Zeitgeist: An Interdisciplinary Journal in Humanities and Social Sciences

Listening to the Human Voice: Carol Gilligan

Uddipona Borah — 2026-09-26

The present paper highlights Carol Gilligan's theoretical contributions to moral psychology and feminist ethics, tracing the transition from the framework of a different voice to the articulation of a human voice. The analysis highlights dominant models of moral development have traditionally prioritised a masculine, justice-oriented paradigm marginalising care, relationality, and embodiment. Building on Gilligan's broader theoretical framework, the discussion reconstructs moral development around the integration of care and justice, thought and feeling, self and relationship. The paper situates this reframing within the history of moral development and care ethics, reframes the critique of the patriarchal psychic split, and emphasises significance of the role of voice and listening in sustaining relational integrity. The main argument is that moral development attains its fullest expression when both men and women move beyond the false dichotomies imposed by patriarchal systems—separating justice from care, reason from emotion, self from relationship—and instead develop a human voice that integrates all these dimensions, enhanced and upheld through voice and listening in relational integrity.

Geo-Environmental Problems Associated with Mariani Town, Jorhat, Assam

Chinmoyee Borpujari — 2026-09-20

A geo-environmental study of an area analyzes the physical, chemical, and biological components of the environment to understand and manage them sustainably. It involves mapping resources, assessing natural hazards like floods, erosion and planning for sustainable land use. Geo-environment refers to the geographical and environmental factors effecting the natural landscape of an area. This paper aims to examine the principal geo-environmental problems affecting the town of Mariani with emphasis on river pollution, water quality and supply issues, flood and erosion hazards, land-use change and solid-waste management, and anthropogenic impacts. The study uses government data, local institutional reports, regional news and peer-reviewed literature for identification of existing problems, categorisation of the factors or underlying drivers, and suggest few mitigation, monitoring and planning actions appropriate for a rapidly changing peri-urban area of Mariani town which is dominated by tea gardens and transport infrastructure.

Falling of Angels into Beasts: The Archetypal Study of Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Madhurima Baruah — 2026-06-25

The impenetrable sound of the breaking conch spread everywhere, where the wind whisper forgotten prophecies and the waves carry the echoes of the first fear of civilization, William Golding’s Lord of the Flies emerges as an evocative modern myth. Amidst the fragile cocoon of an emerald isolated island the innocence blooms only to wither beneath the constant struggle of instinct, which depicts the omnipresent wilderness of human heart. This discussion examines the novel Lord of the Flies by William Golding through the archetypal perspectives of Carl Jung and Northrop Frye, presenting the timeless patterns, symbols and characters that surpass the unseen footprints of historical, geographical and cultural radix.

The unnamed island becomes an archetypal embodiment of the eternal battle between civilization and savagery. Ralph symbolizes the reluctant hero struggling to restore peace and hope amidst interminable darkness, while Jack personifies shadow; captured by the restless desire for power and primal instinct. All the characters embody the archetypal reflections and, human mind and depicts evil as the eternal inhabitant of the human heart.

Through the archetypal and psychological perspective, the paper presents the island both as paradise and dystopia. Moreover, from the Biblical lenses, the novel echoes the Judeo-Christian narratives of the fall, sin and redemption through the sacrifice of Simon that completely transformed the island from an Edenic realm into a site of devastation and the decay of human civilization. Thus, the paper purports to emphasize the significance and space of islands in literature, the archetypal criticism of human civilization and depicts the destruction of nature in the battle of human limitations and desire.

Bridging the Economic Divide

Kasturi Goswami — 2026-06-25

This paper tries to understand the socio-economic and political significance of SAARC countries in regional development. For it assess the performance and achievements of SDGs across member states, focusing on key economic and social indicators. To achieve the objectives, the study relies on secondary data collected from various sources, viz. the World Development Outlook (World Bank, 2024), Regional Economic Outlook Reports, IMF, 2024 and the Sustainable Development Goals Report, 2024. The analysis focuses on selected SDG indicators that capture key aspects of economic and social development. The analysis is divided into three analytical sections. To assess the economic dimensions of SDGs, the study specifically analyzes the economic performance of SAARC nations through sectoral and labour market indicators thereby identifying the structural transformation and economic composition of member economies. The analysis of industrial sector provides a mixed picture across SAARC nations. It reflects the differences in resource endowments, industrial policy, and economic diversification.

A synthesis of the combined sectoral and employment data across SAARC nations reveals a classic pattern of structural transformation. It positions the countries into three broad developmental stages viz. agrarian economies, transitional economies and service-led economies. Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, and India represent agrarian economies, characterized by high agricultural employment, elevated levels of informality, and relatively low unemployment the classical hallmarks of early-stage development. Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka on the other hand represent the transitional economies that are gradually diversifying into industrial and service sectors. The SDGs 1 and 10, covers poverty reduction and inequality and yet again Afghanistan remains the most economically vulnerable, while Maldives and Bhutan have the lowest poverty rates.

The study concludes that the SAARC nations have potentiality and made a significant progress in many indicators of SDGs. However, only a significant improvement in SDGs indicators for all the members of countries can ensure a win-win situation for all and became super power of Asia.

Copying, Collecting, Naming

Mregosree Hazarika — 2026-06-25

This paper examines accounts by three European-origin women who wrote about Assam and its frontier regions between 1916 and 1953. They are: Jessie T. Moore’s Stray Leaves from Assam (1916), Jean Kingdon-Ward’s My Hill So Strong (1952), and Ursula Graham Bower’s Naga Path (1950) and The Hidden Land (1953). It places these works alongside selected writings by other western men operating in these regions in order to examine how colonial knowledge was assembled, transmitted and recorded. Rather than treating gender as a self-evident determinant of textual perspective, the paper distinguishes two recurrent registers. First, a transmitted documentary register, consisting of reports, statements, returns, correspondence and other materials reproduced from institutional sources. And second, a situated relational register, through which writers recorded the labour, translation, payment, negotiation and interpersonal relationships that made movement and knowledge production possible. The distinction is most visible in the paratexts and documentary insertions. Moore’s mission volume incorporates conference statements, statistical returns and resolutions while also recording the staff, linguistic work and domestic circumstances of a station. Kingdon-Ward’s account of the 1950 earthquake preserves an expeditionary staff structure, payment arrangements and the labour behind botanical collection alongside official reports. Bower’s The Hidden Land places an account of administrative methods and personnel beside an extended narrative of interpreters, traders, slaves and local intermediaries. Comparison with male-authored commercial and scientific society publications, including two authors who wrote in both venues, suggests that genre, institutional audience and publishing venue strongly shaped the visibility of local intermediaries and of documentary authority. The paper argues that these women’s writings are valuable not because they offer an alternative or inherently “less colonial” perspective, but because their particular institutional and practical positions preserved evidence of the relational and material labour through which colonial knowledge was produced. Read as composite textual archives rather than homogeneous narratives, these books disclose people and transactions that official records frequently rendered peripheral.

Assam Was Not a Place

Bikram Bora — 2026-06-25

Book Review of Manjeet Baruah’s Hunter, Peasant, Rebel