Contributed seminar papers.

C. Lalkima, b. 1942, former Professor, Dept. of Public Administration, Mizoram University; contributed articles.

The book is a study of the travels of colonial law into the North-East frontier of the British Empire in India. Focusing on the nineteenth century, it examines the relationship of law and space, and indigenous place-making. Inhabitants of the frontier hills examined in this book were not defined as British subjects, yet they were incorporated within the colonial legal framework. The work examines the nature of this legal limbo that produced both the hills and their inhabitants as interruptions but equally as integral to the imperial project. Through a study of place-making by indigenous inhabitants of the frontier, it further demonstrates the heterogeneous narratives of self and belonging found in sites of orality and kinship that shape the hills in the present day.

Study on Christianity in Northeastern India in the works of Frederick Sheldon Downs, b. 1932, American Baptist missionary.

Chingboi Guite Phaipi examines how biblical texts reinforced female subjugation in Northeast Indian tribal societies after tribes had accepted Christianity in the early 20th century. Phaipi shows how most tribal groups reinforced women's subordinate status by invoking newly authoritative biblical texts such as the creation stories in Genesis 1, 2 and 3. Phaipi studies the creation stories in Genesis to offer broader readings for Christian tribal communities that are communal, traditional, and struggling to retain their women and girls, particularly those who are educated. This volume recognizes and respects tradition, traditional communities, and the enduring witness of faithful lives in tribal communities at the same time as offering ways forward with respect to unworthy cultural practices and preferences that have been legitimised by the Bible. This book offers a contextually sensitive and scholarly reading of the Bible, with particular attention to the ways patriarchal norms in biblical narratives are perpetuated, rather than considered and reformed.

INDEX UNIT 1 GENERALISATION UNIT 2 CAUSATION UNIT 3 OBJECTIVITY AND INTERPRETATION UNIT 4 HISTORY, IDEOLOGY AND SOCIETY UNIT 5 GRECO-ROMAN TRADITIONS UNIT 6 TRADITIONAL CHINESE HISTORIOGRAPHY UNIT 7 HISTORIOGRAPHICAL TRADITIONS IN EARLY INDIA UNIT 8 MEDIEVAL HISTORIOGRAPHY – WESTERN UNIT 9 MEDIEVAL HISTORIOGRAPHY — ARABIC AND PERSIAN UNIT 10 MEDIEVAL HISTORIOGRAPHY: INDO-PERSIAN UNIT 11 LOCAL HISTORY UNIT 12 POSITIVIST TRADITION UNIT 13 CLASSICAL MARXIST TRADITION UNIT 14 THE ANNALES SCHOOL UNIT 15 RECENT MARXIST APPROACHES UNIT 16 POSTMODERNIST INTERVENTION UNIT 17 GENDER IN HISTORY UNIT 18 RACE IN HISTORY UNIT 19 COLONIAL HISTORIOGRAPHY UNIT 20 NATIONALIST APPROACH UNIT 21 COMMUNALIST TRENDS UNIT 22 MARXIST APPROACH UNIT 23 THE CAMBRIDGE SCHOOL UNIT 24 HISTORY FROM BELOW UNIT 25 SUBALTERN STUDIES UNIT 26 ECONOMIC HISTORY UNIT 27 PEASANTRY AND WORKING CLASSES UNIT 28 CASTE, TRIBE AND GENDER UNIT 29 RELIGION AND CULTURE UNIT 30 ENVIRONMENT, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Tribal societies in India observe a diverse set of religious practices which are a quintessential part of their community life. This handbook explores rituals, beliefs, ceremonies and festivals, liturgy, knowledge and traditions that tribal people practice today and traces the history of their interaction with other religions, communities and cultures. The book provides analytical, intellectual, and cultural insights into the religious tradition of tribes within the interactive space of a pan-Indian civilisation. It examines contemporary religious practice within tribes while also exploring changes either brought on by interactions or political interventions. The volume reflects on the intersections of cultural or political life of communities and their religious worldviews. The book also discusses the processes of assimilation or adoption of different religion or religious traditions by tribes and the challenges of detribalisation and shrinking populations of vulnerable groups. It explores both established and emerging dynamics in the field of tribe and religion and provides a look into the unique systems of kinship, worship and life within many different tribal communities in India. This and its companion handbook, The Routledge Handbook of Tribe and Religions in India: Contemporary Readings on Spirituality, Belief and Identity, provide a comprehensive look into the religious life and practices of a very diverse group of tribes in India. It will be of interest to academics and researchers working in the fields of religion, anthropology, indigenous and tribal studies, social and cultural anthropology, sociology of culture, sociology of religion, development studies, history, political science, folkloristic, and colonialism.

The advent of colonialism and its associated developments has been characterized as one of the most defining moments in the history of South Asia. The arrival of Christian missionaries has not only been coeval to colonial rule, but also associated with development in the region. Their encounter, critique, endeavour and intervention have been very critical in shaping South Asian society and culture, even where they did not succeed in converting people. Yet, there is precious little space spared for studying the role and impact of missionary enterprises than the space allotted to colonialism. Isolated individual efforts have focused on Bengal, Madras, Punjab and much remains to be addressed in the context of the unique region of the North East India. In North East India, for example, by the time the British left, a majority of the tribals had abandoned their own faith and adopted Christianity. It was a socio-cultural revolution. Yet, this aspect has remained outside the scope of history books. Whatever reading material is available is pro-Christian, mainly because they are either sponsored by the church authorities or written by ecclesiastical scholars. Very little secular research was conducted for the hundred years of missionary endeavour in the region. The interpretations, which have emerged out of the little material available, are largely simplistic and devoid of nuances. This book is an effort to decenter such explanations by providing an informed historical and cultural appreciation of the role and contribution of missionary endeavors in British India.