Voices From Within: Interpreting Australian Anglo-Indians' Responses to Cotton Mary (1999)

Abstract

This paper undertakes a critical examination of Glenn D’Cruz’s short video Re-Viewing Cotton Mary (2002) through the frameworks of socioeconomic class, gender, and spatiotemporal location. Through an exploration of the reactions and responses from members of the diasporic Australian Anglo-Indian community as they ‘re-view’ Ismail Merchant and Madhur Jaffrey’s Cotton Mary (1999), the study addresses several key questions. Firstly, it seeks to understand the diversity of perspectives among the audience and delves into the reasons behind such diversity. Secondly, the paper investigates major points of concern and contention for viewers, and explores how existing scholarship on Anglo-Indians addresses these points. It probes the convergences and divergences between audience responses and the available academic and journalistic discourse on the film.