Brought to life by the voice : playback singing and cultural politics in South India / Amanda Weidman.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Weidman, Amanda J., 1970- author.

Series:

South Asia across the disciplines

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Motion picture music--India, South--History and criticism.

Motion picture music.

Musical films--India, South--History and criticism.

Musical films.

Musical films--Social aspects--India, South.

Singing in motion pictures.

South India.

Genre:

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Physical Description:

xv, 248 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm.

Place of Publication:

Oakland, California : University of California Press, [2021]

Summary:

"To produce the song sequences that are central to Indian popular cinema, singers' voices are first recorded in the studio and then played back on the set to be lip-synced and danced to by actors and actresses as the visuals are filmed. Since the 1950s, playback singers have become revered celebrities in their own right. Brought to Life by the Voice explores the distinctive aesthetics and affective power generated by this division of labor between onscreen body and offscreen voice in South Indian Tamil cinema. In Amanda Weidman's historical and ethnographic account, playback is not just a cinematic technique, but a powerful and ubiquitous element of aural public culture that has shaped the complex dynamics of postcolonial gendered subjectivity, politicized ethnolinguistic identity, and neoliberal transformation in South India"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: pt. I PREHISTORIES

1. Trading Voices: The Gendered Beginnings of Playback

pt. II PLAYBACK'S DISPENSATION

2. "A Leader for All Song": Making a Dravidian Voice

3. Ambiguities of Animation: On Being "Just the Voice"

4. The Sacred and the Profane: Economies of the (Il)licit

pt. III AFTERLIVES

5. The Raw and the Husky: On Timbral Qualia and Ethnolinguistic Belonging

6. Anxieties of Embodiment: Liveness and Deadness in the New Dispensation

7. Antiplayback.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 225-241) and index.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons CC-BY-NC-ND license. To view a copy of the license, visit: http://creativecommons.org/licenses

Other Format:

Online version: Weidman, Amanda J., 1970- Brought to life by the voice

ISBN:

9780520377066

0520377060

OCLC:

1201662324