bombaynights:This paper develops two provocations: the necessity of dystopian visions in shaping s
bombaynights: This paper develops two provocations: the necessity of dystopian visions in shaping subjectivites; and the legacies of past imperfections as resources for addressing the present. Prof. Joshi applies these general observations to the case of India where they help reckon with the urgency of dystopia in the fabrication a national narrative. The chosen dystopia is located in the 1970s, a decade that by most metrics was a nadir in India. Two wars, a global oil crisis, 1% growth, widespread shortages of staple foods, runaway inflation, trouble meeting debt payments, and a 22-month suspension of the Constitution outline the economic and political situation during the long 1970s. Somewhat paradoxically during this decade of political and economic decline, the cinemas of India underwent a renaissance. India’s popular cinema of the 1970s was also a political cinema, insistent on engaging and archiving the moment in public culture. This archive is a critical resource in the current neoliberal moment when dissent appears to have been captured by the promises of the lotus flower. Sheared of the political commitments embedded in the cinema of the 1970s, the recent cinema celebrates name-brand luxury and middle-class India’s global ascendance, largely blind to preoccupations with political and social justice. And yet the 1970s persist in the current cinema as remakes, and the dystopian archive of the decade provides resources to address industrial strength patriarchy, corporate prowess, muscular Hinduism, and “India Now.” -- source link
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