The Underrepresented ‘Other’: Portrayal of Religious Minorities in Hindi Language Cartoon Shows

Abstract

Media are sites of struggle for representations, and cartoon shows on television can immensely impact the psyche of young viewers. Drawing upon Bandura’s social cognitive theory, George Gerber’s cultivation theory and symbolic annihilation, this study investigates how the symbolic annihilation of minorities takes place in Hindi language cartoon shows. We examine how Hindi language cartoon shows produced in India methodically underrepresent characters belonging to minority communities using qualitative content analysis of four such shows. In this article, we question the positioning of these characters in secondary, antisocial roles identifying them either as ‘other’/foreigner or ‘other’/negative. This symbolic annihilation of religious minorities in Hindi language cartoon shows resembles the symbolic annihilation of racial minorities in the English language cartoon shows.

Keywords

Representation stereotyping minorities misrepresentation cartoon shows Indian television

Cartoons and Indian Television

Cartoon shows are one of the best ways to amuse, entertain and educate children, according to Habib and Soliman (2015). Parents do not complain as cartoons keep their children busy and quiet and allow them to work (Habib & Soliman, 2015). Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, India, like all other nations, has witnessed a 45% growth in viewership of kids’ TV shows (Mahendra, 2020). Much of the prior research on cartoon shows has remained concentrated on the representation of violence and gender (Habib & Soliman 2015; Jaggi & Reddy, 2017; Signoreilli, 1990, 2001) and the symbolic annihilation of outgroups in Western cartoon shows (Klein & Shiffman, 2006, 2009). While Disney and other Western cartoon shows/films have received attention on their representation of race and ethnicity in the past two decades (Barnes, 2012; Gooding-Williams, 1995; Keys, 2016; Martin-Rodriguez, 2000; Merskin, 1998; Towbin et al., 2004), South Asian cartoon shows have not yet got similar attention.

Cartoon shows and films broadcast in India in the 1990s were mainly in English or dubbed in Hindi (and other regional languages). They were foreign-produced and were remarkable for their famous and amusing characters. These included Tom and Jerry, DuckTales, Popeye, Aladdin, The Jungle Book and TaleSpin. Subsequently, children in India also came across Japanese cartoon shows like Doraemon, Shin-Chan and Pokémon (Das & Kini, 2018). In the early twenty-first century, indigenous Hindi productions with native characters in channels like Pogo and Nickelodeon received popularity. The Hindi language cartoon shows produced in India mostly draw from mythological characters that teach moral values of victory of good over evil. Some of the top-rated Hindi language cartoon shows produced and broadcasted in India are Kemon Ache (Nickelodeon, 2008), Chota Bheem (Pogo, 2008), Motu Patlu (Nickelodeon, 2012), Mighty Raju (Pogo, 2015), Kumbh Karan (Pogo, 2010) and Chorr Police (Disney XD, 2009). Laskar (2021) argue that these moral lessons are represented by enacting physical fights between the protagonist and the antagonist. Parikh (2016) further notes the stereotypical representation of ethnicity and body image in these cartoon shows. While Indian researchers have critiqued the ethnic and cultural stereotyping, the symbolic annihilation of religious minorities has not yet received the academic attention it deserves. The present study investigates the various ways in which the symbolic annihilation of religious minorities occurs in Hindi language cartoon shows. We also probe the positioning of these characters in secondary, antisocial roles, identifying them as the other (as foreigners/antagonists).

Theoretical Framework of the Study

Due to its vast growth and popularity among the young audience, Indian television cartoon shows have received much attention over the past decade (Jaggi & Reddy, 2017; Laskar, 2021). Further, these studies concentrated more on gender stereotypes than ethnic and religious stereotypes. Children’s cognitive development is influenced by imitation, identification and adoption of normative social behaviours from television cartoon characters (Bandura, 1977; Bussey & Bandura, 1999; Signoreilli, 1990; Swindler, 1986; Walma van der Molen & van der Voort, 2000). Studies show that the average screen time of young children is around seven and half hours a day (Kaiser Family Foundation Report, 2010). This data has skyrocketed ever since the percolation of smartphones over the past decade (Seigel, 2019). Further, compared to older children, preschool children watch more animation shows (Mares, 1998). Hence, it becomes evident that media exerts some influence, either positive or negative, on the cognitive development of these young audiences (Gerbner et al., 2002).

