Book Review...
T.B Subba and G.C. Ghosh (Eds), The Anthropology of North East India, Oriental Longman Pvt. Ltd., New Delhi, 2003, Total pages- 380, Price: Rs. 145/-
Traditionally, the region lying in the northeastern part of the Indian Territory covers 7 sister states namely, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura. More recently, the state of Sikkim has also been included in the council of North East India. Moreover, geographically, the northern part of West Bengal including the districts of Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri and Coochbehar can be regarded as a part of Northeast India besides the above-mentioned states.
Northeast India, as a geographical region has been a unique entity in the Republic of India in terms of physical geography, social geography, economic geography, political geography and historical geography. Because of its geographical and social isolation from the mainstream Indian Territory the region has attracted scant attention from the planners, policy makers and development researchers from the mainland India over the years. Hence, this region is regarded as a backward track inhabited by the tribals by the mainstream Indians.
There has been very few research works done by the scholars with reference to the northeastern hill region of India. The mainstream researchers, cleanly, exclude the states of northeast in their research work in the pretext of non-availability of data. The fact is that they know nothing about the region and are moreover, not interested to explore the issues in development pertaining to the region. Therefore, whatever little work has been done with regard to northeast India it has either been done by the local scholars or the scholars from the foreign land. The mainstream Indian researchers have conducted very few or rather negligible works in this regard.
This book (The Anthropology of northeast India (eds) by T.B. Subba and G.C. Gosh) is one of the first of its kind once again brought by the local scholars of the region. The book covered with articles written mainly by the local anthropologists explores many facets of development dynamics and related issues and concerns pertaining to the northeastern hill region of India.
The book is divided into four major sections comprising of 15 valuable articles. Section I attempts to explore the prehistoric northeast India with the help of the archaeological evidences available so far and highlights the need to enhance archaeological studies in the region
Section II of the book highlights colonial northeast India by critically examining the contributions of J.H Hotton and J.P.Mills both as administrators and scholars (anthropologists). These two civil servants were among the first scholars who attempted to explore and highlight the Social Anthropology and Geography of northeast India.
Section III examines the biological anthropology of northeast India in terms of trends, human growth and development, genetic drift in natural population among others and brings out the related issues in development dynamics pertaining to the region.
The last section talks about the social Anthropology of northeast. This section in detail investigates aspects like tribal social organisation, agrarian relations, status of tribal women and indigenous knowledge in natural resources management in the northeastern hills of India.
This book besides catering to the needs of the students and researchers in Anthropology and allied disciplines like sociology and geography has the potential to influence the much wider audience including planners and policy makers as a standard reference book on the region. One of the major efforts of the book has been to raise curiosity in the minds of the readers about the environment, biology and people of northeast India. The book further attempts to expose the readers to various views and debates open in the hope that students and researchers might probe further into the research problems identified or indicated by various contributors to this book.
T.B Subba and G.C. Ghosh (Eds), The Anthropology of North East India, Oriental Longman Pvt. Ltd., New Delhi, 2003, Total pages- 380, Price: Rs. 145/-
Traditionally, the region lying in the northeastern part of the Indian Territory covers 7 sister states namely, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura. More recently, the state of Sikkim has also been included in the council of North East India. Moreover, geographically, the northern part of West Bengal including the districts of Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri and Coochbehar can be regarded as a part of Northeast India besides the above-mentioned states.
Northeast India, as a geographical region has been a unique entity in the Republic of India in terms of physical geography, social geography, economic geography, political geography and historical geography. Because of its geographical and social isolation from the mainstream Indian Territory the region has attracted scant attention from the planners, policy makers and development researchers from the mainland India over the years. Hence, this region is regarded as a backward track inhabited by the tribals by the mainstream Indians.
There has been very few research works done by the scholars with reference to the northeastern hill region of India. The mainstream researchers, cleanly, exclude the states of northeast in their research work in the pretext of non-availability of data. The fact is that they know nothing about the region and are moreover, not interested to explore the issues in development pertaining to the region. Therefore, whatever little work has been done with regard to northeast India it has either been done by the local scholars or the scholars from the foreign land. The mainstream Indian researchers have conducted very few or rather negligible works in this regard.
This book (The Anthropology of northeast India (eds) by T.B. Subba and G.C. Gosh) is one of the first of its kind once again brought by the local scholars of the region. The book covered with articles written mainly by the local anthropologists explores many facets of development dynamics and related issues and concerns pertaining to the northeastern hill region of India.
The book is divided into four major sections comprising of 15 valuable articles. Section I attempts to explore the prehistoric northeast India with the help of the archaeological evidences available so far and highlights the need to enhance archaeological studies in the region
Section II of the book highlights colonial northeast India by critically examining the contributions of J.H Hotton and J.P.Mills both as administrators and scholars (anthropologists). These two civil servants were among the first scholars who attempted to explore and highlight the Social Anthropology and Geography of northeast India.
Section III examines the biological anthropology of northeast India in terms of trends, human growth and development, genetic drift in natural population among others and brings out the related issues in development dynamics pertaining to the region.
The last section talks about the social Anthropology of northeast. This section in detail investigates aspects like tribal social organisation, agrarian relations, status of tribal women and indigenous knowledge in natural resources management in the northeastern hills of India.
This book besides catering to the needs of the students and researchers in Anthropology and allied disciplines like sociology and geography has the potential to influence the much wider audience including planners and policy makers as a standard reference book on the region. One of the major efforts of the book has been to raise curiosity in the minds of the readers about the environment, biology and people of northeast India. The book further attempts to expose the readers to various views and debates open in the hope that students and researchers might probe further into the research problems identified or indicated by various contributors to this book.
posted by Vimal Khawas at 7:54 AM
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