Interventionist Tendencies in Popular Culture
Vibodh Parthasarathi
What is evident to any traveller in India is that the
'democratic' State, the 'free' Market and the 'nationalist' Hindu Right are
today the dominant fulcrums of cultural production. In doing so, they have
drawn on elements of popular culture -- be they cultural practices predating
the modern mass media, or those created and shaped by the latter. Moreover,
they have harnessed the most significant techno-organisational elements of
contemporary media industry towards proliferating the production and
circulation of their culture-ware.
Prevailing Fulcrums of Culture
What is, however, not evident is that all three are
involved in a rigorous exercice of codifying elements of popular culture.
While looking at instances of these, it is important to take note of how each
has drawn from the experience of the other. In general, corporate advertising
often creates a series of messages from self-referential popular 'text'. The
ad campaign on TV of the global giant Coke employs a range of decontextualised
images of what is apparently "cricket culture," towards positioning
its brand in India. Together with sponsoring key events, Coke's imagery seeks
a fundamental change in perception -- from it being a drink to a symbol
associated with cricket all over the country. Interestingly, in terms of
representation, both its narrative and ideology, this series of TV
advertisement by Coke echoes the "mera bharat mahaun" series
initiated by Doordarshan a few years ago. To construct a harmonious
"national culture," it uses snippets of music and dance from various
parts of the country, thereby reaffirming the discourse of unity-in-diversity.
Ostensibly rivalling such dominant Videshi (metropolitan) and Swadeshi
(indigenous) modes of national culture, stands the Hindu Right, whose
culture-ware is today as equally visible as that of the State and the Market.
Through posters, graffiti, pictures or stickers of Vishwa Hindu Parishad's
saffron flag along with (proposed) temple at Faizabad, it has given
traditional icons a contemporary political context and ideological direction,
ensuring that a single message is read from such individual texts (Basu et al.
1993:61). Very much like corporate brand promotion, images of Om have been
usurped by Hindutva's symbology and projected in public (such as on
car-stickers) as an assertive indication of the 'new' Hindu identity. Detailed
analysis have revealed that structures of dominance are reproduced as much
through media representation as within the mode of communication associated
with the Hindu Right (Babb & Wadley 1997).
Very much the way Rajiv Gandhi was 'made' by State
Television, Rithambara was 'made' by audio tapes 'marketed' through non-State
media. A close look at the 1980s indicates that the Hindu-Right's use of the
audio-visual medium is neither sporadic nor at a larger level unprecedental.
In harnessing the audio-visual media the Hindu Right reaped what MGR, NTR and
Rajiv Gandhi had sowed with the help of popular cinema, mobilevideo vans and
television respectively. However, the forces of Hindutva have demonstrated the
unique, and rather discomforting, synergy between a reactionary 'Church' and
the modern Electronic Church. At the same time, its use of media-forms
predating the mass media (puppetry, theatre, music et al ) has striking
parallels with the way in which they were adopted by the State to promote the
discourse of Green Revolution in the 1960s and the ideology of Family Planning
in the 1970s.
Not surprisingly, in a decade old trend fundamentalist
forces (the Political Right) have transformed, re-contextualised objects of
worship and mythological tales rooted in popular culture into symbols of
political conflict and sociological documents respectively. I say "Not
surprisingly" because the media-culture industry (the Economic Right) has
always drawn on elements of popular culture, projecting them as
decontextualised ond depoliticising 'culture-ware' -- be they are brandnames,
in television soaps, in advertisements.
Quite obviously, promoting popular culture was never the
primary objective in all three instances. What these forces sought was to
employ expressions from "the popular" towards attaining their
underlying ideological and material objectives. In other words, in each case
hegemony has been to a large extent achieved through an instrumental use of
popular culture in their media campaigns and political discourse. Thus, what
we have witnessed is that the three most dominant forces in the country are
instrumentally employing elements of "the popular," redefining their
meaning and re-locating their contexts to suit their own discursive practices.
While some of these may represent popular aspirations and others merely
populism, commonality lies in each of them projecting a history and a
worldview. In their articulations of popular culture, these three forces may
either find themselves in conflict, or symbiotically overlapping, or operating
in distinct social terrains.
Nevertheless, all three have integrated various means of
communications and cultural practices towards furthering their political
agenda. Their mode of communication is characterised by purely instrumental
use of the media; their encouragement of decontextualised presentation of
image, sound and text; their disregard for critique from within; their
monopoly over cultural production; the homogenising and universalizing essence
of their specific cultural products; and, an active reproduction of structures
of dominance, as much through their media practice as within their own mode of
communication. The modes of organisation of such dominant cultural processes
provide the institutional base for the creation of a 'new' individual and a
collective self in accordance with the respective logic of the State, the
Market and the Hindu Right. At the same time, their cultural production sets
the political context within which other cultural practices are taking shape.
