Professor Rachel Dwyer
BA (London) MPhil (Oxon) PhD (London)
Overview
Department of the Languages and Cultures of South Asia
Professor of Indian Cultures and Cinema
Centre for Music and Dance Performance Research
Member, Centre for Migration & Diaspora Studies
Centre of South Asian Studies
Member, Centre of South Asian Studies
Centre of Jaina Studies
Member, Centre of Jaina Studies
Centre for Media and Film Studies
Associate Member, Centre for Media and Film Studies
Centre for Cultural, Literary and Postcolonial Studies (CCLPS)
Member
Centre for Migration and Diaspora Studies
Member
- Name:
- Professor Rachel Dwyer
- Email address:
- rd3@soas.ac.uk
- Telephone:
- 020 7898 4294
- Address:
- SOAS, University of London
Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1H 0XG - Building:
- Russell Square: College Buildings
- Office No:
- 457
- On Sabbatical:
- 2012-13, Terms 1 & 2
- Website:
- http://www.racheldwyer.com
Biography
Rachel Dwyer is Professor of Indian Cultures and Cinema at SOAS, University of London.
She took her BA in Sanskrit at SOAS, followed by an MPhil in General Linguistics and Comparative Philology at the University of Oxford. Her PhD research was on the Gujarati lyrics of Dayaram (1777-1852). She teaches undergraduate and postgraduate courses in literature, cinema, Gujarati and Sanskrit.
She has published nine books, several of which are on Indian cinema. She has recently completed ‘Beyond the boundaries of Bollywood: the many forms of Hindi cinema’ , co-edited with Jerry Pinto (Oxford University Press, Delhi) and is currently writing Bollywood's India: Indian cinema as a guide to modern India for Reaktion Books, London. She edits two book series on South Asian cinema: one with Oxford University Press, Delhi, the other with Indiana University Press.
Teaching
Courses Taught
- Cinema and Society in South Asia
- Directed Readings in the Literature of a Modern South Asian Language
- Gujarati Language 1
- Indian Cinema: Its History and Social Context
- Indian Cinema: Key Issues
- South Asian Cinema and the Diaspora (MA)
PhD Students supervised
- Chinmay Sharma, The Mahabharata re-constructed for Hindi and English publics: modernity and the 'national epic'
- Eleanor Halsall, German Orientalism, Indian Occidentalism: cinematic collaboration up to 1939
- Syed Asif Haider, Muslim Modernities on the Hindi screen
- Zebunnisa Hamid, New emerging film and television drama in Pakistan; imagining Identity in the nation, 2001 to present
Expertise
For help in contacting SOAS academics and advice on services to business and the community, please contact SOAS Enterprise on +44(0)20 7898 4837 or email enterprise@soas.ac.uk.
For all press and media enquiries please call +44 (0)20 7898 4956/4135 or email comms@soas.ac.uk
Available for
- TV
- Radio
- Press
- Briefings
- Short Term Consultancy
Regional Expertise
- South Asia
Country Expertise
Languages
Publications
Authored Books
Dwyer, Rachel (2013) Bollywood’s India: Hindi cinema as a guide to modern India. London: Reaktion. (Forthcoming)
Dwyer, Rachel (2008) What do Hindus believe? London: Granta.
Dwyer, Rachel (2006) Filming the Gods: Religion and Indian Cinema. Routledge.
Dwyer, Rachel (2005) 100 Bollywood films. London: British Film Institute.
Dwyer, Rachel and Patel, D. (2002) Cinema India. The Visual Culture of the Hindi Film. London: Reaktion Books. (Envisioning Asia)
Dwyer, Rachel (2002) Yash Chopra. British Film Institute.
Dwyer, Rachel (2000) All you want is money, all you need is love: sex and romance in modern India. Cassell (London).
Dwyer, Rachel (2000) The poetics of devotion: the Gujarati lyrics of Dayaram. Richmond: Curzon. (London studies on South Asia, 19)
Dwyer, Rachel (1995) Gujarati: a complete course for beginners. London: Hodder and Stoughton.
Edited Books
Dwyer, Rachel and Pinto, Jerry, eds. (2011) Beyond the boundaries of Bollywood: the many forms of Hindi cinema. New Delhi: Oxford University Press.
Dwyer, Rachel and Pinney, Christopher, eds. (2000) Pleasure and the nation: the history, consumption and politics of public culture in India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. (SOAS studies in South Asia)
Book Chapters
Dwyer, Rachel (2013) 'Bollywood's empire.' In: Chatterjee, Joya and Washbrook, David, (eds.), Routledge handbook of South Asian diaspora. London: Routledge. (Forthcoming)
Dwyer, Rachel (2013) 'Happy ever after: Hindi films and the happy ending.' In: Ssorin-Chaikov, Nikolai, (ed.), The topography of happiness from the American dream to postsocialism/ Топография счастья от Американской мечты к пост-социализму. To be confirmed. (Forthcoming)
Dwyer, Rachel (2011) 'Bombay Gothic: 60 years of Mahal/The mansion, dir. Kamal Amrohi, 1949.' In: Beyond the boundaries of Bollywood: the many forms of Hindi cinema. Delhi: Oxford University Press, pp. 130-155.
Dwyer, Rachel (2011) 'Zara hatke!: The new middle classes and the segmentation of Hindi cinema.' In: Donner, Henrike, (ed.), A way of life: Being middle-class in contemporary India. London: Routledge. (In Press)
Dwyer, Rachel (2009) 'Bimal Roy: a different kind of Hindi cinema.' In: Bhattacharya, Rinki, (ed.), Bimal Roy: the man who spoke in pictures. New Delhi: Penguin, pp. 162-171.
