Marginalized Identities: Dimensions, Perspectives, and Problems
Chapter

Interrogating the Look: Representing Indigeneity in Indian Cinema

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  • Dr. Aparna Singh
Dr. Aparna Singh
Assistant Professor, Department of English, Diamond Harbour Women’s University

Published 03.07.2026

Keywords

  • Representation,
  • Adivasi women,
  • Indian cinema,
  • nation

How to Cite

Singh, D. A. (2026). Interrogating the Look: Representing Indigeneity in Indian Cinema. Loreto College Academic Press, 9–23. Retrieved from https://loretocollegeacademicpress.com/index.php/lcap/article/view/3
Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

Abstract

The representation of Adivasis and tribal communities in Indian cinema has long mirrored the ideological anxieties of the nation-state, oscillating between romanticised otherness and fearful alterity. Indian cinema, particularly mainstream Bollywood and regional industries, has historically rendered indigeneity through lenses shaped by caste, class, and nationalist ideologies, often flattening the diverse experiences of tribal communities into essentialised tropes of primitiveness, victimhood, or militant resistance.

DOI - https://doi.org/10.66496/LCAP.9788168710108.2026.9-23

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