Jaipur • New Delhi • Bengaluru • Guwahati • Kolkata
Punjabi popular music has transcended the linguistic boundaries in
terms of popularity in recent times and several Punjabi singers have become
household names in India and abroad. By experimenting with the emerging western
styles through fusion music it has taken the music industry by storm in India.
However, the cultural roots of Punjabi music have continued to be unchanged
with minor refinements.
The present work treats culture as a flowing river and based on
the premise that the modernity, as it is conceived in the capitalist mode of
production marked by mass consumption, may not necessarily transform the music
by making the already existing musical tradition redundant. On the other hand,
governed by the profit orientation of mass circulation, the same musical
traditions are modified to cater to the needs of masses at wider scale. In the
already existing paradigm established through the stories of epic romances,
such as Heer-Ranjha and Mirza-Sahiban, the contemporary Punjabi music continues
to reinforce the same by refining and modifying the modes of representation.
Introduction
Caste and Religion as Reflection of Punjabi Society and Culture
Traditions of Music and Singing in Punjab
Love as Violence and Devotion
Punjabi Popular Music
Songs, Music and Singers
Women through Words and Music Videos
Masculinity and Two Forms of Love: All about Men's Songs
Inventing New Tradition of Singing: Moosewala Trapped in Jat
Masculinity: Dalit Popular Music
Trapped in Jat Masculinity: Dalit Popular Music
Paramjit
S. Judge is the retired Professor of Sociology from Guru Nanak Dev
University, Amritsar. He has been actively engaged in social research for four
decades. He has worked and published in the areas of social movements,
political sociology of development and social exclusion, sociological theory
and diaspora studies. He is also an eminent Punjabi novelist. He served as President
of the Indian Sociological Society. He was also the Dr B.R. Ambedkar National
Fellow of Indian Council of Social Sciences Research, New Delhi.
