The Changing Role of Women in Naga Society: From Traditional Roles to Contemporary Realities

Abstract

Women in Naga society have historically occupied a paradoxical position: widely celebrated in public discourse as “free” and respected, yet structurally excluded from key arenas of decision-making and resource control. Drawing on anthropological, historical, legal, and gender studies scholarship, this review traces continuities and changes in Naga women’s roles from the pre-colonial period to the present. It first outlines traditional social organization, gendered divisions of labour, and the symbolic and institutional separation of male and female spheres. It then analyses the impact of colonial administration, Christian missions, and the codification of customary law, including the special constitutional status of Nagaland under Article 371A, in entrenching androcentric authority. The review examines contemporary transformations associated with women’s education, market integration, self-help groups (SHGs), migration, and civil society activism, highlighting how women’s organizations and feminist critiques of “custom” have generated new spaces of agency as well as backlash. Case material from Ao and Khiamniungan communities illustrates the lived contradictions between the myth of Naga egalitarianism and the everyday realities of patriarchal customary law and practice. Situating Nagaland within wider debates on customary law and women’s rights in India and beyond, the paper concludes that Naga women’s changing roles reflect not a linear transition from “tradition” to “modernity,” but an ongoing, contested negotiation shaped by the interaction of indigenous norms, state law, Christian institutions, peace politics, and globalizing cultural and economic forces.