Talk:Hindi cinema/Archive 7

Hindi Cinema
Bollywood is not just a part of Indian cinema, it is even just a part of Hindi cinema. Hindi movies are made all over that world. Calling it as whole hindi cinema is as misleading as calling Hindi as a national language. --Onef9day (talk) 23:43, 25 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Explain please? I mean, Bollywood is just a common name for Hindi cinema. Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  09:41, 27 January 2010 (UTC)


 * No, Bollywood is Bombay + Hollywood, and it's the cinema industry centered on Bombay/Mumbai. It's a community (often intermarried) with an interesting history, common institutions, and characteristic cinematic styles. The language is actually Hindustani and the community is mixed Hindu-Muslim (with generous doses of Christians and Parsees/Iranis).


 * It's as if you were to say that Hollywood is the English-language film industry. It also is a lot more than that (for one thing, for many years it was significantly more Jewish than the rest of the US). Zora (talk) 05:05, 8 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Good point Zora. Shahid you have an email. ‡ Himalayan ‡  ΨMonastery 20:42, 8 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, you're right. But no, the language is not Hindustani - it is Hindi. Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  07:40, 8 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Some people, on both sides of the Indo-Pak border, have aggressively asserted that Hindi and Urdu are different languages. The impetus is political: we don't speak THEIR filthy language. Moreover, there has been a lot of pressure to push Hindi (the dialect) towards a Sanskritized vocabulary, and Urdu (the dialect) towards an Arabo-Persic vocabulary. But linguists, as opposed to nationalists, say that Hindi and Urdu are merely dialects of Hindustani and that in their colloquial forms (everyday as opposed to literary or government speech) they are close to identical. (Closer, indeed, than my Western American English is to Glaswegian English, which I find close to incomprehensible.) The fact that they are written in different scripts doesn't make them different languages. To repeat a point that I made above, Turkish did not become a new language when the Young Turks decreed that it be written in Roman rather than Arabo-Persic characters. Note the WP article, Roman Urdu, which discusses the use of Roman characters to write Urdu/Hindi/Hindustani. Shorn of distinctive scripts, the division between the "languages" collapses.


 * See also the WP article on diasystem. Politically-driven will to turn dialects into languages isn't just a South Asian phenomenon. There's a linguist joke that runs, "A language is a dialect with an army." Conversely, nations can insist that they speak one language, for political reasons, when linguists would say that several languages are spoken -- for instance, China insists that there is a "Chinese" language, whereas linguists will point out that Cantonese and Mandarin, for instance, are mutually incomprehensible.


 * Shahid, you keep pointing to popular works that distinguish between Hindi and Urdu and you ignore the work of linguists, who are after all the experts on language. You write as if only words you don't understand, or can confidently identify as Arabo-Persic loan words, can count as Urdu, and ignore the many thousands of words that are shared by Hindi/Urdu/Hindustani. Why this WILL not to see the similarity and mutual comprehensibility? Zora (talk) 09:17, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not one of those "some political people", I'm not a nationalist, I'm a human being like you and I believe you have blood and feelings just like I do. Urdu is beautiful, but the languages are not identical, though similar. In any case, Bollywood is Hindi cinema, not Urdu. Urdu is used in Hindi films, and it can be mentioned.

Shahid •  Talk 2 me  16:22, 9 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Shahid, you believe that your impressions have more weight than the conclusions of linguistic scholars and professors? On what grounds do you reject expert studies? Zora (talk) 20:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)