Does the context sketched-out above provide space for
initiatives to foster a critical cultural practice?
Culture: Between Dominance & Resistance
Contemporary economic organisation has institutionalised
communication processes and cultural practices along industrial lines, giving
birth to the Culture Industry. Leading the universalising zeal of the culture
industry is the Mass Media: the epitome of Dominant Communication today. While
a few continue to believe that 'mass' signifies a large diverse audience whose
members are physically separated from each other (Trenholm 1995:276), it is
more likely that the term indicates the economic organisation and
institutionalised structure of cultural practice. [2]
The mass media is increasingly becoming a zero sum game in which Media Moghuls
seem to be consolidating, while the rest get eroded. The social relations
regulating the contemporary mode of dominant communication have led to the
isolation of individual in two ways: through inequities within the production
and distribution of culture, and through the fragmented nature of information
(images, text, music) churned out by it. Although the mass media is
increasingly influencing conflict and status quo, as also the formation and
erosion of identity at different levels, such influences are more towards
strengthening prevailing discourses.
However, unlike the Media-Culture Industry, the State is
able to perform a dual role in the processes of producing Culture -- be it as
meaning or explicitly as ideology. Firstly, the State acts as an active
participant in directly producing and/or patronising 'Culture' through say,
the media schools, commissioning varied 'culture-ware', sponsoring events,
financing regional centres of folk-culture (some of which Market and the Hindu
Right also do); and secondly, that of regulating or selectively promoting
cultural practices through jural and administrative means viz, Film Censor
Board, Script Board, structures of taxation and patterns of subsidies,
awarding industry status to a cultural form et al. Thus, the State is
in a better position to monopolise 'culture-ware' -- monopolise both its
production and representation. However, this is increasingly being challenged
by competing forces from the Market (representing both transnational and
indigenous capital) and from Society (fundamentalist and secessionist groups).
As a result, on the one hand the beginning of private broadcasting and cable
transmission in the early 1990s represented an end to State monopoly in
television production and distribution. On the other hand, the emergence of
Hindutva as a competing force in defining "national culture" marked
the biggest challenge to the legtimacy of the State as the central and sole
interpreter of Brahminical-Hindu symbolism.
Emphasis on the Market and the State should not blur the
fact that there have persisted throughout history communication processes
outside such dominant spheres. These have been articulations of the
marginalised or the underdog, whose expressions have been relegated to the
background of our social landscape. Often, their means of communication have
been either peripheralised or enveloped by the glut of Dominant Communication;
consequently, it is alleged, they 'failed' to attain universal appeal. Such
institutions and practices of what can be called "Non-Dominant
Communication" are viewed by the Culture Industry as 'remnants' of
history and by the modern State as cultural fossile needing 'preservation'.
The term "Popular Culture" has been used to
refer to a wide variety of practices arising from either the over-arching web
of Mass (produced) Culture, or from the contesting ideologies of National
Culture or from the analytical category of Non-Dominant Communication. Popular
Culture can be addressed from a range of perspectives -- some limiting others
testing; some static others more dynamic. The term was initially used by
European social historians to indicate the history of the 'inarticulate'.
However, in the last decade the term has gone through various redefinitions,
been the subject of critique and has benefited by conceptual clarity and
expansion. To begin with, there is wide consensus around the fact that Popular
Culture is a political activity -- directly and indirectly, consciously or
otherwise. The study of Popular Culture, now undertaken by sociologists, media
theorists, political scientists in addition to historians, is increasingly
being linked to debates on the public sphere and those of transformatory
politics. In India, additionally, the study of Popular Culture has been linked
with those of decolonization, subaltern consciousness and most recently,
modernity. Accordingly, it is alleged that we have arrived at a situation
where either Popular Culture is thriving within the Culture Industry, or its
very existence is threatened by homogenity inherent to the Culture Industry.
Instead of arguing from such extremes, it would be more
fruitful to approach cultural practices in general through the dialectics
between processes of Dominance and Resistance. Equally, what is required is to
approach cultural processes in a differentiated manner -- a difference arising
from their varied modes of production, relative prevalence and social base.
The need to shape such a perspective, I may add, is motivated as much by a
critique of existing structures of Communication and Culture, as by an
understanding the drawbacks of past efforts to do so.
