Today is Raksha Bandhan (or Rakhi), the Indian holiday where sisters are supposed to tie a bracelet around their brothers 
as a symbol of sisterly devotion. The basics of the holiday are at Wikipedia:
The festival is marked by the tying of a rakhi, or holy thread by the sister on the wrist of her brother. The brother in return offers a gift to his sister and vows to look after her. The brother and sister traditionally feed each other sweets.
It is not necessary that the rakhi can be given only to a brother by birth; any male can be “adopted” as a brother by tying a rakhi on the person, whether they are cousins or a good friend. Indian history is replete with women asking for protection, through rakhi, from men who were neither their brothers, nor Hindus themselves. Rani Karnavati of Chittor sent a rakhi to the Mughal Emperor Humayun when she was threatened by Bahadur Shah of Mewar. Humayun abandoned an ongoing military campaign to ride to her rescue. (link)
Though the holiday is strongly associated with Hinduism, in my experience it is somewhat of a secularized, “cultural” holiday both in India and the diaspora, where other religious groups participate. (I’m not sure if it’s absolutely universal — do Indian Christians and Muslims celebrate Rakhi? Is there Rakhi in Bangladesh or Pakistan? Based on this article, the answer to the second question is maybe.) Indeed, these days, it isn’t surprising to see Rakhi designs that contain references to Indian and western superheroes (check out this cool Spiderman Rakhi), alongside the more traditional designs.
In Haryana, a group of women tied Rakhis around trees, as an environmental gesture. (“Her other brother is a tree,” one bystander quipped.) Apparently the best-selling brand of Rakhis (“Laloos”) in the state of Bihar are named after the current Railway Minister, Laloo Prasad Yadav. (“But these Rakhis are only available on the black market!” the same bystander wryly noted.) And Indian PM Manmohan Singh recognized the holiday in a typical fashion.
Amitabh,
funniest story i ever heard of the carribo-brownz: some laborers got fed up with the conditions and decided to got back to brownland, so they started hacking their way through the jungle toward the east!
it’s been a while but i concur with the sentiment. when i was a kid i’d enjoy the tinsel covered ones. eventually i realized the silk ones stay the longest.
btw – there used to be something about the wrist it could be tied on – left or right? anyone in the know? does it have to do anything about going to the loo.
I agree with Amitabh on the wave of homegenisation sweeping through the Indian middle class. Why, the salwar-kameez practically is the uniform for south indian women these days who have tossed aside the paavadai-thavani, half-saris and saris. Chappatis are part of the south indian thali, even at Saravana Bhavan! The southern locus of the IT industry has led to many from the north adopting the south indian street lingo (Machaan and machi…). A few non-south indians even take Bharatanatyam classes though I haven’t heard any taking up Carnatic music yet 🙂 And there are plenty of south indians engaged in traditional north indian cultural activities, including Holi and bhang! Most interesting are the number of cross-regional, cross-cultural, and cross-religious relationships ranging from friendship to …marriage.
I wonder what festivals the south or east has that are similar to raksha-bhandan: secular, community-oriented, between genders, etc. Perhaps in due time raksha-bandhan, along with the regional alternates, will be pan indian. It is an error however to assume we are there already.
Another Desi Dude:
Grammatical gender is the way that all the words in the sentence have to agree with the gender of the main subject. In Hindi, if you wanted to say ‘That boy is tall and fat’ you’d say ‘Woh ladka LAMBA aur MOTA hai’, whereas if you want to say ‘That girl is tall and fat’ you’d say ‘Woh ladki LAMBI aur MOTI hai’. It becomes even more complicated (but linguistically beautiful to me) when you add in singular vs. plural, and different tenses. If you want to say ‘I saw the horse’ you say ‘Main ne ghoda DEKHA’ but if you want to say ‘I saw the mare’ you say ‘Main ne ghodi DEKHI’.
hairy-D,I don’t know the rationale behind it, but I know Rakhis get tied on the right wrist…
Amitabh, assuming you mean it in the same sense as Razib, the answer for Tamil is that nouns are not always associated with gender. In Hindi, you have ‘mera jootha’ and ‘meri pathloon’. In Tamil, you use the same word.
