ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to highlight the perceptions of an indigenous population, the Khamti, who live and work daily with elephants in Northeast India, forgoing domestication. The Khamti do not breed but capture elephants in the forest and integrate them into the village. Why do they not domesticate their elephants? This question raises a further one: what bond exists between tamed elephants and the Khamti, if not a process of domestication? What kind of hybrid sociality is at stake? By studying the different steps in the constitution of Khamti-elephant communities, the chapter examines the logic underlying the relationships within these interspecies collectives. It first describes the process through which a newly captured elephant is integrated into the village, and then turns attention to the capture operations using village elephants. In both of these sections, the focus is on the role of adult village elephants, named konkies. From a practical point of view, it studies in the role and interactions between these konkies, the Khamti and wild elephants. From a more symbolic point of view, their relationships with different supernatural forest and village entities are considered. Ultimately, this case sheds light on the permeable limits between taming and domesticating and on the variety of interspecies entanglements which surround domestication, and may or may not favour the development of this relationship.
