Rice in the Imaginary World of the Western Angami Naga Cultural Semantics and Cultural Modalities.

The historical ethnography of the Western Angami Naga population of northeastern India is examined to throw new light on their symbolism, centred on the cultivation of wet rice. It is argued that rice was a presupposition for a cultural modality in which a major transformation created a new symbolic synthesis of sexuality and death that propelled the life force of growing rice. It is suggested that this modality contained a kernel of charismatic power, as is so characteristic of many other Southeast Asian polities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]