Re-Imagining Colonial Binaries in Understanding the Relationship Betweeen Sikhi and Alcohol
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TENSE MISALIGNMENTS: RE-IMAGINING COLONIAL BINARIES IN UNDERSTANDING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEEN SIKHI AND ALCOHOL TENSE MISALIGNMENTS: RE-IMAGINING COLONIAL BINARIES IN UNDERSTANDING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEEN SIKHI AND ALCOHOL By MANVINDER GILL, BSc., B.A. (hons.) A Thesis Submitted to the School of Graduate Studies in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts McMaster University © Copyright by Manvinder Gill, September 2020 ii M.A. Thesis – M. Gill; McMaster University – Religious Studies MASTER OF ARTS (2020) (Religious Studies) McMaster University Hamilton, Ontario TITLE: Tense Misalignments: Re-Imagining Colonial Binaries in Understanding the Relationship between Sikhi and Alcohol AUTHOR: Manvinder Kaur Gill, BSc., B.A (hons.) (University of Winnipeg) SUPERVISOR: Dr. Mark Rowe NUMBER OF PAGES: vii; 110 iii M.A. Thesis – M. Gill; McMaster University – Religious Studies ABSTRACT This thesis explores the relationship that second-generation Sikh-Canadians have with alcohol. Predominant understandings of alcohol in the community argue that Panjabi culture promotes the consumption of alcohol while Sikhi prohibits it yet culture and religion cannot easily be separated or understood in such monolithic ways. Problems with alcohol are often relegated to a Panjabi issue stemming from a hypermasculine culture that emphasizes overconsumption. Simply blaming “the culture” misses the heterogeneity of the community and the impacts of intergenerational trauma and contemporary formations of masculinity, culture, and religion that are rooted in colonialism. Furthermore, stating that Sikhi is vehemently anti-alcohol fails to engage with the Guru Granth Sahib and the lived reality. The central thesis of the Guru Granth Sahib, IkOankar (1-Ness), advocates against binaries, moving away from normative and simplistic understandings of good and bad or prohibited and accepted. This is not to argue that Sikhi promotes alcohol consumption rather, depicting alcohol consumption in reductive and binary terms is against the IkOankar paradigm and fails to engage lived Sikhi. Although in mainstream understandings of Sikhi, alcohol is prohibited, this is not always what is practiced. Moving beyond simple prohibition or acceptance, alcohol consumption can be understood through the dynamic ways in which Sikh-Canadians engage with the substance. iv M.A. Thesis – M. Gill; McMaster University – Religious Studies ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Dedicated to the woman who carried the woman who carried me, my Nani, Mohinder Kaur and a woman whose voice I never knew and will never know, my Dhahdi, Harpal Kaur. To everyone I interviewed, you all made my heart warm. Your stories will stay with me forever and I am always awestruck by the resilience my community continues to exhibit. I am grateful to Dr. Mark Rowe for the continued support, encouragement, and rigorous edits. At times I was convinced that I did not know the English language and now I am convinced that I do not. Thank you for reading all my drafts, even the unintelligible ones! I would also like to thank Dr. Celia Rothenberg and Dr. Ellen Amster for their helpful comments and questions. I will always hold Dr. Rothenberg’s classes with me for their inclusivity, nuance, and impeccable flow. Finally, I would like to thank all of my dear friends, family, and colleagues in the Department of Religious Studies for their companionship within and outside of the academy. v M.A. Thesis – M. Gill; McMaster University – Religious Studies TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................. IV ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................... V INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................... 1 CHAPTER ONE: BACKGROUND ............................................................................... 7 1.1 Historical Overview of Alcohol Use in India, Panjab, and the Diaspora ........... 9 1.2 Sikh Understanding of Alcohol ........................................................................ 14 1.3 The Politics of Religion Making and Translation ............................................. 16 1.4 Causes for Problems with Alcohol in the Panjabi-Sikh Community ............... 21 1.5 Caste ................................................................................................................. 24 1.6 Gender ............................................................................................................... 27 1.6.1 Historicizing Panjabi-Sikh Masculinity ......................................................... 32 1.7 Intergenerational Trauma .................................................................................. 37 1.7.1 Jallianwala Bagh ............................................................................................ 38 1.7.2 Partition .......................................................................................................... 41 1.7.3 1984 Sikh Genocide ....................................................................................... 43 1.7.4 Sikh Immigration ........................................................................................... 46 CHAPTER TWO: MY ARGUMENT ........................................................................... 50 2.1 Sikhi in the Text, Lived Sikhi ........................................................................... 51 2.2 Dukh Daru Sukh Rog Bhaiya ............................................................................ 57 2.3 The Construct of Religion and Culture ............................................................. 60 2.4 Intergenerational Inheritance of Constructs ...................................................... 68 CHAPTER THREE: INTERVIEWS ............................................................................ 71 3.1 Understandings of Sikhi & Panjabi Identity ........................................................ 73 3.2 Sangtar ................................................................................................................. 75 3.3 Surinder ............................................................................................................... 79 3.4 Manmohan ........................................................................................................... 84 3.5 Kamal .................................................................................................................. 88 3.6 Gurmeet ............................................................................................................... 92 CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................. 98 WORKS CITED .......................................................................................................... 100 APPENDIX A: INFORMED CONSENT FORM ....................................................... 104 APPENDIX B: INTERVIEW GUIDES ...................................................................... 107 APPENDIX C: ETHICS DOCUMENTATION ......................................................... 108 vi M.A. Thesis – M. Gill; McMaster University – Religious Studies INTRODUCTION “Let us decide not to imitate Europe and let us tense our muscles and our brains in a new direction. Let us endeavour to invent a man in full, something which Europe has been incapable of achieving.” Franz Fanon, Wretched of the Earth1 My research uses interviews to investigate problems with alcohol in contemporary Sikh-Canadian communities. In its attempt to understand problems with drinking within the Sikh-Canadian community, my research rests at the intersection of perceptions of alcohol, hypermasculinity, colonialism, and the historical imprint of the Partition of India, as well as the 1984 Sikh genocide. My work aims to move beyond analyses of religious texts in order to place primacy on the lived realities of under-studied communities in Canada. My work contributes to a limited but growing field that explores alcohol consumption in the Sikh community. Alcohol consumption in Sikh communities is particularly noteworthy given that in Britain, home to the largest Sikh population outside of India, alcohol consumption among Sikhs is higher than any other South Asian group and tends to manifest along intergenerational vectors.2 In a study conducted by psychologists Asesha Morjaria-Keval and Harshad Keval, with the exception of Sikh men—who had the second highest levels of heavy drinking—abstention from alcohol is generally reported among younger Asian respondents,3 revealing the intergenerational persistence of problem drinking in the Sikh community. A Canadian study carried out among Panjabi-Canadians as a whole—a group often conflated with Sikhs— revealed that 70% of the community believed that problems 1 Fanon, Frantz. Wretched of the Earth. New York: Grove Press, 1961. 2 Morjaria-Keval, A. and Keval, H. (2015), “Reconstructing sikh spirituality in recovery from alcohol addiction”, Religions, Vol. 6 No. 1, pp. 122-38. 3 Ibid Keval 1 M.A. Thesis – M. Gill; McMaster University – Religious Studies with alcohol were widespread in their community.4 My work aims to explore the particular role culture and religion plays in this phenomenon. The primary questions underpinning my research include: How does the second- generation of Sikh-Canadians perceive alcohol consumption in their community? What role does Sikhi,