Asian descent into fitted stereotypes that are ridiculed and largely distorted. The intent of this thesis was to explore how the growing international intrigues of popular Hindi films exist beyond 'Bollywood'. This study is especially important because current U.S. demographics are undergoing a 'browning' effect yet a comprehensive method for understanding South Asian peoples and their cultures have been isolated to terrorist 'breeders', the model minority or as products primed for consumption. This thesis discusses the history of popular Hindi popular cinema, its changing methods of songs and dance and includes options of pedagogical applications within secondary level classrooms. In short, this thesis is an effort to highlight the similarities present amongst the differences that are consciously and unconsciously created or implicitly believed by the general population when attempting to decipher the many different components that exist across South Asian cultures, ethnicities, traditions, histories and identities. Show less
