TheMalapantiram hereafteranglicizedas the Hill Pandaram are a Scheduled Tribe of the state of Kerala in south India and inhabit the forested hills of the Western Ghats between Lake Periy
Trang 1Greece, whose devotees alsodressed inwomen'sclothingand sometimescastrated themselves
ETHNONYM: Eunuch
Orientation
Identification Hijrasare asocialgroup, partreligiouscult
andpart caste,who livemainlyin north India.Theyare
cul-turallydefined eitheras"neithermen norwomen"or as men
who becomewomenby adoptingwomen's dressand
behav-ior. Hijrasaredevotees of BuhucharaMata, a version of the
Indianmothergoddess Throughtheir identificationwith the
goddess, ratified byanemasculationritual, hijrasarebelieved
tobe vehiclesof thegoddess'spower.Although culturally
de-finedascelibate, hijrasdoengage inwidespreadprostitution
inwhichtheirsexual-erotic roleis as womenwithmen Their
traditionalwayofearning alivingisby collecting alms,
receiv-ing paymentsforblessingnewbornmales, andserving atthe
templeof theirgoddess Hijrasaregenerallycalledeunuchs,
and sexual impotence iscentralto the definitionofahijra
anda major criterion forinitiation into the group.
Location Most hijras live in the cities of north India,
where they havemore opportunities to engage intheir
tradi-tionaloccupations. Hijrasarealso foundinruralareas inthe
north,aswellas cities insouthIndia wheretheyworkmainly
as prostitutes.
Demography Thecensusof India doesnotlisthijras
sep-arately; they are usuallycounted as men,but upon request
theymaybe countedas women. It isthusimpossible to say
withcertaintyhowmanyhijrasthereare inIndia Largecities
likeBombayorDelhimayhave 5,000hijras livingin twenty
orthirty localities; the nationalestimate maybe as high as
50,000
LinguisticAffiliation Hijrasspeak the languageofthe
re-gionsof Indiainwhichtheywereborn and livedbefore
join-ing thecommunity. Thereis no separatehijra language,
al-thoughthereis afeminizedintonationanduseofslang that
characterizes their talk.Hijras comefromalloverIndia and
those from southIndia whomove tothe north learnHindias
well asthe regional languages
History and Cultural Relations
The history and cultural relations of the hijras are rooted
bothin ancientHinduism,whereeunuchsarementionedin a
varietyoftexts,including theepicMahabharata, andinIslam,
where eunuchs servedintheharems of the Mogul rulers The
ritual participation ofhijras in life-cycle ceremonies has a
clearlyHinduorigin,though theymayperformforMuslimsas
well.Many aspectsof hijra socialorganization aretaken from
Islam, and many of the most important hijra leaders have
been andareMuslim However,hijras differ from traditional
Muslim eunuchs, who didnotdressas womenandwere
sexu-allyinactive Nor wereMuslimcourteunuchs endowed with
thepowers tobless andto cursethathijras derive from their
ambiguous sexuality and connectionwith the mother
god-dess Intheeighteenth and nineteenthcenturies Hindu and
Muslim hijras did not live together, but in contemporary
India they often do Another historical connection of the
hijras appears tobe with the Magna Matacults in ancient
Economy
Likeevery caste inIndia,hijrasareprimarilyassociatedwitha
few traditionaloccupations,foremostamongthembeing
ritua-lized performancesatchildbirthandmarriage.Thehijras' per-formance consistsofdancingandsinging,accompanied bya two-sideddrum, and theblessingofthe childorthe married
coupleinthenameof the mothergoddess.Inreturnforthese
blessings the hijrasreceivebadhai,traditionalgiftsincash and
goods, always includingsome sweets,cloth, andgrains. Hijras alsobeginthestreetsfor alms frompassersbyand fromshops; theseactivities areregulatedon adailyrotational basisbythe
elders ofthehijracommunity.Althoughprostitution is
consid-ereddeviant withinthehijracommunity, as it is inIndia gener-ally,manyhijrasearn alivingfromit.Prostitutioniscarriedout
within a hijra household, under the supervision ofa house manager or "madam," who will collect part or all of the
prostitute'searnings in returnforshelter, food, asmall
allow-ance,andprotectionfrom the policeandrowdycustomers.
Al-though many young hijra prostitutes feel that they are
ex-ploited by their "madams," few live orwork on their own.
