Environment and Belief Systems

G. N. Devy, Geoffrey V. Davis, G. N. Devy

• Publisher: Routledge India
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781000721867
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Anthropology
• Index: Social Sciences

Part of the series Key Concepts in Indigenous Studies, this book focuses on the concepts that recur in any discussion of nature, culture and society among the indigenous.

The book, the first in a five-volume series, deals with the two crucial concepts of environment and belief systems of indigenous peoples from all the continents of the world. With contributions from renowned scholars, activists and experts from around the globe, it presents a salient picture of the environments of indigenous peoples and discusses the essential features of their belief systems. It explores indigenous perspectives related to religion, ritual and cultural practice, art and design, and natural resources, as well as climate change impacts among such communities in Latin and North America, Oceania (Australia, New Zealand and the South Pacific Islands), India, Brazil, Southeast Asia and Africa.

Bringing together academic insights and experiences from the ground, this unique book's wide coverage will serve as a comprehensive guide for students, teachers and scholars of indigenous studies. It will be essential reading for those in anthropology, social anthropology, sociology and social exclusion studies, religion and theology, and cultural studies, as well as activists working with indigenous communities.

1
RITUAL AND CULTURAL PRACTICE AMONG INDIAN ADIVASIS

Archana Prasad

Recent political developments and the large-scale onslaught of neo-liberal capital through its alliance with the forces of Hindu nationalism have forced scholars to relook at the problem of ritual and cultural practice in adivasi/tribal societies. The articulation of adivasi identity (which embodies within it a celebration of ritual and cultural practice) is not necessarily an alternative to these hegemonic and oppressive forces. Rather, as this essay shows, they may in fact get incorporated into dominant cultural practice. In order to explore this proposition, this essay reconstructs the contemporary history of the ways in which culture has been studied and practiced in adivasi life.

Apart from the introduction and conclusion, this essay is divided into six sections. The first two sections are conceptual, as they explore the theoretical perspectives and set up the argument to see ritual and cultural practice as socially and politically constructed entities. The third section further extends this argument by exploring the dialectical relationship between adivasi symbolism and their changing material reality. The last three sections locate the empirical history of adivasi politics and cultural practice within this context. Essentially, they look at the interaction between adivasi politics, cultural practice and the changing character of hegemonic forces. Within this structure, the essay argues for a more reflexive and complex way of understanding the relationship between class, culture and adivasi politics.

Religion, beliefs and “pre-capitalist” tribal societies

Since the advent of the Enlightenment, social scientists have viewed the belief systems of “indigenous communities” as “primitive” systems which are largely “uncivilized” in their lifestyles. This perspective espoused an idea of an ideal “civilized” modern society which was based on a modern rationality and where any form of unexplained belief was categorized as “superstitious.” However, this evolutionary framework was contested by the development of sociology and anthropology – disciplines that tried to make sense of “tribal beliefs” within their social and economic contexts. Several anthropologists, like Evans-Pritchard or Malinowski, argued the tribal belief systems constituted a part of the functional organization of society (Evans-Pritchard, 1940). This means that religious beliefs and practices constituted a major part of the organization of the economy and society (Malinowski, 1948). The institutional framework in which this was done largely represented the customary authority which was embodied within kinship institutions. This approach, designated the “structuralist-functionalist” perspective, tried to explain the internal logic of these societies and argued that they had their own rationality. Seen in this context, tribal religion and beliefs are an essential part of a social organization that reproduces communitarian norms and institutions. Hence, the religion and belief systems were seen as a critical element of the survival of these communities themselves (Malinowski, 1948).

The juxtaposition between evolutionary and functional perspectives on tribal religion has formed the contours of the ideological debates. Liberal anthropological theories were often challenged by sociologists and anthropologists from the Marxist tradition (Seddon, 1978). The uniqueness of their analysis lay in distinguishing between “pre-capitalist” societies and capitalism. Simply put, theorists like Maurice Godelier and Meillassoux argued that the question of kinship and religion had to be seen in the context of the lack of the separation between the “base” and the “superstructure” within pre-capitalist societies (Godelier, 1977; Meillassoux, 1981). This implies that authority emanating from kinship and religion maintained the hierarchies and patterns of redistribution of wealth, eventually leading to processes of primitive accumulation. Further rituals and customs (such as marriage and gifts) were also methods of redistribution of wealth in tribal societies. Hence kinship, religion and custom became the ideologies of accumulation and extraction within pre-capitalist societies where the functions of production and social reproduction were conflated with each other because the there was no difference between the “base” and “superstructure” (Mauss, The Gift: Forms and Functions of Exchange in Archaic Societies, 1966). Thus, kinship and religion could be seen as ideologies of accumulation and control. This analysis is, however, not necessarily true for Marxist scholars within India, where scholars like D.D. Kosambi saw both the ideologies of kinship and caste as hegemonic ideologies which resulted in the adverse incorporation of tribal people into systems of extraction of labour and resources (Kosambi, 1965).

