Mayel Lyang Embodied: ‘Tradition’ and Contemporary Lepcha Textiles

The Lepchas, an ethnic group indigenous to the Himalayas and the Darjeeling hills, have been weaving textiles from local nettle (Girardinia diversifolia) for millennia. However, their native land, centered around the former Kingdom of Sikkim in modern-day northeastern India, has been the site of centuries of cultural exchange and colonization despite its remoteness, entailing wide-ranging and continuous social, political, and economic changes within the area. Rapid regional industrialization, and the concomitant globalization process and urbanization will potentially further transform Lepcha culture. Despite this, the Lepchas continue to weave textiles they consider traditional. With that in mind, this article will consider the concept of ‘tradition’ and its place in post-industrial Sikkim, using these textiles as a basis for understanding the significance of ‘tradition’ and how ‘tradition’ is used as a tool for carving a place out in the contemporary world. This study analyzes its deployment in contemporary Lepcha textiles so as to illuminate the relationship between tradition, textiles, and contemporary Lepcha identity.

Regionale Industrialisierung revisited – Die niederrheinische Textilregion von der Protoindustrialisierung bis zum 20. Jahrhundert als Fallbeispiel

The concept of Regional Industrialization developed by Rainer Fremdling, Toni Pierenkemper and Richard Tilly is based on a small-scale research approach and composes regions according to criteria of homogeneity. This paper argues that the concept is fruitful in regard to textile regions and their analysis in a long-term perspective from proto-industrialization to the 20th century. It examines relevant factors such as capital, labour, raw materials, transfer of capital, technology and knowledge in order to analyse the specific regional path of growth. Especially the role of migrant pioneer entrepreneurs and the institutional-cultural setting, i.e. the state monopolies of the regional silk and velvet producers are addressed. Mechanisation and the factory system were introduced relatively late in comparison to other regions in the wool and cotton branch of textile industry. But innovations in weaving and energy technology diffused rather rapidly in Krefeld, Mönchengladbach and the rural surroundings. The paper shows how the growing textile industry of the left lower Rhine region diversified during the Great Depression of the 1870s-90s and induced forward and backward linkages to the machinery, tool and chemical industries. In all segments of the textile industry in the region (silk, velvet, cotton, wool, synthetics) path dependencies evolved which still have an effect on research institutions and industrial culture today.