Nostalgia in Ladakh: Reproducing the Past
in the Present
“Who controls the past, controls the future. Who controls the present, controls the past.” George Orwell, 1984
Introduction
The phrase, ‘the right side of history’ is often used with a certain sense of alarming liberty and can be heard in classrooms and streets alike. The nonchalant use of this phrase has persistently implored me to ask the question- what is the right side of history? Why must history have a side and is it then, an inclusive and equal reconstruction of the past as experienced by all groups and individuals? While the historical mode has evidently emerged as the dominant way of reconstructing the past, it is certainly not an impartial one. Inclined towards deeply embedded power structures, formal history is selective in determining who it includes and excludes from its pages. However, historical consciousness is a complex construction and communities that find themselves excluded or
misrepresented in formal history, find other modes of enabling connections between their past, present and future. Nostalgia emerges as a revealing site to study this process of remembering amidst communities and relevant ‘contemporary issues of identity, politics and history.’ (Ange 2015, 1) Various nostalgic discourses and practices have been at work in social and cultural environments (Ange 2015, 1) and can provide a site to understand, away from the limitations of formal histories, how individuals and groups re-produce their past in the present.
The past is a heavy inheritance and can be a device that shapes life, by both confining it and enabling it. Marx wrote in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, ‘Men make their own history but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past. The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living.’ The post-modern era comes with its own set of circumstances, under the weight of which various communities are attempting to ‘make their history.’ While postmodern theorists describe nostalgia as a ‘longing for what is lacking in a changed present, yearning for what is unattainable due to the irreversibility of time’ (Pickering & Keightley 2006, 920) it inevitably becomes ‘a central notion that permeates many contemporary
discourses and practices.’ (Berliner 2012, 769) Further, cultural imperialism, globalisation and nationalism have emerged as forces of homogenisation, increasing a sense of disorientation amidst communities, that feel the past is disappearing. In light of this, nostalgia as a reaction to the past manifests itself in fields as diverse as tourism, heritage and environment policies, consumerism, nationalism and urbanisation. However, while ‘tropes of vanishing cultures’ (Berliner 2015, 17) have become common in the post-modern era, communities have simultaneously found ways to resist homogenisation and reproduce their histories. Michael Lambek writes in his book The Weight of the Past on the Saklava community, ‘Beyond loss and fractures remains a cultural system, a set of practices that continue to produce a coherent, polyvalent and insightful way of comprehending and engaging social change.’ Nostalgia emerges as a site through which we can understand how cultures are durable and resistant, how they evolve and adapt, ‘bearing the weight of their past and marching on’ (Lambek 2002, 11) rather than be annihilated by massive social transformations. Ultimately, each transformation, even the ones that often bear a threatening facade, in practice often contribute towards creating complex sites of nostalgia for the past that then, systematically become a major force in employing techniques to reconstruct the past in the present.
A community that has been evolving in the shadow of a similar dynamic and is the primary focus of my thesis research, is the Ladakhi community inhabiting the region of Leh, Ladakh in the Western Himalayas of Northern India. Here, the workings of nostalgia have played a crucial role in the process of remembering and in the making of local history. Through this paper, I would like to inquire if multiple nostalgias have been attached to the way the past of Ladakh has been constructed in the present. I would like to bring forth various forms of cultural reproduction during times of social change and analyse them through nostalgic postures amidst the Ladakhi community towards these practices by diverse groups and individuals who have engaged with it. Post the 1970s, after witnessing several wars and political turmoil, Ladakh opened up its borders and witnessed an influx of tourism and development. Over time, many external and internal agents, including tourists, researchers, local elites and NGOs have seen the cultural practices as ‘vanishing’ and the ancient traditions, as ‘eroding.’ Hence, the past has been glorified by certain agents and various efforts have been made to ‘preserve’ local traditions. Meanwhile, the past has also been reproduced in various ways amidst rural Ladakhi communities.
I would like to illustrate through the site of nostalgia the way various actors have engaged with the past and highlight a) the continuity of cultural practices in Ladakh despite disruptions and b) the role played by nostalgia in the reproduction of these practices. I seek to exemplify this by depicting
the interplay between nostalgia and present day cultural practices, to further explore the possibility that the past can be understood as active and relevant in the present. The fundamental question that I intend to address is- How can the site of nostalgia be utilised to depict the way the Ladakhi
community reproduces the past in the present? As opposed to the diagnoses of cultural loss on Ladakh that have seen a rise in recent decades, my aim is to highlight how nostalgic discourses work in the cultural environment of Ladakh, simultaneously enabling a site through which one can understand how the Ladakhi community has reproduced their past in the present. I will display data and findings from diverse cultural contexts, analyse the nostalgic reactions towards these cultural practices and how they might be a site to acknowledge the persistence of cultural environs in the present. I will illustrate this by providing detailed ethnographic analysis, primarily through
testimonies gathered via interviews, drawing on fieldwork conducted during my time in Ladakh. I will further support my work by critical analysis and secondary literature, to gain a more
comprehensive insight into the same.
Multiple scholars have recorded that it is impossible to define Ladakh, explicitly, in historical, political or cultural terms. (Van Beek 2009, 7) From John Bray to Martin Van Beek, both of whom have produced a significant body of work on Ladakh, from colonial sources to the early historical sources of the Christian missionaries, the one aspect of approaches to Ladakh that remains constant, is its evident complexity and diversity that has nourished an evolving and layered social fabric. Therefore, approaches on Ladakh must aim to be interdisciplinary, however in practice, such integrated, ethnographic analysis on Ladakh remains rare and more often than not, research on Ladakh is misfortunately, categorised and segregated. Further, while the politics of memory and identity in Ladakh have been previously explored, specifically in their relationship to modernity, the site of nostalgia in Ladakh is still a fresh one and remains relatively unexplored. For the purpose of my inquiry, I would like to broadly highlight the existing fields of work on Ladakh, to suggest and insist, why an interdisciplinary approach is essential going forward.