The location of culture and religion in relationships of power was implied in the analysis of Marxist anthropology, but was made more apparent within cultural theory. Culture was identified not in terms of rituals and symbolism, but as a way of life. Thus, Clifford Geertz wrote in the The Interpretation of Cultures that the study of cultures and religions is a two-stage process: “first, an analysis or the system of meanings embodied in the symbols which make up the religion proper, and, second, the relating of these systems to social-structural and psychological processes” (Geertz, 1973, 125). This definition has definite connotations when applied to adivasi societies. First, it implies that symbols are embedded in institutional structures with a certain mentality which informs the world view of adivasis and therefore also informs their politics. Second, this world view also creates cultural boundaries which structure the power structure within the community. Thus, as Bakhtin states, the performance of rituals and practice is in fact a method of the exercise of power. Alternatively, folk cultures represented the culture of protest where hierarchies were violated and social codes transgressed. Hence folk culture can be seen as a potential counter-hegemonic tool to enact opposition to existing communitarian structures (Bakhtin, 1984).

In the context of this discussion, it is now imperative to address the question as to whether the term “adivasi” has the same meaning as the term “tribal” in the Indian context. Several authors and researchers tend to use the term “tribal” and “Adivasi” interchangeably. It is also contended that the term adivasi is more authentic because it is a form of self-expression that expresses a community’s own cultural and ethnic identity. The term “tribal” is considered more pejorative, as it implies a certain incorporation of the tribal elites within the existing political system (Rycroft and Dasgupta, 2011). These perspectives, however, treat non-class communitarian identities as the basic form of social organizations that exist within the political sphere and whose status under different stages of capitalism need not be a significant factor. Therefore, it is not surprising that all identities are treated by class-based movements, as both are dividing and hegemonic and supported by the modern capitalist state (Karat, 2011). But this perspective ignores the counter-hegemonic potential that many forms of self-expression may have acquired through a long historical process. This essay treats adivasi identity as an abstraction; a form of self-expression and representation whose material reality is formed by two concurrent processes. First are the processes of primary accumulation, where the alienation of social groups from their own resources integrates them within the lower end of the capitalist labour processes and strengthens the politics of difference (Prasad, 2010). Such a politics of difference is the result of a continuous process of class formation which determines the social basis and the ideological character of this identity. Therefore, it is not possible to attribute identities, in general, to any one form of class or elite politics. The meaning of “being adivasi” will be determined by the class character of collective or individual agency that seeks to organize these sections as agents of social transformation. In this sense, it is virtually impossible to have a static or an essentialist conception of “adivasi identity” whose form changes with the changing character of capitalist modernity (Prasad, 2004). Second, state-determined hegemonic tribal identities have emerged through the institutionalization of affirmative and protective measures which have become an important feature of bourgeois politics (Prasad, 2016a). Such hegemony has created its own opposition in the form of the politics of “adivasi identity” led by a stratum of educated tribal elite. The adivasi identity politics of this kind is oppositional and non-class in its orientation, has romantic neo-traditional influences and critiques all forms of modernity (Prasad, 2003, 2nd edition 2011; Damodaran, 2011). In this sense, both “tribal” and adivasi represent the generic forms of newly created political communities which re-create their own traditions at particular historical conjunctures. This invention of traditions is a legitimizing factor in the creation of new communitarian and national identities whose articulation will differ according to their social basis (Hobsbawm, 1990).

The question of belief systems has to be foregrounded in the previously mentioned observation because the way in which rituals and traditions are represented is itself intimately related with the material reality and the place of adivasi people in the larger political economy. The projection of folk adivasi culture as a counter to hegemonic capitalist modernity was enacted in a manner that drew cultural boundaries. These boundaries established the principle of hierarchy within the community and established certain customary norms which led to the exclusion of women and others from formal ritual practices within the community. They also reflected the morality and values of the adivasi society as it existed in their own times (Prasad, 2008b).

