The representation of heterosexual love, common to all national cinemas, seems to be a special feature of Indian films. While it is common to comment on this aspect of films made in India, there has been a neglect to fully chart and appreciate all the different discursive traditions on human affect and emotion that have shaped visual, narrative and performative cultures—which in turn are present in films made in this region of the world. This course looks at the traditions of many discourses on love (and sexuality), the practises of narrating-performing love-tales, and their connections to religious traditions. Colonisation, modernity, nation-formation, and the westernisation of Indian society, along with cultural changes through the arrival of the modern novel, drama or the gramophone record: much of this is concretised through processes of continuation and change. The course offers a broad understanding of love in India through linguistic, textual (secular and religious), representational, performative and artistic markers spread over centuries and ending with the modern period and the medium of cinema. This will be attempted alongside close analyses of films and film songs.