The Invention of the ‘Jummas’: State Formation and Ethnicity in Southeastern Bangladesh

1992/02/01 by Willem van Schendel · 2 citations
Agricultural and Biological Sciences · Arts and Humanities · Social Sciences · #Agricultural Economics and Practices #Agriculture #Anthropology #Archaeology #Bangladesh Politics, Society, and Development #Bengali #Civil servants #Diversity (politics) #Ethnic group #Ethnology #Geography #Immigration #Law #Political science #Politics #Socioeconomics #Sociology #South Asian Studies and Diaspora #State (computer science)

paper · doi:10.1017/s0026749x00015961

openalex publication_date 1992/02/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/22

Abstract

This paper deals with socio-cultural innovation in the hills of southeastern Bangladesh. Outsiders have always been struck by the ethnic diversity of this area. The literature—written mainly by British civil servants, Bengali men of letters, and European anthropologists—presents a picture of twelve distinct ‘tribes’, all practising swidden or shifting agriculture, locally known as jhum cultivation. In addition, there are Bengali immigrants who do not engage in swidden cultivation.

Cited by

• Killer Khilats, Part 1: Legends of Poisoned "Robes of Honour" in India
• Writing off domination: the Chakma and Meitei script movements

Related

• An Artificial Minority: The Stateless Biharis in Bangladesh
• ‘King's inheritors': understanding the ethnic discourse on the Rajbanshi as an indigenous community
• Scribal elites in Sultanate and Mughal Bengal
• Appropriately Bangladeshi? Invisible labour and class distinction in the construction of British Bangladeshi identity
• Migration and Marginalisation in the ‘Himalayan Kingdom’ of Sikkim