Syllabuses are a way of tracking the development of an area of study. North East Indian writing in English, also often termed Northeast Anglophone literature, has been around for a couple of decades now. But the shape and direction of this literature has only gradually begun to be discerned. The institutionalisation of Northeast Indian Anglophone Literature began with the inclusion of English texts by writers from North East India in English Literature syllabi of several universities in the region. Initially this was in the form of individual authors or texts in IWE courses. The debate over inclusion as a separate course took a while to resolve, with concerns being raised about the availability of supplementary material and indeed about whether we really knew what kind of material was needed. Would it suffice to follow the method of ‘doing’ the core English literature courses where a nodding acquaintance with ‘background’, that might include some information about the time, the author and the form, was considered enough before moving on to the actual nitty gritty of the text itself? Or should we go out into the field and find material from the ground, the archives and the collective memories of communities? And of course, most importantly, which texts would qualify to be taught alongside Shakespeare and Melville and Dickens? (Despite our awareness about the devaluing of the canon, our doubts about the slim texts emerging rather sporadically from some regions, lingered) These, and similar questions ensured that we remained hesitant about what then appeared a radical departure from tradition.
Today, however, most of the universities in the NEI and their affiliated colleges offer complete courses on NE Anglophone writing within their English Literature programs. A survey of some of these shows an interesting commonality – while the genres are represented with separate units on each and often an introductory unit that might contain background essays on politics, literature and history or the introductory essays from poetry and short story collections, there is virtually no reference to the study of formal literary qualities. The pieces selected for such introductory units establish the terms under which the literatures are expected to be studied. The emphasis is mostly on themes of identity, ethnicity, indigeneity, diversity, society, and politics etc. This is admittedly a heavily political literature, as all of these terms would suggest, even where, or perhaps especially where, the political is denied or sidestepped. Once these become part of a systematic program of study, the challenges of teaching and research push them into the popular frames of interpretation circulating within the discipline at a given time. On the other hand, because Northeast Anglophone writing has been an active component of and contributor to, what one can now see as a discourse about North East India (made up of external perspectives and internal responses to them), issues from the socio-political and historical realities of each state often tend to become part of the tacit assumptions underlying the selection of texts and the classroom engagement with them (the latter evident from selection of topics for doctoral research and the enthusiasm demonstrated in discussions of historical neglect, stereotyping, violence). So, for example, the concern with identity in much of the readings of this literature neatly ties in with the international human rights discourse and the overwhelming interest in literatures from conflict regions. The result might be research proposals that flag trauma as a major trope, setting it against violence and conflict that each of the NE states has experienced and that many writers choose to represent.
Institutionalisation and formal disciplinary practice however does not just happen. The preliminary scaffolding made up of textbooks, anthologies, histories, and background material is essential for serious study. The decision to include texts in translation, following the example of courses on European texts in translation that have unquestioningly been part of English syllabi, is part of the conversation that continues.
Concerns that result in such decisions point to the shaky ground that we are on with regard to the idea of the Northeast itself that is now the condition for literary productions which also at the same time carry the flavour of the specific place of formation. We come round once again to the choice of the term Northeast as a label for this literature. Should we look at the literature of individual states and place them in separate units in a course or offer separate courses? Or should they be listed without these distinctions as they have been so far? What should be listed as “Recommended Readings” to enhance the literary experience? Cotton University in its newest MA syllabus features a paper titled “Assamese Literature in Translation” and then goes on to another titled “Writings from India’s Northeast”. The list of Readings recommends books on the various literatures but also suggests a few on conflict and ethnicity, as well as one on the “Indo-Naga war”–works that help supplement cultural information and familiarise students with the NE’s fraught relationship with the Indian nation.
