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The Culture of Sindhi ( sd, سنڌ جي ثقافت) has its roots in the
Indus Valley civilization The Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC), also known as the Indus Civilisation was a Bronze Age civilisation in the northwestern regions of South Asia, lasting from 3300 BCE to 1300 BCE, and in its mature form 2600 BCE to 1900&n ...
.
Sindh Sindh (; ; ur, , ; historically romanized as Sind) is one of the four provinces of Pakistan. Located in the southeastern region of the country, Sindh is the third-largest province of Pakistan by land area and the second-largest province ...
has been shaped by the largely desert region, the natural resources it had available, and continuous foreign influence. The Indus or Sindhu River that passes through the land, and the
Arabian Sea The Arabian Sea ( ar, اَلْبَحرْ ٱلْعَرَبِيُّ, Al-Bahr al-ˁArabī) is a region of the northern Indian Ocean bounded on the north by Pakistan, Iran and the Gulf of Oman, on the west by the Gulf of Aden, Guardafui Channel ...
(that defines its borders) also supported the seafaring traditions among the local people. The local climate also reflects why the
Sindhis Sindhis ( sd, سنڌي Perso-Arabic: सिन्धी Devanagari; ) are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group who speak the Sindhi language and are native to the province of Sindh in Pakistan. After the partition of British Indian empire in 1947, man ...
have the
language Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of met ...
,
folklore Folklore is shared by a particular group of people; it encompasses the traditions common to that culture, subculture or group. This includes oral traditions such as tales, legends, proverbs and jokes. They include material culture, ranging ...
,
tradition A tradition is a belief or behavior (folk custom) passed down within a group or society with symbolic meaning or special significance with origins in the past. A component of cultural expressions and folklore, common examples include holidays or ...
s,
customs Customs is an authority or agency in a country responsible for collecting tariffs and for controlling the flow of goods, including animals, transports, personal effects, and hazardous items, into and out of a country. Traditionally, customs ...
and lifestyle that are so different from the neighboring regions. The Sindhi culture is also practiced by the
Sindhi diaspora The Sindhi diaspora mainly refers to the descendants of ethnic Sindhi people who emigrated from the historical Sind province of British India before the Independence of Pakistan, these people are not a part of Pakistani diaspora as they emigrat ...
.


History

The roots of Sindhi culture go back to the distant past. Archaeological research during 19th and 20th centuries showed the roots of social life, religion and culture of the people of the Sindh: their agricultural practices, traditional arts and crafts, customs and tradition and other parts of social life, going back to a mature
Indus Valley Civilization The Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC), also known as the Indus Civilisation was a Bronze Age civilisation in the northwestern regions of South Asia, lasting from 3300 BCE to 1300 BCE, and in its mature form 2600 BCE to 1900&n ...
of the third millennium BC. Recent researches have traced the Indus valley civilization to even earlier ancestry.


Archaeological discoveries

The excavations of Mohen-Jo-Daro have unfolded the city life of a
civilization A civilization (or civilisation) is any complex society characterized by the development of a state, social stratification, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyond natural spoken language (namely, a writing system). Ci ...
of people with values, a distinct identity and culture. Therefore, the first definition of the Sindhi culture emanates from that over the 7000-year-old
Indus Valley civilization The Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC), also known as the Indus Civilisation was a Bronze Age civilisation in the northwestern regions of South Asia, lasting from 3300 BCE to 1300 BCE, and in its mature form 2600 BCE to 1900&n ...
. This is the pre-Aryan period, about 3,000 years BC., when the urban civilization in Sindh was at its peak. In Sir
Mortimer Wheeler Sir Robert Eric Mortimer Wheeler CH CIE MC TD (10 September 1890 – 22 July 1976) was a British archaeologist and officer in the British Army. Over the course of his career, he served as Director of both the National Museum of Wales an ...
's book, ''Civilization of the Indus Valley and Beyond'', it is said that; "
Civilization A civilization (or civilisation) is any complex society characterized by the development of a state, social stratification, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyond natural spoken language (namely, a writing system). Ci ...
, in a minimum sense of the term, is the art of living in towns, with all that the condition implies in respect of social skills and disciplines." When people speak of Sindhi civilization, they have to concern themselves, mainly with the material and concrete side of human habitation of which Sindhi culture is the only essence called the superstructure. The present day Sindh, along with the Northern part of the Indus Valley Civilization (around 3000 to 2500 BC) is located on its urban civilization.
Ranikot Fort Ranikot Fort ( sd, راڻي ڪوٽ) (also known as Rannikot) is a historical Talpur fort near Sann, Jamshoro District, Sindh. in Pakistan .Ranikot Fort is also known as The Great Wall of Sindh and is believed to be the world's largest fort, wit ...
is also a landmark of the Indus valley civilization. It is the world's largest fort, with walls extending to 20 km. It has been called a "second Wall of China", and attracts many visitors.