The sense of ‘religious superiority’, ‘ethnic in-groups’ and ‘out-groups’ are some of the many social constructs that children eventually adopt from television cartoon shows. The social learning theory (Bandura, 1977) and cultivation theory (Gerbner & Gross, 1976) help situate and construct the framework for marginalised groups’ representation and symbolic annihilation. Bandura (1977) posits that people acquire their beliefs, attitudes and inclination to engage in behaviours from their first-hand experiences with models exhibiting those particular behaviours. It is also postulated that audience members adopt cartoon shows’ media representation and normative behaviour. Accordingly, social learning theory helped predict people’s adoption and internalisation of messages about race, social expectations and identification.

Consequently, the world view of audience members (especially those of the children) gets moulded by their repeated consumption of stereotyped media images or dominant world view. Cultivation theory (Gerbner & Gross, 1976) suggests that people’s perception of reality and perceptions of televisual representation converge through mainstreaming. Further, the audience eventually believes and gets absorbed in television’s portrayal related to their own lives. This reinforcement of values or worldviews is known as resonance. Again, the constant way of representing some socially devalued groups (also referred to as ‘out-groups’) is acknowledged as symbolic annihilation (Kielwasser & Wolf, 1993, 1994; Merskin, 1998; Ohye & Daniel, 1999). Symbolic annihilation refers to valuing a specific ‘type’ of individuals while devaluing the ‘others’. The others/out-groups are either misrepresented or underrepresented, thereby reinforcing these notions of valued and devalued groups of communities among audience members.

Review of Literature

Communication researchers in the USA have studied how television and cartoon shows have portrayed their society (Mastro & Greenberg, 2000; Signoreilli, 1990; 2001; Signoreilli & Bacue, 1999). Earlier research on the content of Disney-animated programmes has raised questions about the presence of gender disparity and power relations in visual imagery (Beres, 1999; Dundes, 2001; Gooding-Williams, 1995; Martin-Rodriguez, 2000; Wiersma, 2001). Wiersma (2001) found an imbalance and stereotypical representation in Disney films since its first animated movie in 1937. Although studies have mostly remained concentrated on representations of gender and race in cartoon shows for children (Jaggi, 2015; Lemish, 2007; Paul, 2011; Rozario et al., 2018; Rozario et al., 2018; Towbin et al., 2004; Walsh & Leaper, 2020; Wasko, 2001), there is a scarcity of academic works on the representation of religious minorities. Some notable works on race concerning American cartoon shows include Doc McStuffins and Dora the Explorer (Keys, 2016).

Signoreilli (2001) contends that the portrayal of gender-, class- and race-related content in cartoon shows significantly impacts children’s cognitive development. Although there has been significant improvement in the balanced representations of race in cartoon shows over the years. There are still some gaps in content analysis research on cartoon shows in India. Shows like Doc McStuffins and Dora the Explorer challenge the stereotypical representation in animated shows with their gender- and race-sensitive portrayal (Barnes, 2012; Keys, 2016). Consequently, studying the representation of minority characters in Hindi language cartoon shows has become a prerequisite to understanding the mainstreaming and resonance they can create regarding religious minority groups among young audiences. Watching these religious representations in television cartoon shows daily for 6 to 7 hours will have inevitable repercussions on the children’s cognitive development and social learning. Putting the minority characters in slots that define the type of roles the society expects them to play directly limits the countless possible options that a child would otherwise be free to explore (Eick, 1998). Cartoon watching is not just entertaining but also acts as a learning tool for social roles for children. Further, studies around entertainment-education (Singhal et al., 2006) show how television can be strategically used for creating and sustaining systemic social change. Consequently, Klein and Shiffman (2009) argue that when disenfranchised groups are symbolically annihilated in cartoon shows, their audience, the young kids, will learn to devalue them compared to the majority group. It has also been pointed out that compared to their portrayal in other popular media products like films and television, socially disenfranchised groups in cartoon shows are lesser annihilated than their majority counterparts (Klein & Shiffman, 2009). But even this level of symbolic annihilation warrants an in-depth qualitative media research.

There is not much work on the representation of religious minorities in Hindi language cartoon shows. Hence, this study probes how the symbolic annihilation and ‘otherisation’ in Hindi language cartoon shows produced in India work. While studies on Indian television have remained largely concentrated on the representation of women in mediating the ‘Indian tradition’ (Laskar, 2015; Moorti, 2007), we argue that cartoons of Indian origin too have a similar role. Further, some studies (Laskar & Reyaz, 2021; Reyaz, 2016, 2018) note that media bias against a particular community largely shapes the public discourse and setting agenda. This concept of agenda-setting of media apparatus’s institutional and corporate funders (Ahmad, 2022) for/against the minorities in children’s programming is worth investigating.

