• GITANJALI BARO

Culture, a way of life is a well-defined set of social customs of a specific ethnic group of individuals at a certain time-period. It is an umbrella term and comprises the social conducts, dogmas, traditions, religions and festivals, languages, music and art, architectures, cuisines, histories, myths, legends, folktales etc. It acts as an epitome of an ethnicity in a certain ethnic group. The Bodos are one of the predominant ethnic groups in the North-Eastern part of India. They belong to the largest ethnolinguistic group in the state of Assam in India. The legacy of their traditional culture is rich and shares a sustainable relationship with the nature. In his article “Tradition Culture of Bodos and Its Changes” (2019), Hemanta Mochahary connotes that the “holistic cultural approach to reality finds its expression in the way of life of Bodos and their natural surroundings” and that the “idea of creation and its relation to man and nature is shown through their socio-religious life” (Mochahary, 2019, p. 9). The scientific study of the vegetation of a territory and its practical uses through the traditional knowledge of the territory’s indigenous people and culture is known as Ethnobotany. In Plants, People and Culture: The Science of Ethnobotany (1996), Balick and Cox denote that the “study of interconnections between plants and people, including the influence of the plants on human culture, is the focus of the interdisciplinary field of ethnobotany” (Balick and Cox, 1996, i). Rashmi Narzary is a Sahitya Akademi Awardee author, columnist and a freelance editor. Her His Share of Sky (2012) is a collection of short stories. The narratives revolve around a ten-year-old boy named Barsau, set in a fictional Bodo village, Madlagami, situated on the banks of a river, Jwima, and located in the Kokrajhar district of Assam in India. This paper deconstructs Rashmi Narzary’s His Share of Sky (2012) to analyse the sustainable relationship between the nature and the Bodo culture through the lens of Ethnobotany.

Bodos, Ethnicity, Ethnic Group, Ethnobotany, Nature-culture.

"LESSONS INSTEAD ARE IN NATURE STORED: A STUDY OF ETHNOBOTANY IN BODO ETHNICITY AS PORTRAYED IN RASHMI NARZARY’S HIS SHARE OF SKY", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.8, Issue 12, page no.c436-c439, December-2021, Available :http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR2112256.pdf

"LESSONS INSTEAD ARE IN NATURE STORED: A STUDY OF ETHNOBOTANY IN BODO ETHNICITY AS PORTRAYED IN RASHMI NARZARY’S HIS SHARE OF SKY", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org | UGC and issn Approved), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.8, Issue 12, page no. ppc436-c439, December-2021, Available at : http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR2112256.pdf