The media and their culture have been with us since the
beginning of time. Recognising that cultural practice today is being
constantly produced and/or re-located by the mass producing zeal of the
Media-Culture Industry as also by the cultural matrix constructed by the
State, does not exclude the existence of cultural processes
outside/independent of such dominant fulcrums. The latter have emerged and
continue to exist as an expression, more importantly as a documentation, of
'another' view of events unfolding. One may add that, depending upon the
political processes it is associated with, could cultural practice
articulating 'another' view be pronounced as revivalist or interventionist.
Each epoch has thrown up a variety of cultural practices
reflecting or questioning the problems and achievements of that particular
society. At the same time, it is has been through a certain political tendency
that cultural practice have been able to articulate a critique of the
historical present. The plethora of social interventions in the sphere of
communication which draw on and build-upon elements of "the
popular," is an instance of such cultural practice. Can one identify
common undercurrents linking what appear to be diverse and often scattered
cultural practices? In conducting such an investigation, one must move away
from merely describing either the social application of communication
technology or the role of various cultural practice; rather, one must focus on
the social processes and political conflicts communication processes engages
in.
Focussing on a spectrum of antisystemic political
processes (Arrighi et al. 1989) will bring to light not only how "the
popular" becomes interventionist, but also whether their aggregate hint
at a communication process whose trajectory is different from that of Dominant
Communication. The following pages put together fragmentary notes on those
structures and processes of "the popular" which are associated with
projects of redefining and broadening the scope of "the political."
By problematising "Alternative Communcation," itself arising out of
anti-systemic politics, I will analytically demonstrate how this praxis
facilitates certain cultural practice in challenging the productive and
symbolic basis of dominant institutions of communication.
Alternative Communication as Cultural Practice
The term 'Alternative', taken conceptually rather than
literally, seems to have been first employed in the body of work now known as
"Development Studies." There seems to be as yet no precise
understanding, let alone even a broadly accepted definition, of 'Alternative'.
As a result, its connotations vary with themes, context, practitioners and
writers. Despite a theoretical incoherence and conceptual variance, this
notion has (been) travelled to many spheres of social sciences, finding its
way only recently in writings on culture and communication. Striking is the
way in which other concepts whose genesis can be traced to Development Studies
(such as 'Participatory' and 'Grassroot'), have been related with
'Communication'.
Contemporary Latin American and European efforts in the
sphere of culture and communication has been largely responsible for
conceptualising and emphasising such a perspective in our agenda. What one had
infered is that their understanding of 'Alternative' suggests a hybrid between
a present-day derivative of Gramsci's 'subaltern' and Brecht's notion of
"the popular"; both essentially symptomatic of an oppositional
tendency towards what the former called "the official world that has
emerged historically" (Gramsci 1977). This rich genealogy aside, the term
'Alternative' remains and will remain elusive as long as it fails to clarify:
 | whether it is suggestive of a rupture from historical
processes of communication, or is it part of a continuum of conflicting
articulations concerning the production and interpretation of social
reality?
| how it defines established processes and structures of
Communication it seeks to contend or transform?
| does it exclusively concern initiatives by progressive
coalitions or does it include cultural innovations by Fundamentalist and
Neo-Conservative forces as well? | |
One needs to, consequently, sieve through history as much
to (re)view the genealogy of Non-Dominant Communication, as to understand
political tendencies in Popular Culture to refine the notion of 'Alternative'
in the present context.
Understanding Communication as a process is to understand
the production of ideas and articulation of social relations. Historically,
the presence of Non-Dominant communication is indicative firstly, of an
ideological assertion of subjugated knowledge-systems; secondly, of
articulations which either "the System" cannot assimilate (i.e.
asystemic) or are confrontationist to its needs (i.e. anti-systemic); and
thirdly, of specific processes which have been peripheralised by the
politico-economic organisation of the Media-Culture industry. On its part,
Non-Dominant Communication is often said to consist of those practices whose
endogenous yet assimilative development have not conformed to the aesthetic
values and thematic criteria of Euromodernism; importantly, they are largely
sustained through an intrinsic local essence in addressing social issues of
the moment. This is evident in those articulatons of "the popular"
which are invariably clubbed under the umbrella term of "Folk
Culture."
However, equating "the Non-Dominant" with the
totality of "the Popular" is as much a methodological error, as
viewing "the Non-Dominant" to intrinsically fuel "the
Alternative," is an ideological one. For one, there are instances where
"the Popular" is so harnessed that it in fact (re)asserts elements
of dominance. In the first real boost to Hindutva's mass mobilization in the
late 1980s, one may recall, newspapers, radio and television did not
contribute significantly. Rather, it was achieved by appropriating the
traditional form of Yatra -- beginning from the Ram Janaki Yatra in
1984 to the infamous Rath Yatra of 1989. In a de-feudalizing society,
political processes pivoted around and projected through such decontextualised
idioms of popular culture proved 'successful'. For a significant period, the
degree and nature of this 'success' even overtook the consensus-building
potential of the electronic media, itself harnessed later by Hindutva in its
use of Video-vans. These mobile churches evoked "public opinion" by
screening films and other audio-visual products, heralding the birth of a new,
albeit reactionary, politicization of culture in India.