Firstly, there are several reasons why Ladakh has, over the decades, become a predominantly, popular anthropological attraction. Ladakh is a borderland region, on the periphery of India with Tibet as a neighbour and has often been referred to as ‘Little Tibet’ in a wide array of research, books and articles. While this term was possibly coined with a complimentary intent, it has on the contrary, turned Ladakh into a sub-set of Tibet, placing it rather conveniently under the wing of Tibetan Studies. As Tibet fell under Chinese occupation and crossing its boundaries became
unfathomable for scholarly or journalistic purposes, Ladakh consequently became, a major field of interest to scholars and researchers of cultural anthropology, due to its easier accessibility and due its large numbers of Tibetan and Buddhist societies. Even the monastic orders established in Ladakh were more accessible and open to working with scholars from all over the world. Further, its history of practicing polygamous societies, its Palaeolithic past and its widespread matriarchal structures nourished an ever-growing scope for anthropological interest in the region. The contributing aspect of anthropological approaches, as Van Beek writes, is that ‘not many anthropologists would
unblinkingly assign to their monograph titles, such as were common in the past.’ He suggests vehemently, that ‘the people, communities and societies’ cannot be so easily defined, demarcated and described as a homogenous whole.’ (Van Beek 2005, 8) Conclusively, it has become evident that a singular lens is insufficient for Ladakhi Studies. He suggests the emergence of much needed ‘detailed ethnographic studies of communities, households, individuals, regions, professional groups, kinship, marriage…’ (Van Beek 2005, 8)
However, an interdisciplinary approach to Ladakh has been recent and is still developing, whereas early research on Ladakh was focussed on salvaging village communities and can be categorised as salvage anthropology, devoted to recording information about traditional societies before they disappear under the onslaught of modernity. Such research on Ladakh was often confronted by extremes, in the case of researcher and author, Helena Norbert who depicts modernity as an
‘ominous force destroying what was once a peaceful society’ (Norbert 1992, 23) and R.S Mann who depicts Ladakh as ‘underdeveloped and backward, bogged down by religious prejudice and in need of modernity and change.’ (Mann 2002, 2). The question arises, how does the Ladakhi community confront these changes?
Tibetan Studies, Buddhist Studies and Himalayan Studies have provided a larger umbrella under which to place Ladakh, however their scope is still far too wide and often, results in Ladakh being subsumed as a “Little Tibet” again, as I mentioned earlier. Else, the focus remains on Ladakh as primarily a Buddhist community which can be unfortunately misleading, as its religious
demographic is rather equally divided between Buddhism and Islam. Whereas one can certainly not deny the Tibetan influences in Ladakhi society, there is an increasing need to recognise that there is an equally dominant Islamic culture, Kashmiri culture, Baltistani culture and further, Central Asian inheritances, all of which combine to give birth to Ladakhi culture. Therefore, thematically and otherwise, the representation of Ladakh as one homogenous entity is a huge misrepresentation.
However, post 1974 contemporary trends in Tibetan and Himalayan studies gave way to new themes penetrating on Ladakh and post 80s the topics of development, social and ecological change gained precedence. (Van Beek 2005, 10) Moreover, themes like ‘History and Identity’ and
‘Continuity and Change’ in Ladakh have been explored by various scholars like Fernanda Pririe, Nicola Grist, Martjin Van Beek, A.H Francke highlighting the historical influences that flowed through Ladakh in the 20th century, including themes such as as conquest, colonialism, partition, nationalism and trade. (Van Beek 2005, 10)
Meanwhile, a relatively singular and narrow approach on Ladakh has been the geo-political literature that focusses solely on its strategic and military importance as a borderland region, with Pakistan on one side and Tibet on the other, giving Ladakh an identity that emerges only in light of its neighbours. Further, the discord in Kashmir has created another field where Ladakh is viewed as the ‘peaceful, idyllic’ neighbour, a title often awarded to Ladakh as a two-fold attempt to mock Kashmir and even to attribute the peaceful nature to Ladakh’s Buddhist roots. This approach
remains severely limited and has been critiqued and deconstructed for its employment of a selective and biased use of historical events, peoples and ideas.
Conclusively, as Van Beek mentions in ‘Modern Ladakh’ most approaches to Ladakh today and most scholars working in the region are becoming increasingly aware to adopt an interdisciplinary approach. ‘One must question categorisations’ and be malleable when studying Ladakh, for it needs to be studied across its boundaries, both literal and metaphorical. However, Van Beek also suggests these approaches have been rare and that the reason is ‘the way the academy divides the world’ and that ‘academically speaking, Ladakh is a poor fit under any of these sub-disciplines,’ whether it is in light of its Indian influences or Tibetan. (Van Beek 2005, 9) A huge body of research is steadily finding its way past these limitations and ‘certain theoretical debates are continuing, while new ones are emerging.’ (Van Beek 2005, 14) The multiplicity of Ladakh persists across its various themes and literature, making nostalgia a dynamic, yet relatively under-utilised site through which to examine its socio-cultural fabric.
Nostalgia, as a concept, has lived a substantial life, rife with criticism, debate and its eventual expansion as an applied and accepted theory. Some have called it ‘an poisoned itch’ (Lessing 1976, 7) while others have questioned its ‘falsification of historical facts’ and its ‘sentimentalism.’ (Ange & Belriner 2015, 4) However, its presence in social and cultural environments has been widely realised and addressed, specifically with a growing interest in the field of memory studies by social scientists. Ange and Berliner, in the book ‘Anthropology of Nostalgia’ explore the wide array of ways in which it penetrates the social fabric, constituting the site of nostalgia as an important place to discover the ways in which individuals and groups ‘remember, commemorate and revitalise their pasts.’ (Ange & Berliner, 2015, 2) The book in particular explores and ‘investigates nostalgic feelings, discourses and practices in the fields of heritage and tourism, exile and diaspora, consumerism, modernity….’ (Ange Berliner, 2015, 2) with an emphasis on how nostalgia is a key factor in the process of remembering and how it has increasingly re-surfaced due to the accelerated rate of globalisation. Therefore, nostalgia has often been studied as a reaction to ‘modern accelerism’ a term coined by Robert Musil, while Atia and Davies have defined nostalgia as ‘both the bitter-sweet side effect of modernity and a potential cause of a deadening hostility to the changes that modernity brings. Yet as varied as its consequences can be, it is a distinctive and sharp phenomena.’ (Atia, Davies 2010, 181) This brings forth a crucial aspect of nostalgia, wherein it forms a special alliance with the field of memory studies. How do communities remember and reconstruct their past, specifically marginalised and minority communities, when they have not been adequately represented in or ‘legitimated by more rigid kinds of historiographic understanding?’ (Atia & Davies 2010, 181) Here, Atia and Davies substantiate that ‘nostalgia can be a potent form of such sub-altern memory’, calling to attention, ‘nostalgia’s critical potential.’ (Atia & Davies 2010, 181)
It is not the first and will certainly not be the last time that nostalgia arises and is utilised as a site of remembrance and reconstruction in individuals and groups, in times of social, political and environmental transformations. It can be used to study and interpret various social and cultural environments, as Atia and Davies write- ‘it can be a way of shaping and directing historical consciousness.’ (Atia, Davies 2010, 183) Further, while the term ‘nostalgia’ itself triggers a whimsical notion of the past, in reality it is a process consistently occurring and re-occurring, even in sites of everyday life. Therefore, when used as a formalised tool of analysis, the result can give