Literature


History

Sindhi language is ancient and rich in literature. Its writers have contributed extensively in various forms of literature in both poetry and
prose Prose is a form of written or spoken language that follows the natural flow of speech, uses a language's ordinary grammatical structures, or follows the conventions of formal academic writing. It differs from most traditional poetry, where the f ...
.
Sindhi literature Sindhi literature ( sd, سنڌي ادب), is the composition of oral and written scripts and texts in the Sindhi language in the form of prose: (romantic tales, and epic stores) and poetry: (Ghazal, Wai and Nazm). The Sindhi language of the provin ...
is very rich, and is one of the world's oldest literatures. The earliest reference to Sindhi literature is contained in the writings of
Arab The Arabs (singular: Arab; singular ar, عَرَبِيٌّ, DIN 31635: , , plural ar, عَرَب, DIN 31635: , Arabic pronunciation: ), also known as the Arab people, are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in Western Asia, ...
historians. It is established that Sindhi was the first eastern language into which the
Quran The Quran (, ; Standard Arabic: , Classical Arabic, Quranic Arabic: , , 'the recitation'), also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation in Islam, revelation from God in Islam, ...
was translated, in the 8th or 9th century. There is evidence of Sindhi poets reciting their verses before the Muslim Caliphs in
Baghdad Baghdad (; ar, بَغْدَاد , ) is the capital of Iraq and the second-largest city in the Arab world after Cairo. It is located on the Tigris near the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon and the Sassanid Persian capital of Ctesiphon ...
. It is also recorded that treatises were written in Sindhi on
astronomy Astronomy () is a natural science that studies astronomical object, celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and chronology of the Universe, evolution. Objects of interest ...
,
medicine Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care pract ...
and history during the 8th and 9th centuries.


