Eying Humtsoe
The Nagas have long claimed community living as an essential characteristic of their life and existence, so much so that it literally verges on pompousness at times...
Perhaps it was a truthful assertion in an erstwhile 'pristine' era, prior to the onslaught of modernity. But how accurate is this claim today?
The lure of modernity towards progress has seduced the Nagas to an extent that, in the process, significant elements that define a "community" have been compromised, possibly unbeknownst to the victims. In its original state, a Naga community was a nexus of active relations between persons, families and clans within a locale, specifically a village. In other words, the community was extensive in nature in that each member of the village was a significant part of the whole by virtue of belonging to a family that bonded with other families to form a clan. It was constituted and maintained by mutual assistance for common welfare (discrimination against individuals on superstitious grounds is another issue).
Modernity per se cannot be decried, because Nagas too have had a modest share of benefits from it. But there are some undesirable elements that have gripped the Nagas and undoubtedly affected much of what defines and identifies a "community". In short, the switch from a community way of life to individualism, in its various forms, has minimized the significance of the community itself. Consequently, the different parts (persons, families, clans) in the whole (village/community) have become thinner, and the strength of the community has grown weaker. The ultimate outcome is a disintegrating community.
It is not uncommon to notice some people preferring to shut themselves inside an exclusive world of their bedrooms, surrounded by modern electronic gadgets, which lets technology become a way of life instead of a useful tool. In such cases, interpersonal relationships, face-to-face conversations, and social gatherings are made to appear like activities of not just tech un-savvy beings but also of those who cannot persuade their poorer folks to make their children "fit in" to a techno-crazy cluster. Regardless of the economic conditions, more people are isolating themselves behind whatever electronic objects they may possess: telly, music and video players, cell phones etc.
Most families too are increasingly adopting reclusive life-styles. Prosperity seems to play a role in this. It is hard to tell whether it is for security purpose, but it is easy to tell that the higher the economic status, the higher the walls around the dwelling places! The ever-locked iron gates do not even offer a glimpse of the world behind those walls. The only visible sign of life inside may be the rooftops. This automatically shuts off possibilities of free access with those outside of the imposing walls and gates and vice-versa. It practically makes it harder for inter-family connections or neighborly interactions. Thus, economic-divide becomes more obvious, and sustained.
Also, there is the unprecedented phenomenon of substituting the name of the family's patriarch or the matriarch, in rare instances, for the clan's name. This breaks up whole clans into fragments of families that begin to form new identities and micro clans of their own. The increase of this practice could lead to the decline of the guardianship role of the traditional clan system. Imagine a scenario where each family came up with their own family name, and the trend continued for generations, until families in every generation would take on a different surname. At the end, the existing clans within a tribe, which have served to bond several families into a common family from time immemorial, while also preventing inbreeding through a system of inter-clan marriages, may sadly become a thing of the past. Then, the intra-clan familial feeling, evoked by a shared/common identity among generations of countless families, may slip away into obscurity, as would the extension of family feelings to the larger community through the time-honored practice of inter-clan marriages.
Modernity with its multiple offers of urbanization, convenient amenities, monetary wealth, formal education etc, need not necessarily destroy the valuable tapestry in the fabric of a community. In fact, it can be turned into opportunities for weaving relationships beyond the immediate family, clan, village, tribe or even ethnicity. But indulging in isolated lifestyles and breaking the traditional bonds into even smaller components will only contribute to the disintegrating of the community, instead of supplementing the need of inclusiveness and expansive relations.
The "I-Thou" relationship of Martin Buber (1958), and the "I-need-You" mutuality of John Macmurray (1961), and the Naga ancestral notion of "We" remain foundational principles of establishing and preserving a genuine community. Buber's and Macmurray's reasoning that the 'Other' ("Thou/You") completes the 'Self' ("I") is compatible with the ancestral Naga community setting, in which the unity of persons took precedence over individuality.
To deliberately walk away from the "Other" is to be ensnared by the deceptive charm of modernity that does not let the exclusive "I" go free that easily.
The writer is a Kuknalim.com Columnist
