eBook | “Painted Words”: An Anthology edited by Prof Ganesh Devy – Tribal Literature from all over India

“It is almost impossible to characterize all of India’s tribals in a single ethnographic or historic framework. […] After Independence, these communities were ‘denotified’ and placed quite randomly in the schedules of tribes, castes and other ‘backward communities’. Yet anyone with any experience of tribal culture will find these listings mind-boggingly oversimplified. The most useful … Read more

Learn more about tribal communities in Tamil Nadu

India’s tribal cultural heritage – Odisha (Orissa)

Though Odia is the official language, there are 22 officially recognized tribal languages in Odisha. The overall literacy rate of Odisha has increased from 49 per cent in 1991 to 73 per cent in 2011. The literacy rate among tribal population has also demonstrated the increasing trend over the years, yet the gap between tribal … Read more

Video | Living with the cycles of nature and understanding that it is bountiful: National award winning documentary “I Cannot Give You My Forest” – Odisha

I cannot give you my forest is a documentary directed and produced by filmmakers- Nandan Saxena and Kavita Bahl. It has received the National Film Award for Best Environment Film in 2014. Filmed in the forests of Odisha, ‘I cannot give you my forest’ is a window into the lives of the Kondh ‘adivasis’. The … Read more

eJournal | Involving tribal communities in conservation: Sustainable resource use and forest conservation by the Kaani community of Kanyakumari – Tamil Nadu

3. Sustainable resource use and forest conservation by the Kaani indigenous community of Kanyakumari forests in the Western Ghats, India (Ch. 3, pp. 37-55) in: “Knowing our Lands and Resources: Indigenous and Local Knowledge and Practices related to Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services in Asia” by Madhav Karki, Rosemary Hill, Dayuan Xue, William Alangui, Kaoru Ichikawa … Read more