Adapting to Change: Hunter-Gatherers in Kerala's Nilambur Valley

Abstract

Hunting and gathering are regarded as the earliest form of subsistence. As a subsistence strategy, it combines animal hunting, fishing, foraging for wild foods, and mobility. During colonial times, there was a trend of undermining hunter-gatherer identity, culture, belief, worldview, and practices through the implementation of various policies such as capitalization of nature as a natural resource and displacement-led development. It has also been observed that the post-colonial government has not only re-enacted colonial marginalisation policies and politics, but has also legalised them in the name of development, service, national obligation, legislation, institution, civic responsibility, citizenship, and morality. This act of local government can be described as civiccolonization. The study is centred on the hunter-gatherer tribes of Kerala's Nilambur Valley, specifically the Cholanaickan, Kattunaickan and Aranadan. It aims to theoretically understand the concept of civic colonization and explore how it affected the current hunter-gatherer communities there.