After identifying the gaps in earlier studies and specific vantage points of research on the representation of religious minorities in Hindi language cartoon shows, we have set the following research questions for the present study. RQ1: How are the characters from religious minority groups being represented in these Hindi language cartoon shows? RQ2: Are these minority characters being symbolically annihilated in the content of these shows? RQ3: Do these characters, if any, from religious minority groups get misrepresented/under-represented in these selected Hindi language cartoon shows? RQ4: Do the characters from religious minority groups, if any, are ‘otherised’ in the plot as a foreigner?

Methodology

Most of the studies cited above have remained concentrated on quantitative analysis of misrepresentation/under-representation of females compared to male characters. However, the present study adopts a qualitative content analysis method (Krippendorff, 2004) to study the kind of representation given to the religious minority characters in Hindi language cartoon shows. The content for this study was purposively selected from the universe of all the cartoon shows in the Hindi language having a presence on Indian cartoon television channels, such as Nickelodeon, Pogo and Disney, targeting young children (Das & Kini, 2018; Rozario et al., 2017, 2018). To compile the data, we recorded the data from January 2017 to June 2017. For this study, we have selected four popular cartoon shows which are Chhota Bheem (Pogo TV), Mighty Raju (Pogo TV), Motu Patlu (Nickelodeon) and Chorr Police (Disney XD). The shows under study were purposively selected for their high television rating points (TRPs) during this period of study. The episodes of the selected cartoon shows were watched multiple times by the authors to understand the characters’ broader plotline and behavioural traits. Hence, all the episodes were watched and coded according to the parameters.

Operational Definitions

In the present study, the term hegemonic portrayal will refer to the presence of stereotypical representation of religious minorities in select cartoon shows. The term minority is used to define communities other than the Hindu community. Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists and Parsis belong to the religious minority communities in India. The four cartoon shows under study were accessed from their official websites and watched repeatedly by both authors individually. Consequently, the characters belonging to any of the religious minority communities in India, if represented, were coded as ‘absence of primary roles of minority characters’, ‘presence of secondary roles of minority characters’ and ‘presence of positive roles of minority characters’. Other parameters operationalised are ‘the presence of negative roles of minority characters’.

Further, ‘absence of recurring appearances’, ‘presence of occasional appearances’, ‘other/absence of minority character as resident’ and ‘other/presence of minority character as foreign’ has been coded by the authors. Accordingly, the authors coded the presence or absence of these codes to compile the categories of under-representation or misrepresentation of minority characters in the Hindi language cartoon shows. The variable ‘primary’ is operationally defined for this study as a character playing the role of the protagonist in the cartoon show, while the term ‘secondary’ denotes the non-salient roles or supporting roles assigned to the character. Again, the term ‘positive’ is defined as any association with prosocial roles such as helping others, rescuing or heroic actions. The ‘negative’ variable is defined as characters associated with antisocial activities such as crimes and antagonistic roles creating hurdles for the hero. The term ‘recurring characters’ is defined for the present study as the repeated appearance of any characters in more than one episode, while the term ‘occasional appearances’ is defined as the character’s appearance in a single episode. Further, the term ‘resident’ denotes a character hailing from the same geographical area as the protagonist. In contrast, the term ‘foreign’ denotes a character travelling from across the border in the cartoon shows.

The percentage agreement for two raters was used to test the reliability of the codes and Cohen’s kappa to eliminate chance agreements. The coding was done in Microsoft Excel Code Sheet 1 (eight variables) to study the aforementioned six characters of the cartoon show. The agreement values and kappa are presented in Table 1.

Table 1.

Reliability and Validity Test of Coded Variables

Sl No.	Variables	Percentage Agreement	Kappa Value
1	Absence of primary roles of minority characters	71.42	0.41 (moderate agreement)
2	Presence of secondary roles of minority characters	85.71	0.72 (perfect agreement)
3	Presence of positive roles of minority characters	71.42	0.41 (moderate agreement)
4	Presence of negative roles of minority characters	71.42	0.41 (moderate agreement)
5	Absence of recurring appearances	90.90	0.81 (perfect agreement)
6	Presence of occasional appearances	100	1 (perfect agreement)
7	Other/absence of minority character as resident	90.90	0.81 (perfect agreement)
8	Other/presence of minority character as foreign	100	1 (perfect agreement)

Source: Authors’ analysis.

