Hindu Minorities and the Limits of Hindu Inclusiveness: Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta

Steven Ramey

Academic discourse concerning diaspora has frequently focused on two competing cultural identities, with the classic definition referring to any community that moves from its home region to another place where they maintain a distinct identity (Cohen 1971: 271).1 While some scholars have challenged the simplistic notion of two distinct cultures in competition (for example, Hall 2004; Portes and Rumbaut 2001), this definition still appears in some literature on diaspora. For example, a 2003 article on the Croatian diaspora cites Abner Cohen and then asserts that diasporic communities “are stretched between two countries and two loyalties” (Djuric 2003: 114). The assumptions inherent in this model of diaspora correlate to implicit assumptions in multicultural approaches to difference in North America. Multicultural conceptions generally assume that identity builds from an immigrant’s nation of origin, which comprises a relatively unitary and consistent culture (Dusenberry 1995: 32). The typical hyphenated identities, such as Romanian-American or Indian-American, reflect this assumption.2 The respect for expressions of cultural diversity that multiculturalism promotes, within certain limits of subordination to the values of the dominant communities, creates pressure for the expression of a unitary national culture that provides legitimation and political access for the immigrant community (Kurien 2007: 160; Prashad 2000: 115– 17). International Journal of Hindu Studies 15, 2: 209–39 © 2011 Springer DOI 10.1007/s11407-011-9104-9

210 / Steven Ramey However, the inhabitants in almost any nation maintain multiple, often competing and contested, ethnic and regional cultural identities. In many circumstances, one or more subnational identities coexist for the individual with a broader national identity that connects the individual and the ethnic/regional group with a larger community. In the context of diaspora, those subnational and national identity commitments make the process of forming and maintaining cultural practices and identities more complicated, especially within the multicultural model that equates ethnic and national identity. In the context of the United States, another identity formation often intersects with these questions of ethnic/national cultural identities. As multiple scholars have noted, the maintenance of ritualized activities and belief and value systems, what are commonly called religions, becomes an accepted way to express a person’s or community’s heritage in the United States (Herberg 1960: 27–28; Warner 1998: 16; Williams 1988: 29). Moreover, this expression of ethnicity through religion is a relatively safe, even expected, mode of cultural expression, certainly more so than an emphasis on linguistic heritage (Kurien 2007: 6). This assertion applies well to the contemporary community of Hindu immigrants in the United States. However, religious identification does not always correlate neatly with the ethnic and national identifications. Some immigrant communities construct specific understandings of their cultural heritage that do not conform to the dominant forms of their coreligionists and other immigrants of their nationality. With expectations in the United States about a unitary national and religious identification, these communities have to negotiate between their acquiescence to the larger immigrant and religious communities and their own construction of their regional heritage. The two communities in this study, Sindhi Hindus and Indo-Caribbean Hindus, demonstrate the complexity of negotiating these multiple identifications and pressures. As both communities experienced a double diaspora, creating their cultural forms outside of their homeland prior to migration to the United States, they had roots in multiple locales and a complicated relationship to their national identifications, as their symbolic ancestral homeland and the homeland of their youth represented two nations.3 Their complicated national heritage also influenced their formation of Hindu practices.

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 211 Rather than the immediate acceptance that the assumptions of multiculturalism posit, the relations of these communities to other Hindus sometimes became a matter of question and suspicion. Although both communities identified specifically as Hindus, their practices and understandings of Hinduism reflected influences from cultures outside presentday India and diverged from the practices and understandings that have come to be recognized, among Hindus and non-Hindus alike, as the standard form of Hinduism (which I detail below). Both of these communities, with their competing Hindu, ethnic and national identifications, are, in essence, minorities within the Hindu minority in the United States. Focusing on communities who identify as Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindus in metropolitan Atlanta, Georgia, I have developed a comparative analysis that highlights the different approaches that these communities have taken to the formation of their cultural heritage and identifications in that diasporic context. This comparative analysis reveals a series of ironies within the experiences of these two communities that highlight the influence of a variety of linguistic, political, and socioeconomic elements on their development of practices and relations with other communities as well as the limits of Hindu inclusivity. Double Diaspora Times Two The complications of their double diaspora and their minority status within Hinduism made these two communities similar. Nevertheless, their relation to India and the broader contexts of their diasporas diverged considerably, contributing significantly to their different relations to the larger Indian-American community and their particular strategies for creating their heritages in Atlanta. Reconstructing the stories of a member of each community introduces several issues that were significant for each community. Like many Indo-Caribbean Hindus in the United States, Vijay Ramdatt migrated from the South American country of Guyana to the United States in the 1970s, although he did not live in an area with many Guyanese until he moved to Atlanta in the 1990s. While his personal point of origin was clearly Guyana, his identification was not simply Guyanese. Reflecting the complex dynamics of Guyana, with multiple

212 / Steven Ramey communities competing for power and resources under ethnic identifications, he identified himself as Indian Guyanese based on the migration of his ancestors from India to Guyana approximately one hundred years earlier. Ramdatt, therefore, recognized India, a land where he had never lived, as a significant point of origin for him culturally. His ancestors migrated to Guyana when the British sugarcane plantations recruited indentured laborers from India to replace the emancipated slaves. Most of the indentured servants were brought from the port in Calcutta between the late 1830s and the 1910s when the system of indenture ended. Most of those who departed from Calcutta came from agricultural regions in North India (approximately present-day Bihar and Uttar Pradesh). A smaller number came from South India and maintained distinctions after migration, often being identified as “Madrasis” (Younger 2010: 61). Despite promises of a return to India at the end of their period of indenture, many, like Ramdatt’s ancestors, remained and developed their own communities and cultural practices in the Caribbean. Accounts of the development of formal institutions in Guyana reflect some Christian influence, as the two Indian communities, one North Indian and the other Madrasi, built separate “Hindu churches” around 1920, even sitting on pews for Sunday morning community rituals in some North Indian Hindu institutions (Younger 2004: 38–41). The Madrasi churches incorporated the South Indian worship of the Goddess MåriammaŒ and connected with the power of the goddess through spirit possession, healing, and animal sacrifice. These churches viewed their own rituals as distinctive, refusing to use the “Hindu” label for themselves, which they associated with the North Indian, Hindi-dominated churches (2010: 61, 75). Brahmins among the descendants of indentured servants organized the “Hindu” North Indian churches in Guyana, which provide the primary basis for the ritual practices that immigrants in the United States recreated (83– 85). In Trinidad, the other primary nationality represented within the IndoCaribbean community in Atlanta, somewhat similar practices developed. Brahmins conducted p¨jås in homes, when a priest would perform rituals in honor of significant life events, traditionally commemorated by placing jha~
s (flags) outside their homes (Bisnauth 2000: 119; Vertovec 1992: 114–15). Communities also began to organize satsags (gatherings of the

