Dr. Shoma Munshi, research fellow at the University of Amsterdam, spoke on the topic of "Media, Consumers, and Identity in South Asia" yesterday, characterizing contemporary Indian media as embracing both traditional and Western values.
Munshi explained that the dual purpose of her address was "to look at the complex nature of contemporary cultural identity and the role of the visual media industries -- in particular in advertising and films."
Munshi feels that the recent liberalization of the Indian economy, particularly over the past 10 years, has led to vast changes in urban "mediascape."
Indian economic growth in so-called "I.C.E." industries -- infotech, communications, and electronics -- has helped to promote the recent media barrage.
Fifteen years ago, only two television channels were available in India, both in black and white. Now, however, over 55 color channels can be accessed, and that number is growing at an annual rate of 25 percent.
"If there is one distinguishing feature of these times it is that there is now an increasing multiplicity of choices available to construct one's own identity," Munshi said.
Central to this change is the growing urban middle class, especially residents of large cities such as Bombay and New Delhi, who, according to Munshi, "are caught up in the globalization process as they swing between their traditionally Indian identity and one more in keeping with global lifestyles."
Thus the new advertising and cinema industries which direct their attentions toward the emerging middle class must reflect two oppositional values -- the embrace of a new global identity and the retention of traditional Indian moral philosophies.
For this reason, modern protagonists in Indian films are portrayed as accepting this dual role.
The idea is, "if an Indian girl wears Western clothes, it does not mean that she doesn't have Indian values," Munshi said, quoting the mother of a recent winner of the Miss India and Miss World beauty pageants.
In contemporary Indian media, "it is never this or that, it is this and that," she pointed out. Munshi refers to this delicate balance as one of "acceptable modernity."
"It is this comfortable straddling across two worlds which is one of the main underlying causes of the success of this genre of films," she said.
Munshi said she believes that modern values are influencing not only the media, but Indian society itself.
The new upwardly mobile urban family in India, or "N.U.F.," is currently experiencing a complete makeover.
"The wife and mother who lives for her husband and children is quickly morphing into a partner and friend who is carving out her own consumption and self-fulfillment space," Munshi said.
She also described the "new Indian man" as "caring and sensitive."
Yet many wonder whether or not these media ideals actually affect Indian social values.
"To a certain extent, advertisements are aspirations," Munshi admitted. "But is the media just imposing identities? I don't think so."
Indeed, with the advent of modernity, Western ideals, such as that of the "perfect" female form, have begun to infiltrate Indian values.
"Beauty business is big business," Munshi said, citing that Indian "fitness centers have sprung up everywhere" and "discourse on body care has moved into public display."
Unfortunately this newly fueled pursuit for thinness has created an increased incidence of eating disorders among adolescent girls in large Indian cities, although "certainly not at the scale that they are here," Munshi said.
Although India itself is highly stratified by region, caste, and dialect, Munshi pointed out that most Indian advertisements and movies "do not show any regional or ethnic bias," and thus promote what she called "a Pan-Indian personae."
She does, however, see a parallel trend in the media of extreme factions such as the Hindu Right to "indict the enemy within," attempting to maintain India's rigid social structure in the face of its changing values, but views this as the weaker of the two.
Munshi sees economic growth and Indian acceptance of Western values as powerful catalysts for changing India's place within the world.
"We cannot claim to be an opportunity society," Munshi said, "but there are more opportunities in India than ever before. India has truly moved out of the third world orbit."
