India (1): Language

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India (1) Language the Urban Migrants

• Flute Music, Annamalai
• and Salaam Bombay

Migrant populations flock to the outskirts of
cities to find work. (source)
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Starting Questions

• What are the common points among the three texts?
  And their differences?
• What do you feel about reading them?
• All about the lives of migrant laborers (clerks)
  in Indian cities, how they miss home, and how
  they get exploited by their bossesseen from
  different perspectives (of a migrant adult clerk,
  a migrant chaipautea boy--and a master).
• Two concern the issue of language letter
  writing of hometown and two mention Ganeshthe
  bringer of success.

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Outline

• Background (1) Caste System
• Background (2) Language
• Tagore The Flute Music
• R.K. Narayan Annamalai
• Background (3) Bollywood
• Salaam Bombay!

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Background (1) Caste system

• The main castes
• Brahman (priest)
• Kshatriya (ruler, warrior, landowner)
• Vaishya (merchants)
• Shudra (artisans, agriculturalists)
• Harijan "outside" the caste system (once known
  as "untouchables") (source http//www.csuchico.e
  du/cheinz/syllabi/asst001/spring98/india.htm )
• Musicians-- Harijans (god's children) which
  used to be known as untouchables.

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Caste system -- Determined by

• race? In a verse from the first millennium epic,
  the Mahabharata, Brigu, the sage explains The
  brahmins are fair, the kshatriyas are reddish,
  the vaishyas yellow and the sudras are black.
• by work The Hindus also believe that a man's
  varna is determined by his profession and deeds
  and not by his birth.
• Varna (caste) came to signify an endogamic(?????)
  group, its members linked by heredity, marriage,
  custom and profession (source).

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Caste system -- Today

• Seen illegal since 1947
• Two Indias the rich and the poor, not following
  the caste lines
• In some villages, some lower caste people are
  still marginalized, and inter-caste marriage is
  still prohibited
• In 1998, 60 people were killed by the Ranvir
  Sena, a self-styled armed militia of the
  upper-caste landed gentry, formed to crush the
  movements of Dalits (the untouchables) and
  agricultural laborers. 21 killed in 1999.
  (sources 1, 2)

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Background (2) Language

• No matter that
• my name is Greek
• my surname Portuguese
• my language alien.
• There are ways of belonging.

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Language English literature in India

• The Charter Act of 1813 East India Company's
  responsibility for native education
• 1857 the Indian university system
• After independence, English is no longer one of
  the 21 official language
• Major languages Hindi, Tamil, Marathi, Malayalam
  and Urdu each has more than 10 million speakers.

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Narayans decision to write in English

• We have fostered the language for over a
  century. . . And we are entitled to bring it in
  line with our own thought and idiom.
• Speaking as the English language, he puts
• I will stay here, whatever may be the rank and
  status you may assign meas the first language or
  the second language or the thousandth. You may
  banish me from the classrooms, but I can always
  find other places where I can stay. . . I am
  more Indian than you can ever be (93.)

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Tagore Flute Music

• 1. A man in poverty--
• compared to a lizard (with Ganeshs picture
  stuck on the door)
• Suffers from pay cuts, high train cost, and wants
  to save the cost of light umbrella full of
  holes
• 2. His emotional life
• The contrast between the busy city and his lonely
  room
• Trapped in his office clothes
• his girlsaved from him
• 2. The function of flute music

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R. K. Narayan

• born in Madras in 1906
• full name Rasipuram Krishnaswami Ayyar
  Naranayanaswami
• --gt1935 R.K. Narayan

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Narayan the Writer

• V.s. Naipaul (1999) He wrote about people in a
  small town in South India small people, big
  talk, small doings. That was where he began
  that was where he was fifty years later. To some
  extent that reflected Narayans own life. He
  never moved far from his origins. (The Writer
  in India)

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Narayan the Story-teller of village life

• Id be quite happy if no more is claimed from me
  than being just a story-teller. Only the story
  matters, that is all. . . . But if a story is
  in tune completely with the truth of life, truth
  as I perceive it, then it will be automatically
  significant.
• Presenting Mulgudi (an imaginary village) as a
  peasant community in (southern) India you see
  more concentrated life and you can see the types
  and forces of human relationships, activities,
  aspirations in greater details. (97)

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Annamalai

• Annamalai his views of his job, and of his
  master? And his masters views of him?
• Annamalai Language How does Annamalai look at
  sending letters home? (e.g. the issues of
  village names, his use of English on the address,
  asking one to write and the other to address it.)
  