I think the more general question is whether language shapes the way you think. This may be true to some degree, but I think one must be careful in drawing conclusions or forming conjectures based on textual analysis of languages. For one, it tends to group people based on language, whereas a more appropriate grouping is culture. Does the fact that nouns have associated gender in certain languages indicate anything substantial? I don’t think so. Besides the Bengali counter-example, there is now Tamil. People often quote the number of words for, say, ‘water’ in Arabic or ‘peace’ in Tamil. Does the existence or frequency of certain words in certain languages indicate anything special? I don’t think so. Does the number of words in Tamil for ‘peace’ indicate that Tamilians are generally more peaceful? I doubt it. Does the word ‘Schadenfreude’ indicate a greater German penchant for sadism? I doubt it also.
German penchant for sadism
as someone with a taste for german american females….
but I know Rakhis get tied on the right wrist…
Because, in Hindu culture (i correct, north Indian Hindu culture to be safe), right and left had have unique functions from time immemorial. A Rakhi would never go to left-hand for some obvious reasons.
By the way, I am left-handed and quite a few people in my family are left-handed or ambi-dextrous in 2-3 generations.
Amitabh, right, my comments are valid then. There is so much joy in conjugation 😉
Amardeep @ 17
I’m from Karnataka where Upakarma (or Janjya Pournami in AP) is celeberated. Though people change a scared thread, it is not the kind that is worn on the wrist ( it is a loop of 9-strings of white cotton thread) worn across the torso -over the right shoulder and under the left arm. Only people who have had an initiation ceremony(Upanayam) change this thread. The Janjyam is required for those who do Sandhya Vandanam ( literal translation – Evening Salutation)
I hail from Andhra and fairly large towns (along with big cities) do celebrate Rakhi along with Janjyala Pournami on this day. I cant vouch for everyone, but almost all my frieds are aware of this festival.
Yes. i believe its big in hyderabad. A generation ago, young Tamilian women wore half-saris; salwars were looked down upon as a sign of eccentricity. Now everyone wears salwars and the helf-sari is nearly extinct. In the North, Tamilian/South Indian food is increasingly popular, as is MS Subbulakxhmi, Bharatnatyam and so many other things. There is definitely a pan-browness developing among the middle class in South Asia.
thank you DD/R.
By the way, I am left-handed and quite a few people in my family are left-handed or ambi-dextrous in 2-3 generations.
nasty 🙂
I grew up in the north and the south. Rakhi was celebrated by the others, not in our house even though I have a younger brother. In our house during Pongal, the Kanu Pongal day is reserved for the brother. He sends/brings gifts to the sister and she prays for the well being of her family. The girls/women of the house keep pongal and wish for all the crows to get “married”. I now do the same with my sons as I have no daughters.
Amitabh, you are over-generalizing. I’m a Bengali who was raised in Delhi and we never adopted the celebration of Rakhi. Most of the Bengali families we knew in Delhi would always consider Rakhi as a specifically North Indian festival, not something celebrated Bengali community. As someone noted upthread, there is a Bengali Hindu celebration called “Bhai Phonta”, which though similar in concept is slightly different and is celebrated on a different date.
And lest you think this is some sort of diaspora fossilization of customs, my relatives in West Bengal didn’t celebrate Rakhi either. Bhai Phonta is still the dominant celebration, and Rakhi is virtually unknown except through Hindi movies and television. I have family in North-eastern states such as Assam and Meghalaya and Rakhi was not celebrated there as well. In fact many parts of Northern India do not celebrate Rakhi as well, including parts of Bihar, UP, Uttaranchal, Madhya Pradesh, Kashmir etc. It is by no means even a pan-North Indian festival.
