Introduction
‘Westernization’ refers to the influence of Western ideas, values, and practices on the non-Western world. ‘Westernization’, according to Özay Mehmet, ‘is reconstructing or shaping the rest of the world on western norms and institutions’.Footnote 1 It is, in many cases, supplanting native culture with Western cultural values and practises. More specifically, the term here refers to colonial and missionary attempts at wholesale assimilation of Nagas between 1832 and 1947. The Naga experience of westernization of their culture is not unique in the world. Rather, all colonized people suffered a similar outcome in their encounter with the West.
For Nagas, the process of westernization began when the British invaded their homeland in 1832.Footnote 2 In 1839, the British colonial administration invited American Baptist missionaries to proselytize the Nagas and other native inhabitants in Northeast India.Footnote 3 This ‘two-pronged attack’,Footnote 4 until decolonization in 1947, served to westernize the Nagas and their culture. Thus, nearly everyone who studies the process of change among the Nagas is likely to draw the conclusion that British colonial rule and the introduction of education and Christianity by American missionaries served to transform significantly ‘the Naga way of life in all aspects’.Footnote 5 In this paper, I will discuss the current mental and cultural states of the Nagas that have resulted from the adjustments in the lives and minds of the people because of forced exposure to the imposition of westernization. In fact, it is more than merely a process of adjustment consequent upon conquest, but an extensive overhauling of cultural institutions, values and practises of the Naga people.
Who are Nagas?
Contemporary Nagas are a transnational indigenous people of about 40 different tribes, numbering approximately three million people and occupying a landlocked mountainous region.Footnote 6 Their homeland is surrounded by India in the southwest, China in the north and Myanmar in the east. Politically Nagas live in a number of colonially segmented regions within India and Myanmar, named ‘Naga Hills’ during the British colonial period. The Nagas in India alone live in four different states: Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur and Nagaland. In Myanmar, they inhabit the provinces of Sagiang and Kachin. With the exception of Nagaland, where they are in the majority, the Naga population in all other states and provinces is a marginalized minority. Successive periods of colonial occupation for nearly two centuries, beginning with British colonization and continuing today under India and Myanmar, have partitioned the Nagas both geographically and politically.
Western colonization and proselytization
For decades after their first invasion in 1832, the British undertook numerous military expeditions into Naga territories, inflicting considerable damage and suffering on the people.Footnote 7 It was common practise in every military expedition for British troops to kill any Nagas who resisted, by attacking villages, setting fire to houses, and forcing survivors to flee into the forest.Footnote 8 The British mission to conquer them caused decades of suffering and loss to the Nagas, and has been termed ‘one of the most violent chapters in the history of British conquest of the sub-continent’.Footnote 9 The British occupied the Naga Hills until 1947 when the Naga homeland was arbitrarily divided and transferred to post-colonial India and Burma (now known as Myanmar).
The first encounter between Western missionaries and the Nagas took place in January 1839, when an American Baptist missionary named Miles Bronson went to the Namsang Nagas in what is now known as Arunachal Pradesh.Footnote 10 However, this mission did not succeed and was terminated two years later. More than 30 years later, in 1871, an Assamese evangelist, named Godhula, was sent to the Ao Nagas by E. W. Clark, who was also an American Baptist missionary stationed in Assam. In March 1872, Clark established a mission station among the Ao Nagas at Molung.Footnote 11 In November 1872, he baptized nine Naga converts at Sibsagar. This is considered the birth of Christianity among the Nagas. Subsequently, missions were started among other Naga tribes. The American missionizing enterprise became significantly truncated with India's independence in 1947. Under the mandate known as the Assam Disturbed Areas Act, 1955, the Indian government summarily expelled the last American missionary, Robert Delano, from Nagaland and imposed restrictions on all foreign citizens seeking to enter the region.Footnote 12 This restriction remains in effect today.Footnote 13
For more than a century, Western colonial and missionary agents sought to ‘civilize’ the ‘savage’ Nagas. When they forced their ‘civilized’ and ‘superior’ culture on the Nagas, especially with regard to religion, law and political administration, the Nagas suddenly found themselves ignorant and powerless against the arbitrarily imposed paradigm. Many of their age-old values and traditions became somewhat outmoded. The Nagas found themselves at the mercy of the colonizers who had the knowledge and skills of a new way of life. While ignorance of the new paradigm disempowered the colonized, the knowledge of it afforded power and authority to the colonizer. In other words, the culture of the West was used to disenfranchise the colonized and maintain power over them.Footnote 14 The pronouncement that Naga traditional myths, sacred stories and ways of knowing were pagan, irrational and primitive caused not only a sense of cultural confusion, but also served to invalidate the cultural values and practises that the people relied upon for guidance and strength in life.Footnote 15
Civilizing mission
It is important to note the perception of the Nagas by Western invaders, because the desire to westernize the Nagas stems from how they were perceived. Albert Memmi calls colonial perception a ‘mythical portrait of the colonized’Footnote 16 and argues that without the colonial portrait ‘the presence and conduct of the colonizer . . . would be shocking’.Footnote 17 The Nagas have been subject to a plethora of colonial stereotypes during the extended period of their colonization. The British and the Americans were a people of their time and were deeply entrenched in the vortex of colonial euphoria. They thought that their own culture represented the pinnacle of cultural progress. Conversely, they relegated all colonized cultures, especially the indigenous or tribal cultures, to the lowest stage of progress.Footnote 18 As such, ‘civilizing the savage’ was a constant part of the mindset and appeared frequently in colonial and missionary literature pertaining to Nagas. One colonial writer described the Nagas as ‘very low in the scale of civilization’ and deserving of careful study.Footnote 19 Another recommended a study of the Naga languages because ‘they represent the characteristics of the earliest pre-historic periods’.Footnote 20 Still another remarked that ‘in actual mental capacity [the Nagas] are rather low’.Footnote 21 Consequently, a main goal of the British administration, as outlined by one officer, was ‘the introduction of civilization and Christianity among a large class of people at present hopelessly buried in barbarism and superstition’.Footnote 22
