Activism and Identities in an East Kalimantan Dayak Organization.pdf

Activism and Identities in an East KalimantanDayak Organization

ANNE SCHILLER

In 1999, the East Kalimantan Dayak Association convened a watershedconference in Samarinda, Indonesia, that was attended by indigenous peoplefrom across the province. The conference, which was intended to nurture anemerging indigenous solidarity that aimed to transcend narrower loyalties,included sessions on organizational reform. This article examines the ongoingprocess of organizational rationalization within the association and investigateshow that process comports with the evolving vision of indigenous solidarity thatits leaders promote. It addresses challenges to that vision offered by constituentsand others. The article also explores the role of symbols drawn from the socialand natural worlds in fostering the development of an ethnic identity.The article reveals a paradox in the way that ethnicity is framed within theorganization—one that invites comparison with the methods and goals ofother indigenous and pan-indigenous movements.

There is no other way to say it. Indigenous people must strategize andwork hard as individuals and as a group, first to become more cognizantof our situation, then to take action to realize our mutual dreams, hopes,and goals. And one more thing—government policymakers must dosomething more concrete to respond to [our] needs.

Dayaks need strong leaders for their liberation movement. Dayak sover-eignty must be achieved by struggle and sweat. We must cooperateamong ourselves because there are no guarantees that those who fightalone can achieve success.

—From interviews with Dayak activists, 2000

BY EARLY MORNING ON December 11, 1999, the portico of the Bumi SenyiurHotel in Samarinda, Indonesia, was teeming, even as public transportation

continued to pause and discharge additional arrivals. Some carried feather head-dresses in hand rather than risk crushing them as they stooped to disembark.Businessmen in batik shirts of bold local design and young activists in t-shirtsemblazoned with the logos of nongovernmental organizations chatted outsidethe hotel entrance. Others wore barkcloth vests or particular accoutrements of

Anne Schiller ([email protected]) is a professor of anthropology at North Carolina StateUniversity.

The Journal of Asian Studies Vol. 66, No. 1 (February) 2007: 63–95.© 2007 Association of Asian Studies Inc. doi: 10.1017/S002191180700006X

traditional dress, such as rattan headgear or bead necklaces. By 9:00, more than200 women and men had congregated for the opening ceremonies of the conven-tion of the East Kalimantan Dayak Association (Persekutuhan Dayak KalimantanTimur, or PDKT). Dancers, including an elderly man in a loincloth and civet-skinvest swaying atop a gong and girls in sequined costumes waving hornbill featherfans, provided entertainment. After the dignitaries made their remarks, the par-ticipants went inside. A banner overhead trumpeted the occasion that broughtthem together: “Dayak People of East Kalimantan Awaken and Unify to Engen-der a Prosperous Future.”

The association’s 1999 meeting in the provincial capital was the organiz-ation’s second major conference since its founding. The first, in 1993, was heldwhen the PDKT was established by a self-selected group of local leaders as anadvisory body on Dayak affairs. The PDKT can be characterized as a publicpolicy–oriented organization based in the larger Dayak community. The organiz-ation seeks to embrace all of the province’s Dayak peoples and to incorporatethose from other Kalimantan provinces into some of its activities. Among themost striking aspects of the PDKT’s charter is its commitment to cultivating asolidarity that transcends narrower loyalties premised on blood, custom, geogra-phy, or language. “Community,” “solidarity,” and “tribe” are highly chargedabstractions in East Kalimantan, as in other parts of the island, and thus attemptsto foster broader ethnic self-identification have consequences for social relationsin the region. Such a situation raises interesting theoretical considerations forstudents of ethnicity in Indonesia (and elsewhere) regarding the role of formalorganizations in the production of identities.

In encouraging the subordination of localized identities to a more encom-passing concept of Dayak indigenism, the PDKT’s broader goals resonatewith those of other organizations in Kalimantan. In fact, organizations andmovements intended to mobilize Dayak people as a group have existed inKalimantan since the early twentieth century. These include Sarikat Dayak(later known as Pakat Dayak), established in Banjarmasin in 1919; politicalparties such as the Partai Persatuan Dayak, which was active in the 1950s;and the Gerakan Mandau Talawang Pro Panca Sila, an underground move-ment that ended its activities when the province of Central Kalimantan wasestablished in 1957 (Miles 1976). More recently, in the 1980s, a group of tea-chers in West Kalimantan founded the Yayasan Karya Sosial Pancur Kasih,part of which has evolved to become the very prominent and active InstitutDayakology, a leading Dayak organization.1 The 1980s also saw the establish-ment of a small institute for the study of indigenous customs in Central

1For more information on the activities of this important organization, see the institute’s homepageat http://dayakology.com.id. The institute publishes a monthly journal, the Kalimantan Review,which contains articles on regional developments and research (usually focusing on indigenouspeople in the West Province), as well as an annual English-language edition.

64 Anne Schiller

Kalimantan that published tracts on Ngaju Dayak beliefs and customs throughthe provincial university there.

In the 1990s, other Dayak organizations were set up. In addition to thePDKT, these included the Solidarity Forum of Dayak People (Forum SolidaritasMasyarakat Dayak), based in West Kalimantan Province, and the DiscussionInstitute for Dayak Peoples and Central Kalimantan Region (LembagaMusyarawah Masyarakat Dayak dan Daerah Kalimantan Tengah) in CentralKalimantan Province. An element of religious affiliation is involved in some ofthese organizations and movements. Some may be characterized as Christian,others as local religionist, and still others include Christians, Muslims, andlocal religionist Dayaks.

The constituents whom the leaders of these organizations claim torepresent—the Dayaks—inhabit the Southeast Asian island of Borneo. Althoughindigenous peoples with diverse languages and customs can be found acrossthe island, the term Dayak is used generically to refer to those who live in theIndonesian part. Their diversity poses challenges and opportunities for individ-uals who would organize interest groups, seek restitution for past injustices,and develop human resources in a region that was notoriously neglected byIndonesia’s collapsed “New Order” regime.

Though the phenomenon of Dayak organizations and movements is notentirely new, it appears that a growing number of Dayak leaders in Kalimantanare now choosing to frame their activities in broader ethnic terms. Regardingthe adoption of ethnic identities, Charles Keyes has argued that “[a]n ethnicidentity … becomes a personal identity after an individual appropriates itfrom a cultural source, that is, from the public display and traffic insymbols” (1981, 10). As one of several organizations that seek to essentialize“Dayakness,” the PDKT aggressively traffics in symbols that implicate socialrelations. Its leaders’ foray into the construction of symbols is an attempt topromote and embed a particular view of Dayak society. These symbolsinclude linguistic usages charged with new meaning, adaptations of artisticforms, and an anthem that celebrates and expresses the force of a commonidentity. They seek to identify symbols from the natural world that can meta-phorically convey oneness.

But what are the attributes of Dayak identity in East Kalimantan? Evenas some organizations there advance the view that a Dayak ethnicity exists,they offer varied conceptualizations of its components—for example,whether religion should be included or the extent to which subgroupidentities should be fostered, if at all. In addition, organizations may seekto operationalize Dayak identity for different ends. The comments of theDayak activists that open this paper are taken from interviews with twoPDKT members who are also affiliated with a nongovernmental organizationthat educates villagers about land rights. These particular activists are alsomembers of a pan-national indigenous rights organization. They have

Activism and Identities in an East Kalimantan Dayak Organization 65

participated in conferences with indigenous peoples from other islands; onehas lobbied internationally.

The first interviewee’s broader frame of reference is evidenced by the useof the term “indigenous people” (masyarakat adat). In interviews that I con-ducted with members of organizations in East Kalimantan, I found thatyounger individuals with broader activist experiences use the phrase indigenouspeople much more frequently than middle-aged or older individuals, whoprefer the term Dayak.2 The second interviewee espoused a radical but notidiosyncratic view that Dayaks should undertake a successionist movement.Though some others within the PDKT may privately embrace the notion ofa separatist movement, it is certainly not a part of the organization’s officialideology. The executive secretary of the PDKT remarked on this credoduring our first interview:

Dayaks have been ignored. The Dutch had a policy of divide andconquer, but in the New Order, with all of its centralization, thesituation was just as bad. We Dayaks have been colonized by ourown people—although it is unfortunate to say this, you know that it istrue. But don’t believe any reports that Dayaks want to be free [fromIndonesia] or that we aren’t unified. We want to be free from ignoranceand free from being ignored. Anyone who tells you otherwise is aprovocateur.3

In this regard, a handout prepared by the 1999 convention organizers avouched,“We the Dayak Community of East Kalimantan esteem the oneness and unity ofthe people in the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia” (unpublishedmaterials circulated at the 1999 conference).

