What makes you not a Bhutanese?

Spring Edition , May 24th, 2015 You can download this Article as a PDF by clicking here What does it mean to be Bhutanese, or not? Is there more to it than just being born in Bhutan of Bhutanese parents? I have a friend who was not born in Bhutan and whose parents are not Bhutanese,...

What is the “Bhutanese-ness” of the Bhutanese people?

Spring Edition , May 24th, 2015 You can download this Article as a PDF by clicking here World leaders, anthropologists, philosophers, stateless people around the world have pondered over the question of national identity, trying to define and re-define it at different times, under different circumstances, in different perspectives. Many believe that it is not really...

What would a 21st century Bhutanese identity be?

Spring Edition , May 24th, 2015 You can download this Article as a PDF by clicking here Our inheritance Bhutan’s journey from the 20th into the 21st century is one that the Bhutanese take great pride in. Our Fourth Druk Gyalpo regarded as a wise, skillful and compassionate leader worked tirelessly to build on the foundations...

Bhutan as recognised by history

Spring Edition , May 24th, 2015 You can download this Article as a PDF by clicking here Is there such a thing as a Bhutanese “national identity?” If so, how can it be defined, and how did it arise? Of related interest is the question of governance. Over the past thousand years or so, Bhutan has...

The cultural construction of Bhutan: an unfinished story

Spring Edition , May 24th, 2015 You can download this Article as a PDF by clicking here Our future sovereignty as a nation-state will continue to depend upon the articulation of a cultural imperative that asserts our distinctive Bhutanese identity.* Most Bhutanese would be familiar with the postulation that Bhutan’s survival as an independent nation rests...

Language and identity in Bhutan

Spring Edition , May 24th, 2015 You can download this Article as a PDF by clicking here In 1812, the famous linguist Wilhelm von Humboldt wrote that the difference between nations is most clearly manifest in their languages. In 1856, August Pott wrote that language is the key trait defining nationhood. In 1987, Emil Cioran wrote...

Beyond cultural preservation: contemporary art and identity in Bhutan

Spring Edition , May 24th, 2015 You can download this Article as a PDF by clicking here “While a few may have succeeded to integrate the two seamlessly, thus having the best of both worlds, most modern Bhutanese are in a cultural limbo, having relinquished the old but not fully reached the new.” – The History...

Manufacturing Singapore

Spring Edition , May 24th, 2015 You can download this Article as a PDF by clicking here At Singapore’s Changi international airport, a tourist from Delhi gets into a local yellow taxi for a ride into one of the city’s many luxurious hotels. Eager to learn more about the island nation known as a marvel of...

What does it mean to be an Indian?

Spring Edition , May 24th, 2015 You can download this Article as a PDF by clicking here “Ind” or “Sindh-stan” was a Greek and Persian construct referring to the river Indus as a territorial marker. Historians tell us that it was only after the late 14th century that residents of India began to refer to India...

Nationalism in a new republic

Spring Edition , May 24th, 2015 You can download this Article as a PDF by clicking here “A yam between two stones” is how Nepal’s founding monarch, Prithvi Narayan Shah, described the unified kingdom he forged out of dozens of feuding Himalayan principalities in the 18th century. Even back then, it was evident to the king...