http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=46025

Mabrur sent me this link -a very good article, highlighting teh basics but nonetheless a brief look at some of the struggles of these communities.

If these people are “Indigenous” then what does that make all the other people, the ones that are brown like us?

Good point Abdul, I dislike compartmentalisations and lables too because it highlights a sense of difference. But nonetheless, labels exist and can help us identify many things. Those who are indigenous are different from the dominant people in the same country etc etc, so i guess... you will fall into the dominant social grouping in Bangladeshis? a member of the masses as opposed to minority.

Rahima, I *think* Abdul Hyes point was that to call them "Indigenous" gave them a stronger claim to Bangladesh than the rest of the population; almost as if to say that the rest of the Bangladeshis are occupiers? (or something along those lines).

I know AK, that is another angle in which his point can be taken. I guess, no one tribe or community of collective group of people can be seen to have more of a claim to a country than another - there will be minorities and majorities in terms of numerical measurements but historically and socially, we are all refugees.

Only an opinion, I think its a huge mis-conception that we have as people (conditioned by media and other forces),relating skin colour with nationality. Although human perception strongly disagrees with this I don't think there's any relationship between the two.


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