A journey to the Lepcha in the southeastern Himalayas. At the center of her lecture are the Lepcha, an indigenous community that calls itself Mutanchi Rongkup Rumkup. Bentley provides insight into their complex relationship with land, environment, and the animated beings that are as much at home in this landscape as the people.

Bentley focuses on the indigenous concept of Lyangdok Ungdok - the guardians of land and water - and describes the multiple meanings attributed to this concept within the community. Using impressive examples, Bentley shows how these relationships with the environment have played a central role in ethnic, political, and ecological movements over the past two decades. She also speaks about two defining disasters in the region - the 2011 earthquake and the 2023 glacial lake outburst flood - and how these events and the experienced increasing precarity have sustainably changed the relationship between humans, nature, and "more-than-human" beings.

A fascinating insight into a little-known world - between spiritual cosmology, environmental ethics, and the challenges of a changing mountain region. Publication: Bentley, Jenny. 2025. Guardians of Land and Water. Rituals, Vulnerability, and Indigenous Belonging among Himalayan Mútunci Róng. Zurich/Gangtok: Seismo/Rachna Publications.

Anthropologist Dr. Jenny Bentley is the managing director of the Tapriza Association and commutes between Darjeeling, Sikkim, and Basel in Switzerland. The book was published in Switzerland in November 2025 by Seismo Publisher.

Location: Songtsen House, in Zurich-Oerlikon