ABSTRACT
The primary trope of Panjabi performing arts, traditionally the domain of performing castes like baazigars, bhands, mirasis and other categories of naqqal artists, is naqqal. This chapter establishes naqqal as a legitimate Panjabi trope for disrupting political and cultural authority through examining two new Bhangra mutants, namely Bhangrapop and Bollywood Bhangra. It shows how the Bhangrapop performer appropriates both Western pop and traditional Bhangra through the deployment of naqqal strategies to disrupt both dominant and (non)dominant authority by engaging with the discursive category of difference that is mimicry, "almost the same but not quite". Though Daler Mehndi is often dismissed as a naqqal in Panjab, it is Mehndi, rather than Gurdas Mann, who may be truly credited with crossing the linguistic barrier and nationalizing Bhangra. One of the main tropes Bollywood Bhangra inscribes is the enactment of family bonding and love and Indian family values.
