Paper short abstract:

The paper examines the growing influence of the diaspora on Bollywood by looking at the changes in films, as well as the growing field of “Bollywood studies”. It analyzes the effects of this focus by linking this shift to Indian neoliberal aspirations and diasporic race politics. I conclude that the broader shift is from action to consumption and this shift, while it marks the entry of India into the space of neo-liberal trade and philosophy, also effectively abandons its minorities and any progressive gender politics.

Paper long abstract:

I look at how the Indian diaspora, specially in the Anglo-American world, consumes and shapes Bollywood film. The Hindi language film industry has gone from being an object of nostalgia to being financed and staffed by the diaspora. How does that change its style and content? And more importantly, what is the significance of the diasporas investing so much emotional, political and identititarian capital in this one form of mass culture: contemporary mass film?

Making consumption the central focus of self-fashioning as a hyphenated Indian is not an active form of homeland politics. But more than privileging passive consumption over active engagement, this emphasis on Bollywood serves to fashion an American or British racialized identity abroad, which ignores and marginalizes the priorities of Indian society itself, which may have more to do with forms of equity outside of race. Though the Indian economy and its society are becoming globalized and see themselves as part of the developed world, to a large extent that is based on two premises: an exclusive focus on the urban middle class, and second, by ignoring the growing post-liberalization disparity between the poor and the rich and the erosion of social welfare. Neither of these issues affects the diaspora directly. The economics of film production and distribution ensures that Bollywood film can focus on its growing overseas markets while giving up any efforts at a domestic social conscience. This in turn is reflected in the growing conservatism of Bollywood film, particularly with regard to gender and minority equality.