ABSTRACT
Young Muslim women in the bustees of Kolkata negotiate considerable risks to live more self-directed lives and participate in a Bollywood-inspired youth culture. This book reveals their risky struggles for self-determination in a globalising India, where traditional resources for identity formation are not straightforward and are rapidly changing (Buckingham 2008). Examples of both external and internal risk, and how young women navigate through them have been detailed. In Chapter 3 we see young women negotiate physical violence to participate in a key element of perceived global youth culture – Bollywood dance. We see this participation was temporary and highly restricted. In Chapter 4 young women participate in haram premarital relationships, without confirmed prospects for marriage. Chapter 5 shows young women opportunistically indulging in middle-class consumption culture with boyfriends and friends. Throughout the book we see youth making choices about how to live their lives, and the backdrop here is a pan-Indian youth culture where middle-class aspirations, higher education and higher status, are read by many bustee youth as ‘cool’ and desirable.
