Reading Keila Diehl’s Echoes from Dharamsala was, personally, an emotional ride. Her narrative does a phenomenal job of transporting the reader into a first-hand experience of “movement and being moved” (Diehl, 2002). Published in 2002, the book traces the nuances of life and music (as it is received and performed) in the Tibetan refugee community in North India during the last decade of the 20th century through the eyes and ears of Diehl.
She set out to conduct research in Dharamsala in 1994 on the back of a conference paper she wrote on the Tashi Delek Blues, a cassette tape of ‘modern’ Tibetan music that cemented her desire to carry out “anthropological fieldwork on the other side of the world” – a desire fuelled by wonder at the ability of the ‘other’ to play the blues, and a curiosity about contemporary manifestations of creative expression by refugee youth in a displaced community (Diehl, 2002).
At the outset, Diehl states a couple of rudimentary theoretical assumptions she claims would be “anthropological truisms” today – 1) a belief that expressive performances not only reflect, but also create “culture”, and 2) that traditions are selected and ver changing (Diehl, 2002). These assumptions are informed by a stockpile of anthropological and cultural theory, which in my opinion resonate with the definition of culture as a noun describing the process of cultivation, of rearing (in a certain sense) of human life and development (Williams, 1976), carrying implicit meanings of change, readjustment and evolution with time and place.
At the same time she recognizes that despite a world characterised by new notions of “neighbourliness” (Appadurai, 1990), in a political and economic atmosphere characterized by global flows that transcend ational and cultural boundaries, amalgamating and homogenizing what were once historically informed distinct cultural practices and aesthetics (Bourdieu, 1984), her experience living among Tibetans in Dharamsala made it amply clear that emplacement and tradition became increasingly important in displaced communities living in exile (Diehl, 2002).
Dharamsala, a small hill station situated in the state of Himachal Pradesh in North India, is characterized by its name, which (loosely translated) means ‘sanctuary’ and in popular speak is understood as a resting place for spiritual pilgrims – a meaning hat the title of Diehl’s first chapter, Dharamsala: A Resting Place to Pass Through, is imbued with.
The introduction and first chapter efficaciously construct Dharamsala as a transient space, placed at the heart of a mandala on earth, central to influences from four sides – Tibet (home) in the north, Europe and America (friends and symbols of freedom) in the west, India (home away from home) in the south, and China (the enemy) in the east.
Diehl goes on to elaborate on the history of Dharamsala, its inhabitants, giving snippets of daily life as it progresses in the own placed “as both a centre in the periphery and as the peripheral edge of the centre to” various people. Most of the first half of Echoes speaks about the community in exile and details the day-to-day functioning of their life with a sharp focus on social gatherings and cultural practices (for example, wedding singing by changmas) that are taught and reinforced as an attempt to preserve the distinct Tibetan identity.
It is to be noted that the Tibetans in exile do not consider the post Chinese occupation Tibetan cultural exports as authentic; the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts (TIPA), unded by the Tibetan government-in-exile, works to teach the youth pre-1950s authentic Tibetan performing arts, influenced by Buddhist and folk tradition. Tibetans in Dharamsala, under the Dalai Lama’s religious and political refuge, thus develop a conviction that they are more Tibetan that those living in Tibet.
However, Diehl is less concerned with the “institutionalised arts scene” and goes on to elaborate on the place of Bollywood and western music on the refugee youth – and this is what sets apart her ethnography. Through chapters three and four, Diehl explores the influences nd popular reception of Indian popular music (i. e. Hindi film songs) and the influence of western rock and roll and blues on the creative autonomy of modern Tibetan music composers – like The Yak Band itself, one that she joins as keyboardist during her stay.
Towards the last three chapters she specifically investigates the production and reception of modern Tibetan music through the works and performances of The Yak Band. There is a focus on lyrics and linguistics as a tool to maintain the Tibetan-ness of this synthesised “modern” music which sounds like western rock and roll (case in point Tashi Delek Blues) yet trives to remain relevant and accepted by the community it is part of by using quintessentially traditional literary Tibetan, penned by venerated poets.