 * It is unfortunate that this is becoming so antagonistic and unpleasant. No, I have no impressions. I'm going according to the majority of the sources. If you make a simple Google search through Google Scholar, you will see how many hits "Hindi cinema" gets as compared to "Hindi-Urdu cinema". Most of the sources cited by editors here still support the fact that Urdu is a language which is used in Hindi films, but the language itself is Hindi. Same with IMDb, with every possible newspaper or book. I can't see how citing a few sources can override what is cited by the majority of the sources or can invalidate what is known to be common and official. Film certificates universally (with a few exceptions of course) identify Bollywood films as Hindi. What argument do you have against that? I cited books which prove that the use of Urdu in Hindi films is minor, which discuss its decline in recent years, which speak of English taking its place, yet everyone feels convenient to ignore them. Sources which claim Hindi films to be actually Hindi-Urdu films remain a speculation since they contradict what is known as official. Had Bollywood not been the Hindi-language film industry, it would not have been so widely known as Hindi cinema. Let me just ask you the same question, on what grounds do you reject Encyclopedia Britannica and all the millions of reputable sources which refer to and describe the film indutry as Hindi? Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  20:18, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

If I google "Chinese language" I get more than 99 million hits. Nonetheless, linguists who study Chinese languages do not believe that there is ONE Chinese language, but rather a family of languages, some mutually incomprehensible. Popular misconceptions and verbal shorthand do not outweigh expert opinion. (PS, I've moved Himalayan Explorer's comment up to the thread where it logically belongs; I don't want anyone to believe that he expressed his approbation of ALL my remarks.) Zora (talk) 23:54, 9 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Again, we are discussing that is not relevant. The similarity between Hindi and Urdu does not matter here, and you almost totally ignored my entire message. BTW, expert opinions remain opinions, they do not become facts. The major consensus is that it is the Hindi film industry. We cannot change that. The films are officially Hindi on their certificates. Milions of sources have it as Hindi, there are sources which have disputed over those experts' opinions. You think we have a misconception. And maybe it's you? You reject official film certificates. On what basis? Why would you call "Encyclopedia of Hindi Cinema" a popular misconception? It's just your POV, it cannot change facts, it cannot change what is known as official and what is so widely common. Saying that an industry is actually in another language is a speculation. Speculations can be mentioned, not mentioned as facts. And I'm not willing to discusss what's Hindi and what's Urdu again. You may find a better place to discuss it. Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  09:05, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Note: This side discussion is directly related to the main discussion here. An effort was made to merge all of these discussions into one for easy readability but this effort was stymied by Shshshsh (Shahid). In my opinion, it would be helpful to place all comments relevant to this discussion in the linked section so those new to the discussion will have easy access to all the relevant comments. Thanks for your comments everyone, AnupamTalk 16:40, 11 February 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree with Zora about Bollywood not being the entire of Hindi cinema. Good point, and very interesting. That makes Bollywood a genre then, and not an industry, or a place, or bound by a language or a geography. It's a genre of Hindi cinema that is considered "mainstream". Does this call for a revision then of the introduction to Bollywood? 120.62.39.136 (talk) 17:53, 28 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I, too, agree that Bollywood has become more of a genre of Hindi cinema that is considered mainstream, but if so, would we have to just separate it into two articles, one Hindi cinema and the other Bollywood? Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  21:48, 28 December 2011 (UTC)
 * That would be silly. Bollywood films are made in Hindi/Hindustani. They come in various genres; also, some are commercial and some are more indie. But no one has ever suggested (nor have I ever suggested) that there is a Bollywood film industry AND a Hindi film industry, as separate entities. Nor would there be any reason to split the article into two. What we do see is terminological variation, with some people preferring "Hindi" to "Bollywood" as the name of the industry (either because they want to stress the language aspect, or because they think the term Bollywood is imitative and crass) and some people preferring Bollywood. I just did a google search on various terms. Bollywood gets 71,000,000 ghits; "Hindi movie" gets 26,600,000; "Hindi film" gets 13,700,000, "Hindi cinema" gets 1,670,000. On many of the sites that show up on such a search, both terms (Bollywood and Hindi movie/film/cinema) are used. Bollywood, however, seems to be the clear winner in terms of usage. Zora (talk) 04:37, 29 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Sure, I agree. Actually the thing I was trying to convey is the fact that Bollywood is not a genre. If it was, there would be a need for two separate articles. Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  17:02, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from Wehokid, 3 January 2011
Bollywood popularity in South America is pretty strong especially countries like Suriname and Guyana. Suriname has over 8 televisions in Hindi based languages alone and showing Hindi films several times a day. Hindi video store is a huge business especially in the capital city of Paramaribo, and second capital Nickerie. Popularity of the Hindi movies is due to the 40% North Indian diaspora who still speak Hindi dialects. Guyana on the other hand is pure English speaking but to an amazement people watch Hindi films with or without subtitles, Guyana has a majority of Indian Diaspora covering about 60% of the population, Hindi movies are a high demand and even though TV channels are in English, Hindi movies are shown regularly. Just like Suriname Guyana has a big market for Hindi films. Both these countries gets visits from celebrities from India preforming Hindi Musical concerts, Artists so far included Sonu Nigam, Sharukh Khan, Juhi Chawla and a lot more.

