Article

Caste-based Psychology and Developing Societies

31(1) 88–105, 2019

Oppression, Trauma
© 2019 Department of Psychology,
University of Allahabad
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DOI: 10.1177/0971333618825051
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Erstwhile South
India: The Collective
Therapeutic Potential
of Theyyam

Shaima Ahammed1

Abstract
The decades of collective victimhood and trauma that the oppressed
lower caste members in the southern state of India (Kerala) suffered in
silence were less known to the world until the socio-religious reform
movements offered a space for their collective expression of agitation
and unrest. With no socially sanctioned channels to express their injus-
tice and pain, the folk ritual of Theyyam often became the alternative
for a cathartic release of transgenerational and collective victimhood
and trauma long endured by people belonging to these communities. A
common theme of Theyyam discussed in literature is the symbolic mean-
ing of ‘empowerment’, ‘dissent’ and ‘protest’ that Theyyam takes on as
the performer embodies a chosen deity. The ritual thereby becomes a
temporary outlet for the collective rage, anger and resentment endured
by people of the oppressed communities over the years. These insights
have implied the healing potential of Theyyam as it offers a safe outlet

1
School of Arts & Sciences, City University of Seattle. In Edmonton AB, Canada.

Corresponding author:
Shaima Ahammed, Associate Faculty, School of Arts & Sciences, City University of
Seattle, 100-10010, 106 Street, Edmonton, AB T5J 3L8, Canada.
E-mail: shaima.ahammed@cityu.edu
Ahammed 89

for repressed trauma reactions for individuals as well as for the com-
munity, collectively. However, what is relevant to this discussion is the
mechanism by which healing processes are activated in Theyyam. This
article makes an effort in this direction—the focus is on understanding
Theyyam as a psycho-cultural phenomenon and the collective therapeu-
tic dynamics that it offers.

Keywords
Collective trauma, caste-based oppression, Theyyam, collective healing

Introduction
For thousands of years, the caste system in India has been a fundamen-
tal aspect of the socio-political and economic structure of the nation.
Dating back to 1200 bce, it is often remarked as the world’s longest
surviving system of social hierarchy (Narula, 2008; Shukla, 2009). As a
long-standing oppressive social order, justified by the mythical and
scriptural doctrines of the ancient Hindu tradition and based on notions
such as ‘purity’ of descent, birth-ascribed membership to hierarchically
determined occupational groups and the merit of one’s karma and
dharma, this complex and multifaceted social hierarchical system has
negatively impacted every aspect of the lower castes’ socio-economic
progress and psychological well-being (Mosse, 2010; Thorat &
Neuman, 2012). Kerala, the southern state of India, was no exception to
this system and the impact it had on the quality of life and well-being of
lower caste community members continues to affect them (Manjalloor,
2015; Mohan, 2006; Saradamoni, 1973; Sivanandan, 1976; Sreerekha,
2012). In fact, as several authors (e.g., Dale, 1990; Jeffrey, 2016;
Kurien, 1994) have noted, the then prevailing caste system in Kerala
was much more oppressive than in other parts of India. Not only that,
the state endorsed all the worst and most dreaded practices of the sys-
tem, such as untouchability, slavery, exploitation, humiliation, discrimi-
nation and ostracism of lower caste members, but also there were
extended features to these practices such as unseeability and atmos-
pheric pollution by just the presence of lower caste members. Indeed,
the system was so rigorous that any transgressions to these norms
resulted in severe punishments along with purification ceremonies,
atonements and so on. Stringent social sanctions imposed on the lower
90 Psychology and Developing Societies 31(1)