Becauseof theirhistorical roleasperformers, hijrassometimes
dance in nonritual roles, such as at stag parties, for college functions, or infilms.Asmall number of hijras alsoservethe
goddess Bahuchara athermajor temple in Gujarat, blessing
visitors tothetempleandtellingthemthe storiesof the god-dessinexchange forafewcoins Hijras canalso be foundas
householdservantsand cooks, andin some cities inIndiathey
runpublicbathhouses Hijras complainthatin contemporary
India their opportunity to earn a living by the respectable meansofperformingat marriagesand births has declined, due
tosmaller families, less elaborate life-cycle ceremonies, and a
general decline inthe respectfor traditional ritualspecialists
Hijrashave effectivelymaintainedeconomicpredominance, if
nottotal monopoly,overtheirritualrole Defined by the larger society asemasculatedmen,they haveclearlyseenthatit is in
theirinterest to preservethis definition of their role They do
this by making loud and public gestures to denounce the
"frauds" and "fakes"whoimitatethem.They thus reinforcein
the public mind theirownsole righttotheir traditional
occu-pations.When hijras findother femaleimpersonators
attempt-ing toperform whereit istheir righttodoso,they chase them
away, usingphysicalforce ifnecessary Hijraclaimstoexclusive
entitlementtoperform atlife-cycle rituals, tocollect alms in certain territories, andeven to own land communally receive historicalsupport inthe edicts ofsomeIndianstatesthat
offi-cially granted themthese rights
Hijrashave also been successfulincontrolling their
audi-ences intheirown economic interest Hijrasidentify with re-nouncers (sannyasis) and, like them, hijras have abandoned their family andcasteidentitiesinorderto jointheir religious community. Like sannyasis, then, hijras transcendnetworks
of social obligation Theyoccupythe lowest end of the Indian social hierarchy and, having no ordinary social position to
maintainwithin that hierarchy, hijras are freed from the
re-straints of ordinary behavior They know that their
shame-lessnessmakesordinarypeople reluctanttoprovoke themor
to resisttheir demands for money and hence they tradeon
the fear andanxietypeople have about themto
96 Hijra
Hijra
Trang 2.-Hijra 97
pliance Aculturally widespreadbeliefinIndiais thathijras
havethe powerto cursepeoplewithsterilityand badfortune,
most dramatically by lifting their skirts and exposing their
mutilatedgenitals The fearand anxiety this beliefprovokes
are sufficient to compelmost peopleto givein totheir
de-mandsor at leastto negotiate with them
Kinship and Social Organization
Kinship andDescent The majorprincipleof social
organi-zationamongthe hijrasisthe relation between gurus
(teach-ers) and their chelas (disciples).Thisrelationshipismodeled
bothonthe Hindu jointfamilyandontherelationshipof
spir-itual leader anddiscipleinHinduism The guruor senior
per-son intherelationshipisalternatelyconceived ofas afather,a
mother,or ahusband,while the chelaisregardedas a
depen-dent The guru, likean elderin afamily, isexpectedtotake
careofthe chela's material needs and the chelaisexpectedto
show respectand obediencetothe guru and give theguru'her"
earnings Through the relationship of guru and chela, the
chelas ofaguruarelikesisters.Everyhijrajoinsthe community
under thesponsorshipofaguru, whoisideallyher gurufor life
Hijras expresstheviewthatahijracouldno morelive without
aguru thananordinaryperson could live withoutamother
Gurusalsoprovidethe umbrella under whichhijrasearn a
liv-ing, as economic territories amonghijrasall comeunder the
control ofaparticularguru and areoff-limitstothe chelas of
any otherguruwithout explicit permission.Changinggurus,
whichinvolvesasmall ritual andanescalating fee,ispossible,
thoughfrowned upon.Inadditiontotheguru-chela
relation-ship,thereareother fictivekinshiprelations of which the guru
isthecenter aguru's'sisters"arecalled aunt, andguru'sguru
is called "grandmother" (mother's mother) A guru passes
down herwealthand possessionsto one or moreofherchelas,
usuallytheseniorchela Gurus and chelasbelongtothesame
"house," a nonlocalized symbolic descent group similar toa
clan Thehijracommunityisdividedintoapproximatelyseven
of these namedhouses (withsome variationaccordingto
re-gion) The heads of these houseswithin a particularcityor
geographical region form a council ofelders, orjamat This
group makes important decisions for the community,is
pres-ent at theinitiation ofnew members, and resolves whatever
disputes arise within the community Hijra houses are not
ranked and thereare nomeaningfulculturalorsocial
distinc-tionsamongthem,but each house hasits ownorigin story and
certainrules of behaviorspecialtoitself Whenahijra dies,it is
the members of her house who arrange the funeral.Inaddition
totheregionalgroupings ofhijrasthereisalsoaloose national
organization, which mainly meets on the anniversary ofthe
death ofan importanthijraguru
Domestic Unit Themostrelevant groupindailylifeisthe
hijrahousehold.Thesearecommunally organized,andusually
containfivetofifteenpeople,under thedirection ofaguruor
house manager Hijrahouseholdsarestructured arounda core
ofrelatively permanent members, plusvisitors or short-term
guests, oftenhijras from another city, who stay for variable
pe-riodsoftime.Everyhijrainthe householdmustcontributeto
its economicwell-being by working andin return isgiven the
basicnecessitiesof life andperhapsafew luxuries Olderhijras
who are no longerable or donot wish towork outside the
house dodomestic chores Members ofahousehold may have
