Joanne Punzo-Waghorne (2004: 204-5) made a similar observation at the Lakṣmī temple in London’s East Ham district, where wooden miniatures represent these six temples and receive daily rituals. 26This correspondence between the temples and the particularization of the Tamil identity in Mauritius also emerges from the strong relationship between the geographical distribution of the kōvil and the Tamil population (Figure 5). 2010, Ranganathan 2011) and the perpetuation of their tradition of temple builders5 overseas. Problems faced by migrants and their family members, particularly second generation migrants, in returning to and reintegrating into their countries of origin. The main spatial features of these activities are the organization of processions and the (re)construction of places of worship, where the slightest gestures and manners are reproduced. The majority of Tamil speakers- about 70 million- live in the south Indian state of Tamil Nadu (meaning: country). Learn more. 50It is also worth noting that the social networks that contributed to the construction of this temple were not only transnational. Since independence in 1968, the post of Prime Minister has always been held by a member of the Bhojpuri community, except for the brief period from 2003 to 2005 where Paul Berenger, a member of the ‘White’ minority and of French origin, was the head of the State. Bordes-Benayoun, Chantal (2009) ‘Cultes et rituels en mouvement’ in Virginie Baby-Collin, Geneviève Cortes, Laurent Faret & Hélène Guétat-Bernard (eds. Impact of Forced Migration on Communication and Social Adaptation. Clipboard, Search History, and several other advanced features are temporarily unavailable. Cohen, Robin (1997) Global Diasporas: an Introduction, London & Seattle: UCL Press & University of Washington Press. “Sri Lankan Tamils” is a sect of Tamil speakers who have been living in the Northern and the Eastern provinces of Sri Lanka for centuries. and the fact that they have sometimes remained two distinct groups, such as in Paris (Goreau-Ponceaud 2011), Tamil communities of India and Sri Lanka share essential values, such as language (even if they do not speak exactly the same Tamil), culture and religion, which have enabled them to develop a diasporic consciousness. Indeed, the Āṛu Paṭai Vīṭu Complex, a new Chennai sanctuary also dedicated to Murugaṉ and inaugurated in 2002, shows that some of the Tamil diaspora’s temples can also be replicated in India. Epub 2019 Apr 4. The roaring tiger printed on banners, leaflets and activists’ t-shirts is also a very explicit illustration of the references used by the movement. This is notably the case of the referent priest of the great temple of Montreal, as well as many other priests working in Mauritius or even France. Consequently, the issues in the three constituent parts of the Tamil migratory space sometimes locally overlap in the diasporic community’s temples. As the linguist William Jones had previously proved the existence of a family of Indo-European languages including Sanskrit, it led to the idea of a social, historical and ‘racial’ opposition between the two main linguistic groups of India, since at that time racial and linguistic categories were largely subsumed: on the one hand, the ‘Dravidians’ of the South, presented as the indigenous people of India and on the other hand, the ‘Aryans’ of the North, with a Sanskrit culture, and regarded as invaders and as those who introduced the caste hierarchy over which the Brahmins preside. 4 In his illuminating article dealing with such places, the geographer Bernard Debarbieux (1993) notes that there is no English equivalent to the French expression ‘haut lieu’; that is why the French term will be used in the following discussion. The temples of the Tamil diaspora are not only ritual and symbolic places displaying an ethno-religious identity in the public space. 65-77. They came from Tamil Nadu. 17After showing how overseas temples are markers of Tamil identity in the host countries, I discuss the transnational construction of the Tamil diasporic identity that crystallizes around these temples. Indeed, Santhalinga Ramasami Adigal, the spiritual authority of the Perur temple-monastery, which is very active in the training of Mauritian priests, also supported the construction of the great temple of Murugaṉ in Montreal. To understand the foundations, the stakes involved and the modalities of these processes, the three main parts of the migratory space—countries of origin, host countries and diaspora community—have to be taken into account. Clothey, Fred W. (2006) Ritualizing on the Boundaries: Continuity and Innovation in the Tamil Diaspora, Columbia SC: University of South Carolina Press. 12The Tamil diaspora has not escaped the cultural, social and spatial consequences of globalization (Appadurai 1996). 1988 Dec;26(4):441-52. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2435.1988.tb00663.x. They are not only holy places presided over by one or more deities (kaṭavuḷ, tēvatai or teyvam), but social, community, economic and political poles, whose areas of influence are more or less far-reaching. (1996) Selected Documents on Indian Immigration: Mauritius, 1834-1926, vol. 51Temples are also poles and anchorage points for numerous movements within the Tamil migratory space. 33The importation of Tamil-Dravidian ethnicity is particularly visible in Mauritius. of transnational relations between diasporic communities, as well as religious sites whose sanctity is partly based on identification with the holy places of the homeland. 165-89. Ranganathan, Maya (2011) Eelam online: The Tamil Diaspora and War in Sri Lanka, Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.