Colonial and Post-colonial Anthropology among the Nagas

Abstract

The transition from colonial to postcolonial ethnographic writing in north eastern India has left its imprints on Verrier Elwin’s tribal policy ‘panchsheel’ and his philosophy for North Eastern Frontier Agency, the present day Arunachal Pradesh. Seminal work on anthropology of development in Africa, Latin America and South East Asia has reopened a new genre of ethnographic writings that engages critically with the politics of development and have dealt creatively with with questions of ‘power’ and ‘authority’ using Foucauldian ideas of ‘governmentality’, ‘knowledge-power relations’ and ‘panoptic violence’ in their studies. In the Naga Hills, indigenous intellectuals have used colonial categories to construct an exclusive ethnicity and distinct historical past. In the ethnographic descriptions of the Nagas, three themes in particular have occupied centre stage and are constantly reproduced in the postcolonial ethnographic literature with few exceptions. The critical self-reflection is dissolved in the legacy of colonial ethnography that created communities as static, undifferentiated and homogenous groups sharing common ideas and values.