different gurus andbelongtodifferent houses
Social Control Thehijra community hasdeveloped
effec-tive mechanisms of social controlover itsmembers, mainly throughthenearmonopoly hijraelders haveoverthe
oppor-tunitiesforwork Whenahijrajoins the community,she pays
a"fee" which gives her therightto earn alivinginthe particu-lar territory"owned"byher guru Anyhijrawhoisthrownout
ofthe communitybyher guru forfeits herrighttoworkaspart
of the group Since allhijra performancesarearranged by a guru,ahijrawithoutaguruwillnotbe invitedtoperform,nor
canshebeg for almsinanyplace already assignedtoanother hijra group.Ahijrasuspendedfrom the community may
at-tempttoform herownwork group, but thisisdifficultasit
re-quires finding an area not claimed byanother hijragroup Hijrasuseboth verbal andphysicalabusetoprotect their ter-ritoriesand suspension severely inhibits one'sability to earn Normally, suspension is the result only of severemisbehavior, such asattacking one's guru For lesser offenses hijras may be warned, fined, orhave their hair cutby the jamat The most importantnorm in ahijra householdishonesty with respect
toproperty.With so muchgeographic mobility among hijras
it isnecessarythat individuals betrustworthy Quarreling and
dishonestyaredisruptive to a household and ultimately to its economic success Furthermore, as ritual performers, hijras sometimes enter the houses of their audiences; therefore, maintaining a reputation forhonesty is necessaryfor their profession Because the hijra household is both an economic and a domestic group, pressures to conform are great Serious conflicts are inhibitedby the geographical mobility permitted within the community Anyhijra who cannot get along in one household can move to another for a while; a person who gets
a reputation for quarrelsomeness, however, will be unwel-come atanyhijra house The national network of hijras can work as a blacklist as well as an outlet for diffusing the disrup-tive effects ofconflict
Religion and Expressive Culture
Religious Beliefs The power of the hijras as a sexually am-biguous category can only be understood in the religious con-textof Hinduism In Hindu mythology, ritual, and art, the power of the combined man/woman, or androgyne, is a fre-quentand significant theme Bahuchara Mata, the main ob-ject of hijra veneration, is specifically associated with trans-vestism and transgenderism All hijra households contain a shrine to the goddess that is used in daily prayer Hijras also identify with Shiva, a central, sexually ambivalent figure in Hinduism, who combines in himself, as do the hijras, both eroticism and asceticism One of the most popular forms of Shiva is Ardhanarisvara, or half-man/half-woman, which rep-resentsShiva united with his shakti (female creative power) The hijras identify with this form of Shiva and often worship
at Shiva temples The religious meaning of the hijra role is ex-pressed in stories linking hijras with the major figures of the Hindu Great Tradition, such as Arjuna (who lives for a year
as a eunuch in the epic, the Mahabharata), Shiva, Buhuchara Mata (the mother goddess), and Krishna, all of whom are as-sociated with sexual ambivalence
Ceremonies The central ceremony of hijra life-and the one that defines them as a group-is the emasculation opera-tion in which all or part of the male genitals are removed This operation is viewed as a rebirth; the new hijra created by
it is called a nirvan For the hijras, emasculation completes
Trang 398 Hijra
the transformation from impotent male to potent hijra
Emasculation links thehijrastoboth Shiva and the mother
goddessandsanctionstheirperformances atbirthsand
wed-dings,inwhichtheyareregardedasvehicles of thegoddess's
creativepower.Bahuchara has aspecialconnectionwith the
hijrasasemasculated, impotent men.Hijrasbelieve thatany
impotentmanwhoresists acall fromthegoddessto
emascu-late himselfwill be born impotent for seven future births
Emasculationincreases the identification of thehijraswith
theirgoddess,and it is in her name that theoperationis
rit-ually performed.Ahijra,calleda"midwife," performsthe
op-erationafter receivingsanctionfrom thegoddess.The ritual
of the surgery and many of the postoperativerestrictions
in-volving specialdiet and seclusion imitate those ofa woman
who has just given birth.Atthe end of theforty-dayisolation
period, thenirvan isdressedas abride,istakeninprocession
to abody ofwaterandsubsequentlyto aritualinvolving
fer-tility symbolismrelatingtomarriage andchildbirth,becomes
ahijra,and is then invested with thepowerofthegoddess.In
thehijra emasculation ritual, wehave a culmination ofthe
paradoxes and contradictions characteristicofHinduism:
im-potent, emasculated man, transformedby female generative
powerintocreativeascetics, becomes abletobless otherswith
fertility and fortune
Art andPerformance Hijras areperformers atpointsin
the lifecycle relatedtoreproduction, and thus much of their
expressive cultureemploys fertility symbolism Hijra
perfor-mances areburlesques offemale behavior Much of the
com-edy of their performances derives from the incongruities
be-tweentheirbehavior and that ofordinarywomen, restrained
by norms ofpropriety Hijrasuse coarsespeechandgestures
and make sexualinnuendos, teasing the male children
pres-entand alsomaking fun ofvariousfamily membersand
fam-ilyrelationships There are some songs and comedic routines
that are a traditional part of hijraperformances, most notably
oneinwhichahijra acts as apregnantwomancommenting
