Episode 1: Singing Songs of Resistance

 

47mins

 

Transcript

 

[00:00] Open & welcome

Seyo singing: When no white grandpa got afraid to save us, we realize we need to rewrite questions. Who is God? What is my gender? What is sex? What is God talk? For me, who is perversions? Perversions! This is our theology. This is the way we move. Do you want to come for us? 

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Lis: Welcome to Theological Perversions, a podcast offering different versions about God, gender, and politics. We are scholars of color not born in the United States of America who have studied religion and theology in the USA. Our purpose is to amplify our voices, the voices of scholars of color. In this episode, biblical scholar Dr. Chrisida Anandan facilitates a conversation about songs of protest and hope. 

This episode is possible thanks to support from the American Academy of Religion and the Luce Foundation. 

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Seyo: This is my theology!

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[01:13] Meet the table

Chrisida: Hello, everyone. Welcome to today's podcast, and we are the team of Theological Perversions. And today I'm going to talk about singing songs of resistance. And I am Chrisida Anandan, and I'm from the South India, but I currently live in Chicago for the past eight years. And we have our other friends who will introduce themselves. 

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Lis: Hi, I'm Lis. I am from Puerto Rico, and I live in Chicago. 

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Immanuel: Hi, I'm Immanuel Karunakaran. I'm from Southern India as well and presently live in Chicago. 

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Chrisida: Great. Okay, as I mentioned, today we are going to talk about resistance and hope as we always do. And to start with, I'm going to start by asking: what is your favorite song? Like when you think about your culture or your roots, what is one of, you might have many, but what is one of your favorite songs? And then why is that your favorite song? Is it because of the content of the song, the imagery, the feelings of the song, the tune, the instruments in the song? Anything. 

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[02:30] The songs in our roots

Lis: When I think of my culture, in particular, when you give me that framework, the one that comes to mind is “verde luz.” It means green light, but not as in the traffic light. Green light of mountain and sea. And it was written by, well, it was… it is a song of protest, actually. But it is… I like it because it describes the beauty of Puerto Rico. A lot of beautiful things that Puerto Rico has. So it's like a love song. 

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Chrisida: Yeah. Great. Thank you.

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Immanuel: I come from a Dalit community, which actually has its own music, and I’m a folk musician myself, so I don't have a particular song now in my mind. But I recently love this song, it's a cinema movie song, but it has a lot of power and resistance, which is Malayi Ladanti Puri Kedirasa from one of the movies. This movie is actually the agony of a Dalit person trying to tell that to the world. So that song is … actually, the song is like him. The one who actually sings the song is not the hero or protagonist. He actually is the father of the hero. In that song, he will say, “I will sing this song every day until everybody hears it.” Like the same song, you may think, “why this guy is singing the same song?” But he says that, “I will sing the same song every day until everybody hears it,” so that's so powerful, and I always enjoy that.

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Chrisida: Yeah, yeah. If you're listening to the podcast, you may also think about what your favorite song is. Yes. So we all have favorite songs, and we think about what is the song that we connect to, and today also we are going to talk about some of the songs that don't have the urban music setup, or they don't have the technological… the instruments, the sound systems, and everything - no background music. But there are a number of unwritten, unrecorded songs of many people that don't use technology, that don't use instruments or expensive recording studios. And also, there are these songs that are part of cultures that come from our roots, and I, as I come from the Dalit community as well, and I come from India, where there are predominantly Dalits who are oppressed by the caste system, and the Dalit women come up with these number of songs that are often not part of this larger so-called musical world. But they are so powerful, and they are so meaningful that they become part of their resistance, and this is part of the folklore literature, and as Immanuel also mentioned, we also have folklore literature, folklore in all of our cultures.

So today I'm going to talk about some of the genres of songs that have become part of these resistance movements, which become part of their life, which comes from their life because it's connected to their life. 

