A study of Santals as children of nature in the light of Santal folktales
Main Article Content
Abstract
South Asian nations are home to the Santal tribe. Even though they are dispersed over several nations, most of the Santal are found in India and Bangladesh. The Santal people describe themselves largely as natural beings. This assertion has found support from some scholars who have analysed the Santal rituals and festivals. However, very few studies have tried to define the identity of the Santals from a literary perspective. Therefore, by examining their folktales, this article aims to demonstrate the idea that the Santal are children of nature. The study was guided by The National Folklore Theory, Cultural Functional Theory, and Theory of Reality. The qualitative research was based on a textual analysis of 27 Santal folktales. The rationale of this paper is that Santal folktales serve as a repository of knowledge about their customs, cultures and identities. From the study findings, it is clear that the Santals live in and through nature. They have such intimate relations with nature as one would have with a parent or sibling. They emulate the simplicity of nature in their lifestyle. Even the spirits they worship and revere are thought to reside in nature. Therefore, the Santal are born from nature and exist in mutually beneficial and shared spaces with other creatures in nature.
Downloads
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
This open-access article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) 4.0 license.
You are free to: Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format. Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially. The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms.
Under the following terms: Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
No additional restrictions You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.
How to Cite
References
Acharya, S. K., & Kshatriya, G. K. (2016). Social Change in Contemporary Tribal India: Observations from Changing Status of Ethnicity and Language Identity among Santals.” The Eastern Anthropologist, 69(2), 205-224.
Akan, M. R., Al Mamun, M. A., Naznin, T., Al Pavel, M. A., Yasmin, L., & Rahman, S. A. (2015). An Ethnographic Investigation on Land and Life of Santal Community in Barind Tract, Bangladesh. American Journal of Social Science Research, 1(2), 90-95.
Ali, M. A. (1998). The Santals of Bangladesh. Midnapur: Smaj Sevak Sangha Press.
Bandyopadhyay, S. (2019). Luguburu: Ritual, Pilgrimage and Quest for Identity among the Santals. The Oriental Anthropologist, 19(1), 41-54.
Brandt, C. (2011). Educating Santals: The Seventh-day Adventist Church in Joypurhat (Bangladesh) and the Issue of Cultural Alienation.
Bascom, W. R. (1953). Folklore and Anthropology. The Journal of American Folklore, 66(262), 283-290.
Biswas, M. (2018). Scheduled Tribes in India: Socio-cultural Change of Santal Tribe in West Bengal. International Journal of Applied Social Science, 5(7), 1090-1100.
Boas, F. (1940). Race, Language and Culture. The Macmillan Company.
Canny, M. A. (1928). The Santal and Their Folklore. Folklore, 39(4), 329-343.
Carrin, M. (2015). Performing Indigeneity and Politics of Representation: The Santals in Jharkhand, Odisha, Bengal, and Assam. Irish Journal of Anthropology, 18(2), 21-31.
Cavallaro, Francesco & Rahman, Tania. (2009). The Santals of Bangladesh. The Linguistics Journal.https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330281849_The_Santals_of_Bangladesh
Datta, S. (2018). Setting the Unruly Tracts: Representation of Counter Spatial Tactics, Ideas on Environment and Justice among Santals in 18th Century Folktales. Studies in Humanities and Social Sciencies, 25(1), 169-192.
Dey, A. (2015). An Ancient History: Ethnographic Study of the Santhal. International Journal of Novel Research in Humanity and Social Sciences, 2(4), 31-38.
Dorson, R. M. (1963). Current folklore theories. Current anthropology, 4(1), 93-112.
Esnara, C. B. (2022). Translanguaging in the analysis of narrative techniques and discourse styles in selected Philippine short novels. Research Journal in Advanced Humanities, 3(4), 99-114. https://doi.org/10.58256/rjah.v3i4.960
Guha, S., & Ismail, M. (2015). Socio-Cultural Changes of Tribes and Their Impacts on Environment with Special Reference to Santhal in West Bengal. Global Journal of Interdisciplinary Social Sciences, 4(3), 148-156.
Gautam, M. (1977). The Santalization of the Santals. In K. David (Ed.), The New Wind: Changing Identities in South Asia (pp. 369-382). Berlin, New York: De Gruyter Mouton. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110807752.369
Hasdak, J. (1981). Hor Hopon: Santal Itihas. Dhanjuri Adibashi Cultural Centre.
Hembrom, R. (2018). The Life and After–Life of Orality: Karam Binti and the Santal Identity. Lecture at the Ethnographic Museum at the University of Zurich. 13 Sept. 2018.
Kerketa, V. J. (2018). The Santals’ Belief System: An indication to their deeper dimension. International Journal of Engineering Development and Research, 6(1), 205-214.
Lea, S. D. (2016). Making Place through rituals (PhD Thesis). University of Groningen, Groningen.
Lopez, M. (2006). A Handbook of Philippine Folklore. Quezon City: University of the Philippines Press.
Mohanty, S. (Ed.). (2021). Mainstreaming the Marginalised: Fresh Perspectives on India’s Tribal Story (1st ed.). Routledge India. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003000983
Murmu, G. Illustrations for the Folktale of the Santal Parganas. Retrieved from http://www.dsource.in/sites/default/files/case-study/folklore-santal-parganas/introduction/file/folklore-of-the-santal-parganas.pdf
Padhi, S. R. (2015). Exclusion of Tribal Community and Assertion of their Identity with Reference to North East India. The Oriental Anthropologist, 15(1), 135–143. https://doi.org/10.1177/0972558X1501500110
Propp, V. (1984). Theory and History of Folklore. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Raj, A. (2018). Is Witchcraft a Suppressed Desire of Women Empowerment in Santal Society? A Study in Select Santal Folktales. International Journal of Recent Scientific Research, 9(3B), 24754-24756.
Roy, M. (2016). Life and Culture of the Santhals of Jalpaiguri District in the Twentieth Century: A Historical Outline. International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research and Development, 3(4), 221-228.
Samad, M. (2006). The Santal in Bangladesh: Problems, Needs and Development Potentials.” Journal of Ethnic Affairs, II(Aug), 9-13.
Saren, G. (2013). Impact of Globalization on the Santals: A Study on Migration in West Bengal, India. International Journal of Humanities and Social Science Invention, 2(7), 29-33.
Shamsuddoha, B., & Jahan, R. (2016). Santal Community in Bangladesh: A Socio Historical Analysis. AJHAL, 3(3), 203-214.
Shariff, F. (2008). Power Relations and Legal Pluralism: An Examination of ‘Strategies of Struggles’ Amongst the Santal Adivasi of India and Bangladesh. The Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law, 40(57), 1-43.
Siwakoti, B. (2017). Archetypal Study of Santal Folktales. Tribhuwan University, Nepal.
Soren, Priyanka & Jamir, Waluneba. (2021). A Study on the Folklore of the Santhals in Relevance to Their Folktales and Superstitions. https://doi.org/10.22271/ed.book.807
Tank, N. (2019). Binti: Re-Thinking Santal Identity through the Creation Myth. Lokaratna, XII, 17-28.
Worldmark Encyclopedia of Cultures and Daily Life. (2022) Santals. Retrieved December 20, 2022 from Encyclopedia.com: https://www.encyclopedia.com/humanities/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/santals