Similarly, there exist communication processes which
although are peripheral to the established norms of the Culture Industry, are
in their modes of social organisation surprisingly conformist. Take the case
of "Participatory Video," an exercice in Development Communication
which hitherto has been largely for the non-dominant and not by them. In most
case, this exercice is typified either by a top-down approach of participation
and/or is guided by the notion of "target groups" -- the phrase
itself being blindly borrowed from the advertising industry. [3]
Consequently, media interventions at the periphery despite being (relatively)
innovative in themselves cannot be ipso facto termed 'Alternative', as in
their instrumental use of the media and conventional social organisation of
communication they divers from the ideological basis of 'another' politics.
Keeping these in mind, how can our insights on history and
reflections on the present help in sharpening perspectives on
"Alternative Communication"?
At a rudimentary level, Alternative Communication concerns
social articulations which, in devising new practices in the media and
organically linked to processes redefining and broadening "the
political," challenge the monopoly of established modes of communication
(Stangelaar 1995). My inquiries reveal that what is being referred to as
Alternative Communication represents firstly, media interventions associated
with anti- and a-systemic processes concerning the politics of recognition and
redistribution; and secondly, ideologically revenant cultural innovations
within the mass media oriented towards affirmative or transformatory advocacy
(Parthasarathi 1997). On the face of it, these appear as two distinct
processes. While this is true in some instances, what is crucial to understand
is that both arise from varied degrees of opposition to the material and
symbolic basis of the systemic universals -- be it the State or the Culture
Industry. Since the Culture Industry essentially projects a particular mode of
producing and reproducing social life, the praxis of Alternative Communication
seeks to challenge this dominant mode of producing life. In other words,
Alternative Communication occupies itself, directly and indirectly, with
questioning the character of current economic activity and related political
structures, i.e. questioning the "discourse of Development" (Escobar
1984).
In this context, the entry of the underclass into
processes of Communication has signified not merely a change in social agents.
It has, more importantly, transformed their status from being consumers of
mass culture to the producers of a radical/competing popular culture; from
being the source of 'information' for the Culture Industry to proactive
subjects of counter-cultural words and images. Quite obviously, thus, the
present thrust of Alternative Communication also seeks to transform the social
organisation of various institutions of culture and communication from being a
minority political monopoly to majority social representation (Somavia 1982).
This demands that articulations therein be free to express themselves in a
non-standard 'language' inasmuch as they are an attempt at cultural
decolonization.
It is from such a perspective that one needs to view
interventionist tendencies in contemporary cultural practice. Only by
analysing its social basis and the political processes it is associated with,
would one be able to determine whether its existence -- as being simply
innovative or holistically counter-cultural -- resonates the praxis of
Alternative Communication. Before going further, however, two factors need to
be kept in mind.
Historically, communication processes independent of the
dominant sphere has been prevalent in different. Moreover, such processes have
varied with Identity such as class, gender and ethnicity as also with Space
viz. rural, metropolitan and now cyberspace. It is the technological wonders
of our present "information age" that have (once again) enabled the
production of outside the dominant sphere possible, even if it is to the
limited extent as existing today. Thus, at one level, alternative
communication reflects a mixture of pre-industrial and industrial modes of
communication.
Secondly, realising that Alternative Communication
involves strengthening a distinct ideological sphere should not blur the fact
that such an augmentation has been largely facilitated by adopting, and
adapting, the prevailing communication technology. Thus, at the analytical
level, most current practices in the alternative communication are essentially
superstructural innovations by cultural activists. However, neither should one
pessimistically infer that these efforts at Alternative Communication are too
benign vis-a-vis the all-pervasive mass media, nor jump to the conclusion that
the coming into being of a coherent politics of "alternative
communication."
In the immediate context, the notion of Alternative
Communication enables me to conceptualise the multi-dimensional links between
the politics of resistance and the emancipatory dimensions of the arts, the
media and cultural practice in general. An agenda for emancipation drawing on
the gamut of existing counter-cultural articulations can be said to have three
components: demystifying existing structures and mechanisms of the Culture
Industry; unifying cultural practices sharing common ideological
undercurrents; and submitting a constructive critique of the modes of
representation in such cultural practices.