Wehokid (talk) 17:50, 3 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Not done. Needs sources to back up the claims. Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  21:43, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Bollywood is definitely very popular in South America especially spanish speaking countries like Peru,Mexico,Uruguay,Brazil.Infact the Bollywood movie "Kites" was shot keeping in mind especially this market in mind,where the lead actress Barbara Mori is a well known face in Mexico and popular through the spanish speaking regions.The lead actress Barbara Mori in this movie infact spoke only in her native languare -Spanish.Dhoom 2 was shot in Rio and a scene for Robot was shot in Machu Pichu in which Rajnikanth danced with Aishwarya Rai. In August 2010, Priyanka Chopra was in Rio for shooting the show, 'Fear Factor'.Shah Rukh's TV game show "Zor Ka Jhakta", which went on air in Argentina on feb 2011,(The name of the Show in Argentina was - "wipe Out") is also a factor reaffirm these growing bonds.

The Brazilian model Giselle Monteiro's debut in Bollywood in the movie Love Aaj Kal was also widely publicised by the Brazilian media.From bindis to Ganesh idols, the Indian flavour is becoming popular among the locals, thanks to the Brazilian soap opera "Camino das Indias" that ran for eight months in 2009 on Brazilian Globo.Another craze in Latin America is Bollywood dancing, which was a hit during the festivals of India in 2009 and 2010 in Buenos Aires. And people have also started taking Indian films seriously.he video rental stores in Buenos Aires have a number of Bollywood films. The Indian film shows during the last three Festivals of India attracted long queues of Argentines and the Embassy had to extend the film festivals for about a month.The facebook of the embassy has messages from Argentine girls asking about Shah Rukh and Salman Khan. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Surajitdas01 (talk • contribs) 08:35, 3 December 2011 (UTC)


 * ...and still no source. BollyJeff  ||  talk  13:10, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from Jdraper1, 25 January 2011
The second paragraph is missing a needed comma. It says "It is common to see films that feature dialogue with English words phrases, or even whole sentences."

It should say "It is common to see films that feature dialogue with English words, phrases, or even whole sentences"

Jdraper1 (talk) 04:33, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Done thanks! Qwyrxian (talk) 06:22, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Sub-Genres
I would like to see more discussion on genres within Bollywood, perhaps even including a new article listing Bollywood movies by genre (rather than only having the current list by year). Too many people talk about Bollywood as if it is an indivisible genre, as if all Hindi movies look the same. How about some mention of historical epic dramas, action, comedy, etc.? — al-Shimoni  (talk) 08:56, 24 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Yabbut a lot of them ARE masala movies, with action-romance-comedy-song-dance all mixed up. Makes it hard to categorize. However, I could see a section on Bollywood and genre that would start by pointing that out, then perhaps point to a separate article with lists of films that lean heavily in the direction of one genre or another. Mythologicals, historicals, Muslim socials, underworld, horror, comedy come to mind. Also films that use common tropes: double roles, identical twins separated at birth, reincarnation, revenge on the guy who hurt your family. Zora (talk) 23:41, 25 June 2011 (UTC)


