1Being a Hunter-Gatherer in the 21st Century: Health Knowledge 2System, Problems and Paradoxes
3Rakesh Kumar 4National Institute of Advanced Studies, 5Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India [email protected] [email protected] 8https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8435-2270 9
10 Abstract 11 12 In due course of evolution, maintaining health and coping with aggrievances 13 and illness for survival or adaptation has always been the goal of organisms, 14 which has been verified by the narrative aeons of ancient culture and 15 archaeological shreds of evidence of natural, non-natural/synthetic diseases, 16 accidents and injuries. The earlier discussion on hunter-gatherer’s health, 17 illness, and healthcare management knowledge system involves the 18 discourse of epidemiological transitions. This research aims to understand 19 the health knowledge system of present-day hunter-gatherers through 20 cross-cultural comparison beyond the dichotomy of natural diseases and 21 rational treatments. The researcher has focused on four contemporary 22 hunter-gatherer’s communities i.e. Aranadan, Cholanaicken, Kattunayakan, 23 Paniyan/Kattupaniyan of Nilambur valley, Kerala to understand the hunter- 24 gatherer’s perception/conception of health and illness and what are 25 mechanisms of healthcare and healing among them. This research has 26 highlighted the problem of static versus dynamic in the conception of health 27 in the time spatiotemporal transition and the existing uniformity in the 28 conception of health despite the diversity in socio-cultural practices. The 29 research also delineates of hunter-gatherers relation to landscape (in the 30 context of health and healthcare), and questions assumptions of ecofeminism 31 and axioms of knowledge distribution system among the hunter-gatherers 32 based on Marxian division of labour. The study includes the appropriate 33 ethnographic survey among the colonies of the selected tribes to understand 34 the placement of land, life and living of hunter-gatherers in contemporary 35 context. 36 37 Keywords: health, healthcare, static, dynamic, knowledge system and 38 landscape. 39 40 411. Introduction 42 43 Hunting and gathering, as a subsistence strategy and mode of cognitive 44 production behaviour, had likely to be started in the last phase of 45 Pleistocene geological epoch (~2 million years ago) with the upright man; 46 homo erectus, the first member of homo genus [ CITATION Her20 \l 16393 ] 47 [ CITATION Ung06 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Ben11 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Coq04 \l 16393 ] 48 [ CITATION Gro18 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Mel16 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Ste10 \l 16393 ] 49 [ CITATION Joo09 \l 16393 ]. Hunting-gathering is to be considered as one of the 50 oldest uninterrupted enduring modes of livelihood support mechanism which 51 was opted and developed to interact with the environment, landscape and 52 other non-human organisms[ CITATION Ben11 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Ste10 \l 16393 ] 53 [ CITATION Ind02 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Wid20 \l 16393 ]. Multiple theories have been 54 used and advanced to reinterpret and remodel hunting and gathering mode 55 of subsistence strategy, social organization and economic prototypical but 56 these models devoid of remodelling hunter-gatherer’s knowledge of health 57 and healing system and the problem of existing paradox of static belief 58 which conceptualizes diseases and dynamic nature of health and diseases 59 due to the transmutational relationship of the human organism with the 60 environment and non-human organism. Though the problem of remodelling 61 health and diseases dynamics from archaeological data has been addressed 62 in term of “ Osteological Paradox” [ CITATION Woo92 \l 16393 ] and sometimes 63 the model of caregiving[ CITATION Til15 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Til151 \l 16393 ] 64 [ CITATION Tho161 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Sha18 \l 16393 ][ CITATION McD99 \l 16393 ] 65 [ CITATION And99 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Spi18 \l 16393 ] and use of medicinal plant 66 and their secondary compound by Palaeolithic population [ CITATION Har12 \l 67 16393 ][ CITATION Har19 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Har18 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Har13 \l 16393 ] 68 addresses the mode and method of healing system among Palaeolithic 69 hunter-gatherer. 70 71 Earlier studies on hunter-gatherer incorporate evolutionary and 72 adaptationist approach, and of questioning those approaches with 73 archaeological approach and social theories [ CITATION Lee68 \l 16393 ] 74 [ CITATION Bar83 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Bet87 \l 16393 ]. Whereas, human behavioural 75 ecological description attempts to sketch hunter-gatherer with the help of 76 natural and social science archetypal like (a) natural selection [ CITATION 77 Dar59 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Win81 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Ind02 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Gra06 \l 78 16393 ][ CITATION Sch93 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Smi83 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Rey17 \l 16393 ] 79 [CITATION Fla72 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Har79 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Bet06 \l 16393 ]; (b) 80 sexual selection and practicing of polygamous and polyandrous social 81 structure [ CITATION Dar71 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Lee68 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Haw01 \l 82 16393 ] [ CITATION Mar03 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Wal11 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Mur49 \l 16393 ] 83 [ CITATION Ale79 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Lev49 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Cha08 \l 16393 ] 84 [ CITATION Fli86 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Apo07 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Mil00 \l 16393 ]; (c) 85 cooperative breeding [CITATION Kra10 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Kra05 \l 16393 ]; (d) 86 optimal foraging model [ CITATION Bet87 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Fol85 \l 16393 ] 87 [ CITATION Mar83 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Smi83 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Win811 \l 16393 ] 88 [ CITATION Mar13 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Ing92 \l 16393 ]; and (e) hunter-gatherer as 89 ecologist[ CITATION Lee681 \l 16393 ][CITATION Fla68 \l 16393 ][CITATION Fla72 \l 90 16393 ]. Conversely, the ‘developmental model’ considers hunter-gathers as 91 primitive and labels the projectile trajectory of becoming complex from 92 simple as ‘progressive social evolution’ [ CITATION Tyl71 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Fri68 93 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Ser62 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Mor77 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Hob62 \l 94 16393 ] [CITATION Pow83 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Pow85 \l 16393 ][CITATION Pow88 \l 16393 ] 95 [ CITATION Spe96 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Whi59 \l 16393 ] [CITATION Fla72 \l 16393 ]. 