Culture, Gender and Inequality: Narratives from a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group in Odisha, India

This ethnographic paper explores gender inequality in tribal societies vis-à-vis customary practices and challenges the notion of egalitarianism of tribal society by taking Chuktia Bhunjia tribe of Odisha, India as an analytical category. In the light of a discussion on women specific taboos and restrictions, captured through formal interview, narrative and lived experience approach, the paper explicates the deeply embedded nature of the taboos in Chuktia Bhunjia society and unravels how prohibiting women from socio-economic and religious space, backed by purity-pollution philosophy, perpetuate the gender inequality among them. It was found that although economic division of labour is indistinct; women are perceived being portrayal of misfortunes during perceived pollution periods and are prohibited to enter into sacred places – kitchen room, cowshed, sacred groves and forest – and take part in community festivals and other auspicious occasions. The existing material culture, especially kitchen room, alongside economic structure, self-notion of ‘outsiders’ and apparently fixed customary laws have direct influence on the position of women in this society. It is found that the customary laws are not mere symbolic expressions in perpetuating the gender asymmetry, but have become a powerful tool to patriarchal controls not only over women’s education, health, properties and knowledge, but also over individual’s choice, freedom, decision-making and sexuality. However, internal challenges are reported against customary laws and taboos, the fear of social ostracism, the obligation to restore the purity of cultural entity and anxiety reinforce people to be always submissive to those practices. Therefore, unless there is transformation alongside their culture, it is fruitless to think of gender equality.

Environmental Resources, Traditional Economic Organization and Its Role in the Empowerment of Marginal Tribal Women

Social inequality lies in certain features of all human societies. Predominantly in most of the countries, men enjoy authority, power and rights over resources. On the other hand, by empowerment we mean, to a large extent, the increase of women’s relative access to economic opportunities and resources. The anthropological study of economic organization is a focal point for discovering the relationship between material and non-material aspects of the environmental resources and human behaviour as well as the social system within which it is exchanged and distributed as cultural goods and services. In India, tribal people are found to be dwelling in the hills and forest-covered regions. Their livelihood and traditional economic organization is intimately associated with multifarious natural and environmental resources. In tribal societies, womenfolk play a very crucial role. In this context, environmental resources related to traditional economic organization have generated a scope of income for them, and it can generate a wider potential for their economic self-dependence. The present study has been done on the Karbi tribal group, of Karbi Anglong, Assam, to analyse the significance of environmental resources in the empowerment of women.

Societies within peace systems avoid war and build positive intergroup relationships

A comparative anthropological perspective reveals not only that some human societies do not engage in war, but also that peaceful social systems exist. Peace systems are defined as clusters of neighbouring societies that do not make war with each other. The mere existence of peace systems is important because it demonstrates that creating peaceful intergroup relationships is possible whether the social units are tribal societies, nations, or actors within a regional system. Peace systems have received scant scientific attention despite holding potentially useful knowledge and principles about how to successfully cooperate to keep the peace. Thus, the mechanisms through which peace systems maintain peaceful relationships are largely unknown. It is also unknown to what degree peace systems may differ from other types of social systems. This study shows that certain factors hypothesised to contribute to intergroup peace are more developed within peace systems than elsewhere. A sample consisting of peace systems scored significantly higher than a comparison group regarding overarching common identity; positive social interconnectedness; interdependence; non-warring values and norms; non-warring myths, rituals, and symbols; and peace leadership. Additionally, a machine learning analysis found non-warring norms, rituals, and values to have the greatest relative importance for a peace system outcome. These results have policy implications for how to promote and sustain peace, cohesion, and cooperation among neighbouring societies in various social contexts, including among nations. For example, the purposeful promotion of peace system features may facilitate the international cooperation necessary to address interwoven global challenges such as global pandemics, oceanic pollution, loss of biodiversity, nuclear proliferation, and climate change.

Educational Status of the Hill Kharias of Mayurbhanj District of Odisha in East India : A Psychological Analysis

Education in tribal societies has helped in maintenance of social structure and goal attainment for a sustained living. The Hill Kharias are the primitive tribal people of Mayurbhanj of the state of Odisha in Eastern India. The development of education of the Hill Kharia community/society of Mayurbhanj is the main aspect of the improvement of the primitive tribal communities of the state of Odisha. The Government of India issued directions vide the letter. No. 20018 5/81- ITDA dated 27th April 1980 for the identification of Primitive Tribal Groups, keeping in view the facts that attention to certain tribal groups’ backwardness. In India Hill Kharia is one of the primitive tribal groups living mainly in the forest and hilly covered areas of the Mayurbhanj district of Odisha. Mentally, the people of Hill Kharia tribe of Mayurbhanj are very weak, because of lack of proper education, awareness, adequate foodstuffs, for which they are backward in present society. Odisha has possessed a distinct place in tribal history of India and it is the home of a number of different types of tribes. Different development programmes for education have been implemented through the different govt. or Non govt. agencies. On the basis of field study made by the earlier scholars including the present authors, the Hill Kharias are residing in the Mayurbhanj district of Odisha. The aim of this paper is to focus on educational status of the Hill Kharias of Mayurbhanj district of Odisha. Methodologically, both the primary and secondary sources have been used in the present article.