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[06:30] The lullaby as hope (thalattu) 

Chrisida: The first one that I'm going to talk about is the lullaby. So the lullaby starts with… this is one of the famous genres, which is like there in all cultures. I'm sure that every culture would have its own lullabies, and that the lullaby in Indian Dalit families and communities is, as we all know, to make a baby sleep. A mother trying to put her baby to sleep. but it is more than that. It's not just so simple. It also has this… in Tamil we have this phrase a-ra-ro-a-ri-ra-ro which is like repeated and in with the music and I know each culture would have a specific phrase that they would repeat. I see Lis smiling. So is there a phrase that is from your culture for a lullaby?

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Lis: Ay, le lo lai, le lo lai, le lo lai.

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Chrisida: Okay, okay, yeah. In Hindi they say like lory and then I know like there are other cultures also use many other words or phrases or even like the small phrases that repeat, which sound nice and the child sleeps. But within these lullabies, there are also strong points, strong things that are being communicated by the mother to the child, or even to the community, or even to whoever is thinking about our own songs, our own lullabies, even though we don't remember what lullabies our moms sang for us. But definitely they are part of this resistance. And then the woman sings the lullaby, embracing her child or often rocking her child. There will be in Kaltama culture, they usually use a piece of cloth that is hung on the ceiling, and then the mother puts her child into that and rocks the baby, and these songs will often say things about… sometimes it feels like it is exaggerated, like, oh, actually the baby will be sleeping in a small torn cloth but she'll be saying, “I'll be bringing a golden cradle for you, I'm putting you in a golden cradle, I'll bring the old skies for you.” And all these explanations that we can see in the song content would be beyond what has been happening. Also, when we look at the lyrics of these kinds of songs, the mother uses the lyrics to give hope to the baby, as giving hope to the world. I see this lullaby as hope not only to the baby; this is also like saying, “you're having a better future.” Like by singing a song, she anticipates a better future for herself and for her child and also for this society. And this being able to give a better future is often like a dream, but mothers always strive to give their children whatever is best they can. 

 

[10:00] Biblical lullabies 

Chrisida: I'm also remembering that, when we think about it biblically, I also think about First Samuel chapter 2, verses 1 to 10, which is Hannah's prayer. It is mentioned as Hannah's prayer after Hannah gives birth to Samuel, she prays, and that's what it says, “Hannah prayed and said.” But I also went thinking about this song as a lullaby that she is singing to her child, which is like completely giving hope to society. Even when we look at Samuel’s life after he's leading David, he’s advising David and Saul on many things; we see that this song, the lullaby that Hannah sang, is making so much meaning. She's singing about the whole toppling up of the society where the poor would be seated on the high, so even though this is kind of, “will this happen?” “Is this a utopian future?” But also, this gives a kind of hope that she passes on even to her child and to her society. So the lullaby is also like connecting her life to the child but also giving hope.

What are some of the things that you think about when we sing? When we think about lullaby, it's called thalattu in Tamil, my language, and it literally means, thal is tongue, attu is shaped, like “you move it,” so it is like you thalattu. So what do you think about? How do you think, in your culture, a lullaby can be seen as a song of hope?

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Immanuel: Yeah, for my culture, I spoke in the beginning, saying that the lullaby plays a very important and vital role in bringing up the next generation in hope, especially the mothers, and that is taken care of by the mothers. And there are also lullabies by the fathers, which are some of the important things that these cultures didn't see, but predominantly they are sung by women, especially mothers. And the very important thing that I wanted to make a note of, or share with all of you, is that the way that when the baby cries, the mother says, “Why do you cry? Who beat you? Or what made you cry? I'm here for you. And everybody around you is here for you. The moon, the birds, everything is waiting to see you sleep, you know, with hope that you will get up. You get a good rest and get up energized.” So, something that is very hopeful. Yeah, I also resonate with how that is also for those mothers who have not seen their children. So those things also resonate with me, as this song is directly going through. So this song is not limited only to children. It is also for the adults. That actually helps me to navigate my own thing until today. Whenever I sing a lullaby, my elder daughter, when she was a child, she’d sleep better. She would sleep wherever she was; when I sing the song, she would lie down and start sleeping. It's like pretending to sleep, but wherever she is, she just lies down when she listens to the song. So songs are for my family, for my daughter, actually. When Dad sings this song, he intends to give rest or hope, which actually resonates deeply. Thank you so much for this; bringing this is important. 