Dominance and Cultural Practice
The ruling knowledge-system is most typified by
Television, as the electronic church has come to be the dominant mode of
producing the governing culture. The evolution of Television technology and
its economic organisation reflects a structuring of choices (Williams 1974).
During such structuring, priorities were fixed and a hierarchy was created
concerning the way in which society uses its collective resources for
individuals. Operating on the aesthetics of spectacle and dictated by the
economics of advertising, the television industry has increasingly come to
condition, if not explicitly regulate, the day-to-day life of individuals --
individuals who are simultaneously consumers and citizens. We live in a period
when an event is said to have 'occurred' only when 'reported' on Television (Parthasarathi
1991); the 'credibility' of a political perspective depends upon the media
'exposure' it gets. For me, media representation, especially that of conflict,
essentially draws on the politics of the remembered, the imagined and the
contracted. In a consumer society the imagery of "the popular" has
been created by the dominant media; and since this latter is invariably
associated either with the State or the Market, representation of "the
popular" thus constructed has been a depoliticised or apoliticised one.
Such representation needs to be consciously scrutinised and incessantly
challenged. Since the praxis of Alternative Communication is politically
benign without critique, endeavours at portraying conflict in Popular Culture
are incomplete without building a critical perspective.
That upmarket issues such as Deep Ecology find prominence
in the Mass Media, and consequently impact pop music, art and televison
documentary, substantiates my belief that in the 'packaging' of conflict lies
the key to the politics of representation. Take the case of gender politics.
Rejecting its earlier view of women's movements being a reflection of western
ideology, the mass media in India has come round to providing space for
collective efforts against the oppression of women. Yet in bringing such
"women's issues" under its umbrella, the mass media shies away from
questioning patriarchy, the supremacy of the monogamous family and sexual
preference. What we see, thus, is the dominant media instrumentally employing
"women's struggle" to project an apparent ideological pluralism and
political liberalism.
On the other hand, despite the peripheralisation of
subordinate modes of communication is taking place this very moment, Popular
Culture associated with the underclass is vibrant in India. However, in
instances where such traditions of culture and communication continue to be
associated with a technology and social organisation of its very specific
milieu, such practices are portrayed as being a remnant of the past. A
historical analysis of the peripheralization of such institutions of Popular
Culture reveals otherwise. That the processes and structures of such media run
contrary to dominant values, ideological propositions and organisational norms
of the Culture Industry, is what makes them appear 'backward' or
'anti-modern'. In other words, since technology interacts in different ways
with society as also with pre-dating modes of communication, it is the
techno-industrial base of the mass media that have defined its pre-eminence
relative to other (pre-dating and contemporary) institutions of culture and
communication. This explains why local cultural practices, overshadowed as
they are by the Mass Media, appear archaic and lacking in dynamism.
Popular Culture, especially that whose social base lies in
the agrarian underclass, over a period of time gets meshed with the dynamics
of the mass media market. Typically, such local practices get absorbed firstly
into the national and thereafter into the global Culture Industry -- it is
another matter that once absorbed, they get redefined in terms of a dominant
style by the Culture Industry. Of course, on searching hard one does find
instances where social actors associated with Popular Culture choose to remain
peripheral to the Culture Industry, as they realise their essence being in
addressing local aspirations in situ. Of mention here is the case of Bhangra
which has over the years been transformed from being a local cultural form to
being the darling of metropolitan Punjabi popular music. No coincidence that
it was a cultural form originally associated with a community richest
expatriate or migrant Indians. The complete marginalisation of local
institutions of culture and communication (the Phad-assisted ballade in Marwar)
or alternatively their transformation from being local institutions to being
monopoly industrial activities (such as Bhangra pop/cattle-market based
religious faire), is essentially the challenge beckoning popular culture in
India.
The glut of folk-pop in Indian and abroad together with
the related birth of "World Music" in recent years may seem to
indicate a wider number of people having access to, and being producers of,
popular music. For me, this perfectly illustrates the biggest paradox
concerning media technology in our times. On the one hand, we are in era where
we have the technology to democratise communication in a manner unimaginable a
century ago. On the other hand, the biggest hurdle to the democratic social
organisation of communication, and therefore strengthening "the
Popular," is the corporate control of communication technology and over
media production. Hence, the belief that the technological possibilities
demonstrated within the Mass Media make it the privileged and most dynamic
terrain of Popular Culture, hides more than it reveals.