In the past few years, the PDKT has reinvigorated itself and becomeovertly involved in regional politics. In 2003, for example, the organizationtook a position on the provincial gubernatorial election. When its favoredticket won, the PDKT hosted a victory celebration for the governor and vicegovernor in an indigenous village, Pampang, located outside the provincialcapital.4 At that celebration, the organization’s leaders reiterated the import-ance of maintaining peaceful relations with other ethnic groups in the provincein order to foster development.5 In 2004, the PDKT again offered backingto an official facing reelection, this time the regent of Kutai Kartanegara.It also intervened, not for the first time, in a dispute concerning land

2Another expression used in some contexts was putra daerah, or “regional son.” The significance ofthat phrase will be addressed in more detail later in the paper.3When the interviewee asserts, “We Dayaks have been colonized by our own people,” he is refer-ring broadly to other Indonesians, including government administrators.4On Pampang village, see Anne Schiller (2001b).5See “PDKT Syukuran Suwarna/Ngayoh Pimpin Kaltim” [PDKT Express Gratitude to GodSuwarna/Ngayoh Lead Kaltim], Humas Kaltim, October 8, 2003.

66 Anne Schiller

redistribution claims.6 The PDKT’s increasingly prominent role in provincialaffairs and its success in expanding its membership make it an interestingcase study for considering how a new organization can implicate ethnicity forpolitical, economic, and social ends. The PDKT case also affords scholarswho are interested in the way identities originate insight into the appropriationor rejection of particular formulations of Dayakness among the members of anethnic organization in one Indonesian province.

My intent in this paper is to trace the ongoing process of organizationalrationalization within the PDKT, examining how the organization’s changingstructure has comported with the vision that its leaders promote. As part of myanalysis, I explore attempts to nurture Dayak ethnicity through the creationand manipulation of key symbols.7 Indigenous movements across the globe arenow receiving increased attention. Case studies from Asia on the dynamics ofindigenous organizations and their role in the genesis of identities have alsobegun to emerge. One volume that includes some discussion of indigenousorganizations, specifically in Malaysia (Orang Asli Association for PeninsularMalaysia) and the Philippines (Cordillera People’s Alliance), is R. H. Barnes,Andrew Gray, and Benedict Kingsbury’s Indigenous Peoples of Asia (1995).Another important contribution is Tania Murray Li’s essay on the Alliance ofIndigenous People of the Archipelago (Aliansi Masyarakat Adat Nusantara). Liuses the problematic question of who qualifies as indigenous to address thedangers of the “politics of difference,” noting that such politics might mask ordeflect a struggle that is more rightly class based (2001, 647–48).

As the literature on indigenous organizations continues to grow, scholars willbe able to detect a diversity of motives and methods among them. Notwithstand-ing the prominence of pan-national and international indigenous movements, forexample, at the time I conducted my research in East Kalimantan, no member ofthe PDKT leadership expressed interest to me about affiliating with any pan-national or international indigenous organization. Furthermore, they sought toaffiliate with Dayaks from other provinces only within limited parameters andrejected offering them voting privileges in the PDKT. With such organizational

6On the PDKT’s support for the reelection of H. Syaukani H. R., see “Masyarakat Dayak danKepala Adat se-Kukar Beri Dukungan kepada Syaukani” [Dayak People and Adat Chief GiveSupport to Syaukani], KutaiKartanegara.com, February 21, 2004. For additional information onthe settlement of the land allocation dispute, see “Ratusan Warga Kabupaten Pasir MenggugatPembagian Lahan Sawit” [Hundreds of Citizens of Pasir Regency Criticize the Division of OilPalm Land in Front of Forestry Office], Depan Kehutanan, May 13, 2004.7“Key symbols” is a term borrowed from Sherry Ortner (1973). The category of key symbol includessummarizing and elaborating symbols. The former are considered totalizing, whereas the latterenable members of a group to understand how parts of the society are assembled. In the case ofEast Kalimantan, many PDKTmembers, though not all, would consider the hornbill a summarizingsymbol (although later, this symbol is challenged by a conference participant). A new choreographycomprising parts of indigenous dances from throughout the province that is performed on import-ant occasions might be considered an elaborating symbol.


diversity in mind, this paper seeks to give a sense of the local dynamics of identityproduction among one group of activists. It does not make claims to generaliz-ability but invites comparisons with developments in other locales in Kalimantanand beyond.

How and why new identities emerge is, of course, a long-standing interest ofscholars across all disciplines. Some early contributions to the topic by anthropol-ogists emphasized the importance of transaction and boundary mechanisms(Barth 1969), whereas others underscored the role that ethnicity and organiz-ations play in struggles among groups of people for economic and politicalpower (Cohen 1969). Throughout the years, attention has continued to focuson processes of ethnogenesis. Some scholars remain uncomfortable with theterm, insofar as it suggests that an ethnic category, once established as a socialmarker, necessarily remains a permanent feature of the social environment. Con-trary to that view, in this paper, I demonstrate the flexibility that characterizesidentity-building processes in East Kalimantan today and explain why identitythere is likely to continue to change shape, at least in the near future.

Stuart Hall is one of several scholars whose theoretical contributions havehad an important influence on our understanding of identity building. Hall’stwin concepts of “articulation” and “positioning” offer a useful framework forunderstanding how ideologies “empower people, enabling them to begin tomake some sense or intelligibility of their historical situation, without reducingthose forms of intelligibility to their socio-economic or class location or socialposition” as they construct a political identity (1986, 53). Using Hall’s conceptsas a springboard, Tania Li has argued that the decision to self-identify as“indigenous” is the contingent product of agency coupled with the cultural andpolitical work of articulation (2000, 151). Drawing from fieldwork in Sulawesiand other sources, she compares the fates of two populations, one of whichmanaged to achieve its goal of deflecting a state-sponsored dam project bypromoting itself as “traditional.” Li notes that although positioning may involvea tactical element, she is primarily analytically interested in “the flow ofmeaning from which an articulation is derived and the fields of power withwhich it is engaged [that] transcend temporary fixity” (153).

Yet in closely documented conversations and interviews that make up themarrow of an ethnographic record, it is precisely the tactical element of ethnicitythat research subjects often foreground, at least in my experience with theleaders of Dayak associations in Kalimantan. More studies that focus on the oper-ations of specific organizations are needed to complement broader discussionsabout the phenomenon of indigenism. Scholars must remain alert to the waysin which organizational entities, like ethnic identities, evolve over time. AsAlan Batteau reminds us, “Organization is a process, not a state” (2000, 728).Indigenous organizations should be of particular interest to students of ethnicitybecause they tend to evolve in a manner that is aggressively strategic. Thus, anunderstanding of how and why the PDKT has changed over time can deepen

68 Anne Schiller

our understanding of how and why ethnicity has changed in Kalimantan. Atten-tion to the organizational structures of associations such as the PDKT can alsohelp regional observers to predict how identity is likely to be experiencedthere in the future, as well as the potential consequences of particular visionsof ethnicity in a multiethnic setting.

Writing on ethnicity among indigenous peoples generally, David Maybury-Lewis remarks that “ethnicity is a latent qualification for membership in agroup that every human possesses… that may be activated under certain circum-stances” (2002, 103). This paper addresses some of the circumstances inKalimantan that have led leaders there to try to activate a Dayak ethnicity andhow they have done so. It opens with a brief discussion of the political and econ-omic developments that galvanized the Kalimantan peoples during the Suhartoregime and since. The peoples of Kalimantan are not the only ones to respondto the New Order by contributing to social movements with political aims, ofcourse, and a growing body of scholarship has documented the responses ofpeoples in Aceh, East Timor, Papua, and other areas. In East Kalimantan specifi-cally, however, in the dozen years since the organization was established, thePDKT has seized an increasingly visible role in the provincial struggle forsocial justice for Dayak people, a role that it gives every indication of continuing.

Following an introduction to the organization, the paper turns to a discussionof the goals and results of the 1999 Samarinda conference. The event was con-sidered a watershed by many participants, as it was the first the organizationhad sponsored during the reformation era. One of the organization’s officersinformed me before the conference, “This is an important, historical momentin the history of the Dayak community.” Another emphasized in his opening-day address that “God has given us a chance in this reform era. We have agovernor who understands our situation and a “regional son” [putra daerah]who is a vice governor. This conference needs to create one firm standpoint[satu pendirian yang teguh] among Dayaks.”8 At the conference, the diversityof the participants was repeatedly problematized. Leaders grappled with diversityas they sought ways to maintain their organization’s viability. Drawing data fromspeeches, debates, and artistic works, this paper examines how participants at theconference sought to affirm or challenge the concept of collective identity.