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 213 true) in homes on Sunday, where they sang devotional songs and developed community activities surrounding recitation of the Råmåya~a and other texts (Vertovec 1992: 116–17; Seecharan 1997: 42). Temples similar to the North Indian “churches” in Guyana developed by the 1920s, perhaps through the institutionalization of satsa
gs in homes in response to the perceived pressures from Christianity (Vertovec 1992: 121; Khan 2004: 179). While these Trinidadian and Guyanese temples maintained some distinctions from each other, they differed from the common form of Indian Hindu temples. They resembled aspects of practices in some guru movements in India, such as the SvåmEnåråya~ and RådhåsoamE groups, who conduct regular collective gatherings (Babb 1986: 17). The story of migration for Sindhi Hindus has some similar complexities. One Sindhi Hindu, Hari Gurnani, moved to Atlanta from London, England, in the 1990s. While his point of origin in migrating to the United States was London, that was not his original departure point. Gurnani grew up in India, living in various cities including Mumbai (Bombay) and Bangalore. While his original departure point was urban India, in terms of his cultural identification, neither Mumbai nor Bangalore was fully home. He traced his cultural heritage to Sindh, the southeastern province of contemporary Pakistan, where his ancestors had lived and from where his parents had migrated to India at the time of the Partition of India. Much like Ramdatt’s relation to India, Gurnani’s symbolic homeland of Sindh was a place he had never visited. When Gurnani’s family, along with the majority of Sindhi Hindus, migrated from Sindh to independent India in the aftermath of Partition, they had to reestablish their lives in new contexts. In addition to rebuilding the economic resources that they had left behind, some Sindhi Hindus worked to create distinctive cultural and religious practices in the new context. Many Sindhi Hindus associated these practices with the varied cultural influences of Sindh, largely coming from its neighbors, Punjab and Persia (Ramey 2008: 14–17). The veneration of Guru Nånak and the Guru Granth Såhib that Punjabis brought into Sindh remains a notable difference between many Sindhi practices and those of other Hindus (Thapan 2002: 162–68). The proximity to Persia and the presence in prePartition Sindh of a Muslim majority also relates to the importance of Sindhi ͨfEs within the conceptions of some Sindhi Hindus (Ramey

214 / Steven Ramey 2008: 87–94). While their relations to India differ considerably, the double diasporic heritage means that both communities developed their ethnic heritage away from their symbolic homeland. As the historical overview describes very broadly, Indo-Caribbean Hindus developed their Hinduism in a context of colonial Trinidad and Guyana, responding to the political and social issues there. Concerns developed about conversions to Christianity and about the relations between ethnic communities, as they competed with Afro-Caribbean communities for power and resources, particularly after World War II (Younger 2010: 86–88, 107–8). Sindhi Hindus developed their cultural heritage outside Sindh, but in a Hindu majority context that had vastly different resources and issues. They often faced questions about their Hindu identification, particularly from other Hindus and from Sikhs because of their veneration of the Guru Granth Såhib. They simultaneously developed alliances with non-Sindhi communities and their resources, as some Sindhis in India often visited non-Sindhi gurdwårås and temples (Ramey 2008: 157–70). Hinduism and Diversity in the United States Defining Hinduism has been a highly contested and difficult endeavor since the inception of the term during the colonial period. The heterogeneous practices and communities that people commonly label as Hinduism range from immersing an image of Ga~eça in the ocean in Mumbai and worshiping KålE during Navråtri in Bengal to performing havans at an Årya Samåj temple and studying Vedåntic philosophies.4 Even though the British are often credited with coining the term “Hinduism,” their definition of a Hindu shifted repeatedly. During the censuses of British India, groups lobbied for the inclusion and exclusion of various groups in an effort to influence the subsequent division of resources between communities (Jones 1981). The expectations about religious identity and belief in the United States, along with the multicultural assumptions, force immigrants to explain their religions in simplified “sound bite” phrases (Kurien 2007: 7). Ideally, immigrant cultures have spokespeople who explain their cultural and religious practices to dominant communities in an accessible fashion. Such pressures reinforce the need for a clear definition and

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 215 unity, something which Hindutva organizations in India have also promoted (119). Organizations such as the Vishva Hindu Parishad and the Hindu American Foundation took on the role of spokespeople for Hinduism, promoting a particular understanding of Hinduism (140–62). Some of the common explanations of Hinduism in the American context reveal particular tensions within this process of definition. Hindu communities often quote ¸g Veda 1.164.46, which states, “The wise speak of what is One in many ways” (Doniger 1981: 80) to explain the unity within this diversity, sometimes using this passage to assert their superiority over more exclusive traditions (for example, Kurien 2007: 146). Interpretations of this inclusive assertion vary, however, as some want to include only the diversity that recognizes the Vedas while others include anything originating in India, including Sikhs, Buddhists and Jains as Hindu even though they reject the Vedas (138, 199). Hindutva conceptions typically reserve the stronger rejection for Christian and Muslim traditions. The effort to define Hinduism as coinciding with traditions indigenous to India (and thus rejecting Christianity and Islam) reflects another aspect of Hindutva ideology, that India and Hindu are interchangeable. In the context of the United States, this assertion correlates with the assumptions of multiculturalism that an immigrant community represents a unitary national culture, often expressed through religious practices. The Vishwa Hindu Parishad of America and other Hindutva organizations have promoted a sense of national pride among Hindu immigrants that combines patriotism, cultural pride, and devotion for elements defined as sacred (Kurien 2007: 142–44). Clearly, though, many Hindus and non-Hindus, including many academics, adopt the former interpretation, distinguishing Hinduism from other religions. Citing a passage from the Vedas, for example, is clearly Hindu. Acknowledging the significance of the Vedas takes many forms among Hindus, including designating it as the “basis” of Hinduism (even while studying other texts), reciting Vedic hymns during rituals, repeating a Vedic mantra and interpreting a Vedic passage in translation, as above. Certain other communities and their texts, because they reject the Vedas, belong outside the boundaries of Hinduism, such as the Guru Granth Såhib (Sikhism), the Lotus S¨tra (Buddhism), the Qur’ån (Islam), and the Bible (Christianity). Hindutva ideology, through various individuals