caste members, deprivation of their fundamental rights and needs, vio-

lation of their dignity and so on were established practices of the time.
As a closed and rigid system based on sacred scriptures, the social
status of the members and groups remained fixed and allowed no scope
for mobility or change of social status. The systematic discrimination
and injustice was so ingrained and built into the very structure of the
social order that it allowed no dissenting and protesting voices or dia-
logues, making it a classic example of a structurally violent society
(Galtung, 1969, 1996). Galtung’s (1996) definition of ‘structural vio-
lence’, as a ‘violence frozen into structures’ and a ‘culture that legiti-
mises violence’, is important to note here, as it is precisely a structurally
endorsed legitimation of violence in a highly repressive society that
made caste oppression possible for centuries without any resistance or
protests. The most distressing effect of such structural violence and
muted pain was that there existed no viable means or mediums within
the established social order to express and externalise the trauma that
they suffered. While the impact of historical and intergenerational
trauma that lower caste members have suffered over thousands of years
is not within the scope of this article, Galtung’s (1996) theory of struc-
tural violence and Evans-Campbell’s (2008) understanding of intergen-
erational trauma are relevant here as these concepts remind us of the
extreme psychological and mental health disadvantages experienced by
people belonging to marginalised groups in oppressive social environ-
ments. In recent years, several studies (e.g., Baider et al., 2000; Bell,
2016; Hirsch, 2001; Roland, 2010; Yehuda, Halligan, & Grossman,
2001) have highlighted the deep impact of structural violence and inter-
generational trauma and its negative consequences on the health and
well-being of collective victims across generations. Although Evans-
Campbell’s (2008) study represented intergenerational trauma in a dif-
ferent social context, the emphasis on the collective nature of ‘complex
trauma inflicted on a group of people who share a specific group iden-
tity or affiliation—ethnicity, nationality, and religious affiliation’ and
the ‘legacy of numerous traumatic events a community experiences
over generations’ and their psychological and social responses to such
events makes it of great significance in the discussion here. This legacy
and perpetuation of trauma over generations are indeed a common
theme in literature. For example, LaCapra (1999) discussed the South
African apartheid to note the recurring nature of trauma. He argued that
members of traumatised communities may experience traumatic loss as
the impact moves through generations and continues to manifest itself.
Ahammed 91

Despite the far-reaching implications of such intergenerational and col-

lective trauma on the well-being of the marginalised and oppressed
caste victims, there has been little scholarly or practical interest in stud-
ying or discussing the psychological effects of caste-based trauma
within regular academic or even lay discourses. A start to this, however,
may be the recent interest in studying narratives of collective trauma
reflected as anger, helplessness, violence, hopelessness and suffering in
what is termed Dalit literature (Ganguly, 2009; Heering, 2013; Nayar,
2006, 2011, 2014; Suresh, 2017). Thus, even as caste victims’ trauma
has not been a focus of academic discourse in India, the lived subjective
traumatic experiences and memories are beginning to emerge in these
poetic and autobiographical narratives which often echo several symp-
toms of trauma such as anxiety, sadness, guilt, anger, grief, fatigue,
pain, despair, shame, chaos, loss of trust and so on.
The atrocities perpetrated by higher castes were rarely met with
resistance or intolerance by lower castes as they were conditioned to
believe in the hegemony of upper castes as deeply rooted in a sacred
ideology. Hence, the humiliation, oppression and trauma continued for
thousands of years as they endured poverty, forced labour including
exploitation of children, deprivation of basic necessities including food
and shelter, forced separation of children from their parents, denial of
access to water and other such public amenities, assaults and rapes, pub-
lic lynching, persecutions and so on. The absence of any socially sanc-
tioned means to express their grievances, protests and dissent often
perpetuated and intensified the lower caste members’ disempowerment
and trauma as they repressed their angry protests and internalised their
worthlessness, lack of agency and self-defeating beliefs (Anandhi &
Kapadia, 2017; Yu, 2018).
At an individual and interpersonal level, the impact of such silenced
trauma is profound, complex and dynamic. When denied expression,
healing and integration, trauma imposes a devastating effect on the per-
son’s functional capacity and constrains any sense of individual agency
(Phillips, 2015). Such repression disempowers the victim with a deep
sense of loss and intensifies their shame, humiliation and helplessness,
thereby furthering the inner breakdown of the self (van der Merwe &
Gobodo-Madikizela, 2009). As authors such as Pearlman and Saakvitne
(1995) and Hanna, Bemak, and Chung (1999) note, one key feature of
trauma is the person’s experience of feeling overwhelmed as it impacts
one’s ability to comprehend, process and integrate the experience into an
organised and cohesive narrative. A disintegrated sense of self and identity
92 Psychology and Developing Societies 31(1)