• Annamalai home
• narrative time and technique How does the story
  start? How does it end? Does the story follow a
  chronological order?
• Can you think of any example in Taiwanese
  literature that is similar to this story?

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Annamalai and his Master

• Annamalai p. 117 a custodian of me and my
  property cannot intervene A at work p. 133
  take him as he was.
• Annamalai at work
• 121 vs. in the masters study
• Simple-minded, dividing plants into the
  flourishing and the evil ones
• balances the good and the evil p. 128
• a lot of water and garbage on the plants p. 128
• Stubborn and with self-contradictory reasoning129

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Annamalai and his Master

• Annamalai off from work
• go for news but cannot comprehend a lot
  (Kannedy) (telepoon, trunk call long-distance
  call p. 132)
• The episode of fowl killing ? his fear and
  dignity p. 135 ? his past

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Annamalai and Home

• Very far away p. 120
• Keeps postcard connection, which is cheaper
• Revulsion and curiosity? his brothers postcards.
• As choice between home and work pp. 140-

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Annamalailanguage race/class division

• The postcards serve as connection between A and
  his home
• linguistic hegemony English vs Tamil
• When the master gets his letters, he is not even
  sure if it is from Annamalai.
• As a whole, the story shows the distinct
  personality of this peasant worker, his sense of
  duty and honor, and an inevitable gap between him
  and the master.

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Background 3 Bollywood

• ????(Bombay, Mumbai)
• ???????(Dream Factory)????,????(?????????),??????
  ,????,???????????????
• ????????Meenakshi Shedde?????,???2002?????????????
  ,??942?,?????????650????????????????,??????????,?
  ????????????5????(???http//movie.cca.gov.tw/COLU
  MN/column_article.asp?rowid27 )?

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Bollywood ????

• ?????? Devdas
• ???????Lagaan
• ??Bollywood ??????????????
• Salaam Bombay (????) -- ???????????,??????-????Go
  to Bombay, come back a hero.
• Masala -- ???????? ??????????
• Monsoon Wedding (????)--?????????,Punjabi
  ???????????
• Desperately Seeking Helen -- ??Bollywood
  ???Helen, ??????????????

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Outline Salaam Bombay!

• BackgroundMira Nair the history of the
  production of Salaam Bombay.
• Major Theme 1 Migrants in the city
• Major Theme 2 family/comradeship and betrayal
• Major Theme 3 Larger Social Forces
• (Language Differences and Illiteracy
• slums in Bombay, government inefficiency
• Colonialism/tourism -- in the background)

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Introduction to Mira Nair

• Born in Bhubaneshwar, Orissa in 1957 (middle
  class family)
• Attended the University of New Delhi (Sociology
  and Theater)
• Went to Harvard in 1976 (Sociology) (source)

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Films by Mira Nair

• Jama Masjid Street Journal (1979)
• So Far From India (1982)
• India Cabaret (1985)
• Children of a Desired Sex (1987)
• Salaam Bombay (1988)
• Mississippi Masala (1991)
• The Perez Family (1993)
• Kama Sutra A Tale of Love (1997)
• My Own Country (1998)
• Monsoon Wedding (2001)

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Salaam Bombay! History of Production

1. Interviews of street kids in Bombay.
2. Out of these interviews emerged a screenplay that
   was a composite of several lives.
3. Then many of the children were enlisted for
   weeks in a daily workshop, not to teach them
   "acting" (for that they already knew from
   hundreds of overacted Indian film melodramas),
   but to teach them how to behave naturally in
   front of the camera. (source)

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What happened to the children?

