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Slumdog Millionaire did more to introduce modern India to students in American schools than anything in recent history. The 2008 Academy Award winner for Best Picture highlighted a society poised between poverty and wealth, tradition and modernity, medieval torture and twenty-first century technology. For some, the film confirmed the worst stereotypes of a poor, developing nation wracked by class conflict. Others saw the film as the latest manifestation of India’s debut as a nuclear superpower and economic juggernaut.