As for urban Indians having more in common with each other than their ethnic brethren in rural areas, that’s true to a very limited extent. Besides the pan-Indian popular culture that is transmitted in Hindi and English, there are many other cultural discourses that exist within the different linguistic communities. A lot of shared perceptions, idioms and experiences come through these linguistic discourses. In Bengali for instance, there’s a thriving magazine scene, at least four television channels broadcasting exclusively in Bengali, films, music, books, etc.
Oh, and I know Razib has already clarified this, but Bengali is both an Indo-Aryan language and without gender. In fact, even the pronouns are not gendered. In this respect, it is exactly like Farsi, that pillar of the Indo-Iranian language group.
And for the record, I have no great love for Rakhi (and neither for Bhai Phonta), so I’m less sanguine about the wish that it would sweep the Indian middle classes. Shudder Hope not.
So Rakhi is like anti-Valentine’s day, eh?
So I called my SO up to see what he was up to. He was busy and at a family member’s home.
Me: Where are you?
Him: Cousins… its that brother/sister day.
Me: Oh, ok, ttyl (thank goodness I checked SM today)!
He is so vague when it comes to explaining things… I have to sleuth everything out.
So Rakhi is like anti-Valentine’s day, eh?
Yes, too much of a population problem is what we have.
Thalassa, I’m a little beat after a great Raakhi celebration, I will try to respond to your post (#66) tomorrow. But Oneup (#68) has me thinking…about the role that cousins play in most of our lives, and in the Indian culture in general…although they can be our worst enemies when it comes to dividing up property, but in other situations they are literally just like our brothers and sisters. In fact I don’t believe any of the northern Indian languages even have a word for cousin, we just say ‘bhai’ or ‘bhain’ (brother/sister). Many of us maintain that familiarity and closeness even as adults…something I see largely missing from mainstream American society. Heck, I even know the majority of my 2nd cousins, and quite a few 3rd cousins…and I don’t think that’s so rare in Indian families.
As for urban Indians having more in common with each other than their ethnic brethren in rural areas, that’s true to a very limited extent. I would personally qualify the commonalities as being to true to ‘a limited context’. I know we are splitting hairs here, but I would agree with Amitabh on a certain degree of homogenization across India and the emergence of a pan-Indian middle class culture.
Besides the pan-Indian popular culture that is transmitted in Hindi and English, there are many other cultural discourses that exist within the different linguistic communities. A lot of shared perceptions, idioms and experiences come through these linguistic discourses. In Bengali for instance, there’s a thriving magazine scene, at least four television channels broadcasting exclusively in Bengali, films, music, books, etc.
Yes, but somehow, I have often got the feeling that this latter cultural discourse tries to “aspire” to be more pan-Indian. This might be due to a sense of nationalism. I brought up the point earlier under Sajith’s post earlier on the Kamala Hasan clip that one of the major differences between Tamil cinema and Bollywood cinema is that Tamil is about a Tamil cultural identity, while Bollywood is about a pan-Indian cultural identity. In the context of movies, such an “apsiration” towards a more pan-Indian culture is related to market economics, as well as nationalism. It is much easier to market a movie like Roja in the North, East and West since it does not scream “South Indian” out loud.
Another Desi Dude (#57):
never, in fact – which is one less thing to worry about when trying to learn such a freaking complicated language…
Complicated? I don’t know how easy it is to learn to speak Tamil. At least as far as writing goes, I found it to be very simple to learn for two reasons.
1) Fewer letters than any of the other “official languages”
2) The letters have very simple shapes that are well differentiated from one another. Probably because of being super old (and primitive folks had some sense in coming up with symbols)
Contrast this with Malayalam where the very first letter ‘aa’ is so frigging complicated it’s enough to make a child cry. Thankfully, the newer teaching style in Kerala now starts kids off with words and letters that look simple rather than following the order in the alphabet.
Hindi – again, rather simple shapes. Could this also be because of Devanagri being super old? Or does it merely seem simple because it was just the first language that some of us learnt?
