Fabrics of Indianness: The Exchange and Consumption of Clothing in Transnational Guyanese Hindu Communities
Since the early 1990s the availability of “Indian Wear” has considerably increased in rural Guyana. To a large extent this development can be related to the financial, but also material support provided by Guyanese migrants in North America. “Indian Wear” is regularly given or sent to relatives, friends and the religious community in Guyana, either within the network of the extended family or within the framework of religious organizations. It is largely consumed during Hindu religious functions as ritual clothing, as an offering to a deity or as altar decoration. Its continuous exchange and the changing patterns of its consumption have led to social and ritual transformation within the different Hindu traditions.
Therefore, the PhD project examines the transformation of Guyanese Hindu traditions in the context of Guyanese migration to North America. It considers to what extent this transformation is linked to and influenced by transnational exchange and consumption processes. It focuses on material objects which are exchanged between Guyanese Hindus in North America and Guyana, particularly the exchange and consumption patterns of “Indian” clothing. It is based on a multi-sited ethnography conducted in Berbice, Guyana, and New York City, USA.
Zur Person
Sinah Kloß
Transcultural Studies
Universität Heidelberg
Marstallstr. 6
69117 Heidelberg
Telefon (0049) 6221/54 7858
Fax: (0049) 6221/54 7862
Aktuelle Kontaktdaten
Sinah Kloß
Global South Studies Center
Universität zu Köln
Venloer Str. 151-153
50672 Köln
Tel.: (+49) 221/470 89182
http://gssc.uni-koeln.de/de/node/833
http://www.zrwp.ch/fellows2015_16.htm
Lebenslauf
seit Oktober 2015
Postdoc und Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin am Global South Studies Center, Universität zu Köln
seit März 2015
Junior research fellow in der Forschungsgruppe “Religion and Development in the Global South”, Zentrum für Religion, Wirtschaft und Politik, Universität Basel, Schweiz
November 2014 – September 2015
Ethnologische Feldforschung in Guyana
Oktober 2014
Abschluss des Dissertationsprojektes "Fabrics of Indianness: The Exchange and Consumption of Clothing in Transnational Guyanese Hindu Communities"
November 2010 - Dezember 2013
Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin und Doktorandin in der Transcultural Studies-Nachwuchsgruppe „Karibik-Nordamerika und zurück“ an der Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg
Oktober 2011 – Februar 2012
Gastwissenschaftlerin in der School of Education and Humanities, Department of Language and Cultural Studies, University of Guyana
Oktober – Dezember 2012
DAAD-Kurzstipendium für Feldforschung in Guyana
Mai 2010
Magistra Artium an der Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Magisterarbeit: Internationale Migration und Transnationalismus der indo-trinidadischen Bevölkerung in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart
September 2007 – August 2009
Studentische Hilfskraft/Tutorin am Seminar für Indologie und Tibetologie der Georg-August-Universität Göttingen
Oktober 2006 – Februar 2007
Studentische Hilfskraft am Geographischen Institut der Georg-August-Universität Göttingen
Oktober 2005 – April 2010
Studium der Anthropogeographie, Indologie und Ethnologie an der Georg-August-Universität Göttingen
Veröffentlichungen
Kloß, S. 2016 (forthcoming). Fabrics of Indianness: The Exchange and Consumption of Clothing in Transnational Guyanese Hindu Communities. Basingstoke, New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Kloß, S. 2016 (forthcoming). “Manifesting Kali’s Power: Guyanese Hinduism and the Revitalization of the ‘Madras Tradition’”, Journal of Eastern Caribbean Studies, Special Issue 'Religion in Contemporary Caribbean Society'.
Kloß, S. 2016 (forthcoming). “Performing Authenticity through Fashion: Sartorial Contestations of Guyanese Indianness and the Creation of the Indian ‘Other’”. In: Fashion Tales. Feeding the Imaginary, edited by E. Mora and M. Pedroni, Milan: Vita&Pensiero.
Kloß, S. 2016 (forthcoming). Review of “Food and Identity in the Caribbean” by Garth, H. (2013) (ed.). Passato e Presente.
Kloß, S. 2015. “Der multiethnische Faktor: Bei den Parlamentswahlen in Guyana löst ein gemischtes Bündnis nach 23 Jahren die indisch geprägte Regierungspartei ab“. Lateinamerika Nachrichten (493/494): 62-64.
Beushausen, W., Brüske, A., Commichau, A., Helber, P. and S. Kloss (eds.) 2014. Caribbean Food Cultures: Culinary Practices and Consumption in the Caribbean and its Diasporas. Bielefeld: transcript.
Beushausen, W., Brüske, A., Commichau, A., Helber, P. and S. Kloss 2014. “The Caribbean (on the) Dining Table: Contextualizing Culinary Cultures”. In: Caribbean Food Cultures: Culinary Practices and Consumption in the Caribbean and its Diasporas. Bielefeld: transcript, pp. 11-24.
