Indigenous question: search for an identity
- New Delhi Indian Social Institute 1993
- 204p.
Midway through the International Year of the Indigenous Peoples, we present this collection of essays as a contribution to the discussion that is going on in India as well as in other countries, on the identity of the original inhabitants. In India they are called adivasis but are denied the indigenous status. In several other countries of Asia they are not accorded any such status. In the American continent they are legally accorded a special status but efforts are made to get around these clauses and integrate them in the dominant mainstream as marginal to it. In this context, the tribals in India and the Native peoples elsewhere are searching for a new identity. The attack on their identity is very much linked to control over the natural resources in which the regions they inhabit, abound. Their search too, while being political and cultural, is linked to control over the same resources and self-determination in their economic, socio-cultural and political life. This book brings out various aspects of the same issue and continues the debate on the question that is crucial to the survival of the indigenous peoples all over the world.