Talk:Zou people (India)

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. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.129.194.20 (talk) 16:57, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

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[edit] Confusing Terminology

Zou is a name of Kuki-Chin-Mizo tribe in Manipur south district recognized by Government of India in 1954 at present,the authors article seems utopian in character.Zou is not synonymous with Zomi or Mizo or Jou or Zhou. If Zou is the name of all these people whom he mentioned why are there so many tribes and clans. Why don't they call themselves wiht one name only? The author has gone mad and crazy. It is put up to confuse younger generations and the Zou tribe/groups instead of unifying them.

[edit] Useful Ethnographic Information

This article provides useful ethnographic information; it is a contribution to the knowledge pool about the indigenous people along the Indo-Burma border. However, it needs more revision and more references to enhance its usefulness. Due to the absence of standard spelling in the past, the Zou people used different spellings (eg. Jo, Jou, Zou, Zo, etc.) at different points of time. But this problem should not be exaggerated. The history of literacy among the Zous is still very recent; so such problems are understandable.

Even in mainland India, there is a kind of craze to change place names - Calcutta to Kolkotta, Bombay to Mumbai, Madras to Chennai, Bangalore to Bangalooru. The same is true of tribe-names in Northeast India. Many of the tribe-names mentioned in colonial ethnography of Northeast India (Shendu, Siyin, Kamhau, Lushai, etc.) are hardly known and used or remembered today. Perhaps they are discarded for good. It is confusing indeed; but what can we do? Is there a politics and power behind all tribe names and place names? Or, are they happy accidents?

[edit] This is about Zou tribe (India), not about Zomi or Zo

Please don't change the original term "Zou" into Zomi or Zo or Zote of Burma and Bangladesh. The "Zou people" is an entry about the "Zou tribe" of Manipur state of India. Zomi and Zo have different entries in Wikipedia. The officially recognized term in India, i.e., "Zou" (India) has been used throughout this article for the sake of consistency. So, replacing the word "Zou" used in the original version with Zo and Zomi does not make sense! Here "Zo" (Burma) is mainly used to refer to the Zou dialectal groups of Burma since they prefer the spelling that way. This distinction is useful to achieve clarity in the present context. It's true that "Zou" is a component of the so-called Zomi group which includes several other tribes. But this aricle is purely an ethnographic description of the "Zou tribe" as it is - not as it ought to be in a future "Zomi" nationality. There is a thin line between positive description and political propaganda.

[edit] "Zo" as a generic term

  1. During this modern days, many politicians, thinkers and writers propounded the name 'Zo' stands for a single community/tribe under the royal chief i.e. the Manlun, Mantuang - clans.

Thus, the Zou tribe in Manipur could not unified the others close brethens under a single notation. This gave a differential thoughts and likes amongst the Chin-Kuki-Mizo-Zomi goups.

[edit] Further Clarification: Scope of Study

This article "Zou people (India)" is primarily a description of the "Zou tribe" in Manipur. But there are two sections related to the historical background of the tribe. In this section, the narrative of Zou history is merged together with the history of other Chin-Kuki or Zomi groups because it is not possible to isolate the history of a particular community before 1956, when the Indian Govt. officially recognized the Zou as a distinct Indian tribe. Nevertheless, this article focuses only on the Zou community from the 1950s onward (as it should be).