96 Whereas, Mason’s techno-geographical archetypal tries to cohere hunter- 97 gatherers socio-political, cultural, technical and other intellectual knowledge 98 system with the description of “centripetal” and “centrifugal” forces of 99 techno-environmental approach, which negates cultural diversity and 100 hypnotised world as a single cultural unit [ CITATION Mas94 \l 16393 ]. Schools 101 like “new ecologist”[ CITATION Mur70 \l 16393 ] and “neofunctionalism”[CITATION 102 Vay19 \l 16393 ] also followed the guideline of techno-environmental 103 predecessors and show their interest in cultural materialism which were 104 guided by the techno-environmental ‘determinist interpretations’ [ CITATION 105 Bet15 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Har68 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Orl80 \l 16393 ]. 106 107 The shift in paradigm from traditional archaeological approach to “new 108 archaeology or processual archaeology” to appreciate the dynamic culture of 109 hunter-gatherer in systemic and scientific in the manner by defining culture 110 as “extrasomatic means of adaptation” [ CITATION Bin621 \l 16393 ][ CITATION 111 Bin68 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Fla68 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Hil68 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Lon68 \l 112 16393 ][ CITATION Fla67 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Cal59 \l 16393 ]. Now, approaches of 113 “ethnoarchaeology” [ CITATION Cam68 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Gou78 \l 16393 ] 114 [ CITATION Kra79 \l 16393 ] and “behaviour archaeology” [ CITATION Sch761 \l 115 16393 ][ CITATION Sch83 \l 16393 ] processed an analytical approach of “middle- 116 range theory”[ CITATION Sch761 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Bin812 \l 16393 ][ CITATION 117 Tho83 \l 16393 ] which started considering contemporary hunter-gatherers’ 118 sustenance strategy, reasoning and production-consumption-distribution 119 nexus as the reference point and proxy to ‘bridge the gap between the 120 known, observable archaeological contexts and the unknown, unobservable 121 systemic context’ [ CITATION Tho79 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Tho86 \l 16393 ]. However, 122 application of approaches like “post-processual-archaeology” [ CITATION 123 Hod79 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Hod2a \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Hod2b \l 16393 ] offered a 124 meaningful alternative for the description of modern cultural materialism of 125 Harris [ CITATION Har68 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Har79 \l 16393 ] through Marxian 126 description of production-distribution of hunter-gatherer society being 127 egalitarian [ CITATION Eng72 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Mar67 \l 16393 ][ CITATION OLa75 \l 128 16393 ]. This approach was later enhanced by the inclusion of Lévi-Straussian 129 structuralism with Marxism to explain hunter-gatherer socio-economic 130 structure and the formation and transformation processes through 131 ‘structural causation’ [ CITATION Alt70 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Alt701 \l 16393 ] which 132 was later incorporated in the practices of ethnography and 133 ethnoarchaeology[ CITATION Cam681 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Kra791 \l 16393 ]. 134 135 While biology has been integral to anthropological discourse e.g. optimal 136 foraging theory[ CITATION Mac66 \l 16393 ] which establishes the intricate 137 relationship of time and energy via the ‘diet breadth model’ [ CITATION Alv93 \l 138 16393 ][ CITATION Lev11 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION McN87 \l 16393 ]. Though, this 139 utilitarian standpoint has been developed from the reference of non-human 140 foragers. The “inclusive fitness” [ CITATION Ham63 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Ham64 \l 141 16393 ] [ CITATION Kap85 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Kap911 \l 16393 ] “tolerated 142 theft”[ CITATION Blu871 \l 16393 ] and neo-Darwinian description of energy 143 efficiency, genetic fitness [ CITATION Boy832 \l 16393 ] and cultural transmission 144 through double inheritance model (i.e. genotype and phenotype) [ CITATION 145 Boy851 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Bet96 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Boy09 \l 16393 ][ CITATION 146 Ric051 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Boy831 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Boy95 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Boy053 147 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Bet991 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Bet10 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Hen031 \l 148 16393 ][ CITATION Hen071 \l 16393 ][ CITATION McE051 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Mes8a1 \l 149 16393 ][ CITATION Mes8b1 \l 16393 ] are fitness-oriented analytical approach to 150 cultural evolution and cultural transformation but not discernibly engage 151 with problem of health and its social implication in hunter-gatherer society 152 which causally effects the micro-level socio-economic structure and course of 153 cultural construction. 154 155 This article is an attempt to understand the components and magnitudes of 156 health, dimensions of healing, problem and paradoxes in the conception of 157 health and healing and its insinuation among the four contemporary hunter- 158 gatherer community of Kerala. It also focuses on the (a) the role of 159 landscape in the health management system, (b) types of health problems, 160 (c) methods of healing, (d) problem in health management at the stage of 161 transition (in contemporary context) (e) decision making process in course of 162 health management, and (f) distribution of the health management 163 knowledge system in the form of collective intelligence among the selected 164 hunter-gatherer tribes. 