By Somali Panda
Migrating Music | Dialect of the Soul
Introduction: Crossing Boundaries, We Build Bridges
Movement of people is perhaps as old as the history of civilisation itself. From the time immemorial people are walking down the path of happenings, leaving or losing their home in search of a newer one, with their own desire and dream, longings or desperation, music and amusement; and they are interacting, creating, merging or emerging, in the course. This movement or migration has shown the path of unknown to the human race, though the elemental urge for them is to settle down. The reasons may be as different as natural, spatial, political, economic, social or racial, people have to move toward a new horizon, but with an incessant quest for the root somewhere deep in the mind. Migration of people and their culture, especially music, across the world has been occurring to an unprecedented extent and in novel ways for some time now.
Migration is more than a physical journey—it is a dialogue across time, culture, language, and identity. It is through migration that civilizations have met, exchanged, collided, and evolved. Communication—linguistic, artistic, spiritual—has always followed in the footsteps of migratory paths. This paper explores how migration shapes, and is shaped by, the primal human need to communicate.
1. The Primal Act of Migration as Communication
From prehistoric wanderers to modern refugees, every migration carries a message: of hope, need, resistance, and transformation. As people move, they carry oral histories, symbols, food habits, rituals, and musical traditions. These are all forms of encoded communication, transposed across geographies.
- Language as a migratory artefact: Dialects evolve as linguistic roots mingle with local tongues.
- Music as migratory memory: From the African diaspora’s blues to the Baul songs of Bengal, migration is remembered and processed through rhythm and melody.
1.Language as a Migratory Artefact
Language is one of the most fluid and adaptive tools of communication, and it travels with people across borders and generations. As communities migrate, their native tongues do not remain static—they absorb, influence, and get influenced by the languages they encounter.
- Dialectal evolution: When migrant groups settle in new regions, their language interacts with the dominant or local language, resulting in hybrid dialects. For example, Creole languages arose from the blending of colonial languages with indigenous and African tongues. Similarly, Indian diasporas have developed forms of English, Tamil, Hindi, or Bhojpuri influenced by the speech patterns of Caribbean, Southeast Asian, or African communities.
- Linguistic resilience and reinvention: In some cases, language becomes a marker of identity and resistance. Minority communities may preserve linguistic traditions even when surrounded by dominant languages, as seen with Yiddish, Roma, or Maori languages.
- Code-switching and linguistic layering: Migrants often switch between languages or borrow words across languages in a single conversation, creating a layered linguistic culture that reflects migration’s impact.
2. Music as Migratory Memory
Music holds emotional resonance and is a powerful vessel for memory, trauma, resistance, and identity. It travels with migrating communities and preserves the stories they carry.
- African diaspora and the Blues: The transatlantic slave trade dislocated millions of Africans. In the Americas, their suffering and spiritual endurance found expression through work songs, spirituals, and eventually blues music. These forms evolved into jazz, gospel, soul, and hip-hop—each carrying the ancestral voice of displacement and resilience.
- Baul songs of Bengal: The Bauls, itinerant mystic minstrels of Bengal, represent a different kind of migration—internal, spiritual, and philosophical. Their music speaks of longing, identity beyond borders, and the body as a temporary home. Many Bauls were wanderers, moving across Bengal and Bangladesh, blending Hindu bhakti, Sufi mysticism, and folk traditions, producing music that reflects pluralism and the search for truth beyond material boundaries.
- Transmission of memory: Migrant music often retains older forms and melodies, even when newer generations have lost the original language or culture. Thus, music becomes a living archive of ancestral journeys and emotional truths.
These two dimensions—language and music—are not just by-products of migration, but active vessels of communication, preserving and evolving identity across geographies and generations.
2. The Communicative Soul of Culture
Every migrant carries an inner culture—silent or sung. This migratory culture is neither left behind nor fully assimilated; it communicates in hybridity. Think of the Tagore songs sung by Bengali families in the UK, or the Indian ragas adapted into Middle Eastern frameworks by migrants in Oman.
Migration compels individuals to learn new signs, codes, customs. This constant decoding and re-coding is the core of communicative empathy.
- Dress becomes dialogue.
- Cuisine becomes confession.
- Gesture becomes grammar.
3. Diaspora Dialogues: Communication Beyond Borders
Diasporas are not just displaced populations—they are echo chambers of belonging and becoming. They form new communication networks:
- The migrant letter home: Once a lifeline, now replaced by voice notes and WhatsApp groups.
- Transnational storytelling: Diaspora literature and cinema transmit ancestral narratives to new lands.
- Rituals across time zones: Celebrating Holi in Harlem or Eid in Edmonton is a communicative act of cultural anchoring.
4. The Digital Turn: Virtual Migration & Communication
In our era, digital migration enables virtual communities. Here, even without physical movement, identities migrate—through avatars, posts, and global audiences.
- Zoom calls become emotional embassies.
- Memes carry migrant humour across generations.
- Blogs (like mine: somalipanda.wordpress.com) become oral archives.
5. Migration in Music: A Personal Testament
As a vocalist of Indian classical, trance, and migratory genres, I have experienced how music speaks what borders mute. My creation, Migrating Music, is a testimony to how ragas met refugees, how folk met flight, how sound migrates even when people can’t.
Every note we sing across borders is an act of defiance, a call for connection.
Conclusion: Communication as the Compass
Migration is not only about departure or arrival—it’s about dialogue. It’s the telling and retelling of who we are, wherever we go. Communication, thus, is the compass of the migrant—guiding, grounding, and growing new maps of humanity.
As we gather today in Kolkata under the banner of Borderless Humanity, let us remember:
Every migration is a message. Every migrant, a messenger. Migrants are no marginalised people; they are the mainstream people.
Presented by Somali Panda
Independent Researcher on Academia.edu.
Sonic Historiographer, musicologist, classical vocalist, +919007861391, somalipanda@gmail.com
Migrating Music 