Poetry

Prominent in Sindhi culture, Sindhi poetry ( sd, سنڌي شاعري) continues an oral tradition dating back a thousand years. The verbal verses were based on
folk tales Oral literature, orature or folk literature is a genre of literature that is spoken or sung as opposed to that which is written, though much oral literature has been transcribed. There is no standard definition, as anthropologists have used vary ...
. Sindhi is one of the major oldest languages of the
Indus Valley The Indus ( ) is a transboundary river of Asia and a trans-Himalayan river of South and Central Asia. The river rises in mountain springs northeast of Mount Kailash in Western Tibet, flows northwest through the disputed region of Kashmir, ...
having a peculiar literary colour both in poetry and prose. Sindhi poetry is very rich in thought as well as contain variety of genres like other developed languages. Old Sindhi poetry impacts upon contemporary languages and also accepts the healthy influence of some languages like
Hindi Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been de ...
. Sindhi poetry contains two main original forms of verse, such as bait and Waei. ''Bait'' slightly resembles with
form Form is the shape, visual appearance, or configuration of an object. In a wider sense, the form is the way something happens. Form also refers to: *Form (document), a document (printed or electronic) with spaces in which to write or enter data ...
Dohas and Sorthas, moreover also influenced by
Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
forms like
Ghazal The ''ghazal'' ( ar, غَزَل, bn, গজল, Hindi-Urdu: /, fa, غزل, az, qəzəl, tr, gazel, tm, gazal, uz, gʻazal, gu, ગઝલ) is a form of amatory poem or ode, originating in Arabic poetry. A ghazal may be understood as a ...
, Mathnavi, Rubai, and Kaafi. Since the 1940s, Sindhi poetry has incorporated broader influences including the sonnet and blank verse. Soon after the
independence Independence is a condition of a person, nation, country, or state in which residents and population, or some portion thereof, exercise self-government, and usually sovereignty, over its territory. The opposite of independence is the statu ...
of
Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...
in 1947, these forms were reinforced by
Triolet A triolet (, ) is almost always a stanza poem of eight lines, though stanzas with as few as seven lines and as many as nine or more have appeared in its history. Its rhyme scheme is ABaAabAB (capital letters represent lines repeated verbatim) and ...
,
Haiku is a type of short form poetry originally from Japan. Traditional Japanese haiku consist of three phrases that contain a ''kireji'', or "cutting word", 17 '' on'' (phonetic units similar to syllables) in a 5, 7, 5 pattern, and a ''kigo'', or se ...
, Renga and
Tanka is a genre of classical Japanese poetry and one of the major genres of Japanese literature. Etymology Originally, in the time of the ''Man'yōshū'' (latter half of the eighth century AD), the term ''tanka'' was used to distinguish "short poem ...
etc. At present, these forms continue to co-exist, albeit in a varying degree, with Azad Nazm having an edge over them all. Poetry of
Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai ( sd, شاھ عبداللطيف ڀٽائي, ur, ; 1689/1690 – 21 December 1752), commonly known by the honorifics ''Lakhino Latif'', ''Latif Ghot'', ''Bhittai'', and ''Bhit Jo Shah'', was a Sindhi Sufi mystic, an ...
and Sachal Sarmast is very famous throughout Sindh.


Music

Sindhi music has its own unique quality. It is performed in many different ways. Sufi music is performed at shrines, and other simple music is performed at
studio A studio is an artist or worker's workroom. This can be for the purpose of acting, architecture, painting, pottery (ceramics), sculpture, origami, woodworking, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, industrial design ...
s and gatherings.


Sports

There are many regional sports that are played in
Sindh Sindh (; ; ur, , ; historically romanized as Sind) is one of the four provinces of Pakistan. Located in the southeastern region of the country, Sindh is the third-largest province of Pakistan by land area and the second-largest province ...
. Malakhiro is one of the famous sports of Sindh. Other sports include ''Wanjh wati'', ''Kodi Kodi'', ''Beelarhoo'', ''Thipai Rand'', ''Notinn'' and ''Biloor'', ''cricket'', and ''football''.


Cultural character

The ancient Sindhi civilization was the place, where the aesthetic utilization of leisure was freely indulged. There has been evidence, that the excavations of sites dating back to 3000 BC (all over Sindh) is also true, around 1200 years ago when Jaina Dakshiniya Chihna (778 AD) described the distinguished features of Sindhis in this way: "Elegant, with a lovely, soft and slow gait, they are fond of the art of Gandharvas (that is, songs, music and dancing) and full affection towards their country." :Nasir Kalwar


Sindhi Cultural Day (Ekta Day)

Sindhis Sindhis ( sd, سنڌي Perso-Arabic: सिन्धी Devanagari; ) are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group who speak the Sindhi language and are native to the province of Sindh in Pakistan. After the partition of British Indian empire in 1947, man ...
celebrate Sindh Cultural day worldwide every year on first Sunday of December,( 1st Sunday of December was Advised and fixed by Dr.Sarang Ansari , a Sindhi poet, also known as Sarang Bhittai .Dr Sarang Bhittai lives in New York , USA. ) by wearing Ajrak &
Sindhi Topi The Sindhi cap, also known as the Sindhī ṭopī () rarely known as the Sindhi Kufi ( sd, سنڌي ڪفي), is a skullcap worn predominantly by Sindhis in Sindh, Pakistan. Together with Ajrak or Saraiki Ajrak, the Sindhi cap is regarded as an ...
. On that occasion, the musical programmes and rallies are held in many cities to mark the day with zeal. Major hallmarks of cities and towns are decorated with Sindhi Ajrak to highlight the cultural values of Sindh. The people across
Sindh Sindh (; ; ur, , ; historically romanized as Sind) is one of the four provinces of Pakistan. Located in the southeastern region of the country, Sindh is the third-largest province of Pakistan by land area and the second-largest province ...
exchange gifts of Ajrak and Topi at various ceremonies. Even, the children and women are dressed up in Ajrak, assembling at the grand gathering, where famous Sindhi singers sing Sindhi songs, which depicts love and progress of Sindh. The musical performances of the artists compel the participants to dance on Sindhi tunes and ‘Jeay Sindh Jeay-Sindh Wara Jean’.
All Political, social and religious organisations of Sindh, besides the Sindh culture department and administrations of various schools, colleges and universities, organize variety of events including seminars, debates, folk music programmes, drama and theatrics performances, tableau and literary sittings to mark this annual festivity. Sindhi culture, history and heritage are highlighted at the events.

