Paper short abstract:

This paper proposes the study of the Kodungalloor theripaatu, songs sung at the annual temple festival of the Kodungalloor Goddess temple, as a rhizomatic node, in order to map the multiple narratives that underlie the development of the temple as a sacred 'Hindu' space.

Paper long abstract:

Every year, in the summer months of March/April, Kodungalloor is colored yellow with turmeric and the air reverberates with the rhythmic singing of devotees who congregate at the Kodungalloor Goddess Temple to celebrate the Bharani festival. A festival primarily attended by devotees from the Vannan, Mannan, Pulaya, and Thiya castes, and from the Mala Arayan and Malaya Tattan tribes, the Kodungalloor Bharani has both been read as a celebration that champions pre-Brahmanical, non-Aryan modes of worship and ritual traditions and as a celebration of the violent Brahmanical usurpation of Sramana spaces, deities and modes of worship. A key ritual element of the festival is the singing of the theripaatu, which translates to songs of abuse. By studying the theripaatu as a rhizomatic node, defined by Deleuze and Guattari as "bodies and things (that) ceaselessly take on new dimensions through their contact with different and divergent entities" that have no "distinctive end or entry point" and "propelled and perpetuated by innumerable levels of the affective forces of desire and its resonating materialisations" (Parr 2010), it is possible to lay before the reader a map of the multiple myths and histories that mark the growth of the Kodungalloor Bhagavathy Kshetram as a Hindu temple, and through this mapping, understand the ways in which the temple developed as a sacred site for 'Hindu' communities. This mapping in turn also helps us understand the ways in which these communities engaged in the process of 'becoming' Hindu in Kerala.