How does ‘sovereignty’ play out in the Naga areas – on the borders of India and Myanmar – with their rich stories connected to land, and their struggles to survive? How can we think about notions of sovereignty beyond nation-state boundaries, territorial independence, common language, culture, and religion; instead look at the productive ways in which people orient their lives, and politics, across time and space? What are the different ways in which academics and journalists use the languages of human rights, sovereignty, indigeneity or religion?
In this episode, Dr Arkotong Longkumer, Senior Lecturer/Programme Director of Religious Studies at the University of Edinburgh, and PhD research fellow in Religious Studies, Aheli Moitra, at UiT-The Arctic University of Norway, talk about their work in the Naga lands - with Christianity, the role of prophecies, with a newspaper, movements for the recognition of Naga rights and participating in international networks, among other things.
For more on this topic, read Longkumer's chapter Indigenous Futures: The practice of sovereignty in Nagaland and other places (Routledge 2020) (Open Access).
Also check out Longkumer's new book The Greater India Experiment: Hindutva and the Northeast (South Asia in Motion) (Stanford University Press 2021).
This podcast is brought to you by INREL and GOVMAT from the Department of Archaeology, History, Religious Studies and Theology at UiT The Arctic University of Norway.
Recording studio and technical support: UiT Result.
Musical intro and outro: Lasse Michelsen.
Host, editor and logo designer: Liudmila Nikanorova.