Reimagining disaster preparedness in Indigenous Nepal

What is the conceptual boundary for disaster? Does the term include supernatural and social harms, or simply geophysical, hydrometeorological or technological hazards? In this chapter, we focus on the bhume puja ritual as a specific articulation of Indigenous disaster theory and disaster prevention active in the Himalayan region, specifically within Nepal. We establish the bhume’s significance as a set of practices intended to alleviate a community’s risk from catastrophe by bringing together comparative ethnographic research on bhume rituals undertaken in two geographically and socially distinct villages in the Nepal Himalaya: Gyoikhar in Temal Rural Municipality, Kavre District in Bagmati Province; and Dana village in Annapurna Rural Municipality, Myagdi District in Gandaki Province. We argue that collective performance of the annual bhume ritual is critical to the well-being of the localities discussed since failure to perform the ritual well erodes the vitality of the earth and the divinities and ruptures the relationship between nature, divinities and human beings. By closely attending to acts of reciprocity performed within the ritual, we identify the importance of social relations – between humans, environment and divine beings and between socially differentiated groups living within a given territory – to the prevention of rupture and disruption of Himalayan lifeways and landscapes.