Indian television engages with the diaspora through diverse programming, reconstituting them into the national imaginary and facilitating transnational media flows.
Author
Ritika Pant, Associate Professor, Jindal School of Journalism & Communication, O.P. Jindal Global University, Sonipat, Haryana, India
Summary
While Bollywood’s relationship with the diaspora has been addressed frequently, television’s engagement with the community has not found sincere interest among scholars. By exploring a range of creative approaches that TV broadcasters employ to engage with the diaspora, this paper attempts to bridge the gap between scholarship on television and the diaspora. The paper examines three Hindi General Entertainment Channels–Star Plus, Zee TV, Colors, to understand how television imagines the diaspora. Through field interviews with industry experts, the paper argues that by addressing the diasporic community through diverse programming strategies, Indian television assimilates and reconstitutes the diaspora into the national imaginary. By including diasporic narratives in national programming, TV programmes serve as reterritorialized media objects that reconnect the diaspora to the homeland. The paper highlights that the transnational televisual exchanges between the nation and the diaspora signify the emergence of ‘neo-global’ media flows that perpetuate between media peripheries.
Published in: South Asian Diaspora
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