165 1662. Materials and Methods 167 168 Case Study: The research focuses on the four hunter-gatherer tribes of 169 Kerala, India namely (i) Aranadan- etymologically who lives half of the year 170 inside the forest and rest half outside the forest (ara nadu -ara kadu), a 171 PVTG group, smallest in number (among all 35 tribes of Kerala), 172 autochthonous and mostly endogamous but currently started exogamous 173 marriage practice due to the problem in progeny because of not having 174 enough genetic mutation, speaks a mixture of Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, 175 Tulu and Telugu, subsistence mode includes food gathering, non-wood-forest 176 product (n.w.f.p) collection and sometimes forest labour, having distinctive 177 physical feature of short stature, distributed in Karulai and Kalikavu ranges 178 of Nilambur south forest division and Vazhrkkadavu range of the Nilambur 179 north forest division of Nilambur taluk in Malappuram district, Kerala and 180 lives in traditional dwelling unit called Pira, a temporary shed-like structure 181 erected on six bamboo poles but now many of them resides in government 182 provided pakka houses (ii) Cholanaicken- etymologically the king/lord of 183 forest, autochthonous and mostly endogamous PVTG and the living 184 ‘primitive’ hunting-gathering tribes (Census of India, 1971), currently lives 185 in natural rock shelters (alai) and huts (manai) of the upper ghat section 186 where the forests are wet evergreen in nature and some of them lives in 187 pakka houses of Menchari, Alakkal and Pooch Appara colonies on the banks 188 of various rivers and rivulets namely Karampuzha, Panapuzha, Taalipuzha 189 and Nanjakkadavu of Nilambur valley, subsistence practices includes food 190 gathering, non-wood-forest product (n.w.f.p) collection, speaks mixture of 191 Malayalam, Tamil and Kannada and having physical features are similar to 192 Aranadan (iii) Kattunayakan- etymologically the king/lord of forest and 193 literally who born in forest, autochthonous and mostly endogamous with 194 some exception relation with cholanaicken, distributed in Wayanad, 195 Malappuram and Kozhikode Districts of Kerala and also found in Andhra 196 Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, live in the lower semideciduous valley, 197 lives in kudi; a temporary shelter in depended forest near water source and 198 practices food gathering, non-wood-forest product (n.w.f.p) collection (iv) 199 Paniyan/Kattupaniyan- numerically dominant tribe among the 35 Scheduled 200 Tribes of Kerala, etymologically who are panikkaar (labourers), subsist on 201 agricultural labour related to paddy cultivation and n.w.f.p collection and 202 gold collection from river, distributed both inside the deep forest (called as 203 kattupaniyan) and outside the forest area of Malappuram, Kozhikode and 204 Wayanad of Kerala and lives in hamlet is called padi. [Figure 1The 205 distribution of the colonies of the selected hunter-gatherer community of 206 Nilambur Valley.] 207 208 Data Collection Method: This ethnographic research has deigned to do a 209 cross-cultural comparison of indigenous healing tradition among the selected 210 hunter-gatherer tribes of Nilambur valley, Kerala, India with a possible slice 211 of historical research. The researcher has used both the primary and 212 secondary data (i.e. Governments report like ITDP reports, Forest 213 department reports and data previous researches). The primary qualitative 214 data collection includes flowing methodology (1) participant observation, (2) 215 in-depth interviews, (3) focus groups (4) textual analysis, and (5) direct/ Non- 216 participant observation, which have focused on both the behavioural and 217 material observation. Before starting data collection, the research has first 218 conducted a social survey to investigate and analyse the 219 socioeconomic/cultural and demographic profile and then specific survey 220 method supported by mixed questionnaire having contents carrying the 221 parts of the research objective like (a) concept of health and healing in tribal 222 knowledge system, method of recognition of diseases, method of diagnosis, 223 method of treatment, mode of treatment and the role of gender & religion in 224 the healing process has been used for primary data collection. 225 226 Ethical Consideration: The research has duly taken the permissions from 227 Schedule Tribe Development Department, Thiruvananthapuram and its allied 228 regional departments and Department of Forest, Government of Kerala and 229 its allied regional departments before fieldwork. The research has explained 230 the nature of data purpose of data collection and also used informed 231 consent form before the data collection from the community people. 232 Research declares that all the intellectual property rights belong to the 233 community. 234 235 [Please Insert Figure 1 Here] 236 2373. Uniformity in Diversity : Connection with Landscape in the Time of ‘Third 238 Cognitive Revolution (TCR)’ 239 240 For the peoples of Aranadans, Cholanaickens, Kattunayakans and Paniyan, 241 the landscape is both the source of nourishment as well as the source of 242 knowledge because it provided them with the mode of life, habitat and diets 243 and serves in form of medicine or therapeutic remedies (plant and animal 244 origin) in need. The people of these communities also use their knowledge a 245 mean to develop a reciprocal relationship with people of the outside world to 246 thrive in the transition phase of third cognitive revolution (i.e. the era of the 247 world wide web). As the source of knowledge thinks of this example as an 248 opening point of discussion, the people of these communities do not know 249 the names of the most of plants but are able to identify when they use to see 250 those plants in an environmental context like based on growing area/place, 251 colour, shape, and with other associate plants or trees. They are also aware 252 of the value of knowledge system because they use to utilize knowledge 253 system as a commodity (selling of the collected medicinal plants is one of the 254 economic quests) for the exchange, communication, learning and 255 transformation. Let just think of the responses on a hypothetical situation of 256 “ what do you do when you get a bone breakage or fracture?” people of 257 Hunter-gatherers of Nilambur valley replied “……..I don’t know the name. It 258 grows near the river. He (Deven a member of Kattukaicakn colony of 259 Kumbalpara, Nilambur Kerala) had a bone fracture and applied that paste” , 260 “………….A creeper used for bone fracture, when it grinds it turns into 261 yellow colour”, “…..actually we do not use these names. when we need we 262 just collect it”. What does this statement mean?. It gives an insight into 263 their deeply rooted practical connection of community people with their 264 landscape and environment around. 265 266 Ancient Indian medical text like the Atharvaveda, the Carakasaṃhitā (CaS), 267 the Suśrutasaṃhitā(SuS), the Aṣṭāṅgasaṃgraha, and the 268 Aṣṭāṅgahṛdayasaṃhitā have emphasized the importance of the landscape in 269 due course of evolving relationship of people with plant and animal habitat, 270 as well as the human environment. Charka, in the Carakasaṃhitā, describes 271 the types of landscape (i.e. deśa- CaS 3.3.47–48), the characteristics of deśa 272 (CaS 7.1.8 ), types of diseases possibilities when a person interacts with 273 other organism and environment which are available in that particular deśa 274 (CaS 3.3.47–48, CaS 7.1.8) [ CITATION Ang17 \l 16393 ]. 275 276 The landscape of the study area (Nilambur, Kerala) falls under the ānūpa 277 (CaS 7.1.8) category of deśa (landscape) i.e. tropical-humid regions of the 278 subcontinent which never dry out completely and ‘…..…receive little 279 sunlight, are sheltered from the wind but nevertheless affected by frosty 280 winds, richly wooded, mostly situated along rivers or the ocean, and 281 provided with overgrown mountains……… being the home of delicate people, 282 and being abundant in wind and phlegm’ [ CITATION Ang17 \l 16393 ]. Suśruta 283 (SuS 1.35.42) also discuss similar disease-causing factors i.e. the morbific 284 factors wind and phlegm in ānūpa region[ CITATION Ang17 \l 16393 ]. All the 285 above-discussed condition describes the uniformity of the environmental 286 landscape and anomalous exposure to disease-causing factor/vectors for the 287 selected diverse group (in term of socio-economic, cultural practices, 288 methods of healing, the problem of health management at the stage of 289 transition, and decision making processes) of hunter-gatherer of Nilambur 290 valley. The landscape also offers the parallel opportunity to interact with the 291 analogous environment and animal habitat. 