{"title":"History Binds Us, Can Break Us Too: Contention over Manipur’s Chivu Stone Inscription","authors":"L. Piang","doi":"10.1080/14631369.2022.2051111","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Monuments with inscriptions have always been an important source of history and are helpful for reconstructing the past. They recreate collective memories, as they were erected to commemorate significant events from the past. The historical process of state formation, especially among the former colonies, has bound different ethnic communities, which obliges them to initiate state nation-building processes. So, memories which are recreated, remembered, and forgotten have played a crucial role in shaping ethnic relations as well as relations between the state and various ethnic communities in a multi-ethnic state. This paper analyses the allegation about the Manipur’s Chibu stone inscription as a fabricated historical event, and the complaint asking that its status as a protected archaeological site be denied. It argues that in the name of the state nation-building project, the state has resorted to recreating collective memories with little consideration to the sentiment of ethnic minorities in a state.","PeriodicalId":45296,"journal":{"name":"Asian Ethnicity","volume":"23 1","pages":"641 - 657"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9000,"publicationDate":"2022-03-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Asian Ethnicity","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/14631369.2022.2051111","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"ETHNIC STUDIES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
ABSTRACT Monuments with inscriptions have always been an important source of history and are helpful for reconstructing the past. They recreate collective memories, as they were erected to commemorate significant events from the past. The historical process of state formation, especially among the former colonies, has bound different ethnic communities, which obliges them to initiate state nation-building processes. So, memories which are recreated, remembered, and forgotten have played a crucial role in shaping ethnic relations as well as relations between the state and various ethnic communities in a multi-ethnic state. This paper analyses the allegation about the Manipur’s Chibu stone inscription as a fabricated historical event, and the complaint asking that its status as a protected archaeological site be denied. It argues that in the name of the state nation-building project, the state has resorted to recreating collective memories with little consideration to the sentiment of ethnic minorities in a state.
期刊介绍:
In the twenty-first century ethnic issues have assumed importance in many parts of the world. Until recently, questions of Asian ethnicity and identity have been treated in a balkanized fashion, with anthropologists, economists, historians, political scientists, sociologists and others publishing their studies in single-discipline journals. Asian Ethnicity provides a cross-disciplinary, international venue for the publication of well-researched articles about ethnic groups and ethnic relations in the half of the world where questions of ethnicity now loom largest. Asian Ethnicity covers any time period, although the greatest focus is expected to be on the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.