The theme of the presence or absence of under-representation of minority characters was studied with two variables tested as ‘primary’ or ‘secondary’ character roles. The absence of variable ‘primary’ roles reached a moderate agreement (71.42%; kappa = 0.41), while the presence of ‘secondary’ roles attained a perfect agreement between the two raters (85.71%; kappa = 0.72). Further, for the identification of misrepresentation of minority characters’ presence or absence of two variables were studied, such as ‘positive’ and ‘negative’. The ‘presence of the positive character’ variable reached a moderate agreement (71.42%; kappa = 0.41), and the ‘presence of the negative character’ variable also saw a moderate agreement between the two raters (71.42%; kappa = 0.41). We studied the presence or absence of salience of the character within the show with two variables with the ‘absence of recurring appearances’ reaching a perfect agreement (90.90%; kappa = 0.81), and the ‘presence of occasional appearances’ attained perfect agreement (100%; Kappa = 1). The presence or absence of ‘otherisation’ of the character within the show was studied with two variables, ‘absence of minority characters as resident’ and ‘presence of foreign’. Both ‘absence of minority character as resident’ and ‘presence of minority character as foreign’ reached a perfect agreement (90.90%, kappa = 0.81) and (100%, kappa = 1), respectively.

Findings on Otherisation and Symbolic Annihilation of Religious Minorities in Hindi Language Cartoon Shows

Chhota Bheem is a very popular animated comedy adventure series aired on Pogo TV since 2008. It is carved straight out of a mythological character Bheem from the epic Mahabharat. The story also refers to the story’s setting in a fictional place named Dholakpur with the absence of any character belonging to any of the minority communities in India. Hence, it gives an idea of a complete Hindu village celebrating most Hindu religious festivals, and the names of the ‘primary’ and the ‘secondary’ characters refer to the Hindu community. Although occasionally celebrations of Ramadan and Christmas do find a place within the special festival episodes, the absence of any character from the village aligning to those particular religious minority identities remains present. While during the episode of Christmas, Santa Claus is portrayed, during Eid, the protagonist travels to a foreign country Petra, Jordan, to give a portrayal of Muslim characters in the show. Similarly, the Buddhist characters are portrayed during the episode of ‘Chhota Bheem and the Master of Shaolin’, but only as residents of China.

Since the 10 years of broadcasting of Chhota Bheem, there has hardly been any representation of any significant ethnic or religious character other than those belonging to the majority religious community. Exceptions only being on special events like Christmas, Halloween, Ramadan, etc., where the supporting characters are either misrepresented or underrepresented. In these special episodes (‘Halloween Halla’, ‘Journey to Petra’, ‘Master of Shaolin’ and ‘Santa Clause’), these characters from religious minority groups do not have any strong screen presences. In the episode showing the Christmas celebration, the people of Dholakpur are shown celebrating Christmas. In one of the Christmas episodes, Chota Bheem, the show’s protagonist, is shown to collect and distribute gifts among the children. Santa Clause’s character is also shown to appear at the end of the Christmas episode to distribute gifts to Chota Bheem and his friends. In the Halloween episodes, Bheem rescues himself and his friends from the trap of a group of possessed men.

The negative connotations associated with minority religious festivals and characters portray exclusionist characters in this cartoon show. The complete under-representation of characters belonging to minority communities in India might be detrimental to the psychological development of the children in a multicultural nation like India. Children who are enamoured by Chota Bheem will unknowingly also consume these hegemonic portrayals of minority characters as ‘othered’. The otherisation of religious minorities in the cartoon shows for children will present a skewed representation of a multicultural country like India in contrast to what the American cartoon and television did to represent racial and ethnic minorities. In recent years, Disney has come a long way and has started giving prominent roles to the Black characters. India also has to follow similar representational strategies and inclusive growth strategies.

In another Hindi language cartoon show Mighty Raju, under study, we find that the protagonist Raju lives in a fictional city named Aryanagar with his friends Gopi and Julie. While the characters Raju and Gopi are represented as Hindu children, the religious identity of Julie and the antagonist Charlie are not clearly stated. The third Hindi language cartoon show under study is Motu Patlu running on Nickelodeon. This show again revolves around the adventures of two friends, Motu (meaning the fat one) and Patlu (meaning the thin one), living in the fictional city Furfuri Nagar. The name of the antagonist plotting against them is John, who aspires to become an acclaimed underworld don by committing theft, robbery and other crimes. John can be identified as a Christian character both by his name and his physical features (a beard and mole on his face). This kind of representation has been a recurrent trope of Christian portrayal in Indian Hindi films and media (Mishra, 2014). Another stereotypical representation borrowed from films to denote him as a Christian is that he is shown to wear a gold watch and chains around his neck. His colourful dress also represents the association with people hailing from Goa (Dubey, 2007).

