Precarious Viewing: Film and Television Consumption within Jhuggis

Author: Aiza Hussain

 

Abstract

 

This paper examines the importance of film and television within jhuggi settlements in Lahore—urban environments that lack even basic amenities such as water, electricity, and sanitation—including the practices and social formations that emerge around them. Lahore, as one of Pakistan’s largest urban centers, has been sprawling for decades now, and transformations have occurred to the extent that individuals visiting Lahore after extended periods have failed to recognize parts of the city. Within what may be seen as favorable growth, the emergence and eviction of these jhuggi settlements has been a constant feature. I posit that these communities, while often deprived of the most essential of facilities, and considered temporary by virtue of their settlements’ precarity, have developed ways to establish a sense of belonging within their designated yet prone to uprooting spaces. Moreover, I argue that film and television play an integral role in this establishment. Through this research, screen viewership within these settlements was studied in great detail. Here I focus on the physical characteristics and infrastructure of these spaces, the residents’ attitudes towards media narratives, and their access to and consumption of kinds of media. This research also addresses the linguistic aspects of these films and the gendered dimensions of viewership practices. Overall this research seeks to unfold the meaning media narratives hold for these communities, and how screen narratives seep into their lived realities. By examining the entwinement of media narratives with their lives, this paper demonstrates the role film and television must play in creating a sense of belonging, community, aspiration and, most importantly, home in an otherwise precarious shanty setup.

 

Keywords

 

Precarity, Informal Settlements, Urban Ethnography, Reception Studies, Viewing Practices