216 / Steven Ramey and organizations, has often in practice emphasized the Vedas and Brahmin-led rituals alongside Hindu inclusiveness. Despite the assumptions of multiculturalism and the attempts to establish a unified Hindu public representation, the variety within Hinduism in the United States has been increasing. Broad regional heritages, most generally South Indian and North Indian, were often important as Hindu communities established the first temples in the United States. As the population of Indian-Americans has grown, the subdivision of Hindu communities into regional groups, often along linguistic lines, has increased, including the proliferation of regional organizations that celebrate particular regional holidays and some regionally defined temples that service one regional community primarily. Organizations following Hindutva ideologies gained increasing prominence, beginning in the 1990s (Kurien 2007: 144–54). Despite the contradictions inherent within broad definitions of Hinduism and the regional variety, American multiculturalism and the influence of Hindutva organizations combined to promote an official Hinduism that was tolerant yet Vedic and Brahmin-led and equated with the nation of India. Yet, based on my discussions with Hindus from various heritages, Hindutva ideology was never universal among Hindu communities. Those opposed to a Hindutva ideology often emphasized particular aspects of this universal definition, especially the conception of tolerance, but interpreted it more broadly to include non-Vedic traditions, even Islam and Christianity.5 Those opposed to Hindutva also frequently used patriotic expressions about India that on the surface appeared to promote Hindutva hegemony. Because Hindutva ideology coopted particular ideas for its own conceptions, some assertions that appeared to promote Hindutva actually opposed it. With the influence of this homogenizing definition, reinforced with the assumption that one definition can fit the general religion of Hinduism, communities like Sindhi Hindus and Indo-Caribbean Hindus had to negotiate their emphasis on the distinctive ethnic or regional heritage that they constructed and their relations with the larger community of Hindus. The equation of Hindu with India in both Hindutva and multicultural understandings made the position of these communities, with their multiple points of origin, tenuous. In the 1990s in Atlanta, Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindus began developing their practices alongside the

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 217 rising dominance of the Hindutva formulations. Despite the similarities of being minority Hindu communities who experienced a double diaspora and their tenuous position in relation to India, the ways these two communities developed their heritage and community differed significantly. As the comparison that follows demonstrates, these differences reflected both aspects of the traditions that they identified as their heritage and the particular dynamics of their diasporic situations. Creating Indo-Caribbean Heritage and Community in Atlanta Indo-Caribbean Hindus often referred to social concerns when they explained their decision to develop Indo-Caribbean Hindu temples in the outskirts of Atlanta. Making a generic assertion about immigrant communities, Vijay Ramdatt, whom I introduced earlier, expressed the importance of meeting together with people from the same cultural heritage. Despite the multiple sources that we can identify in Ramdatt’s heritage, he clearly identified this shared cultural heritage as being IndoCaribbean, while helping develop an Indo-Caribbean Hindu temple, as opposed to something simply Guyanese, Hindu or Indian. Ramdatt further explained this construction by distinguishing the practice of collective gatherings in Indo-Caribbean Hindu traditions from the familial and individual rituals that other Hindus often practice, even though they use the same scriptures. Illustrating the same conception, P.T. Permaul, a leader of another Indo-Caribbean temple, emphasized how the absence of collective gatherings at a temple when he moved to Atlanta made him miss his previous community in New York City and that the rituals at Indian-American temples, which seldom emphasized satsa
gs, were no substitute. In these statements, both leaders, like many other Indo-Caribbean Hindus that I met, distinguished their community from Indian-American Hindus most directly. In that process, IndianAmerican Hindus became the most explicit “other” that helped establish an ethnic identification, in contrast to Guyana where the AfricanGuyanese and/or Christians would have been the more explicit “other.” Before any temple developed in Atlanta, people identifying as IndoCaribbean Hindus began meeting together for social purposes as well as to perform practices that they saw as representing their heritage. Formalizing some of these gatherings during the process of establishing their

218 / Steven Ramey temples, each community met monthly or weekly in homes or rented facilities for satsags. Explaining the interest in forming a separate temple, Ramdatt emphasized the challenge of using temporary facilities because of the difficulty in maintaining the sanctity of the space. This situation became the impetus for their first temple, the Shiva Shakti Mandir in Norcross, a northeastern suburb of Atlanta. After collecting funds from the community and obtaining a mortgage, in the Fall of 2004 they purchased a house and garage and converted the garage into a satsag hall. With the opening of the Shiva Shakti Mandir, the community began meeting together every Sunday morning for “church,” as they frequently termed it, probably from the Guyanese nomenclature of Hindu churches reinforced by the dominant Sunday religious practice in Atlanta. From the road, only the jha~
s at the front corner and the sign designated the property as a temple. People entered the converted garage behind the house for satsags, leaving their shoes in a breezeway between the two buildings. Upon entering, devotees saw a series of m¨rtis on the left half of the end of the hall, including a Çiva liga and Çiva m¨rti and two rows of additional m¨rtis, including SarasvatA, Hanumån, RådhåK®‚~a, Ga~eça, Råma and his darbår, and Durgå. All of these images, except for the Çiva liga, were in the North Indian-style white marble and dressed in fabric as in many temples. On the opposite side of the hall was a two-foot by two-foot square platform on which smaller m¨rtis sat. Devotees, often numbering around seventy-five, sat between the entrance and the m¨rtis. These communal gatherings reflected aspects of their memories and various ethnographic descriptions of rituals in the Caribbean. The larger community participated in some of the recitations, following a printed book with transliterations of the Sanskrit and some explanations of their meaning. The Brahmin priest (who was also a medical doctor) chanted additional passages while directing the central volunteers to make offerings to the small images on the platform. At the same time, devotees sang bhajans appropriate for the deity being honored, such that the larger congregation frequently could not hear the priest chanting. Volunteers also served the larger m¨rtis at the appropriate time, not the priest. After completing the various rituals before the smaller images, the community performed a havan. Often, the young man who regularly assisted the priest directed the havan and led the entire community in the

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 219 main recitations, while a few devotees, usually children and youth, joined the central volunteers in placing the traditional herbs in the havan at the appropriate time. Unlike some havans that can be quite lengthy, the havan at the Shiva Shakti Mandir was relatively short, less than fifteen minutes. At the conclusion, everyone took the blessings from the fire. While the main practices so far resemble elements primarily from Guyana, including the group bhajan singing, a havan and lay participation (Younger 2010: 78, 83), many of these also appear in other IndianAmerican contexts, despite the obvious contrast with the individual and familial rituals common in Hindu temples. Satsags, lay-people serving m¨rtis, transliterated Sanskrit, and havans occur variously in temples and guru movements in the United States, though less in the most formal temples. The role of the priest differed the most. In many Indian-American temples, the priest is primarily a ritual specialist, not a religious educator (Kurien 2007: 119). In the Shiva Shakti Mandir, the main priest followed the havan with a discourse in English, which involved an exposition on passages from the Bhagavad G tå. These discourses used the G tå to explain ethical teachings of Hinduism and explanations of particular Indo-Caribbean practices, such as displaying jha~
s. The role of the Indo-Caribbean priest reflected aspects of practices in both Trinidad and Guyana and is especially significant, as Indo-Caribbean Hindus often respected the priest as both a ritual specialist and a guru (Younger 2010: 77–79; Seecharan 1997: 40–41; Munasinghe 2001: 36; Khan 2004: 166). Although the role of the priest differed, various participants at the Shiva Shakti Mandir used the priest’s training for legitimation, referencing time he spent studying rituals and Sanskrit in India. At the conclusion of his discourse, the central volunteers and other children and young adults performed årt before the various m¨rtis. After waving the lamp before the m¨rtis, each group took their lamp among the devotees and performed årt before parents, other family members, community elders and the priest, bowing and touching their feet as the elders blessed them. The satsag’s concluding rituals and the time following the satsag reinforced social ties in the community. As children walked among the devotees, offering them the flame from årt , kumkum for foreheads, perfume for wrists and flower petals, community announcements were made, including welcoming newcomers and announcing birthdays. To