The last cartoon show under study is Chorr Police, an animated comedy series aired on Disney XD. The story revolves around Anthony the Thief and Inspector Lovely Singh. Anthony is the Robin Hood-style thief who robs the elite in the slum of the city of Mumbai. He outwits Inspector Lovely Singh, and the chase continues in new adventures. Judging by the looks and clothing, one can assume that Inspector Lovely Singh is a Sikh in the show Chorr Police. The surname ‘Singh’ is used both by Hindus and Sikhs, but only the followers of Sikhism wear the turban. The thief goes by Anthony’s pseudo name, while his real name is revealed later as Krishna. Hence, the character who hails from the religious minority community in this cartoon show is Inspector Lovely Singh. It also draws heavily on the popular stereotype of the Sikh community in Hindi films and popular culture, where Sikh characters are shown as half-wit and are exploited for humour (Dubey, 2007).

Religious Minorities as ‘the Insignificant’

The analysis of the four select cartoon shows under study reveals that even when the characters belonging to the minority communities exist in the plotlines of these shows, they are not given prominent roles. The characters like the Buddhist monk, the Sikh cop and the Muslim emperor of Petra were portrayed as neutral characters. Charlie, an antagonist in Mighty Raju, Kala Haath, the villain in the Eid special episode of Chota Bheem and John, the Don, from Motu Patlu are portrayed as ‘negative’ for their antisocial actions and crimes. These characters are mainly portrayed as creating hurdles for the protagonist. Only two characters belonging to minority communities that have been adequately represented in the cartoon shows under study are John, the Don, and Inspector Lovely Singh. While John, the Don, is the villain himself, his existence gives a humorous angle to the episodes of Motu Patlu. Although Inspector Lovely Singh is a police officer in Chorr Police, he is often outrun by the main character Anthony/Krishna. While the cartoon shows Motu Patlu and Chorr Police do not represent the minority characters as a foreign and non-resident, Chota Bheem and Mighty Raju otherise the religious minority characters either as antisocial or foreign. In Mighty Raju, Charlie and Julie’s names denote belonging to the Christian community. Apart from their names, these two characters have no other religious identification.

Disney has not entirely left out the exaggerated and stereotypical representation of ethnic or racial minorities. However, the whiteness of the Disney princess was more prominent in the initial decades. But over the years, Disney has tried to present a multicultural foregrounding of their ‘non-white’ ‘non-Caucasian’ characters in prominent roles like Mulan and Pocahontas (Towbin et al., 2004). These representations may appear to be an apologetic attempt of Disney in correcting the wrongs that have been done since decades of misrepresentation and symbolic annihilation of African Americans, Latin Americans and Asians. Hence, Disney has portrayed the inclusion of Polynesian characters in prominent roles like Moana and Pocahontas, but with colonial undertones. The Indian Hindi language cartoon shows also use stereotypical representation to make the religious identity of the characters stand out for the young audiences. The Chota Bheem with his ‘Tilak’, the Motu Patlu with its conman ‘John’ and Chorr Police with the Sikh police officer have been using the stereotypes to represent the religious minorities. Although the portrayal of these communities is not overtly hostile, their inaccuracy is problematic.

Religious Minorities as ‘Other’/Foreigners

As defined for the present study, the term ‘national’ refers to someone hailing from the same geographical area as the protagonist. Hence, we find that the characters hailing from common Indian religious minority groups such as Sikhs and Christians are represented to live in the same city or region as the protagonists in the recurring episodes. However, the Muslim and Buddhist characters are shown as foreigners travelling from distant countries to the land of the protagonists. The Muslim emperor shown in Chota Bheem is shown to belong to Petra of Jordon. Again, the Buddhist monk character appearing in one of the episodes of Chota Bheem hail from China. The association of these minority characters as foreign nationals and ‘other’ has macro contestations within the contemporary socio-political environment in India. With the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) debate looming large in the country that would provide citizenship to non-Muslims seeking citizenship from three neighbouring countries of India—Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh (ET Online, 2019)—the symbolic annihilation (Merskin, 1998) is a concerted effort of creating a near-total absence of a group of people in media. Tuchman (1978) described the term symbolic annihilation as a process of omission and condemnation of socially devalued groups by either rarely or never giving them a portrayal. This kind of portrayal aids in sending messages to the audience members. In this case, the young children are portrayed that these devalued groups who are the religious minorities in India are out-groups and are not important fractions in the society. It can have a profound impact on the audience’s behaviour.

