ABSTRACT
Marian devotion and pilgrimages to Marian shrines are common features of Catholicism worldwide, including in India. Through ethnographic research the authors of this chapter have investigated the experience of a particular group of pilgrims, Anglo-Indians, to the South Indian located shrine of Our Lady of Vailankanni. Anglo-Indians are an Indian Christian minority of mixed European and Indian ancestry, many of whom have migrated to countries within the British Commonwealth since India gained its independence from Britain in 1947. Even in India Anglo-Indians are known for their ‘western’ worldview and practices, so the authors assessed how this group negotiates the devotional practices that are normative at this pilgrimage site, such as garlanding and tonsuring, which reflect the broader South Indian Hindu context. Edith and Victor Turner’s classic work on pilgrimage is applied to understand the liminal quality of the experience of Anglo-Indian pilgrims at Vailankanni, and Eade and Sallnow’s theoretical articulation of ‘contestation’ provides further insights.