on the difficultiesateach state ofthe pregnancy In all the
performances blessing the newborn male, thehijras inspect
the infant'sgenitals It isbelieved that any child born a
her-maphrodite will be claimedbythe hijras for their own In
ad-dition to traad-ditional elements hijra performances also include
popular songs and dances fromcurrentfavoritefilms
Bibliography Bradford, NicholasJ. (1983) "Transgenderism and the Cult
of Yellamma: Heat, Sex, andSickness in South Indian
Rit-ual."Journal ofAnthropological Research 39:307-322
Freeman, James M (1979) "Transvestites and Prostitutes,
1969-72." In Untouchable:AnIndian Life History Stanford:
Stanford University Press
Nanda, Serena (1990) Neither Man nor Woman: The Hijras
of India Belmont, Calif.: WadsworthPublishers
O'Flaherty, Wendy Doniger (1980) Women, Androgynes,
and Other Mythical Beasts Chicago: University of Chicago
Press
SERENA NANDA
Hill Pandaram
ETHNONYMS:Malai Pandaram, Malapa&tiram
Orientation Identification TheMalapantiram (hereafteranglicizedas
the Hill Pandaram) are a Scheduled Tribe of the state of Kerala in south India and inhabit the forested hills of the Western Ghats between Lake Periyar and the town of
Ten-mali, about9°N.Although they share thename"Pandaram"
with a caste communityof Tamil Nadu, there appeartobe no
links between thetwocommunities Mala (mountain) refers
to their long association with the hill forests, the Western
Ghats, which form the backbone of peninsular India and rangefrom 600 to 2,400 meters Anomadicforaging commu-nity,the Hill Pandaramlooselyidentify themselveswith the
forest and refer to all outsiders, whether local caste
communi-ties orforestlaborers, asnattuharan (country people) Location Centeredon the Pandalam Hills, the Hill
Pan-daramprimarily occupy the forest ranges of Ranni, Koni, and Achencoil TheGhats are subject to two monsoon seasons; the southwest monsoon, falling between June and August, beingresponsible for the bulk of the rain Rainfall is variable, averaging between 125 and 200centimetersannually, precip-itation being high at higher elevations around Sabarimala and Devarmala The forest type ranges from tropical ever-green to moistdeciduous The foothills of the Ghats and the valleys ofthe major river systems-Achencoil, Pamba, and Azbutta-are cultivated andheavily populated by caste com-munities who moved into theGhats during the past century Demography A small community, the Hill Pandaram numbered 1,569 individuals in 1971, and had a population density of 1 to 2 persons persquare kilometer
Linguistic Affiliation Living inthe hills that separate the states of Kerala andTamil Nadu, the Hill Pandaram also lie
between two main language groups of south India-Tamil andMalayalam.They speak a dialect of one or the other of theselanguages, and divergences from standard Tamil or Ma-layalam seem tobe mainly matters of intonation and
articula-tion.Theirdialect generallyis notunderstood by people from theplains, andalthough there is no evidence available it is
possible that their languagemaystill containelements ofa
proto-Dravidian language Few Hill Pandaram areliterate
History and Cultural Relations Althoughthe Hill Pandaram live within the forest environ-ment and have little day-to-day contact with other communi-ties,they do havealonghistory of contact with wider Indian society.Aswith theother forest communities of south India, such as thePaliyan, Kadar, Kannikar, and Mala Ulladan, the Hill Pandaram have never been an isolated community; from earliest times theyappear to have had regular and important trade contacts with the neighboring agriculturalists, either through silent barter or, since the end of the eighteenth cen-tury, through mercantile trade Early Tamil poets indicate that tribal communities inhabited the forests of the Western Ghats during theSangam period (around the second century B.C.); and these communities had important trade contacts
Trang 4Hill Pandaram 99
with their neighbors andcameunder thepoliticaljurisdiction
of the earlyTamil kingdoms orlocal petty chieftains, who
taxed forest products such as cardamom, bamboo, ivory,
honey, andwax.The importance of this trade atthe
begin-ningof the nineteenth centuryishighlightedinthe writings
of the Abbe Dubois andintheeconomicsurvey of the former
Travancore Statemade atthattimebytwoBritishofficials,
Ward andConner Forest trade still serves to linkthe Hill
Pandaram tothe wider Hindu society
Settlements
The Hill Pandaram havetwotypes ofresidential
grouping-settlements and forestcamps-althoughabout25percentof
Hill Pandaram families liveacompletelynomadic existence
and are notassociated with any settlement Atypical
settle-ment consists of abouttenhuts, widely separatedfrom each
other, each housing a family who live there on a
semiper-manentbasis The hutsaresimple, rectangularconstructions
withsplit-bambooscreensandgrass-thatched roofs; manyare
little more than roofed shelters Around thehutsites
fruit-bearingtreessuchasmangoandtamarind,cassavaand small
cultivations may be found The settlements are oftensome
distance from village communities (with their multicaste
populations) and have no communal focus like religious
shrines Settlements are inhabited only on an intermittent
basis The second type of residential grouping is the forest
camp, consisting of two to six temporary leafshelters, each
made fromaframework of bamboo thatissupportedon a
sin-gle upright pole and covered by palm leaves These leaf
shel-tershaveaconical appearance andareformedover afireplace