In considering this material, the paradox of the PDKT leaders’ approach toethnicity is revealed. Even as they have challenged the importance of narrowerloyalties as they have promulgated an East Kalimantan Dayak identity, theleaders have strengthened the reification of ethnic subcategories in order to

8The speaker was referring to H. Suwarna A. F., governor of East Kalimantan, and to Drs. YurnalisNgayoh, the vice governor (Bidang Pemerintahan dan Kesejahteraan Rakyat). For information onthe PDKT’s preparations for the 2003 gubernatorial election, see “1.500 Personel AmankanPemilihan Gubernur Kaltim: Akan Dihadiri Ribuan Pendukung” [1,500 Personnel Render Safethe Kaltim Governor’s Election: Thousands of Supporters Will Attend], Kompas, June 2, 2003.


secure broader participation in their organization. This finding offers an interest-ing point of comparison for researchers of other local or pan-indigenous move-ments. Similarly, despite claims to inclusivity, the PDKT is largely identified asa Christian organization, although the fact is rarely discussed openly. Borrowingfrom Hall, one perceives a “line of tendential force” that links Christianity toDayak politics (1986, 53). Yet even among Dayak Christians, denominationalismplays an important, if subtle role in alliance building. Further research may yieldan understanding of how alliances premised on shared religious beliefs affect theoperations of Dayak organizations. In closing, the paper remarks on how ethnicmobilization among Dayak people in East Kalimantan has begun to affect thesocial, economic, and political arenas in ways that raise important questionsabout future intragroup and intergroup relations in that province and beyond.

KALIMANTAN’S INDIGENOUS PEOPLES: A SHORT INTRODUCTION

Borneo, Southeast Asia’s largest island, is home to the people known collec-tively as Dayaks.9 Geopolitics, including European colonialism, have left theirmark on the island’s political and social geography. Three countries—Malaysia,Brunei Darussalam, and Indonesia—lay claim to parts of the island, thoughIndonesia possesses the largest share. Indigenous peoples live in each part.10

Indonesian Borneo, known in that language as “Kalimantan,” is divided intofour provinces: Central (Kalimantan Tengah), East (Kalimantan Timur), South(Kalimantan Selatan), and West (Kalimantan Barat). The overall population isgreatest in the West and South provinces.11

The highest numbers of Dayak peoples are found in the West, Central, andEast provinces. Exact figures are impossible to obtain, as census figures for theinterior are unreliable. Moreover, Indonesia did not collect census data onethnicity until very recently. The 2000 census was the first in seventy years tocollect direct information on ethnic affiliation. Remarkably, although the 1930census registered 1.1 percent of the archipelago’s population as “Dyak,” the cat-egory had all but vanished by the 2000 census (Suryadinata, Arifin, and Ananta2003, 13). Small numbers of Dayak people do surface in the census (e.g., theKendayan in West Kalimantan Province, the Ngaju and Katingan in CentralKalimantan Province, and the Bukat in South Kalimantan Province), but the

9On prehistoric immigration to the island of Borneo, see Victor King (1993, 59–82).10This paper concerns the use of the ethnic category Dayak, with a focus on one specific Indonesianprovince. It is not necessarily used in the same way—or at all—elsewhere on the island. For usefulcomparative material, see Claire Boulanger (2000) and Robert Winzeler (1997).11According to the 2000 census figures, the total populations of Kalimantan’s four provinces are asfollows: Central Kalimantan, 1,855,447; East Kalimantan, 2,451,895; South Kalimantan, 2,984,024;and West Kalimantan, 4,016,353 (Suryadinata, Arifin, and Ananta 2003, 3). For more statistics, visithttp://www.bps.go.id/sector/population.

70 Anne Schiller

only populations that are specifically categorized as Dayaks are the Dayak Sampitin Central Kalimantan Province and the Dayak Kenyah in East Kalimantan Pro-vince.12 Census figures aside, self-categorization as Dayak is not uncommonin local discourse. In East Kalimantan Province, many individuals readily self-identify as Dayak, not all of whom are Dayak Kenyah. Like the data for otherKalimantan provinces, those for the East Province are deeply flawed.

Although some Dayak people live in cities, such as Samarinda (the capital ofEast Kalimantan Province), Pontianak (the capital of West Kalimantan Province),and Palangka Raya (the capital of Central Kalimantan Province), the majority livein the interior. Their villages are often separated by hours or days or more of hardtravel. A small proportion are nomadic hunter-gatherers (Sellato 1994), but theprimary means of subsistence for most is shifting cultivation. Families plant hillrice and other crops. Many supplement their income by cultivating stands ofrubber trees, growing rattan, and fishing and hunting. The majority live in villagesof a few hundred people, usually on or near a river. In some communities,villagers live with members of their extended families in freestanding homes.In others, they inhabit traditional “longhouses,” enormous wooden buildingsthat can accommodate hundreds of residents. Their architecture often featuresa communal space along a front veranda and individual family apartmentsbehind (Winzeler 1998). Longhouses remain powerful symbols of traditionalsociety and values, even among individuals who no longer or have never livedin one (Sutlive 1978, 183; Winzeler 2004).13

The structure of Dayak societies also varies, ranging from egalitarian tohighly stratified forms of social organization composed of aristocrats, commoners,and slaves. Partialities grounded in systems of social stratification continue toaffect coalition building; for that reason, the adat chief of one East Kalimantangroup issued a declaration that represented a formal attempt to do away withthe social category of slave (Sebilang 1999).

Dayak peoples adhere to a variety of faiths. Some remain committed to localbelief systems. Among the best known of these systems is Kaharingan, which ispracticed by thousands of Central Kalimantan’s Ngaju Dayaks (Schiller 1997a,2001a). In 1980, after a decade of negotiation with the national Ministry ofReligion, Kaharingan was declared a variety of Hinduism and therefore includedwithin the five official faiths to which Indonesian citizens may belong. MostDayaks are converts to world religions, however. The majority practiceCatholicism or Protestantism. Although fewer in number, some have embraced

12The census conclusions did not go unnoticed. As a result of a protest by West Kalimantan’sCustomary Law Council, the Census Bureau (Badan Pusat Statistik) issued an apology. In thatresponse, the Census Bureau noted that 1,234,162 people, or 33.1 percent of that province’s popu-lation—rather than 0 percent—had been counted as Dayaks, making Dayak the largest ethniccategory in the province.13The appropriateness of the longhouse as a summarizing symbol of East Kalimantan Dayakidentity emerged during discussions at the PDKT conference.


Islam (Tien et al. 2000). Aggregate characterizations of Dayaks as “non-Muslim”

natives are now obsolete; in the past, when individuals converted to Islam, theyusually preferred to refer to themselves as Malays (Conley 1976, xiv). Today,most of East Kalimantan’s indigenous people are affiliated with an evangelicalProtestant denomination established by the Christian and Missionary Allianceand attend the Gospel Tabernacle Church of Indonesia (Kemah Injil GerejaMasehi Indonesia). Some others are Catholic, particularly those living in thearea surrounding the Tunjung Plateau (van Kleijnenbreugel 1987).

Rita Kipp (1993) has suggested that Indonesian government policiesregarding religion sharpened citizens’ religious identities and served todeflect the construction of class identities during the New Order regime.This paper will return to the relationship between class and ethnicity.However, issues of religious adherence and the extent to which religion is acomponent of identity remain important to Kalimantan’s peoples. ThePDKT, for example, reveals Christian partiality even in its name. The wordpersekutuhan is generally used to refer to Christian assemblies, and it was delib-erately chosen for that reason. “Christianity is central to Dayak life,” one of theorganization’s founders assured me.14 Scholars must remain attentive to theway that religious affiliation affects solidarity building among East KalimantanDayaks and the role of religion in local politics there, as they have attended toreligion’s role in social movements in West Kalimantan, East Timor, Aceh, andthe Moluccas.15 Furthermore, among Dayak Christians, a Protestant versus aCatholic identity inflects the operations of organizations differently. The impli-cations of Christian denominationalism on Dayak organization building inEast Kalimantan warrants serious further study.16

Among the Dayak peoples, religion is related in complex ways to customarylaws (adat) that have been passed down through generations. As is the case forother indigenous Southeast Asian groups (Kammerer and Tannenbaum 1996),the distinction between religion and customary law is not clear-cut. That adatlaws remain important in Kalimantan is evidenced by the prominence of adatchiefs, the existence of an adat council that advises the PDKT, and the waythat some have adopted the moniker Masyarakat Adat, or “indigenouspeople,” which contains a referent to adat.17

14For more on the processes of religious conversion in East Kalimantan and the Gospel TabernacleChurch of Indonesia, consult William Conley (1976). For additional information on the Christianand Missionary Alliance, see that organization’s web site at http://www.cmalliance.org.15For an excellent discussion of religion and identity in the province of Papua, see DanilynRutherford (2003).16A preliminary discussion of attitudes toward denominational differences among East KalimantanDayak Christians appears in Schiller (2001c). An extended discussion on the role of Protestantismin East Kalimanthan Dayak identity appears in Jennifer Connolly 2004.17As noted earlier, a large indigenous peoples organization in Indonesia includes the phrasemasyarakat adat in its name: Aliansi Masyarakat Adat Nusantara. For more information aboutthis organization, see Li (2000), as well as the organization’s Web site at http://dte.gn.apc.org/aman.

