Talk by Karen Donoghue (Journalism and Mass Communication at North Eastern Hill University)

In an era marked by migration, identity and community dynamics are constantly remade, throwing into sharp relief questions of belonging that must be addressed through a post-nationalist lens. My own scholarly focus was sharpened by a personal catalyst, directing my attention to the period of uprising in the state of Mizoram against the Indian government, called Rambuai-“troubled or disturbed land", that spanned approximately two decades, from 1966 to 1986. A body of works known as Rambuai literature serves as a cultural anchor, tying Mizo memory to this traumatic conflict.

This talk extends Rambuai literature beyond its conventional borders into the overlooked, narrow streets of Happy Valley, Shillong, in the neighbouring state of Meghalaya, where a diasporic Mizo community settled. Through their stories, I explore how identity and homeland are rebuilt in the quiet, domestic spaces of displacement. I discuss how unique perspectives emerge when narratives are analyzed through Mizo/ indigenous philosophical frameworks. Specifically, I examine how lunglen, which I loosely translate as “the inability to imagine oneself without the other,” becomes the embodied virtue underpinning the Mizo diaspora’s unique migration and rebuilding experience. I show how this community-centric approach, using oral history and photography, uncovers novel ways to look at migration experiences and the ideas of home and belonging. I will conclude by reflecting on my own positionality as a diasporic researcher and how it directly informs my current project on the Mizo diaspora in the United States.

Karen Lalrindiki Donoghue teaches in the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication at North Eastern Hill University, Shillong, India. She holds a PhD from the same university, which critically examines media representation of Northeast India in mainstream Indian media. Her research interests include media representation, media and culture, and oral history. She is currently a member of the executive committee of the Oral History Association of India. Her previous work includes co-leading "Stories from the Valley," an oral history project that documented the experiences of the Mizo diaspora in Shillong, culminating in a published book. She is part of the "Rambuai Archives" initiative, which seeks to record first-hand testimonies from a period of conflict in Mizoram and create a sustainable digital repository for these memories. Driven by the urgency to preserve vanishing histories, her scholarship extends to her current project on the Mizo diaspora in the United States, which investigates themes of transnational identity and community. Beyond her academic work, she is a published poet, with her work featured in the anthology "We Come From Mist: Writings from Meghalaya."