Homeland echoes: music, sound, and devotion among the South Asian Hindu diaspora in Edmonton, Canada

Abstract

ABSTRACT In Edmonton, the capital city of the province of Alberta, Canada, music, sound, and devotion have gained extraordinary popularity and proliferation among the South Asian Hindu diaspora. From festival celebrations to community gatherings or congregations in temples, this phenomenon of Hindu religio-cultural practice has been an important magnet to attract a vast number of the Hindu diaspora. Spending hours together, members of the South Asian Hindu diaspora engage in devotional musical soundscapes; immerse themselves in those soundscapes through clapping, singing, and bodily movements; and deeply engage in devotional activities. Based on the ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 2017 and 2022, including three case studies, this article discusses how these homeland echoes – recreating and resembling homeland music, sound, and devotional practices – play a powerful role in maintaining homeland ties and function as a constitutive element of collective identity of South Asian-ness for the South Asian Hindu diaspora in the Canadian society.