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Chrisida: Yeah, thank you. Thank you for naming the men. When you mentioned about who beat you and also name them, who beat you? Name that person. It is like naming the injustice from childhood, as you name whatever happened to you. Speak out; speak about that. And also talk about when you wake up, it's going to be a better future. So now you sleep, but when you wake up, it's going to be better. Yes. Thank you. 

 

Lis: The one lullaby that came to mind speaks about not only going to sleep, but to dream, and to play with the angels, and I think it's an important distinction to not only sleep, but to dream. But I am fascinated with the idea that lullabies give access to marginalized people to do something that the main industry doesn't necessarily let them do. They still do it. And it passes on from generation to generation. It's passed on, this wisdom, popular wisdom, and when I think about it that way, I am like, oh man, I lost so many opportunities to write new lyrics for the lullabies of my shift. I did write new lyrics. I sang some … when they were babies, but it didn't occur to me that it was that kind of opportunity to teach them about the future. But it did make me think about the song of, it was maybe Mary, maybe Elizabeth. It is contested, right? And it was a praise because allegedly Mary was pregnant, maybe Elizabeth. I mean, they were both pregnant in ways that were supernatural, allegedly, but I have made the arguments. I have heard very few people engage with the connection between what that text says and the upbringing of Jesus, right? Like if Jesus was who he was because of who raised Jesus, right? How is it that what that song says about bringing down the rich and honoring the poor played a role in shaping Jesus' character, and therefore he did what he did when he was a grown-up, right? To what point that song, the Magnificat we call it, it's better known as the Magnificat, was or can be seen as a song of hope that maybe Mary or Elizabeth sang to their babies, you know? Or can we sing songs like that to our babies? Can we make up songs like that? Can we change the lyrics of other songs we know so we can put them not only to sleep but to dream, to dream different futures, futures of liberation. That's amazing. Thank you so much. 

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Chrisida: Yes, I really love that, like what is mentioned about the dream, especially how you dream for a better future, not only for the baby, but also for society. So I love that. They also say babies can see angels. I don't know whether... But they say babies can see angels. 

 

[Break] Lis (singing in Spanish): A dormir, a soñar. Despertemos a luchar. A dormir, a soñar. Otros mundos por crear. El clarín, va a sonar. Vamos todes a luchar. Vamos sí, vamos ya. No podemos aguantar. Vamos sí, vamos ya, este mundo a transformar.

 

[19:30] The dirge & the wail (oppari) 

Chrisida: So the next thing that I want to talk about is another form, another genre of song that comes from our cultures. I'm sure this is also part of every culture, so we can relate to that. It is called a dirge. And in my language, we call it opari. So this is a song performed by women and girls of all ages, both from middle and lower caste communities. And these are sung at the funerals. We talked about the birth, the babies, and now we talk about the songs and the funeral. And these address mostly, sometimes it address the dead person. Is there a name in your culture, in your language, for a dirge? Okay. Okay, so we call that opari in Tamil. So, these opari expressions are, sometimes it is about a wife, making an odd dirge for her husband, or opari of a daughter for her father or mother for daughter. So it is not only between blood relatives, but also the opari takes place when anyone in the community dies. When anyone in the community dies, women go, and they cry, and they sing songs about this person who's dead. But it doesn't stop there. They also bring out so much of their emotions through those songs. One thing is, they sing about this person who died or who is there, even if they are not blood-related to that person. This shows how the community was together, that the whole village or the whole community would cry when a person dies. 

Recently I was watching a show, and then one person was saying, “Oh, we had a very big success in our family. We wanted to have a celebration, but when we came to know that three of the people from the same village died, we couldn't have the celebration.” So it's about how we are so connected. Now, globalization and organization have put us into boxes where we do not know what's happening in our family and in others’ families, but in the Dalit culture, it is always the one village; it always knows what's happened with the other families because it shows how they were tied with one another as a family. The whole village was like a family where one person calls another as if they were blood-related. For example, even Immanuel's daughter calls me auntie, which is like an aunt, even though we are not blood-related; she calls me like a paternal aunt. That's how we see this blood-like connection within this communion of togetherness, the kinship. 

