‘Christianity and the Making of Modern North-East India’ by Kanato Chopy

About the session:

In India’s geopolitical region known as North-East, a high percentage of Christian population in this frontier region has rendered a distinctive socio-political climate. In a country where nearly 80 per cent of the citizens identify as Hindus, the north-east frontier remains a litmus test to the Indian democracy and diversity. The session will delve into important questions grappling the region such as conversion, culture loss, identity politics, and nation building.

About the book ‘Christianity and the Making of Modern North-East India’:

Through an ethnohistorical study of the Nagas – a congeries of tribes inhabiting the Indo Myanmar frontier – this book presents a kaleidoscopic view of an unusually interesting region of India which is all too often seen as peripheral. The book provides a distinct vantage point for an understanding of the Nagas and other ethnic communities in relation to colonialism, missionary encounters, identity politics, and cultural change – all seamlessly woven around American Baptist mission history in this region. The book also analyses India’s cacophonous post-independence democracy in order to delineate multi-faith issues, multiculturalism, and ethnicity-based political movements.

About Kanato Chopy:

Kanato Chophy received PhD in social anthropology from the Department of Anthropology, University of Delhi. He currently teaches social anthropology in Dibrugarh University, Assam. His research interests include tribes and indigenous peoples, political anthropology, comparative religion, and ethno-history of North-East India. His writings focus on contextualising ethnography within broader historical and regional interconnectedness in South and South East Asia.