Floating Sounds Across the Ocean: Interspeciesism, Siddis, and Afro-Indian Music
By Sayan Dey
The Indian Ocean is not just a geographical entity, but also a transcultural aesthetic space germinating and archiving musical cultures across communities, races, spaces, and time. [1] The interactions between the slave trade, the spice trade, colonialism, tourism, transportation, and the terraqueous ecosystems have made the Indian Ocean a metageographical entity, with different human and more-than-human cultures, emotions, and aesthetics collaborating, coexisting, and co-performing in intersectional ways. [2] Such is the history of the Afro-Indian musical practices of the Siddi community in India. The term ‘Siddi’ refers to the Afro-Indian diaspora brought to India by the Portuguese and the Islamic invaders from different parts of eastern Africa during the 14th and 15th centuries as traders, enslaved workers, palace guards, harem guards, and musicians. [3] With time, they settled in different parts of the country, like Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka, and Telangana, preserving their eastern African ancestral practices, while also adopting local ones. [4]
This assemblage of eastern African and regional cultures and traditions occurs not through assimilative and conformist approaches but rather operates in an archipelagic manner. [5] Ananya Jahanara Kabir and Luca Raimondi observe in “Archipelagic Memory and Indian Ocean Literary Studies: An Introduction” that the archipelago, as “an analytical framework”, disrupts the notion of “insularity” beyond the “linear narratives of historical, national, and cultural development” (5). This archipelagic assemblage of eastern African and regional cultures has given birth to the musical traditions of the Siddi community in India, vastly derived from Afro-Sufi traditions widely prevalent in eastern African countries like Sudan, Tanzania, Zanzibar, and Ethiopia, the local Islamic practices in India, and the eco-entangled eastern African ancestral knowledge systems. [6]
In the context of the Siddis, the entwinement specifically happens with Eastern African spiritual practices. In what follows, I focus on the musical cultures of the Siddi community in Gujarat and detail how their musical patterns and lyrics serve as an assemblage of their interactions with the terraqueous ecosystem of the Indian Ocean and their eastern African ancestors, thus generating non-linear, fragmented, and tangential memories of sociohistorical connectedness that are both “polyphonic and palimpsestic” (12) and shaped by human and more-than-human entities.
Siddis and the Music of Afro-Indian Assemblage
The Afro-Indian musical practices of the Siddis center on the musical forms of Zikrs, Dhamaals, and Salaamis. Zikrs are a form of music that remembers the ancestors through repetition. In As We Have Always Done, Leanne Betasamosake Simpson argues that repetition, often called redundancy within mainstream knowledge-making practices, is an essential methodology to remember and re-member ancestral values. For the Siddis, the practice of repetitive singing is no different. The singer sings a line, which the fellow singers then repeat. Usually, Zikrs are sung without musical instruments. [7] On the other hand, Dhamaals are sung to invoke the relationality of the Siddis with the Indian Ocean, forests, plants, birds, animals, and stones, and are performed through both song and dance. They are sung with eastern African instruments like Misr Kanga, Musindo, and Mugarman. [8] The Dhamaals conclude with Salaamis – songs that seek blessings from their ancestors, so that they can continue to preserve and practice their ancestral traditions across generations. [9] The floatability of these musical practices lies in their cultural and emotional intersections with human and more-than-human, physical, and metaphysical knowledge systems. [10]
[Sayan Dey, Indian Ocean on the Coast of Kuda, Gujarat, 2022]
The characteristics of archipelagic assemblage can be identified through the display of human and more-than-human voices and memories as seen through the usage of Hindi language and Swahili in songs, the playing of eastern African musical instruments with traditional Indian ones, as well as references to eastern African spiritual ancestors and the spirits of the natural environment in India. [11] For instance, due to their interactions with the local Islamic practices of Gujarat, the Siddi Zikrs, Dhamaals, and Salaamis make references to their ancestors, such as Bava Gor, Mai Misra, and Bava Habas; the Indian Ocean through which they arrived in India; and the local forests, floras, and faunas of Gujarat.
