Tribal Literature in India: Some Features

Abstract

Tribal Literature in India is a colourful one. It is indeed a vast one. One of the basic problems leading to its slow recognition is that it is unrecorded or more appropriately it is unwritten. One of the best solutions to this issue lies in our modified notion of literature. It means that we need to concede that literature is not just written, but also oral in nature or form. In addition to this, India is best known for its rich oral traditions. Orality as a feature of communication embodies in it both traditional and modern characteristics. Timeless and unanchored, it freely travels from age to age, country to country and genre to genre. In fact, every written piece of literature contains substantial layers of orality.

Tribal literature or Adivasi Sahitya is available mostly in the form of songs or dance forms. These songs have been orally transmitted from one generation to another and have survived for a long time. Even some of the folk songs are lost forever. It is high time for us to collect and conserve tribal literature for the posterity. The glory of the mainstream literature in the country lies in the fact that it accepts oral or folk as complementary, as it gives a complete picture of the Indian culture and thought.

Tribal people dwell in different parts of the Indian Union. They are found in small and big groups; they speak their own tongues or dialects; practice their own customs or culture; and attract the attention of linguists, anthropologists, scholars and researchers now –a- days.Tribal men and women are natural singers, dancers or performers. They are emotionally attached to their motherland; they are full of patriotic feelings and work for the progress of the nation. The tribal vision of life or the tribal philosophy of life cherishes close contact between man and Nature.

The literature of the tribal groups is marked by a great variety of songs, dance forms or dramatic performances. A sincere effort is now being made to collect them, to compile them through translation or transcreation.

The tribal story -teller can imagine the unimaginable; readers, listeners and viewers will be rendered willing to believe the unbelievable and to forget the demarcating lines between art and non-art. It seems that the primary aim of the tribal art is to amuse the audience