consisting of three stones that were found on the site
Rec-tangular lean-tos may also be constructed using two upright
poles Settlements are scattered throughout the forest ranges
except in the interior forest, which is largely uninhabited
apartfrom nomadic camps of the Hill Pandaram The
major-ityof the Hill Pandaram are nomadic and the usual length of
stay at a particular camping site (or a rock shelter, which is
frequently used) is from two to sixteen days, with seven or
eight days being the average, although specific families may
reside in a particular locality for about six to eight weeks
No-madic movements, in the sense of shifting camp, usually vary
overdistances fromahalf-kilometer to6kilometers, though
indaily foraging activities the Hill Pandaram may range over
several kilometers
Economy
Subsistence and Commercial Activities Although the
HillPandaram occasionally engage in paid labor for the
for-estdepartment, andasmall minority of families are settled
agriculturalists on the forest perimeter, the majority are
no-madic hunter-gatherers, who combine food gathering with
thecollection ofminor forestproduce.Themain staple
con-sists of various kinds of yam collected by means of digging
sticks, together with the nuts of a forest cycad, kalinga
(Cycas cincinalis) Such staples are supplemented with palm
flour, and cassava and rice are obtainedthrough trade The
hunting of small animals, particularly monkeys, squirrels,
and monitor lizards, is important These animals are
ob-tained either during foraging activities orina hunting party
consistingoftwo men or a manandayoungboy,using old muzzle-loading guns Dogs, anaidtohunting,are theonly domestic animals
Trade The collectionofminor forestproduceis an impor-tant aspect ofeconomiclife and theprincipalitemstradedare
honey, wax, dammar (a resin), turmeric, ginger, cardamom, incha bark (Acacia intsia,onevarietyofwhichis asoap sub-stitute,the otherafishpoison),variousmedicinalplants, oil-bearingseeds, and bark materials used for tanning purposes The trade of theseproducts isorganized througha
contrac-tual mercantile system, aparticular forest rangebeingleased
by theForestDepartmentto acontractor,whoisnormallya
wealthy merchant livingintheplains area, oftenaMuslimor
a high-caste Hindu Through the contractor the Hill
Pan-daram obtain their basic subsistence requirements: salt, con-diments, cloth, cooking pots, andtins forcollecting honey All the material possessions of the communityareobtained through such trade-even the two items thatare crucialto
theircollecting economy, billhooks andaxes Asthe contrac-tual systemexploited the Hill Pandaram, who rarely got the full market value for the forest commoditiesthey collected, moveshavebeen madeinrecent years to replace it by a forest cooperative system administered by forestry officials under the auspices of thegovernment's Tribal Welfare Department Division of Labor Although women are the principal gatherers of yams, while the hunting of the larger mammals and the collection of honeyarethe prerogativesofmen, the division of laboris notarigid one Men may cook and care for children, while women frequently go hunting for smaller ani-mals, an activity that tends to be a collective enterprise in-volving a family aided by a dog Collection of forest produce tends to be doneby both sexes
LandTenure Each Hill Pandaramfamily (or individual)
is associated with a particular forest tract, but there is little or
noassertion ofterritorial rights or rights over particular forest products either by individuals or families The forest is held to
be thecommonpropertyofthe whole community No com-plaint isexpressed at the increasing encroachment on the for-est by low-country men who gather dammar or other forest products, or at increasing incidences of poaching by them
Kinship
Kin Groups and Descent Unlike the caste communities
ofKerala, the Hill Pandaram have no unilineal descent sys-tem or ideology and there are no recognized corporate group-ings above the level of the family The settlements are in no sense stable or corporate units, but like the forest camps they are residential aggregatesthat may be described as"transient
corporations." The basic kinship unit is the conjugal family, consisting of a cohabiting couple and their young children A forest camp consists of a temporary grouping of one to four such families, each family constituting a unit There is a per-vasive emphasis on sexual egalitarianism and women some-times form independent commensal units, though these al-ways are part of a wider camp aggregate Many encampments consistonly of a single family, and such families may reside as separate and isolated units for long periods
Kinship Terminology The kinship terminology of the HillPandaram is of the Dravidian type common throughout south India, though there is much vagueness and variability
Trang 5100 Hill Pandaram
inusage Apart fromconjugaltiesand close"affinal"
relation-ships(whichin contrast tothe"kin" links have warmth and
intimacy), kinshipties are not"load"-bearinginthesenseof
implyingstructured role obligations
Marriage and Family
Marriage Both polyandrous and polygynous marriages
have been recorded, butmost marriages are monogamous
Cross-cousinmarriageisthenormand marriages emerge
al-most spontaneously from preexisting kinship patterns, as
camp aggregatescenter onaffinallyrelatedmen.Thereis
lit-tle or no marriage ceremonyand thereis noformal
arrange-ment of marriage partners,althoughyoungmentendto