Henry Balfour, in his presidential address to the British Folklore Society, stated unambiguously that bringing civilization to ‘primitive’ people was not simply a responsibility, but the White person's right as well. He asserted, ‘We all share in the responsibilities arising from our assumption of the right to control the destinies of peoples in a backward state of culture. Our prestige is at stake’.Footnote 23 Balfour had just returned from a three-month visit to the Naga Hills in 1922, and his address was replete with concern for the welfare of the ‘primitive’ Nagas. One concern was ‘rescuing a very interesting people from inclusion in the category of “dwindling populations” and “moribund races”’.Footnote 24 Then he reminded his fellow Society members of their responsibility and challenged them saying, ‘Our conscientious aim is to raise the savage to a higher level . . . by evolution, not by revolution’.Footnote 25
The missionaries were no better in their judgment and derision of Nagas and their culture. This should surprise no one, because Christianity and civilizing the ‘savage’ went hand-in-hand. In fact, civilization was considered a prerequisite for proselytization.Footnote 26 It was believed, as Tink Tinker has rightly noted, that civilizing the ‘barbarous’ natives would prepare them to grasp and embrace Christianity. The Naga Hills was then referred to as ‘the wilds of barbarism’Footnote 27 and the people as ‘those savage wilds’.Footnote 28 Consequently, it was acknowledged, ‘To the natural man these people [Nagas] would be revolting, but in Christ all is changed’.Footnote 29 The missionaries also hoped that ‘the Nagas, once civilized and Christianized, will make a manly, worthy people’.Footnote 30 E. W. Clark, a pioneer American missionary to the Nagas, thought that the Nagas were ‘by far the most pure pagans’, who ‘are sitting in gross darkness . . . and to whom we are under obligations to give it [i.e., the gospel]’.Footnote 31 As it was understood then, ‘civilization was white and Christian and everything else was barbarian’.Footnote 32 Having perceived the Naga Hills as ‘the paradise of the head-hunters’,Footnote 33 where ‘heathenish darkness and ignorance reign supreme’,Footnote 34 the mission to the Nagas began essentially as a strategy for colonial pacification and civilization. This dark and prejudicial perception of the Nagas led to an intense and passionate desire to westernize and ‘civilize’ them.
Now, having provided a glimpse of the ‘cognitive world’ of the Western civilizing agents, I describe below some aspects that have served to westernize the Nagas and shape the course of their life and modern history. I will do so by describing traditional or pre-colonial practises on some aspects of the Naga way of life vis-à-vis Western culture.
Westernization of Naga culture
Richard Clemmer observed that the Hopis were being pulled by ‘two opposite poles: the pursuit of progress and opposition to it’.Footnote 35 Most, if not all non-Western cultures are subject to this debilitating and helpless experience, including the Nagas. The Naga writer Charles Chasie observed, ‘The advent of the [Western colonization], and exposure of the Nagas to the outside world, turned Naga society upside down and ushered in profound changes that would leave indelible scars that could never be erased’.Footnote 36 Although there is a growing awareness among some Nagas of the importance of preserving cultural identity and values, the overwhelming majority remain deeply entrenched in the idea of the pursuit of modernization.Footnote 37
Westernization through education
The introduction of Western education served to transform the non-literate Naga culture. When American missionaries arrived in 1839 with the desire to introduce literacy and Christianity, the Nagas reacted with either indifference or resistance: ‘Who wants religion from a foreigner, and who will alter the customs of their fathers to receive books?’.Footnote 38 This attitude to Western culture gradually shifted as the Nagas realized the social and economic advantages that accompanied literacy and Christianity in the newly emerging Western socio-cultural paradigm. Accordingly, the introduction of education by missionaries was poised to transform permanently the way of life that the Nagas had previously known. Naga scholar Piketo Sema observes that amongst ‘the agencies which brought about a considerable socio-political change . . . were Christianity and education’.Footnote 39
American missionaries were at the forefront with regard to the introduction of Western education. Initially, education meant merely enabling the Nagas to become literate. It had a religious motive—‘to develop literacy in order that the Bible could be read’.Footnote 40 Christianity and education were intentionally intertwined to pursue a set of objectives. For this reason, some scholars have drawn the conclusion that the spread of Christianity resulted in cultural crisis among Nagas.Footnote 41 However, the causes of crisis in culture and identity are numerous and varied, and it would be naïve to suggest it is due to one factor alone. Education and Christianity were two sides of the same coin and served as a conduit through which Nagas were not only Christianized but also westernized. Some Naga elders, such as Talitemjen Jamir and Lanunungsang, have rightly attributed the gradual disappearance of Naga culture to the ‘influence of westernization’, education being a major force.Footnote 42
For the educated Nagas, their attachment to White people through education and employment created alienation from their own community and culture. They tended to consider themselves in a class of their own, with superior knowledge and achievement. Education enabled them to pursue non-traditional means of livelihood, causing disinterest in and detachment from participatory cultural practices such as festivals, rituals, ceremonies and other social activities. Thus, a tendency towards individualism and personal achievement at the expense of alienation from the community and culture, previously unthinkable, became an acceptable norm. Mission schools not only trained students, but also provided non-traditional employment opportunities, thus promoting a culture that increasingly became dependent on money.Footnote 43 This paradigmatic cultural shift introduced monetary culture that paved the way for the inception of the Western culture of materialism and consumerism among contemporary Nagas.
