Honoring the Living and the Dead

Concluding my series of entries about my lived experiences during my visit to Chennai, this blog entry focuses on ways of communicating that help us remember and honor the living and the dead.

One of the sub-fields within Communication is Family Communication. Among other things, it analyzes the ways in which families share their stories with one another and how narratives play an important role in remembering family histories. In Western cultures, we have such things as genealogical research where archival documents and even DNA testing are conducted to find out our family history. Not so in families like mine.

We remember our ancestors through an elaborate ceremony once a month. Every new moon day, my parents spend an entire morning remembering each and everyone in our immediate family who have now passed on. They started doing this ritual once my paternal grandparents died, by which time I was already in the U.S. It was only during this trip that I had the opportunity to sit down to be part of the remembrance ceremony.

Here is what happens. Every new moon day, our family priest -- a very smart, learned young Sanskrit scholar -- visits our home around 7 AM. Using water and sesame seed offerings, the priest guides my parents through the ceremony. They make these offerings to parents, grandparents, great grandparents and any members of previous generations (paternal and maternal). The names and birth stars (if known) of all these ancestors are explicitly pronounced repeatedly. During this ceremony, I came to know the names of some of my father's great grandparents whom I was not even aware of. At the end, they concluded by offering our respects to all our ancestors whose names we don't know. We also made offerings to all dead souls not belonging to our family who might have no one to remember them. I thought of them as "abandoned souls."

Offerings for all the ancestors

All set and ready for the monthly ceremony

Anyhow this whole ceremony was very moving. It was a beautiful way to keep alive the memory of our family ancestors. It was a great opportunity to start conversations about who belonged to our families, how they were like, and what we know of them. Once every month - wow!! Isn't that amazing? It is a great way to make the dead ones come alive as part of our present moment.

Another interesting function that we happened to be present for during this trip is the "sumangali praarthanai." This ceremony is conducted in my family, usually before or after weddings. But also sometimes along with baby shower functions (seemandam) as was the case this time for my second cousin. During this ceremony, the women of the family get together to celebrate, remember and get the blessings of our female ancestors who have passed away. Elaborate meals are prepared and served on banana leaves. Then the doors are closed and the dead women (not just grandmas but also aunts, grand-aunts) are remembered by loudly saying their names while clapping our hands, inviting them to come to the closed room to enjoy the feast. After a few minutes, the doors are opened and the living women of the family are served, often by the men in the family. This is indeed another lovely way to remember the womenfolk in our family. The only sad and discriminatory part is that during this ceremony, only those women who died before their husbands (as sumangalis) are honored. Those who died as widows are not included during this remembrance. It seemed quite unfair to me and speaks to a culture where widows are constantly marginalized. Anyhow, this ceremony for the female ancestors helped me learn from my great-grand aunt the names of some of her grandmothers and great-grandmothers!

While my family would probably publish an obituary to "The Hindu" when a loved one passes away, families in other communities announce deaths of their loved ones by printing and posting hundreds of wall posters along city walls. These posters have photos of the dead person and names of their family members who are offering "kanneer anjali" or "offerings of loving tears."

Another curious type of wall poster celebrates a rite of passage of a different kind- the first menstruation period!! Yes, you read right! Alongside the posters that honor the dead, I saw hundreds of posters celebrating young women coming of age. This entrance into womanhood is marked with elaborate celebrations where the young woman is dressed like a bride and receives many gifts. It announces to the world that she is now an eligible bride. The posters have photos of these girls wearing their first saree - a marker of womanhood- and decked up with lots of jewelry. The names of their family and the date of the "coming of age party" are printed too. This ceremony is called the manjal neeraattu vizha (the turmeric bath celebrations) because anti-bacterial turmeric is used to cleanse the girl. If you are interested in reading more about how such functions are celebrated, read Richard Clarke's blog entry.

Here is a billboard announcing a puberty party of a young woman
(photo courtesy: Richard Clark)

Thankfully, my family did not have such a public function when I reached puberty. I would have been totally embarrassed for the world to know that I got my first period, which was a very personal and somewhat confusing moment for me. Also, I am much more than just my body. For me, becoming a woman was more than just menstruating. But perhaps some other women would have enjoyed the attention and the celebrations, which is fine too. I just do hope that the young women themselves have enough agency to make decisions about such celebrations and announcements using public media.

I would like to conclude this series by saying that India (and Eastern cultures) have much to offer to my field of Communication, whether in the context of mediated communication, family communication, intergroup communication, political communication, and health communication. Apart from the ancient texts written by scholars such as Panini, Patanjali, and Chanakya, even contemporary lived communication practices offer many useful avenues of study for Communication scholars. I invite my U.S. friends to visit India. I am forever eager to be your tour/cultural guide. I also invite my colleagues and fellow scholars to widen their scholarship to include other cultures such as India.

If you haven't already done so, please do read my other entries in this series on morning walks, Marina beach, and mangoes.