IN WHAT STYLE SHOULD WE MEMORIALIZE?

Abstract

This essay examines recent memorial practices and projects among the global Sikh community. These memorials range in form and scale from purpose-built museum buildings to candlelight vigils. Their peculiar placement as repositories of Sikh memory is juxtaposed with the memorial role already implicit in the architectural, spatial, and theoretical program of gurdwaras. By examining recently constructed memorial projects in and outside of Punjab, this essay calls for critical questioning of what (and who) is on display in Sikh museums and exhibits. The essay is essentially a study of the dialogue that is created as a result of the spatialization of Sikh identity and thought through memorial projects: (How) can a Sikh museum or memorial be as much a statement of Sikh socio-political identity as a gurdwara?

Notes

1 The Kurukshetra Panorama and Science Centre (2000) and Akshardham Temple (2005) in New Delhi are two recent projects that use panoramas.

2 The fact that the chronology of history as presented at Virasat-e-Khalsa stops at 1947 is an important but different issue. In reference to the state's role in sponsoring the museum, Darshan Tatla writes: Designed by an Israeli architect, the proposed museum only covers events up to 1947, as a narrative for post-1947 events would raise difficult issues. Notably, Anandpur Sahib already has a state-sponsored museum at the entrance to the historic shrine. (2006, 75)

3 ‘The television of today is a direct descendant of the panorama’, Oettermann (1997, 44).

4 Kup Rohira, the memorial in Sangrur for the Vaddha Ghallughara; Kahnuwan Chhamb, the memorial in Gurdaspur for the Chhotta Ghallughara, Fateh Burj, the memorial in Mohali for Banda Singh Bahadur. Another memorial for Banda Singh Bahadur is currently under construction in Anandpur Sahib.

5 Nietzsche's idea of the hypertrophy of history written about in Untimely Meditations cited in Huyssen (2003, 2–3).

6 Virasat-e-Khalsa is colloquially referred to as ajooba (wonder, marvel).

7 One of many unfortunate incidents, in February 2012, the Sterling Heights gurdwara in Michigan was vandalized and defaced while under construction. ‘The graffiti included vulgar language, racial epithets, the use of what appears to be a cross, a large drawing of a gun, and references to the attacks of September 11th’. http://www.saldef.org/news/mi-gurdwara-vandalized/.

8 http://www.si.edu/Exhibitions/Details/Sikhs-Legacy-of-the-Punjab-2779.

9 The 2006 exhibit, ‘I see no stranger. Early Sikh art and devotion’, at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York City also showcased a faux Guru Granth Sahib in darbar. At the Rubin Museum, the faux darbar display was on the floor and was not enclosed in glass, allowing visitors to walk up and encircle to the palki. The display created an uncanny environment for those used to seeing Guru Granth Sahib in darbar at gurdwara.

10 I thank Prabsharandeep Singh for his help in clarifying the difference between these two modes of seeing.

11 In the manner of exhibitions and displays in nineteenth- and twentieth-century world fairs and expositions.

12 Gurdwaras held vigils in memory of victims from shootings in Aurora, Newtown, and Boston, among others.

13 Take, for example, shahidi-themed dhadi singing outside Akal Takht annually in June to commemorate Operation Bluestar.

14 Look forward, do not turn backwards. [Says] Nanak, become successful this time and you will not have to return. Dakhne M. 5, Guru Granth Sahib, 1096.