Traditional Naga society had no formal education system as it is being practised in today's westernized Naga society. Education was conducted through oral transmission and learning by experience. It was participatory and practical and took place in the context of the home and larger community. Each person was an integral part of the community.Footnote 44 As such, every Naga was taught to be responsible to the family and village, thereby contributing to the cohesion and harmony of the whole. Priority was given to formation rather than information, that is, formation of character over information of a body of knowledge such as facts and ideas. The purpose of education was to make an individual fit for the societal role expected of him or her and to develop skills and character rather than impart a certain quantity of essentially abstract knowledge. The traditional education was inextricably integrated with the socio-economic, artistic, religious and recreational life of the community.Footnote 45 Thus, contrary to western education, the aim of traditional education was not to generate change or innovation, but to produce conformity to societal norms and practises.
In contrast to traditional education, the modern westernized education system among the Nagas remains largely irrelevant and meaningless. Indeed, it breeds social problems, because it is not only from the West, but also is highly examination-oriented. As Vine Deloria, Jr. argued, ‘modern education places immense reliance on the standardised tests as a measure of the worth and accomplishments of the individual’.Footnote 46 Paulo Freire called this the ‘“banking” concept of education’, a system in which ‘students patiently receive, memorize, and repeat’.Footnote 47 Deloria also contended that the Euro-American system of education amounts to indoctrination because ‘it insists on implanting a particular body of knowledge and a specific view of the world that often does not correspond to the life experiences that people have or might be expected to encounter’.Footnote 48
The current system of westernized education among Nagas lacks cultural relevance to the needs of the learner or their society and does not take into account the applicability of what is being taught and learned. It has miserably failed in meeting the needs of the society. The school curriculum contains very little or no Naga culture and history. In a world that is almost completely shut off from the West by India,Footnote 49 Naga students are taught White middle-class ideals and values relating to economics, law, politics, science, and philosophy, none of which have much practical relevance to a largely agrarian Naga society. They compete to learn and pass examinations on European history, the Renaissance, Western industrialization, the American democratic system, Keynesian economics, free trade, and English literature, to name a few. Education is oriented towards the acquisition of mostly irrelevant factual information with very little thought put to comprehending the meaning or implication of what is being learned or taught. This social and cultural irrelevance means that students often lack the motivation to study. They have difficulty in relating what they learn to their frame of reference and in making it a part of their knowledge or themselves. Below I will discuss some of the lingering impacts of Western education on contemporary Nagas.
First, the westernized education system created visible social polarization and stratification. Colonial education and employment, provided to a select group, created social divisions and asymmetry in structures of power and wealth. Western education also brought bureaucracy and elitism, or an Euro-American class system to a formerly classless society. Today, Naga society is divided into the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’, the educated and illiterate, the employed and unemployed, and the government employees and traditional subsistence cultivators. The illiterate, the poor, the unemployed and the subsistence workers are seen as ‘backward’ and ‘primitive’ village dwellers, who are trapped in tradition. Naga writer Chasie rightly observed, ‘The bureaucrat, and his lifestyle, also became the ‘role-model’ for many. Focus shifted from values to symbols of achievement while money became the measuring yardstick’.Footnote 50 Consequent to this stratification of Naga society, widening socio-economic disparity has emerged rapidly, particularly between the educated employed in urban settlements and the subsistence cultivators in rural villages. This aspect of westernization has brought about an erosion of traditional consciousness such as the practice of communal caring and equitable distribution of resources.
