DIASPORA AND FUNDAMENTALISM ON SCREEN: A STUDY OF SELECT SOUTH ASIAN MOVIES

Abstract

South Asian diaspora cinema engages audiences of Western as well as non-Western origins as it depicts experiences of diaspora communities through the themes of nostalgia, cultural hybridity, alienation, immigration, refuge, and many others. The films of South Asian diaspora become a powerful medium in the global world where the message can be conveyed from a single television screen to any place which is far away. As there is an abundance of South Asian diaspora literature, filmmakers choose to adapt diaspora novels to reach larger audiences, which may not be possible through readership because of a lack of knowledge of the English language, which is the prevalent language for diaspora authors. These films break this barrier of language through subtitles and dubbing in other languages. Most of the time, their selection criteria for making film adaptations is the popularity of the novel, which has been widely accepted by readers. Also, curious readers criticise the film adaptations after watching them and sometimes try to compare them, but the transformation from a novel to a film is an arduous task that demands changes due to its distinct medium of expression. In this process, along with plots and characters, the themes shown in the novel are adjusted accordingly. Today, fundamentalism is a global phenomenon often referred to as religion by critics even when it is not just limited to it. After the attack of Al-Qaeda on the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York, America, the term has gained popularity by the western world. However, it is often misrepresented as merely religious. The social, cultural, political, and economic forms of fundamentalism are not much explored by critics. Despite the plethora of primary sources of vi South Asian diaspora literature and cinema, fundamentalism is not even considered a theme. When it comes to film adaptations, any inaccurate representation can be taken for granted. Secondary sources do touch upon the connection of fundamentalism with globalisation and culture, but they fail to associate it with the struggles of diaspora people of South Asia. There is a dearth of addressing fundamentalism in South Asian films by critics. This study, "Diaspora and Fundamentalism on Screen: A Study of Select South Asian Movies," aims to explore this gap in the phenomenon of fundamentalism depicted in select South Asian movies, which are cinematic adaptations of select source texts. The primary sources selected for the current research are three film adaptations of South Asian diaspora based on the three well-known novels of prominent South Asian diaspora authors. These works are Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger, Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist, and Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, which deal with India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, respectively. Authors of these novels look at society from their perspectives, which is reflected in their unique representations of fundamentalism. All the main characters—Balram from The White Tiger, Changez from The Reluctant Fundamentalist, and Amir from The Kite Runner—are products of globalisation, which shapes their personal identities. Their thought processes and actions are consequences of globalisation. However, fundamentalism is also a part of globalisation and culture and sometimes hinders the growth of their dreams and desires. Despite belonging to the diaspora, all three cinematic renditions and the novels are distinct in their representation of fundamentalism. The study is relevant to understand how South Asian diaspora filmmakers reconstruct fundamentalism in the contemporary context and how there is a need to observe this concept in depth as it affects both natives and diaspora communities of the countries. The thesis is divided into five chapters. The first chapter gives a brief introduction to the South Asian diaspora, its literature, and its cinema, along with research vii questions and objectives. This is the foundation of the thesis, as fundamentalism’s correlation with culture is explored in it. The second chapter provides a theoretical framework with film as an interdisciplinary art and how it reflects society, which in the case of the present study is reflected as the contemporary issue of fundamentalism noticed in the novels and the films. The prominent themes of South Asian diaspora films are highlighted too. In the third chapter, culture and globalisation and how they play a role in the representation of fundamentalism are analysed. The fourth chapter is the core chapter, which compares the depiction of fundamentalism in the select novels and their film adaptations. The last chapter summarises the key points of the research and provides future directions for further research for scholars. In this way, the present study holds significance in the field of South Asian diaspora as it connects globalisation, fundamentalism, and South Asian diaspora cinema.