Paper short abstract:

An ethnographic exploration of the religious and social culture of Mumbai’s Goan Catholic community.

Paper long abstract:

Tied to a past that is infused with vestiges of a Portuguese colonial heritage, the Goan Catholics of Mumbai, India are a community too western for the Indian cultural landscape. Yet, the Goans of Mumbai maintain their identities as fully Indian members of the city they live in. Their Indianness is an amalgam of their Catholic religious roots, their Goan cultural traditions, and their Indian nationality—a mélange in which the community sees no conflict or contradiction.

This paper, borne of ethnographic fieldwork conducted in 2013 amongst the Goan Catholic communities of Mumbai, India, utilizes in-depth interviews and observational research to gain insight into the concepts of culture, identity, and what it means to be "Indian" to the Goan Catholics of Mumbai. This data yields intriguing insight into the mechanisms that the Goan Catholics of Mumbai—with their western clothes and Portuguese names— undertake in order fit into the multi-religious, multi-ethnic, multi-cultural landscape that is the bustling cosmopolis of Mumbai.