Ascending the Milky Way: Seven Sisters Festival and the Religious Practices of Cantonese Women in Singapore

Abstract

The Seven Sisters Festival (also known as Qixi Festival) is especially important to Cantonese women, with differences in syncretic religious practices and beliefs between marriage resistance and nonresistance regions. Despite being forerunners in the wave of women’s migration since the 19th century, developments in ritualistic practices and sisterhood structures of these Cantonese women after their migration remain largely unexplored. This article investigates the formation of Milky Way associations, liturgical sororities for organizing festival celebrations and worship of the Seven Sisters, and its influence on the social and religious lives of Cantonese women in Singapore. Through highlighting the coexistence of different belief systems, shifts in interest from China as the center of sociocultural origin to post-war/post-independence Singapore in the periphery, as well as negotiations with space, this article shows that Cantonese women have been active agents in reorganizing themselves, interacting within and outside of their communities, and engaging in heritage meaning-making. By compiling a non-exhaustive list of over 100 Milky Way associations in Singapore in the 1930–1940s, this article spotlights the magnitude and significance of the Seven Sisters Festival, which has disappeared since the 1970s with little material trace.