that result is often manifested in the fragmentation of memories and a

disconnect with one’s body. The wealth of scientific knowledge we have
from contemporary trauma research informs us of the formation and
manifestation of these symptoms, post the traumatic experiences,
whether acute or chronic. Most importantly, these studies provide evi-
dence on the far-reaching effects of unprocessed trauma stored in the
nervous system and the body. One of pioneers in the field of somatic
trauma treatment, Levine (1997), describes that in response to an over-
whelming or traumatising experience, the body and brain react by invok-
ing primitive states of either fight, flight or freeze. When the person is
incapable of fighting or fleeing from the threat, the body resorts to the
most primal response known as freezing. However, these survival
responses of fight, flight or freeze invoked by primitive centres in the
brain in the aftermath of threat do not just remain as somatic reactions;
they also determine how one relates to the world. Thus, the effects of
trauma in imposing itself repeatedly and seeking expression and assimi-
lation (Caruth, 1996) often manifest as violence to self or others in a
tragic vicious cycle. As pointed out by several scholars (e.g., Evans-
Campbell, 2008; van der Merwe & Gobodo-Madikizela, 2009), trauma
seeks a way out in one way or another even when denied expression. A
comprehensive study by James et al. (2003) validates this hypothesis.
They presented a tripartite model of violence, suggesting that structural
violence generates its consequences through the collective psyche and
manifests itself as domestic violence, childhood sexual assaults and vio-
lence directed at oneself. Thus, whether it is aggression displaced or a
desperate effort to regain their lost power and control, victims of trauma
often re-enact the suffering by becoming the perpetrators themselves.
On a collective scale, examples of such re-enacted trauma and perpetual
repetition of violence are plenty in the history of the world. As James
et al. (2003) insightfully noted, ‘All forms of violence and oppression
are linked in that violence stems from and is legitimized by situations of
oppression’ (p. 129). The net impact of this silenced yet re-enacted and
recurring trauma is that the vulnerable community remains trapped in
the cycles of trauma and dysfunction. On a macroscale, this explains the
lower castes’ socio-economic stagnation and regression that can be
traced back to chronic poverty, exclusion and denial of opportunities,
mortality rates, negative health outcomes, illiteracy, lack of access to
resources, systemic discrimination and so on.
While the discussion so far has focused on the profound and long-
lasting impact trauma can have on the lives of people both individually and
collectively, it is worthwhile to note how communities’ often have their
Ahammed 93

unique traditions and sacred rituals serve as coping mechanisms for

collective trauma (Ngwenya, 2017). These rituals are so closely and intri-
cately interwoven into their narratives and lives that their original purposes
and adaptive functions often remain masked. As Whitehouse (2012)
notes, rituals ‘can be invested with functional and symbolic properties
even though (people) may struggle on occasion to identify what those
may be’ (p. 82) According to him, rituals may be attributed to super-
natural, symbolic, expressive and social functions but the causal link,
meanings or explanations to how these functions are realised may
remain unknown to the community and participants. One such centuries-
old, religious folk ritual performed in the southern state of India (Kerala)
is Theyyam,1 which literally means God. Traditionally, the ritual only
represents a visible and tangible manifestation of God, from whom the
community can seek and receive blessings. From a psycho-anthropological
perspective, however, this ritual with its central features of elaborate
rites and costumes, dynamic and rhythmic dance movements, musical
instruments such as drums and cymbals, stories and narratives of social
significance recited as ritual songs and performers that go into a state of
trance seems to have functional properties that go beyond the religious
and traditional meanings and interpretations. As pointed by several
authors such as Monteiro and Wall (2011), traditional rituals involving
elements of dance and theatre play a key role in relieving psychological
distress, as well as neutralising and lessening the impact of collective
trauma. Sociological and anthropologists studying Theyyam have often
pointed out how the ritual serves as a cathartic release of repressed col-
lective social tensions and frictions built into the inequality and contra-
dictions of a caste-ridden society, by creating the ambience of a festival
and evoking participatory trance (e.g., Dalrymple, 2010; Flood, 1997;
George, 1998; Narayanan, 2006; Pallath, 2013). Indeed, this key feature
of Theyyam brings us to an important question that guides the focus
of this article—what socio-cultural and psychological functions are
realised in keeping Theyyam the prerogative of the lower castes or
‘untouchables’, who were exploited, oppressed and enslaved to a life of
deprivation by the upper castes in the social hierarchy of the society.
Considering monopolistic rights, upper castes held to everything that
represented the divine and holy, this stirs a thought as to what within the
power dynamics would have made it possible for the upper castes to
give up their privilege of representing God. More importantly, what
about the ritual that would have been so compelling for the oppressing
higher caste that it even allowed for a temporary suspension of the
caste and ‘untouchability’ status of the Theyyam performer. In recent
94 Psychology and Developing Societies 31(1)

