Mobilising Kinship as a Modern Network: Syrian Christian Family Associations

Abstract

This article analyses the meanings, practices and socio-historical contexts of kudumbayogams (family associations) among the large, relatively prosperous, multi-denominational community of Syrian Christians in Kerala, who are today spread across the globe. Kudumbayogams present new ways of mobilising and displaying family, kinship and community ties. The article argues that while earlier socio-economic shifts inaugurated the spatial dispersal and reconstitution of Syrian Christian patrilineal families and households, they also led to the formation of family associations, alongside other modern associational forms. Based on a detailed analysis of printed family histories, and allied documents, this study conceptualises kudumbayogam as a modern fortification of attempts to resolve the ambiguities of changing times by tethering a Christian brand of upper-caste social conservatism with ‘neoliberal’ individualism. This modern fortification mobilises households and families through an array of structures and activities that seek to foster cultural continuity, communication, conflict resolution and charity among its members. In the process, kudumbayogams actively blunt intra-group contradictions and highlight inter-group differences.