Namdev is a central figure in the cultural history of India, especially
within the field of bhakti, a devotional practice that has created
publics of memory for over eight centuries. Born in the Marathi-speaking
region of the Deccan in the late thirteenth century, Namdev is
remembered as a simple, low-caste Hindu tailor whose innovative
performances of devotional songs spread his fame widely. He is central
to many religious traditions within Hinduism, as well as to Sikhism, and
he is a key early literary figure in Maharashtra, northern India, and
Punjab.
In the modern period, Namdev appears throughout the public spheres of
Marathi and Hindi and in India at large, where his identity fluctuates
between regional associations and a quiet, pan-Indian,
nationalist-secularist profile that champions the poor, oppressed,
marginalized, and low caste. Christian Lee Novetzke considers the way
social memory coheres around the figure of Namdev from the sixteenth
century to the present, examining the practices that situate Namdev's
memory in multiple historical publics. Focusing primarily on Maharashtra
and drawing on ethnographies of devotional performance, archival
materials, scholarly historiography, and popular media, especially film,
Novetzke vividly illustrates how religious communities in India preserve
their pasts and, in turn, create their own historical narratives.