an internalised and detailed understanding of how communities remember during times of social transformations. As Ange and Berliner mention, ‘when used for social and political concerns
nostalgic discourses and practices do not necessarily involve the melancholy with which it is associated, they bond diverse categories of actors and constitute a source of mnemonic convergence. And such convergence, remains relatively understudied…’ (Ange, Beliner 2015, 9)
Most crucially, nostalgia is not a mere ache for the past or a longing to rekindle remembrance in the face of irreversible changes. As proposed by various scholars, when the romantic notions attached to nostalgia are set aside, it can be a lucid way to connect the past, to the present and the future. ‘Nostalgia reveals relationships that exist between the past, present and future’ write Anges and Berliner, meanwhile others like Dominic Buoyer have suggested that it carries with it ‘politics of the future’ and that it is not simply ‘retrospective but also prospective.’ (Anges, Berliner 2015, 11) (Buoyer, 2012, 25) In a sense, there would be no nostalgia for the past if there was no hope or fear of the future in groups and individuals, therefore it can also be a site for assessing the present and future. Nostalgia, then, can also be interpreted as a way to critique the structures of the past. Atia and Davies conclude in their article, ‘Nostalgia and the Shapes of History’ by stating that ‘whatever its object, nostalgia serves as a negotiation between continuity and discontinuity.’ (Atia, Davies 2010, 184)
Deriving from the analysis of nostalgia and from an understanding of the temporalities within which nostalgia occurs, more of which I will discuss later, it can be suggested that in a transformative time, whether that is as a subject to modernity or other homogenising phenomena like globalisation or nationalism, communities emerge with their own interpretations of continuity and discontinuity. Anges and Berliner support the argument of Atia and Davies by concluding in their introduction that ‘an anthropological exploration of nostalgia (as well as other mnemonic states) indeed nurtures such a reflection upon the durability of human societies in the face of the ruptures of history.’ (Atia, Davies 2010, 184) (Anges, Berliner 2015, 12)
Conclusively, I aim to utilise this site of nostalgia to explore how the Ladakhi community has encountered social change and analyse it through nostalgic reactions or the lack thereof. Further, I would like illustrate how this site of nostalgia can broaden the understanding on how the Ladakhi community reproduces their past in the present, how they have preserved and enabled social order, in a time of radical transformation, using Ange’s and Berliner’s proposition, that ‘nostalgia is a fascinating angle from which to explore persistence and the disappearance of cultural forms, even more importantly, it allows for a reconciliations between, the anthropological, historical and
psychological, the continuous and the discontinuous, the persistent and the mutable, and between the past, present and future.’ (2015, 12) My aim will be to analyse the relationship that exists between nostalgia and cultural practices in the period of ‘modern acceleration’ in the context of the Ladakhi community.
Following a brief overview and background of Ladakh, I will bring forth the ethnographic data collected through my disparate field-work in Ladakh. This includes an assimilation of overlapping data, collected and then contextually connected over a course of three years, which is the duration of my work-period in the region. The data simultaneously draws on my own experiential connections and understandings as well as ethnographic evidence gathered from various primary sources. This includes an amalgamation of testimonies gathered through interviews and case studies that can further be placed in and supported by key arguments in existing research on Ladakh. Meanwhile, by placing it in the conceptual framework of nostalgia, examining nostalgic reactions and concluding how the past is reproduced in the present, I seek to explore a new site, in hope to gain an alternative and integrated perspective that suggests how there can be multiple ways of constructing the past and how this process is on-going in Ladakh. To depict this, I have chosen to analyse various sites of reproduction of the past in cultural practices. These range from village structures, material culture to everyday life sites. My aim is to bring forth a diverse range of cultural contexts and analyse them through the site of nostalgia, concluding in each if the nostalgic postures of various communities, or even the lack there of, are coherent with the understandings of modernities and their impact on how the past is being reproduced in the present. Ultimately, the findings are focussed on whether or not the cultural practices display durability in times of social change. I will further provide an analysis of each argument and conclude the inquiry through a discussion on the findings.
A brief background of Ladakh:
Ladakh, a cold desert region, tucked away in the rain shadow belt of the Western Himalayas, is a remote, high altitude area and at first glance, seems like an unlikely place to have had multiple histories. However its social and political history suggest a complex and textured fabric that has been interwoven with various over-lapping modernities. The region has had multiple
socio-historical entities, while being home to a diverse religious and ethnic demographic, since antiquity to present day. It has further been referred to as the ‘Crossroads of High Asia’ (Rizvi 1983, 75) in
light of its history in trade, specifically along the Silk Roads, given that it was purposefully poised at the axis of the sub-continent, between Central and South Asia, a fact that contributed significantly to its cultural heterogeneity. The term also generates a spatial understanding of Ladakh’s importance as a historical crossroads- an intersection of ideas, goods and people along Himalayan trade routes that flourished for centuries under various independent kingdoms of Ladakh, between the 10th and the 17th century. Before this promisingly prolonged period of independent Ladakhi kingdoms, Ladakh was under the Tibetan Empire from the late 7th /early 8th century until the 10th century. It lost its independence in 1842 again and 4 years later was incorporated in the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, ‘which acknowledged British paramountcy within the Indian empire.’ (Bray 2005, 1) Since the Indian independence from the colonial empire in 1947, it remained a part of J&K until 2019, when it was awarded the autonomy of being a union territory, a fate that was eagerly awaited by much of the Ladakhi community, despite being contested, delayed and opposed for several political and internal reasons.
Figure 1. Context Map by Timothy Stall
While this brief background itself reflects diverse influences, Ladakh was and still remains, as Fernanda Pirie puts it, the meeting point of the Islamic and Buddhist worlds and of the Tibetan and Indic cultures. (Pirie 2007, 1) However, after the colonial era ended and the nation state took its
place, a series of economic, social and environmental plans of ‘modernity’ and development made their way into the region. Further, the region was opened up to tourism, with ‘forces of
consumerism and material advancement’ spreading even to the remotest parts. (Pirie 2007, 1) Moreover, through the years, Ladakh’s borders have been demarcated, making it a highly
militarised zone of ‘strategic importance’ to the Indian state and even today, these borders remain strongly disputed, as India faces geopolitical tensions with its neighbours, Pakistan and China, as recent as the current conflicts that took place on the Indo-China border. Conclusively, the region has undergone a series of social, religious and environmental conflicts, facing interference at national and international levels. Therefore, there has been an increasing sense of nostalgic discourses surrounding the region brought in due to this notion of transformative change. It is a notion that has become essential in understanding nostalgic practices and why there has been an increased feeling of nostalgia in the post-modern era.
