ABSTRACT
The chapter examines the significance of the politics of oral narratives and their impact upon the dynamics of culture and identity within the context of the oral tradition in the Mizo. The aspects of colonisation as well as Christianity have played a significant role in shaping the notion of Mizo identity. Within this framework oral narratives have been located in such a manner that it is almost relegated to a semblance of myth or mere lore. The chapter focuses on the location of Mizo oral culture vis-à-vis the Mizo written culture. This location is also addressed in terms of shift from the oral to the written in the making of Mizo modernity since the twentieth century, and its historical and cultural implications. It shall also study the significant role of oral tradition in the Mizo and how these traditions have been important in the construction of identity paradigms within the politics of a post colonial domain.
