In this fieldwork-based study, Corinne Dempsey examines Christianity in Kerala, which is home to India's ancient and thriving Christian community. Dempsey views their saint traditions as reflecting devotees' "hybrid" (Western and Eastern) identities in colonial and postcolonial times. She uses Kerala Christian devotional practices as points of comparison with European Catholicism and the indigenous Hinduism of the region.
In this fieldwork-based study, Corinne Dempsey examines the ways in which Kerala Christians construct "hybrid" (Western and Eastern) identity in a postcolonial world. She focuses on their devotion to saints as a particularly useful point of comparison with similar devotion in European Catholicism and the indigenous Hinduism of the region.