220 / Steven Ramey finish the gathering, those with a birthday on that week sat near the ritual platform while everyone showered them with flower petals and one musician sang a version of “Happy Birthday” in English. By the conclusion, volunteers working in the kitchen provided bags of praçåd for devotees. People then conversed with friends and newcomers, received advice or blessings from the priest, expressed more intimate devotion to the m¨rtis, and after that ate lunch together in the house. The design of the ritualized activities reflected two of the primary interests within the community, according to some of the leaders. First, the leaders wanted to create a community for themselves and other IndoCaribbean Hindus, fulfilling Ramdatt’s concern to connect with others with the same cultural background, which these concluding rituals and the social time afterwards particularly accomplished. These community actions reinforced the second concern, to pass pride in their heritage onto their children. Many participants encouraged the children who participated, and the adults generally deferred to the children the privilege of doing årt or serving the deities as the central volunteers. Ramdatt specifically commented that his children began identifying with their Guyanese heritage after they began participating in the Indo-Caribbean temple activities. Before then, they were primarily assimilated into American society. Two other Indo-Caribbean temples developed after the Shiva Shakti Mandir. According to Permaul, the distance from his eastern exurb to the Shiva Shakti Mandir was problematic. Realizing the number of IndoCaribbean families in his area, he began to organize them to establish a second temple. They secured a temporary location in an empty home owned by a community member until they completed their own temple in 2007, which their priest named Vishwa Bhavan. The third temple, the Radha Krishna Mandir, developed from a split in the Vishwa Bhavan. The Radha Krishna Mandir’s leaders initially purchased a house, before the Vishwa Bhavan completed its own temple, and asserted that the slow movement at the Vishwa Bhavan was a factor in the split. Due to zoning problems, the Radha Krishna Mandir returned to meeting in a leader’s basement and later purchased another property, slightly further east than the Vishwa Bhavan, which they converted into a temple in 2008. Like at the Shiva Shakti Mandir, both the Vishwa Bhavan and the

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 221 Radha Krishna Mandir conducted collective satsags on Sunday mornings, following a very similar format with the combination of bhajans and formal rituals at the beginning, a havan, a discourse by the priest(s), and årt to the m¨rtis and elders. The jha~
 flags were also present outside each structure. The Radha Krishna Mandir differed, as it had multiple Brahmins serving as priest, alternating leadership roles, and frequently had several priestly discourses in each satsag. Like at the Shiva Shakti Mandir, participants at the Radha Krishna Mandir emphasized the training that one of the priests had in Nepal. The discourses at both temples focused more on admonishing people to live as good Hindus than the analysis of specific Hindu texts at Shiva Shakti Mandir. While all three temples emphasized the participation of the youth, one priest at the Radha Krishna Mandir carried this further, teaching the youth both to play traditional musical instruments and to read Hindi. Aspects of this formation of ritualized activities created challenges for these communities. Most members were middle-class and hourly wage earners. To maintain these activities and facilities, the community needed substantial financial sacrifice from members. Illustrating the challenge of making their mortgage payments, leaders at the Shiva Shakti Mandir repeatedly praised the efforts of one child who persisted in collecting pocket change from members until he raised enough for one month’s payment. Beyond the financial issues, maintaining these facilities and activities required many volunteers behind the scenes, whether cooking food, cutting grass or maintaining the facilities. The reasons for the development of three separate temples that each required these sacrifices depend on the perspective of the interviewee. One issue raised was the importance or irrelevance of one’s country of origin; however, none of the temples exclusively emphasized one country of origin. While the founding leadership in both of the first two temples was Guyanese, leaders in the third temple emphasized that the second temple was too exclusively Trinidadian and they wanted a panCaribbean composition. The country of origin of the original priest in the second temple might be the source of that complaint. Leaders in the first temple also presented it as pan-Caribbean, although some others identified it with Guyana more specifically. The position of the priests is perhaps more significant. A participant at the Shiva Shakti Mandir identified the second and third temples as the

222 / Steven Ramey result of a desire by entrepreneurial priests to enhance their clientele. This participant contrasted the volunteer priest at the Shiva Shakti Mandir, who did not keep the money he was given as priest, to other Indo-Caribbean priests who insisted on being treated with extreme deference and took the money given them for rituals to supplement their income, as was common in Guyana (Younger 2010: 69). He also contrasted the explanations that the priest at the Shiva Shakti Mandir provided on some of the Hindu texts to the moralizing emphases of priests in other temples. While the perspective of this particular participant reflected other aspects of his ideology, the issue of the priest arises in other assertions. A leader in the Radha Krishna Mandir related the split to the refusal of the priest of the Vishwa Bhavan to allow other Brahmins with training to take any leadership. This concern was reflected in the shared role of the priests serving in the Radha Krishna Mandir. While participants in these temples often critically characterized the other Indo-Caribbean temples, overlap existed between the temples. When families hosted p¨jås in their homes on weekends, reflecting the traditional Trinidadian home p¨jås for special occasions (Vertovec 1992: 114–15), generally members from several temples attended these rituals, thus suggesting a larger Indo-Caribbean community. Similarly, special events at a temple, particularly with a visiting guru or priest, often attracted participants from all three temples. On a Valentine’s Day weekend in 2009 at the Radha Krishna Mandir, a Guyanese Hindu priest presented a special satsa
g, giving a lengthy discourse which referenced his visits to Vrindavan in India repeatedly, along with references to Guyana and New York. Leaders from both of the other two temples attended at least one of his satsa
gs. Through these various activities, Indo-Caribbean Hindus emphasized their distinctive form of ethnic Hinduism, rather than simply participating with other Hindus or other immigrants from the Caribbean. Some even emphasized that choice by contrasting themselves to other IndianAmerican Hindus. While the practices have some similarities to practices in some other Hindu communities, the role and training of the priests did not conform to the expectations of many Indian-American Hindus. The emphasis on the training of some priests in South Asia actually suggests a realization within the community that others questioned the status of the Indo-Caribbean priests.6