A more holistic perspective on communication technology
brings to light its three principal facets. Communication technology is
firstly Economics, in it being a product in itself as well as the raw material
for the creation of cultural products; secondly it is Knowledge, in itself as
also being an instrument for the further generation of knowledge either as
ideology or as culture; and finally it is Social Structure, as its production
and utilisation is defined by class, gender and race. [4]
One corollary is that dominant ideas governing
communication technology in their drive to universalize themselves,
effectively marginalize subordinate institutions of communication. For
instance, when optimists rejoice at TV reaching the villages and articulate it
as "the democratization of technology," they fail to mention that
the success of the Culture Industry is at the cost of a vibrant Popular
Culture -- back to the zero-sum game mentioned in the beginning. Moreover, far
from being neutral, Communication technology responds to the dominant
tendencies of societies and thus, mediate relations between individuals and
groups in a society. What satellite-TV has brought to the villages in the
subcontinent in the 1990s is a Mass Culture produced and governed by a
national, increasingly transnational, industrial minority. Such a critical
conceptualisation concerning television's inroads into society, thus, uncovers
the ideological packaging of what media-optimists choose to label "the
democratization of technology." In fact, even the proto-history of
communication in the previous century indicates that the very trajectory of
technological innovation was determined either by its business application (Laing
1991), or by the need to maintain a social structure (Ghose 1995). [5]
Attention has often been drawn to innovative applications
of communication technology in a Participatory manner, which it is alleged
runs contrary to the media industry. A case in point is the social application
of video technology towards the varied practices clubbed under Development
Communication. At the face of it, video technology has been employed towards
the self-expression of the voiceless and marginalised. In celebrating the
alleged contribution of such Participatory Video what is often pointed out is
the degree of innovation and novelty in the social application of dominant
technology. However, to begin with, an innovative application of technology
does not in itself reflect emancipatory tendencies in cultural interventions.
What is crucial is that besides portraying 'alternative' imagery, video
activism involves questioning the legitimacy of dominant representation as
also exposing the institutional process delivering this dominant imagery (d'Agostnio
& Tafler 1995:xvii). Efforts in Participatory Video have invariably come
round to being exercices for the underclass and not by the underclass, as
mentioned before. Moreover, the notion of Participation itself is being
harnessed by Industry (in office-managment and labour relations) (Waterman
1988) and by the State (such as Panchayat Raj). Consequently, not only is a
radical epistemological shift required in the notion of participation, but, if
and when it is achieved, such participation would constitute but one aspect of
democratising communication processes.
Moreover, the three aforesaid facets of technology impart
every means of communication a content, an ideological content, which is a
function of its primary social objective. This substantially lays down the
range of priorities concerning the utilisation of communication technology. In
other words, what needs to be realised is that the socio-economic origin of
communication technology substantially defines its principal application (Hamelink
1986).
Having said this, are we to infer that these origins are
so 'loaded' that they outweigh any significant alternative, i.e.
un/non-intended, social application of communication technology?
Resistance and Cultural Practice
To begin with, one needs to begin by moving away from
simply elucidating either the applications of communication technology in
general or, the character of Non-Dominant media in particular. In recognising
that communication technology under certain circumstances may contribute to a
movement away from dominant norms of representation and established modes of
organisation, one realises that the means and mode of communication provide a
framework of possibilities and parameters within which political processes
operate. Thus, perspectives on Alternative Communication must focus equally on
the political and economic arenas which contextualise Non-Dominant
Communication, i.e. the related functions to which they are applied, the modes
of representation its enables and the manner in which these are socially
organised.
In their efforts at challenging the material and symbolic
basis of institutionalised systems of dominance, contemporary Social Movements
are said to be redefining and widening the nature and scope of political
processes. [6] These
changes in their articulation of "the political" reflect in their
mode of communication: practices consisting of a selection, modification
and/or opposition to Dominant Communication. Communication processes
associated with social movements in India have moved away from relying
entirely on the dominant (mass) media; in the process they have often
succeeded in creating distinct ways in which communication processes are
socially organised, going well beyond traditions of the agitprop (Sanghvai
1997). Since social movements take place at the "intersection of culture,
practice (both collective and everyday) and politics," they equally
reflect efforts at creating alternative frameworks of meaning (Escobar
1992:396). In many ways, therefore, at the heart of anti-systemic movements in
general is the issue of representation which directly relates to information,
communication and cultural practice. This explains cultural innovations in
movements concerning folk songs, painting and puppetry in their campaigns, as
also trace unions building further on their ricin history of street-theatre. [7]
One may add that the evolution of such alternative modes of communication and
representation is not only endogenous to a Movement, but is equally realised
between various modes of organisation, be they Autonomous Groups,
Coalition-groups, and Unions, towards common strategic orientations.
