Tomorrow

An original reading of contemporary India, through insightful conversations, revealing cultural analysis, and expert interviews. This is our kitchen: where we gather our motley collection of observations before they transform into insights. www.to-morrow.in

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This month, we introduce ‘Voices’, a new section of our web archive.

'Voices' presents an India in conversations. It delves into Life’s Big Questions and seeks their possible answers: who are we, and what are we really searching for?

This is a permanent, ongoing archive that we shall add to as we go along mapping and studying the shape of contemporary culture in India.

To start with, we look back at 10 great interviews - with thinkers, activists, doers, experts in various disciplines - from our independent studies over the years.

Among them, screenwriter Juhi Chaturvedi, stand-up comedian Kunal Kamra, chef Manu Chandra, writers Advaita Kala & Natasha Badhwar, sociologist Sanjay Srivastava, feminist activist Kamla Bhasin, and more.

Read more at www.to-morrow.in/voices

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While studying the covers and titles of modern romance novels in India, we found a sharp divide between the genders when it comes to romance novels.

“Chick Lit and Lad Lit speak from the vantage point of two different perceptions of time. In the romance titles by women, the protagonists (mostly female), are looking out to the horizon on a clear-sighted forward march, while the romances by men have protagonists (mostly male) looking back in reckoning, revealing their emotions…

In this map of romance novels, it’s almost as if there are two kinds of fantasy that Love offers to its modern readers: that women have a future, and men have an inner emotional life. Between the covers and amidst the titles of these novels, there breathes a promise: one that love in real life is yet to fulfil

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“Sometimes, body stances express more than entire songscapes can. While studying the romancing couple in movie posters from Bollywood romances of the last 10 years, we noticed a stunning pattern emerge. As women tread new territory in the script, they begin taking up equal space in the poster too. The heroine’s stance matches her man’s --- unlike the Bhagyashrees of Maine Pyaar Kiya and the Kajols of DDLJ, she’s not leaning on him, gazing at him, or hiding behind his shield-like chest anymore. Instead, her upright posture and frontal gaze portray a new confidence vis-à-vis her man --- and sometimes, as in the Tanu Weds Manu poster, turned away from both the camera and the man, not bothered to make the effort to match anyone’s expectations. And so the heroine in Humpty Sharma ki Dulhania poster inverts the DDLJiconography, to show the woman in charge of the romance, lifting the hero and the storyline with ease.”

Read more at http://to-morrow.in/article/the-romance-makeover

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“In their brief depictions, they show love and romance that isn’t eternal; it is temporal and mortal. It can be briefly tragic, drudgingly long, painfully unrequited, or positively vague; its relationships demand constant transactions of time, energy, and emotion from individuals. Love in short films isn’t an isolated emotion: it is subject to external forces (tradition, class, privilege, age, taboos) and internal forces (fear, confusion, loss). And at the end of it all, love doesn’t always win, relationships don’t always work - thus, deflating the heroism of love usually depicted in the movies.”

Short films do what Bollywood cannot – or perhaps, would not – it makes epic love fallible. We tell you how, in 5 short films: http://to-morrow.in/article/love-in-short 

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We can no longer talk about love without talking about self-love. ‘Main Apni Favourite Hoon’ in our issue Modern Love, traces the trajectory of how we got here, through a selection of films from the last decade of Indian cinema.  

http://to-morrow.in/article/main-apni-favourite-hoon

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From ‘Heartbreak Hero’, our article about the making of a new archetype, from Tomorrow’s latest issue, ‘Modern Love‘: http://to-morrow.in/article/heartbreak-hero

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Ever wondered why ‘going slow’ is such a refrain in songs these days? While analysing the lovesongs on the Billboard Hot 100 over the last 8 years, we found that this was a recurring theme in the songs of 2017, with everyone from Ed Sheeran to Justin Bieber to Weeknd crooning about it. More about how and why we got here, in our article ‘The Way You Make Me Feel’, in Tomorrow’s latest issue ‘Modern Love’. With stunning illustrations by Bharat Chauhan. 

Read more at http://to-morrow.in/article/the-way-you-make-me-feel 

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Of late, we have been seeking collaborations with varied artists, from different worldviews. The idea is to bring together a range of perspectives to the chosen themes we work with at Tomorrow, and create a dynamic interaction of cultural voices.    

When we shared our ideas about Modern Love with artist Smita Singh, she chose to interpret them in her own medium. The result is a beautiful cover artwork that uses imagery culled from vintage illustrations, to depict a triptych around the various interpretations of love in this issue: ‘Seule’, or French for ‘alone’, is a portrayal of the single lady adorned with butterflies. Peine D’amour (French for ‘heartbreak’), has the dagger drawn across two acrobats. ‘Across the Mammoth Love’ illustrates a stunt artist and his lady love, dancing on the globe.  

