Accepted Panels

The ‘Anthropocene’, is now a familiar, though contested, term. Derived from geology, it describes how humans have become a ‘global geo-physical force’. Its global range claims all human history and through concepts derived from European histories, produces a narrative for ‘mankind’. Kathleen Morrison contests this construction and argues that alternative historical research reveals that histories, from the margins, can pose a challenge to research which produces hegemonic histories and disciplinary imaginations of the human place in the world. She suggests, provincialising the Anthropocene, by writing other stories.

This paper will explore anthropogenic change in the Central and Trans-Himalayan region. Over the millennia, anthropogenic activities---the firing of the forests, mining of copper and iron, the making of alpine meadows, terraced fields, construction of earthen dams and canals (guls) transformed the landscapes of these highlands. Around the tenth century, the region settled down to an interconnected agro- pastoral regime of verticality, which linked variegated bio-geographies of the Trans-Himalaya, Upper Himalayas, Middle Himalayas and the Bhabhar-Tarai in seasonal rhythms for optimal use of natural resources. The advent of British rule disrupted these linkages and introduced new practices connected with property, land and forests.

Nation states continued property regimes and commodification of natural resources. Gradually, the Himalayan system of verticality broke down. The disaggregation of the Himalayas meant a restructuring and realignment of livelihoods. Over the twentieth century the exodus of Pahari labour and declining yields led to the depopulation of villages which heralded the onset of a new order.

This paper argues that verticality, peculiar to adaptive strategies of mountain societies, was sustainable and it was British economic control that engineered its collapse.