Abstract
ABSTRACT The Mission Compound is a residential enclosure in a small town in the hinterland of south-western Odisha, India that is exclusively inhabited by Christians. Acquired by German missionaries who introduced new forms of religion, administration and togetherness, this land became Christian and fostered the importance of rituals as well as the clergy’s dominance in a formerly self-administered Adivasi-tribal culture. I conceptualise this Compound as a religious infrastructure, encompassing material components – roads, buildings, walls, and gates – as well as the collective memories and meanings with which these are entangled. Examining the residents’ interactions with this infrastructural apparatus offers a window into the everyday dynamics of security and power that they navigate, as well as the processes of Christian identity formation and belonging in which they – and the infrastructure itself – participate. In this sense, the Mission Compound has great material, religious, social and semiotic meaning for the local Christian community.
Published Version
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