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Entertainment

Did Norah Jones disown her part-Indian heritage?

By: Santosh :+: Under: Entertainment, Opinion
On: ⋅ February 14, 2007 ⋅  Email this post ⋅  Print this post ⋅ Post a comment
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Reluctantly Indian?

Do you consider yourself part Indian?” Couric asks.
“I grew up in Texas with a white mother,” Jones says. “I feel very Texan, actually and New York. New Yorker.”

In a short interview with Katie Couric on 60 minutes, Norah Jones was questioned on her personal life which included references to her father, the revered (and in his day, uber playa) Pandit Ravi Shankar, her childhood, upbringing and early family life. Then Couric brought up the issue of her being part-Indian to which Norah replied she felt more of a Texan and/or New Yorker.
Predictably, desi media outlets, the world over, exploded in response to that statement. Here’s a sampling of the headlines:

Ravi Shankar’s daughter Norah doesn’t consider herself Indian
DailyIndia.com
RxPG NEWS
Newindpress
India eNews.com

A more sensational headline indicating perhaps the writer took it personally.

Norah Jones avoids Indian tag
Hindustan Times

At least this headline uses a direct quote.

“I grew up in Texas with a white mother”
Daily News and Analysis(DNA)

My first observation is that most of these websites use the material directly from the original CBS website. The articles were changed here and there and the order was jumbled up but for the most part if you read these articles you feel like you’re reading the CBS story over and over. Secondly, what is the big deal if Norah Jones doesn’t consider herself part-Indian?
She grew up in a suburb of Dallas and her mother is a white American. Even though she was fathered by a famous Indian, she never had the opportunity to experience him in that role.

Norah’s father is the famous musician, Ravi Shankar, the virtuoso Indian sitar player. “I knew who my dad was,” she says. “I saw him sporadically until I was nine and then I didn’t see him again or talk to him until I was 18.”

Even her musical roots are distinctly non-Indian, save for the genetic plumbing.

Norah says her musical roots are country and jazz, tastes acquired growing up in Grapevine, Texas, listening to her mother’s eclectic record collection.

Besides, the darker skin tone and the musical gene, which she could have arguably inherited from her father, she has very little in her history to do with “considering” herself Indian or even part-Indian, for that matter. The Indian media needs to stop hounding her for that statement. If someone does not want to be associated with you for personal reasons, let them be.
This revelation is not shocking at all, given her story and background. Now, Lord Krishna forbid, if one or both of the Malakars denied that they were part-Indian, that would be shocking. Actually, I would be fine with that too and notch it to the battle of nature versus nurture .

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