 * And a lot of them are not. Actually, the majority of recent Hindi movies cannot be called masala. Gone are the days when every film had song and dance and different genres within a single picture. Today everything is rapidly changing. Filmmakers start concentrating on one single genre. And there have always been non-mainstream films as well. Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  05:13, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Peru - South America
The paragraph about South America is untrue and incomplete. Bollywood cinema is widely popular in Peru and it was a boom during the 70's and 80's in that South American country. Movies like Joker or Boot Polish were a huge success all over the country, and in Lima, until the beginning of the XXI century, there were at least 2 movie theaters completly devoted to Bollywood movies (the City Hall and the Metropolitan). 190.232.82.1 (talk) 19:55, 28 June 2011 (UTC) Armando Pattroni

please correct
Can anybody correct this with reference, 3rd paragraph of section History which reads.
 * In 1937, Ardeshir Irani, of Alam Ara fame, made the first colour film in Hindi, Kisan Kanya. The next year, he made another colour film, Mother India. However, colour did not become a popular feature until the late 1950s. At this time, lavish romantic musicals and melodramas were the staple fare at the cinema.'

It says Kisan Kanya was made in 1937 and next year he made Mother India, where as Mother India was released in 1957. Regards --Omer123hussain (talk) 00:44, 23 August 2011 (UTC)--Omer123hussain (talk) 00:45, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
 * According to Mother_India_(disambiguation), there were other films with this name in the 30's, so maybe its true. I will just remove the link to the wrong film for now. BollyJeff  ||  talk  02:40, 23 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks --Omer123hussain (talk) 08:59, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Name Bollywood
The article introduction read as below:
 * Bollywood is the informal term popularly used for the Hindi-language film industry based in Mumbai (formerly known as Bombay), Maharashtra, India.

where as section etymology says:
 * it has its own entry in the Oxford English Dictionary.

well in this case we should remove the word informal term from the introduction and replace it with some suitable sentence. regards--Omer123hussain (talk) 08:57, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
 * It is indeed an informal term and that's what Oxford says. Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  09:10, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Editing is not vandalism
A newish user made changes to the article; Shahid (Shshsh) reverted them. I undid his reverts. He left a message on my talk page telling me: Next time you revert, I will report you on ANI.

Shahid, go ahead. I would like to see you make a case for not allowing anyone but yourself to edit the article when it comes to the Hindu/Urdu/Hindustani issue.

Sorry, I have not had time to do a rewrite of the article that gives this issue the space that it needs. BOTH views need to be presented: scientific linguistics and linguistic nationalism. That's the Wikipedia way. It is not OK to declare one POV false and not to be mentioned in the article. Zora (talk) 00:22, 24 December 2011 (UTC)