And it also shows how they can express their emotions. One thing that I wanted to say is how these songs usually contain- sometimes they not only talk about the person who died, but also bring out what things are happening to them. Sometimes that would be… this space has been used… even the widow of the deceased person would use this space to voice all her concerns through this opari. She would cry out about the woes of being suddenly, like she's being thrust into this widowhood, and what would be the problems, what would be her future, even that kind. And a woman would also sing about how she's being oppressed, how she's being beaten by her husband. She cannot scold her husband in public, but through this opari she would scold her husband back or protest against what's happening. I see this also as a catharsis moments. Women can’t show their emotions, but this dirge would be a common space where all women come together, and then they sing this dirge, and then they think about their struggles and their pains. It's not always songs about their struggles. Sometimes these songs are kind of weapons that pierce into the hearts of their male counterparts or anyone in the dominant communities, and in some cases it would make them repent. So it's not only about crying and singing. It not only shows their weak emotional state, but they are a cathartic release. They are communicating their messages to their listeners to see, to ask them to see the world from our point of view so they open up. It is asking them to see their world, to see the women's world. Also, they claim to strengthen and confirm. They also say … they are speaking against the social hierarchies, and in fact they don't even have a good musical thing, but they are just chaotic. These songs are so chaotic that they don't follow one single tune, but their content tells; it is a form of protest and resistance. 

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Immanuel: I was thinking the song that I said in the beginning is a wailing song. So the Dalit culture has its own wailing practices. That shows how it is not just a catharsis, not limited to catharsis, but also a protest song. Because when death happens, women come together, cry, and sing this song, saying, “Why did you go? What made you go alone? We are here.” So these songs are not just questions, but piercing asks. And then in between, they keep quiet. They become normal. They speak. They smile, laugh, eat, go around. And then, if somebody new comes, then they do it again. With the whole again, with the agony and the pain, with the crying, they wail. Which actually shows how important it is, going back and coming and do this again every day, living life normally, but that pain is never gone. So the wailing songs are the protest songs that remind the dead and the living, showing that it should not happen in my life. So this is very important.

Thank you so much. There are men wailers in Tamil Nadu, where I come from. So it is predominantly women who do this, but now men are also identified with that culture. It is also there. Men also cry. So that's the only best thing that can happen in Dalit culture, men can cry. Because the dominant culture says men cannot cry. But the Dalit culture has a protest saying this has nothing to do with gender. So actually that breaks the binary of who can wail and do these wailing songs. Thank you so much for bringing that.

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Lis: Yeah. We have songs that grieve the absence of loved ones in a very general way. It's very different from what you described. What you described reminded me of a song about Che Guevara. Ernesto Che Guevara was a revolutionary leader who proposed that all the countries from Central Latin America should have come together to get their independence once upon a time. And he was killed very young because of his political activities. And there's this song that tells his story, and it kind of fits everything that you said. And I have seen it in, you know, I hear it in female voices, and I have seen videos of it. And it tells the story of what he did, but also that his presence is still here, that his presence is still here, basically that we should still, you know, be doing what he used to do, right? And anyway, that's the song that came to mind that fits the description of what you're saying. 

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Chrisida: Yeah. Thank you. This kind of dirge and opari, as Immanuel mentioned, it's not only for the dead but also for anything. Even when a husband beats a woman, his wife would go and while crying, she would sing. There are even times when she would tell, she would be free to speak, wise up, what you want to say.