Importantly, floatability refers to the fluid, intersectional, cross-cultural, interspeciesist, and rhizomatic characteristics of the Siddi lyrics and rhythms. [12] The association of the Siddi cultures with spiritual ancestors, plants, oceans, stones, birds, and mountains outlines how Siddis as human beings value knowledge systems by acknowledging their fluid and porous relationalities with more-than-human subjects and objects. To further understand, let us investigate the lyrics of the following Zikr, which is also performed as a Dhamaal:
Ye bolo Sabaya Hua hey
Ya bolo sabaya hua wey
Hu Sabaya
Salwale Nabi Sultan
Salwale Nabi Sultan
Pyara Muhammad Dastagui
Sachha Muhammad Dastagui
Allah hu
Nabi hu
Allah hu
Nabi hu
Dungar Rangaye Mian
Allah hu
Nabi hu
Allah hu
Nabi hu
Dungar Rangaye Mian
Utho Noori Karo Bandagi
Subaah ka waqt noorani
Andheri ki gaflat meye
Tajawwul noor ka saya hain
Baitho na baitho na
Saccha Pir baitho na
Maulana maulana
Badey Pir maulana
O jungle ke janawar
Baitho Na baitho na
This Zikr is sung in the praise of the Siddi spiritual leader Nabi Sultan, who is believed to have first arrived in Gujarat on the coast of Kuda (located in the Bhavnagar district) from the Nubian Valley (which encompasses the geographical regions of Sudan and Egypt). The lyrics state that after praising Allah and Bava Gor, it is time to praise Nabi Sultan. The Zikr implies that if the blessings of Siddi Nabi Sultan exist, then no evil can befall the Siddis of Gujarat. This Zikr also talks about how Bava Gor has brought with him the blessings of the Prophet Muhammad for every living being in Gujarat. With Bava Gor’s arrival, it is time to decide the way forward for the Siddi community. To decide, the mountains, birds, trees, forests, animals, and humans must wake up, sit with Bava Gor, and seek his spiritual suggestions.
In this Zikr, the knowledge values of the spiritual ancestor Bava Gor are not only invoked by humans but also by birds, animals, and plants. The lyrics reveal the floating nature of the Siddi community by focusing on the intersections of humans with the natural environment in porous and fluid ways. The lyrics demonstrate how the identity of the Siddi community is not restricted within anthropocentric parameters but instead extends across the existential and knowledge-making systems of nature that are not enclaved and fortified by prejudiced human-made disciplines. [13]
The association of the Siddis with the Indian Ocean, the stones that lie on the ocean bed, e African ancestry, plants, forests, animals, and human communities of Gujarat generates transversal, entwined, and rhizomatic knowledge-making spaces that are archipelagic. Significantly, these relationships cannot be restricted within the compartments of mainstream knowledge disciplines like sociology, anthropology, history, cultural studies, environmental studies, general sciences, liberal arts, and others.
Afro-Indian Music as an Interspeciesist Identity
The musical practices of the Siddis are entangled with their ecological existence. The Siddi localities are usually close to the oceans, forests, and rivers, enabling them to establish an interspeciesist identity based on their intimate interactions with nature regarding food, fashion, and knowledge systems. The rhythms and lyrics serve as an archive and celebration of their rhizomatic entanglements with more-than-human beings. In a time of human-made catastrophes and ecological disasters, the need for weaving interspeciesist identities is deeply essential. Humans must transcend their anthropocentric narcissism and co-interact, co-engage, co-learn, and co-function with more-than-human living beings in non-hierarchical and collaborative ways, within an ecology where nature and humans are not conditioned as dialectical and conflictual entities.
Several sociocultural and geohistorical records reveal that the rhizomatic existence of humans and nature was an essential feature of the biological and social features of human civilizations, which have continuously been attacked and even destroyed by colonialism and capitalism in some locations. [14] The normalization of colonial and capitalistic approaches to life has been further systematized by the superficial, corrupted, and eye-washing principles of sustainability in constructing fancy gardens and installing indoor plantations. The notion of sustainability is deemed colonialist and capitalistic because the idea of sustainability is widely rooted in the concept of human-nature balance that is conceptualized and regulated by humans according to their whims and fancies, without taking into account the knowledge patterns and functional systems of the natural environment. [15]
The floating, archipelagic patterns within the Afro-Indian music of the Siddis not only remind us of the natural association of humans with the existential patterns of the natural environment, but also socially, culturally, and historically portray how the floating sounds of the Siddis generate cross-cultural ecological consciousness by acknowledging the eco-entangled knowledge-making traditions of their ancestors. Unfortunately, this musical knowledge system remains concentrated within religious occasions like Urs and cultural festivals. [16] Moreover, these cultural practices are not considered acceptable within India’s popular mainstream sociocultural spaces and beyond. However, consistent efforts are being made by the Siddi welfare associations in Gujarat, who build schools and organize workshops in the Siddi localities exclusively for Siddi children. [17] In doing so, their eco-entangled, porous, fluid identities and knowledge systems are carried across generations.
