Cinema and Karachi in the 1960s
Cinema and Karachi in the 1960s
Cultural Wounds and National Cohesion
This chapter examines the use of cinema to promote an agenda of a common national identity and cohesiveness among Karachi's ethnically diverse population. Focusing on the 1960s, it argues that Karachi had gained some distance from partition by that decade, and that the ethnic-and Islam-based politics of today has still not overwhelmed the city's social life. The chapter begins with an overview of the religious facet of Muslim nationalism in Pakistan before turning to a discussion of urban planning in Karachi and Pakistan's cultural politics, along with the linguistic and cultural diversity underlying the claims of Muslim nationalism. It then looks at the cinema-going habits of the family of Zeenat Hassam, a journalist and author based in Karachi, by offering a reading of the film, Behen Bhai (1968). Within the context of Behen Bhai, the chapter discusses the social changes that Karachi (and Pakistan) witnessed during the postpartition years as well as the question of national unity during the rule of the military strong man Ayub Khan.
Keywords: cinema, national identity, Karachi, partition, Muslim nationalism, Pakistan, cultural politics, cultural diversity, Behen Bhai, national unity
California Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs, and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us.