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 223 Creating Sindhi Hindu Heritage and Community in Atlanta Sindhi Hindus in Atlanta, who number at least one hundred and fifty families, expressed significant interest in devotional practices and the maintenance of their regional heritage, like the Indo-Caribbean Hindus. However, Sindhi Hindus, as of 2011, had not purchased property in the metropolitan area for a general Sindhi Hindu temple or a Sindhi †ikånå, which combines image worship and veneration of the Guru Granth Såhib, even though some Sindhis in Atlanta visited Sindhi temples and †ikånås when they visited India. In 2008, followers of Sådhu T.L. Vaswani, a Sindhi Hindu guru, opened a center in an India-oriented mall at the behest of the current guru, Dådå J.P. Vaswani, but this center did not fully reflect the practices of the larger Sindhi Hindu community in Atlanta and developed because of the guru’s command, not the community’s initiation. As a guru center, the Sadhu Vaswani Center differed from regional temples like the Indo-Caribbean temples. The teachings within the movement reflected the expansive understanding of Hinduism among many Sindhis. Both Vaswanis talked positively about ͨf= Muslims and Guru Nånak. However, the movement at the beginning of the twenty-first century placed less emphasis on elements commonly recognized as outside Hinduism than it did previously. For example, a discourse that the center held in 2010 included Dådå Vaswani’s advice to children to recite çlokas every day. He used the example of Sådhu Vaswani reciting Japj=, a composition of Nånak, every morning, but when instructing the children, Dådå Vaswani suggested a passage from the Bhagavad Gtå as a good çloka to recite daily. Shifting from the Japj= of Nånak to the Gtå reflected a larger move towards mainstream Hinduism that extended throughout the movement, not just in Atlanta (Ramey 2008: 94–103). Following this direction of the broader movement, the Sadhu Vaswani Center did not have a Guru Granth Såhib installed. For their weekly satsa
gs, followers sang devotional songs, recited the poetry of their guru, and listened to a video discourse by Dådå Vaswani. Prior to establishing its own space, the group of followers met regularly in the homes of members to conduct the same activities. However, the weekly gatherings at this center, and in the homes before the suite was rented, often attracted only a handful of Sindhis, in contrast to the attendance of

224 / Steven Ramey over one hundred at occasional Sindhi sponsored events. While some personal commemorations were held in the Sadhu Vaswani Center after it opened, many of these events continued to take place in either rented facilities or non-Sindhi temples or gurdwårås. Another organization that Sindhi Hindus in Atlanta established more closely recreated the range of Sindhi heritage, as they have constructed it. The Sindhi Sabha consistently conducted community activities a few times each year that emphasized Sindhi heritage and identity, including the ritualized commemoration of D7vål7 and the Sindhi New Year festival, called Cheti Chand, and several social occasions. The Sabha also sponsored a la
gar at a gurdwårå one Sunday each year. The Sabha rented facilities in hotels or community parks for these celebrations (other than the gurdwårå ritual), which created some of the same challenges that led Indo-Caribbean Hindus to purchase their own facility, as each location became sacred only temporarily. However, these gatherings remained less frequent than the monthly or biweekly gatherings within the Indo-Caribbean community before their temples. The challenge of recreating a sacred environment each time was, therefore, less troublesome and did not mobilize the community to create their own temple. Cheti Chand is the festival that many recognized as the most specifically Sindhi. Even after the establishment of the Sadhu Vaswani Center, the Sindhi Sabha used a community room in a municipal park where they sang devotional songs, circumambulated a temporary shrine and performed årt for Jh¨lelål, whom many identified as the Sindhi Hindu god. In some years they hosted Sindhi musicians who performed songs that they connected to the multireligious heritage of Sindh, and frequently children participated in games or performances that emphasized aspects of the story of Jh¨lelål, and thus their regional heritage. One reason that the Sindhi Hindu community did not develop more regular gatherings of the Sindh Sabha is that a number of Sindhi Hindus actively participated in or visited a variety of organizations and institutions within the larger Indian-American community. Several individual Sindhis participated in other guru movements or sectarian institutions that had regular meetings, including the Satya Så7 Båbå movement and the Rådhåsoam7 satsa
g. Sindhi Hindus also visited temples individually, including the Årya Samåj temple and the Ve
kateçvara temple. With the significance of the Guru Granth Såhib in the common Sindhi Hindu

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 225 understanding of their heritage, some Sindhi Hindus were active in the gurdwårås that Punjabi Sikhs established in the Atlanta area. When an individual or family wanted to conduct a special ritual, they often invited other Sindhis to one of these non-Sindhi institutions, especially the gurdwårås, thus recreating the Sindhi community in another site. When the second gurdwårå developed in Atlanta, known as the Sikh Education and Welfare Association (SEWA) Gurdwara, the leadership included at least one Sindhi among the Punjabi majority. They intentionally developed an atmosphere that included
ålså and non-
ålså Sikhs, Hindus and American Sikhs, even in leadership positions. The Sindhi Sabha began sponsoring the la
gar each year after the SEWA Gurdwara opened. Many Sindhi Hindus that I have interviewed asserted that the Guru Granth Såhib and Nånak, or in some cases all of the Sikh gurus, are ultimately Hindu. Sindhi Hindus frequently argued that assertions about the separate religious status of Sikhism related to political developments historically and in contemporary Punjab.7 While such assertions also fit with the indigenous definition of Hinduism that Hindutva groups often promoted, generally Sikhs and non-Sindhi Hindus distinguish the veneration of the Guru Granth Såhib as Sikh and p¨jås before m¨rtis of deities as Hindu. Despite the questions that this participation could elicit, Sindhi Hindus continued to incorporate gurdwårå rituals. Sindhi Hindus also organized ritual events in homes and other rented facilities on an individual basis. One family performed Ga~eça Caturth7 every year in their home, inviting Sindhi Hindus and others to participate during the ten-day festival. Other families conducted a Satyanåråya~ P¨jå or other special ritual at homes or in a banquet room at a restaurant to accommodate the larger community. While it was not always exactly the same people at each event, many Sindhi Hindus participated in most of these occasions, which sometimes required them to choose between multiple events on the same day or shuttle between events on a busy Sunday. What is particularly noteworthy about the participation of Sindhi Hindus in a variety of institutions is that often the Sindhi Hindus participated explicitly as a community much like the Indo-Caribbean community did at home rituals. Beyond inviting the broader Sindhi Hindu community, many in the community assisted with the rituals, including preparing

226 / Steven Ramey food, and the Sindhis made up a significant percentage of the devotees at the gurdwårås whenever another Sindhi sponsored the la
gar. Consequently, rather than constructing their own temple, Sindhi Hindus in Atlanta participated as a group at non-Sindhi institutions, the Sadhu Vaswani Center, Sindhi Sabha functions, homes and rented facilities, creating a floating community that utilized resources in the larger IndianAmerican community to create their regional traditions.8 The lack of a structural institution clearly did not reflect a lack of devotional or cultural activity among Sindhi Hindus. Beyond these activities in Atlanta, a number of Atlanta’s Sindhi Hindus demonstrated their emphasis on Sindhi identity through leadership in international Sindhi organizations, both cultural and devotional. A lack of financial resources also did not discourage the Sindhi Hindu community in Atlanta from creating a temple. Like many Sindhis outside of Sindh, community members in Atlanta were generally financially successful. Clearly, participation at diverse institutions and facilities had been satisfactory enough that no widespread call for a Sindhi organized temple or †ikånå had gained a critical mass of support. Some Sindhis explicitly stated a preference not to have a temple. One leader explained that she preferred to avoid the leadership obligations that arise with constructing their own temple. While they participated in various institutions with non-Sindhi immigrants from India, their practices, like the practices of Indo-Caribbean Hindus, maintained clear distinctions between Sindhi Hindus and other Indian-Americans. No Hindu temple in Atlanta had installed the Guru Granth Såhib, and no gurdwårå had m¨rtis of deities. Despite those distinctions, the ritual forms that Sindhi Hindus expected in relation to m¨rtis and the Guru Granth Såhib coincided with the practices at Hindu temples and gurdwårås, respectively. Therefore, Indian-American institutions in Atlanta were more satisfactory for Sindhi Hindus than they were for Indo-Caribbean Hindus. Yet, in their collection of practices and floating community, Sindhi Hindus in Atlanta continued to emphasize their regional distinctiveness, although they did not describe any “other” as strongly as Indo-Caribbean Hindus did. Comparing Diasporic Formations Both Indo-Caribbean and Sindhi Hindus emphasized the importance of

