‘I felt more homely over there … ’: analysing tourists’ experience of Indianness at Bollywood Parks Dubai

Abstract

In recent years, Bollywood has expanded into a global, trans-textual phenomenon, consumed by a large audience-base worldwide. Existing research has shown how Bollywood offers Indiansboth home and abroada cinematic image of their homeland, fostering a sense of belonging. This paper focuses on the popularity of Bollywood's transmedia culture in an international setting. More, in particular, it offers an empirical exploration of the tourist experience of Bollywood Parks Dubaithe first and largest theme park dedicated to Bollywood. Based on a series of in-depth interviews with 18 participants and accompanied by participant observations, this paper shows how Indian tourists use this leisure zone far away from the Indian subcontinent as a platform to connect and celebrate larger notions of Indianness. In experiencing nation-pride in a playful manner beyond the national borders, ideas of contemporary Indianness are redefined in a cosmopolitan context. The paper concludes by critically examining these popular celebrations of nationalism.

On the Tracks of Musical Screenscapes: Analysing the Emerging Phenomenon of Bollywood Filmi-song Tourism in Iceland

“…This study intends to make meaningful contributions to the growing corpus of research on the interrelation between popular culture, place and tourism (Månsson et al, 2020; Reijnders, 2016 etc.) by bringing in a (critical) Indian perspective that is still largely missing in media tourism research (but see: Angmo and Dolma, 2015; Biswas and Croy, 2018; Mishra, 2018; Nanjangud, 2019; Nanjangud and Reijnders, 2020, 2021). Such a critical commentary fills in for much elusive discussions on the storytelling format and the specificities of the films from the region that has global effects on transnational mobilities that, perhaps cannot be generalized using existing research dominated by western case-studies.…”