Telugu – Very pretty script but the letters don’t seem differentiated well enough – harder to learn.
Can Kannadigas read the Telugu script? They look close enough with a quick glance though the spoken form is quite distinct.
The script is easy enough, granted. I was actually talking about grammar, syntax, and especially vocabulary. It was hard enough for me having left the language at 6 and coming back to it at 20. I can’t imagine having to learn it without having had any exposure to it at all.
I’m surprised no one has mentioned how trendy it is to celebrate Hindu festivals like Rakhi, Holi, or Karva Chauth in the elite social circles (read circus) of Pakistan…
True, but. I might celebrate St.Patty’s day (boy, do I), but I’ll never consider it part of “my culture”. It’s the same with say, Holi – I’ll do it cuz it sounds like fun, but nothing more. Raksha Bhandhan, I never will, not having ever seen anything fun about it.
@Vivek: A lot of the difficulties with learning Tam is because of the underlying differences between the Dravidian and Indo-European language families. Some, like not needing gender agreement, make it easier, while others, like agglutination, make it more difficult.
I think the reason “Raksha bandan” was not celebrated much in the south could be due to the fact that “first cousin marriages” are not banned in the South unlike North and you have only a few “sisters” left..
Other than that I find the idea “cool” and I think it is catching up like “Holi” in the urban south. I’m all for “fun” and “festivals” to flow across regions irrespective of any barriers..
That’s very interesting !!!
word!
I didnt know it was Rakhi until my one and only cousin here called me. 🙁
Memories and fun times. It was also a good time to find out which girl really liked you cuz she got a raakhi for the whole class but you. If I was still in India, I would be really broke. No real sister but 19 girl-cousins. OUCH
Vivek, never, in fact – which is one less thing to worry about when trying to learn such a freaking complicated language… Yeah, totally. In the context of adjective, adverb and adverb conjugation following the subject.
Thalassa makes the point that in Bengali, even pronouns are without gender. Does this mean that there are no separate words for ‘he’, ‘she’, ‘her’ and ‘his’? I am not sure if this is the case. If so, then Tamil does have implicit gender in the sense that if you have a female person, say, Shanti, then you must use ‘her’ as opposed to ‘his’. This can be a problem if you don’t know if it is a ‘he’ or a ‘she’ (which builds in sexism into a language : how about people who are not comfortable being categorized? And to further the point : how would you feel if you had to use the word ‘whe’ for white people and ‘ble’ for black people and ‘bre’ for brown? )
But I am with you, brothuh, it IS a pretty complicated language to learn.
The script is easy enough, granted. I was actually talking about grammar, syntax, and especially vocabulary. It was hard enough for me having left the language at 6 and coming back to it at 20. I can’t imagine having to learn it without having had any exposure to it at all.
Personally speaking, I found reading Tamil to be easy but writing Tamil to be quite complicated. In fact, despite several attempts, I have not really succeeded in learning to write Tamil. This is because of a very specific peculiarity with the Tamil language – the existence of a literary language (senthamizh) which has little to do with the spoken language. I find it difficult to even understand the senthamizh although I have no problem understanding regular spoken Tamil. In fact, I speak Tamil at home all the time. This has bizarre consequences – I can understand the sit-coms, but not the TV news.
So, hampered with this problem, as I think a lot of people would be if they did not learn Tamil at school, I find the following:
Writing Tamil is hard. There is such little resemblance between the written language which is the literary Tamil versus the spoken language that I might as well virtually be learning a new language in learning written Tamil.
Reading Tamil, on the other, is easy because there are so few characters, as you said, and because it is neatly structured like Hindi into consonants and vowels in a pattern similar to Hindi and Sanskrit.
People still got their nookie on with the rakhi on! No nookie, please. We are Indian. This is the anti-Valentine’s Day, the day we commemorate our population problem.