72 Anne Schiller

It is important to emphasize, however, that Dayak traditions, like theirlanguages, vary widely. There are dozens—if not hundreds—of different kindsof Dayaks depending on the criteria by which they are distinguished (King1993, 36–40). Self-identifiers, with some exceptions, have traditionally centeredon kin groups, small geographic areas, or distinctive cultural practices. Forexample, an executive board member of another Dayak organization based inEast Kalimantan emphasized to me that he did not even “realize that he wasDayak” until he left the island to attend high school in Java. When he toldpeople there that he was an “East Kalimantan person,” they responded bytelling him that he was a Dayak. “It’s the same within communities here,though,” he added, “this problem of using names given by outsiders. I, forexample, would say that I am Tonyoi, not Tunjung, but they [it was unclear towhom he was referring] call me Tunjung.”

Today, the designation “Dayak Tribe” (Suku Dayak) and references toparticular “subtribes” (subsuku) are used more widely than in the past. TheWest Kalimantan Solidarity Forum (2000) captures this change in its declaration:

Before the 1990s there were four versions of the word Dayak: Dayak,Dyak, Daya,’ and Daya. The words … caused conflict about the identityof Dayak people, [with repercussions] in everyday life. A bad image [ofDayaks] was disseminated. On the island of Java people who are dirtyand delinquent are called “ndayak” or “kedayak-dayakan.” In West Kali-mantan, fermented fish condiment and mangy dogs are called dayak …Dayak people were humiliated. To do away with these bad connotations,Dayak leaders held a meeting in Sanggau [in 1956]. They omitted theletter “k” from the word Dayak [Daya] … The new generation ofDayak people assume that it takes more than changing spelling tochange bad connotations … humiliation, loss of dignity and respect.According to them, the correct spelling is Dayak.

The passage emphasizes that more is at stake than orthographic preference.References to the Dayak Tribe signal important developments in the way thatsome of Kalimantan’s inhabitants are coming to define and express their identity.As one Dayak teacher at an East Kalimantan university wryly remarked to me,“Nowadays, lots of folks who didn’t know that they were Dayaks a few yearsago have suddenly realized that they are.” Another informant, a universityresearcher, described his own experience of self-identification:

When I came to Samarinda in 1979 [from a village in the interior], ifsomeone called me a “Dayak,” I would have hit him. So ashamed werepeople to say that they were Dayaks. I preferred to refer to myself onlyusing my name. But now there is a huge change. Everyone says thatthey are Dayak now. Including groups that would never have said thatthey were Dayak ten years ago. Even businesses that operate out of


East Kalimantan put the word “Dayak” in their name, although where’sthe Dayak? Everyone wants to sell the name Dayak [ jual nama Dayak].

Greater acceptance of the ethnic classification Dayak notwithstanding, manyindividuals continue to emphasize variations in adat to underscore their distinc-tiveness from others. Even in the past, however, there were occasions whennatives attempted to standardize some dimensions of their cultural practices.One was the Tumbang Anoi Peace Conference (Rapat Besar Damai TumbangAnoi), held May 22–24, 1894. The village of Tumbang Anoi is located along theupriver reaches of the Kahayan River in what is now the Gunung Mas Regencyof Central Kalimantan Province. Dutch colonial administrators, working in con-junction with a native expert in adat, organized the conference.18 Its specificgoals included winning native recognition for Dutch colonial and civil law andstandardizing adat at least to the extent that native peoples would abandon headtaking and slavery. In exchange, the Dutch offered limited recognition for thedecisions of adat courts (Ilun 1983). An estimated 600 representatives fromDayak groups participated, some of them apparently walking for months fromhinterland villages to attend. Although accords had to be renegotiated repeatedly,the conference continues to have important symbolic significance for manypeople, representing an early forum at which their ancestors gathered to discussissues that affected them as a group. A highly placed armed forces membersuggested to me during a 1995 interview, “We Dayaks used the conference atTumbang Anoi as an opportunity to unite. The Dutch had their own agenda,but Dayaks did it for the sake of our tribe” (emphasis added).

MIGRANTS, MINERALS, FORESTS AND THE STATE

In the century that followed the Tumbang Anoi conference, new develop-ments furthered the evolution of communal sentiments among Kalimantan’sDayak peoples. As a result of policies put in place during the New Order,many now share the ill effects of state measures that left them impoverishedon a resource-rich island. Concerning their plight, one East Kalimantanwoman about twenty years of age, speaking to me on the condition of anonymity,remarked,

My opinion is that as the Dayaks are the original tribe of Borneo, theyshould have authority and be given the opportunity to arrange thingsin their own homeland. But this hasn’t happened—to the contrary, the

18The publicly recognized position of expert in customary law referred to here is known in CentralKalimantan as a damang. In East Kalimantan, the corresponding term is kepala adat. The damangto whom the accounts of the Tumbang Anoy Conference refer was an individual called DamangBatu.

74 Anne Schiller

Dayaks have taken first place among the tribes that have been sacrificedin the name of what is called development. They are poor, behindin matters of education, and have become spectators in their ownland. This situation was engineered by the system [of government inIndonesia]. I’m optimistic that the activist movement that we are nowcarrying out will awaken the consciousness of the Dayaks. They willbecome aware that the system has made them poor, uneducated, andhas crushed them. These are the kinds of things that we must combatby organizing the Dayaks into one people.

Others, too, share the opinion that they have been the victims of unjust practicesand that Dayaks are often exploited. In response to my question, “What is themost pressing challenge facing the people in the interior of East Kalimantan atthis moment?” one man in his late twenties replied laconically, “The governmentis not concerned about the interests of Dayak people. We are used in our owncountry as the slaves of state regimes.” Another answered bluntly, “I hope thatanyone who interacts with Dayaks doesn’t just treat us as mechanisms to getsomething [for themselves] anymore. That includes researchers … I hate it.”

High on the list of government actions that have evoked native resentmentare agrarian laws that have enabled the state to claim lands that many feelbelong to communities by virtue of adat and traditional communal land rights(hak ulayat). The Basic Agrarian Law of 1960 acknowledged traditional landrights as long as they were in keeping with the national legal system (Loffler1996). But later legislation, including the Basic Forestry Law of 1967, compli-cated the ability of indigenous people to retain control over their land. The1967 law placed all forests and resources found there under the direct controlof the state. It defined the government’s task in forestry management: “tocontrol, manage, and administer all designated forest lands (Moniaga 1993,133).19 In cases in which traditional and national law conflicted, national lawswere to prevail. Additional lands could also be acquired by the state when itwas deemed to be in the public interest. An article that appeared in theEnglish-language edition of the Institut Dayakology’s publication, the Kaliman-tan Review, explained,

In West Kalimantan, The lands have been divided into lots or blocks oflands. These lots of lands are earmarked for Logging Concession compa-nies, Industrial Tree Plantation, Transmigration area, Mining, ProtectedForest, and National Park. This parceling of lands often over-laps withthe inherited-customary lands, and even causes disputes between the

19For an excellent discussion of forestry policy during the Suharto regime and its effects, seeMoniaga (1993). For a consideration of the effects of forest management plans, consult Moniaga(1998). On Indonesian mining laws and practices, see “Communities and Companies,” Down toEarth, August 2001, http://dtn.gn.apc.org/50.min.htm.


logging concessions and industrial tree plantation etc. The overlappingoccurs from the use of sophisticated methods to produce the mapsthat designate the territory, methods such as satellite (GPS) or Ariel por-trayed maps, etc. These sorts of maps cannot differentiate between fruittree plantations, primary forest, the young rubber plantation or grasslands. So there are lots of land encroachment cases due to technical mis-takes like productive local plantations being considered as empty forests.This gives ample reason for the government and companies to take themat will. (1999, 23)

Article 19 of the 1960 Basic Agrarian Law specifies that all land is to be regis-tered, but the registration of land requires a level of monetary resources, commit-ment of time, and degree of understanding of national law that few Dayak peoplepossess. Participatory mapping of adat lands is now considered an important wayfor Dayaks to ensure that their landholdings are recognized. Many have joinedresistance movements that draw on adat laws to justify reimbursement for orreturn of lands that have already been seized by the state. In a provocativediscussion of how the concept of adat has been framed differently by participantsin East and West Kalimantan peasant movements, Mariko Urano (2002) hassuggested that a distinction between “state” and “NGO” versions of adat iscentral to understanding why the efforts of some Dayaks have been moresuccessful than others.

