Culinary Perspectives in Spirit Nights and Sky is My Father: A Naga Village Remembered

Abstract

 This article explores the culinary perspectives present in Easterine Kire’s novels Spirit Nights (2022) and Sky is My Father: A Naga Village Remembered (2003; revised edition 2018). Food functions not merely as a biological necessity in these narratives but also as a powerful cultural symbol that reflects the social structure, collective memory, and spiritual worldview of the Naga community. The culinary traditions depicted in these novels illustrate rituals, taboos, ecological awareness, and community practices that shape everyday life in Naga society. Through feasts, agricultural practices, preservation of food, and communal cooking, Kire presents food as a narrative device that strengthens kinship ties and reinforces cultural identity. The study draws upon theoretical insights from food studies scholars such as Roland Barthes, Claude Lévi-Strauss, Sidney Mintz, and Mary Douglas to analyse the symbolic and social dimensions of food representation in the novels. The article argues that culinary practices in Kire’s fiction function as an archive of cultural memory and community formation while also reflecting ecological relationships between humans and their environment. By examining the cultural meanings attached to food, this study highlights how culinary narratives contribute to understanding indigenous knowledge systems and social traditions within Naga society.