Teaching entrepreneurship through film in subsistence marketplaces

This study examines how an integrated film-and-facilitation program shapes observational learning and self-efficacy among women in a subsistence marketplace, where conventional entrepreneurship education is poorly suited and in-person role models are scarce. The study centers on Shakti Rising, a film designed for women in subsistence settings, featuring a culturally proximate female protagonist who serves as a symbolic role model through her entrepreneurial journey. Drawing on social cognitive theory of mass communication as a sensitizing lens, this study analyzes interviews with twenty-nine women in Tamil Nadu, India, who completed a three-day film-and-facilitation program. Three themes emerged. Participants reported alignment with the symbolic role model through homophily, aspirational fit, and affective engagement. They reported observational learning, drawing lessons from the protagonist and adapting them to their own circumstances. They also reported shifts in entrepreneurial and general self-efficacy beliefs. The study contributes to film-based entrepreneurship education research by showing how contextualized symbolic modeling operates in low-literacy, resource-constrained settings. It contributes to subsistence marketplace research by showing how the program cultivates women's marketplace literacy, agency, and self-efficacy beliefs while engaging the consumer-entrepreneur duality. It also contributes to social cognitive theory of mass communication by suggesting that the socially mediated pathway of symbolic modeling operates as an essential route in resource-constrained settings where in-person role models are scarce.