Notes
[1] See Jim Sykes and Julia Suzanne Byl. Sounding the Indian Ocean: Musical Circulations in Afro-Asiatic Seascape. Oakland: University of California Press, 2023.
[2] See Jesse Spohnholz. Ruptured Lives: Refugee Crisis in Historical Perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020.
[3] See Sayan Dey. Performing Memories and Weaving Archives: Creolized Cultures Across the Indian Ocean. New York: Anthem Press, 2023.
[4] For geographical reference: Gujarat is a state located in western India, Maharashtra is a state located in the south-western part of India, Karnataka is a state located in southern India, and Telangana is a state located in the southeastern part of India.
[5] For more information about the notion of “assemblages,” see Donna J. Haraway. Staying with the Trouble: Making kin in the Chthulucene. Durham: Duke University Press, 2016.
[6] Afro-Sufism is a sub-form of Sufism, as a part of which the Sufi Islamic practices are intertwined with different traditional African sociocultural and spiritual practices.
[7] To know more about Zikrs and Dhamaals, see Sayan Dey. “The Incredible Story of How East African Culture Shaped the Music of a State in India.” The Conversation. February 3, 2023.
[8] The Misr Kanga is a funnel-shaped musical instrument filled with 108 stones collected from the Indian Ocean, which is played through mild shaking, causing the rocks to make rhythmic sounds. The Musindo is a cylindrical two-sided drum that is horizontally played with both hands on both sides. Lastly, the Mugarman is a large, cylindrical, two-sided drum that is played vertically.
[9] To know more about Salaami music, see Sayan Dey. “How Siddis of Gujarat Share Their Knowledge Through Music.” Madras Courier. November 28, 2024.
[10] To know more about the floatability and mobility of Afro-Indian sociocultural practices in India, see the written and audiovisual works by scholars like Helene Basu, Khatija Khader, Shihan de Silva Jayasuriya, Jasmin Graves, Sureshi Jayawardene, Abu Minda Yimene, Neelima Jeyachandran, and Amy Catlin-Jairazbhoy.
[11] The Swahili language that is used in the Zikrs is not the mainstream Swahili that is spoken in eastern Africa, but a version of it that has changed by mixing with local languages like Gujarati, Hindi, and Urdu.
[12] For more information on rhizomes, see Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari. A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1987.
[13] For more information about disciplinarity, see Lewis Ricardo Gordon. Disciplinary Decadence: Living Thought in Trying Times. New York: Routledge, 2006.
[14] See Yufang Gao and Susan G. Clark. “An Interdisciplinary Conception of Human-Wildlife Coexistence.” Journal for Nature Conservation 73 (2023): 1-8.
[15] See Lyla Mehta. “The Challenges of Decolonising Sustainability and the Environment in Development Studies.” The European Journal of Development Research 37 (2025): 454-466.
[16] A Sufi Islamic practice of celebrating the death anniversary of spiritual ancestors.
[17] Some of the welfare trusts that play active roles are ‘Sidi Jamaat,’ and the ‘Al-Mubrik Welfare Trust.’
References
Kabir, Ananya Jahanara and Luca Raimondi. “Archipelagic Memory and Indian Ocean Literary Studies.” Monsoon 2:1 (2016): 3-12.
Simpson, Leanne Betasamosake. As We Have Always Done: Indigenous Freedom Through Radical Resistance. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2017.
Sayan Dey is an Assistant Professor and Department Chair (English Studies) at Bayan College (affiliated with Purdue University Northwest), Oman. His latest monographs are Performing Memories and Weaving Archives: Creolized Cultures across the Indian Ocean (Anthem Press, 2023), and Garbocracy: Towards a Great Human Collapse (Peter Lang, 2025). He was awarded the Nicolás Cristóbal Guillén Batista Outstanding Book Award for Performing Memories and Weaving Archives in 2025 by the Caribbean Philosophical Association. His research interests are posthumanism, decolonial studies, environmental studies, critical race studies, culinary epistemologies, and critical diversity literacy. He can be reached at www.sayandey.com.