Seeds, Loom And Indigenous Spiritual Identity: Unwriting the Climate Change Narrative

Abstract (English)

Indigenous people view land and natural resources as sacred –living, thinking, and acting beings. Indigenous land, forests, water, and mountains are currently under pressure, commodified, and objectified from the dramatic expansion of large-scale extraction activities and mindless development ventures taken up by states and profit-oriented multinational corporations. "Plantationocene" has broken the ties to place, disregarding the indigenous land-based knowledge and wisdom. Based on my fieldwork in Odisha, I will focus on the sacred logic of Thengapalli Women, Dongaria Kondhs, and the neighboring tribes to protect their sacred mountains, the source of their food, water, livelihood, and spiritual identity. Previously, I have discussed mountains as powerful and sacred actors in indigenous people's efforts to organize and protect their regions from irrevocable destruction through mining activities (Pandey and Kingsolver, 2022).
The Dongaria Kondhs are trying to revive their traditional farming and weaving. In 2013, they fought against Vedanta, a U.K.-based mining company. With a renewed sense of their rights to the forest and collaboration with grassroots organizations, such as Living Farms, the tribe has resuscitated lost seed varieties and revitalized their symbiotic relationship with nature for sustainable farming and weaving. The Thengapalli women, through their elaborate cultural rituals, are protecting their forest.
Based on ethnographic research, I will present Indigenous wisdom on their land, medicine, livelihood, and spiritual identity as the logic behind fighting the coercive state and profit-making corporations.