I can vouch for Madras knowing/celebrating Rakhi, thanks to a sizeable ‘Marwari’ population (Saits, as they are locally referred to), spread all over the city, but mostly concentrated in Sowcarpet. I would only think Rakhi-time celebrations have gotten bigger in Madras.
While it is widely regarded as the anti-Valentine, I do know of master strategists who used it to their benefit. A ‘Rakhi’ couple from our college even got married! 🙂
Thalassa, Razib, I would be interested to know whether Bengali has separate words for ‘he’ and ‘she’. Indeed, does the notion of gender enter the language at all?
While it is widely regarded as the anti-Valentine, I do know of master strategists who used it to their benefit. A ‘Rakhi’ couple from our college even got married! 🙂 Oh no, Rakhi incest!
Indian folks, consider before getting married if you have ever tied a Rakhi to somebody and made him your brother or sister. Also, check with your brothers and sisters, both biological and Rakhi, if they have tied a Rakhi to someone who you might be about to marry. Also, check with these brothers and sisters if they have tied to Rakhi to these second-generation brothers. And so forth. This is no more difficult than computing the connectivity closure of a graph. Use this graph to show your relatives, espeically the ones trying to get you into an arranged marriage, why you cannot possibly marry the ‘nice dentist boy’ they show you the bio-data. Also, once such connectivity is computed, use it to show others why they should not be getting hooked up in the first place. I guarantee you peace and popularity.
heres a look at raksha bandhan from a religious stand point and its origin
http://www.baps.org/festivals/rakshabandhan/index.htm
Yes, but somehow, I have often got the feeling that this latter cultural discourse tries to “aspire” to be more pan-Indian.
Not necessarily, otherwise we’d see much more translation and dubbing work in India than we actually do. They have their niche markets,which are fairly substantial. As the Bengali author Sunil Gangopadhyay once said (and I’m just paraphrasing him) I have the kind of readership in Bengali that many Indian Writers in English can only dream of. For every Mani Ratnam, there are countless Tamil directors who are more than happy to just work with Tamil cinema.
Thalassa makes the point that in Bengali, even pronouns are without gender. Does this mean that there are no separate words for ‘he’, ‘she’, ‘her’ and ‘his’? I am not sure if this is the case.
This is indeed the case. Bengali does not have separate words for “he”, “she”, “her” and “his”. I once heard the actor Victor Banerjee try and explain that this is what makes Bengalis progressive. I don’t think that argument is worth much. But yes, no gendered pronouns whatsoever. There are words identifying gender though, as in separate words for brother and sister, uncle and aunt, etc.
Some languages don’t even have that. In Malay and Indonesian, for instance, there aren’t even separate words for brother and sister, and you have to say “male sibling” (saudara laki-laki) or “female sibling” (saudara perempuan) to indicate gender.
well, the he/she is very similar sounding to she. more like sheh, a “heh” with a sh sound.
By the way, to those that know, do Dravidian languages have grammatical gender?
All south Indian languages, as far as I know ( Tamil, Kannada for sure, and I’m basing the rest on my broken Malayalam and Telugu, and understanding of bits of Coorgi) don’t have “grammatical gender” in regular useage. The earlier examples for ‘mera jootha’ and ‘meri pathloon’ were good….nothing like that in Dravidian languages.
As far as Rakhi goes…..it is getting more popular in the South. But many celebrate it without really going in to the meanings/symbolism in the relationship, or with a superficial understanding of the concept. I’m South Indian, and always celebrated it (perhaps due to some Central/north Indian influences, since my parents grew up in Maharashtra, and many of my relatives lived for various times in different parts of north India)…..and when I was younger, it was less common amongst my many south indian friends. It is a lot more common now, and very common in the larger cities (Hyderabad, Bangalore etc), and even in TN (Chennai etc).
Many janoi-wearing people find Raksha Bandhan (also called Badev) especially significant as its the day of the year where we change our janois.
