Music, Religious Experience, and Nationalism in Marathi Rashtriya Kirtan

Abstract Throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, India has been marred by waves of Hindu nationalist violence. A robust body of scholarship interrogates the politicians and nationalist organizations who use religion to further India’s nationalist agendas, but less attention has been given to nationalism as it seeps into ritual contexts. In these contexts, nationalism is experienced not as politics but as religion. In order to understand the emotional registers of Hindu nationalism, we need to pay careful attention to how nationalism becomes religious experience, a process often activated through music. This chapter attends to singer-storytellers known as rashtriya kirtankars who generate devotion to nationalism (Hindu and otherwise) through their spirited ritual performances in the Marathi language. Using examples from two different kirtankars on different points of the political spectrum, the chapter considers how meanings are shaped and how emotions are generated in rashtriya kirtan performance.