From The Peopling of New York City

this is nice, Eliza. Good for you for getting the clips.

One question--why does she (I assume this is a young woman after the fashion reference) buy her music online not at a store? If so much is available online, what do the music stores in Jackson Heights sell? Are they feeling a pinch? Is it worth asking them?

I am also still curious about how this music is used--individual consumption on You-tube? Group get-togethers? Watched/listened to as part of the original movies? It seems to me that these songs have no separate existence apart from the movies, so that movie-watching and music video watching are part of the same pattern of experience. Is the music ever just listened to alone?

And what does consuming this type of entertainment have to do with identity? It seems to me this stuff is an acquired taste--you have to have grown up on it to enjoy it--for all the claim that it is popular in other parts of the world. Furthermore, it seems to me that watching the dance sequences is often as/more important than listening to the music itself.

In looking at these clips, I am also struck by the persistent mixing in of Western and traditional motifs, both in the music and in the visuals. For instance the song from " Kutch Kutch kotai hai" is danced in a setting that is Western European and one of the actresses wears Western clothes. In "Kah ho na ho" the clothing and dancing are traditional (well--intended to evoke Indianness and tradition) but the dance moves are heavily MTV and some of the words are English. "Devdas" with its "traditional dancing" opens to jazz. What do young, Indian-American viewers make of this? Are they even aware of it? Certainly the filmmakers are making a bid not only for the Westernized yearnings of young South Asians but also for the attention of young South Asian-Americans. How aware are young viewers? best, Hanna Lessinger