Second, westernized education also caused disruption in the balance of authority, especially with regard to the traditional practice of respecting elders and valuing their leadership role and pragmatic wisdom.Footnote 51 Most British officers and American missionaries were young individuals, keen on exploration and adventure. Although young, they wielded enormous authority in an extremely unequal power relationship in a colonial context. Not surprisingly, they also elevated young literate Nagas to leadership positions. Most, if not all, educated young individuals were also Christians, who believed that they were no longer bound by traditional socio-religious rules.Footnote 52 Because of their newly found privileged position, they shifted their allegiance and loyalty to their Western colonial and/or missionary masters. In this respect, Western education has proved disruptive to the traditional balance of authority by contributing significantly to the disintegration of traditional gerontocracy.Footnote 53 Education, and the shift of the socio-political paradigm, served to nullify the social position and influence of elders. Indeed, this paradigmatic shift rendered the older Nagas redundant in that their wisdom was no longer efficacious. Their status dropped and their contributions were minimized amidst social changes. Consequently, their self-esteem and self-worth also declined.
Third, unemployment among Naga youth is a serious modern malady caused by westernized education. It is a condition unknown to the pre-colonial Nagas.Footnote 54 In pre-colonial society, every Naga was employed, because a good share of their traditional education was devoted to ensuring that each person acquired the knowledge and skills necessary to provide a livelihood. In gaining this education, it made the person feel valuable and meaningful within their social group. No one suffered psychologically from being socially stigmatized as ‘unemployed’. With the inception of Western education, the reality of unemployment and its associated socio-economic and psychological ramifications begin to affect unemployed educated Nagas as well as society in general. For many educated unemployed, education has become an end in itself, i.e., education has become simply a means to acquire a school degree, leading only to frustration, despair and a loss of self-esteem and self-worth.Footnote 55
A colonial administrator in the 1850s observed that ‘the motive which brings the [Naga] boys to the schools is simply the prospect of getting Government employment’, which remains even more so today. He further remarked, ‘The one cry with the higher classes is: “you have given us education under the promise of employment, and unfitted us for an agricultural life, and you do not fulfill your promise.”’Footnote 56 An American missionary made a similar observation in the early 1920s: ‘. . . boys who have been in the Mission School consider themselves above manual labour. They have observed that the missionaries and officials, and the high-caste Assamese, who are teachers in the school and as Government clerks, do not perform manual labour’.Footnote 57 He also observed that some of the boys preferred to ‘care for the missionaries’ ponies’ over the traditional means of livelihood, because they considered the former to be superior to the latter.Footnote 58
The colonizers and missionaries consistently and persistently propagated the idea that the Naga's subsistence living was primitive and so labour-intensive that no civilized person ‘could stand the life for a year’.Footnote 59 Young Nagas were strongly encouraged to submit to the new education system as the only escape from the ‘backward’ life. Those who did were offered paid employment. Subsequently, over the decades the belief that education is the vehicle through which one moves away from the primitive and into the modern has become deeply engrained in the Naga psyche.Footnote 60
This attitude towards education and its associated expectations produced a rate of literacy among the Nagas of 19 per cent in 1960 to 67.11 per cent in 2001, translating into 44,960 educated, unemployed youth in 2006 in the state of Nagaland alone.Footnote 61 Today, there is no private sector to offer employment opportunities. Educated Nagas continue to think of subsistence living as beneath them and do not consider self-employment honourable. Consequently, trade and commerce are almost entirely dominated by non-Naga immigrants, who drain resources away from the Nagas. With only government jobs available, the power of Naga bureaucrats and politicians has become disproportionate. Additionally, widespread nepotism, tribal favouritism and bribery, unknown in pre-colonial society, have become the norm.
The introduction of job specialization through westernized education has also generated unemployment among the Nagas. Because of the irrelevance of the training, many educated Nagas find themselves at a loss after completing their studies. For example, dentistry, veterinary medicine and computer engineering do not bear much relevance to a largely agricultural and rural Naga society where such types of expertise are rarely needed. Even when employed by the state government these sorts of professions end up contributing minimally to society. So, the modern Western idea of professionalizing work has become a factor in contributing to social problems such as unemployment and unnecessary waste of human and monetary resources in acquiring professional training that is contextually irrelevant.
The foundation on which the westernized education system was laid is flawed and has a negative impact on contemporary Nagas because the system did not encourage adapting education to the specific Naga cultural setting. The objective of the Western education was not to strengthen the existing cultural values and practises, but to disrupt and transform the culture and the mindset of the people. Its objective was, and still is, to inculcate White middle-class values, example, adversarial democracy, individual rights, freedom of expression and free trade. Colonial education was not only transplanted, but also was needed for the colonizing of the Nagas. While the missionaries needed literate Naga teachers and preachers to assist them in proselytization, the British needed educated Nagas as agents to enforce colonial rules. Consequently, educated Nagas were not only critical agents in the westernization and modernization of the Nagas but also were the first colonial instruments and native accomplices.