292 293 The uniformity in diversity is only not limited to identical opportunity and 294 experience but also existing in the perception and construction of a 295 relationship with ecology, practical and technical management of the 296 environmental resource. Hunter-gatherers of Nilambur valley (ref. to 297 Aranadans, Cholanaickens, Kattunayakans and Paniyan) perceives nature is 298 culturally constituted form such as mother and father not as an external 299 world of nature. Though, this might seems a paradox because nature is 300 something which is physical substance and cultural is a conceptual 301 form[ CITATION Ind02 \l 16393 ]. This culturally constituted connection with the 302 ecology intuitively eternalise animals, plants, rivers, mountains , non-human 303 organisms and even non-living beings into the internal structured of nature 304 and establishes an ancestral relationship with ecology. For example, 305 unanimously all the four tribes venerated Maldivian (the mountain god, 306 which is the source of all kinds of foods, medicine and other requirements 307 except the government PDSes) as father and ancestral god. This 308 homogeneity in beliefs (among the people of all four tribes) of perceiving 309 environment which is culturally created, models the production-distribution- 310 consumption pattern in a fashion where emotional attachment (due to 311 personalistic relationship with environment/landscape like father or mother) 312 devices the method of procurement (foraging with care) and make hunter- 313 gatherer subsistent strategy and reciprocal relation (with nature) 314 sustainable. Though there exists a variance (among the four tribes) in lived 315 experience, meaning-making processes, and ‘imaginatively constructed’ 316 myths, religion, ceremony and other practices. For example, Cholanaickens 317 burial practices are unique in itself because the people of this community 318 buries their dead’s within the habitational area and after completing the 319 ritual members of the family use to abandoned that habitation area and 320 settled into a new place adjacent to the previous habitation area. 321 322 Since knowledge economy of the hunter-gatherers (ref. to Aranadans, 323 Cholanaickens, Kattunayakans and Paniyan) is moulded in ethos and 324 philosophy of life and has deep time correspondence link with micro/macro- 325 economic practices, cultural consciousness and socio-political governs 326 (which makes it historical, spiritual and personal), therefore, it appears that 327 knowledge is distributed among every member of the community. For 328 example, both the male and female of these communities have the 329 knowledge of medicinal plant because both of them actively involved in the 330 process of collection of medicinal plant and other forest products like honey 331 from the field (forest). whereas, children and old age members help in the 332 sorting of the collected plant at the shelter. This diffusion of knowledge 333 system into the community and the interconnectedness with culturally 334 constituted nature shapes the collaborative economics of need-oriented 335 means of procurement which assists in evolving collective intelligence 336 among the hunter-gatherers. The above example also calls into attention to 337 two other aspects of collective intelligence- (a) the exercise of labour division 338 and cooperation (2) the method of information transfer and social learning. 339 340 The division of labour (man: the producer and women, children & age-old 341 members: the consumer) has been a relentless point of discussion for the 342 past and present hunter-gatherer mode of sustenance strategy [ CITATION 343 Bin812 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Bin621 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Chi35 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Was68 \ 344 l 16393 ][ CITATION Isa78 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Isa81 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Kap85 \l 16393 ] [ 345 CITATION Gur07 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Gur09 \l 16393 ][ CITATION WAG05 \l 16393 ] 346 [ CITATION Hur20 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Bri96 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION Mar07 \l 16393 ] 347 [ CITATION Joc88 \l 16393 ]. This producer-consumer stratigraphy has the pit of 348 inherent inequality and the hierarchical difference in social evolution which 349 has been a focal point in the debate of ecofeminism [ CITATION Mie10 \l 16393 ] 350 [ CITATION Mel97 \l 16393 ]. But the of perceiving Maldivian as a father (varied 351 from the common conception of mother nature) by the Aranadans, 352 Cholanaickens, Kattunayakans and Paniyan and distributed knowledge (from 353 procurement to processing) in the form of collective intelligence (among 354 both the male and female) ) questions the assumption of ecofeminism in 355 context of hunter-gatherer society. 356 Example, Q. Have encountered any new medicines which your father has not 357 used. If so how did you identified the medicinal qualities? 358 359 A. “ ….. I got the medicinal knowledge from my father’s mother. I only use 360 the medicines which have been used by my ancestors. I have not 361 encountered any new medicine”. 362 363 It also questions the axioms of inequality in knowledge distribution, which is 364 fundamental in the dichotomy (producer and consumer) of the division of 365 labour subsumed productive capacity (of both biophysical and cognitive) in 366 the communal effort of production cognition and social consumption. 367 For example, Q. Is there any difference regarding the knowledge of the 368 plants among men and women? 369 Ans. “ …No. everybody knows the same kind of medicinal practices. If 370 someone finds new medicinal herbs they will be introduced to others”. 371 372 Q. Who practices medicines male or female? 373 374 “….Both of them. In the Arnadan community, Ooru muppan ( Tribal chief) or 375 elders don't say medicines to the next generations. It is practising even now. 376 So we are not aware of every medicine”. 377 378 The answers laid two different sets of question. One hand it arises a question 379 of why there is a need for secrecy in information sharing? (this has been 380 discussed in the discussion section of this article). Whereas, On the other 381 hand, the researcher also finds the uniformity in the transfer of information 382 to the next generation through social learning. The communities people have 383 established an enhanced social network which helps in the building of social 384 cogitation and use to deposit the information in the cultural cloud and 385 ecology. 386 For example, Q. Do you teach this medicinal knowledge to your children? 387 388 Ans.