Among the government programs that have threatened native interests aretransmigration and massive commercial logging and mining operations (Ary2000). The transmigration program, which largely ended after the collapse ofthe New Order, had an enormous impact throughout Kalimantan. Initiatedby the Dutch during the pre-independence period, the transmigrationprogram grew exponentially under the New Order regime. Between 1949and 1974, the Indonesian government resettled 674,000 people through trans-migration. By 1990, an additional 3.5 million had been resettled. The program’sprimary goal was to move people from the densely populated islands ofJava, Madura, and Bali to less populated ones, such as Kalimantan, Sumatra,Sulawesi, and Papua (formerly Irian Jaya). Speaking generally, transmigratedfamilies received land, other incentives, and enough provisions (in theory, ifnot always in practice) to support themselves for up to eighteen months.Some were offered opportunities to work on nucleus estates (Adhiati andBobsen 2000).20

Tensions between the transmigrants and local peoples were not uncommon,as Mary Fulcher (1983) described in East Kalimantan more than twenty yearsago. Not only did transmigration give newcomers rights over parcels of land

20For a useful discussion of the transmigration program and parastatal plantations, see Adhiati andBobsien (2000).

76 Anne Schiller

that Dayak people often insisted were theirs by virtue of adat (see http://www.gn.apc.org), but some have asserted that the program was part of a larger crusade towipe out local cultures. In 1983, several people in Central Kalimantan pointedout to me that the government had consistently failed to establish hospitals inthe interior but had managed to send “birth control safari” boats regularly. “Iftoo many babies are being born in this province,” one man observed sardonically,“it shouldn’t be necessary to bring in transmigrants.” Nearly two decades later, asimilar position was espoused by a participant at the PDKT convention, whoremarked to me, “We don’t need birth control, we need more East KalimantanDayaks.”Government programs more directly aimed at the assimilation of nativepeoples will be addressed later in this paper.

In addition to members of other ethnic groups who arrived under the aus-pices of government-sponsored programs, thousands of spontaneous migrantshave come to Kalimantan. Cultural differences between the newcomers andthe local people have led to tension and often brutal conflict, in particular withChinese migrants and, later, with migrants from the island of Madura. Violencebetween the Dayaks and the Madurese have ranged from assaults to a so-calledtribal war in 1997 (Dove 1997; Human Rights Watch 1999). Nancy Peluso andEmily Harwell have written a fascinating account of the latter event, contextualiz-ing the episode historically (with particular attention to the prior situationbetween the Dayaks and the Chinese) in terms of national and global politicaleconomic changes and the process of Dayak identity construction. At the sametime, they emphasize that their analysis is “West Kalimantan-specific” and situ-ated in the “conjuncture of … social and geographical relationships [that] havemade West Kalimantan unique” (2001, 84–86). More fighting erupted in WestKalimantan in 1999, and more accounts of beheadings and cannibalism thereappeared in the international press (Schiller and Garang 2002; Suparlan 2000).

By 2001, violence had ignited in Central Kalimantan Province as well.21

Relations between the local people and the migrants remain tense in manyparts of the island today. It is important to emphasize, however, that large-scale Dayak–immigrant violence did not and has since spread to East KalimantanProvince. The PDKT was among the organizations that worked to preventclashes (Suara Kaltim 2001b). Still, some sources assured me in 2000 thatplans for a response were in place in the event that an episode should erupt.At that time, some expected that members of ethnic groups from other Indone-sian islands, taking advantage of the chaotic situation in neighboring provinces,would arrive in East Kalimantan by boat (in particular from nearby Sulawesi),intent on slaughtering Christians.

In addition to immigration, changes in the natural environment, mostlyrelated to large-scale commercial logging and mining and the establishment of

21For a discussion of that episode and its aftermath, including the role of some Muslim andChristian elites in indigenous organizations there, see van Klinken (2002).


parastatal plantations, have tremendously affected the local people. Urano notesthat “in 1997, the province of East Kalimantan contained more than 20% of totalforest concession area of the nation [sic] … [and] more than three quarters oftotal forest area has been allocated to the forest development schemes by big cor-porations supported by the government in Jakarta” (2002, 2). She deems conflictbetween the local people and concession holders there as inevitable. In additionto their anger over their inability to control adat landholdings, the indigenouspeople are frustrated by the poor efforts that have been made at reforestation.Speaking about what many consider the inappropriate selection of trees forreplanting, one forestry researcher at Mulawarman University, himself aDayak, explained the problem in a way that made the relationship betweenculture and environment explicit. “Hornbills,” he reminded me, “can’t eatacacia wood.”22 It is true that hornbills eat only the fruit of particular trees;however, his larger point was that replanting programs are sometimes inter-preted by indigenous people as attempts to create “Potemkin forests” simplyto quiet government critics.

As Max Weber observed long ago and as many have argued since, “The beliefin group affinity, regardless of whether it has any objective foundations, can haveimportant consequences, especially for the formation of a political community”(Guibernau and Rex 2003, 18). Over time, the implementation of policiesthreatening the survival of the indigenous peoples have contributed to the cre-ation of a Dayak community. It is the PDKT’s role in the promotion of communalidentity and Dayak political activism in East Kalimantan to which this discussionnow turns.

REGIONAL IDENTITIES AND ETHNICITY

Concerning the relationship between culture and politics under the NewOrder, John Pemberton has argued that the Indonesian state displaced issuesof class and power through the manner in which it handled issues of “culturalinheritance” and diversity among its citizenry (Pemberton 1994, 10). Althoughit did not encourage the cultivation of specific ethnic identities, the state madeefforts to promote identification with some traditions, particularly the arts.Thus, even as some Kalimantan peoples were overlooked in terms of economicand human resource development, the state recognized their particularity inother ways. Model longhouses were constructed in Indonesia’s cultural themepark, Beautiful Indonesia in Miniature (Taman Mini Indonesia Indah), inJakarta. Dayak dances, albeit performed mostly by non-Dayaks, were broadcaston television, as were those of other Indonesian groups. Anna Tsing has

22The reference here is to rhinoceros hornbills (Bucerous rhinoceros), birds with distinctiveplumage and remarkable social behaviors that are of enormous symbolic significance to many indi-genous peoples across Kalimantan.

78 Anne Schiller

probed the notion of ethnicity as entertainment even further in her studies, usingit as a point of departure for the consideration of alternative formulations of eth-nicity (including gendered ones) and political culture among Meratus Dayaks inSouth Kalimantan Province (1993, 248–49).

Yet even as the government attempted to model acceptable modes ofcultural expression, the manner in which it objectified the ways of life ofsome remote peoples threatened their cultural groundings. Many populationsthat practiced hunting and gathering or swidden horticulture were classifiedas “isolated tribes” (suku suku terasing) or “backward” (terbelakang), includingsome in Kalimantan. As such, they were targets of assimilation. In a recentreport, the Indonesia Forum for the Environment discussed how that policyhas evolved:

During the “New Order,” the government’s policy towards those it offi-cially designated as suku suku terasing (isolated and alien tribes) soughttheir rapid assimilation into national mainstream society through forcedresettlement and imposed economic and cultural change, while denyingthese peoples’ rights to land and forests. An objective of the policy was tofree up land and forests for logging and “national development.” Thecurrent policy towards masyarakat terpencil (remote communities) pro-motes their integration with less emphasis on forced change and moreopportunities for participation but still does not address land andresource rights.23

Dayak people in Kalimantan today remain alert for disguised attempts at assim-ilation that undermine their traditional values. How to ensure the survival of atraditional way of life as they better their circumstances is the subject of manyof their debates. One young activist, in response to my question, “What do youthink that people need to know in order to understand the situation that youface in East Kalimantan?” recalled those debates when he told me, “What isreally needed is a way to improve Dayaks’ education and mastery of modern tech-nology, because there is no reason that we should have to remain ignorant… butalso at the same time we have to hold on to the traditional principles of ourculture.” That is, recognizing that indigenous peoples are no longer able todepend on their traditional subsistence base, this interviewee called for skillstraining that would enable Dayaks to compete for jobs in nonagricultural sectors.