Westernization through Christianity
On first contact, the effort to Christianize the Nagas was a cooperative undertaking by the American and British colonial agents who made ‘a two-pronged attack’ on traditional Naga society.Footnote 62 However, schism began to emerge gradually between the two interest groups. The later British colonial administrators desired to keep Naga culture as pristine as possible, and they saw the effort of American Baptist missionaries to foster conversion as a threat to keeping the Hills as a ‘colonial zoo’ or ‘human museum’.Footnote 63 Unlike the British, American missionaries had the resolute goal of Christianizing the Nagas as fast as they could. Accordingly, besides proselytizing and establishing schools, the missionaries implemented the creation of ‘Christian colonies’ in order to transform the Naga converts as rapidly as possible.Footnote 64 For example, one of the first things Clark, the first American missionary to arrive in the Naga Hills known today as Nagaland, did was to establish Molung-yimsen (New Molung), to where converts were relocated from their old village of Molung.Footnote 65 Little Christian colonies such as these were created out of fear that the converts might relapse into their old ‘demon worship’. So, the new converts were separated with the object of cutting contact with their non-convert families, community and their ‘heathen’ way of life. The objective of the segregation was to fully Christianize Naga converts by inculcating and training them in Western Christian values and lifestyle. The missionaries referred to the mission compounds, as they are called to this day, as the abode of light, progress and civilization as opposed to the abode of darkness, evil and barbarism.Footnote 66 By superimposing their own rules on the converts, missionaries created a microcosm of the Christian West. Even in traditional villages where Christians and non-Christians co-existed, as the demand for schools increased observance of Christian rules by the entire village became a prerequisite for establishing a school.Footnote 67
A. K. Ray argues that the missionaries ‘sought to sweep . . . [Naga culture] away at one stroke, and replace it with something that is entirely foreign’.Footnote 68 Indeed, Christianity has been an important force in westernizing the Nagas. In fact, Christianity is in itself a form of westernization, because modern Christianity has an enormous influence on Western culture. Conversely, it has so much Western culture contained in it. So as it Christianizes, it also westernizes by inculcating Western values and practices. For this reason, Christianity is rightly viewed as a Western religion, although the West inherited it from the ‘Middle East’.
Consequent to the aggressive missionary effort, contemporary Nagas share a westernized Christian culture that mirrors the West. Christianity among Nagas is not a contextualized one. It is a transported or ‘imported’ one in its entirety. For example, instead of singing Naga music and playing Naga musical instruments in church, Naga Christians sing Western hymns and play guitar or synthesizer. Appreciating the ability of Nagas to sing Western hymns that were introduced by missionaries, an American missionary in reporting home wrote, ‘I cannot tell you how it thrills our hearts to hear these heathen voices singing so sweetly the praises of Jesus’.Footnote 69 Because of these westernized practices, Naga traditional songs, dances and musical instruments have long been discarded. Besides, the worship-styles and religious literature are mostly Western. To show the impact of westernization through Christianity, I will point out some contrasts between Naga traditional religious beliefs and Christianity.
As opposed to the Christian concept of a male deity, pre-Christianized Nagas believed in a divine being who was perceived in feminine terms. Among the Rengma Nagas, the word for the deity is Anyiza (mother of humanity). Anyiza is a compound word, where anyi means humanity and za is an archaic form for mother. Likewise, in Angami Naga language, the divine being is referred to as Kepenuopfü (literally, ‘birth spirit’). Not only does the concept imply female (i.e., birth), it is also feminine as pfü is a feminine suffix.Footnote 70 As Angami Naga scholar Visier Sanyü pointed out, ‘[Ukepenuopfü] was a female God, not a goddess. When the missionaries came to our land they made her a male God and used her name to translate Jehovah’.Footnote 71 Today, both terms have been ‘Christianized’ and are being used to refer to the Christian God understood as a male deity. This is an example of how Christianity has revolutionized, colonized and altered the religious mind of contemporary Nagas.
Furthermore, unlike Christian theology, the concept of God was never formulated at length; nor was it a basis for rationalism, argument, division, conflict or war. The concept of the divine was left to the experiences of the individual in the context of communal life and nature. No school or teacher existed from where or whom Nagas learned about the divine being. There was no designated worship place, literature, creed or a religious expert to help delineate the beliefs. The traditional Naga religion was not an account of one person's life and teaching as it is in the case of Christianity. Rather, it was represented by the communal life, wisdom and experience of a group of people over a long period of time. Unlike Christianity, the Naga religion did not have a missionary tendency and did not gain followers by conversion. Rather, it was passed down successive generations through oral narrations, myths, songs, rituals, dances and ceremonies. As such, conversion was understood as a total rejection of one's own community and tradition and was viewed with great seriousness. Conversion caused so much tension and conflict within the family and village as ‘early Naga converts were even disowned and exiled from their village communities’.Footnote 72
Another crucial aspect of westernization is the concept of the ‘secular’ and the ‘sacred’. The concept of ‘separation between religion/church and the state’ is a purely Western concept. For traditional Nagas, the so-called ‘religion’ was not a dogma or a set of established beliefs. Rather, it was a way of life. Life experience in its entirety was religious. Every traditional Naga was a deeply religious being and the thought of oneself as an atheist, agnostic, sceptic, non-believer or non-religious never existed.Footnote 73 In other words, religion permeated all of life. The concept of life as inseparably interwoven as a whole was a dominant unifying force that united the Naga not only to the community, but also to nature around human beings. The compartmentalization of ‘things sacred’ and ‘things secular’ never occurred to a Naga. As such, Western Christianity secularized the once thoroughly religious Naga society by introducing the concept of the secular and the sacred, or the natural and the supernatural. Today, the Nagas, who had no concept of things secular but considered everything sacred or religious, have radically compartmentalized their lives to things secular and things sacred, verging closely on Gnostic dualism.Footnote 74
Additionally, there was no concept resembling heaven or hell in the Naga religion. It was believed that in death a person would be exactly what he or she was in life—live in the same village with the same villagers and family and do the same thing—albeit, in the world of the dead. So at the initial stage of ‘missionization’, the Nagas dreaded the idea of converting to Christianity to get to heaven because of fear that it would mean eternal separation from their ancestors who, in the judgment of missionaries, were in hell. Given a choice, some Nagas chose to go to ‘hell’ and be with their dead relatives and community members. As opposed to this kind of communitarian religious tradition, the concern of the missionary religion was largely individualistic and eschatological. It placed a strong emphasis on personal salvation, even at the expense of physical separation from one's societal members and traditions, not only ‘hereafter’ but also ‘herenow’. Therefore, emphasis on personal salvation directly or indirectly fostered individualism and individual responsibility and eroded the primacy of community hitherto valued among Nagas.
