The Impact Of Creolization In India

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The arrival of the Indians brought forward a completely new culture where their religion, language and social customs marked their unique identity. A majority of the Indians that arrived were Hindus. However, the Hindus had their own culture and this culture was segregated via a caste system. This caste system is a traditional hierarchical system having its origin in Vedic times (around 1500 and 700 B.C). It is based on responsibilities and expectations and the main categories of this system include the Brahmins (the upper echelon), then the Kshatriyas (the warriors and soldiers), the Vaishyas (the merchants and peasants), the Shudras (the labour caste, delegated to serve the three castes mentioned before) and lastly, the Chandalas (the outcasts).
In Guyana Hinduism is said the experience this creolization- in the performances of its weddings, jhandis and ways of worship.
Hindus worship a variety of different deities at specific occasions. With the removal of the caste system, the different castes of Hindus no longer worshipped different deities, but instead all worshipped the same deities at specific times due to the lack of holy texts and limited knowledge retained by the Brahmins. In addition, the deity “Maa Kali”, a goddess worshipped primarily by the Hindus from Madras who is said to have healing powers began to be worshipped by Hindus generally as said by Janet Naidu, in the Guyana Journal (2007).
Many Hindu weddings have also experienced transculturation and have taken on a dual Indian/ Western celebration. The weddings still retain the same ritualistic practices, clothing, food and music but the weddings also have taken a western approach in which the couple would change from traditional Indian clothing to a wedding dress and a suit and celebrate a western styles wedding reception with cake, western music and dances. In addition, the use of the bamboo maro[1] to facilitate the wedding rituals has become more creolized by being constructed out of wood and in few cases-

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