years there has been a growing interest in examining the socio-cultural

dynamics of these questions about Theyyam. However, it is also critical
that we begin to understand the psychological processes underlying the
ritual that account for the cathartic effect as well as the experience of
devotion, dread and awe that they brings to the spectators. The collec-
tive restorative effect that religious rituals such as Theyyam offer
through its highly charged embodiment of energy and power is explained
well by van der Kolk (2015) as he points to the trauma-alleviating effect
of rhythmic and synchronous movement in communal rituals. Drawing
on the wealth of literature around how our nervous system and body
respond to trauma, this article makes an attempt to understand the role
Theyyam plays in alleviating the impact of intergenerational and collec-
tive psychological trauma that lower caste Hindus in the southern state
of India have suffered over centuries.

Oppression and Collective Victimhood of the

Lower Caste Hindu Community in the Southern
State of India
During the pre-independence and colonial period, the state of Kerala,
like other parts of India, was a society with rigid hierarchical stratifica-
tion based on the caste system. As Manjalloor (2015) notes, historically,
Kerala represented the peak of caste discrimination compared to the rest
of India, by practising the most atrocious features of caste discrimination
including slavery and untouchability. The dominant Nambudiri (equiva-
lent to Brahmins), upper caste, community monopolised resources,
social status and power and enslaved lower castes, leading them to a life
of deprivation and humiliation. As in other parts of India, the caste sys-
tem created a hierarchical order within which mobility of groups and
individuals was impossible (Fuller, 1976). The hierarchy comprised
upper caste Hindus (Brahmins and Nairs), lower caste Hindus (Ezhavas)
and Dalits in a respective hierarchical order (Nisar & Kandasamy, 2007;
Werff, 1982). The lowest in the hierarchy (Dalits) were the Pulayas,
Parayas and Kuravas who were treated inhumanely and exploited
mostly by their labour in agriculture and cultivation. They were enslaved,
treated like animals, traded, rented and even killed as human sacrifice for
pleasing the deities (Werff, 1982). Such was the extent of inhumane
treatment that they were denied most fundamental human rights includ-
ing wearing clothes, using public spaces such as roads and wells, using
Ahammed 95

utensils and so on. Indeed, the women of lower castes were prevented
from covering the upper part of the body until the ‘mid-19th century’.
The ritualistic purity that the Nambudiris assumed meant that a Dalit’s or
untouchable’s foot prints would pollute a path, so a broom had to be tied to
their back to clean their polluting foot prints and a pot on their neck to collect
their polluting spittle (Nisar & Kandasamy, 2007; van der Werff, 1982).
One peculiar feature of caste oppression in Kerala was agrestic and pre-
dial slavery which forced lower castes to be dependent on their ‘masters’
for their sustenance and survival. The bondage of slavery meant that they
spend all their lives as agricultural slave labourers in the rice fields,
engaging in intensive manual labour in return for rationed-out grain and
shelter. Due to the feudal landlords’ absolute right of ownership, they
could also trade the slaves along with the land, as they wished.
As it is with any oppressing system, strategies to maintain caste-based
social order in Kerala were sanctions and punishments imposed on the
lower castes. Thus, any disobedience or negligence of the landlords’
commands were met with brutal punishment, torture and killing. Even
slight lapses of caste rules, for instance, as not referring to oneself as
‘adiyan’ (slave), were met with severe penalties from the landlords.
Thus, every living moment of their lives as well as their thoughts and
actions was controlled and regulated by the upper castes. This included
their domestic affairs, social engagements, rituals and practices and so
on. Despite such extreme oppression, humiliation and violation of their
fundamental rights to exist, lower castes never challenged or protested
the established order until social reform movements in the 20th century.
Centuries of mythical and scriptural justification of Brahmin dominance
and caste hierarchy had systematically indoctrinated them to believe that
their servility and compliance to exploitation and deprivation was their
bounded duty to perpetuate a society prescribed by the scriptures. This
internalisation of their imposed condition as their ordained fate or results
of their karma (Bandhopdadyay, 2012) and incapability of resistance
was perhaps a way to adapt to the realities of such social inequity and
oppression (Freire, 1973/2002).