- “ …I watched and learn from my father. I saw my father taking those 389 plants for medicinal purposes. By seeing those I learned some variety of 390 plants have the individual quality to heal some sort of health issues. Like 391 this, they will watch and learn gradually. It’s a part of our life”. 392 393 “ …. we got this information from our parents and grandparents. They 394 taught us the uses of the plant and a large number of edible medicinal plants 395 used for healing practices”. 396 397 Later, this ecocultural cloud is used to be referred to as a repository for the 398 process of information transfer to the next generation. The people of these 399 communities use to store information in ecology, outside the mind and body 400 in the form of image and action (as described in the first paragraph of this 401 section) are transferred to the next generation through everyday subsistence 402 activity. This ecocultural repository is not only limited to information 403 sharing. The environment as storage is inherent in the structure of life 404 activity. For example, on the question of do you use to store the medicine in 405 advance to future because it might happen that you need medicine either in 406 the night or a season when the medicine is not available to you? they replied 407 – 408 “…This type of difficult situations is happening in summer. We don’t get 409 some medicines at that time in our area. There is no one who collects this 410 medicine in advance. If we need any medicine urgently, we collect to the 411 medicine from the inside forest. Because that forest area is very cold. So all 412 herbal medicine like plants, roots, leaves, creeps, etc.. are always available 413 there….” (transcription in English from Malayalam). 414 415 “ …. we are not preserving medicine. When we need medicine we will 416 prepare and consume at 417 the same time”. 418 419 The significance of storage has always been a topic of debate in hunter- 420 gather society. It has been discussed in the context of ‘temporal 421 incongruities’ (i.e. seasonal research shortage) and ‘spatial incongruities’ 422 ( i.e. a locational mismatch between population and resource) due to 423 nomadic behaviour of hunter-gatherers [ CITATION Bet15 \l 16393 ]. Scholars like 424 Tim Ingold [ CITATION Ing83 \l 16393 ] has described this issue of the need for 425 storage as ‘expectation of delayed return’ and ‘storage as one manifestation 426 of delayed return” in context hunting-gathering societies. For Ingold, 427 ecological storage is an ‘interruption in the flow of nutrients from animals 428 and plants to human consumers’ because he finds a human relationship with 429 the environment is functional not only spatial[ CITATION Ing83 \l 16393 ]. This 430 Eco-functional approach of Ingold doesn’t match well with the social- 431 functional value of storage in hunter-gatherer’s need-oriented means of 432 economic practices because it annotates the function of storage in 433 spatiotemporal context. 434 435 E.g. Due to climate change ( seasonal) , do you collect medicines in advance? 436 437 A. ” … No, All plants available throughout the year in the forest. 438 439 4404. Uniformity in Diversity: Health, Problems and paradoxes in the Time 441 of Transition 442 443 A. Hunter-Gatherer Perception of Health and Problem of Static vs 444 Dynamic : 445 446 Uniformity in diversity among the hunter-gatherers of Nilambur valley (ref. 447 to Aranadans, Cholanaickens, Kattunayakans and Paniyan) is not only limited 448 to the perception of landscape and relationship with the environment. It also 449 exists in the conception of health e.g. method of recognition of diseases, 450 method of diagnosis and method of healing e.g. method of treatment, and 451 mode of treatment. Health has been defined in the literature in multiple 452 ways like the absence of disease, role performance, adaptation and 453 maximizing human potential [ CITATION Sim89 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Cow99 \l 16393 ] 454 [ CITATION And99 \l 16393 ][ CITATION McD99 \l 16393 ]. But for hunter-gatherer’s of 455 Nilambur valley, health is something related to causal contribution to the 456 socio-economic goal pursued by the community and has some degree do 457 with to normal functioning . 458 459 For example, Q. How do you know that a child is sick or some are unhealthy 460 in case they do not come and tell you? 461 462 “……the mother can understand the mood or condition of the child. It's a 463 common phenomenon. Once they get the disease they use to stop playing 464 with other children, eating less, always crying etc……” 465 466 “………the older generation people have knee and back pain issue so they are 467 no longer able to come with us in forest……” 468 469 But the conception of health as a causal contribution to the goal pursued 470 and the normal functioning is not temporally universal. Health in hunter- 471 gatherer community is also somewhat associated with social and cultural 472 construction and became a resource of everyday life. For example, 473 pregnancy. In this case, women are neither functional like before pregnancy 474 not able to contribute to the causal goal of the society but still not 475 considered as sick or ill or diseased. The perception of health, perceived 476 causal root of the disease (e.g. ancestral anger, supernatural forces and evil 477 eye), and recognition and classifications of illness etc. are planted in the 478 beliefs and native logic, which people of these communities hold in the 479 subsequent management of health. This makes the perception of health and 480 illnesses among the hunter-gatherer’s static in nature which it does not 481 change even if there is a change in a primary milieu like living place or 482 settlement pattern. 483 484 Though, Health and illness is something which has been understood as 485 dynamic in nature and undergoes changes with the change in both the 486 internal and external circumstances [ CITATION Sim89 \l 16393 ][ CITATION 487 Cow99 \l 16393 ][ CITATION And99 \l 16393 ][ CITATION McD99 \l 16393 ] [ CITATION 488 Ang17 \l 16393 ]. Omran’s model of Epidemiological Transition (ET) (from 489 infectious to contagious to degenerative to chronic illness) has explained 490 how health is a dynamic element also in hunter-gatherer way of living 491 because of its multifaceted interface and collaboration with bio-social 492 component and variables depending on outside coefficient [ CITATION Omr711 \l 493 16393 ]. In the hunter-gatherer society, ET depends on the factors like hunter- 494 gatherers quest for the food exposed them to bacteria and indirect contact to 495 zoonotic disease vectors who are capable of causing infectious diseases 496 among hunter-gatherer[ CITATION Arm99 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Bar99 \l 16393 ] 497 [ CITATION Arm05 \l 16393 ]. The ET model also explains how the direct 498 interaction with the non-human animal during hunting, taking prey to the 499 home after hunting, during consuming contaminated the prey, bite from 500 insects and snakes etc. makes hunter-gatherers susceptible of getting 501 diseases [ CITATION Arm99 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Bar99 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Arm05 \l 502 16393 ]. In the archaeological context, scholars have widely discussed 503 zoonotic diseases