Trust me, after 10 or so months that sacred string doesn’t smell so sacred anymore (yes, I try to soap it down in the shower in the meantime)
Many janoi-wearing people find Raksha Bandhan (also called Badev) especially significant as its the day of the year where we change our janois.
That’s mainly for brahmins and other dvija castes. Rakhi is for all.
I’ve often found Rakhi to be a co-opted process in South Indian cultures, it’s almost like putting up a Christmas tree: Something you do when you’re young to not feel left out, but when you grow up and realize it’s somewhat co-opted and not really natural.
Thalassa:
To respond (finally) to your comments in post #66; I don’t think you and I are necessarily contradicting each other. I recognize, as you said, that there are “cultural discourses that exist within the different linguistic communities. A lot of shared perceptions, idioms and experiences come through these linguistic discourses.” I did give an example of an urban middle class Punjabi youth and an urban middle class Bengali youth having more in common with each other than with their own rural brethren; but I recognize that in many ways they obviously still have much in common with their own native ethno-linguistic communities.
For one thing I think we are talking about two different middle classes…I am referring more to the fairly westernised, English-medium educated for at least 2 generations (in some cases 3 or more), hardcore urbanised families with no recent roots in any village, and who have a lifestyle that people in the US or Europe would recognize as middle class. I think (correct me if I’m wrong) you may be referring to a much larger group of people that are reasonably well-educated but not necessarily very fluent in English, have middle-level jobs, have some disposable income and have the basics covered (food, shelter, clothing, education, basic appliances, etc) but are still living thrifty lifestyles, and who may have roots in small-town India or even village India just about 2-3 generations back. I agree that the latter group is still fairly rooted in it’s regional culture, and relatively less engaged with the developing Pan-Indian culture. Although, among the young kids even in that group, things are changing due to the type of education, media exposure, internet, movies/tv, etc. and of course India’s growing economy which they are a definite part of. And to these kids, the cultural discourses you described (those that take place in the context of the mother-tongue and the natal culture) appear less ‘cool’ with each passing decade, and is not something many of them necessarily want to strengthen or embrace. Even if one or two would want to do that, as individuals, it would prove tough to resist the force of this flashy new culture. I guess what I would say to you is, don’t overestimate the robustness or health of the traditions you described; I feel they are very imperilled.
Overall I still stand by my assertions in regard to the changes and emerging trends going on in India. If it is happening in Mumbai today, it will happen in Pune tomorrow, Nasik the following day, and eventually the villages down the road.
And Thalassa, getting back to my original point that some of these observations were gleaned from watching kids from diverse backgrounds interacting on these singing shows, I would have to say that these kids (who primarily come from the kind of middle class I ascribed to you above) definitely had a common idiom, frame of reference, etc. and just a lot of things in common that enabled an easy interaction amongst most of them; and I don’t think you would have seen that 2 or 3 generations ago.
which brings up an interesting question: how many people did the whole christmas tree thing, even if it wasn’t part of their family’s religion? How much did it matter that you participated in the holiday? And how many people didn’t co-opt Christmas, and did you feel left out?
I didn’t do either, and except when I was little, I didn’t feel left out. Then again, I’m not much of a herd animal and my nabe wasn’t much into xmas. Now hanukkah – there’s a minor festival I really could have gotten in to …
raksha bandhan is pure,ancient,indian festival.the thread is a symbol of love between brother and sister and this thread made us to care sister.its hindu festival so only hindu can understand its feeling no one othrs.but we welcome others too;if they understand the feeling behind rakhi.
Khyati Chauhan Raksha bandhan is a festival to get close for brother and sister, and the brothers after the rakhi they have to care their sisters.I have two brothers and one fights with me and one loves me. both brothers are younger than me.one who fights with me also fights and disturbs the younger one ,so i want that the younger one will be bigger sometime and also disturb the bigger one . I love both my brothers and i also get happy with the money iget in raksha bandhan
rakhi is mad go to hell
not good ,want in hindi.Should improve
i don’t have brothers to tie the rakhi,,,,,,,,,,,,,,