The Festivals of Urban Oraon: An Anthropological Study

Abstract

The present paper navigates that the ‘Urban Oraon’ celebrates two types of festival i.e. Ideal type and Modern type. Hence ‘Ideal type’ refers the traditional festivals Oraons and the festivals which are borrowed from larger society that is termed as ‘Modern type”. The traditional or ideal type festivals are Kharian, Dangri, Veloafari, Sahrul, Sohrai, Murgipaithya, Maghe basi and Karam. The Modern festival refers the worship of DurgaPuja, Kali Puja, Jagadhatri Puja, Lakshmi Puja, Sitala and Sarawasti. The traditional five categories of Oraon festival on functional basis are not worshiped by the present studied people.  The present study shows that the festivals of Urban Oraon may be classified into three categories i.e. 1) Family 2) Clan and 3) Community wise.  The study also intends to focus the changes and modification of festivals of ‘Urban Oraon”. Keywords: Urban Oraon, festival, Cultural continuity, cultural fertility.