Theyyam and Its Potential for Collective Healing

The name, Theyyam is said to have originated from the Malayalam word
Deivam or Deiyam which means God. Historians such as Allchin and
Allchin (1968) consider socio-religious ritual to have ancient origins
96 Psychology and Developing Societies 31(1)

with traits that can be traced back to the earliest periods of Neolithic and
Chalcolithic settlement and expression. Many features of Theyyam such
as its vibrant costumes, music, songs, elaborate face and body paintings
and so on are similar to that of other temple art forms in Kerala such as
Kathakali, Ottanthullal and so on. However, unlike those art forms, the
performer or Theyyamkaran in Theyyam does not simply enact a charac-
ter but rather manifest and embody a chosen deity in a trance or ‘pos-
sessed’ state, thereby assuming a fierce and raging yet benevolent power
of the deity or God. As Vadakkiniyil (2010) notes, the body of the
Theyyam performer becomes the medium for the manifestation of the
deity or God through dance, dialogue, narrative, songs and ritualistic
acts. This aside, one unique aspect of Theyyam that is of particular sig-
nificance to this article is that it is conventionally performed by members
of lower castes, once considered ‘untouchables’ by the upper castes.
Specifically, as Damodaran (2008) points out, ‘All the performers are
akin to the members of the Scheduled Castes, the so-called “untoucha-
bles” such as, Malayan, Vannan, Velan, Pulayan, Anjutan, Munnutan,
Mavilan, Chingathan, Kopalan, and Karimpalan’ (p. 284).
Several features of Theyyam are of special interest to this discussion
due to its potential to evoke and enable phenomena such as synchronous
arousal (Konvalinka et al., 2011; Xygalatas, 2014) and vicarious cathar-
ses (Miller, 2007; Yalom, 1995). These include the pace of dance and
music that varies from a slow (Pathiniyattom) to fast (Elakiyattom)
tempo, the performers’ agile and rhythmic dance steps including inward
and outward as well as cyclic movements, use of vivid props and vibrant
costumes, the display of martial arts and sword play, invocative ritual
songs, the central importance of trees and sacred groves as the arena for
the performance, fiery ambience with flames, embers and lighted torches
and fire pits, the rites of fire walking and so on. These typical features
make Theyyam a high-arousal ritual that allows performers as well as
spectators to be induced with highly charged emotions, exceptional feel-
ings, sensations and perceptions. As the performance progresses,
Theyyam becomes interactive and playful with the spectators. They take
an active participatory role by engaging in dialogues and receiving bless-
ings from Theyyam, insisting and requesting Theyyam to rise up from
scorching embers and so on. Xygalatas (2014) pointed out that taken
together, these features of stress, physical exhaustion, sensory overload,
repetitive music, dancing and fasting and the use of psychoactive drugs
generate an altered state of consciousness, eliciting particular responses
of the brain. One anthropological concept that needs to be highlighted in
this context is spontaneous exegetical reflection, typical of high-arousal
Ahammed 97

rituals and characterised by spontaneous insight into the meaning of the

ritual and strong emotional reactions. Given that Theyyam is replete with
themes of suffering and trauma which otherwise do not have any outlets
for expression, it seems reasonable to assume that spontaneous insight
and meaning making are important functions served by the ritual. From
a sociological perspective, all these seem to converge to Durkhiem’s
classical concept of ‘collective effervescence’ as also observed by
Xygalatas, Konvalinka, Bulbulia, and Roepstorff (2011). Durkheim’s
reference to ‘a sort of electricity’ in the following excerpt implies the
underlying psychophysiological factors that mediate the collective expe-
rience in rituals:

The very fact of congregating is an exceptionally powerful stimulant. Once

the individuals are gathered together, a sort of electricity is generated from
their closeness and that quickly launches them to an extraordinary height
of exaltation.... Probably because a collective emotion cannot be expressed
collectively without some order that permits harmony and unison of move-
ment, these gestures and cries tend to fall into rhythm and regularity….
(1915, p. 217)

