For almost half a century, the Miss India competition has been a prominent feature of Indian popular culture, influencing, over time, the conventional standard for female beauty. As India participates increasingly in a global economy, that standard is gradually being shaped by forces beyond the country’s borders. Through the unexpected lens of the 2003 beauty pageant, Susan Dewey’s Making Miss India Miss World examines what feminine beauty has come to mean in a country transformed by recent political, economic, and cultural developments.

How does Sushmita Sen remain poised and confident? What is Madhu Sapre's secret recipe for perfect skin? How does Neha Dhupia deal with bad hair days? What are Lara Dutta's make-up tips to look youthful? Answering these and many more questions, How to Look Like Miss India is a practical guide by Sathya Saran who was on the core team of the Femina Miss India Contest for several years. In this book she brings you helpful, easy-touse tips and advice from Wendell Rodricks, Ambika Pillai, Dr Jamuna Pai, Mickey Contractor and many others. The people who turned Sushmita Sen, Aishwarya Rai and Priyanka Chopra into superstars reveal industry secrets that create the winning formula. From making your skin glow to choosing clothes that flatter your body type, this is the book you need to read whether you want to be Miss India or your very best self

Through micro-analysis of language use, this book chronicles young women's pathways to becoming a Tanzanian beauty queen, offering an original perspective on the intersection of language with globalization, nationalism, and inequality in urban East Africa. This compelling linguistic ethnography considers the real-life effects, both on- and off-stage, of language policy, education, and gender dynamics for the women competing in the pageants. While highlighting many contestants' struggles for escape from poverty and patriarchy, the book also emphasizes their creative strategies – linguistic and otherwise – for bettering their lives and shows how people living in a global economic periphery take part in, and sometimes feel left out of, the wider world.

The Nigerian beauty pageant industry positions itself as working to symbolically restore the public face of the nation while seeking to materially shift the private lives of affiliates on the ground.

At a time of significant change in the precarious world of female individualization, this collection explores such phenomena by critically incorporating the parameters of popular media culture into the overarching paradigm of gender relations, economics and politics of everyday life.

SOON TO BE A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE. Jennifer Hosten went to the 1970 Miss World pageant on a lark, representing the tiny Caribbean island of Grenada, and came home with the crown and a place in history. What was supposed to be a light-hearted affair, with a parade of the world's most beautiful women vying for the attention of the judges and comedian/host Bob Hope, turned out to be the most controversial, politically-charged, and consequential pageant ever. Women's liberation activists blew up a BBC broadcast truck and stormed London's Royal Albert Hall in an attempt to sabotage the show, which they deemed a "cattle market." They threw rotten vegetables in the auditorium and hit Bob Hope with a flour bomb. When order was restored, Jennifer Hosten made history as the first women of colour to win the title. The broadcast introduced its massive audience to both a militant new brand of feminism and a new ideal of beauty, one in which the whole world could share. Ms. Hosten followed her triumph with a successful career as a diplomat and public servant in Grenada and Canada. Her book tells the stories of the epochal 1970 contest and her life with grace and an amused modesty. Her story has been purchased by the makers of The Crown and is the basis for Misbehavior, a 2020 film starring Keira Knightley. Rising British actress Gugu Mbatha-Raw, who plays Jennifer Hosten, is contributing a foreword to the book.

Asian Popular Culture in Transition examines contemporary consumption practices in South Korea, China, India, and Japan, and both updates and extends popular culture studies of the region. Through an interdisciplinary lens, this collection of essays explores how recent advances and shifts in information technologies and globalization have impacted cultural markets, fashion, the digital generation, mobile culture, femininity, matrimonial advertising, and a film actress’ image and performance. Drawing upon a diverse range of sources and methods including historical research, content analysis, anthropological observation, textual analyses, and interviews, Asian Popular Culture in Transition makes a significant contribution to this growing area of research. Given its broad range of countries, theories, and approaches, this book will be of great interest to students and scholars of Asian studies, cultural studies, media and communication studies, and gender studies.

This Handbook brings together leading interdisciplinary scholarship on the gendered nature of the international political economy. Spanning a wide range of theoretical traditions and empirical foci, it explores the multifaceted ways in which gender relations constitute and are shaped by global politico-economic processes. It further interrogates the gendered ideologies and discourses that underpin everyday practices from the local to the global. The chapters in this collection identify, analyse, critique and challenge gender-based inequalities, whilst also highlighting the intersectional nature of gendered oppressions in the contemporary world order.

Containing almost 250 entries written by scholars from around the world, this two-volume resource provides current, accurate, and useful information on the politics, economics, society, and cultures of India since 1947. With more than a billion citizens—almost 18 percent of the world's population—India is a reflection of over 5,000 years of interaction and exchange across a wide spectrum of cultures and civilizations. India Today: An Encyclopedia of Life in the Republic describes the growth and development of the nation since it achieved independence from the British Raj in 1947. The two-volume work presents an analytical review of India's transition from fledgling state to the world's largest democracy and potential economic superpower. Providing current data and perspective backed by historical context as appropriate, the encyclopedia brings together the latest scholarship on India's diverse cultures, societies, religions, political cultures, and social and economic challenges. It covers such issues as foreign relations, security, and economic and political developments, helping readers understand India's people and appreciate the nation's importance as a political power and economic force, both regionally and globally.

This book explores the meanings of nationalism in a post-globalization, postcolonial context. It provides an in-depth understanding of the relationship between marginalized groups, media and politics by a focused study of the Telangana movement in India. Events like the Arab Spring, unrest in Myanmar and Ukraine, and the Brexit, Kurdish and Catalan referendums have proved how catalytic the changing media environment has been in reshaping the nature of resistance and social movements. Based on the author’s ethnographic research, this book examines how marginalized groups engage with the media and their community to participate in political processes. Analyzing public meetings, folk performances, pamphlets and media reports of the Telangana movement, the author reflects on the cultural notions of nationalism and the politics of state formation in the post-colonial context. This volume also evaluates the role of students and intellectuals in contemporary social movements and in uniting the discontents of globalization. Highlighting intersections of performativity, geography and justice, this book examines changing articulations of identity and everyday forms of resistance. It will be useful for students and research scholars interested in media and communication, cultural studies, political sciences, ethnic and minority studies and sociocultural movements in India.