Cassette Culture: Popular Music and Technology in North India by Peter ManuelReview by: Rahul Peter DasJournal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 115, No. 2 (Apr. - Jun., 1995), pp. 357-359Published by: American Oriental SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/604723 .

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Reviews of Books Reviews of Books

line of continuity from the sacrificial religion, without resis- tance. Renunciation became the organizing principle of the dharma literature, Olivelle argues, only gradually, and in the face of clear opposition. Olivelle's work, thus, helps add com-

plexity and nuance to our understandings of the transitions from Vedic to classical religiosity.5

One small point on which this reader would like further

clarification, particularly because of its intriguing nature, con- cerns the relationship between the wilderness and the cities,

during the crucial era of intellectual ferment after the fifth cen-

tury B.C.E. In Olivelle's discussion of the social environment of the upanisadic period, he associates the rise of an ascetic ide-

ology with urban centers, even though the transmission of the

upanisadic collections themselves may not have been carried out in cities at all, but in the wilderness (n. 90, p. 61). Was this urban brahmanical enthusiasm for the life of a forest monk similar to the zest with which many city dwellers in our own so-

ciety rush to Outward Bound adventures, or even champion the

preservation of wilderness areas they will probably never see?6 Were the ascetic ideals actually taught in wilderness settings, or were the urban brahmins of Olivelle's reconstruction merely idealizing? More attention to the chains of geographical influ-

ence, where possible, would render this part of Olivelle's argu- ment even more convincing and fascinating.

The Asrama System is a brilliant book, one that will change the way scholars of Hinduism think and teach, not only about the dsramas and their development within the context of the

emergence of classical Hinduism, but also about the benefit of

using indigenous traditions of hermeneutics for understanding change in India.

RACHEL FELL MCDERMOTT

BARNARD COLLEGE

5 For additional discussion of the Heesterman-Dumont di- vide, and Olivelle's comments thereon, see Olivelle's Samnyasa Upanisads, 19-29 and 68-71.

6 I am grateful to my colleague, Charles Hallisey, who sug- gested this ingenious parallel.

Cassette Culture: Popular Music and Technology in North In- dia. By PETER MANUEL. Chicago Studies in Ethnomusicology. Chicago: UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS, 1993. Pp. xix + 302. $52 (cloth); $22 (paper).

In the author's own words, "this volume is a study of the impact of cassette technology on popular music in North India"

line of continuity from the sacrificial religion, without resis- tance. Renunciation became the organizing principle of the dharma literature, Olivelle argues, only gradually, and in the face of clear opposition. Olivelle's work, thus, helps add com-

plexity and nuance to our understandings of the transitions from Vedic to classical religiosity.5

One small point on which this reader would like further

clarification, particularly because of its intriguing nature, con- cerns the relationship between the wilderness and the cities,

during the crucial era of intellectual ferment after the fifth cen-

tury B.C.E. In Olivelle's discussion of the social environment of the upanisadic period, he associates the rise of an ascetic ide-

ology with urban centers, even though the transmission of the

upanisadic collections themselves may not have been carried out in cities at all, but in the wilderness (n. 90, p. 61). Was this urban brahmanical enthusiasm for the life of a forest monk similar to the zest with which many city dwellers in our own so-

ciety rush to Outward Bound adventures, or even champion the

preservation of wilderness areas they will probably never see?6 Were the ascetic ideals actually taught in wilderness settings, or were the urban brahmins of Olivelle's reconstruction merely idealizing? More attention to the chains of geographical influ-

ence, where possible, would render this part of Olivelle's argu- ment even more convincing and fascinating.

The Asrama System is a brilliant book, one that will change the way scholars of Hinduism think and teach, not only about the dsramas and their development within the context of the

emergence of classical Hinduism, but also about the benefit of

using indigenous traditions of hermeneutics for understanding change in India.

RACHEL FELL MCDERMOTT

BARNARD COLLEGE

5 For additional discussion of the Heesterman-Dumont di- vide, and Olivelle's comments thereon, see Olivelle's Samnyasa Upanisads, 19-29 and 68-71.