Perhaps one feature of Theyyam that necessitates a more detailed discus-

sion is its invocative ritual songs or ballads, accompanied by percussion
instruments such as drums and cymbals. The ballads locally called
Thottampattukal often comprise myths and legends as well as voices of
protest against social discrimination, purity and pollution and the practice
of untouchability (Damodaran, 2008; Namboodiri, 1998). As Menon (1993)
points out, the ritual often becomes a space to challenge the exercise of
arbitrary authority of the powerful. One frequent theme in these perfor-
mances, he noted, was that of retribution for the callous murders of vic-
tims, deifying the victims and worshipping them along with a pantheon
of deities shared by all castes. Given the rigid social hierarchy that over-
powered and subjugated the lower castes, one key question that may
arise here is the following: what dynamics in the ritual make it possible
for the performer to defy all social norms and voice his/her protests and
grievances against the atrocities of the caste system. Pallath (1995) in his
defining study of the ritual points out five distinctive features of indige-
nous cultural rituals that enable the performer embody such spontaneity
and spirit in challenging the powerful. The features of liminality, lucid-
ity, ritual inversion, social catharsis and reflection of social processes
characterise the folk rituals of lower castes in contrast with the aspects of
rigidity, permanency, ritual affirmation, individual fantasises and individual
98 Psychology and Developing Societies 31(1)

fulfilment that represent the higher castes’ rituals. While liminality relaxes
the social norms and helps the performer be in a state of ease, lucidity
sets the playfulness, humour and laughter that soon gives way to subtle
scorn, sarcasm and mockery.
A typical example of Theyyam which presents a synthesis of limi-
nality and ludicity is Potten Theyyam,2 which literally translates as
fool/idiot Theyyam, in which the performer represents and embodies a
slapdash fool who is clumsy and has no systematic pattern to his play
(Pereira, 2017). The underlying myth in Potten Theyyam is that of the
meeting and dialogue between Sri Shankaracharya, a saint philosopher,
and Lord Shiva, when the former was set to ascend the ‘Sarwanjha Peedam’
(the throne of ultimate knowledge). In the myth, Sri Shankaracharya
meets a Pulayan (a member of a lower caste) on his way. As was the
social norm, Sri Shankaracharya orders the Pulayan to move away and
not pollute him. The Pulayan who is actually Lord Shiva in disguise
engages in a dialogue with the sage and asks him what would be the
colour of the blood if there was a cut on either of their bodies. The dia-
logue continues and the Pulayan finally makes the point that all human
beings are equal and are entitled to the same respect regardless of one’s
caste. At this juncture, Shankaracharya recognises both that it is Lord
Shiva in disguise testing his knowledge and understanding of humanity
and the absurdity and senselessness of the caste system and the cruelties
such as untouchability imposed on lower castes. The scholars Obeyesekere
and Obeyesekere (1976) seem to have summed up the blend of liminality
and ludicity in Pottan Theyyam quite aptly. In their words, ‘The group by
virtue of a shared religion, vicariously participates in the ritual enactment
and purges their own internal terrors and anxiety through communally
shared humor’ (p. 69).
On the surface, the element of ludicity and liminality in Pottan
Theyyam appears to have the purpose of entertaining the audience, shed-
ding all inhibitions and controls as well as relaxing social norms.
However, it seems that implicit in these is also the function of deep reso-
nance that allows spectators to embody the powerful emotions, reclaim
their sense of agency, become engaged and feel in control, none of which
is possible for a traumatised individual (van der Kolk, 2015). He points
out that trauma impacts people’s relationships with their bodies and their
capacity to experience and process emotions, feelings and sensations.
Indeed, revisiting the traumatising experience leads to dysregulated
emotions and loss of control. Apparently, processing trauma requires the
person’s access to inner sensations and their capacity to stay present and
connected in their body. Communal rituals such as Theyyam seem to
Ahammed 99