like Avian or ichthyic, tuberculosis, leptospirosis, relapsing 504 fever, schistosomiasis, scrub typhus, malaria, tetanus, trichinises, and 505 trypanosomiasis which had likely to be affected the hunter-gatherers of past. 506 [ CITATION Aud61 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Coc71 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Arm99 \l 16393 ] 507 [ CITATION Arm05 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Led98 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Liv58 \l 16393 ] 508 [ CITATION Spr \l 16393 ][ CITATION Wie67 \l 16393 ]. Scholars have also emphasized 509 that how despite the nomadic demographic profile with small population 510 size, weak network and having the proper division of labour, hunter- 511 gatherers affected by the dynamic problem of health because of being either 512 consumer or producer[ CITATION Hil14 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Hil11 \l 16393 ][ CITATION 513 Gro12 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Kes18 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Kes17 \l 16393 ] and how the 514 transition either change in diet (carnivorous to omnivorous) or settlement 515 pattern (hunter-gatherer to sedentary) or subsistence strategy (hunting- 516 gathering to agriculture) makes hunter-gatherer’s vulnerable to dynamic 517 disease vectors because of the booming pollutions, close proximity with 518 domesticated animal, poor waste management etc. and are resulted into the 519 increased possibilities of spreading infectious diseases among the group 520 member[ CITATION Omr711 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Arm05 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Boy053 \l 521 16393 ]. 522 523 Now, consider the current to the situation of hunter-gatherers of the 524 Nilambur valley (ref. to Aranadans, Cholanaickens, Kattunayakans and 525 Paniyan). Hunter-gatherers of Nilambur valley are moving from hunting- 526 gathering nomadic lifestyle to permanent settlement with the help of 527 government-built houses and PDS systems. ( The transition is happing due to 528 many factors like forest regulation on hunting, conflict of over space etc. but 529 the cause of transition is not the concern of this article). Let analyses new 530 situation in this transition phase, Hunter-gatherer’s relationship with 531 landscape in the process of change arises an internal conflict (inside the 532 mind of hunter-gatherers) of modern space and pre-modern comfort. For 533 example, change in the habitation and settlement pattern. For hunter- 534 gatherers of Nilambur “….the government houses are small, 535 compartmentalize, closed claustrophobic, limited space of house 536 construction and not designed to cope up with the threat from the wild 537 animal with respect hunter-gatherer own built settlement which is open, 538 single space and space of escape in the situation of human-wildlife 539 conflict….therefore, we have built our own type shelter on the roof of the 540 government houses or abandoned the houses and lives in the natural caves” 541 [Figure 2 The conflict of modern and pre-modern in new settlement pattern 542 among the Cholanaickens of Mencheri colony, Kerala]. Though there are also 543 other reasons e.g. unavailability of forest product in the near vicinity will 544 lead them to travel of extra distance (which cannot be covered in one single 545 day) if they choose to settle at new permanent settlement option. The 546 relationship of hunter-gatherer has not changed only with wild animals but 547 also with domestic animals and other non-human organisms. Now hunter- 548 gatherer is bound to share the space with their domestic animals and birds. 549 This reduced proximity of distance with animals makes hunter-gatherer 550 more defenceless towards getting zoonotic diseases like monkey fever and 551 scrub typhus (due to bacteria called orienitia tsutsugamushi). These diseases 552 are reported among the Cholanaickens colonies of Karulai forest, Nilambur. 553 [ Figure 3 The member of Cholanaicken community living in natural cave of 554 Nilambur Valley.] 555 [Please Insert Figure 2 & 3 Here] 556 The sedentary settlement has not only brought a change in human and non- 557 human relation but also lead to the change of their diet and food habit due to 558 change in their settlement habit from nomadic to permeant settlement and 559 government-provided PDS foods. Now, the community people are getting 560 only rice and salt because it’s made easily available by government supports 561 so community people stoped collecting food items from forests. Sometimes 562 government regulation on hunting also forces to shift diet for omnivorous to 563 pescatarians. This shift has bought a major change in food habit and now 564 people are eating only kanni (rice and salt) all three-time and occasionally 565 fish and crabs and along with a new habit of black tea, which has lead to the 566 nutritional imbalance and cause diseases like iron deficiencies and 567 nutritional anaemia (in female and child), vitamin deficiencies lead night 568 blindness etc. among the contemporary hunter-gatherers of Nilambur valley. 569 The change in diet and preference of landscape for the continues habitation 570 adjacent to a water source with having poor wastewater management has 571 made hunter-gatherer of Nilambur valley critical and susceptible to new kind 572 of diseases and for ET form infectious to contagious to degenerative to 573 chronic illness. 574 575 This description of the condemnatory hunter-gatherer’s conditions at the 576 transition stage seems a proxy and imprecise snapshot of Neolithic 577 transition experience. This might be a problematic and paradoxical 578 statement because of the vast spatiotemporal gap, therefore let me clear 579 that I am not making a conjecture that the present hunter-gatherer is 580 experiencing a similar experience of Neolithic transition. The central focus 581 of this discussion is the problem of static vs dynamic conception of health 582 among contemporary hunter-gather of Nilambur valley. All the above 583 conditions make the health and illness dynamic vector in hunter-gatherer but 584 the communities people conceptualize health, recognition of diseases, 585 diagnose disease those problems via their static believes and native logics 586 (as described in the first paragraph of this section). 587 588 For example. Q. Have you been affected by any disease which spread 589 through these domesticated animals? 590 591 “….Till date, nothing like that has experienced. It is because we gave the 592 animals the same food that we eat”. 593 594 595 B. Dimensions of Healing among Hunter-gatherers of Nilambur 596 Valley. 597 598 Let me put the statement of Sumati amma from Aranadans community 599 before I discuss this section. 600 601 “…….Elders taught us. Many medicines are used for different diseases. 