This concept of dichotomy of ‘heaven and hell’, ‘the secular and the sacred’ or ‘the here-and-now and the here-after’ has created in the minds of many Naga Christians the belief that Sundays or religious holidays are ‘holier’ than other days and ‘religious’ works are holier and/or greater than ‘secular’ works. This misconception encourages rampant corruption in what is understood as the ‘secular’ sphere. Then, on a Sunday or in the ‘religious’ sphere the same people who indulged in corrupt and wicked acts seek to assuage their guilt by offering a part of their ill-gotten gains to ‘God’. This compartmentalization also has rendered religion hollow and futile in the transformation of society as the emphasis is placed on personal regeneration and the salvation of the individual soul. The theology of the church, in most part, has remained vertical (i.e., between God and a person) and has little horizontal or social dimension. So in the midst of widespread corruption, unending political violence between Nagas and the Indian government and fratricidal killing associated with the Naga freedom movement, the propensity of Naga Christians to uphold ‘vertical religiosity’ and to overlook ‘horizontal religiosity’Footnote 75 validates Marx's claim that religion is the ‘opiate of the masses’. Thus, the once ‘this-worldly’ religious worldview of the Nagas has become increasingly ‘other-worldly’ and less relevant to ‘this-worldly’ existence.
Westernization through ‘democratization’
‘Democratization’ is used here to refer to the negation of the Naga system of social orderingFootnote 76 and the imposition of a Western form of government or ‘the imported state’.Footnote 77 The introduction of Western institutions of politics and ‘civil’ government rested solely with the British imperial government. The democratizing of the political processes of the Nagas was rigorously enforced in order to subjugate them.Footnote 78 A main and obvious example is the creation of a system of centralized power and control, contradictory to the Naga practice of egalitarianism, which is discussed further below.
Here, it is important to note that the British and American intruders thought that no form of government existed amongst the Nagas. One colonial officer argued, ‘. . . no regular Government can be expected to exist amongst wild uncivilized tribes who are ignorant of the use of letters or the art of writing’.Footnote 79 Similarly, an American missionary to the Nagas also said, ‘. . . the wild men not infrequently come from across the border and beg the English official to take them under his government and protection, for he knows . . . that he cannot govern himself’.Footnote 80 Undoubtedly, a form of government equivalent to the West did not exist. Nonetheless, the Nagas were not without any form of governing system or unable to govern themselves. So the claims above clearly show the fixation of the Western mind and its inability to see beyond the culturally biased view.
Some Western anthropologists have argued that societies have evolved from stateless societies to chieftainship to social classes and sophisticated state societies.Footnote 81 This evolution of a political system was then thought to be a sign of evolution from the depths of savagery to civilized nation-states or ‘civil’ government. One of the reasons for the failure of Westerners to see any form of ‘civil’ government amongst the Nagas is the absence of institutionalized authority, hierarchy and class structure associated with Western civil government and ‘democratic’ politics. In their mind, it was hard to perceive how systematic ordering of social relations could be maintained without the institutions of civil government and politics. The failure to see a Western-style hierarchical structure led to the misconception that no civil government existed amongst Nagas and resulted in the imposition of a Western structure of government to a formerly stateless society. J. P. Mills, who served in the British administration in the Naga Hills between 1916 and 1938, lamented the destruction of the native system of social organization as ‘the great loss of the tribe’ and believed that ‘it is impossible to revive it’. He admittedly noted:
The habit has grown up of rushing to [British] court with complaint, and the courts have lent far too ready an ear. A chief's power is bound to disappear if the aggrieved party can always appeal to an alien law administered by a magistrate who has the best intentions in the world uncombined with knowledge of indigenous custom.Footnote 82
To understand the process of democratization better, I will describe some of the salient features of social ordering practiced in traditional Naga society, with an emphasis on the virtue of egalitarianism vis-à-vis the British system of centralized authority. Although Nagas are often referred to as tribal people, the concept of tribe is a colonial construct. ‘The term “tribe” as coined by the British was an administrative and even political category [which] has come in handy as a lever to exploit “tribal consciousness”.’Footnote 83 The Nagas were villagers and not tribals. Almost every Naga village was an autonomous socio-political entity or ‘village-state’.Footnote 84 Even in a more autocratic system practiced by some Nagas, each village was ‘indigenous and independent’.Footnote 85 So, in the discussion of the ordering of society, it is helpful to think in terms of village governance rather than in the modern sense of a nation-state political institution or government.
