Indian Communalism
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Indian communalism as described by Peter van der Veer is a combination of religion and nationalism, described by Dumont as one of a number of uneasy combinations. Communalism is a stage that disappears only when the given society is made truly "modern" (van der Veer 17-18). Communal refers to the fact that Indian society is made up of a number of religious communities, and communalism is a consciousness which draws on a supposed religious identity and uses this to form an ideology. Communalism then demands political allegiance to a religious community, supporting a program of political action to further the interests of that religious community (Thapor 60-61). Migration is identified by van der Veer as an important social process underlying both nationalism and religion and also the communalism which results from their combination. Van der Veer considers the nature of pre-colonial communities in India and the different forms of migration perceived there and makes a distinction between secular migration and sacred pilgrimage, while also finding a number of elements in common in the two. His analysis of migration and pilgrimage points to the underlying meaning of modernization and to the persistence of communalism in Indian society. Van der Veer is countering a trend he sees in the literature toward seeing the spheres of the nation and of the local community as mutually exclusive and opposite in nature. He refers to Ferdinand T÷nnies and his conception of Gemeinschaft
. . .
(van der Veer 113).
Migration has been important for the development of nationalism elsewhere than in India, and this process took place in two ways. Migration often created a nationalistic identity among the people already in a given place as they tried to protect themselves from the migrant, and the migrants themselves would adapt a stronger sense of communal identity in the face of the opposition they received from the host country:
Those who had not thought of themselves as "Indians" before migration became "Indians" in the diaspora. The element of romanticization that is present in every nationalism is even stronger among nostalgic migrants, who often form a very rosy picture of the country they have left (van der Veer 117).
The formation of group identity is also noted in studies of ritual on the level of the individual and of the community. Community rituals are performed in a public space, and pilgrimage is a public ritual expressing the ideas of the community:
That pilgrimage is always a ritual of the wider community is in some sense a truism. By definition, it involves a journey from one's village or town to a sacred center and back, and its performance appears to reinforce the notion of a wider community of be
. . .
Some common words found in the essay are:
Gemeinschaft Gesellschaft, Hinduism Hindu, , Finally Western, Indian Britain, Rama Hindu, Veer Indian, England Far-reaching, India Bayly, Medina Roberts, van der, van der veer, der veer, migration pilgrimage, indian society, development nationalism, communal conflicts, migration development nationalism, conflicts disputes, religious identity, rule india, nationalism religion,
Approximate Word count = 2082
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)
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