Consuming Cultural Hegemony

Book review: Harisur Rahman, Consuming Cultural Hegemony: Bollywood in Bangladesh

“…While laying out his theoretical framework, the author extends the notion of cultural hegemony to be inclusive of soft power, cultural imperialism, regional modernity and Bollywoodisation. In addition, to explore the access to technological tools for private viewing of Hindi films that separates the middle class from the low-income class, Rahman proposes the concept of ‘cultural subscription’ (2020, p. 5), which is engaging in particular forms of ‘cultural consumption, cultural appropriation, cultural tastes and lifestyle preferences’. But for the most part of the book, the terminology, though appealing, remains unengaged.…”

“…The author places Bangladesh within a South Asian cultural economy and market that bifurcates class along the line of modernity, a modernity which the author associates with the consumption of Indian cinema and its by-products. As the title suggests, the overall aim of the book is to unpack the socio-economic patterns of Indian film circulation and consumption that is ‘enforced’ in Bangladesh and ‘their impacts on Bangladeshi society and the Bangladeshi culture industry’ (Rahman, 2020, p. 4). The book attempts to map the consumption of Hindi cinema in Bangladesh to present a holistic chain of supply and demand that maintains and propagates India’s cultural hegemony and different forms of resistance towards it in Bangladesh.…”

“…While new technologies of visual entertainment in Bangladesh have always been considered to be threatening the indigenous film industry (Kabir, 1979; Islam, 2008), Bangladesh’s visual entertainment business, like many others in South Asia, is also a ‘complex network that connects events such as changes in Bangladesh’s politics with new forms of visual entertainment’ (Awwal, 2018, p. 42). Thus, though Indian cultural hegemony is seen as threatening, Rahman ironically shows that political stakeholders have control over the distribution of the hegemonic goods, which is most likely why ‘[a] change in national politics may lead to changes in the way the cable business is controlled and owned’ (Rahman, 2020, p. 101).…”