However, for the Ladakhi community itself, turbulent and transformative times have been on-going and ‘within a consistent and converging web of political and social upheaval, Ladakhi’s have constructed their own ideas of community and spaces of social order.’ (Pirie 2007, 1) The community is not averse to change, on the contrary, they are acutely aware of their social and cultural environment. Moreover, even as different modernities have penetrated their social and cultural orders, they have, in turn interpreted these modernities and expressed it in their own
language. Pirie writes in her book, Peace and Conflict in Ladakh as she explores the ways in which Ladakhi populations, both urban and rural maintain social orders, that ‘the experiences of modernity are vastly different but there are common threads to be found in the ways in which they manage conflict and pursue peace, constructing fragile webs of order within the boundaries of Himalayan communities.’ (Pirie 2007, 3)
Meanwhile, Martin Van Beek has suggested in his book, Modern Ladakh that there is a need to urge Ladakhi history to expand its representation, to think past conventional accounts and stereotypes. He has suggested that writers such as Helena Norberg have written on Ladakhi society to create a powerful narrative on change and development, that has been depicted as an ominous force by others. He goes on to write that the politics of these projects is easy to identify, however
‘scholarship on contemporary Ladakh is capable of entering a politicised public realm' and hence the way Ladakh is represented has effects on the people who live in the region. Further, it is not simply the political and social sites that get impacted by such narratives but simultaneously the sites
of memory of Ladakhis are shaped through this process. However, the Ladakhi community
interprets the ‘ominous forces of development’ through a range of diverse reactions. While certain rural communities display a complete lack of nostalgia and even welcome certain aspects of
development, urban Ladakhi communities have attempted to organise and formulate the experience of development through their own trajectory. NGOs and organisations aimed at preserving cultural practices, heritage tourism and ecological tourism have seen a rise amidst the urban Ladakhi communities who feel the need to preserve their culture, which they view as prone to erosion. Meanwhile, both in the rural and urban communities, certain connections between the past, present and future can be seen as forming a common thread and nostalgic practices at work here provide an interesting site to understand this highly debated issue of ‘cultural loss.’ Meanwhile, amidst various types of nostalgia, David Berliner, brings forth the term ‘exo-nostalgia’ suggesting that ‘losing culture is a nostalgic figure as old as the discipline of anthropology itself.’ (Berliner 2015, 19) He goes onto say that ‘nostalgia is hetroglossic’ and it can take many forms. (Berliner 2015, 21) His demarcations are not isolated and have been supported by various other scholars that have grouped nostalgia under different categories, giving them terms like ‘colonialist’ or ‘imperialist’ nostalgia, a field that studies the impact that Western colonialism of the East had on the communities of the colonies. Scholars have also made distinctions between individual and collective sites of nostalgia, whether it is in the context of exile, diasporas or heritage. Arjun Appadurai also gives us, ‘armchair nostalgia’ and has written on consumerist nostalgia. (Appadurai 1996, 78) (Berliner 2015, 21) Within this umbrella of different forms of nostalgia, I suggest that multiple nostalgias have been attached to the way in which the past of Ladakh has been reproduced, including consumerist, exo and endo nostalgia, more of which I will discuss through my data analysis.
I would like to analyse the following data; a combination of testimonies via interviews and disparate case studies, collected during my field work in Ladakh. Due to Ladakh’s sheer magnitude in terms of size and social diversity, to gain as comprehensive a perspective as possible, I have chosen data from an assimilation of testimonies, gathered via interviews and case studies conducted over a long period of time. I have also aimed at selecting the data from a miscellaneous demographic, not focussing on age, gender, ethnicity, religion but attempting to keep it as neutral as possible. Since the perceptions on urbanisation and tourism specifically, differ across the demographic and are starkly opposed in urban populations and remote villages, I have attempted to represent them both equally. I aim at presenting the data in its most unadulterated form, as direct quotes from testimonies, further supported by arguments and examples from secondary literature.
My ethnographic focus remains on the way in which various small communities in Ladakh, display continuity in cultural practices by resisting disruptions. I further examine them through the site of nostalgia, in an attempt to illustrate the reactions of various agents in the community to the past and the ways in which it is reproduced in the present.
There are certain limitations that have been bound within the scope of my data-collection. These primarily refer to the testimonies collected, that are subject to an ethnographic bias since they are restricted to the Ladakhi community. I have not included testimonies of external agents and while the aim has been to provide a view of the internal Ladakhi narrative, this in turn limits the reflective scope of the thesis. Secondly, the primary language used to gather the interviews and testimonies has been Hindi and while it is as widely spoken in Ladakh as Ladakhi, there are still limitations that come along with it, as there are certain words that cannot be translated from the Ladakhi language. However, in a short glossary I have attempted to translate those words from the Ladakhi dictionary as directly as possible.
The Continuation of Social Orders and the Role of Nostalgia
In this section I would like to analyse the continuing practice of ‘a sacred social space’ in the village structures of Ladakh. I would like to analyse the nostalgic reactions towards this practice and illustrate how nostalgia can be utilised as a site to understand this continuing social order.
As I have previously portrayed, the complexity of Ladakh’s political and social history suggests that we use an interdisciplinary approach to understand Ladakh’s history at different levels, without assuming that Ladakhi Studies can be a sub-division of Tibetan, Buddhist, Himalayan or South Asian studies. While religious and cultural forces continue to tug at Ladakh from all directions, there has also been an ever-growing struggle of power relations within the structures of society in Ladakh. (Pirie 2009, 196) In her book, Pirie refers to the ‘all-powerful Tibetan monasteries,’ a structure that exercises a huge amount of power in the Ladakhi community. (Pirie 2009, 196) This has also shaped the politics of identity in Ladakh, leading to disputes between the Islamic and Buddhist factions, particularly given the national and global context. Alongside religious divides, there have been historic tensions with Kashmir, meanwhile power structures from the Indian nation state have penetrated Ladakhi systems of governance. But while development projects,
consumeristic advancements, modern democratic and judiciary ideals have seeped in, the Ladakhi community have found ‘numerous sources of order.’ As Pirie writes, ‘there has been simultaneous distancing of external power holders.’ (Pirie 2009, 197) She suggests that what has happened inertly, is that instead of these forces displacing Ladakhi identity, they have given rise to an acute sense of regional identity. ‘Wars, communal tensions and the regions incorporation into India have shaped ideas about regional autonomy.’ (Pirie 2009, 197) She goes on to write about how local forms of social orders, including moral norms have continued to become stronger alongside the ideas of modernity. Herein, Ladakhis have reproduced a social order despite disruptions and utilised it find their own understanding of modernity. (Pirie 2009, 197)
While Ladakhis have found numerous ‘sources of order’ (Pirie 2009, 197) under a dramatic and evolving range of political, social and environmental influences, there is still, both, a visible distrust and acceptance of new modernities. ‘More localised forms of order have been simultaneously maintained in numerous small communities, of which Ladakh is composed.’ (Pirie 2009, 197) This is a reflection of the way village communities have displayed continuity in change and have developed alongside ‘powerful ideological forces of Buddhism and the economic, ecological and material values of the late 20th century.’ (Pirie 2009, 197) Pririe’s focus lies mainly on how Ladakhis use persisting social orders to resolve internal conflict and social disputes, both in the newly urbanised populations and those in the remote villages.
A detailed example draws on the village of Photoksar, where a conflict between urban elites of an organisation called SECMOL (Students Education and Cultural Movement of Ladakh) and the monastic establishment was resolved without the use of recently established judicial systems brought in via the modern Indian state, instead, they were resolved using the persisting ideal that holds the community as sacred, the monastic institution as the highest and demands that disorder be resolved internally, between the two conflicting parties. Pirie suggests through her extensive analysis that various urban elites have retained social values and identity structure that they formed in their local, village communities and adapted them to the new trajectories of modernity that have penetrated through. In this case, their own organisation SECMOL is devoted to the preservation of Ladakhi culture. Here, a nostalgic reaction can be seen manifesting itself in the urban elites, who have segregated themselves from rural Ladakh through social and economic mobility and see themselves as agents that need to preserve the culture of Ladakh.
