Pop Culture India! Media, Arts, and Lifestyle. PRESENTATION INSCRIPTION FROM AUTHOR

Asha Kasbekar, Pop Culture India! Santa Barbara: ABC Clio, 2006.

Hard cover, 26 x 18 cm, 337 pages.

Very good, clean condition.

Warm presentation inscription from the author on the title-page.

'The purpose of this book is to provide a first step for anyone interested in discovering popular culture in India today. The chapters cover cinema, television, and radio; newspapers and magazines; music, theater, and literature; and sport, providing an explanation of the critical developments in each of these fields. The book also explores the changing lifestyles in India, particularly in the areas of shopping, eating, and other forms of consumerism. Each chapter has its own list of the books, academic papers, and articles in the popular press that I found useful in the compilation of the book. With the growing number of books on India, it would be useful to explain the need for yet another on the subject. Most books on India tend to specialize in one particular aspect of Indian culture literature, theater, cinema, the press, and so on. This book strives to provide the reader with an overview of the major aspects of popular culture by providing both a brief history and an explanation of the current situation in each of the areas and portraying a comprehensive picture of present-day India and Indian culture. It also brings into play the role of the Indian underworld, which most academics scrupulously avoid mentioning, de-spite its extreme importance in the economy of popular culture and consumerism in India. It has been difficult grappling with the unwieldy diversity of Indiaits languages, its written scripts, its regional and local culturesand harnessing it into a cohesive and comprehensive book.'