The Chanchannag and the Preservation and Promotion of Kalinga Lifeways

Abstract

Chants are universal expressions of the complexity of the artistic life of a people. That chanter, almost always, plays a role in keeping the community together. In some instances, the chanter is also a healer. In the case of the Kalinga, the chanter chants because their heart is full, their spirit rejoicing. If the chanting is filled with grief, that chant could be purging, offering relief and healing however transient the healing is. Among the Kalingas, the chanchannag is a vital part of Kalinga's cultural and spiritual heritage. An ethnographic account of the chanchannag not only makes us enter into the “chanted world” of the Kalingas but invites us to reside in that world. While the chant was robust in the past, today it is hardly performed, the chanting hardly done unless it is part of a bigger cultural performance. That spontaneity has been lost, and gradually, if the chanting tradition is not recorded, this could be lost forever. Following a variety of ethnographic approaches, this presentation maps the decline of this chants and proposes ways to have them preserved for the future generations of Kalingas