On the subject of governance, a Naga writer contends, ‘Democracy in its purest form existed among them. A system so suitable to them [has] lasted through centuries which formed an integral part of their life’.Footnote 86 Three ways of governing the village existed in traditional Naga society. Among a few tribes, a governor or overseer, such as the ang of the Konyak Nagas, could have supremacy over several villages.Footnote 87 Amongst others, such as the Ao Nagas, a group or council members, known as tatar, was chosen by the village to oversee the functioning of the community. The function and authority of tatar, however, was ‘very small’ and limited to their village only.Footnote 88 The most predominant and common form of ordering society, however, could be termed as ‘democracy by consensus’.Footnote 89 This practice reflects the communitarian virtue that was highly valued among the Nagas. However, consensus does not mean that every villager participated and consented in decision-making, which is not feasible in any society. It means a willingness and readiness to set aside differences and cooperate for the sake of the larger whole. For this reason, traditional Naga society was much less contentious and polemic than it is today. Because most Nagas followed this last system of governance, it will be emphasized in the following discussion.
The Naga form of governance was neither a multi-party nor a one-party system. It was a non-party system. Nothing comparable with western partisan politics existed in traditional Naga society. As such, the introduction of westernized partisan politics and electoral or ‘adversarial’ democracy has had disquieting effects and dire consequences on a once consensus-seeking community. In traditional Naga society, there were individuals, mostly men, who led the community and provided guidance and judgment on customary practices when necessary. However, unlike today's politicians or government bureaucrats, no one fulfilled these communal roles as a profession, for a living or for remuneration.Footnote 90 No political institution or government entity existed to which the Nagas were required to pay taxes or look up to for social welfare. The needs of the community members were taken care of by fellow community members, not by an institution. The communal practice of charity and sharing eliminated the need for an impersonal institution to provide welfare services. The establishment of a Western-style government, bureaucracy, electoral or partisan politics has drastically transformed Naga society.
Another aspect of westernization relates to the introduction of a Western-style legal system. As a stateless society, this concept remained almost absent in traditional Naga culture.Footnote 91 Communally accepted rules or customs, not laws, served to guide social behaviours and conducts. For this reason, Western invaders thought of the Nagas as a ‘lawless’ people.Footnote 92 Indeed, the traditional Nagas were ‘minimalists’ as far as repressive law and its enforcement agencies were concerned. The Nagas never had any law enforcement agencies such as Western and westernized societies have, let alone a standing army. No externally repressive law or policing system existed. Consequently, no prison existed. In contrast, one of the first things the British did after gaining supremacy over the Naga Hills was to introduce a British legal and prison system. Under English law, Naga ‘criminals’ were tried and sentenced to prison. Those who in the judgment of the British committed serious crime were unfairly exiled as far away as British prisons in Andaman Islands.Footnote 93 Thus, the proliferation of an external mode of statutory law and its associated policing agencies is an obvious westernization of Naga culture. For traditional Nagas, the custom served as the modality for common behaviour. It enforced internally the regulation of personal and communal moral conduct. In other words, the traditional moral conscience and values served to buttress the moral actions of the people. Rules were hidden below the surface, interwoven in culture, and were implicit in behaviour and deeply engrained in the habit.
Finally, in its effort to subjugate the Nagas effectively, the imperial administration established a centralized system of power and control. The British established their district headquarters and sub-divisional offices in strategic places in the Naga Hills, from where a handful of white personnel exercised control over the Nagas.Footnote 94 The traditional Naga system of social ordering was a people-centred and decentralized form of governance. In the Naga system, the people were sovereign. In contrast, the Crown is supreme or sovereign in the British imperial system. The superimposition of the centralized and hierarchical structure of administration was a strategy aimed at increasing government revenue and political monopoly over the Nagas. This new power paradigm became one of the most potent factors in effectively controlling the Nagas. Until then, most Nagas had never known or experienced a strong and repressive hierarchical and centralized administration. So, this Western paradigm of power pyramid not only affected them in the past, but also is responsible for the modern-day build-up and misuse of power and misappropriation of public funds. Among contemporary Nagas, this westernized system of centralized government lacks check-and-balance mechanisms. As such, the system accumulates unrestrained and excessive power in the hands of a few, who then blatantly disregard the will of the people with impunity.