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 227 uniting people with particular cultural and religious backgrounds, enacting their heritage according to their own understandings, and developing cultural pride for future generations. The structural differences between the ways these communities developed their heritage, with the absence of a comparable temple among Sindhi Hindus, relates to the heritage that each community created and their diasporic experiences. These contrasting responses to the competing identities in the United States both reflected and reinforced the differing connections between each community and the broader Indian-American and Hindu communities. As satsa
gs involving collective rituals developed in importance within Indo-Caribbean Hindu communities prior to migration to the United States, developing temples that emphasize Sunday morning satsa
gs connected these communities to their construction of their heritage, in addition to its importance for social relations within the community. This process was particularly necessary since most of the temples that IndianAmerican communities had built in Atlanta emphasized individual devotion over collective satsa
gs. Establishing their own institutions, however, further isolated them from Indian-American Hindus. In contrast, Sindhi Hindus did not identify a specific collective ritual as so central within their construction of their Sindhi Hindu heritage. The particularly diverse elements that many Sindhis identified as representing their heritage were more distinguishing from other Hindus in the United States than the more standard collection of deities and texts that IndoCaribbean Hindus venerated. Yet, multiple non-Sindhi institutions had established practices that resembled different components of these practices, allowing Sindhis to create their heritage through practices in a range of institutions and develop connections to other Indian-Americans, both Hindu and Sikh, in Atlanta. The diversity of Sindhi elements also made a unified institution more complicated, as those who especially revered the Guru Granth Såhib visited one of the gurdwårås, those who worshiped Ve
kateçvara visited the Ve
kateçvara temple, and those who emphasized a ͨf3 master from Sindh did not consider any of the institutions or Sindhi organizations in Atlanta to be fully engaging. These differences also reflect the migration stories of each community. The diverse regional origins among Indo-Caribbean Hindus became generally homogenized, with the exception of the Madrasis, as they mixed together after their migration to the Caribbean (Younger 2010: 69;

228 / Steven Ramey Vertovec 1992: 92–94). The diverse elements comprising Sindhi constructions of their heritage, in contrast, increased as that community’s first diaspora spread Sindhi Hindus throughout India. Most Sindhi Hindus adapted their practices to the local emphases, particularly in relation to deities, so Hanumån became more important to Sindhi Hindus in Lucknow while MurugaŒ increased in importance among Sindhi Hindus in Tamil Nadu (Ramey 2008: 66–70). Hari Gurnani, for example, became a devotee of Ve
kateçvara after visiting the Ve
kateçvara temple in Tirupati with family members who had settled in Andhra Pradesh. Therefore, the experiences of their dispersal across India added to the difficulty of uniting the community around a single institution. While Sindhi Hindu communities in some metropolitan areas, in India and in North America, established temples that reflect a portion of this diversity, these institutions were much less common than Indo-Caribbean institutions in the United States and Canada. Another connection between these contrasting strategies and the migration histories of each community involves their connections to other Hindus and Sikhs. The Indo-Caribbean community moved from being geographically centered in British India, with many coming from the Hindi heartland, to being isolated in the Caribbean. With generations spent separated from the developments within mainstream Hinduism, the ritualized activities developed in relation to the Caribbean context, such as having satsa
gs with an English discourse by the priest. Conversely, the first migration of Sindhi Hindus went from a Muslim majority area on the periphery of British India to more geographically centered, Hindu majority areas of independent India. For at least a generation before most Sindhi Hindus in Atlanta migrated, their communities had adapted to a Hindu majority context that did not fully recognize Sindhi Hindu understandings of Hinduism. Therefore, their first recreation of Sindhi Hindu traditions in diaspora was in conversation with the Hindu majority and Punjabi Sikh communities of India, including Sindhi Hindu participation in Punjabi Sikh gurdwårås and non-Sindhi Hindu temples. When they began to develop their practices in the context of Atlanta, the compromises involved in participating at non-Sindhi gurdwårås and temples were familiar within the experiences of many Sindhi immigrants. Despite the ease or challenge of creating a single institution that represents the conceptions of community members or participating in the

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 229 institutions other communities organized, the particular implications of these different approaches reveal a complicated relationship to the unity of each community. Constructing a formal institution with a regular commitment of time and resources enhanced the sense of community among the Indo-Caribbean Hindus who gathered every week, yet it also led to greater subdivisions within the community, as some established additional temples based on competing interests. Without a temple that required such an extensive, public commitment, Sindhis had not subdivided as formally. As opposed to a temple with weekly satsa
gs, the flexibility of intermittent gatherings enabled people to emphasize their own interests without formally declaring them or rejecting the foci of other Sindhis. A Sindhi temple in Atlanta would have required some people to choose between their ongoing participation at a guru’s satsa
gs or the gurdwårå and their Sindhi community every week. The development of the Sadhu Vaswani Center further illustrates the complications of more regular gatherings, as some leaders in Atlanta expressed frustration at the limited participation of other Sindhis in those weekly satsa
gs. Irregular Sindhi gatherings, therefore, created an amorphous unity, which was not as developed as the Indo-Caribbean unity, but simultaneously created fewer sources of contention and division. The Indo-Caribbean community experienced a stronger tension between their assertion of India as the origin point of their ancestors, which was an important distinction in the multiracial context of the Caribbean, and the development of their distinctive practices in the Caribbean. While most Sindhi Hindus in Atlanta had grown up in India or had at least visited family who remained there, most Indo-Caribbean Hindus had limited knowledge of their ancestor’s migration and had never visited India. Their memories drew primarily on experiences in the Caribbean, which became their primary reference point. The importance of New York City as a reference point within Indo-Caribbean communities in the United States further complicated their sense of connections to India in a way that was not present for Sindhi Hindus. Having the largest IndoCaribbean Hindu population in the United States, New York set the standard for diasporic Indo-Caribbean Hindus as much, perhaps, as the Caribbean. One Indo-Caribbean leader in Atlanta, for example, compared their plans for celebrating Hol/ to celebrations at Indo-Caribbean temples in New York, not Guyana. He also validated his temple’s success by

