Piers Vitebsky

I first read this book a couple of years ago when I was taking courses in anthropology for my minor in university. Back then, it already made a great impression on me. At the time, I had to finish it fairly quickly in order to write an assignment on it, leading me to skip certain chapters and passages. Ever since, the book remained firmly planted in the back of my mind, and recently I have bought my own copy in order to re-read at my own pace simply for my own enjoyment. I am therefore writing this review as a layperson.

In this book, Vitebsky describes his ethnographic fieldwork among the Lanjia Sora in southern Odisha from the 1970s onwards, and especially the abandonment of the animist religion and way of life by the younger generations of Sora.

Despite the scientific nature of the work, Vitebsky writes in an accessible style which is for the most part easy to follow. Large sections read almost like a novel, and even when reading it for the second time around, I desperately wanted to keep on reading. Some passages of thorough analysis are of course present, and take some more careful reading to follow the train of thought. Despite this slowing my reading, Vitebsky’s account is striking.

The first part of the book especially, which deals with Vitebsky’s early fieldwork in Soraland in the late 1970s, speaks to the imagination, as he describes his gradual integration in and his understanding of this culture, language and religion. In addition to the text, the photographs taken by the author bring this world, remote in terms of both space and time, intimately close to the reader.

In a way, the book feels like a tragedy, as the culture that the author had come to understand and love no longer exists today as it did then. The second part of the book deals with Vitebsky’s return to the Sora after a long absence from 1992 onwards, and discusses much of what has changed since. This was more difficult for me to read the first time around, both because I shared the author’s sense of loss, and because it seemed I had also slowly come to understand this culture while reading, and now having to learn yet another worldview was perhaps too much. This second time around, the animist way was already familiar to me, which made reading about the new more manageable.

Personally, I think that this book brings much more than knowledge about this remote tribe in India. Coming to understand a worldview so distant from one’s own is a valuable experience, and shows us the wonderful diversity of our world, as well as a mutual understanding between human beings. In fact, I think this book could be a positive experience for almost anyone, whether they know they are interested in anthropology or not.

Vitebsky writes at the end of the book that it has been a privilege to be accepted into the lives of so many Sora over the years. Likewise it feels like a privilege to be led by the author through his experiences among the Sora, and get to know so many people’s lives intimately through his words.… (plus d'informations)