In an important paper on ethnic politics, Jan Pieterse suggests that “unsuc-cessful assimilation fosters ethnic identification, and hence can lead to ethnicmobilization, in an attempt to renegotiate access to resources and public spaceon a collective basis. Ethnic identification and mobilization, then, are strategiesto achieve collectively what one could not achieve individually” (1996, 29).

23See Wahana Lingkungan Hidup Indonesia, “Application of FSC Principles 2 and 3 in Indonesia:Obstacles and Possibilities,” 2003.


He asserts that, rather than displacing class, ethnicity parallels it, with the distinc-tion that ethnic identification is “confined to a particularist agenda, while classpolitics carries a universalist component” (29). Among Dayak peoples, too,ethnicity may parallel class identification in ways that have important implicationsfor the region’s political economy.

Debates concerning how ethnic solidarity may affect the Dayak peoples’economic circumstances are taking place throughout East Kalimantan on thefront pages of newspapers, behind closed doors in private homes, and in the con-ference rooms of major hotels. New laws that afford greater regional autonomyhave upped the stakes. Law 22 and Law 25, both passed in 1999, address theassignment of political authority to districts and new economic plans thatreturn greater percentages of income generated by provinces than in the past(Bell 2001). Regional autonomy in Indonesia will likely contribute to what JoelKahn (1998) describes as the growing irrelevance of Southeast Asian nation-states as containers for identity construction amid claims for cultural recognition.Timothy Oakes (2000, 670) makes a similar point concerning China, namely, thatthe nation has become fragmented by social movements seeking to articulate amore localized identity and cultural practice. In the case of China, local eliteshave discovered that place-based identities—in particular, those at the provinciallevel—offer a new “space ripe for commodification and colonialization.” Region-alism allows local elites to log on to broader networks to access “resources ofpower such as capital, legitimacy, and wealth” (Oakes 2000, 669). It has resultedin the “scaling-up” of identity in order to participate in new economies ratherthan attempts to protect an older one (687).

Dayak people in Kalimantan, too, have begun to “scale up” identity to theprovincial level, and sometimes beyond, partly in an attempt to secure resources,as the case of the PDKT illustrates. Speaking with a newspaper reporter in March2001, for example, the former head of the PDKT, Martinus F. Tennes, commen-ted, “If someone wants to say that I’m only an East Kalimantan Dayak, that isn’tright, because my great-grandparents came from Central Kalimantan, SouthKalimantan, and West Kalimantan. So the most accurate [way to put it is] actuallythat I am a Kalimantan Dayak” (Suara Kaltim 2001a). Tennes’s remark to thepress regarding his own ethnicity recalls Fredrik Barth’s observation that “thecharacteristic of self-ascription and ascription by others” is of paramount import-ance in ethnogenesis (1969, 14). As Barth underscored, ethnicity building is a dia-logic process. The PDKT’s leaders, for example, must negotiate the terms ofDayak identity with their own constituents, who have different frames of refer-ence and goals. They must also negotiate the terms of Dayak identity with abroader society. “Scaling-up” in East Kalimantan is complicated by the questionof who should be considered a “regional son” (putra daerah).

With the advent of regional autonomy, many in Kalimantan anticipate thatspecial quotas for government posts, jobs, and seats in universities will be ear-marked for regional sons. Dayak people often use this phrase to indicate that

80 Anne Schiller

they consider themselves to be descended from an aboriginal population. Theterm itself does not necessarily convey aboriginality, however. In that respect,it recalls the Indonesian word pribumi (native) or the Malaysian word bumipu-tera (son of the soil). The latter is particularly useful as a point of comparison,as it refers specifically to Malays and to Bornean peoples, who are bothconstitutionally entitled to special rights and protections.24 Bumiputera,however, is an ethnic category fixed by the Malaysian state. The colloquialputra daerah is more fluid; whom the phrase is intended to signify depends onwho deploys it.

In Central Kalimantan Province, for example, a 1993 controversy surround-ing the installation of a governor became a platform for Dayak activists to call forthe appointment of a regional son possessing a “greater understanding of the areaand be more committed to it.” As one spokesperson declared, “We don’t wantanyone dropped on us [from another province]” (Schiller 1997b, 139–41).Dayak people often claim that only putra daerah can understand the challengesthey face; Kalimantan is their homeland, hence the majority of its regents andgovernors should be putra daerah. The assumption in Central Kalimantan, a pro-vince with a large Dayak population, is that a regional son is a Dayak. In East Kali-mantan, notwithstanding its smaller percentage of Dayaks, the term is used in asimilar way. For example, in an earlier quotation from a PDKT leader praisingthe province’s sympathetic governor and vice governor, the vice governor, anindigenous person, was described as a “regional son.”

At the same time, many East Kalimantan residents who are not descendedfrom indigenous peoples are adamant that they, too, are putra daerah (KaltimPos 1999). Their argument is premised partly on East Kalimantan’s longhistory of successful immigration. The Kutai peoples are descended from oneof several immigrant groups that arrived centuries ago. The Hindu kingdom ofKutai Martapura, ruled by King Mulawarman, was established on theMahakam River in the eighth century. Javanese refugees from the SingosariKingdom established the Islamic kingdom of Kertanegara on Kalimantan’s eastcoast during the 1600s. In the 1700s, Bugis traders from Sulawesi founded thetown of Samarinda, now the provincial capital. By the latter years of thatcentury, the court of the new kingdom had moved upriver to Tenggarong(Magenda 1991). Tenggarong’s Erau Festival, held annually in September, com-memorates the establishment of that court and the Dayak peoples’ acceptance of

24Robert Dentan points out that, as bumiputera, Malays are distinct from the Chinese, Indians,and, ironically, the Orang Asli (earlier inhabitants of peninsular Malaysia). According to formerMalaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohammed, “The Malays are the original or indigenouspeople of Malaya and the only people who can claim Malaya as their one and only country”(quoted in Dentan et al. 1997, 20). In the case of the Orang Asli, however, the former prime min-ister concludes that “the presence of aborigines prior to settlement by other races does not meanthat the country is internationally recognized as belonging to the aborigines… The definitivepeople are those who set up the first governments” (21).


the sultan’s power over the region. The former royal palace is a local touristattraction and home to the Provincial Museum of East Kalimantan.

Given the region’s history, it is unsurprising that some residents insist that thecategory of “regional son” extends beyond the Dayak population. As a spokesmanfor one political party remarked on the appointment of a regent in the newlyestablished Bulungan District, “Don’t let the term [putra daerah] be misinter-preted to refer only to Dayaks. The meaning has to be clearer and wider. [Todemand that the regent be a Dayak] … would be the same thing as expandingcorruption, not doing away with it (Kaltim Pos 1999, 2). When queried aboutthe establishment of a medical program at Mulawarman University in Samarinda,the rector similarly explained that the target enrollment would be 80 percentputra daerah and 20 percent students from outside the province. He added,“The meaning of putra daerah here isn’t an exclusionary kind of putra daerah.[The category] is not just limited to the Kutai or Dayak ethnic groups, but[includes] young men and women who have a commitment to develop theregion” (Suara Kaltim 2000, 5). Just as the term “Dayak” has gradually cometo be embraced by a larger population than it was twenty-five years ago, so,too, over time, more non-Dayaks are likely to claim the status of “putra daerah.”

