Why are Indians so preoccupied with what Nagas eat, whether it is dogs, bats or falcons?
Debates about Naga food overlook the perspective that situates it in relation to other aspects of their cultural and political life. Feb 22, 2021 · 11:30 am A woman prepares her stall with containers of fresh water insects and frogs for sale at a food market in Dimapur, Nagaland. | Caisii Mao/AFP
All of humanity emerged from a rock on my family’s rice field. This is what I was taught. The field, though small, boasts a perennial spring which comes out from below the rock that is the source of all of humanity, keeping the field permanently flooded and amenable for growing rice. The first time I descended down the stone terraces from the village to the field, my aunties and uncles showed me where to place my hands on the rock to feel the polished grooves where, they say, the first people stepped and climbed up into the world, in what is now our small rice field.