Most other university English departments either have just one dedicated paper on NE literature where texts from all the NE states, of poetry, fiction and drama, and sometimes non fictional pieces, appear, with a deliberate inclusion of translated texts alongside Anglophone ones (as in the Gauhati University paper). In Assam University, Temsula Ao’s “Lament for an Earth” and Mamang Dai’s Legends of Pensam feature with texts from around the world in a paper on “Literature and Environment”; while Ao’s poem “The Old Storyteller” and two novels, Siddharth Deb’s The Point of Return and Aruni Kashyap’s The House with a Thousand Stories sit alongside Soyinka, Walcott, Achebe, Coetzee, and Naipaul in a paper on “Postcolonial Literature”. Dibrugarh University titles its course, “Northeast Literature”, and states in its Course Objectives that texts will “specifically locate the Northeastern region as a distinct socio-cultural and political space”. While the course includes poetry and fiction, a unit on non-fiction contains several pieces that clearly discuss political issues, like Sanjoy Hazarika’s Writing on the Wall, Udayon Misra’s The Periphery Strikes Back and Sanjib Baruah’s Durable Disorder. Mizoram University, among the earliest to introduce NE writings in its English Syllabus, now has a paper titled, “Narratives of North East India” featuring poets (poems are not named), fictional texts (Malsawmi Jacob’s Zorami, the first Mizo novel in English appears here along with Ao and Dai) and a set of essays on social identity, the history of indigenous peoples, folklore and gender. The list of “Recommended Readings”, as in other cases, is again a blend of the literary and the socio-political and historical. Manipur University takes what appears to be a circuitous route by offering a course on Cultural Studies and Folklore, that might be seen as preparatory (given the increasing focus of NE literature on folklore and myth), then choosing two Manipuri texts in English translation for a paper on Translation while also offering an IWE course with no NE texts. The course from North-Eastern Hill University (NEHU) is titled “Northeast Studies” (interesting choice because this is a growing field where the literatures contribute significantly) and this would seem to refer to the long list of suggested readings where themes of marginality, the frontier, colonial exploitation etc. appear alongside books on folklore and the history of tribes. While Kire and Ngangom appear as in the others, here you also have the poetry of Esther Syiem, Kynpham S. Nongkynrih and Mona Zote, Ratan Thiyam’s Nine Hills and a Valley and fiction by Kaushik Barua, Jahnavi Baruah and Arup Dutta that have so far not appeared in any of the courses from the other universities and that introduce a significant complication into the field, with Barua’s novel Windhorse having nothing to do with NEI, being about the Tibetan struggle and set in India, Nepal and China.
The components of NE courses, as this somewhat sketchy account shows, point to a number of issues that accompany institutionalisation of the area. First, the political underpinning of this literature is obviously unavoidable – literary texts represent political-historical themes and the way the texts are framed by statements of Objectives and Outcomes suggests that teaching strategies must emphasise political-historical and cultural issues equally, and with the National Education Policy in view, focus on questions of diversity and inclusivity. Secondly, the choice of texts is determined by availability. The two Ngangom and Nongkynrih volumes, Anthology of Contemporary Poetry from the North East and Dancing Earth appear often because of easy availability, while the two-volume Oxford Anthology of Writings from North-East India edited by Tilottoma Misra is listed only in a couple of courses since, quite surprisingly, it is not currently available. Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, institutionalisation, which is both inevitable and desirable, requires that a discipline or area is practised consciously; in other words, that it works systematically towards enhancing the experience of doing the subject. This would entail teaching the history, types, and context of literatures, which in turn would demand the writing of histories of the literature, the making of anthologies and textbooks that will establish a culture of reading appropriate to the material, and the gathering of a vast amount of additional material from each of the communities/states/cultures that produce this work (So far, if the current courses are any indication, the extra-literary material mostly consists of history and politics, folklore and some sporadic sociological studies. It would not be surprising to find that there is still some dependence on colonial era ethnographic studies – P. R. T. Gurdon’s book on the Khasis being a preeminent example, often cited in research, though mercifully not listed in courses).
What then are the challenges that the making of a course on NE Anglophone literature presents? As the somewhat messy scene presented above would suggest, there is firstly the issue of resolving what exactly is meant when the term NE is used. How is its dual sense, of a single region made up of many diverse entities, to be represented in the course? What should determine text and author selection? Those that contain all the commonly acknowledged themes? A variety of forms and types? An author who has a body of work or an exceptional sense of place? But even as all this is sorted out, it is time for these courses to get out of the spirit of randomness, use a chronology, get clarity about what they seek to present as NE literature and offer a clear perspective on the field for the prospective student that will address the where, when and why questions essential in any course of study.
— Nandana Dutta
Professor of English, Gauhati University