Should Dayak people unite to contest such claims, the development of Dayaksolidarity might be furthered, albeit in a manner that would contribute to inter-ethnic tensions. The more pertinent point, however, is that in East Kalimantantoday, context counts as individuals opt to scale their ethnic identification upor down “in the pursuit of their interests” (Keyes 1981, 10). In her classicessay on the development of ethnic categories in neighboring Malaysia, JudithNagata (1981) demonstrates how individuals may continue to oscillate betweenidentities over time. On the origins and development of the Jawi Peranakan(Indo-Malay) community, Nagata notes,

Many cultural practices can be manipulated to justify either identity[Malay or Jawi Peranakan], as the case may be. Indian customs can …

be used by Malays to distinguish themselves from the Jawi Peranakan,or to express solidarity of identity, by stressing the common Indianorigin of much of Malay custom. What is important, however, is theuse of ideas of primordiality and charter myths in varying combinationsin different situations … the conditions in which the various identitiesare operative depend largely on the interests stemming from thebroader social, economic, and political environment. (1981, 107)

Like the subjects of that study, people in East Kalimantan may employ one ethnicaffiliation over another depending on the context. Thus, even as the PDKTleaders emphasize the need to “[u]nify the perception, vision, and mission ofthe Dayak people and synchronize [mengsinkronisasikan] the movement,” theyare well aware that theirs is not the only indigenous organization that is

82 Anne Schiller

attempting to direct the development of an ethnic identity. Smaller organiz-ations, to which many PDKT members also belong, are likewise extending mem-bership to other ethnic groups based on homogeneity, geographic proximity, orlanguage. By fostering or preserving the distinctiveness of smaller constituencies,the leaders of those organizations hope to attract investment and development tovery specific locales and peoples. One interviewee, speaking about the relation-ship between ethnic mobilization and development, provided a clear example ofthis phenomenon when he suggested that “the Aoheng used to consider them-selves Bahau. Now they have a different strategy.”

With regard to actualizing an ethnic constituency, Abner Cohen long agosuggested that leaders must make use of “extensive moral and ritual obligationsthat bind their members, in order to organize their political functions” (1969, 5).That is, they must employ symbolic processes to foster a shared identity. Ritualsbind people, as Stanley Tambiah (1985) and others have noted, through their rolein the production of morally charged experience. On the role of symbolicprocesses in ethnogenesis among indigenous peoples, Eugene Roosens arguesthat the manner in which members cultivate or maintain a notion of themselvesas a group “if necessary in the face of contrary ‘facts’ is an important variable inthe ‘process’ of ethnogenesis” (1989, 47). The next section of this paper willexamines how the PDKT’s leaders have confronted the issue of Dayak diversityas they have attempted to instantiate a shared identity. It will also address howtheir constituents responded at the second conference.

THE PDKT AND DAYAK SOLIDARITY: THE 1990S AND BEYOND

The PDKT was officially established in Samarinda on April 3, 1993, at aconvention that followed a period of private deliberation. The founders wereurban businessmen, some of whom have had involvement in the timber indus-try, all of whom are considered local elites, and many of whom remain active inthe organization even today. One intent behind the organization’s establish-ment was to facilitate the formation of cooperatives among small businessowners. Although its goals have enlarged considerably over time, one thingthat has not changed since the organization’s inception is that the PDKTleaders claim to represent all East Kalimantan Dayaks. Some intervieweessuggested to me, however, that, at least in its early years, few leadership oppor-tunities were extended to non-elites. One man ironically alluded to a parallelbetween the PDKT’s early operating style and the workings of the HolySpirit, claiming that neither could be understood through normal humanlogic. His remark points to some of the challenges facing the PDKT’sleaders: Some people consider the organization too closed off to the masses,too focused on the concerns of urbanites, and too willing to accept help (pri-marily in the sense of office space and other facilities) from non-Dayak


individuals affiliated with timber companies and other large businesses. In mydiscussions with younger activists in particular, I heard concerns that thePDKT’s leaders had been “co-opted into old ways of doing things.” One inter-viewee, invoking a foreign term, said that the PDKT was “bourgeois.” Anotherexpressed concern that the organization could not mengakomidasikan keingi-nan kami (accommodate our wish) to engage in more public demonstrations.I would point out that all of these speakers were, in fact, among the organiz-ation’s rank-and-file members.

By 1999, when I arrived in the field, there was a clear emphasis on achievingtransparency and broader participation in the organization’s affairs. The execu-tive board comprised a head, assistant head, secretary, operations manager,and advisors—the precise number was to become rationalized at the upcomingconvention. One participant voiced a sentiment early on that was shared bymany attendees, asserting that the “PDKT must become more terbuka [open],not dibuka-buka [opened].” In other words, the participant was calling forgreater openness on the association’s part rather than exposing its workings byforce, like secrets that become revealed perforce.

All organizations that operate with the approval of the Indonesian govern-ment, including the PDKT, must embrace the Five Principles of State(Pancasila). Similarly, the PDKT has adopted the Broad Outlines of State(Garis-garis Haluan Negara) as its ideological axis. The PDKT’s three objectivesare (1) “to cultivate the Dayak Community of East Kalimantan as an indivisiblepart of Indonesian national life,” (2) “to foster the sentiment of brotherhood,family, and sameness among the Dayak Community of East Kalimantan,” and(3) “to integrate perception in organizing the potential that exists in the Dayakcommunity of East Kalimantan, so that [the community] optimizes its role indevelopment” (unpublished materials circulated at the 1999 conference;author’s translation). According to its mission statement, the PDKT seeks “tointercept, formulate, channel and struggle on behalf of the aspirations of theDayak community, and to serve as the go-between with adat councils, subtribalorganizations, development organizations, Dayak leaders and intellectuals,and the government and private parties” (unpublished materials circulated atthe 1999 conference; author’s translation). The spirit of these objectives iscaptured in the East Kalimantan Dayak Anthem, which was commissioned bythe PDKT and performed for the first time at the close of the 1999 conference.One stanza urges,

Dayak People, Arise and Construct a Prosperous Future …

One Word, One Heart, [in our] Struggle and Dedication …

United in Intention and Energy to Work …

Like a Hornbill in Flight, Far, Aiming for the Clouds …

With the Spirit of Reformation, What Else are We Waiting for?

84 Anne Schiller

In 1999, the PDKT’s advisory board was composed partly of advisors from adozen groups. Each was referred to as an anak suku (subtribe) or simply suku(tribe or ethnic group). Anak suku represented in the organization were theAoheng, Bahau-Usap, Bahau Busang, Bentian, Benuaq, Kayan Miau, KayanLong Kuling, Lun Dayeh, Punan, Tunjung, Modang, and Kenyah. More wereexpected to be added. One member of the executive board suggested, “We’llprobably get up to about seventeen.” By 2003, sixteen had been recognized.That it remains to be seen how many anak suku will ultimately coalesce reflectsthe ductile quality of self-identification. During an interview with a highly placedmember of the Lun Dayeh aristocracy, the fluidity of the local sense of ethnicityemerged unmistakably.25 He remarked,

The word Dayak is [often seen as] negative. As a result, I have workedvery hard to see that my people are called Lun Dayeh, not LunDaya, which sounds like “Dayak.” Anyway, I could just as easily referto myself as a “Krayan” [a geographic region associated with theKrayan River] as a “Lun Dayeh.” Names are relative. There are reallyonly four groups here in East Kalimantan, Lun Dayeh, Kenyah,Tunjung-Benuaq, and Bahau. Everyone else is just an offshoot of thesegroups.

Although the PDKT executive board acknowledges the likelihood that otheranak suku will demand recognition in the organization, it seeks to downplaythe importance of loyalties to these groups. As one board member explainedto me in 2000, “We need to throw out the notion of twelve subtribes.”

In these plastic circumstances, PDKT leaders have sought to foster the devel-opment of an interest group based on shared ethnicity. Their efforts recall theprocess once referred to in anthropological literature as “retribalization.”Cohen (1969) defined retribalization as a process by which an ethnic categorymay become an ethnic group. As part of retribalization, a group within oneethnic category, whose members are involved in a struggle for power andprivilege with members of a group from another ethnic category within theframework of a formal political system, may manipulate some customs andsymbols from their cultural tradition in order to articulate an informal politicalorganization that can be used as a weapon in that struggle (Cohen 1969, 2).

The PDKT’s second conference attempted to articulate just such anorganization. The conference goals included reviewing and updating the organ-ization’s constitution; electing a new slate of members; attending presentationson topics such as human resource development in the twenty-first century,forest use policies, and legislation regarding regional autonomy; conducting

25For more on constructions of ethnic identity among the Lun Dayeh—in particular, the relation-ship between identity and place—see Jay Crain and Vicki Pearson-Rounds (2000).


work groups on the effectiveness of the PDKT’s organizational structure; draftingan agenda for the next three years; writing position statements on topicsdiscussed at the conference; and exploring the formation of a standing commis-sion on adat. In his opening morning remarks, Rama Asia, the regent of WestKutai and outgoing director of the PDKT’s Daily Operations Committee,warned his audience of nearly 300 PDKT members about the consequences offailing to construct an effective political organization premised on commonethnicity:

In the third millennium, we should cultivate a new spirit of sameness. Weare facing globalization. If we persist with the old walls between us, con-fining walls, this will lead to the disintegration of Dayaks as we move intoan era of global competition. We [should] select people who are pro-fessional, regardless of where they are from. I am from the Benuaqarea, but I don’t have to think “Benuaq person, Benuaq person” all ofthe time.