es-tablish priorties with prospective parents-in-law Marriages
arebrittle andmostolderHill Pandaram haveexperienceda
seriesofconjugalpartnerships duringtheir lifetime.Acohab
itingcouple forms an independenthousehold onmarriage,
but thecouple maycontinue as a unit inthe camp aggregate
of either setofparents
Domestic Unit Theconjugal familyisthe basiceconomic
unit Members ofafamily maylive inseparateleaf shelters
(though spousesshare the same leafshelter) and may form
foraging parties with othermembers ofacampaggregate,but
all food gatheredby an individual belongs to his or her own
immediatefamily, who share a simple hearth Only meat,
to-bacco, and the proceedsofhoney-gatheringexpeditionsare
shared between the families constituting a camp aggregate
Inheritance As the Hill Pandaram possess no land and
have few material possessions, little emphasis is placed on
inheritance
Socialization The Hill Pandaram put a normative stress
on individual autonomy and self-sufficiency, and from their
earliest years children are expected to assertindependence
Children collect forestproducefor trade and will often spend
longperiods away from their parents
Sociopolitical Organization
Social Organization Organized as a foraging community,
living in small camp aggregates of two to three families
scat-tered over a wide area, the Hill Pandaram exhibit no wider
structuresof sociopolitical organization There are no ritual
congregations, microcastes, nor anyother communal
associa-tions or corporate groupings above the level ofthe conjugal
family.Alack of wider formal organization is coupled with a
pervasive stress on egalitarianism, self-sufficiency, and the
autonomyof the individual Some individuals in the
settle-ments arerecognized as muttukani (headmen) but their role
is not institutionalized, for they are essentially a part of the
system of control introduced by administrative agencies of
the Forestryand Welfare Departments to facilitate efficient
communication with the community
Social Control The Hill Pandaram have noformal
insti-tutions forthe settlement of disputes, though individual men
and women often act as informal mediators orconciliators
Social control is maintained to an important degree by a
value system that puts a premium on the avoidance of
aggres-sion and conflict; like other foragers, the HillPandaram tend
toavoid conflict by separation and by flight
Religion and Expressive Culture
Although nominally Hindu, Hill Pandaram religionis
dis-tinct from that of theneighboring agriculturalists inbeing
un-iconic (i.e., venerating not images of deities, but the
crestsof mountains) and focused onthe contact, through possession rites,of localized mala devi (hillspirits).Hill
Pan-darammayoccasionallymake ritualofferingsatvillage
tem-ples, particularly those associated with the gods Aiyappan andMuruganatthetimeof the Onam festival(December)or
atlocal shrines establishedinforestareasby Tamil laborers; butotherwisetheyhave littlecontactwith theformal rituals
ofHinduism
Religious Beliefs Thespiritualagenciesrecognized by the HillPandaram fallinto twocategories: theancestralghostsor
shades(chavu) and the hill spirits (mala devi).The hill spirits
aresupernaturalsassociated withparticularhillorrock preci-pices,andinthe community asawholethese spiritsarelegion, with a hilldeity for about every8squarekilometers of forest Although localized spirits, thehill spirits are not 'family spir-its" forthey may have devotees living some distance from the particular locality The ancestralshades, on the otherhand,
arelinkedtoparticular families,but like the hillspirits their in-fluence ismainly beneficent, giving protection against misfor-tuneandproffering advice in times of need One class of spir-its,however, is essentially malevolent These are the arukula, the spirits of persons who have died accidentally through fall-ing from a tree orbeing killed by a wild animal
ReligiousPractitioners Certain menand women have the ability to induce a trancelike state and inthis way to contact the spirits They are known as tullukara (possession dancers, from tullu, "to jump"), and at times of misfortune they are called uponby relatives or friends to give help and support Ceremonies The Hill Pandaram have no temples or shrines and thusmakenoformal ritual offerings to the spirits, leading local villagers to suggest that they have no religion Nordothey ritualize the life-cycle events of birth, puberty, anddeathtoany greatdegree The important religious cere-mony is the possession seance, in which the tullukara goes into a trance state induced by rhythmicdrumming and sing-ing and incarnates one or more of the hill spirits or an ances-tralshade During the seance the cause of the misfortune is ascertained (usually the breaking of a taboo associated with the menstrual period) and the help of the supernatural is sought to alleviate the sickness ormisfortune
Arts In contrast with other Indian communities the Hill Pandaram have few art forms Nevertheless, their singing is highly developed, and their songs are varied and elaborate and include historical themes
Medicine All minor ailments aredealt with through her-bal remedies, since the Hill Pandaram have a deep though unstructured knowledge of medicinal plants More serious complaints are handled through the possession rites
Bibliography Firer-Haimendorf, Christoph von (1970) "Notes on the Malapantaram ofTravancore." Bulletin of the International
Committee for Urgent Anthropological and Ethnological
Re-search 3:44-51