However, the paradox, as highlighted remains that while navigating new trajectories of modernity and secular ideas of justice and human rights, the urban elites in question still resort to the mediation process that was used previously in village communities and would rather refrain from taking the matter to court. Through this, Pririe displays ‘the ontological, moral and epistemological concerns that govern Ladakhi ideas concerning conflict.’ (Pirie 2009, 198) The common realm here is the idea that community is sacred, an idea that both the urban and rural Ladakhis hold onto and create a space of order in their community for this idea to persist by distancing themselves from external modes of centralised power that are brought in by the state. Thus, ‘a ceremonial restoration of order’ (Pirie 2009, 198) was used to resolve the conflict between Ladakhi elites from SECMOL and the two monks that they had a dispute with. Pririe brings in the ‘idea of a sacred social space’ and Durkheim’s proposition ‘the social is sacred to the extent that it must be preserved.’ (Pririe 2009, 201) and applies to the ritual of dralgo, which is the village meeting and ceremonial resolution of disputes and further, the maintenance of yulpa, a village body that is called in to resolve conflict and can exert their authority to restore good relations. Herein, it is crucial, that the community as a moral whole is maintained, however the idea of morality and justice which is held onto is that of the past, that which creates local autonomy and not the one brought in by the modern nation state. It is inherent in a complex village hierarchy, where equality is found by resolving conflicts internally. It is interesting to note that the village body here, think of themselves as an extended family and this notion has remain unchanged, as has their idea of justice and morality.
Again, nostalgia as a site becomes active, as in the present political order, many external forces have attempted to assimilate themselves into the Ladakhi power hierarchy. However, it is the notion of a sacred social order, that persists from the past and displays resilience, in maintaining the urban and rural Ladakhi structures from within. They remain, in the present as they were in the past, functioning from the ground up. Rural local discourses emphasise that external homogenising forces do not have an impact on the internal village social structures. One such testimony I gathered of a member of the village municipality depicts this,
‘The villages in Ladakh are very strong and we are all like family. We always solve our issues on our own, we don’t need any court for that! It is important that this continues because I do not think it possible for any other system of governance that can work here. Ladakh is different and we need our own ways to deal with our specific issues.’
‘Whether it is about land or water, or anything political happening, sometimes there are fights between Buddhist and Islamic houses but even then we resolve it within ourselves. We have our village elders and we
include the youth in decision making too. That is simply how it has always been. Changes outside will keep happening but these things will not change much according to me.’
Here, instead of being an ache for the past, nostalgia simply emerges as a practical way to connect the past and present. It accounts for two things. Firstly, with the introduction of new judicial systems and in times of social and political change, it shows that the Ladakhi community has internally employed their own persisting idea of social order and almost entirely dismissed any external forces. Secondly, it shows a common thread between urban Ladakhis, who view the past with a nostalgia and hold onto a need ‘to preserve it for future generations’ and rural Ladakhis, who view the past with a lack of lament or loss. Instead they view it as very much intact in the present, the way it needs to be. The commonality is that despite their varying nostalgic and non-nostalgic reactions, there is a point of convergence on the idea of mediating conflicts through the same ‘sacred social order’ that has been maintained from the past.
Pririe suggests, ‘this accounts for the resilience and re-emergence of distinct social shapes in the much more fluid and complex world of the modern urban centre.’ (Pririe 2009, 202) It is important to note, that while in the judicial centre of Ladakh, legal bureaucratic systems have been deployed, in the villages, local communities have chosen to maintain this autonomy in an attempt to continually reproduce their practice from the past. The Ladakhi word for inside or within, nangkuli, is an important one and is sought to be maintained both within the old and new community establishments. Further, while power relations have always persisted in Ladakh for centuries, from kings and aristocrats to present day monastic establishments and village authorities, what has remained consistent is that then and even now, internal conflicts, including serious conflicts over water (of which there is a severe scarcity) and irrigation are resolved through goba (headman) and chupon (water official), not through lawyers, courts and legal systems.
A sense of community and a sense of sacred social space remains undisrupted in times of social change and nostalgia towards this ‘sacred social order’ can be used to understand how this is a form of resistant nostalgia. The sacred social order highlighted here is not an abstract concept. Pririe highlights that while there is no Ladakhi word for ‘order’ directly, there are a range of different words and phrases that are translatable to the idea of resolution. For example, ‘drig-song’ means ‘it is okay again’ and ‘trangpo’ means ‘straight and honest like a piece of wood.’ Further the Ladakhi dictionary has a range of other moral terms that refer to truth, honesty, sincerity- all indicating that a
resolution of conflict is essential to the Ladakhi social order. (Pririe 2009, 125) As Pririe puts it, ‘the restoration of order, is simply a return to normality.’
Similarly, while there are introductions of new modernities, Berliner’s concept of nostalgia as understanding how communities conduct the change around them and find a space for continuity can be applied here. Berliner suggests that one must question the idea that regional and local communities are fragile and that their traditions are prone to breaking and falling apart. On the contrary, he suggests, ‘cultural change and persistence manifest themselves through copious use of notions such as memory, resurgence, revival, reinvention, resilience, syncretism, invented traditions, heritage and neo-traditionalism.’ (Belriner 2015, 26) It is the simple notion that despite transformation, cultural and social environments display resistance towards disrupted equilibriums and find ways to evolve and adapt, persist and prevail and re-emerge as a continuous rather than as a fragmented or lost entity. ‘The reproduction of societies’ and ‘the continuity of representations’ occurs despite dramatic changes. (Belriner 2015, 26) I would like to propose through this analysis that the Ladakhi community has displayed cultural persistence by letting the ‘sacred social order’ reproduce organically, by drawing on the past, adapting to the present and converging it into something new.
Continuity in Material Culture: Textiles and Copper
In this section I would like to analyse two forms of material culture in different villages of Ladakh. Each has persisted and adapted in its own way, charting a different course through the post-modern period. I will analyse the nostalgic reactions towards these practices through testimonies of individuals that have engaged with the practice in different contexts.
Carpet Weaving in Ladakh
Various cultural practices in Ladakh have been maintained, ranging from fields as diverse as medicine to arts and crafts, festivals, oracle rituals, all the way to every-day household practices. However, very few practices have been clearly identified and recorded. One of the few that was first mentioned by Marco Pallis in 1946 was in his book Peaks and Lamas, in which he talks about a carpet weaver, ‘the only man with any reputation for weaving rugs.’ (Pallis 1946, 296) Later, in the 2000s, Monisha Ahmed, another researcher who has worked on textiles in the region, identifies this
man as Sonam Paljor from the village of Khaltse, writing on the importance of his role in the acknowledgement of carpet weaving as a practice. (Ahmed 2008, 68)
While carpets certainly grew to become an expensive item in the economic market of Ladakh, as well as an attraction for tourists in the region, their primordial intent was local and immediate. Ladakh’s frigid temperatures required that all homes, monasteries, yurts, mosques alike utilised carpets and rugs woven from wool to increase the warmth indoors. They were not initially intended for decorative purposes but for practical ones, like sleeping, seating and as saddle coverings. Meanwhile, during the extreme and long winter, carpet-weaving was an activity in the nomadic region of Chang-thang, that often brought together various members of the house-hold and village. Various techniques and hand-looms were used to fit the shape and size required for household and monasteries alike. Before the Indian independence in 1947, when Ladakh’s borders were more fluid, carpets and carpet-weaving techniques were regularly brought in and exchanged through trade with Central Asia.
