An Ordered Society

Himalayan Households is a comprehensive study of the cultural ecology, demography, and domestic organization of the Tamang, the largest Tibeto-Burman speaking population of Nepal. A people on the cusp of a major socio-economic transformation. The overall intent of this ethnography is to show how particular strategies for making a living have implications for household structures and organization of a village. Three major processes intersect in the Timling's adaption: the annual subsistence cycle, demographic processes of fertility and population expansion, and the household development cycle. The village of Timling (132 households) was chosen because, having retained control over their primary productive resources, the people were not strictly peasants. Currently they are faced with a crisis. For the first time, their local environment cannot keep up with agricultural and material needs brought on by population growth. They now find themselves in a position subordinate to other groups and are becoming involved in an economy that requires them to sell their labour in unequal exchange, competing with others who must do the same.