6 I am grateful to my colleague, Charles Hallisey, who sug- gested this ingenious parallel.

Cassette Culture: Popular Music and Technology in North In- dia. By PETER MANUEL. Chicago Studies in Ethnomusicology. Chicago: UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS, 1993. Pp. xix + 302. $52 (cloth); $22 (paper).

In the author's own words, "this volume is a study of the impact of cassette technology on popular music in North India"

(p. xiii). We learn about the history and workings of the cassette

industry in this region, as well as about what it is that these cas- settes disseminate. Though one of the most popular products of the cassette industry, namely Hindi film songs, is duly noted and

discussed, the main focus of the work is not on Hindi film mu- sic, as such, but, rather, on what is mostly, but not only, by na- ture music. As it is, the advent of the audio cassette, a relatively inexpensive medium for reproducing and disseminating aural information, has made it possible for aural material formerly hard or impossible to obtain to be relatively easily obtainable, even by poorer segments of the population. Moreover, it is now

possible to cater to the needs of relatively small groups and still turn a profit, and this has, according to the author, not only rev- olutionized listening habits in South Asia, but is also having widespread impact in the social and political spheres. Any vis- itor to South Asia is sooner or later confronted with the ubi-

quitous cassette (so impossible to overlook in the many shops in which it displays itself in its often rather garish garb) and/or its contents (more often than not in the form of loud and mer- ciless acoustic onslaught), but few have probably spared more than a passing thought on the place it occupies in modern South Asian society. This book sets out to examine just that.

Its style is what I would call 'journalistic', and the readership it seems primarily aimed at seems not to be expected to have much knowledge of South Asia. This precludes any in-depth analysis (historical or cultural) of both the "great tradition" and the "little traditions" in which much of the material discussed

(especially "devotional" and "folk" music) is rooted; not only would the readership probably soon have lost interest, but, judging from the few sporadic forays the author makes in this

direction, this would moreover also have been to the detriment of the work as a whole.1 He does however try his hand at the

theorizing and generalizing that seems so popular in much of North American socio-anthropological literature. Most of this, in the opening part of the book, is however a bore. But once one has realized that much in this preliminary part, by nature of in- tense theorizing and discussion of various theories, as well as the quotations from and references to "authorities" strewn in

every now and then, is more like the lettuce leaves serving to

garnish a dish and can safely be put aside without any adverse effects, and once one has become used to the author's leftist rhetoric (which gradually disappears in the course of this book)

1 Obviously, no recourse to primary material can be expected

in such a context and publication, but even the sporadic second-

ary material quoted is highly selective and confined to a few works, which scholars who are not primarily North American

socio-anthropologists may not necessarily find to be very reli- able. Even this material seems not always to have been utilized

properly; thus one is startled to read that "in 1972, Milton Singer coined the terms 'Great Tradition' and 'Little Tradition'" (p. xiv).

(p. xiii). We learn about the history and workings of the cassette

industry in this region, as well as about what it is that these cas- settes disseminate. Though one of the most popular products of the cassette industry, namely Hindi film songs, is duly noted and

discussed, the main focus of the work is not on Hindi film mu- sic, as such, but, rather, on what is mostly, but not only, by na- ture music. As it is, the advent of the audio cassette, a relatively inexpensive medium for reproducing and disseminating aural information, has made it possible for aural material formerly hard or impossible to obtain to be relatively easily obtainable, even by poorer segments of the population. Moreover, it is now

possible to cater to the needs of relatively small groups and still turn a profit, and this has, according to the author, not only rev- olutionized listening habits in South Asia, but is also having widespread impact in the social and political spheres. Any vis- itor to South Asia is sooner or later confronted with the ubi-

quitous cassette (so impossible to overlook in the many shops in which it displays itself in its often rather garish garb) and/or its contents (more often than not in the form of loud and mer- ciless acoustic onslaught), but few have probably spared more than a passing thought on the place it occupies in modern South Asian society. This book sets out to examine just that.

