Mundum: Oral Tradition, Ritual Practice, and Cultural Identity Among the Bantawa Rai

Abstract

This study examines Mundum as a living oral tradition and indigenous knowledge system that shapes ritual practices, symbolic power, and collective identity among the Bantawa Rai of eastern Nepal. Although previous scholars have primarily interpreted Mundum as mythology, folklore, oral literature, or a sacred religious scripture, its broader sociological significance remains insufficiently explored. Addressing this gap, the study is theoretically grounded in Practice Theory, drawing primarily on Pierre Bourdieu’s (1977) concepts of habitus, field, and capital, which explain how social life and cultural practices are continually produced and reproduced through embodied social action. Adopting a qualitative ethnographic approach, the research draws on both primary and secondary sources. Primary data were generated through observation, in-depth interviews, key informant interviews, and repeated discussions with purposively selected ritual specialists, cultural experts, and community elders possessing extensive knowledge of Mundum and Bantawa Rai traditions. Secondary data were collected from books, peer-reviewed journal articles, research reports, and other relevant published and unpublished sources. The findings demonstrate that Mundum extends beyond a sacred oral scripture to function as a living corpus of oral tradition, an indigenous knowledge system, and a framework of symbolic power that organizes ritual practices, legitimizes ritual authority, preserves cosmological knowledge, and structures social relations within the Bantawa Rai community. The study concludes that Mundum constitutes the central cultural institution through which the Bantawa Rai sustain their ritual life, indigenous worldview, social order, and collective identity.