Drum'n'dhol 1

Abstract

British bhangra is a genre of British popular music fusing Punjabi lyrics and the beats of the Indian drum, the dhol, with black music genres and British pop sounds, producing an urban anthem and commentary about the lives of its British South Asian audiences. This article draws on qualitative research and interviews undertaken in Birmingham in the UK. It outlines how diasporic South Asian identities are made sense of through a conception of the way in which British bhangra music encapsulates an urban black British experience, how conservative lyrics of caste and gender in the music are negotiated by its listeners, and how some of the intergenerational formulations of British South Asian identities are performed at celebratory social gatherings.