Locating Aging in India

Abstract

Abstract Aging and its conceptual dimensions manifestly emanated from particular cultural axioms within a Euro-American temporal context. With the expansion of such axioms obscured within the imported modernism, understanding of institutions such as family and its role have been inundated by so-called expert knowledges framed within and only from a colonial system of cultural archive. This suggested framework seems convincing, but in practice, the reality in Indigenous communities is different. Without acknowledging the historical nuances and cultural archive from an Indigenous worldview, aging as a concept can be a poor fit or be seen as an instrument of power knowledge for a captive mind. This chapter discusses the conceptual construction of aging from activity, disengagement, and other critical theoretical frameworks; it argues that these lenses deny Indigenous structure and its ways of organizing. The chapter seeks to place aging in a cross-cultural context using the framework of “indigenization from within” to bring to the fore concepts and knowledge that are located within specific cultural contexts. Furthermore, it examines the subtle power relations in the transitions with modern bureaucratic-politico structure and socialization that relegate older persons as “service receivers,” threatening the relevance of Indigenous elders. The chapter also explores understanding in two Indigenous communities, the Khasis of Meghalaya and Jad Bhotiyas in Uttarakhand, India, about older persons and their roles and status in the community. A model, the cultural paragon, is applied to this subject in relation to Indigenous communities, particularly in the context of India.