230 / Steven Ramey repeating the story of a visitor from New York being impressed with the activeness of their youth. When P.T. Permaul described his feelings of nostalgia for congregational gatherings, he was not simply pointing back to temples in the Caribbean. He repeatedly described his experiences in New York City, where he had lived previously. Following the Caribbean and New York City, India became in effect the third point of reference for Indo-Caribbean Hindus in Atlanta. Leaders of several temples emphasized when the priests had studied in India or Nepal. India also entered some of the priestly discourses there, such as describing the setting for different events in the Mahåbhårata. A visiting pa~
it at the Radha Krishna Mandir made much more explicit assertions about India as he described at length his trips to Vrindavan, the traditional home of K®‚~a. He also discussed New York and Guyana, using them all as a means to validate his position, but the emphasis on India was notably stronger in this presentation than any other IndoCaribbean discourse that I experienced. This contrast highlights the overall limited emphasis on India in Indo-Caribbean communities in Atlanta. The different levels of experience with India separated IndoCaribbean Hindus, both in terms of cultural elements and personal experiences, from other Indian-Americans in a way that Sindhi Hindus were not separated. To the extent that American multiculturalism and Hindutva equated Hindu and India, the Indo-Caribbean community was more peripheral and less legitimate than the Sindhi Hindu community was. As their migration after Partition gave Sindhi Hindus a stronger cultural connection with independent India than Indo-Caribbean Hindus developed, Sindhi Hindus did not describe the same experiences of marginalization that Indo-Caribbean Hindus described. While most temples and gurdwårås in Atlanta did not explicitly prevent people from entering, the opportunity to contribute to the functioning and leadership of an institution was not necessarily inclusive. Sindhi Hindus had greater success engaging and contributing to the leadership of non-Sindhi institutions, particularly SEWA Gurdwara, than what Indo-Caribbean Hindus described. Another factor in the relationships to the larger Indian-American community was their socioeconomic status. While people of Indian heritage in the United States are generally seen as a “model minority” of profes-

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 231 sionals and business owners, a stereotype that census data on income certainly supported,9 the Indo-Caribbean community appeared less affluent, on average, often working in the service sector for an hourly wage. As Vijay Ramdatt described it, he and his community sensed that Hindus from India had a notion of superiority, largely based on their economic status. Sindhi Hindus, in contrast, generally matched the image of Indian-American successes and therefore related to the broader community more as equals. While the greater economic successes of the Sindhi Hindu community generally meant that Sindhi Hindus had more resources to establish their own institutions than Indo-Caribbean Hindus did, their easier acceptance in non-Sindhi institutions, perhaps because of their economic position, reduced the need to use those resources to create their own institution. Moreover, while Indian-Americans were not always wealthy, some community leaders had a strong interest in maintaining the “model minority” image (Khandelwal 2002: 91–94). Communities and organizations that did not fit the image of the successful “model minority” were also marginalized in an effort to promote that image. In these ways, socioeconomic issues contributed to the experiences of greater marginalization among Indo-Caribbean Hindus in comparison to Sindhi Hindus. The approaches that each community took towards conducting their practices further reinforced their connections to the broader community. While Indo-Caribbean Hindus described a lack of acceptance from Indian-American communities, the separate temples of the Indo-Caribbean Hindus reinforced their isolation from the larger Indian-American community. In contrast, the easier acceptance that Sindhi Hindus reported facilitated their continued engagement with non-Sindhis in multiple non-Sindhi institutions, both Hindu and Sikh, which simultaneously deepened their connections as a distinct Sindhi community that shifted between institutions. While Sindhi Hindus were more accepted than Indo-Caribbean Hindus, their position was not entirely free from tensions. Since their participation in non-Sindhi institutions placed them as a minority within institutions that other ethnic groups dominated, even in the case of more inclusive institutions such as the SEWA Gurdwara, no single institution supported the varied activities that Sindhi Hindus identified as their heritage. When the community participated in the SEWA Gurdwara or at a Hindu temple,

232 / Steven Ramey they also incorporated Punjabi Sikh or non-Sindhi Hindu practices into their Sindhi Hindu heritage. This approach, therefore, never fully enacted the experience that some Sindhi Hindus in Atlanta remember from participating in †ikånås in India that incorporated both the Guru Granth Såhib and images of Hindu deities. While some Sindhis emphasize the adaptability of the Sindhi community that this strategy reflects, it made the continual development and change of their heritage more obvious than in communities who control their institutions directly, such as the IndoCaribbean community. This strategy also required the continued acceptance of Sindhi participation by the non-Sindhis at each institution. Interestingly, the main rejection of Sindhis in Sikh gurdwårås in the United States related to nationalist and political issues in India, such as the 1984 violence following the Indian Army’s action to oust militant separatists from the precincts of the Harmandir in Amritsar and the subsequent assassination of Indira Gandhi (Williams 1988: 241). Engaging the broader community of Hindus and Indian-Americans more generally involves this type of trade-off between a loss of direct control and access to a greater range of resources as well as closer connections to that broader community. The nature of conceptions of ethnic identifications among IndianAmericans further complicated the peripheral status of both communities. In India, the recognition of official languages has been an important issue of respectability for ethnic communities, and the effort to draw state boundaries according to majority language demographics connects states, ethnicity and language. Because the ancestors of the Indo-Caribbean Hindus migrated from different parts of India, they did not have a common Indian language among them. Bhojpuri, a dialect of Hindi, developed as a lingua franca among Indo-Caribbean laborers in Trinidad after migration, but that language developed differently in Trinidad than in India and is not recognizable to other Indian-Americans, even as few Indo-Trinidadians still know it (Vertovec 1992: 94). Sindhi Hindus successfully campaigned to have Sindhi added to the list of officially recognized languages in India, so they have that sense of legitimacy, even though few Sindhis in diaspora know much Sindhi (Daswani and Parchani 1978; David 2001). Since they dispersed across India and do not comprise a clear majority in any region, they also do not have a separate state within India. Several Sindhis in Atlanta have cited these

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 233 lacunae, the absence of a Sindhi state and their limited linguistic ability, as problematic within their experiences in the United States. For example, some Sindhi Hindus described their implicit exclusion when the organizational scheme of the Festival of India in Atlanta, a pan-Indian cultural exhibition, centered on organizations representing each state. Thus, the contemporary Indian emphasis on ethnic language and state boundaries reinforced the peripheral status of both Indo-Caribbean and Sindhi Hindus. The Ironies of Minority Hindu Experiences in Atlanta In the context of American multicultural assumptions of a unitary Indian Hindu culture and vocal Hindutva assertions of particular understandings of Hinduism, both Sindhi Hindus and Indo-Caribbean Hindus maintain their distinctive ethnic and regional identifications in Atlanta. Many Sindhi Hindus identified as Indian-American, Hindu and Sindhi simultaneously, while many Indo-Caribbean Hindus identified as Hindu, Indo-Caribbean and the nationality of their diasporic homeland, generally Guyana or Trinidad. The experiences of these two communities and their specific strategies to negotiate their multiple identifications highlight a series of ironies. The practices in the Indo-Caribbean community, while having unique elements, more closely resembled the practices in other Hindu communities in the United States in terms of the objects of veneration, the emphasis on temple community and the priestly leadership, even though the priests are more didactic and less traditionally trained. Among Sindhi Hindus, however, their practices diverged more directly from practices in temples, especially with the inclusion of the veneration of the Guru Granth Såhib, the Sindhi god Jh¨lelål, Nånak and occasionally ͨf4 Muslims (primarily on the individual level). Despite their greater similarity in practice, Indo-Caribbean Hindus ironically expressed a greater sense of isolation and even rejection from Indian-American Hindus than Sindhi Hindus typically expressed. This experience of rejection derived partially from other cultural issues, including food and language, where the IndoCaribbean communities reflected the influence of creolized Caribbean cultures. Their socioeconomic position, which did not match the “model minority” conception, probably also contributed to their sense of infe-