Its style is what I would call 'journalistic', and the readership it seems primarily aimed at seems not to be expected to have much knowledge of South Asia. This precludes any in-depth analysis (historical or cultural) of both the "great tradition" and the "little traditions" in which much of the material discussed

(especially "devotional" and "folk" music) is rooted; not only would the readership probably soon have lost interest, but, judging from the few sporadic forays the author makes in this

direction, this would moreover also have been to the detriment of the work as a whole.1 He does however try his hand at the

theorizing and generalizing that seems so popular in much of North American socio-anthropological literature. Most of this, in the opening part of the book, is however a bore. But once one has realized that much in this preliminary part, by nature of in- tense theorizing and discussion of various theories, as well as the quotations from and references to "authorities" strewn in

every now and then, is more like the lettuce leaves serving to

garnish a dish and can safely be put aside without any adverse effects, and once one has become used to the author's leftist rhetoric (which gradually disappears in the course of this book)

1 Obviously, no recourse to primary material can be expected

in such a context and publication, but even the sporadic second-

ary material quoted is highly selective and confined to a few works, which scholars who are not primarily North American

socio-anthropologists may not necessarily find to be very reli- able. Even this material seems not always to have been utilized

properly; thus one is startled to read that "in 1972, Milton Singer coined the terms 'Great Tradition' and 'Little Tradition'" (p. xiv).

357 357

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Journal of the American Oriental Society 115.2 (1995)

and his harping (which too gradually disappears later on) on the undemocratic nature of the music produced and disseminated

by oligopolistic entities and the democratic, grass-roots nature of smaller and regionalized producing and marketing entities, one discovers that this work is quite enjoyable and has a lot of

very interesting information that it-rather surprisingly, given the author's obvious biases (which he himself makes no at-

tempts to hide, p. xv)-mostly presents in a manner that may be termed 'differentiating', and even critical of several of his own beliefs put forth in the preface (e.g., "undemocratic" musical culture is not always necessarily harmful, whereas "demo- cratic" musical culture is not always necessarily beneficial).

All in all, the book makes not only quite interesting, but also

enjoyable reading. We learn how cassettes are manufactured, recorded and distributed, how not only the legitimate, but also the huge pirating industry (often difficult to differentiate from the former) functions, how artistes are won and treated, etc. The individual genres of cassette recordings and their target groups too are analyzed, in some cases more or less superfi- cially, but in others quite thoroughly; the social impact of what is disseminated is also studied, but with too much generaliza- tion. This latter is indeed one of the weaknesses of this work, a weakness it shares with many modern works which study South Asia from a socio-anthropological point of view-

namely the tendency to generalize on a rather limited and lo- calized (both in space and in time) data base. Thus, though the

study is roughly confined to the Doab and immediately adjoin- ing regions, even here it being only the Braj area which is thor-

oughly studied (the Garhwali cassette market, too, comes in for some closer scrutiny), and though, given the dearth of really re- liable data, much of what is presented in the book is anecdotal or based on a scattering of interviews, i.e., highly personalized, the author more often than not generalizes his gleanings from this material to write not only about "North India" (which in it- self is bad enough), but about "India" in general. The reader would thus do well to take the book's analyses and conclusions cum grano salis.

The Dravidian south is expressly left out in this study, as also

are, apart from some remarks on pp. 186-88 and some sporadic references in other parts of the work, east and west India- which is probably all for the better, as the remarks on the latter

regions are quite superficial, notably, the remarks on Bengal that show great unfamiliarity with the subject (as well as, seem-

ingly, total ignorance of the music industry in Bangladesh). The

Punjab and Rajasthan are slightly better represented, but basi-

cally the author's "North India" is what in official Government

parlance is the "Hindi speaking area." This terminology is un-

critically accepted by the author, and we thus find diverse lan-

guages of North India which have the misfortune to be written in the Nagari script today classed as "dialects" of Hindi in this

work, too. In this connection, the map on p. 36 is most inter-

esting. On it we find, distinct from the "Hindi language group,"

a "Rajasthani" language-which is a misnomer too, since there is no such single language, but several languages spoken in

