Work

From local to global: Village YouTubers and rural creator cultures in South India

Year: 2024

Type: article

Abstract: This article examines emerging rural creator cultures in South India. Specifically, it focuses on the uptake and production of YouTube videos by village creators, a relatively understudied but increasingly important phenomenon given the rapid spread of social media entertainment in rural India. Through a case study on My Village Show, a YouTube media collective, this article shows how rural cultural producers transformed into ‘media workers’, ‘creators’, and ‘influencers’. The South Indian YouTubing landscape, with a multitude of village-centric social media entertainment channels, reveals a new dynamic of cultural production in the Global South, distinguished by collective, collaborative, and formalizing creator labor practices. Drawing upon ethnographic observation and in-depth interviews with rural cultural producers, this article analyzes and conceptualizes rural creator cultures within particular socio-cultural, vernacular, and regional dynamics in India.

Source: International Journal of Cultural Studies

DOI: 10.1177/13678779241292639

Authors: Srikanth Nayaka, Vamshi Krishna Reddy Vemireddy, Prabha Shankar Dwivedi

Institutions: GITAM University, University of Hyderabad, Indian Institute of Technology Tirupati

Language: English

Topic: South Asian Cinema and Culture

Subfield: Visual Arts and Performing Arts

Field: Arts and Humanities

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Decent work and economic growth

Open Access status: bronze

Funder: University of Hyderabad