"Indian Matchmaking," BAME, and Portland Whiteness with Historian Radhika Natarajan

In this episode, Tammy gabs with her old friend Radhika Natarajan, a professor of history at Reed College and low-key brilliant TV critic.

Radhika talks about her childhood in Ohio, her parents’ emigration from Tamil Nadu (relevant spoiler: an arranged Brahmin marriage), and her scholarly work on post-colonial migration, citizenship, and multiculturalism in Britain. (Bonus: BAME = POC/BIPOC?) She schools Tammy on Portland’s Black and immigrant communities (the city isn’t all white, Radhika softly yells) and describes the local vibe during 74+ days of Black Lives Matter protests.

Then, the discussion (takedown? disquisition?) many TTSG listeners have been waiting for: about the Netflix show “Indian Matchmaking”! Tammy and Radhika talk caste, religion, class, and colorism in the series, media representations of South Asians, and Modi’s bloody transnationalism. Radhika invokes the cultural critic Stuart Hall to question the desire for “cheering fictions” over messy depictions of identity, and looks forward to learning more about Dalit–Black American connections in Isabel Wilkerson’s new book on caste.

For more, Radhika recommends:

• Stephen Frears’s 1985 film, “My Beautiful Laundrette” (per Hall)

• Nicholas B. Dirks’s 2001 history, Castes of Mind

• Annihilation of Caste, the 1936 book by Dalit revolutionary B.R. Ambedkar (arguing that inter-caste marriages could never solve the problem of caste; take that, Auntie Sima!)

And here’s what the TTSG team has been perusing:

• Come on, Karen—Indian Food, really?

• The political economy of the TikTok and WeChat war

• Media savagery at Sports Illustrated

• Pankaj Mishra and Adam Shatz talk Anglo-American failure and free speech

P.S. – We recorded this episode before the Kamala announcement, but now that she’s every liberal’s favorite Indian…