Like the varied processes which constitute anti-systemic
politics in general, instances of critical media interventions can be found in
the 'cracks' within, or on the margins of, the Culture Industry. Illustrative
of this are the handful of news agencies, journals and publishing houses
operating within the dominant sphere, and despite the economic constraints, of
the media industry (Butalia 1993). To strike a balance between the need for
affirmative voices from within the mass media to strengthen the politics of
recognition and the importance of independent articulations to foster the
politics of redistribution, has been indeed difficult. For, firstly, some such
initiatives have a tense relationship with the larger Media-Culture Industry.
Nevertheless, despite the presence of cooptive universals, there is every
reason and need to harness available space within the conservative democracies
of today. Secondly, it has been observed that initiatives rooted in furthering
citizens politics, itself beset with internal contradictions, are often unable
to contribute towards the creation of an alternative culture of discourse (Sethi
1997). For me, only when critique is realised as a state of consciousness,
that the production of 'culture' (be it as image, text or sound) could be able
to contribute towards a larger conscientization. Finally, before celebrating
cultural interventions by anti-systemic movements and complementary
innovations outside their fold as a definitive process of Alternative
Communication, one would like to recall that most such 'interventions' have
been, and largely remain, at the superstructural level. Nevertheless, in
oppossing the foundations of Dominant Communication they represent a varying
degrees of challenge to systemic norms. What is significantly, however, is
that some such processes have sought to prevent the reproduction of structures
of dominance -- equally, through their modes of representation as through
their social organisation of communication.
It has been difficult for me to discern why the 'modern',
especially when Euro-American in origin, is considered instrinsically superior
and therefore desirable. At the other end, are propositions to revive social
institutions, and therefore cultural practices, in the name of preserving
tradition. Being well aware of the contradiction between living heritage and
social transformation, which more often than otherwise emerges as an apology
for the status quo, one is far from soliciting the preservation of certain
streams of cultural practice, either as tradition per se or as exotica for
display. For me, if any medium of communication is unable to retain its
capacity to reflect changing social aspirations, the vitality of the medium
undoubtedly ceases to prevail. Instead of a short-sighted preservation of,
say, Folk Culture as a space for articulations by those forgotten in the
electronic era, my emphasis on "the Popular" is oriented towards a
critical rejuvination of subordinate knowledge systems.
A deeper analysis reveals that the influence of
institutions of culture and communication is essentially a product of
competing knowledge systems, and only thereafter of competing technology. That
televison appears to have influenced the adoption of fertilizers by farmers is
indicative first and foremost of the success of the discourse of Modernization
(agriculture dependent on canal irrigation, on HW seeds and of course chemical
fertilizers), and only therafter of broadcast technology and programmes on
agriculture through it. (Krishi Darshan). After all farmers have taken to
fertilizers in regions where television is still inaccessible to them!
Resultantly, a perspective on Popular Culture rooted in Alternative
Communication must highlight political processes concerning a critical
rejuvenation of subordinate and/or dormant knowledge-systems. Thus, only those
interventions in Popular Culture which either pivot around a critical
rejuvenation of subordinate knowledge systems towards facilitating the
assertion of peoples rights, can be regarded as initiatives in Alternative
Communication.
The right to inform and be informed implies that the
vertical dispensation of knowledge to consumers by those who have access and
means to produce it should give way to a beneficial exchange through
horizontal, dialogical interaction -- each individual or community being at
the same time a provider and receiver of experiences. Those who discharge
specialised functions should become aware of this political requirement and
their own learning process should reflect this need. Although processes of
Alternative Communication involve practices in different media as also across
a variety of social subjects, they are invariably directed at the creation of
a Public Sphere: a socio-cultural common which stands distinctly from the
institutions and norms of the State and the Market.
Throughout history the village square, chai-shops,
grain- mandis and street corners, have been the space for debating
political happennings and societal gossip. From an aggregate of many such
encounters developed what some call "public opinion," which was
oriented variously towards consensus-building or reaffirming dominant norms.
In other words, the historical public sphere provided a milieu in which
politics and social values came to be framed. Of course, at different times in
history this public sphere excluded different individuals and communities
based on class, caste and gender; it neither provided for a dialogue based on
equity, nor did it shape all aspects of social life. What is equally important
to realise important, however, is that such public spheres did indeed
contribute their share of dissent and criticism against dominant social
articulations.
With the proliferation of radio, television and satellite
broadcasting, the social role and political importance of such public spaces
has changed drastically. They have either been peripheralised to various
extents or have ceased to be the primary locus of political debate and
cultural production. While both the State and citizens alike are still getting
attuned to what is essentially a market-driven publicness (such as in
broadcasting), the latest avatar of publicness (the Internet) is already being
promoted as one that will not only broaden the terrain of popular culture but
also redefine the scope of democratic processes in the next century.
