Identity by Pooja Pallavi Is A Rousing Music Video Dedicated To The Indo-Fijian Community

Identity by Pooja Pallavi Is A Rousing Music Video Dedicated To The Indo-Fijian Community

“I’m A Brown Bitch, Melanin Rich, Fijian Queen”

Featuring her posse of strong brown women and assertive lyrics, Identity by Pooja Pallavi is a music video that quickly makes the audience realise it is an anthem. It speaks of being proudly brown, about the system of oppression and most of all, about embracing the power in all your intersecting identities. Hailing from the Coolie community of Fiji, Pooja Pallavi is a proud representative of her many cultures. Rapper, song writer, model, actress, dancer, director and more, Pallavi is someone who doesn’t like to restrict herself to a single means of expression.

While her stage name Fijiana is a simple play on her Indo Fijian identity and the movie ‘Colombiana’, defining the musical style of Pallavi is not an easy feat. She does not like sticking to a single genre and tries to create diverse music. But being brought up in Richmond, California in a diasporic family, Pallavi listened to a lot of Hindi music from her father, in addition to popular R&B and rap. A major inspiration and influence for her music was Ladybug Mecca, whose raps Pallavi practiced, till she started writing her own.

The mixture of these influences can be heard throughout her works and can especially be noticed in the music and video for her song ‘80’s Love Affair.’ Most of all, according to Pallavi, her music is the way she tries to communicate what she is feeling and she went on to say, “with my music as a whole whether through lyrics or visuals I’d like to bring up conversations about colorism, gender norms, femininity and masculinity and what we each define it as for ourselves.”

With the song Identity, she attempted to start a conversation about the Coolie/Girmitiya community that she belongs to. They are descendants of the indentured people taken from South Asia during colonization, especially to Fiji. Often the voices of these people are not heard in mainstream media and Pallavi, through her art is attempting to challenge that.

The Girmitiya people of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar were taken to Fiji in order to work predominantly on Sugar Cane plantations. The opening scene of Pallavi’s song starts with sugarcanes in the backdrop and women in traditional attire, symbolizing the migrations photos of yore and also about the importance that sugarcane has had in their lives. It was the reason that the people were shipped all around the world. This scene is contrasted later in the video with shots of a local Fiji Market where powerful women are having a good time. With their bhajan instruments and laughter, the song alludes to the vibrancy of the women in the villages that Pallavi has seen. The music video also features motifs from three different religions to show the unity that exist among the people, regardless of race or religion.

Featuring women of varying features and looks in her video, Pallavi shows off the cultural shift that is happening surrounding beauty norms and how confidence, love and self-acceptance have become the parameters by which beauty is looked at. She said, “there’s still a lot more work to do when it comes to issues like colorism or being accepting of all body types but I do see progress being made and inclusivity being in which is amazing.”

If you would like to stay tuned to Pooja Pallavi, you can stay tuned on her Instagram.

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