Migrating rituals: negotiations of belonging and otherness among Tamils in Norway

ABSTRACT

By examining a funeral ritual devised by Tamil refugees living north of the Arctic Circle in Norway, I argue that the study of migrant rituals offers new insights into migrants’ senses of belonging, identity and wellbeing. Within a context of the exclusion and inclusion of cultural minorities, I describe the process of creating a funeral ritual that involves encounters between local Norwegians and Tamil refugees. The funeral followed the sudden death of a Tamil worker at the local fish plant as a result of a freak accident. The article focuses on how the Tamils’ work of devising and performing the funeral speaks to local migrant experiences of living on the boundaries between the Tamil and Norwegian life-worlds. A centrepiece of the case study involves a young widow, thus the analysis includes social and cultural dimensions of widow- and womanhood, while also highlighting issues of migration and the shared human condition. In conclusion, I underscore the way in which the migrant ritual, embodiment and (Othering) discourse cohere together to form a temporal phenomenon that responds to the present-ism of human life.

KEYWORDS:

• Tamil refugees
• identity
• ritual
• belonging
• wellbeing

Acknowledgements

I owe grateful thanks to Nigel Rapport, who offered inspiring comments on an earlier draft of this paper. I also thank the editors of this volume, Marianne Holm Pedersen and Mikkel Rytter, for thoughtful and precise remarks in the final stage of its preparation.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 Within the Tamil community there are various caste and class belongings, religious belongings such as Hindus, Christians and a small minority of Muslims, as well as other local cultural variations. Among the here termed Norwegians it is included aboriginal Sami populations and the minority Kven and Finn populations, as well as other local cultural identities. For more details see for instance Grønseth (2010a).

2 Verdens Gang 16.10.1996.

3 The theory of karma postulates that every action has its unavoidable consequences in such a way that a person’s condition is determined by good or bad deeds in this and previous lives (Fuller 1996). In spite of one’s best efforts to adjust the balance of ‘rights’ and ‘wrongs’ over their lifetime, the balance may not always be favourable. Still, the theory of karma assures individuals that their best efforts have not been wasted. They will start the next life with the balance achieved at the close of their previous existences (Kakar 1997). In this way, karma holds out the promise of hope for the next reincarnation.

4 Dharma may variously be understood as ‘“moral duty”, “law”, “right action” or “conformity with the truth of things”’ (Kakar 1997, 37). Each pattern refers to an image of the human life cycle and may be seen as the principle underlying social relations in which dharma is the means by which one reaches the goal of human life, moksha. For Tamils in exile, the possibilities of living in dharma are strongly challenged as crucial elements of social and cultural life are missing.