Assamese Language, Narrative and the Making of the North East Frontier of India: Beyond Regional Indian Literary Studies

This paper is divided into two broad sections. The first section deals with the Brahmaputra Valley in Assam (north east India) and its transformation into a frontier in the nineteenth century. The section also deals with how this process was closely linked to the re-interpretation of the region's relationship with Indo-Gangetic culture, and the impact on development of the modern ‘Assamese’ language. The second section interprets modern Assamese novels in the light of the issues raised in the first section. It explores how issues such as indigeneity, the concept of India and modern Assamese language, share a relation of conflict in modern Assamese fiction. It is suggested in the conclusion that, due to such historical specificities, the language and narrative of the frontier require a specific regional approach, and should not be subsumed within larger frameworks such as ‘the nation’ or ‘South Asia’.