Rajasthan, often dubbed "dialects"; one may here note the row caused by the word "Bihari" in a similar context, even though George Abraham Grierson, who publicized it, actually meant it to refer generically to a group of languages and not to a single "standard" language of which these languages were "dialects." Not only does this parallel spring to mind when one sees the

map on p. 36, but things get even more complicated when one reads there that Marwari is classed as a dialect of the "Hindi

language group" (whatever that may then be), as are also all the

(Magadhan) languages of Bihar, as well as those of Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh. This will, of course, be much to the liking of Hindi chauvinists, but is defi-

nitely not valid linguistic terminology. At least "Hindi lan-

guage group" is a slight improvement over "Hindi" alone, but it would be much appreciated if non-linguists, too, became more sensitive to this issue and did not blindly follow the official terminology of the Central Government.

Though in the beginning of the book we are given the im-

pression that the cassette industry is marked, on the one hand, by large corporations promoting Hindi film music and, on the

other, by small, often tiny, businesses promoting other sorts of

cassettes, in the course of the study one learns that such dis- tinctions cannot always be made. To this reviewer, it seems rather that the main distinction we should make is between mu- sic forms aimed at a non-regional audience (not only Hindi film

music, but also bhakti and gazal) and those aimed at smaller

audiences, regional or otherwise specialized (e.g., Punjabi lorry2 drivers); it seems to be this distinction which leads to different sorts of development, whoever the producers of the cassettes may actually be.

However, any criticism, though valid, should not detract from the very substantial merits of this book. No one who has

gone through it will lay it down without having been greatly benefited by the wealth of diverse material presented here. Es-

pecially the descriptions of regional genres, whether these be devotional or ribald, if not to say lewd, and the discussion of the difficulties one attempting to classify these often encounters3 are highly interesting, as are all the depictions of cassette cov-

2 The author uses the American "truck." 3 On the other hand, in some cases one would have wished

for more differentiation on the part of the author. Thus the 'bor-

rowing' of existing tunes for Hindi film songs is certainly not

"parody," and neither is such 'borrowing' for other songs "par- ody" unless these songs truly be of parodistic nature, i.e., a

burlesque imitation, in which popular tunes are given funny texts, which also provoke feelings of mirth because they pur-

posely stand in marked contrast to the known original texts

accompanying the tunes.

358

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Reviews of Books

ers, some of them risque and of a grossness that is bound to star- tle those (and their numbers are still quite large) who tend to see India as the land of spiritualism and deep thoughts. If there is one thing this book makes clear, it is that the cassette revolution has allowed that part of South Asia which many regard as the 'real' South Asia-namely the not or only superficially West- ernized and largely rural or small-town population-to articu- late itself and make its weight felt in a manner which even a few decades ago would have been deemed impossible, in this par- alleling the development in other spheres, particularly the po- litical. In this context I may also remark that the author seems to hold that one of the adverse effects of the cassette revolution has been to foster a "vulgarization" and "machoization" of the

popular taste; I would however submit that this is only partly true, for, like it or not, the cassettes seem to be but mirrors of this other South Asia, which does seem basically to be "vulgar" and "macho," at least according to the standards of middle class

gentility and of modern Western scholars. A topic on which this book touches only briefly is the use of

the cassette as a medium for propagating political and other

messages, not only through music. Given the increasing impor-

tance of this sort of usage in ongoing (and often violent) strug- gles on the Indian subcontinent, the subject deserves its own,

in-depth study, as becomes very clear when one reads about one

particularly hideous example of such use of cassettes, namely the instigation of deadly riots in Agra (p. 255):

The police seized some audio cassettes, which screamed

slogans inciting both communities, it was reliably learnt. The cassettes started off with 'Allah-ho-Akbar' then 'Jai Shri Ram', followed by bachao-bachao (Help, help!) and maaro-maaro (Kill, kill). These were played by Maruti car stereos at full volume in the dead of the

night. The unidentified cars would zip off into the dark-

ness, leaving behind two panic stricken and suspicious communities, who would then begin screaming and

pelting stones at each other.

RAHUL PETER DAS

MARTIN-LUTHER-UNIVERSITAT, HALLE-WITTENBERG

359

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