India’s State-Run Media

Indias State-run Media presents a new perspective on broadcasting by bringing together two neglected areas of research in media studies in India - the intertwined genealogies of sovereignty public religion and nation in radio and television and the spatiotemporal dynamics of broadcasting into a single analytic inquiry. It argues that the spatiotemporalities of broadcasting and the inter-relationships among the public religion and nation can be traced to an organizing concept that shaped Indias late colonial and postcolonial histories - sovereignty. The book contends that studies of television have glossed over the meanings experiences and practices of the religious in televisual narratives and viewers interpretations of television programs. Drawing on the philosophical writings of Paul Ricoeur and Michel Foucault connecting their ideas with media cultural and religious studies it examines cultural discourses power relations repertoire of meanings social events etc. in broadcasting in late colonial and postcolonial India.