Indigenous Conflict Resolution Systems

African tribal societies still rely upon indigenous conflict resolution systems as well as cultural sources to uphold the values of peace, tolerance, solidarity, and respect for one another. The purpose of this chapter was to examine the efficacy of indigenous conflict resolution systems in building peace and promoting social solidarity among indigenous communities in South Africa. Data collection was largely based on critical review of literature relating to the application of indigenous conflict resolution systems in resolving conflicts among indigenous communities. Social capital, Ubuntu, and social solidarity were also used as underpinning theories to guide the study. Findings revealed territorial expansion, resource competition, inheritance or land boundaries, misunderstanding over succession, indebtedness, chieftaincy, adulterous affairs, family property, breach of contract, murder, allegations of bewitchment, theft, matrimonial fall-outs, and cattle raiding as the main causes of violence conflict in indigenous communities. However, the absence of clear policy in the application of indigenous conflict resolution system has been found to be a limiting factor, although these systems are effective in resolving conflicts, building peace, and promoting social solidarity among indigenous communities. Socio-cultural norms and values embedded in indigenous communities have remained an integral part of every organized society. The study thus recommended the establishment of indigenous institutions of governance based on norms, values and principles of conflict resolution and peace building.

Textual unification in a community of Native American storytelling voices

This article explores the centerpiece of contrast between the dominant American and Native American tribal societies – the interaction of individual and group in maintaining community. While Western paradigms of personal development focus on the individual – a model consistently reflected in the most popular Western narrative structures, Native Americans prefer a support group as a center for individual development. In extreme forms, statements about this social phenomenon can become ethnocentric and stereotyped. Ethnographic observations confirm this difference in social systems, but sometimes specifically question stereotypical interpretation. Our analysis leads us to the conclusion that instead of necessarily including an individual in a group, American tribal society can value both group and individual.

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? or about The Sense of Cultural Nostalgia

"The evolution of the European musical culture took place in a flagrant contradiction with the traditional image of a simple succession of stylistic stages. Even if the linearity of the consecution of Antiquity, Middle Ages, Renaissance, Baroque, Viennese Classicism, Romanticism, Modernism and Postmodernism is only too obvious, the nature and logic of the transformations are related to the determining referentiality of the syncretic principle. But, unlike the Enlightenment conception of linear progress, applicable rather to the technological and, in general, scientific thinking, musical art has evolved in mirror symmetry to a cultural history that was separated into two great “ages”, following Eliade's idea of the sacred-profane dichotomy. Around the year 1600, the order of the constituents of the syncretic principle, which are three in number: the Sacred (the tribal societies), the mythological (the Greek and Roman Antiquities) and the ritualistic (the Middle Ages and the Renaissance), was reversed – the ritualistic and the mythological (the Baroque, the Viennese classicism and Romanticism) and the Sacred (the first modernism). In postmodernity, the syncretic principle itself is “recycled” and thus the cycle of cultural evolution closes by returning (in an obviously distorted manner) to the original principle. Keywords: syncretism, Sacred, mythological, ritualistic, three modernisms and three modernities."

Assement and Interventions of Social Capital among Primitive Tribal Communitites in India

Social capital has been described differently by various researchers, depending on how they concentrate on social capital's functions, outcomes, sources or impacts. According to Robert Putnam (1993) “social capital refers to the collective value of all 'social network' and the inclinations that arise from these networks to do things for each other”. The tribal communities in India are in different stages of transition. Their unique system of living, tradition and customs differentiate one tribe from another. They are spread over in different geographical regions of the country. The present study will contribute towards understanding the role of social capital in influencing these outcomes, allowing tribal societies to respond faster to change than those with a certain number of resources. And it also intended to suggest the strategies to enhance the social capital among the Irula tribes in Tamil Nadu.

Decolonizing youth development: re-imagining youthwork for indigenous youth futures

Drawing on scientific theories of racial supremacy and efforts by Western nations to develop uncivilized races, preeminent psychologist G. Stanley Hall proposed that the bio-psychological development of children recapitulated the ancient history of mankind. Utilizing Hall’s theory, US youth organizations designed programs for young people to engage corresponding sociological stages. Using archival sources, I document how Hall’s theory, and the “playing Indian” programs established from it, secured settler colonialism by marginalizing Indigenous cultures, governance, laws and ideologies and positioning tribal societies as primitive and childlike relics of the past destined to be replaced by modern man and nation. I then introduce the specter of recapitulation and how these ideas continue to harm Indigenous communities, and exponentially harm Indigenous youth. Finally, using Ermine’s concept of ethical space, I conclude by exploring the space between knowledge systems about youth and presenting possibilities for decolonizing youth development and reimagining youthwork supportive of Indigenous youth futures.