Exploring Indigenous Consciousness: A Critical Study of the Oraon Folktale “The Enchanted Mandolin”

Folklore encompasses the tradition, culture, knowledge and teachings of a particular community. It often carries within it the worldview of the people of that community. The paper attempts to investigate a particular folktale of the Oraons, a tribe originally inhabiting the Chhotanagpur plateau, on the eastern part of India. Due to the prejudiced notion of tribe in India and the world, folklore, though theoretically has been referred to as verbal art but practically it has still not been accorded the status of literature. An absolute and comprehensive understanding of folklore necessitates the study of the folk as well. The present paper attempts an analysis of the Oraon folktales within the ambit of the cultural life of the Oraons. The paper attempts to question the binaries of barbaric and civilized, primitive and advanced while exploring the indigenous consciousness through the folktale.