Customs, rituals and the construction of inequalities

As mentioned earlier, the construction of tradition and custom in adivasi societies is historically constructed and defines the culture of the communities vis-àvis the dominant “other” (Bakhtin, 1984). However, in doing so, it itself acquires a hegemonic character which reproduces the inequalities within the communities. The construction of the rituals closely follows and represents the social structure of the adivasis. Broadly speaking, two types of social structures are identified in contemporary adivasi societies. The first are the patrilineal structures where inheritance and property rights are guided by patriarchal authority, and the exclusion of women and youth is evident in all kinds of ritualistic practices. Though these societies are largely non-idolatrous in character, the rituals performed during marriages and the invocation of gods during agricultural operations reflect the power hierarchy within the community. The second are the adivasi communities that follow matrilineal systems of inheritance. Though kinship and descent is traced through the mother, the husbands and brothers continue to enjoy significant powers. Hence, though these societies are matrilineal they are not matriarchal, where women enjoy real control and power.

Seen in this context, anthropological analysis of adivasi belief systems displays a certain type of romanticism in projecting a morally superior adivasi society. A good example of this is the work of Verrier Elwin who, in his magnum opus, Baiga, where he recorded the creation myths of the Baiga, also known as the high priest of the adivasi society in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. As he records:

The Baigas were established in the practice of bewar by Bhagvan himself, who when he called the tribes of the world to make a king first chose the Baiga. But Nanga Baiga begged that the Gond his brother be made king instead. Bhagvan was pleased, and as a mark of favour, took Nanga Baiga by the hand and placed him on his throne by his side. He granted his prayer to make the Gond King, but gave him a greater blessing.

“All kingdoms of the world” he said “may fall to pieces but, he who is made of the earth and is Bhumiraja, lord of the earth shall never forsake it. You will make your living from the earth. You will dig roots and eat them. You will cut wood and carry it on your shoulders. Your wife will pick leaves and sell them. You must not tear the breast of your Mother the Earth with the plough like the Gond and the Hindu. You will cut down trees and burn them and sow the seeds in their ashes. But never become rich, for if you did you would forsake the earth and there will be no one to guard it and keep its nail in place.”

(Prasad, 2008b, 317)

This creation myth, as told by Elwin, establishes the authority of the Baiga patriarch as the protector and the creator of the world. The only mention of the woman, or the wife of Nanga Baiga, presents her to us as an ordinary gatherer of leaves, rather than one who is an equal partner in the procreation of the tribe or the world. What comes out supremely in the myth of the 1930s is the overpowering presence of the Baiga man as one who bears the burden of the entire world. However, if we trace the history of this myth from the time of the Ain i Akbari, perhaps this was not always so. A version of the creation story reproduced from the medieval text by ethnographers Russell and Hira Lal in The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India (1910) is the following:

In the beginning they say, God created Nanga Baiga and Nanga Baigin, first of the human race, and asked them by what calling they would choose to live. They at once said they would make their living by living in the jungle, and permission being accorded, have done so ever since. They had two sons one of whom remained a Baiga, while the other became a Gond and a tiller of the soil. The sons married their own two sisters … and while the elder couple are the ancestors of the Baigas, from the younger are descended the Gonds and all the remainder of the human race.

(Russell and Hira Lal, 1910, 79)

What is noticeable in the earlier version of the creation myth is the role accorded to both Nanga Baiga and his wife Nanga Baigin as the originators of the human race. Women, in this myth, are considered part of the ancestral heritage of the tribe. Perhaps the explanation for this lies in the way in which the history of bewar progressed in the last three centuries. The seasonal livelihood system of the ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• CONTENTS
• List of figures
• Notes on contributors
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 Ritual and cultural practice among Indian adivasis
• 2 Forests now speak English: the indigenous at odds with the state
• 3 Indigenous peoples and the Great Lakes in North America
• 4 Indigenous art, resilience and climate change: Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand and Samoa
• 5 Indigenous religions of Oceania: Australia, New Zealand and the South Pacific Islands
• 6 Indigeneity, the environment and Africa: some key concepts from the /Xam of southern Africa
• 7 Can there be religions without belief? Religion in Latin America
• 8 Indigenous peoples and the environment: views from Brazil
• Index