This article discusses political and ritual aspects of indigeneity in the former jungle kingdoms of southern and northern Orissa. It will ask whether “tribal” principles of authority and sociopolitical organization do or do not differ from “royal” ones, and argue that the dichotomy, which is often taken for granted, between states and stateless societies must be questioned. In place of using this dichotomy, this article identifies a “contact zone” in which acephalous segmentary lineage societies and kingdoms existed side by side and were interconnected in mutually reinforcing ways. But how can such aggregations of two apparently different forms of political organization, with their concomitant ideologies, be understood as forming a unitary whole? How was the relationship between the royal principles of rule and authority of the Hindu kind, on the one hand, and the tribal principles of rule and authority on the other, viewed and practically pursued by the indigenous, and sometimes exegenous, actors themselves?
{"title":"Contact zone: ethnohistorical notes on the relationship between kings and tribes in Middle India","authors":"Burkhard Schnepel","doi":"10.18874/AE.73.1-2.12","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18874/AE.73.1-2.12","url":null,"abstract":"This article discusses political and ritual aspects of indigeneity in the former jungle kingdoms of southern and northern Orissa. It will ask whether “tribal” principles of authority and sociopolitical organization do or do not differ from “royal” ones, and argue that the dichotomy, which is often taken for granted, between states and stateless societies must be questioned. In place of using this dichotomy, this article identifies a “contact zone” in which acephalous segmentary lineage societies and kingdoms existed side by side and were interconnected in mutually reinforcing ways. But how can such aggregations of two apparently different forms of political organization, with their concomitant ideologies, be understood as forming a unitary whole? How was the relationship between the royal principles of rule and authority of the Hindu kind, on the one hand, and the tribal principles of rule and authority on the other, viewed and practically pursued by the indigenous, and sometimes exegenous, actors themselves?","PeriodicalId":53972,"journal":{"name":"Asian Ethnology","volume":"73 1","pages":"233-257"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2014-11-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67695310","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In this article, I introduce the discrepancies between official and ethnographic views on conditions in the highlands of the province of Odisha, the western and tribal half of the province. For tactical reasons, the colonial government joined it with the Hindu coastal zone, even though Odisha’s borders cut through several major tribal territories with millions of inhabitants. Amazingly, very little field research has been conducted in these highlands, and the major anthropological schools have almost entirely neglected them. For millennia, empires or petty kingdoms have tried in vain to subjugate the highlanders, but during the last decades major industrial ventures by national and international trusts have entered the hills. Numerous state efforts at “development” have amounted to the transformation of free cultivators with a local religion into Hindu untouchables in slums. However, most of the unique tribal social structures continue to exist, though “education,” as the major state effort, tries to undo them.
{"title":"Ethnographies of States and Tribes in Highland Odisha (SPECIAL ISSUE : The Bison and the Horn : Indigeneity, Performance, and the State of India)","authors":"G. Pfeffer","doi":"10.18874/AE.73.1-2.13","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18874/AE.73.1-2.13","url":null,"abstract":"In this article, I introduce the discrepancies between official and ethnographic views on conditions in the highlands of the province of Odisha, the western and tribal half of the province. For tactical reasons, the colonial government joined it with the Hindu coastal zone, even though Odisha’s borders cut through several major tribal territories with millions of inhabitants. Amazingly, very little field research has been conducted in these highlands, and the major anthropological schools have almost entirely neglected them. For millennia, empires or petty kingdoms have tried in vain to subjugate the highlanders, but during the last decades major industrial ventures by national and international trusts have entered the hills. Numerous state efforts at “development” have amounted to the transformation of free cultivators with a local religion into Hindu untouchables in slums. However, most of the unique tribal social structures continue to exist, though “education,” as the major state effort, tries to undo them.","PeriodicalId":53972,"journal":{"name":"Asian Ethnology","volume":"73 1","pages":"259-279"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2014-11-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67695432","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article describes and analyzes forms of indigeneity with reference to a highland community in Odisha called Gadaba. Three types of indigeneity are distinguished: indigenous indigeneity, ascribed indigeneity, and claimed indigeneity. The first concerns local sacrificial practices through which indigeneity is constructed. Significantly, this type of indigeneity is local, symmetric, relational, and the Gadaba are themselves the creators of this representation. Different forms of ascribed indigeneity, by contrast, assign indigeneity to the Gadaba unilaterally, and the relationship between those who ascribe and the Gadaba is asymmetrical and monolithic. The third type of indigeneity is as yet in a nascent state as only a few Gadaba voice an indigenous identity in the larger political field of the state, and no cultural performances are referred to nor do political organizations exist to support such a claim.
