Paper short abstract:

Through a multispecies lens this paper explores changing seasonality in the Eastern Himalayas through indigenous observation of changes in the migration and hibernation cycles of five species of birds, one insect and one frog—all taxonomically identified as "season-birds".

Paper long abstract:

In the tribal state of Arunachal Pradesh in the Eastern Himalayas, a biologically rich but under-researched area of South Asia, climate change is already influencing the migration, hibernation and reproduction cycles of animals. This is already having significant knock-on effects for indigenous cultivators in the region. Responding to recent calls for social scientific study of climate change "from the inside" this paper examines indigenous perceptions of changes in the migration and hibernation of five birds, an insect and frog—all taxonomically identified as "season-birds". Through a multispecies lens, the paper examines how such observed changes in the behaviour of these locally significant companion species produce friction as they scrape and grind against established oral narrative accounts of the temporal alignment of human practices with seasonal changes in the landscape required for successful cultivation of rice. An indigenous cosmological portrait arises of climate change in this part of the Eastern Himalayas as both a threat to the more-than-human social contract between swidden cultivators and the surrounding landscape and its spirits, and as a trigger for adaptation.