 * First of all, I'm not Shshsh, I'm Shshshsh. Secondly, I said much more than what you just quoted, so please do not try to misrepresent it. I do not own this article, so I'm not here to allow anything to anyone, but you don't either. My edits were in accordance with policy. I'm frankly fed up of seeing you accuse others of nationalism and of all the negativity you bring to the editing of this page.
 * Now, I welcome everyone who edits Wikipedia, but everyone must adhere to policy, otherwise the article may never progress. Such bombastic claims as "enormous film empire" and "Stars, rather than plots, were often the driving force behind the films" (which were added by the user in the lead!) just sound terrible to me, in addition to being unsourced (can they be sourced at all?), while you added them back calling them "reasonable" and in the process took the liberty of changing info that is sourced. How come? And it's not just that, there is also one huge block added in the first section, which is full of original research, and you just added it back. Ever heard of WP:OR or WP:CITE? I did explain why I reverted the edits, citing policy, but you reverted me because you personally find the other edits reasonable and because you see some "nationalism". Any logic?
 * The introduction has been this way for years, and the language of a film industry (which you just removed) is indeed the first thing that a reader should see (particularly when it comes to India, in which every film industry is sorted by language, basically).
 * And to remind you, this article is about cinema, not "scientific linguistics and linguistic nationalism", I'm not here to serve anyone's agenda. That Bollywood is a term used to refer to Hindi cinema and that Hindi is the lingue franca of the film industry is not even debatable, and we never even argued over it in the previous discussions (which concerned scripts). You have the best source one can ask for, Britannica's "Encyclopedia of Hindi Cinema", supporting it right there. You have film certificates which officially acknowledge Hindi as the language of Bollywood films, and a list of bibliographic works all of which call it Hindi cinema. That's what the lead must represent. You also have the use of Urdu mentioned and elaborated in the article. What else do you want? I think everything is clear. What is overlooked according to you?
 * It is not the first time you revert my edits on this page, and it's not just content, it is the fact that you have formed some negative opinion of me so you cannot trust them. I find it unacceptable. I work daily on articles and try to improve them to the best of my abilities. Seeing someone come every once in a while to revert an edit of mine without proper justification and then disappear for another month is just not done. My problem is the addition of nonsense to the article, which you have just supported. Shocking. Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  00:53, 24 December 2011 (UTC)
 * In the past, I have seen other editors attempt to add information and references on the topic but they too have been reverted. I too, agree with User:Zora as I feel that both sides of the issue should be represented as there are references that support the alternate position of Hindustani being the lingua franca of film industry. I do not have a whole lot of time now but I will try to work more on this issue later, potentially in the summer. With regards, AnupamTalk 01:12, 24 December 2011 (UTC)
 * That would be great if you would, but everything of this sort should be fair and should be agreed upon by others, so remember that. The lingua franca is not Hindustani, it is Hindi, at least according to the view of the great majority. Every possible film has a certificate which has the line - "language - Hindi" even if the movie later has an Urdu script (and today they almost do not), and most books you can see on the net refer to Bollywood as Hindi cinema, even if they later discuss the presence of Urdu (and most say, "the presence of Urdu in Hindi films... well). So that's what I believe we should do as well, as even you yourself have called it an alternate version; it is mentioned on the article (as you can see, "Urdu is often used in film titles, screenplay, lyrics, the language of love, war, and martyrdom") and I'd like to see it expanded, but I would strongly oppose to biased editing aimed to reflect the minority view as a common fact. Urdu has been used but its presence has been dying and it's been facing a decline over the years, that's another thing that should not be forgotten. Today it's more present in films like Jodhaa Akhbar, and basically English has been becoming more present in Hindi film dialogue. In the end, Bollywood is the term used to refer to Hindi cinema, as everyone calls it, not Urdu, not Hindi-Urdu and not Hindustani. Thanks, Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  11:51, 24 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Even if the "great majority" of Indians and Pakistanis believe that Hindi and Urdu are separate languages. linguists say that they are indistinguishable at the level of everyday speech. So, we present both views. That's the Wiki way. That's why I need to do a rewrite of the article to bring this issue out in the open, rather than fighting over stray words and phrases here and there. Also, the article is cluttered and nigh unreadable. A lot of the stuff here needs to be broken out into other articles and then linked. I just haven't had the TIME. Perhaps during these holidays ... Zora (talk) 19:19, 24 December 2011 (UTC)
 * "A lot of the stuff here needs to be broken out into other articles and then linked." - that's something I agree with, and I'm planning to do it soon, once I'm done with an article I've been working on. Regarding what linguists say, you first need to cite sources for it and discuss it if it might cause controversy amongst the editors here - that's the wiki way. Many Hindi movie-goers would need subtitles to watch a full-fledged Pakistani film in Urdu, many books about Hindi cinema discuss its presence in Hindi films. If these languages were practically the same, there would be no need to do it, and for that matter, there would be no need to make this devide, calling one Hindi and one Urdu - there's a blend - called Hindustani. Watch Umrao Jaan and Mughal-E-Azam to hear it. If you want to present both ways, do remember that there's a weight that each side must be given. And mind you, this article is about the film industry, the films, not linguistic research. The latter would rather belong in articles about the language. Thanks, Shahid  •  Talk 2 me  21:24, 24 December 2011 (UTC)