1. "Our whole attitude was to meet them halfway and
   help them realize their own self-worth and
   dignity," said Nair in a recent interview with
   The Christian Science Monitor (12 Oct 1988,
   p.19). "We wanted to help them create
   opportunities they want for themselves."
   Responding to this respectful approach, some
   children entered school, some returned home to
   their villages, some got jobs, and some have
   stayed on the streets.
2. Nair is using proceeds from the film to open
   learning centers for street children in both
   Bombay and Delhi. (source)

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Salaam Bombay!

• Awards
• the New Director's Award at the Cannes Film
  Festival in 1988 an Academy Award nomination for
  best foreign film in 1989
• Neo-Realism A departure from Bollywood Musical.

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Salaam Bombay! Questions

• How does Krishna go to Bombay? What is his first
  experience of it? (clip 1)
• Why is he away from home? Why does he go to
  Bombay and what does he want to do there? (clip
  711 )
• How does he relate to the people he meets in
  Bombay? (e.g. Manju, Sweet 16, Manjus mother,
  Chillum, the other street kids.) e.g. Why does
  Krishna fall in love with Sweet Sixteen?
• Are there any traces of Bollywood musical
  influence in the film?

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Major Theme (1) in Salaam Bombay

• Migratory identity people drifted to the
  metropolis, lost in the crowd, e.g. shots of the
  train station
• -- Chaipau his name (Krishna) no home address
• -- Chillum completely lost (not trusting anyone)
• ? hybrid culture and identity (e.g. Chillum,
  Manjus danceclip 3 Ms. Hawaii in the movie
  clip 6)

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Major Theme (2) desire, betrayal and survival

• Desire for home family
• e.g. Krishna
• -- tries to write home
• -- needs 500 rupees so that he can go home
• -- forms a family in Bombay (Chillum, the
  other children).
• What about Manjus family?

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Salaam Bombay The migrants in a city (2)

• Manjus family
• Baba child-abuser and pimp
• Mother loving but cannot help
• Manju lonely and in desperate need of love.
  (e.g. clips 8, 9, 12, 14)

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Major Theme (2) desire, betrayal and survival

• How do Krishna and the other kids survive?
• Work as Chaipau ? taken advantage of by the other
  kids
• Skin chicken, clean chicken coops ? fired by the
  boss
• rob an old man, ? Krishna throws up money taken
  away by Chillum.
• serve in a rich mans wedding party ? arrested by
  the police, money taken away.
• For Krishna, it is a continuous process of loss
  and disillusionment.

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Salaam Bombay a series of betrays
disillusionment
His wife
Baba
Manju

• Chillum

Krishna
The other street kids
The Sweet Sixteen
The circus boss
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Major Themes (2)

• Comradeship, betrayal and rebellion/survival--
  Pattern of Repetition
• Drug-dealing the death of the previous drug
  dealer, Chillum and then another Chillum.
• Cheating Manjus mother cheated, The Sweet
  Sixteen
• Some are self-destructive and some, surviving
• Chillum has no friend cheats Krishna with his
  bank.
• Krishnas setting fire as a way of rebellion
  against his brother, and then against the
  whorehouse
• Finally, the major forces of frustration are
  those of society the government and the crowd.

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Major Themes 3 Larger Social Forces

• An urban tragedy characters with no names.
• Why are Baba and his wife not named?
• Why do people call Krishna Chaipau?
• What roles do Krishna God play in this film?
  And the Chiller room? (clip 20, 22)
• Who sends the two kids to Chiller room?
• How is the chiller room presented?

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Salaam Bombay social factors

• State intervention Chiller Room
• drug, prostitution and Bollywood
• traces of collonial influence
• cricket, tourists, statues, movies
• Religion helpless. E.g. Ganesh

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Salaam Bombay the ending

• What do you think about the ending of Salaam
  Bombay? Is there any hope for the street
  children? What does the spinning top mean?
• Can you think of any other film that is
  comparable to Salaam Bombay?
• Children of Heaven ?????

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Next time . . .

• Womens experiences of Racial, Class and national
  divisionesp. childrens.

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References

• Roger Elbert. SALAAM BOMBAY!