Conclusion

The studies on media representations in Western television and films have revolved around gender, race and ethnicity. In India, we have to look at issues related to representation/under-representation of various religious minority communities. Given the history of multicultural fabric and post-Partition ethnic violence, there has been the inert and overt exclusion of minority communities from media imagery. Post-9/11, the Islamophobia that engulfed Western media spectacle (Saeed, 2007) got percolated easily in Indian media (Ahmed, 2012; Anand, 2005). The continuous consumption of stereotypical/misrepresentations of various religious communities may also impact the cognitive development of the young audience. We, hence, build this study upon cultivation theory (Gerbner & Gross, 1976), which suggests that television viewers’ perceptions of social reality will be shaped by continuous exposure to mediated messages. Accordingly, children who watch around 4 to 5 hours of cartoon shows every day might develop a world view aligning with the one represented in media. In the context of the study of the under-representation of minorities in Indian cartoon shows, cultivation theory would posit that media messages about out-group and in-group would become the context of socialisation for the young audience.

Furthermore, this will eventually define their attitudes and behaviour towards the members of religious minority communities. Hence, it becomes imperative to study the content of the media imagery that young audiences get exposed regularly. Prior research has argued that early life exposure to media messages impacts the attitudes of the young viewers towards their immediate environment (Greenberg, 1982; Tiggemann & Pickering, 1996). For example, suppose children never or rarely witness a character from any minority community in India in salient roles or as protagonists. In that case, they may be left with the impression that such individuals do not exist. Hence, the media can symbolically annihilate specific communities by excluding characters that represent the true pluralistic nature of the society. The earlier studies on gender and race in cartoon shows suggest that animated cartoons are guilty of this type of symbolic annihilation. More extensive inclusion of characters from various minority communities in India is needed to give a balanced representation for the young viewers during their formative period of life. It will help them interpret these groups as valued and equal members of our culture. The minuscule representation provided to the characters from the minority communities paints them as non-existent, non-native/outsiders and non-salient/unimportant residents in India compared to their majority counterparts. There also exists the danger of constructing and reinforcing their imagery in the popular psyche as second-class citizens of India.

In the four selected shows—Chhota Bheem, Mighty Raju, Motu Patlu and Chorr Police—it is evident that the portrayal of the characters from religious minority communities is not even a quarter of the total characters, which is worrisome. There is every possibility of attaining a skewed vision of the world by the children watching these ‘othered’ representations in Indian television cartoon shows amid the toxic religious persecutions in the socio-political arena of the country. The percolation of symbolic annihilation of these religious minorities in cartoon shows and other media texts in the cognition of young audiences is unconstructive for a pluralistic society. The media representation of Muslims in news, films, television and online media as violent, antisocial and barbaric has furthered Islamophobia around the globe (Anand, 2005). Much of this learning about representation can be traced back to a child’s early and regular exposition to ‘othered’ content on television. The cultivation theory posits that prolonged exposure to media imagery will impact the viewer’s perception of the world. Bandura’s social learning theory draws it further to children’s cognitive development through media influence.

This study delved into an exploratory topic as there is still not much work in this genre and area. Although it suffers from the limitation of studying, only a select number of cartoon shows out of the vast expanse of cartoon shows and animated films are produced in India. Furthermore, the present study is a qualitative analysis, and hence, more quantitative analysis like that attempted by Klein and Shiffman (2009) can help delineate more analysis. The operational definitions chosen for this study are subjective and based on the literature review. But further investigations by other researchers with different parameters may lead to diverse findings. Considering all this limited scope of the present article, it can still become a vantage point for further research on the symbolic annihilation of devalued groups in Hindi language cartoon shows. We believe that this type of research related to the representation of religious minorities in children’s programming outlined in this article merits further exploration.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

We would like to express our sincere gratitude to the editorial department of JCC for their support and encouragement in submitting the revisions. We would also like to thank our anonymous reviewers who have provided us with sincere and constructive feedback for the improvement of our article. Further, we are also thankful to Dr Mohammad Reyaz, Assistant Professor, Aliah University, for his valuable input and suggestions during various stages of this research.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.

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