I would like to illustrate three nostalgic reactions towards the carpet-weaving practice in Ladakh. First, is the nostalgic reaction of members from the village communities that use these carpets in everyday sites, meanwhile also preserving them as a connection towards their Central Asian roots and trading past. Secondly, is the reaction of external agents like the Christian Missionaries who sought to preserve this practice by establishing schools and organisations. Thirdly, is the nostalgic reaction of Ladakhi urban elites, who have chosen to display these carpets in museums, while also starting initiatives and organisations aimed at preserving the hand-loom practice in the present day. Through this, I would like to analyse how multiple nostalgias are attached to this form of material culture and why it is crucial to distinguish between them. Lastly, I would like to draw an analysis through this to suggest that nostalgia here offers a site to understand how the practice of carpet-weaving is being reproduced in the present by different groups.
Ladakh’s spatial capacity affords it a very convenient position for trade, as Janet Rizvi wrote, ‘Ladakh is situated squarely between some of the great mercantile towns of south and central Asia.’ (Rizvi 1983, 75) The 16th and 17th centuries saw the peak of trade, amidst which carpets and rugs were a reoccurring object. The exchange of techniques was specifically done with Tibet and Yarkand and overtime through interaction, the communities formed various ties. Various families in Ladakh today, have overlapping Tibetan and Yarkandi roots and view their trading past with a
nostalgic reaction. The carpets are a ‘symbol of prestige’ (Ahmed 2008, 70) of this trading past and various households ensure to separate the carpets and rugs, used for everyday activities and those used for special occasions and festivals. Meanwhile, the nostalgic reaction towards the carpet-weaving practice amidst these groups is hardly one of loss. While the rural Ladakhi community seek to ensure that the ‘special’ carpets are kept free from any damage and remain preserved, the nostalgic reaction is rooted in practicality for everyday life simultaneously. It is reflective of a very common house-hold practice seen in an array of different societies, wherein, there is a simple and practical segregation between items used for special occasions or guests, those used in everyday life and those passed on from ancestors, as inheritance. This can be seen as a form of endo-nostalgia, a term coined by David Berliner that he uses to describe, ‘nostalgia for the past one has lived personally, implying a sense of personal ownership for the past.’ (Berliner 2012, 781) It is not essentially a nostalgic discourse where the past is viewed as disappearing and there is no alarming need that arises here to sanctify heritage and preserve traditions. While nostalgic discourses create a foundation for heritage tourism in Ladakh, they do not prevail in the cultural practices of the rural Ladakhi community. Rather, the nostalgia that can be seen manifesting here, is a common, practical and everyday nostalgia, for a past that has been lived personally and exists now in the present, displaying natural and practical continuity. While the descendants of the Tibetan and Yarkandi trading community make the initiative to preserve the carpets that have been in their family for generations, they do so with the overlapping, practical practice of segregating household items, as I mentioned earlier. It is rooted in an ordinary interpretation of a personal past, without the assumption that this past might vanish. Therefore it is not visualised as a form that is disappearing but simply as a part of everyday-life, leading to a natural reproduction of the past in the present.
The second nostalgic reaction towards the carpet-weaving practice can be seen in the Moravian Missionaries that came to Ladakh in the end of the 19th century from England and Germany. (Ahmed 2008, 72) Records of their work in diverse field can still be found and there is a descendant community and various schools and churches that still prevail in Ladakh. Monisha Ahmed, a researcher working on textiles in the region writes about one of the missionaries, Walter Asboe, a local priest who started an Industrial School in Leh, where weavers could work and simultaneously train others, to ensure that the practice was preserved. (Ahmed 2002, 24) (Ahmed 2008, 72) She also records how Walter Asboe tracked down the man who was known for his exemplary carpet-weaving work, Sonam Paljor from the village of Khaltse and brought him to work in the Industrial School, in the town of Leh. She records Asboe’s statement, ‘It occurred to me that in order to
preserve this art of carpet weaving, I would have to bring him to teach two or three youths, so I employed him a good wage to do this.’ (Asboe 1950, 37) (Ahmed 2008, 72) The nostalgic reaction that manifests here, is not originating from a past that has been personally experienced but for the past of a different community and their history. Berliner terms this as exo-nostalgia, ‘nostalgia for the past not experienced personally but a vicarious nostalgia for someone else’s historical past.’ (Berliner 2012, 781) The missionaries were one such external agent that sought to preserve the traditions of the Ladakhi community, however over the course of time there have been various external organisations that have brought in similar initiatives in Ladakh. This nostalgic posture towards carpet-weaving depicts how the issue of cultural loss leads to external nostalgia from various groups. In this case, instead of preserving and reproducing the actual practice of carpet-weaving, an aestheticised and beautified version of the practice prevails today, in similar Industrial schools and handicraft emporiums that engage with the development of a growing body of heritage tourism in Ladakh.
Lastly, the reaction of the urban Ladakhi elites towards the carpet weaving practice is another form of endo-nostalgia, however, while it is a nostalgia for the historical past of their own community, it is one that needs to be distinguished from the ordinary and practical posture of the rural Ladakhi community. It is crucial to note here, that various members of the elite Ladakhi community have left Ladakh in their childhood to pursue higher education in India and abroad, then returned to establish various NGOs and tourist agencies devoted to preserving heritage and preserving the environment. Herein, the nostalgic reaction that manifests reflects a different understanding of history and time altogether. There is a growing need to protect and preserve the past, while engaging with its economic and social prospects in the present. Many disconnected agents can be seen converging here, through the site of nostalgia that could possibly paint a picture for the future of practices such as carpet weaving in Ladakh. Here, the nostalgic posture of local elites works to create concrete initiatives on ground, by engaging with a) NGOs and researchers from both within the country and outside and starting organisations for cultural preservation, that in their view might benefit Ladakh both economically and socially and b) the creating of an extensive site of heritage tourism that has gained increasing precedence over the last two decades. Meanwhile, carpets and rugs are displayed in museums and the weaving practice is often termed as a ‘disappearing art.’ The increasing need to museumify objects arises from the endo-nostalgia that views their past as disappearing and combines it with experiences that the urban Ladakhi elites might have had in Ladakh during their childhood. It can be seen as a reaction, seeking to recreate this experience and ensure that it remains
intact for future generations. Moreover, these nostalgic reactions engage directly with the creation of an increasing preoccupation with heritage tourism in Ladakh. Simultaneously, they nurture a nostalgia that tourists tend to consume and is becoming increasingly popular, growing in its appetite and urge to engage with the ‘local.’
