Reconciling Witchcraft and Ho_ṛ Cosmopolitanism

Abstract

In examining the deep (pre)history of transnational Santals, this chapter engages ethnoarchaeology, ethnolinguistics, cognitive science, and genetics to apply the Santals' long-sustained theory of transmigratory cosmopolitanism to contemporary studies of Indigenous cosmopolitanisms. The Santals utilize mindscapes, witchcraft, memory, social archaeology of institutions, and Indigenous cosmopolitanism to inform Santal understandings of borderlands across temporal and spatial chasms. By drawing on these transhistorical and transgeographical practices, this chapter pursues an understanding of the borderlands of India, Nepal, and Bangladesh informed not by their relationship to states but by their relationship to transnational Indigenous cosmopolitanism. Thus, this chapter poses a comprehensive understanding of territory and physical boundaries, emphasizing the epistemological value of Indigenous configurations of fluid histories and spaces.