ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the complex articulation of socioeconomic and representational context, star role and discourse around childhood in Hindi cinema. It delineates the role and position afforded to child stars in the Hindi film industry of the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s. The chapter outlines the literature on Hindi film representations of childhood to build a case which suggests a gradual but steady exclusion of representations of working-class childhood and ideals of economic justice from the popular cinematic oeuvre. It suggests that changes in India's media landscapes in the decades following economic deregulation may be a factor that connects–and even goes way towards explaining–changes in the status of child performers and representations of children. The chapter considers the star role of the child actor in terms of representation, pointing to the connections between the increasing exclusiveness of child performance and the staging of a new consumer childhood nested in neoliberal and religious chauvinist narratives typified by the new Bollywood.