 

[Break] Immanuel (singing)

 

[30:45] Ululation & improvisation (kulavai, bomba, décima) 

Chrisida: One more genre is there. I'm not sure if other cultures have this, but this is called Ululation or Kulavai. This is a sound that is being made by women. It's a long, wavering high pitched sound, vocal sound. Yes, it's accompanied by the rapid movement of the tongue. And this is also made by women, especially when they do agricultural work, and it is for both joy and sorrow. So this sound is made, and they also do it as part of their spirituality; they go to temples. And so this is also part of when they are in the fields: the women stand, and they are knee-deep in the mud, the slush, and they plant the seedlings, and when they work in the field, they make this Kulavai sound. It is not only to provide a kind of entertainment, but also a kind of encouragement during their work. And these are, as I said, even when they wanted to welcome a guest, and in some places, they even say that the visitor is expected to gift a token amount to the women if he or she is greeted by them by singing the Kulavai song. So these are called Kulavai songs, as mentioned, it will be like a moment of time like that. So that's how it goes. And these are also sounds of songs and genres that provide an exceptional opportunity for women to express and voice out their thoughts. And so these are just a few genres that I wanted to share today: the lullaby, the dirge, and the Kulavai, ululation. Probably, like in your cultures, I'm not sure if there is anything related to that. But Kulavai is also a kind of celebration. So there is also a kind of hope when they do this agricultural work; it is like everything, like a kind of blessing and celebration as they do this planting and bringing up the seeds, and yeah, do you have anything to say about ululation? Do you hear that anywhere? Yeah. 

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Lis: We know about it. Shakira did it when she was the singer for the cup, for the soccer, the big World Cup of soccer. And she did that, and it was a big issue whether it was cultural appropriation or not. Is Shakira allowed to do that? She looks too white or whatever. But yes, we know that. I've heard it. The one more famous, our expression that is more famous that does the same purpose is wepa. You probably heard it, where we work, where we are, we have enough Puerto Ricans that we have used it enough times. Wepa. But we do that. Woo. Yeah. Woo. And one genre that we use to improvise to tell stories, well, there are various genres that allow to do that. And as times go by, different genres allow to do that. Like, la Décima Puertorriqueña allows to do that. Décima Puertorriqueña. But the one that kind of has been around forever, or from generation to generation, from many generations for hundreds of years, and it comes from Afro inheritance, is La Bomba. We call it La Bomba, which means bomb. Bomb, like bomb. So it has a rhythm, right? And you imitate. So everybody sings the same thing. And then one person improvises, following the same metric. And then everybody sings the same thing. And then somebody tells the story that they want to tell, following the same metric. People usually sing it during Christmas, but in protests, they do it too. Or it can be done at any given time. But in Christmas, there's a particular set that people know by memory that they do it again and again and again, that, yeah, that are kind of standard for Christmas, if you would. But it's a genre that lends itself to improvisation and therefore to tell these kinds of stories in which people can tell what has happened and complain about what happened and offer solutions if they would like or imagine possibilities if they would like, or, yeah, we do it through bombas. 

 

Chrisida: Okay, thank you. That's really amazing. Yeah, and yes, so these kinds of songs, they are part and parcel of this community, and one thing is that they, as I mentioned, these are exceptional opportunities for women to express and voice their concerns and also call us to affirm their agency. As women sing, as women or men sing these genres, these songs, which are not following the regular rhythm, they express their concerns, and even if it makes a protest against the unfair social conditions, they also express a grievance against someone of higher status, or they communicate grievances of caste, hierarchy, patriarchy, until it reaches the ears of wrongdoers, and often it is not explicit. It is sometimes explicit, but it is also implicit. I'm also remembering the hidden polemic, the concept of hidden polemic that is being used even in the bible. But this is also kind of when sometimes we are not able to voice out, where we are not allowed or forced not to voice out; hidden polemic also becomes a tool to voice out against or to speak what we wanted to, inside the language that we can speak. I'm also remembering that in Ezekiel there is this thing about Gog of Magog. And this semester, I was teaching Ezekiel, and we were talking about the Gog of Magog. When Ezekiel speaks about the Gog of Magog, even though in Babylon they don't know [what he is referring to]. But the people knew; even though we don't know who Gog of Magog is, the people in the exile knew who was being referred to. So even though now we are debating, the scholars are debating who this Gog of Magog is: is it Nebuchadnezzar, or who is that? But [Ezekiel’s] people knew because that was inside language. Today, when we think about the songs that are there within our communities, from our cultures, that are from our roots, whether it is a lullaby or a dirge or ululation or any genre of song, but that speaks out, that comes out from the communities. And these are songs of hope; these are songs of togetherness, and these symbolize resistance and retaliation. These also bring about hope and courage, and these communicate. Love is being communicated through these songs, where the ultimate thing that we all expect is love and justice. Today, as we listen to our own songs, we might not be singers or maybe or probably, we don't like it; it's not the regular rhythm that is being accepted in the musical world, but what are our songs of resistance today? Let us think about what our songs of resistance are that come from ourselves, that help us to connect ourselves to the world and also help us to call the world, to see the world from our point of view, from our eyes, from the point of view of the communities who are often being sidelined. So, let us sing our own songs of resistance.