What needs to be recognised is that the nature of cultural
practice within the electronic and virtual public spaces have their own logic,
own ways of forming public opinion and distinct ways of constructing social
relations, as compared to the historical, pre-mass media, public spaces. It
has been observed that new sites of publicness such as television, due to
their intrinsic techno-cultural form and techno-economic organisation, have
contributed more towards isolating individuals rather than bringing them
together (Corner 1995:12-15). Moreover, the social organisation of
communication shaping the electronic public sphere have led to a wider terrain
and covert forms of mediation. The caste/class divide, the biggest hinderance
to interaction in the pre-industrial public sphere, has been compounded by
institutions of broadcasting and Computer-Mediated-Communication (CMC). This
has not only created another caste/class divide based on limited access and
participation but has superimposed such divides on the apex of prevailing
socio-political stratification. In influencing the production and
representation of 'culture', these factors set limits to the emancipatory
character and interventionist potential of the public sphere in the evolving
digital era.
Although they break with traditional forms of social
articulation, this break is primarily at the level of technology (the means of
communication) and not necessarily with prevailing modes of representation and
of social organisation of communication. Therefore, the social context and
economic parameters within which 'new', dominant public spaces are operating,
share with predating communication technologies (printing and broadcasting)
stratification based on access, participation and 'language'. If the
electronic church of the day, i.e. television, has become the hallmark of
dominance, how sure can we be for a church in the making, i.e. the Internet,
especially when the latter is fragmenting on the one hand, and stratifying on
the other!
Nevertheless, one should recognise that technologies such
as DTH transmission and CMC are something new, and their effects on
anti-systemic politics do not have historical precedents. Moreover, their
specific social applications have demonstrated that they could be employed as
a means to question the State (through counter-information campaigns) as also
challenge private property (by redistributing organised knowledge).
Recognising ways in which political discourse has been mediated in the
electronic era, and we need to act on the possibilities this 'new' publicness
might provide in terms of decentralisation and dialogue -- all through keeping
in mind that they continue to be largely guided by access to 'technology',
viewed here in terms of both a machinery and a language.
Consequently, we must examine changes in technology, their
economic organisation and related cultural practice, together with the
character of the public sphere they create, without either a euphoria for the
'new' or a nostalgia for the 'traditional'. Only a thorough understanding of
communication processes unfolding in an aggregate of 'traditional' and 'new'
publicness in general, will facilitate critical and collective interventions
being integrated with larger anti-systemic forces.
We have arrived at a situation where institutions of
culture and communication are being absorbed by the techno-organisational
complex of a consumerist Culture Industry, which reproduces them in a
homogenous and homogenising manner. Simultaneously, cultural practice is being
relocated by the State seeking to construct and impose a fabric akin to a
National Culture. Towards attaining their respective forms of conformism, both
the State and the Market tend to subvert diversity and dissent which has been
an intrinsic character of cultural practice.
If cultural practices associated with larger anti-systemic
processes is envisaged within the terrain of the Public Sphere, then the
praxis of Alternative Communication would constitute the 'playing-field' of
this terrain. However, it is through a certain political tendency that
cultural practice in general is able to articulate a critique of the
historical present. As long as the alternative communicaton as a political
praxis is able to retain its capacity to reflect the urges and aspirations of
antisystemic processes, it will maintain its political dynamism. In the quest
for coherently realising the elusive 'Alternative', the plethora of
communication processes and cultural practices are an experience to be acted
upon -- both, critically and constructively, as in practice in theory.
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[2] about "symbolic
content," see (Thompson 1995:23-24); about "mass medium," see
(Corner 1995:14-15)
[3] For contrasting
approaches to the use of video, see (White & Patel 1994; Sarkar &
Agarwal 1997).
[4] Ekocrantz [$check name]
(1986) adds that technology is 'politics', i.e. a power structure and a
bureaucracy system, as well. For me, this is an extension of the above three.
[5] For observations on the
inter-relationship between political control and knowledge-systems concerning
the telegraph in the same period, see (Choudhury 1999).
[6] One of the earliest
writings on such political process is (Kothari 1984). Subsequently, a variety
of scholars, commenting on different regions, have commented upon such 'new'
politics from varying theoretical perspectives. For a conceptual framework on
contemporary social movements, see (Fuentes & Frank 1989). For an overview
of social movements in the South, see (Wignaraja 1993). Specifically on the
Indian scenario, see (Omvedt 1994).
[7] For critical
self-reflections by a theater activist, see (Deshpande 1997).
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