The three diverse nostalgic postures depict that the sites of reproduction of the same practice have been engaged with differently by various groups. Herein, nostalgia provides insight to how certain practices are not reproduced coherently within the Ladakhi community but in fact have multiple nostalgias attached to it. Simultaneously, they reveal different relationships formed by disconnected groups between the past and present, providing scope to understand how this practice might evolve in the future. As Berliner puts it, ‘nostalgic reactions are anything but singular.’ (Berliner 2012, 770) They are formulated uniquely for diverse groups and agents, reflecting their own experiences and engagements with the past. Ultimately, ‘Nostalgia takes on different forms and dimensions, engaging an array of social agents, interests, forces and locations.’ (Bisell 2005, 239)
The Copper Valley: Generational Nostalgia
Whilst the practice of carpet-weaving has evoked multiple nostalgic postures, when it comes to material culture, each practice has followed a different path and engaged multiple agents. Views towards persisting cultural environments and the production of objects within, draw out divided reactions, even within families and generations. To bring forth the evolving nostalgic postures within different Ladakhi generations, I would like to analyse the following case study based on an interview I conducted with a copper-smith from the village of Chilling, at the periphery of the Zanskar Valley in Ladakh. The village has several households that have been historically involved in the practice and production of copper vessels like ornaments, household items and a range of instruments and equipment used in monasteries. The practice can be traced back to the 17th century, when under the Namgyal Dynasty rule several Nepalese copper-smiths were brought in to work in Ladakh by the King Deldan Namgyal on a Shakyamuni Buddha Statue for the Shey Palace in the old capital of Ladakh. Once the statues were finished, the copper-smiths created settlements in villages spanning Ladakh, including Taru, Chemdre, Skyu and Gaya. This practice then became wide-spread and grew to become the backbone of sustenance in these villages for centuries. It has been continued into the present day, as a practice being passed down within generations.
Herein, I would like to present the testimony of Tsering Jigmet who is a sergar or a copper-smith in the village of Chilling, Ladakh. It offers a first hand account of his direct engagement with the cultural practice and its production, which has been maintained in his family for generations. I would like to examine the way the practice has been reproduced through the site of nostalgia and the relationship between the two. The interview was conducted in Hindi, which is as commonly spoken as Ladakhi, due to prolonged Indian and Nepalese influences over time. I have translated it into English, as directly as possible, while trying to minimise to the best of my ability, the limitations of a language bias.
“I was five years old when I was meant to start school. But in those days there was no road connecting Chilling to Leh and so I could only go to school a few times a month. But then I began to learn the work of a copper-smith from meme-le.” (Translating to grand-father) “By the time I was 12, I had begun practising and remained with my grandfather until I was 24. Being a sergar requires intricacy and patience, so for 20 years I practiced before I could start contributing to the family work. When my grandfather passed, I carried on the family work. It was his inheritance to me and I simply knew I had to continue it.”
“In the summer, days are longer, I have much more time and I can produce 6-7 objects a day. Currently I am working on 42 different types of spoons, all of which are hand-crafted and serve a different purpose. Some are decorative, those take the longest because the designs are delicate and if I make one mistake I have to start all over again. One also needs an understanding of chemistry to produce a flawless object. The temperatures need to be perfectly regulated, the smelting has to be done efficiently, the exposure to air has to be monitored.”
“But as long as the process is, these utensils are build to last even longer. Some of the spoons and butter-lamps in my house have been used for centuries and are still in great condition. However, the gold, copper, brass and silver, used to be purer during my grandfather’s time when it was derived straight from the river Zanskar. The river is very important for us because it is a source of water for the villagers and it is our source of life because it gave us copper. In fact zhans translates to copper and is how the river and the valley gets its name.”
“There are people doing the work with machines now but it is not the same. The zhans and raghan used is adulterated. The machine work is not made to last, it only produces in large numbers so people can earn more money. But the life of the utensil is extremely short as opposed to when it is handcrafted. Moreover, there are certain utensils, like chang and butter-tea makers that machines cannot replicate.”
“The life of a copper-smith has been passed on to us as an inheritance. It is our heritage, our life’s work. And is more valuable to us than any statue or ornament we can build. It will simply have to continue in one way or another. As far as money is concerned, I understand that it is important but I have always been able to support my family sufficiently. I sent my children to school and then for higher education. Money should be enough but never too much.”
“My absolute favourite thing to make is Gyeling. It is like a flute, an instrument used in monasteries. An extravagant Gyeling can take a month to make. It is a beautiful instrument, I love making it and playing it both. It is also a huge honour to make them for monasteries.”
“I never wanted to restrict my son. I know all the other children of copper-smiths had left for jobs in tourism or joined the army or another government job. In fact there are only 3 of us left in a village who do the work properly now. But I sent my son to study. I told him to do his masters. I did not want him to have regrets or to feel forced into the family work. But then my son came back on his own. He started a museum in our heritage house and he also started to learn the work of a copper-smith from me. I worry if I have enough time with him, because he started at 28 while I started at 5. I am 55 now and I hope that there will be enough time to pass on all my knowledge to him.”
‘Nostalgia can be a bitter-sweet side effect of modernity.’ (Atia and Davies 2010, 181) While using nostalgia as an interpretative tool of analysis here, I would like to propose that it can be used to understand a growing sense of compromise with modernity for many marginalised groups in the Ladakhi community. The copper-smiths emerge as one such group, who have come to terms with evolving modernities and defined their own path within it. Meanwhile, when combined with sites of memory, this nostalgia becomes a very important way of remembering and reproducing the past because the history of the copper-smiths has not been ‘legitimised by more rigid kinds of historiographic understanding’ (Atia and Davies 2010, 181) and has not been recorded or represented in any mode of formal history despite there being several oral histories that connect it back to the 17th century.
However, here nostalgia emerges as a way of directing historical consciousness and has shaped the way copper-smiths like Tsering view their past, present and future. He says, ‘When my grandfather passed, I carried on the family work, it was an inheritance and I simply had to continue it.’ The endo-nostalgic reaction towards his grandfather and the continuation of his work is evident when he suggests that it was not a matter of question but simply a practice that had to continue. His nostalgic preoccupation is not with any strict form of loss but with what remains, the practice of being a copper-smith and why it must continue. Certain approaches to nostalgia might even suggest that there is a healing trope in this posture that eliminates the emotional capacity of nostalgia and views it as giving loss a substantial form in the present. Nostalgia here reveals a way in which copper-smiths ‘negotiate between continuity and discontinuity. It insists on the bond between their present selves and a certain fragment of the past but also from the force of separation from what has been lost.’ (Atia and Davies 2010, 184) Through nostalgia, we can visualise how the past is being re-interpreted in the present, giving it form and context, meanwhile the social actor- Tsering himself, has shaped his own understanding of modernity and the present through it. He has himself, experienced the past and formulated it in the present, in his own unique way.