Dwyer, Rachel (2009) 'Ich mag es, wenn du zornig wirst: Amitabh Bachchan, Emotionen und Stars im Hindi-film.' In: Tieber, Claus, (ed.), Fokus Bollywood: das indische Kino in wissenschaftlichen Diskursen. Münster: Lit. Verlag, pp. 99-115.
Dwyer, Rachel (2009) 'Depictions of and by religious practitioners in films: Hinduism.' In: Lyden, John, (ed.), Routledge companion to religion and film. New York: Routledge, pp. 141-161.
Dwyer, Rachel (2007) 'Indian cinema.' In: Cook, Pam, (ed.), The cinema book. London: British Film Institute, pp. 221-223.
Dwyer, Rachel (2006) 'Planet Bollywood: Hindi film in the UK.' In: Sayyid, SHasan and Ali, N and Kalra, VS, (eds.), Postcolonial people: South Asians in Britain. Hurst & Co. (UK), pp. 366-375.
Dwyer, Rachel (2006) 'The saffron screen?: Hindi movies and Hindu nationalism.' In: Meyer, B. and Moors, A., (eds.), Religion, media and the public sphere. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, pp. 422-460.
Dwyer, Rachel (2006) 'Kiss or Tell? Declaring Love in Hindi Films.' In: Orsini, F., (ed.), Love in South Asia. A Cultural History. Cambridge University Press, pp. 289-302.
Dwyer, Rachel (2006) 'The goddess in Indian film.' In: Goddess: divine energy. Sydney: Art Gallery of New South Wales, pp. 153-155.
Dwyer, Rachel (2005) 'Cinema.' In: Cush, D. and Robinson, C. and York, M., (eds.), The encyclopaedia of Hinduism. London: Routledge Curzon.
Dwyer, Rachel (2004) 'Yeh shaadi nahin ho sakti! (This wedding cannot happen!).' In: Jones, GW and K.Ramdas, , (eds.), (Un)tying the knot: ideal and reality in Asian marriage. Asia Research Institute, National Univesrity of Singapore (Singapore), pp. 59-90.
Dwyer, Rachel (2004) 'International Hinduism: the Swaminarayan sect.' In: Jacobsen, KA and Kumar, P, (eds.), South Asians in the diaspora: historiesand religious traditions. Brill (Netherlands), pp. 180-199.
Dwyer, Rachel (2004) 'Representing the Muslim: the 'courtesan film' in Indian popular cinema.' In: Parfitt, T and Y.Egorava, , (eds.), Mediating the other: representations of Jews, Muslims and Christians in the media. Routledge/Curzon (UK), pp. 78-92.
Dwyer, Rachel (2002) 'Landschaft der Liebe: die indischen Mittelschichten,die romantische Liebe und das Konsumdenken.' In: Schneider, A, (ed.), Bollywood: das indische Kino und die Schweiz. Museum fur Gestaltung, Zurich (Switzerland), pp. 97-105.
Dwyer, Rachel (2000) 'Shooting Stars: the Indian film magazine Stardust.' In: Dwyer, Rachel and Pinney, C, (eds.), Pleasure and the nation: the history, consumption and politics of public culture India. India: Oxford University Press, pp. 247-85.
Dwyer, Rachel (2000) 'Bombay Ishtyle.' In: Bruzzi, S and Gibson, P, (eds.), Fashion Cultures: theories, explorations and analysis. Routledge (London), pp. 178-190.
Dwyer, Rachel (1998) '“Starry nights”: the novels of Shobha Dé.' In: d'Haen, Theo, (ed.), (Un)writing empire. Amsterdam: Rodopi, pp. 117-133.
Dwyer, Rachel (1994) 'Caste, religion and sect in Gujarat: followers of Vallabhacharya and Swaminarayan.' In: Ballard, Roger, (ed.), Desh pardesh: the South Asian experience in Britain. Hurst, pp. 165-190.
Articles
Dwyer, Rachel (2011) 'The case of the missing Mahatma: Gandhi and the Hindi cinema.' Public Culture. Special issue edited by Ritu Birla and Faisal Devji, 23 (2). pp. 349-376.
Dwyer, Rachel (2010) 'Hindi films and their audiences.' Marg. A Magazine of the Arts, 61 (3). pp. 30-39.
Dwyer, Rachel (2010) 'I am Crazy about the Lord: The Muslim Devotional Genre in Hindi Film.' Third Text, 24 (1). pp. 123-134.
Dwyer, Rachel (2010) 'Bollywood’s India: Hindi cinema as a guide to modern India (Based on inaugural lecture, Feb 5, 2008).' Asian Affairs, 41 (3). pp. 381-398.
Dwyer, Rachel (2009) 'Phalke, Dhundiraj Govind [known as Dadasaheb Phalke] (1870-1944).' Dictionary of National Biography .
Dwyer, Rachel (2002) 'Real and imagined audiences: Lagaan and the Hindi film after the 1990s.' Etnofoor, Vol. 1 . pp. 177-193.
Dwyer, Rachel (2000) 'The erotics of the wet sari in Hindi films.' South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, 23 (2). pp. 143-159.
Dwyer, Rachel (2000) '"Indian values" and the diaspora: Yash Chopra�s films of the 1990s.' West Coast Line, 32-34 (2, Autumn). pp. 6-27.
Dwyer, Rachel (1998) 'Hindi romantic cinema: Yash Chopra’s Kabhi Kabhie and Silsila.' South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies . pp. 181-212.
