he nominated storytellers whereas the women like to sing traditional songs while pounding rice, or as lullabies for their children.
Is the younger generation interested in keeping these stories alive?
The Wancho people are proud of their culture because it is what keeps them together, gives them a sense of identity. However, as the younger generations travel out of the villages and seek employment elsewhere, their links with the stories are weakening. They now face pressure to become educated, find jobs, and earn incomes. They are also losing touch with their mother tongue as they are taught Hindi and English in school. It is very important to keep the traditions alive for the well-being of the community, and they realise this. Which is why they are happy and cooperative when I document the stories and traditional practices.
How was your film “The Myths of the Wancho” received by the Wancho community?
I screened the two documentary films that I have made with the Wanchos in Kamhua Noknu village on December 5, 2021. It was a challenge because of the technical requirements. I borrowed the projector and generator from the school and the amplifier from the church, and a team of local boys set up a huge screen in the common ground of the village for the screening.
It was a big occasion for them because they don’t have these kinds of screening events. About 500 people attended, many of them children and young people. They loved TheMyths of the Wancho because it was about them: it had their stories and people speaking in Wancho (with subtitles). It is very important to share the audio-visual material with the community, involve them as much as possible and develop trust and friendship. Once they have seen the footage, I can screen it elsewhere. So far there have been no objections, but if there would be any, it has to be taken into account and acted upon. I depend on their feedback, inputs, and translations.
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What other tribes of Arunachal have you worked with?
I have worked with the Tani group who live in central Arunachal Pradesh: with the Adi, Galo, Nyishi, and Apatani. One of the stories in “The Tales of the Tribes” series was an adaptation of a story about Abotani, considered the ancestor of the Tani people. In 2017, I worked with Rajiv Gandhi University near Itanagar to translate and record the film dialogues in Apatani and Galo, and later that year I went back to central Arunachal to screen “The Tales of the Tribes” to local audiences in Ziro, Basar, as well as in Itanagar.
Is the method of preserving folktales through animated films generating more awareness and interest?
“The Tales of the Tribes” series presents adaptations of the stories of the Tani; the Lepcha of Sikkim; the Angami of Nagaland; a Manipuri story and one from the Pardhan Gonds of central India. Animation is a good way of engaging younger people in traditional stories and storytelling. When the story is adapted to the medium of animated film, it inevitably undergoes transformation because the oral form is very different from the audio-visual. The process of adaptation is complex and interesting, and this is what I was studying during the PhD.
The animated films can only be the starting point for someone to get interested in the storytelling traditions, but it is a way to engage diverse groups of people in traditional culture during workshops to decide how it should be done. We have to do a lot of research, looking at the anthropological texts as well as listening to storytellers.
What are the new projects you are working on?
My ongoing projects include the publication of the collection of Wancho myths and folktales, and adapting a Wancho story for a short animated film. There is a lot more documentation to be done with the Wancho community and other local groups, the Mao community of Manipur, for example, are also interested.
Another project is to make an animated film on the myths of the Andamanese people. The project has started, but I will need to record dialogues for the film in the Andamanese language, of which only a few s