Ekta (Unity) day is observed to display solidarity among the Sindhi-speaking masses, the event is celebrated not only in Karachi, but throughout Sindh. The province’s culture and unity day was celebrated for the first time on December 6, 2009 (as the Sindhi Topi Day) as a backlash to the comments of anchorman Dr
Shahid Masood Shahid Masood ( ur, ) is a Pakistani columnist and political analyst who hosts the talk show ''Live with Dr. Shahid Masood'' on GNN. He is known for his series ''End of Time'' on ARY''.'' Previously, he served as Group executive director of ...
who had criticised President Asif Ali Zardari for wearing a Sindhi cap on his foreign tours. People across the
Sindh Sindh (; ; ur, , ; historically romanized as Sind) is one of the four provinces of Pakistan. Located in the southeastern region of the country, Sindh is the third-largest province of Pakistan by land area and the second-largest province ...
province condemned Masood’s comments via SMS, which ultimately resulted in the announcement of celebrating the Sindhi Topi Day. Moreover, a prominent figure in Sindh, Ali Kazi, had started issuing a call for observing a unity day, and a large number of people responded to the call and started celebrating the culture and the unity days. Ever since, Sindhi media groups have started to celebrate the day as ‘Sindhi Cultural Day’ or 'Ekta day'. The Sindhi language TV channels including KTN, Sindh TV, Awaz TV and
Mehran TV Mehran ( fa, مهران, link=no) is derived from the term ''mehr'' (English: ''sun''), relating to Mithra, an ancient Zoroastrian Persian deity. Mehran may refer to: Places Iran * Mehran (district), a neighborhood of northern Tehran, capital of ...
broadcast special programmes on the culture of Sindh, besides these media outlets separately arrange the mega musical events, which also attract large audience to celebrate the Culture Day every year. The Sindhi language TV channels and Political Parties of Sindh, first time celebrated Sindhi Cultural Day (Ekta Day), together on December 8, 2013. Image:Hindu girl karachi.jpg, Image:Muslim girl karachi1870.jpg, Image:Abida Parveen concert 1.jpg, Image:Z.A Bhutto j.jpg,


See also

*
Sindh Sindh (; ; ur, , ; historically romanized as Sind) is one of the four provinces of Pakistan. Located in the southeastern region of the country, Sindh is the third-largest province of Pakistan by land area and the second-largest province ...
* Sindhi * Tomb paintings of Sindh *
Sindhi dress Both Sindhi women and men wear the shalwar qameez or the kurta with pyjama. Women wear sari or ghagra. However, before the adoption of the Shalwar kameez and the kurta, the sari as well as other articles of clothing, Sindhis had their own tradi ...
*
Sindhi cuisine Sindhi cuisine ( Sindhi: سنڌي کاڌا) refers to the distinct native cuisine of the Sindhi people from Sindh, Pakistan. Sindhi cuisine has been influenced by Central Asian, Iranian, Mughal food traditions. It is mostly a non-vegetarian c ...


Notes


External links


Official website of Sindh about culture

Sindhi Sangat - produces many Sindhi Movies, Music Albums, Events Worldwide promoting Sindhi heritage, culture and language
{{DEFAULTSORT:Culture Of Sindh Pakistani culture Pakistani social culture