Trang 6Hill Tribes 101
Krishna Iyer,L A (1937)."Malapantiram." InThe
Travan-coreTribes andCastes.Vol 1,96-116.Trivandrum:
Govern-mentPress
Morris, Brian (1981)."Hill Gods and EcstaticCults:Notes
ontheReligionofaHuntingandGathering People."Man in
India 61:203-236
Morris,Brian(1986).ForestTraders: A Socio-EconomicStudy
of the HillPandaram L S E.MonographsinSocial
Anthro-pology, no 55 London: Athlone Press
Mukherjee, B (1954) The Malapandaram of Travancore:
TheirSocio-EconomicLife Bulletin of the Department of
An-thropology, no 3 Calcutta
BRIAN MORRIS
Hill Tribes
ETHNONYM:Scheduled Tribes
This inexact term was long applied by British and
American travelers and colonial authorities to the
indige-nous inhabitants ofupland areas in South and Southeast
Asia (andsometimes inotherpartsof theworld) Although
itwouldseemclearenough what a'hilltribe" is, theterm
finds littlefavoramongmodemanthropologists.Firstof all,
it seems tohavetonesof racialinferiority;thus thetermhas
never been applied, forexample, to the Highland clans of
Scotland, even though they do fit the usual mold ofhill
tribes Second, Western writers have been inconsistent in
their identification of hill tribes, usually defining them as
somehowin opposition toothersocialcategories.Inthe
In-dian subcontinent tribes orhill tribes have long been
de-pictedasdistinct from castes; inSoutheastAsiathey have
often been presented asdistinct fromrice-cultivating
peas-ants in theplains and alluvialvalleys The Nilgiri Hills of
south India,totakeaspecificexample,arehometoseveral
small, more or less indigenous groups, most notably the
Todas,Kotas, Kurumbas, and Badagas (alldealt with
else-where in this volume) British writers and administrators
there during the nineteenth century always identified the
Todas, Kotas, and Kurumbas as hill tribes or aboriginal
tribes; whereas the Badagas, who hadcome up totheNilgiri
Hills from the Mysore Plains a few centuries before, were
usually written about, even in legislation, as being
some-thing other thanhilltribes.Yetthey hadlived withinafew
miles of theKotasand Todas forcenturies,andtheywere at
a verysimilar level ofeconomicdevelopmenttothe Kotas
The Nilgiricase leadstothe conclusionthat hill tribes are
simply the indigenouscommunitiesthatlive abovean
eleva-tion of1,000 meters.
Intraditionalsocieties like thoseof India and Thailand
onecanstill find discrete culturalunitsconventionally called tribes These tendtobeendogamoussocial units, occupyinga
distinguishablerural territory,bearingatribalnameanda
dis-tinctmaterialculture, and oftenspeaking theirownlanguage Butthesamefeatures characterize many dominantcastes in
SouthAsia aswell (e.g., theRajputs)
Inthis region the old categories will notsimply disappear
as anthropologists developmoreuseful ways of categorizing human societies This is because the legal formulation in
India soon after independenceof two broad social categories, Scheduled Tribes and Scheduled Castes, hasby now touched hundreds of millions ofpeoplewho thereby have become eli-gible for specialtreatmentby variousbranches of the govern ment,in anefforttoameliorate thesocioeconomic backward-ness of these groupings So valued have these government benefits become that the Indianauthorities today find them-selves unabletoabandon the granting of special benefits,two
generations after they were first instituted There are even
groups like theBadagas, who were nevercalled hill tribes nor treated as ScheduledTribes, who nonethelesstodayare clam-oring for classificationasScheduled Tribes for the most obvi-ous ofreasons The Badagas actually became a Scheduled Tribe in 1991
Although many of the earlier accounts depicted hill tribesas'animists,"orbelievers in spirit entities who did not followoneof the great SouthAsianreligions (e.g., the Hill Pandaram), subsequent research has described hill tribes that are Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, and even Christian (the Mizos, Garos) Along with these differences in belief, the hill tribes showagreat varietyof economic adaptations: while agriculture is preeminent among most,there are some who are pastoralists (such as theTodas), some who are artisans (Kotas), and some who are itinerant peddlers, magicians, and entertainers
More than 500 namedtribes can still be recognized in the countriesof South Asia Details about tribal demography areelusive Most national censuses have not attempted (or at least have notpublished) adetailed tribe-by-tribe enumera-tion since gaining theirindependence One has to go back to the British census ofundivided Indiain 1931 tofind the last set ofreliable figures onindividual tribes and castes through-out the entire region But atthat time, sixty years ago, the totalpopulation of thesubcontinent was less than 400 mil-lion, compared with morethan one billion today Presumably the tribes have increased proportionately
The futureof the South Asian hill tribes is an uncertain one: while very few groupsshow any signs of dying out, most are inthe process of rapid cultural and economic change that will eventually alter them, or their social boundaries, beyond recognition Whether the government of India con-tinues itsspecial benefits forScheduled Tribes into the in-definite future is one very big factor Another is the aliena-tion of "tribal" land-its seizure by immigrant settlers or timber merchants-whichhas long been reported in many hill areas, perhaps most notably in Andhra Pradesh In gen-eral virtually all hill tribes are now changing greatly through the impact of Hinduism or Christian missionaries, as well as the effects of modernization, secularization, and sometimes industrialization These factors, among others, are tending toward a weakening of tribal languages and tribal identity Seealso Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes
Trang 7102 Hill Tribes
Bibliography Fried, Morton H (1975) The Notion ofTribe Menlo Park:
Cummings Publishing Co
Fuchs, Stephen (1973) TheAboriginalTribes ofIndia New
York: St Martin's Press
Fiirer-Haimendorf, Christoph von (1982) Tribes ofIndia:
The Strugglefor Survival Berkeley: University ofCalifornia
Press
Helm, June, ed (1968) Essaysonthe ProblemofTribe
Pro-ceedings of the 1967 AnnualSpring Meeting of the
Ameri-canEthnological Society.Seattle: UniversityofWashington
Press
Mandelbaum,DavidG (1970).SocietyinIndia Vol.2,
573-619 Berkeley: University of CaliforniaPress
Sahlins, Marshall D (1968) Tribesmen Englewood Cliffs,
N.J.: Prentice-Hall
Singh, K S., ed (1983) Tribal Movements in India 2vols
New Delhi: Manohar
Singh, K S (1985) Tribal Society in
Manohar
India New Delhi:
PAUL HOCKINGS
Hindu
ETHNONYMS: Hindoo, Gentoo (eighteenth-nineteenth
centuries)
WhileHinduismisundoubtedlyoneof theworld'smajor
religions, whether gauged in terms ofitsethical and
meta-physical complexitiesorsimplyin termsof thenumbersof
ad-herents (estimatedat760millionin1991),itdefieseasy
de-scription. Ithadnofoundingfigure, likeJesus;ithasno one
sacredbook, likethe Quran, butmany; ithasnocentral
doc-trines;worshipcanbe conductedanywhere; thereis no
prin-cipal spiritual leader,likea pope;and thereis nohierarchy of
priestsanalogous to achurch Theverywords "Hindu" and
"Hinduism" areforeigntermswithnoreadytranslationinto
Indianlanguages
"Hindu" is the Persianterm that referredto the Indus
River and surrounding country (Greek "Sindou," modem
"Sindh").Asappliedtopeopleby the early Muslim invaders,
it simply meant 'Indian." Perhaps it was only in the
nine-teenth centurythat Europeansand educated Indiansbegan
to apply the word specifically to adherents ofa particular,
dominant SouthAsian religion
Despite the great diversity in forms of Hindu worship,
the hundreds ofdiversesects,and the vast number of deities
worshiped (conventionally 330 million), there are certain
philosophical principles that aregenerally acknowledged by Hindus.Inbrief,there are four aims oflivingand fourstages
of life.The aims ofliving (andtheir Sanskrit-derivednames) are: (1) artha, material prosperity; (2) kama, satisfaction of
desires; (3) dharma,performing the duties of one'sstation in
life; and (4) moksha,obtainingrelease from thecycleof
re-birthstowhicheverysoul issubject.These aims arethought
toapplytoeverybody, from BrahmantoUntouchable.So too
arethe four stages of life, whicharestudentship, becominga
householder, retiring to the forest tomeditate, and finally, becominga mendicant (sannyasi)
Hinduismismorea'way of life," a culturalform, thanit
is a'faith," foritsethical and metaphysical principles per-vade most actsofdaily life: taking food, performing other bodily functions,walking around, conducting any business enterprise, farming, arranging marriages, bringing up chil-dren, preparingfor thefuture,etc.These arejustsomeof the
things with whichnearly everyone will beinvolved, yet all of them aretinged withreligious rules A"good Hindu" (not reallyanIndianconcept) is one who strives to do his or her duty towardaperson'sfamily andcastetraditions (dharma) and who shows devotion to certain gods Regular atten-dance attempleis notrequired, nor isworship of a specific deity or study of a particular scripture; there are no rules about prayerbeingobligatory at certain hours or on certain days It is almost true that one could follow any religious practice and, if an Indian, be considered a Hindu Thus it should come as nosurprise that many Hindus consider the Buddha and even JesusChrist to be incarnations (avatars)
ofVishnu, one of the three principal deities of Hinduism (theothers beingShiva and Brahma) No doubt in historic times Hinduism absorbed local tribal deities into its large pantheon, by makingthem avatars or simply relatives (wife, son, daughter) of already established deities
Insummary, we may say that a Hindu is a South Asian person who recognizes amultiplicity ofgods (though he or she may only be devotedto one); who practices either mo-nogamous orpolygynous marriage; who lives in some form of nuclear or extended patrilineal family; and who believes he or she has onesoul, though itwill normally be reincarnated after death
Because ofemigration beyond South Asia during the past century, Hindus are today to be found in considerable numbers in Canada, the United States, Trinidad, Jamaica, Surinam, and Guyana; in the United Kingdom and the Neth-erlands; in South Africa, Kenya, Tanzania, Reunion, Mauri-tius, and South Yemen; and in Myanmar(Burma), Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Hongkong, Australia, and Fiji Over the past two decades manythousands of Hindu men and women have gone to take up menial jobs in the Persian Gulf nations, though they will probably not be allowed to become citizens
of those (Islamic) nations More than a thousand years ago Hindus also migrated to some parts of Indonesia, where they are still identifiable today on the islandsof Java, Bali, and Lombok There are alsoidentifiable Hindus associated with the Thai royal court, especially Brahmans In most of the above-mentioned countries there are at least a few Hindu temples