General Information about Item:

• Material Folklore: Ritual object
• Language: English
• Country: United States

Informant Data:

This informant is a junior at Dartmouth from Massachusetts. Her father is Indian and she celebrates Hindu holidays. She attended the Diwali celebration and the lighting of the diyas on the Green.

Contextual Data:

• Social Context: Part of the Diwali celebrations at Dartmouth was lighting diyas on the Green, one of Dartmouth’s major landmarks. We interviewed our informant, a 19, who attended the ceremony.

• Cultural Context: Diyas are lamps or candles that are traditionally lit to celebrate Diwali. They are used to symbolize the victory of light over darkness, or of good over evil, which is mentioned Diwali’s origin story. During Diwali in India, one can see thousands of diyas during Diwali. Even at the celebration on campus, there were at least a few hundred.

Item:

An image of the diyas being lit during the evening on the Green. We also transcribed the 19’s description of the lighting of the diyas.

Associated File:

Transcript of Associated File:

“We decided to have everyone go to the Green in order to light the diyas, which are an important part of Diwali. Diwali’s known as the festival of lights, so we wanted to make the display really beautiful. A lot of people ended up staying and eating the food afterwards.”

Informant’s Comments:

The informant helped organize the Diwali celebrations at Dartmouth this year.

Collector’s Comments:

I interviewed the informant immediately after the celebration, so she could recall it clearly.

Collector’s Name:

Celine Guan

Tags/Keywords:

India, holiday, Diwali, Material folklore