activate and enable this visceral experience of being powerful and in

control by way of neurological mirroring (Konvalinka et al., 2011;
Mason, 2018). Possibly, spectators by staying within the safety of the
collective (as in the context of trauma therapy) go through a process of
what Levine terms ‘pendulation’ (Levine & Frederick, 1997), that is, a
sensitive and careful moving in and out of accessing traumatic memories
and linked internal sensations that allow release of involuntary body
reactions associated with trauma.
A similar explanation of vicarious catharsis albeit without the neuro-
logical explanation is offered from the field of group psychotherapy. In
Moreno’s (1946/1985) ground-breaking therapeutic technique of psy-
chodrama, the protagonist becomes a catalyst who evokes the somatic
anchoring and catharsis of repressed emotions in fellow group members
as he/she experiences and acts out the same (Bemak & Young, 1998).
Here too, the element of resonance seems to be at play as the spectators
connect with the feelings of the protagonist, thereby arousing and owning
up their repressed feelings and reclaiming their disowned aspects of the
self (Miller, 2007).
Inherent in other features that characterise Theyyam, namely, ritual
inversion, social catharsis and reflection of social processes, is the power
of witnessing and naming the injustices and speechless terror imposed
on the community. While the features, ‘social catharsis’ and ‘reflection
of social processes’, seem to be self-explanatory, ‘ritual inversion’ neces-
sitates a discussion here. Anthropologists consider ritual inversion to be
a symbolic reversal of social power structures. As Pallath (1995) notes,
it is this status reversal in Theyyam that allows the performer to exercise
ritual authority over their oppressors. By doing so, Theyyam grants voice
to the voiceless and represents their collective sense of retribution.
This voicing and uttering of protest are critical, given the understanding
that verbalising trauma is considered of critical importance to processing
and recovering from trauma. However, a challenge to this is that the imprint
of traumatic exposure is stored in the brain’s right hemisphere, which pro-
cesses nonverbal information, while deactivating the left hemisphere that
helps to organise experience into logical sequences and decode the expe-
rience into language and words (Klorer, 2008; van der Kolk, 2015).
Apparently, during hyperarousal there is decreased stimulation in the left
side of the brain, which thereby deactivates verbal processing and chal-
lenges the brain’s capacity to integrate the experience and memories in space
and time (van der Kolk, 1996). This explains the preference for nonverbal
approaches in trauma therapy, that help bypass verbalisation in favor of
nonlinguistic modalities of communication and expression (Harris, 2009).
100 Psychology and Developing Societies 31(1)

In Theyyam too, artistic embodiments and nonverbal features such as

rhythmic music and dance, ethereal and flamboyant costumes and head
gears, vivid and vibrant masks and face paintings and so on are paramount
and often overshadow the verbal and linguistic components. Perhaps the
emphasis is on evoking somatic and visceral sensations prior to narratives
elaborated through songs and dialogues and in doing so being responsive
to spectators’ readiness for verbal processing.

Concluding Thoughts
This article, while focusing on the collective healing potential of a folk
ritual of lower caste groups in Kerala, attempts to draw attention to the
enduring psychological impacts of caste-based structural violence and
intergenerational trauma that they have suffered over thousands of years.
The complex psychological impacts of structural violence and intergen-
erational trauma are perhaps impossible to be dealt with in entirety.
Nevertheless, it is of critical importance that we begin by acknowledging
the traumatic effects of caste violence that continue to impede their
socio-economic progress and psychological well-being. Any attempts to
address their psychosocial concerns require this historical consciousness
and awareness of collective memories that incapacitate them in many
ways. Indeed, as van der Merwe and Gobodo-Madikizela (2009, p. 58)
noted, ‘Without the integration of traumatic events into cultural dis-
courses, individuals as well as society in general stay traumatized.’ This
is particularly true of any community mental health initiatives and ser-
vices such as addictions recovery, community rehabilitation programmes,
prevention and intervention services for domestic as well as other forms
of interpersonal violence, suicide, family/community crisis and so on.
The aims of these programmes are best realised when the focus is as
much on engaging and empowering communities as it is on supporting
the individual. This is where folk rituals such as Theyyam that hold
immense potential for collective healing come of relevance and value.
The traditional knowledge as well as coping and healing mechanisms
embedded in these rituals and rites may be interwoven effectively into
community services and programmes intended for individuals and
groups belonging to lower castes. Given these understandings, the over-
arching premise in this article is that which is unseen in the timeless
wisdom of folk rituals such as Theyyam may be neurophysiologically
informed restorative and psychotherapeutic functions that help people
cope and heal from traumatising experiences.
Ahammed 101

Ethics Statement
The author confirms that the ethical policies of the journal have been
adhered to. No ethical approval was required as this is a review article
with no original research data and did not involve human participants.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research,
authorship and/or publication of this article.

Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or
publication of this article.

Notes
1. Throughout this article, the word Theyyam is used to mean the art form as
well as the performer/deity.
2. In native Malayalam, the expression pottan kali or fool’s play connotes
playing dumb.

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