Meanwhile there is a sense of awareness of these modernities, ‘There are people doing work with machines but it is not the same.’ In Tsering’s words, there is a prevailing knowledge and acceptance of modernity and that there has been transformation from external forces. However, he also displays a sense of disinterest in it and dismisses the machine work being done as ‘not made to last.’ Simultaneously, his nostalgic posture displays reassurance in the vessels produced by hand. He
claims that certain ornaments and vessels are too intricate to be reproduced by machines, whereas others use adulterated copper and brass, thereby giving them a shorter life span. Here, the nostalgia attached to hand-made vessels is reinforcing a sense of identity that has prevailed within the copper-smith community because it reinstates a prospect within which their practice must continue. Davis writes, ‘Some of the most sophisticated, of all analyses of nostalgia, have described it in terms of the continuity that it gives to to our identity in an age of unsettling change.’ (Davis 1979) In this case, the nostalgic reaction towards the past is rooted in identity, however, identity itself is being viewed as something evolving. It is not static, nor is it shaped by loss. ‘Our identity itself is not simply a matter of preserving continuously the self-hood embodied in some earliest gem or seed of consciousness.’ (Atia and Davies 2010, 184) Herein, identity is not visualised as rooted in the continuation of the past but as a combination of the past and who we are in the present. I propose that the nostalgic reaction within the copper-smith community is occurring in a similar manner. In fact, it is being established in the discontinuity, in the present, by adapting to a changing modernity.
The practice of copper-smiths is being reproduced in the present, in accordance with this evolving relationship with the past. It is yet another way to understand how the Ladakhi community has practiced continuity in times of transformation. ‘We are inclined to define who we are by reference to the least determined of our choices, the characteristically individual ways in which we have responded to our circumstances. As subjects of modernity, the continuity of our identity resides precisely in our most personal discontinuities, in the ways we have altered and created ourselves.’ (Atia & Davies 2010, 184) Here, nostalgia becomes a way of understanding how evolving identity, particularly in marginalised and under-represented communities, becomes a very strong way of remembering and reproducing the past, ‘a potent form of sub-altern memory.’ (Atia & Davies 2010, 181) This can also be reflected in the way that nostalgia here is being transitioned from father to son. In his testimony, Tsering mentions that he never intended to force his son into the family work. Here, nostalgia can be seen in transition, as being passed on from Tsering to his son who after his education decided to return and start a museum. However, it can also be seen changing, manifesting differently in his son, who is interacting with the emerging heritage tourism landscape in Ladakh.
The nostalgic posture towards the copper-smith community as formulated by the urban Ladakhi population is one that visualises the community as disappearing and with it, there is a concern that soon there will be ‘no original copper-smiths left in Ladakh,’ as one source put it. As I have
mentioned previously, this falls under the same vein as the ‘tropes of vanishing cultures’ (Berliner 2015, 17) and those of cultural loss that have been evoked in different contexts globally and deployed by various agents for a diverse range of purposes. However, I would like propose through my analysis, that the copper-smith community has not formulated a preoccupation with their past and instead simply used it to reinvent their position in the present. The community has changed, as can been seen in the transition from Tsering to his son and the difference between their nostalgic reactions, however, they show a common thread. Just as Tsering adapted to his circumstances and the cultural practice to his present, his son can be seen as doing the same. The trope of heritage tourism is one that many locals are engaging with and while it may not be the same way in which a practice was reproduced in the past, it might be the way it will adapt in the future. Once again, the site of nostalgia has been an active one- connecting the past, present and future.
Figure 2 & 3: Tsering Jigmet working on a spoon in his workshop; The final product. (Both images originally taken by me with Tsering’s approval for use)
Everyday Sites of Nostalgia: The Ladakhi household
In Ladakh, social interaction occurs more in the everyday sites of life than in any other. These sites are continually active and engaging a dynamic range of factors and agents. Meanwhile, various nostalgic postures can be observed in these sites and can be used to understand how the past has been maintained in some, while changing in others. The Ladakhi household is one such active site that is central to the Ladakhi way of life and shapes many crucial factors such as identity and memory. I would like bring forth the testimony of Sonam Spaldon, a middle-aged woman from the village of Stakna, on the Eastern banks of the Indus in Ladakh. The testimony provides insight into the inner-workings of a Ladakhi household and specifically reflects her nostalgic postures towards the many communal practices that take place within its confines on a daily basis. Sonam and her
family lived initially in an ancestral home that had been in their family for almost 200 years. Due to the time duration itself, the extent of the nostalgic attachment towards this ancestral home would be expected to be quite high. However, in time, Sonam and her family have moved out of the house for practical purposes and instead, chosen to reproduce the ancestral home as a space for storage, cattle, a small temple and various other purposes. They now live in an extended home adjacent to the ancestral home, which has been built by employing more modern architectural techniques. I would like to primarily analyse Sonam’s nostalgic postures towards this shift through her testimony.
“In a Ladakhi household, each member has certain duties and assigned chores and partakes in the structure of the household. My family was a large one and three generations of us lived together. I was always happiest doing the duties in the fields or with the cattle and not inside the house. But we all did our bit. We first lived in the ancestral house but as the house grew older it became more and more difficult to maintain it. It was also built almost 200 years ago and many of the materials it was built with are not practical anymore. The climate has changed, the environment has changed and so we too have to change with it.”
“The house we built adjacent is built with new materials and the maintenance is easier. The old house was all made of mud-brick and it became more and more difficult to clean. But the new house has hard floors and cleaning this house is worse for my body, it hurts more. The old house with brick was better for my body I think. New house or old house, the work, the rituals and the chores are the same.”
The communal room or main room of a Ladakhi household remains largely unchanged in her testimony. She explains the practice of the daily communal gathering in the household at the end of a days work, gathered around the thap or a multi-purpose, mud-brick hearth in the centre and each member partaking in a certain activity, from cooking to cleaning. Meanwhile, the members of the house-hold sit in accordance of age, as a way of the younger generation displaying respect for the elderly.
“Even in my grandfathers time it was the same, we all did our days work and then in the evening we would cook together, recite stories and songs. The changsa is the most important of the house of course, sometimes I think the other rooms are unnecessary. Everything is done here. But nowadays the young kids want to have their own rooms.”
“The room opposite the changsa was extended into being the celebration room if you could not have one big one. In all the villages there is a time when each household has to hold a five day losar (Tibetan new year) celebration in the house. For five days two families get the responsibility to host. And the entire village gathers together. There is separate part for the monks and the village head. But nowadays sometimes because the structure of the household has changed, we just do it outside the house in a small tent if there are two many people.”
The discourse towards the practice of building traditional houses, maintaining communal practices and daily household rituals is a complex and multi-layered one and to divulge its various components is far beyond the scope of this paper. There are varying positions towards these practices from local elites and NGOs that have attempted to preserve vernacular architecture and certain sites such as ‘Old Town of Leh’ which has been protected under the Tibetan Heritage Fund.
