Brimming  with old tales

KOCHI: Corinne Dempsey has always been fascinated by ancient folklore and the mysticism surrounding places. Which is probably why most of her travels across the globe and especially to India has been to places of religious interest. In Kerala, the St Alphonsa’s shrine at Bharananganam is one of her personal favourites  and featured in her book, Kerala Christian Sainthood. Back home, in New York, she is credited for her in-depth study of the traditions and community of the Sri Rajarajeswari Temple in upstate Rochester, which practises the teachings of Sri Vidya. Her book, ‘Goddess lives in Upstate New York’ has a special mention of a Sri Lankan priest who is teaching women to offer poojas. 
Her latest work, a study on 80-year-old women across the globe, has brought her back to Kerala where she is visiting ancestral homes and interviewing women over 80 years to find out about their spiritual upbringing and roots.

“This quest to study octogenarian women was influenced by my own mother. She is 88 years old and when she saw me flying around the globe to understand more about religion and people, she asked, ‘Why don’t you interview me instead? I have so many interesting stories to offer.’ Suddenly, I was very interested. Definitely, old women like my mother would have so much to offer, in terms of their knowledge and definition of a power that influenced them. I knew I had found another research topic, which may translate into a book,” she said.

With the help of her mother’s friends, Corinne got in touch with around 20 American women who were over 80 years. She started asking them about their experiences with the sacred. “Most of the women who featured in my interview were living at retirement communities in the US. I asked them questions like what life was for them when they were young and about their earliest memories -- those they have chosen to latch on to. I also asked them about their religious upbringing,” says Corinne. 

Old women in the US are quite diverse. “I interviewed women in Northern California who tend to be very progressive and less traditional. They were diverse also in that many were atheists yet could speak about experiences that were, to them, sacred,” says the professor of religious studies. 

In Iceland, she discovered that many of the old women were less willing to speak about their spiritual roots. “I thought that interviewing in Iceland would be simple enough due to my many contacts. But when I arrived I was surprised to find that not everyone was willing to talk about her faith,” she said.
She says the women’s hesitation to speak about their religious faith would probably be because they didn’t feel equipped to talk about such things.

For the most part, they lived in extreme poverty when they were young. “There was acute poverty in Iceland up until the 1970s. Many of the women were from isolated farms. The nights would be cold, food was often scarce, and the churches were often inaccessible, especially in the winter. In many cases, there was little mention of God in the household, as their aim was just to survive. So in these conversations, rather than talking about God, women could instead talk about the sacred, finding it in nature, around the farms and mountains,” she said.

Visit in Kerala
“However, in Kerala, Corinne was glad to find that many women who were in their 80’s  and 90’s were more than willing to tell stories, to relate their views of God and describe how God and religion influence in their lives. “There was one person who, like the Icelanders, found a sense of sacred in nature. Yet everybody, including her, spoke about finding strength in a traditional religious upbringing,” she said.

For the interviews, she visited places in Kochi, Aluva and Kottayam where she met 22 women in total. She spoke mostly to Hindu and Christian women who belonged to wealthy, middle and low-income families. “My impression is that older women in Kerala feel they are valued by the younger generation for the knowledge they have to offer. They also speak freely about their experiences of hardship. It was an honor for me to be able to hear them share so willingly,” she said.  

At an old-age home in Kothad, Corinne was impressed by a woman who seemed extremely joyful despite her circumstances. “Many of the women in Kerala I spoke to, irrespective of their social status, had faced some sort of a personal tragedy, but they derived strength from their religious beliefs,” she said. “Also, I found there was a far less sectarian spirit in Kerala. There was this Brahmin woman who took me to her home and told me she prays to all the gods.”Corinne hopes to bring out a book based on her findings in the coming years. But, for the time being, she feels the interview process has been positive for all involved.