Telling Our Own Stories: Oral Tradition, Memory, and Resistance in Easterine Kire’s Sky is My Father and When the River Sleeps

Abstract

This article examines how Easterine Kire integrates Naga oral traditions into modern narratives as a form of cultural resistance. It argues that her works challenge colonial and nationalist narratives that marginalize Northeast India. Using postcolonial and memory studies, the paper shows how storytelling becomes a political act that preserves indigenous knowledge and reclaims narrative authority.