{"title":"Dimensions of Indigeneity in Highland Odisha, India","authors":"P. Berger","doi":"10.18874/AE.73.1-2.03","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18874/AE.73.1-2.03","url":null,"abstract":"This article describes and analyzes forms of indigeneity with reference to a highland community in Odisha called Gadaba. Three types of indigeneity are distinguished: indigenous indigeneity, ascribed indigeneity, and claimed indigeneity. The first concerns local sacrificial practices through which indigeneity is constructed. Significantly, this type of indigeneity is local, symmetric, relational, and the Gadaba are themselves the creators of this representation. Different forms of ascribed indigeneity, by contrast, assign indigeneity to the Gadaba unilaterally, and the relationship between those who ascribe and the Gadaba is asymmetrical and monolithic. The third type of indigeneity is as yet in a nascent state as only a few Gadaba voice an indigenous identity in the larger political field of the state, and no cultural performances are referred to nor do political organizations exist to support such a claim.","PeriodicalId":53972,"journal":{"name":"Asian Ethnology","volume":"73 1","pages":"19-37"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2014-06-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67694185","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The Kotas number about two thousand and live on the Nilgiri plateau in South India. Kotas refer to themselves by various terms that implicate indigenous status, including “tribals,” ādivāsīs, and “mountain peoples.” Although in some situations Kotas stress their tribal status and in others they emphasize their modernity, most do not consider these to be in opposition. The ways Kotas view themselves today in relation to their forefathers, their spirits of the dead, their gods, and tribal and non-tribal others, are in various ways discernable in Kota song texts and musical styles. Analysis of performance style and texts of Kota mourning songs, devotional songs, and popular styles provides nuanced perspectives on how Kotas position themselves socially and culturally in the contemporary world.
{"title":"Tribal and Modern Voices in South Indian Kota Society (SPECIAL ISSUE : The Bison and the Horn : Indigeneity, Performance, and the State of India)","authors":"R. Wolf","doi":"10.18874/AE.73.1-2.05","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18874/AE.73.1-2.05","url":null,"abstract":"The Kotas number about two thousand and live on the Nilgiri plateau in South India. Kotas refer to themselves by various terms that implicate indigenous status, including “tribals,” ādivāsīs, and “mountain peoples.” Although in some situations Kotas stress their tribal status and in others they emphasize their modernity, most do not consider these to be in opposition. The ways Kotas view themselves today in relation to their forefathers, their spirits of the dead, their gods, and tribal and non-tribal others, are in various ways discernable in Kota song texts and musical styles. Analysis of performance style and texts of Kota mourning songs, devotional songs, and popular styles provides nuanced perspectives on how Kotas position themselves socially and culturally in the contemporary world.","PeriodicalId":53972,"journal":{"name":"Asian Ethnology","volume":"73 1","pages":"61-89"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2014-06-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67694023","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Guest Editors’ Introduction: \"Indigeneity, Performance, and the State in South Asia and Beyond\"","authors":"R. Wolf, Frank Heidenmann","doi":"10.18874/AE.73.1-2.02","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18874/AE.73.1-2.02","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":53972,"journal":{"name":"Asian Ethnology","volume":"73 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2014-06-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67694127","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In this article I trace the ironic social life of the ethnic names used for a forestdwelling people living in the Nilgiri-Wynaad in South India in various intersecting arenas: local, colonial, and postcolonial. They call themselves sonta (translatable as “own, relatives who live together”), usually prefixed by nama (our). Outsiders, such as the neighbors in their multi-ethnic region, and colonial and postcolonial administrators, have regarded them by various ethnonyms including Nayaka/Kattunayaka. I examine the meanings and politics of their appellations in this case study of the complex processes of making indigenous polities in India.
{"title":"The Social Life of an Ethnonym : The \"Kattu Nayaka\" of South India (SPECIAL ISSUE : The Bison and the Horn : Indigeneity, Performance, and the State of India)","authors":"N. Bird-David","doi":"10.18874/AE.73.1-2.08","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18874/AE.73.1-2.08","url":null,"abstract":"In this article I trace the ironic social life of the ethnic names used for a forestdwelling people living in the Nilgiri-Wynaad in South India in various intersecting arenas: local, colonial, and postcolonial. They call themselves sonta (translatable as “own, relatives who live together”), usually prefixed by nama (our). Outsiders, such as the neighbors in their multi-ethnic region, and colonial and postcolonial administrators, have regarded them by various ethnonyms including Nayaka/Kattunayaka. I examine the meanings and politics of their appellations in this case study of the complex processes of making indigenous polities in India.","PeriodicalId":53972,"journal":{"name":"Asian Ethnology","volume":"73 1","pages":"139-153"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2014-06-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67694212","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The Betta Kurumbas are one of more than sixteen indigenous groups of the Nilgiri-Wayanad hills of southern India, a region that, since the nineteenth century, has experienced wide-ranging cultural and political changes, including extensive immigration by people from other parts of India. This article describes the Betta Kurumbas’ view of their homeland, based on the information contained in native-language narratives in which they describe their social organization into clans and their spiritual beliefs. The narratives provide a glimpse into the Betta Kurumba perspective on the changes that have overrun the region, changes that have rendered them—along with other Nilgiri-Wayanad groups—politically and socially marginalized in their own homeland.
