Transcending socio-spatial boundaries: Contested Thresholds and Belonging in Sacred Geographies of Delhi's Dargahs

• In Event: Spatial Mechanisms in Social Life

Abstract

Dargahs, shrines of a Sufi saint, are vibrant, socio-urban spaces in Delhi where diverse actors continuously negotiate spirituality, belonging, and place attachment by transcending established social and spatial boundaries. As the sites of identity construction and meaning-making, where various agents, such as Gaddi Nashin (successor or a disciple of a Sufi saint), custodians, devotees, pilgrims, residents, and visitors, co-construct socio-spatial realities. Through everyday practices of mobility (both physical and social) and interactions within the dargah, these actors employ various cultural skills to construct identities and forge meaningful attachments that challenge traditional territorial divisions and social hierarchies. Individuals, belonging to various classes, genders, ethnicities, and religions, conceive access to sacred dargahs as a form of spiritual benefit and reaffirm recognition and dignity. However, this access to the socio-spiritual space is not equally awarded to all the devotees and visitors due to religious and social beliefs. Whether through inter-faith participation in rituals, women's strategic navigation of gendered spaces, or economically marginalized groups claiming symbolic capital through devotional practices, actors transform territorial restrictions into opportunities for belonging.
Drawing on Bourdieu's (1984, 1990) theory of practice, social field and agency, Marcus's (2010) spatial capital framework, Lamont and Molnár's (2002) symbolic and social boundaries, Swidler’s (2001) cultural toolkit, Barth's (1969) and Wimmer's (2008) boundary-making theory, the paper argues that the dargah is not merely a site where social processes happen to occur but an active spatial mechanism: a configurational arrangement whose properties of accessibility, proximity, and relational positioning generate, constrain, contest, and amplify altered social positions. How does space do social work through fuzzy boundaries, which are institutionally constructed and sometimes creatively trespassed? This multi-method ethnographic investigation demonstrates that meaning-making at dargahs is fundamentally relational and dynamic: devotees cultivate belonging not despite socio-spatial boundaries but through the very act of boundary transcendence.

Author

• Animesh Dev, George Mason University