Besides the establishment of its headquarters and sub-divisional offices, the British administration created two categories of native representatives to enforce the efficacy of the newly created hierarchical imperial system. At the village level, the British created a category called gaonbora (village elder). Gaonboras served the colonial administration in collecting taxes and enforcing imperial law at village level; the second group, known as the dubashi (interpreter),Footnote 95 being a step higher in the rung of the imperial hierarchy. Literally meaning ‘men of two tongues’, the role of the dubashi was to serve as a go-between for colonial officers and village gaonboras, because most of them could not speak Assamese, which was the language of communication. Each dubashi was in charge of several villages. As colonial representatives, both the gaonbora and dubashi were directly accountable and responsible to a white colonial officer in the district or sub-district.
Conclusion
The objective of this paper is not to highlight the ‘form’ or ‘material’ aspect of the culture, such as clothing, although mimicry in clothing is almost faultless among a large section of Nagas. Rather, the goal has been to underscore the westernization of some basic social structures and the mindset of the Naga people. Today, the literal colonization by the imperial West has ended, but the process of the westernization of Nagas and their culture is continuing. Thanks to the ongoing influence being exerted by modern media, technology and other trends in globalization, the process of westernization continues to take place more than half a century after the political decolonization from the West.
Every culture evolves over generations. Likewise, social systems take ages for their evolution. As such, well before there was a United Kingdom or United States of America, Naga culture was thriving. However, when the Euro-American colonizers, ethnographers and missionaries came into contact with the Naga culture they had no appreciation for it. Accordingly, they stereotyped and ‘primitivized’ the Nagas and their culture and were determined to impose upon them Western values. Tampering with long-established and deeply rooted customs was apt to be dangerous and was traumatic for the Nagas. One British visitor to the Naga Hills warned that ‘as with arsenic, an overdose of civilization is likely to have disastrous effect’.Footnote 96 And disastrous it has been for the Nagas.
The rapid imposition of a foreign cultural system, that has taken generations to evolve, to an entirely different people group in a completely different cultural and geographical setting within a short span of time, has been destructive and disorientating, to say the least. With reference to Naga society in the aftermath of Western invasion, Chasie observed that Naga society has been frequently overtaken by the current of modernizing events, presenting them with no opportunity for an informed process of choice for change. He contends ‘that changes have come too suddenly and too fast, without opportunity to digest and assimilate them’.Footnote 97 He also noted that ‘as a result of these sudden changes and difficulties in coping with them, the Nagas emerged from the colonial period confused and unsure of themselves—only to find themselves engulfed in another violent conflict with the new Government of India’.Footnote 98
In the absence of a traditional system of social structures, the colonial paradigm left behind by the imperial agents continues to serve the colonization of Nagas as they continually depend on the West for Western knowledge and technology for the organization and ‘civilization’ of their society. The supplanting of the long evolved Naga cultural systems with Western cultural values and practices and the consequent penchant for mimicking the West have misplaced Naga society to a place where Nagas are competent in neither traditional skills nor in Western knowledge for the ordering of their life. Consequently, the contemporary Nagas lack in what Piotr Sztompka calls ‘civilizational competence’, which he defines as ‘a complex set of rules, norms and values, habits and reflexes, codes and matrixes, blueprints and templates’ required ‘for participation in modern civilization’. Thus, they are left with ‘civilizational incompetence’.Footnote 99
Analogous to a piece of fabric, Naga society has been in tatters because of the onslaught of westernization. Since the inception of Western colonial and missionary conquests, the threads of their cultural fabric have been pulled out one after another, which has come to greatly weaken the society. As a result, vices that were once foreign have taken deep roots. On the other hand, traditional virtues that underpinned the society and kept it functioning for ages have been disappearing, resulting in social dysfunction and disintegration. The traditional practises of Nagas who, over countless generations had evolved a pattern of life, well adapted to their social needs and to the landscape in which they live, are in the process of gradual abandonment for want of ‘progress’. Therefore, the need of the hour for Nagas is to identify and reclaim the bedrock principles rooted in their traditional culture, and to practise them rather than pursuing the Euro-American ideas and models they have come to adopt gradually. Obviously, no culture can remain entirely isolated; however, a blanket adoption of any alien way of life is unwise and bound to be flawed.
When revived, their moribund traditional bedrock principles and practices will work better for them, because Naga traditions provide sophisticated, coherent and practicable resources in worldviews, institutions and human-nature relatedness. These long-evolved traditional values, which are time-tested and developed for optimum benefit and advantage for Nagas in their particular location of existence, can help to serve as an alternative to an alien lifestyle and patterns of life of which they have but obscure and scant knowledge. The traditional art and knowledge of how to negotiate with terrain, trees, vegetations, water, insects and animals for a long lasting sustainable and harmonious existence are paramount for the Nagas in their geo-specific location. These established cultural and geographical specific ways of living with the land that has preserved the Nagas for time immemorial as opposed to an environmentally unsustainable way of modern life is crucial for the Nagas in their rugged and ecologically fragile land. Moreover, a wholesale adoption of Western patterns or structures for social ordering would ensure their own subjugation and subordination as they depend on the West for technology and the ‘know-how’ knowledge for their day-to-day existence.