602 Some medicines are used for both descentry and poison. Like, paada 603 kizhangu (Pata root) , Amalpuri(Indian Snakeroot), Chathuramulla 604 (Myxopyrum) , Karlakam (Aristolochia India). All these can be seen inside 605 the forest. Payar Valli ( Pea plant) is used for skin disease and Venga (Indian 606 Kino) bark is used for body pain. If someone died in our family, we do kali ( a 607 kind of dance among tribals and Scheduled caste in Kerala) after their burial 608 that night. Ooru Mooppan will start it, both males and females join with IT. 609 The ancestor's soul evokes the Ooru moopan body and finally, the soul of the 610 dead evokes and everyone asks the soul of the dead person to remain in 611 their home. Sometimes they reject. Then on the 7th day, they practise '' Nali 612 Vekkal''. They give their favourite things to the soul and then they agree to 613 remain with the family. They believe in the grace of that soul with them 614 every time. If anyone has diseases in that family ask that soul to cure it. 615 Family members give money to those who do “ Nali vekkal". Our main god is 616 in hilltops. We will go there once every month or year. Our ancestors were 617 living in those hilly areas. After the invasion of British, they forced us to 618 leave those places, where British planted teaks……..”. 619 620 Healing is defined in medical literature defined as “ restoring the person to 621 the life context”[ CITATION Kok16 \l 16393 ]. Two dimensions of healing can be 622 deduced from the above statement i.e. the dimension of individual healing 623 and dimension of collective healing. The dimension of individual healing 624 involves personal health and healing of mind and body through spiritual and 625 emotional healing. The individual dimension of healing also involves the 626 plant and animal into the dimension of healing. 627 628 “……. We use the teeth of the elephant for the purpose of children’s fever. A 629 small kind of elephant teeth powder applied for their head so they get well 630 soon……… That also get in the forest without any risk. Those are getting 631 from long before died elephants remain, and sometimes we collect from the 632 help of the forest department. when an elephant died in the forest, the 633 officers will do a post-mortem. On that time we ask that for the medicinal 634 purpose”. 635 636 “…..Apart from the plants, we used python’s fat for cracked heels in early 637 times”. 638 639 Whereas, the dimension collective healing signifies the cultural wellbeing 640 along with individual wellbeing. Now the question is why are these two 641 dimensions of healing? Hunter-gatherers are very much connected with their 642 environment from subsistence to settlement (as described above), therefore, 643 they get tuned with the nature in such a way that a little disturbance in 644 nature creates an unsettling situation among the hunter-gatherers. For 645 example, on reply to a question of how do you survive in recent flood (flood- 646 hit Nilambur in 2019 after more than 200years, therefore, none of the 647 current generation people of hunter-gatherer have experienced this situation 648 before) the people from Cholanaickens replied, “…… the night before we felt 649 that the smell of the soil has changed and also experienced very unpleasant 650 vibes from birds and animals in air……so we immediately left the current 651 living place, crossed the river and went that (pointing towards the other side 652 of the river) side on the hilltop …..and that very night flood along with 653 bolder from the hills had destroyed our earlier place…”. 654 655 Since hunter-gatherers believe in ecological and social storage (as discussed 656 in the above section) therefore, a little change in landscape and environment 657 has a larger impact on health and health management system. Here in this 658 case again, let me describe trough the example of the flood again. The flood 659 in Nilambur valley has bewailed the Nilambur landscape and deposited a 660 pile of sand in the affected area, which resulted in the extension/destruction 661 of many medicinal plants which use to grow either near the river or 662 waterbody. This deposition of send fetched a change in the landscape which 663 is an intrusion in cultural wellbeing and ultimately resulted in the 664 devastating experience of transition among the hunter-gatherer health 665 management ecology. This interconnectedness and relatedness with the 666 landscape bring a sense of belonging among the community people and 667 share a common core of the healing process which shapes the caregiving as 668 healing methods. 669 670 Before going into the much details of methods and mode of healing, let me 671 analyse hunter-gatherer’s method of diagnosis first. Their diagnosis 672 methodology is somewhat connected to their perception and conception of 673 health and illness which involves the alteration in normal functional abilities, 674 touch, observation of behaviour, change of colour (of the body or body 675 waste), temperature etc. but does not involve the methodology of ayurvedic 676 or any other codified medical system. For example, on a response (in group 677 discussion) to a given situation of “suppose a child is sick and has come to 678 you crying, she/he doesn’t know what has happened to her/him. How can u 679 find the disease/illness?” Kattunayakans tells “…we will check if there is any 680 pain over the body.we can understand through observation. We will touch 681 and inspect the patient. This method is not solely practised by 682 Kattunayakans only but it is a common methodology of diagnosis among all 683 the other community people also. 684 685 Again come back to methods of healing and its dimensions. It is discussed 686 that caregiving was one of the method of healing among the community 687 people. The method of caregiving inadequately rooted in the practice of 688 cooperative breeding’s among the hunter-gatherer of Nilambur 689 valley[ CITATION Nai10 \l 16393 ]. In the field survey (and later verified by 690 government population register data) the researcher finds that many 691 children don’t know who is him/her actual father and even few unmarried 692 girls have a child. In this case, it resemblance the social structure of a free 693 society where the child became the responsibilities of grandparents and 694 shapes the culture of cooperative breeding[ CITATION Kra10 \l 16393 ][ CITATION 695 Kra05 \l 16393 ]. 696 697 The other healing methods and mode involve the healing through herbal 698 medicine and animal products (this analogy is deduced from all the above- 699 cited examples and statements from community people). As far as knowledge 700 of medicine for diseases and dosage of the medicine is concerned, the 701 community people have the knowledge of common diseases encountered 702 (like fever, cough, cold, headache, stomach pain, tooth pain, ear pain, back 703 & bones pain, wound or cut or injury, skin disease, menstrual pains, snake 704 bites) to uncommon diseases (like-cholera, mouth cancer, TB, diabetes, 705 chickenpox, fertility-related issues etc.) whereas, there is no definite 706 measurement of dosages. The reasoning behind not having a defined system 707 of the dose is lying in the belief of not having side-effects because the 708 medicine is mostly natural or herbal. 