The concept of folk (or lok in North Indian languages) has become an essential part of public discourse in contemporary India that is used to mark social identity and an authentic relationship to place. This musical ethnography explores the contours and consequences of the contemporary folk music boom in Uttarakhand while tracing the influences of colonial, nationalist, and post-colonial ideologies on current conceptualizations of folk music and on various approaches to “folklorizing” musical practice. Like the better-documented process of classicization, folklorization necessarily entails the ... More

The concept of folk (or lok in North Indian languages) has become an essential part of public discourse in contemporary India that is used to mark social identity and an authentic relationship to place. This musical ethnography explores the contours and consequences of the contemporary folk music boom in Uttarakhand while tracing the influences of colonial, nationalist, and post-colonial ideologies on current conceptualizations of folk music and on various approaches to “folklorizing” musical practice. Like the better-documented process of classicization, folklorization necessarily entails the silencing and purging of undesirable, polluting, low-status bodies and musical elements from particular performance traditions. Recasting Folk documents the ways in which reformers have sought to create value for folk traditions by turning to processes of codification, adaptation, and exclusion. The book also illuminates the lives of artists whose opportunities to succeed in the vernacular music industry have varied on the basis of their caste, class, and gender positions. By moving beyond the village to examine interconnected contexts of production in recording studios, state festivals, and literary texts, this text challenges long-entrenched understandings of the folk concept in South Asia.