The songs while slightly avant gardist musically, resonate messages of independence (‘Rangzen’) and are constantly attempting to justify themselves in the exile community through political and nationalistic lyrics invoking images of Shangri-la – a free and peaceful Tibet, and thereby contribute to public awareness and activism. Diehl’s observations on public performances in Dharamsala of this modern music versus traditional Tibetan folk music highlight he contradictory reactions that come from the community.
While folk performances generate much nostalgia and feelings of being away from home yet at home in exile, in a town geographically (and through performance of pure culture) and culturally likened to Tibet itself, performance of modern rock and roll or even Hindi music is largely frowned upon as it threatens the larger ideal of preserving the distinct Tibetan culture that refugees are in a sense bound to protect. Overall, Echoes from Dharamsala paints an exhaustive portrayal of life and cultural reproduction of the Tibetans living in Dharamsala in the 1990s. Diehl does a brilliant job of mainstreaming the cultural preservation paradigm with reference to communities and especially youth growing up in exile. Her book ties together issues of identity, nationalism, language and tradition, and cultural appropriation of new musical influences into a flowing narrative interspersed with anecdotes and experiences of her time as an Inji living in Dharamsala – in her own sort of exile with the Tibetans.
As an anthropologist, her study of refugees was particularly motivated by the copious amount of academic and scholarly nterest in matters of transnational flows and the maintenance of distinct cultural practices “despite the development of a rhetoric of permeability and transformation” (Diehl, 2002).
Refugees in particular were chosen for the simple reason that they are constantly engulfed by a “tension in their hearts” that stems from the need to maintain and further their native culture even in exile, yet are exposed to cultural influences from the host country and around the world which makes preserving the ethnic margins all the more challenging.
In this sense, Echoes from Dharamsala, being in fact one of the pioneering works to xplore Tibetan popular culture, becomes an important contribution to the discourse on multiculturalism, hybridity and cultural preservation in a neoliberal world where immense movements across borders and redrawing of lines is prevalent. It serves as a base for further research that may be carried out in this field.
However, in context of recent developments, it seems to fall short of being relevant. I studied with many Indian born Tibetans in University of Delhi and was surrounded by a new wave of ‘Free Tibet movements at university and news of Tibetans self immolating as protest against the visit of the Chinese Prime Minister’s visit to India in 2012. We organized a conference in April 2012, which an Indian born Tibetan poet and activist, Tenzin Tsundue.
While his talk resonated certain similarities with Diehl’s ethnography and stirred evocative imaginary of a free Tibet, reminisced about feelings of freedom he found in “singing broken Hindi songs” in prison, in comparison, Diehl’s book largely misses out on the violent unfurling of conflict over the past decade, and ignores the rather real struggle for sustenance that refugees (not just in Dharamsala, but worldwide) are faced with everyday.
Even as Tsundue pointed out that Tibetans had found a welcoming home in India, along with the freedom to identify as Tibetans, the larger issue of freedom and self-determination for Tibetans under Chinese domination still looms large. While musical performances within the community may soothe the wounds momentarily, the question remains of the applicability of musical ethnographies to make tangible socio-political changes.
Echoes from Dharamsala, to me, reconstructs many passed conversations and narratives from friends. From an ethnographical perspective, it is a compelling piece of writing hat efficaciously encapsulates the musical face of Tibetan existence as a displaced community in India. Reading this book was both enlightening yet emotionally unsettling.
There is little ethnography that possesses the capacity to incite such deep sentiment akin to music’s own ability to spur affective meaning. Inarguably, this is attributable to Keila Diehl’s honest and simplistic writing that is easier to connect with than most academic ethnographic writing. Whether this is a strength or weakness of her work, is debatable, but counted as a largely positive trait in my opinion.
