Khumi Indigenous People
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Submission Date: 9 th December, 2009 Assignment on ii Table of Content Introduction Definition of Indigenous People History of Indigenous People o Australia o Africa o Asia o Bangladesh Khumi indigenous People Who are Khumi Indigenous People Location of Khumi Indigenous People History of Khumi Indigenous People Language of Khumi Indigenous People Religion of Khumi Indigenous People Educational Condition of Khumi Indigenous People Economic Condition of Khumi Indigenous People Social Condition of Khumi Indigenous People Health Practice of Khumi Indigenous People Women condition of Khumi Indigenous People • Conclusion iii Introduction “The dead, it is said, do not live to tell the tale, but this is not true in ethnic cleansing. The dead do tell the tale; it is the living, who are reluctant to speak”. Horowitz, Donald (2001): The Deadly Ethnic Riot . University of California Press, Los Angeles. Indigenous Peoples are a significant and important portion of humanity. Their heritage, their ways of life, their stewardship of this planet, and their cosmological insights are an invaluable treasure house for us all. The word Indigenous has many meanings. In every region of the world, many different cultural groups live together and interact, but not all of these groups are considered indigenous or inherent to their particular geographic area. In fact, it is only in the face of a collective or shared sense of identity that the term indigenous peoples have been internationally recognized. Indigenous Peoples live in every region of the world. They live in climates ranging from Arctic cold to Amazon heat, and often claim a deep connection to their lands and natural environments. For many indigenous peoples, the natural world is a valued source of food, health, spirituality and identity. Land is both a critical resource that sustains life and a major cause of struggle and even death. Each indigenous culture is distinct and unique. While many peoples may express similar worldviews and a common indigenous identity, their cultures are nonetheless based on different histories, environments, and creative spirits. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights affirms the inherent dignity, equality, and inalienable rights of all members of the human family. The rights of all members of indigenous populations are included in this declaration. However, Indigenous Peoples also have rights as distinct cultural groups or nations. "Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect." (Chief Seattle, 2008). The situation of the indigenous people in the world is not encouraging. According to an estimate, there are about 370 million indigenous people spread across 70 countries. Individual groups practice their uniqueness, different from those of the dominant communities they live in. They are the descendents of those who originally took up habitation in a geographical location. Other settlers, who came through conquest, occupation, encroachment, or other means, gradually joined them. Ultimately, when and where these intruders and occupiers became more dominant than the original population, the indigenous people were displaced and driven away from their ancestral homelands. Today, these indigenous populations iv throughout the globe, including Bangladesh, are facing similar problems and are fighting for their land and way of life. Bangladesh has quite a few varieties of indigenous communities living in various parts of the country. Though the total indigenous population is about one million, or less than 1% of the total population, it consists of 45 indigenous communities using about 26 different languages. Most indigenous people live in the rural settings of Chittagong Hills and in the regions of Mymensingh, Sylhet and Rajshahi. Most of the tribal people are of Sino-Tibetan descent, and have distinctive Mongolian features. These indigenous people differ in their social organization, marriage customs, birth and death rites, food, and other social customs, from the people of the rest of the country. In the mid-1980s, the percentage distribution of tribal population by religion was Buddhist 44, Hindu 24, Christian 13, and others 19. Each indigenous community, however small it may be, has a distinctive culture and heritage. The leaders from those communities express concern that those are fading away due to lack of government patronization and aggressive activities by sections of local people. They complain that their rights are often violated both by the government and by Bengalis. These can be protected only if the government shows more awareness and sensitivity to indigenous causes and comes forward and take steps. Bangladesh is a poor country. But, it may not be wrong to say that, with very few exceptions, Bangladesh's indigenous peoples are by and large the poorest among the poor. It cannot be denied that they face discrimination in education, employment, and civil rights. Decades of violence between indigenous-led insurgencies and government security forces in the Chittagong Hill Tracts gave rise to social tensions there which still persist despite the signing of a peace accord nearly ten years ago. Allegations of serious human and civil rights abuses against members of indigenous communities surface every now and then. The diversity of our culture due to the presence of indigenous communities is providing extra vigor to the national fabric of Bangladesh. Moreover, indigenous people are the original inhabitants of our country. So, they have the same right we have over Bangladesh, if not more. v Definition of Indigenous People The term indigenous peoples or autochthonous peoples can be used to describe any ethnic group of people who inhabit a geographic region with which they have the earliest known historical connection, alongside migrants which have populated the region and which are greater in number.[1] However, several widely accepted formulations, which define the term indigenous peoples in stricter terms, have been put forward by prominent and internationally recognized organizations, such as the United Nations, the International Labor Organization and the World Bank. The indigenous people are defined from the various conditions and specialists. So the definition of indigenous people can be found various differences. Now we should focus some of the definitions that are given various specialists and organizations. Some of them as follow- - Indigenous people are the people living in an area prior to colonization by a state or the people living in an area within a nation state, prior to the formation of the nation state, but who do not identify with the dominant nation or the descendants of either of the above. • David Maybury-Lewis, in his famous book “ Indigenous Peoples, Ethnic Groups, and the State ”(1997,p 99) defines- "Indigenous peoples, though they are difficult to define..., in fact make up about 5% of the total population of the globe. They are the descendants of peoples who were marginalized by the major powers and especially the expanding empires in their regions of the world--the European overseas empires in the Americas, Africa, Asia and Australasia, and the Russian and Chinese land empires in the heartland of Eurasia." • The United Nations Economic and Social Council, Commission on Human Rights has adopted the following definition: “Indigenous Populations are composed of the existing descendants of the peoples who inhabited the present territory of a country wholly or partially at the time when persons of a different culture or ethnic origin arrived there from other parts of the world, overcame them and, by conquest, settlement or other means, reduced them to a non-dominant or colonial situation; who today live more in conformity with their particular social, economic and cultural customs and traditions than the institutions of the country of which they now form a part, under a state structure that incorporates mainly the national, social and vi cultural characteristics of other segments of the population that are predominant. (U.N., UNESCO, ref: E/Cn.4./Sub.2/L.566, 1982). Although they have not suffered conquest or colonization, isolated or marginal groups existing in the country should be regarded as covered by the notion of "Indigenous Populations" for the following reasons: a) They are descendants of groups which were in the territory of the country at the time when other groups of different cultures or ethnic origins arrived there; b) Precisely because of their isolation from other segments of the country's population they have preserved almost intact the customs and traditions of their ancestors which are similar to those characterized as indigenous; c) They are, even if? Only formally, placed under a state structure which incorporates national, social and cultural characteristics alien to theirs. • The UN Commission on Human Rights has provided the following definition: “Indigenous people are composed of the peoples who inhabited the present territory of a country wholly or partially at the time when persons of a different culture or ethnic origin came there by conquest”. (UN minorities.com) History of Indigenous People The history of indigenous people all over the world is not same. It has different colors and history. So it is not possible to draw history from the one slide. We have to search based on the continent or country. Now we can focus some of the selective continent and countries which are more popular for indigenous people. Australia Aborigines are Australia's indigenous people. Recent government statistics counted approximately 400,000 aboriginal people, or about 2% of Australia's total population. Australian Aborigines migrated from somewhere in Asia at least 30,000 years ago. Though they comprise 500–600 distinct groups, aboriginal people possess some unifying links. Among these are strong spiritual vii beliefs that tie them to the land; a tribal culture of storytelling and art; and, like other indigenous populations, a difficult colonial history. When Australia was “discovered” by the Europeans it was declared to be terranullius.