 

[40:00] The songs we carry now 

Lis: One singer, well, two singers. One singer I've been connecting with for a few years now who sings songs of love for our country but also protests what's going on in the world is Residente from Calle 13. Also, his name is René Pérez Joglar. And most recently, better known than him, Bad Bunny. His most recent album, Debí tomar más fotos, hit number one, allegedly, in the world, and it sounds - well, some people interpret it as a breakup album - for some people it sounds like love songs that could be sung from a man to a woman, and I have interpreted it as a love song for Puerto Rico. And you can see a lot of the videos are interpreted that way. And so it can be both. So when you say that comes from you, from your heart and to your country, I think that's what he's doing with this last album. It comes from his own experiences that maybe are experiences of love and heartbreak, but that can be paralleled to what is going on in Puerto Rico politically and socially in this historical moment, and he is singing about it. And not only singing about it, his whole marketing campaign for it and his performance, the way he shows up in the world, he has been - all the words are coming in Spanish - but he has been teaching the world about our, like, all about our folklore, about our ways of dressing on the island, about our customs, about our culture, that we should protect our rights and make sure that it doesn't happen here what happened to Hawaii. In one of the songs, he says explicitly that, he sings explicitly that. So I relate to those, but my heart has other songs of protest. 

I don't know about songs of hope. I'm thinking about a friend who thinks very negatively about hope, and I have a love-hate relationship with hope because you can have too much or too little. If you have too little, you can fall into despair and do nothing. If you have too much, you can also do nothing because everything is all right. But then if you have the right amount, it's like things stay the way they are. It's a problematic concept for me, and at the same time I think it's kind of needed. But maybe not. My friend thinks it’s not needed. That we do things because we love each other, because we love humanity, and we love our communities; that's why we do it. We do the things to improve the conditions for our community out of love, and that's where the protest comes from. From, “Hey, don't hurt my people!” And it comes out of love. I'm not musically oriented like Immanuel; that's not my talent, but I have songs in my heart, and sometimes I don't rhyme well, but I sing them. I sing in the shower, and I write songs that don't rhyme in my journal.

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Chrisida: Yeah, and also these songs, when we think about songs, they are different forms. Even an art form could be a song that we like; what would we communicate? Even if it is a poem or art form or just a drum beat, instrument, or anything, it could be our songs. 

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Lis: Yeah, earlier you were talking about songs that had different rhythms and can be dissonant. I love one in a movie that is in English and in Spanish, the movie. I saw it in both languages. But there is this odd character, a girl who lost her father. And the father was Cuban. She has this adventure. Anyway, she doesn't have a lot of friends because she's weird, but there's a moment in which she sings this song that says, “I dance to the rhythm of my own drum.” And I loved it in Spanish!

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Chrisida: I love that!  

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Immanuel: Thank you. This has been a nurturing experience to listen from women, actually, all the time. You are the Sophias.

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Lis: Thank you. Thank you. I also like when you play the drums. 

Immanuel: Yeah. 

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[45:45] Sing your own song 

Chrisida: Thank you, thank you. Think about and sing your songs.

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Lis: Yeah, thank you, everybody, for listening to this podcast, and we hope that you continue to think what is the song inside of you, and sing your own song. 

This has been Theological Per/Versions! Until next time. 

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Chrisida and Immanuel: Bye. 

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Lis: Thank you for listening to this episode of Theological Perversions. Subscribe to this podcast and share it with your friends.