{"title":"Placing Indigeneity: Betta Kurumba Narratives of Territory and Clan Structure","authors":"Gail Coelho","doi":"10.18874/AE.73.1-2.04","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18874/AE.73.1-2.04","url":null,"abstract":"The Betta Kurumbas are one of more than sixteen indigenous groups of the Nilgiri-Wayanad hills of southern India, a region that, since the nineteenth century, has experienced wide-ranging cultural and political changes, including extensive immigration by people from other parts of India. This article describes the Betta Kurumbas’ view of their homeland, based on the information contained in native-language narratives in which they describe their social organization into clans and their spiritual beliefs. The narratives provide a glimpse into the Betta Kurumba perspective on the changes that have overrun the region, changes that have rendered them—along with other Nilgiri-Wayanad groups—politically and socially marginalized in their own homeland.","PeriodicalId":53972,"journal":{"name":"Asian Ethnology","volume":"73 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2014-06-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67694339","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Fertility or Indigeneity? : Two Versions of the Santal Flower Festival (SPECIAL ISSUE : The Bison and the Horn : Indigeneity, Performance, and the State of India)","authors":"Lea Schulte-Droesch","doi":"10.18874/AE.73.1-2.09","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18874/AE.73.1-2.09","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":53972,"journal":{"name":"Asian Ethnology","volume":"73 1","pages":"155-180"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2014-06-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67694354","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
On 15 May 1989, the Badaga, the dominant peasant community in the Nilgiri Hills, organized a huge rally and handed over a memorandum to the government. On the basis of their culture they demanded tribal status, a guaranteed price for their agricultural products, and other privileges. I shall argue that the medium of a memorandum with its textual and material form requires and fosters the process of cultural objectification. "Culture" is turned into an object and becomes a form of currency in the political process. Later, 15 May was named "Badaga Day," an annual context for self-representation. Performative acts like hoisting the Badaga flag, singing the Badaga hymn, and worshipping the bust of H. B. Ari Gowder contribute to an overall social aesthetics. Sounds, colors, proximity, and other "culturally patterned sensory experienc[s]w" (MACDOUGALL 2006, 98) contribute to the feeling of "one-ness" and underline the demand for cultural autonomy.
{"title":"Objectification and Social Aesthetics : Memoranda and the Celebration of \"Badaga Day\" (SPECIAL ISSUE : The Bison and the Horn : Indigeneity, Performance, and the State of India)","authors":"F. Heidemann","doi":"10.18874/ae.73.1-2.06","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18874/ae.73.1-2.06","url":null,"abstract":"On 15 May 1989, the Badaga, the dominant peasant community in the Nilgiri Hills, organized a huge rally and handed over a memorandum to the government. On the basis of their culture they demanded tribal status, a guaranteed price for their agricultural products, and other privileges. I shall argue that the medium of a memorandum with its textual and material form requires and fosters the process of cultural objectification. \"Culture\" is turned into an object and becomes a form of currency in the political process. Later, 15 May was named \"Badaga Day,\" an annual context for self-representation. Performative acts like hoisting the Badaga flag, singing the Badaga hymn, and worshipping the bust of H. B. Ari Gowder contribute to an overall social aesthetics. Sounds, colors, proximity, and other \"culturally patterned sensory experienc[s]w\" (MACDOUGALL 2006, 98) contribute to the feeling of \"one-ness\" and underline the demand for cultural autonomy.","PeriodicalId":53972,"journal":{"name":"Asian Ethnology","volume":"73 1","pages":"91-109"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2014-06-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67694058","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article explores how in the northern Nilgiris of South India the postcolonial state and indigenous adivasi communities imagine, perform, and negotiate ideas of a good life in ritual and political discourse, that is, how they articulate practical reason. I analyze the politics of ethics and how indigenous Jenu Kurumba and Sholega adivasi groups on the one hand and the state of Tamil Nadu on the other construct and perform their identity with respect to moral ontologies and ideas of a good life. The postcolonial Nilgiris thus appear as a political field where various articulations of ethical worlds compete with and challenge one another, while at the same time the collective actors seek to gain hegemony over other imaginations of a good life.
{"title":"The Poetics and Politics of Practical Reason Indigenous Identity, Ritual Discourse, and the Postcolonial State in the Northern Nilgiris (South India)","authors":"Ulrich Demmer","doi":"10.18874/AE.73.1-2.07","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18874/AE.73.1-2.07","url":null,"abstract":"This article explores how in the northern Nilgiris of South India the postcolonial state and indigenous adivasi communities imagine, perform, and negotiate ideas of a good life in ritual and political discourse, that is, how they articulate practical reason. I analyze the politics of ethics and how indigenous Jenu Kurumba and Sholega adivasi groups on the one hand and the state of Tamil Nadu on the other construct and perform their identity with respect to moral ontologies and ideas of a good life. The postcolonial Nilgiris thus appear as a political field where various articulations of ethical worlds compete with and challenge one another, while at the same time the collective actors seek to gain hegemony over other imaginations of a good life.","PeriodicalId":53972,"journal":{"name":"Asian Ethnology","volume":"73 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2014-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67694155","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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