Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: This paper explores the role of poetry as an alternative historiography in the context of political violence and marginalization in Manipur, Northeast India, with a focus on the works of poet Robin S. Ngangom. It argues that in a region often excluded from dominant national narratives, poetry becomes a form of counter-memory that resists state-sanctioned histories and hegemonic structures of knowledge. Drawing upon Michel Foucault’s concepts of subjugated knowledge and counter-memory, the paper examines how Ngangom’s poetry functions as a political and historical archive — not through grand narratives or official documentation, but through deeply personal and affective responses to conflict, grief, and loss. The paper thus situates Ngangom as a poet-historian whose work transcends literary aesthetics and participates in the urgent political task of remembering. In doing so, it posits that poetry in conflict zones like Manipur is not only a cultural expression but a form of resistance, remembrance, and radical truth-telling.
Author: Baihunshisha Khongshun
Language: English
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
OpenAlex ID: W4409646609