234 / Steven Ramey riority and rejection. In contrast, Sindhi Hindus in Atlanta actually reported fewer questions about their practices than Sindhi Hindus in India did (Ramey 2008: 4, 85; Daswani N.d.). While Sindhi Hindus in Atlanta were more able financially to create their own institutions, it was the Indo-Caribbean community that built multiple temples. Despite the irony within that situation, the greater socioeconomic similarity between Sindhi Hindus and the self-image of many Indian-Americans may have encouraged non-Sindhi communities to welcome Sindhi Hindus into leadership roles. Moreover, the different strategies reinforced the relations with other Indian-American communities, by connecting Sindhi Hindus with other communities and isolating Indo-Caribbean Hindus in their own temples. While both Hindutva proponents and anti-Hindutva Hindus pointed towards Hindu inclusivity as a central tenet of Hinduism, the experiences of these two communities highlight the limits of that inclusivity. To add to the irony, Sindhi Hindus often asserted this concept of Hindu inclusivity to defend their practices that some other Hindus considered to be outside the bounds of inclusive Hinduism. The limits to Hindu inclusiveness, taken from the experiences of these two communities in Atlanta, revolved around much more than proper practices and beliefs. Practices contributed to the marginality of these minority Hindu communities, such as the training of the priests in the Indo-Caribbean temple and the veneration of the Guru Granth Såhib as central in many Sindhi Hindu understandings. The weak connection of Indo-Caribbean Hindus to contemporary India through the isolation of their ancestors in the Caribbean, the lack of a recognizable Indian language, and their emphasis on multiple homelands as reference points, of which India is often third, contributed significantly to cultural differences and further isolated them from other Hindus in Atlanta. Geopolitical factors, such as the absence of a Sindhi state in India, have become more explicit, though occasional, points of exclusion for Sindhi Hindus. Increased tensions surrounding Sindhi participation in Sikh gurdwårås in the United States following political tensions and violence in India between Sikhs and Hindus in 1984 further confirm this point. Less explicitly, the socioeconomic position of each community, which probably contributed to a generalized sense of similarity or difference, appeared to be an additional factor in their level of acceptance. These assertions coordinate with portions of Gyanendra Pandey’s (2006)

Sindhi and Indo-Caribbean Hindu Communities in Atlanta / 235 claims that interreligious interactions in India reflect issues of expressions of patriotism and socioeconomic status more than philosophical or ritual disputes. Yet, the experiences of these communities further suggest that the ideal of Hindu tolerance needs careful scrutiny beyond the critique of Hindutva intolerance of “foreign” religions. Like most human communities, Indian-American groups place limits on their tolerance of ritual, ethnic, socioeconomic, and linguistic differences within their institutions and communities. As these two communities illustrate, the ways of creating and maintaining cultural identities in diaspora are varied. The multicultural assumption of the unity within immigrant communities, organized by nationality, and a focus on a religion’s vocal representatives, who often attempt to match contemporary American expectations about religions, can lead scholars to overlook other ways of creating identities and constructing heritages in diaspora. As the differences between these communities and their strategies highlight Hindu diversity, they illustrate the tenacity of the heterogeneity within Hinduism, even as some express concern about attempts to homogenize Hinduism. With this tenacious heterogeneity comes a reminder of the danger of over-generalizing about Hinduism. The failure to nuance the complexity of Hinduism, whether by practitioners, scholars or popular discourse, cloaks the socioeconomic, political and cultural factors that contribute to group dynamics in assumptions of sacred traditions and implicitly reinforces homogenization, which further marginalizes communities like Indo-Caribbean and Sindhi Hindus. Notes 1. I received support for the fieldwork that contributed to this article from the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Alabama and an award from the Research Grants Committee of the University of Alabama. This project also could not have happened without the hospitality and cooperation of many individuals in both communities. I have used pseudonyms for interviewees throughout the article to protect their privacy. 2. Some scholars critical of these assumptions also reinforce them. Kurien’s (2007: 3–7) analysis of the assumptions within multiculturalism and its influence on Indian-Americans implicitly maintains that assump-

236 / Steven Ramey tion, as she repeatedly focuses on American Hinduism in relation to Indian culture as a whole, which fits her larger interest in the mutual influence of Hindutva and American multiculturalism. 3. I use the past tense to describe my observations of these communities to avoid the assumption, implicit within the ethnographic present, that these communities and their practices are unchanging. Most of the fieldwork that informs this article took place from 2006 to 2010. 4. Academic discourse has emphasized the variety that is often included in the category of Hinduism. Introductory texts often cite this diversity (see, for example, Knott 1998: 110–18; Narayanan 2004: 7–9), while scholars have developed reflections on the representation of this diversity, such as Lipner’s “Banyan model” (2004: 24–25). 5. In one debate about constructing a temple in the Southeast, some community members proposed creating a center for Indian spirituality that would include Sikhs and other Indian-Americans, but others opposed that, placing a condition on their financial support that the temple be identified as Hindu. 6. Younger (2004: 44) addresses Indo-Caribbean concerns about the acceptance of Indo-Caribbean priests in Canada. He describes how a prominent Guyanese priest presented himself as a spokesperson for Hinduism, but also hired Brahmins from Varanasi to provide legitimacy in terms of the Sanskrit portions of the ritual at his temple. 7. These assertions resemble portions of the critical scholarship on Sikhism (McLeod 1991 and Oberoi 1994, for example). 8. This format is similar to the assertions about a “community in moments” detailed in Raj’s (2003: 81–95) study of Punjabi Hindus. 9. Asian Indians on the 2000 census reported a median family income in 1999 of over $70,000, higher than any general racial category, including “White, not Hispanic,” and just below the Japanese-American median family income, which was the highest among specific Asian ethnic communities (Reeves and Bennet 2004: 16; Welniak and Posey 2005: 5). References Cited Babb, Lawrence A. 1986. Redemptive Encounters: Three Modern Styles in the Hindu Tradition. Berkeley: University of California Press.

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STEVEN RAMEY is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa. [email protected]