Smita is a passionate collage artist, who has trained extensively under master craftspersons in Rome, Florence and France. A significant part of her work focuses on Art Deco, traditional découpage, and Italian decorative arts involving gold-leaf gilding and are lacquered under and over glass, wood and metal. Juxtaposition of diverse imagery and materials is her forte and she adroitly uses varied textures and themes to create a surprising contrast in her works. She lives and works in Gurugram, India. Her work can be accessed at www.smitasingh.in.

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Love is at the cusp of a great re-imagination.

Today, it is no longer an absolute. Love, just like our lives, has gotten more complicated. It must be personal to begin with, and draw deep and rich from our many lives and contexts rather than a singular, grand idea.

To find the coordinates of this modern love, we turned, as always, to popular culture. We looked, we listened, we watched, we read. From The Billboard Top 100 song lyrics to indie short films, from body language in movie posters to self-love in Bollywood, from romance novel covers to dating site profiles, we delved into all of love's cultural manifestations, in word, image, action and evocation.

In Tomorrow's latest issue ‘Modern Love’, we attempt to understand how modern life's experiences with time and spaces have changed the definition of this most potent emotion of all times. 

Read more at www.to-morrow.in 

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When we began our study on masculinity in contemporary India, we turned to popular culture to see where the a new idea of manhood was most visible, even if not fully formed. Fashion, we felt, was where the earliest stirrings were apparent not just to the eye, but also to instinct: a new identity was being tried for size, worn and removed, altered and reimagined. 

In Cuff, Collar & Sleeve, we put together the most insightful observations that came out of our study, tethered around the evolution of menswear in the last 20 years. 

read it here: http://to-morrow.in/article/cuff-collar-sleeve

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Is the beard a metaphor for a larger phenomenon, and not merely a fad?

We thought it out loud here: www.to-morrow.in/the-beard-metaphor

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As Bharat Chauhan’s cover art for our latest issue ‘Manscape’ expresses, the male body is no longer portrayed as the singular and essential Vitruvian man, naked and universal. The modern male body is clothed in detail, magnified and broken down into many parts and elements, expressed in many colours and stances, mapped in varied patterns.

This isn’t just a more desirable body; it is also a valorised body. The body is not just an object; it is also a perception. It isn’t just about what can be seen, but also what is imagined when a man looks into the mirror. When the image of the body becomes much more certain than the identity it cases, we glimpse a crucial moment in men’s relationship with not just themselves, but also the fundamental changes in their relationship with the world.

The curated selection of articles that emerged from this theme can be read at www.to-morrow.in

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Why 'Are you a feminist?' rarely evokes a forthright answer from Bollywood celebs, and other great insights in our conversation with author and journalist Meghna Pant: http://to-morrow.in/article/conversations-2018April

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When the young woman is given a front-facing camera and the power to self-publish her image, she is creating a narrative of herself. The production of her self, is literally, in her own hands. To be pro-selfie is about taking ownership of how you are looked at, and how you look at yourself. The freedom to freeze her own image with the tap of a virtual button, allows her moments of self-celebration – something the older codes of beauty never allowed her.

http://to-morrow.in/article/heroic-beauty

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Calling out recognises that the most powerful structures are made pervasive by their namelessness. By giving them a name, etching their body and shape through words and narrative, they render such value systems exposed and redundant. Just like its grammar, calling out is a figure of action; a verb that verbalises, but also one that grants agency.

http://to-morrow.in/article/voice

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When 19-year-old slam poet Ujjwala said this to us, we were compelled to wonder: what does love mean to a young woman out to rule her world? Today love isn’t the be-all-and-end-all of emotions. It is rather, anathema to self-actualisation. It slows you down, distracts you from yourself, makes you needy. It’s something you could forego, as the price you pay for becoming stronger. Read more in our article from the latest issue: http://to-morrow.in/article/body-of-work

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Today we see more and more Bollywood actressess partaking in the aesthetic of the new Indian woman: outspoken, unafraid, eager to take a stand, constantly calling out the biases of the world we live in.

We felt that an inherent irony, however, underlies this change.

While actresses are calling out imperfection, they still are in the business of perfect beauty. They must look aspirational, beautiful, glamorous and unreachable. Amidst the constant documentation of airport looks, outside-the-gym shots, brand endorsements and public appearances, how do they express their true views that challenge perfection? How do they express the change they seek and wish to represent?

To probe this thought further, we analysed four iconic and outspoken Bollywood actresses that are inspirational to young Indian women today, and how they wear their hair, especially offscreen.

If you thought the messy bun was just a fad, you’d be surprised at what we found.

Read more: http://to-morrow.in/article/not-just-a-messy-bun