ABSTRACT

Working to interpret overlapping layers of media and culture in Mira Nair’s film Monsoon Wedding (2001), this paper focuses on what new media theorists call “transcoding” – a convergence of layers of media, technology, and culture that generates new layers of meaning. In The Language of New Media (2002), Lev Manovich describes transcoding as one of the most substantial outcomes of the computerization of media. For Manovich, the “ontology, epistemology, and pragmatics” of technology influence the “organization,” “emerging genres,” and “contents” of the cultural layer (2002, p. 63). Monsoon is an example of postcolonial convergences that include culture and technology, and in this essay we explore transcoding in Bollywood and Hollywood film genres. We argue that Nair refashions elements of previous films, a process in new media theory known as “remediation,” borrowing from and transforming existing media (Bolter and Grusin, 2000, p. 49). These two principles of new media – transcoding and remediation – that relate to cinematic intertextuality are important in understanding the entry of Indian cinema into a globalized cultural economy. 1