709 7105. Discussion 711 712 From the above description, it is clear that the knowledge system in hunting- 713 gathering society has been situated in the culturally constituted ecology and 714 transfer of this knowledge system to the next generation doesn’t require an 715 intuition-based pedagogy. Information transfer in hunter-gatherer society 716 follows the cultural and practical way of bestowing to the next generation 717 either via imitation, social learning or individual experience, though the 718 “cultural transmission theory”, describes the two-mode of information 719 transfer i.e. cultural and genetic in human [ CITATION Boy09 \l 16393 ][ CITATION 720 Boy851 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Boy831 \l 16393 ][ CITATION Ric051 \l 16393 ]. We have also 721 seen that how this persisting information in the cultural cloud in the form of 722 traditions, beliefs and native logics create a static mechanism of knowledge 723 economy which functions at the historical, spiritual and personal level. 724 725 The analysis of the hunter-gatherer relationship with time and environment 726 have described that how the knowledge formation process with continuous 727 interaction with the environment and through cumulative decision-making 728 process (because knowledge in hunting-gathering society exists in the form 729 of collective intelligence) has contributed in developing of an unambiguous 730 conception of health & health management mechanism among the hunter- 731 gatherers. The inquiry on healthcare knowledge system has shown that how 732 that formation knowledge system has been a communal effort and there has 733 been a system for equal distribution of knowledge among community 734 members irrespective sex and gender and also have an equal opportunity for 735 participation in the knowledge accumulation process. Though, there exists 736 inequality in knowledge system among the community people and this 737 inequality occurs due to a personal interest in learning, formed limitation of 738 cognitive capacity and flawed in information transfer mechanism. This 739 research as potentially highlighted the lacuna in axioms of Marxian division 740 of labour based knowledge distribution in a hunter-gatherer society and has 741 also questioned the underlying assumption of ecofeminism. 742 743 One major question often comes when a person from outside community 744 encounter any culturally-rooted knowledge system i.e. why there exist a 745 secrecy and sacredness in knowledge management. The hunter-gatherer of 746 Nilambur valley has explained that ”…….these bits of knowledge have been 747 transferred to them by their own ancestor, it is the only wealth they have 748 ….”. This description comprises two major concepts of management i.e. 749 ownership and protection. In this context, knowledge becomes the 750 belongings and secrecy and sacredness are the means to show the 751 ownership and to protect for their direct descendant. The hunter-gatherer’s 752 perception of health and illness is one such knowledge system which is 753 grounded in experience and deeply embedded in the environmental and 754 cultural constructions. Whereas, the knowledge of health management is 755 rooted in history, stored in environmental context and comprises of both the 756 empirical (of plant and animal) and unempirical (faith healings) knowledge 757 of healing. 758 759 Though, the hunting-gathering subsistence strategy is older than current 760 human and hunter-gatherers have experienced the transition which are often 761 linked to change in climate, environment, demography and cognitive 762 capacity. But the contemporary hunter-gatherer has some fundamental 763 issue. One hand they are living in ecology like the past whereas, on the 764 hand, they are experiencing the dynamic social realities of being hunter- 765 gatherer in the phase of ‘third cognitive revolution’ and within the nation- 766 state governance. The consequence of these issues are the negotiations 767 between the past and present (or modern-and pre-modern) and retarded 768 adaptive response to the new sense of space, settlement pattern and new 769 relationship with nature and other non-human organisms which have 770 consequently become the paradoxical problem of static versus dynamic in 771 perception and management of health during the transition phase. 772 7736. Conclusion 774 775 Health has always been a primary component of survival for every organism. 776 The cross-cultural investigation of the perception and management (in the 777 amid of transition in the landscape, food culture, settlement pattern and 778 subsistence strategy) of health among contemporary hunter-gatherers of 779 Nilambur valley has potently accentuated that healing mechanism are 780 intrinsic to the fitness maximizing the optimum process of hunter-gatherers 781 and are also acutely embedded in their bond with environment and non- 782 human organisms. For hunter-gatherers of Nilambur valley health is a 783 functional variant of human efficient contribution to the perused goal of the 784 community and illness is an abruption in that normal functional abilities. But 785 illness among hunter-gatherers has not always been understood in bio- 786 cultural terms it has socio-cultural implications also (as described above). 787 Whereas the knowledge of the healing mechanism is an integral part of their 788 tangible culture and ecology like plants, animals and other materials and 789 intangible worldview, faith, belief, customs& traditions, histories and 790 cognitive capacity. This duality in the conception of health and illness as bio- 791 cultural component posses a paradoxical problem in front of people from 792 outside the community that how to analyse the dichotomy of health being a 793 dynamic phenomenon and conceptualized through static native beliefs and 794 logics in hunter-gatherer worldviews. The analysis has also elucidated that 795 how the little change in landscape, climate, diet, settlement pattern and 796 subsistence strategy can bring a structural transformation in dynamics of 797 health and how hunter-gatherer resistive enculturation process are adapting 798 in the new world exposed to them. 799 800 Nowhere, this article in any sense claims that the transition experience of 801 the hunter-gatherers of the 21st century has anomalous experience of 802 transition, which hunter-gatherers of the past (during Neolithic transition) 803 had experienced by considering the facts of the vast spatiotemporal gap and 804 different environmental and ecological condition. But the contemporary 805 hunter-gatherer is facing identical set of problems in the management of 806 health due to similar kind of transition circumstances. These circumstances 807 create an episodic illusion where the hunter-gatherers of the present 808 resemble a snapshot of hunter-gatherers from the past. 809 810 Acknowledgements: 811 812 I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my doctoral advisor Prof. 813 Sangeetha Menon for her guidance and continuous support. I would also like 814 to offer my special thanks to Prof. Vasant Shinde (co-supervisor) for his 815 advice and assistance. I am particularly grateful to the National Institute of 816 Advanced Studies Consciousness Studies Programme & Tata Trusts for 817 financial support. I wish to acknowledge help and resource provided by the 818 Superintendent of Police, Malappuram, Divisional Forest Officers, Nilambur 819 (North & South) and their team. Last but not least, I would pay my deepest 820 gratitude to all the community people for sharing the information with me.
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