This book, put together in the wake of changing times and with an awareness of past, includes essays from several experts in their fields. They attempt to describe and study the texture of cultural space, which is understood in terms of material and non-material aspects, and historically too. The most interesting thing one finds as one goes through the articles is the principle of organization of various tribes and the significant change which occurred over the ages. There are similarities and differences across societies in more or less the same geographic space. What underpins the description and observation is the way the communities cope in the face of exacting and instrumentalizing modernity. Some of the articles focus on the way the societies have carried to current times very vividly their ‘self-knowledge’, their traditional wisdom, their intimate knowledge of geography and resources, their spiritual belief-systems and world-views. Similarly some of the articles focus on the cultural artifacts and archeological remains. While interpreting, attempts have been made by some contributors to establish linkages between the societies of Arunachal Pradesh and Assam and even other parts of India. Attempts have been made to trace the spread of Neo-Vaishnavism, and adapting Buddhism to the local conditions. The essays are broadly classified into three categories: (1) dealing with historical facts and artifacts, (2) traditional lifestyles of communities, and the socio-economic and religio-cultural aspects of the various tribes including the role of religious beliefs, oral tradition and culture, and (3) the aspects of archaeological sites of Arunachal Pradesh.
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