The regent’s remarks were scheduled to precede the election of nine members tothe PDKT executive board who would serve three-year terms. Some participantsin the audience seized the opportunity, however, to voice their opposition to themanner in which the board was to be constructed. One man enquired, “Why doesparagraph 23 say that the board will have nine members, when there are twelvesubtribes?” He assumed that the election of nine members meant that only nineanak suku would be represented. An executive council member responded,“Why do we say nine or twelve? I’ve been waiting for this question. It’sbecause everyone votes for their own tribe [if there are twelve].” Another partici-pant raised his hand to object to the regent’s claim that failing to cultivate acommon identity would lead to disintegration: “This is not about disintegration,it’s about justice. Only a stupid tribe doesn’t want to be represented by one of itsown. If my tribe isn’t represented, why should I participate in this organization?”A third added, “I am only voting for someone that I know. If they aren’t from mytribe, I won’t know them and I won’t vote for them.” A young man called outfrom the floor, “PDKT must be organized in such a way as to give everyone achance to express their opinion. We have twelve subtribes, but there has neverbeen a meeting to agree even to this.” Like some others, he felt that his ownanak suku, located in the northwest and not among the aforementioned dozen,was being overlooked.

Seeking to attract attention away from the issue of subtribal representation,another highly placed member of the organization interjected levity. “What aboutintermarriage?” he teased. “Some of us are mixed—our parents came fromdifferent parts of Kalimantan. What can we do, then, except chop the headsoff the rest of you?” Only some took the remark as a joke, interpreting it tomean that Dayak people of mixed parentage were likely to be disadvantaged

86 Anne Schiller

by their lack of representation in the organization. A woman phrased her ques-tion in distinctly political terms that underscored the connection between iden-tity and place: “So,” she queried, “What do we do about the stateless Dayaks?”

A middle-aged man urged that another seat dedicated to “mixed ones” beadded to the executive board; his suggestion was immediately seconded. The pro-posal stimulated audience members to call for the inclusion of other unrepre-sented groups on the board, particularly youths and women. Preparing torelinquish the podium to the next speaker, the regent summed up the new res-olution with a hint of resignation: “So we have to review the number of tribes. Wehad twelve, now we have to add more, also for the mixed Dayaks, and a categoryfor youth, and one for women. OK, now we’re plus-plus-plus” (a joking referenceto a popular television commercial for an antibacterial soap that promised threekinds of protection). Though some convention attendees applauded, an observerwho was part of an invited contingent from a West Kalimantan organizationshook his head discreetly from side to side. “These people,” he remarked tome, “when you ask them who they are, they respond with the name of a sub-group. When we are asked our ethnicity in [my province], we say ‘Dayak.’They aren’t there yet.”

Not surprisingly, the issue of fairness in representation was paralleled indebates over the appropriate cultural leadership style. The Kenyah adat chief,who had been instrumental in the establishment of the PDKT in 1993, notedin his welcome address,

Seven years ago a group of us declared that we represented all the EastKalimantan Dayaks. Legally, we do represent them. Usually, whenpeople discuss leadership, they use Western models. But Dayaks havetheir own theory. Our theory can be symbolized by the hornbill. Why?Hornbills have an attitude that is different from other birds. They onlyeat fruit from banyan trees. That shows discipline. Hornbills don’t liketo fight. When there is a hornbill, smaller birds cluster nearby [for protec-tion]. Hornbills represent unity, they all call out mauk together. Thisshows that they are in harmony. Hornbills fly far to see their underlings.Their feet are straight, they don’t aim to the left or to the right, just like agood leader who doesn’t veer to the left or to the right. The hornbill’slong beak represents how adat chiefs proffer an opinion.

Some in the audience began to applaud, but the Lun Dayeh adat chief raised hishand to demur:

People say that we must unite to compete. That we don’t know how tocompete. That’s not so, because from the “ignorant times” [masabodoh] we were used to competition. We used to attack one another.Now we need to show our fangs to outsiders … But the whole issue ofhow to make Dayaks one is very difficult. There are differences


between us. My subgroup is hard, with many war veterans, your group issoft, they just take orders from their leaders. Our symbol isn’t thehornbill … Ours is the crocodile.

In fact, some members of the group wore bark-skin vests decorated with picturesof crocodiles over their other attire. The exchange between these two adat chiefswas significant. Challenges to an adat chief’s authority may be met with broadresentment. Other hard feelings similarly surfaced at the convention. Oneexample concerned a situation in which one chief, referred to broadly as “adatchief of the Dayaks” in a newspaper article on regional autonomy, was suspectedof trying to wrest authority from the others. Thus, when the Dayak response toautonomy was introduced as a topic for discussion at the 1999 convention, oneyoung man (from a different anak suku) raised his hand and sarcasticallyquipped that he “didn’t realize that there was only one Dayak adat chief nowwho speaks for all of us.”

The exchange about competing models for leadership, phrased in terms ofbirds and reptiles, evoked further discussion of the role of symbols in promotingsolidarity. An executive council member seized the moment to make a largerpoint. “You see,” he entreated participants, “We leaders need input from youabout how to demonstrate [emphasis added] the integration of the Dayaks.Symbols are important. For example, some say that we need to build a longhousein Samarinda. A longhouse would stand for our common Dayak identity.” Manymembers of the audience responded to this suggestion with enthusiasm, whereasothers questioned the style in which the longhouse would be built. “Would it be aKenyah or a Tunjung one?” asked one elderly man.

CONCLUDING REMARKS

The PDKT convention lasted three days. When the participants convened onthe final morning, the executive board began by declaring the meeting a success.A resolution in support of Megawati Soekarnoputeri’s government was passed “inthe name of the Dayak Community.” Development objectives were set for theorganization for the next three years; slots for “mixed” Dayaks, youth, andwomen were added to the executive committee; and an election took place.26

Committees were constituted and charged with efforts in the economic, social,and educational spheres. The next convention was scheduled for late 2003. Theaffair concluded with an evening celebration that featured a dance choreographedto combine elements from dances throughout East Kalimantan. The new EastKalimantanDayak Anthemwas sungmultiple times in order to familiarize partici-pants with the words.

26In fact, the individual who was selected to represent Dayak women on the executive committee in1999 came in second for the position of the head of the organization in the 2003 election.

88 Anne Schiller

Shortly after I left the field in June 2000, I came across a newspaper accountof an interview conducted with the PDKT concerning whether interethnic vio-lence between the indigenous peoples and migrants from the island of Madurawas likely to spread to the easternmost province (which it did not). In that inter-view, the new head of the organization responded to one reporter’s question,“What kind of Dayak are you?” by saying that he was a Dayak Gado-gado—a“vegetable salad Dayak” (Suara Kaltim 2001a). The word Gado-gado refers toa popular Indonesian dish composed of beans, carrots, and fermented soybeancakes, all covered with a spicy peanut sauce. By comparing himself to a meal,the leader clearly intended to deflect attention from subgroup identifications.Certainly, there is much interesting research to be done on the role of intermar-riage and the Dayak identity movement. As this paper has shown, however,despite attempts to downplay distinctions within their constituency population,the PDKT continues to meet with resistance as it attempts to structure programsthat do not directly reflect emerging anak suku divisions. The PDKT thus con-tinues to replicate an evolving pattern of subtribal membership in the apportion-ment of many leadership posts. One informant suggested to me that the PDKTwould never succeed in cultivating Dayak solidarity until each smaller groupbecame stronger. Only after pressing issues in local communities are servedwill many people be in a position to want to participate in something larger. Itmay well be that creating categories to represent Dayaks of mixed ancestry,youths, and women within the PDKT will have a positive effect, movingpeople away from exclusively subgroup identification. Nevertheless, the senseof community that the East Kalimantan Dayak Association seeks to foster is asyet only imagined by some. Whether the organization can survive and ultimatelyeffect the realization of Dayak ethnicity in an operational sense remains tobe seen.

Sociologists have noted that “to enter into a relation is to make a choice”(Degenne and Forsé 1999, 9). In order for individuals to choose to enter intorelations with the PDKT, it is necessary for its leaders to make a persuasivecase with broad appeal and to persist in their attempts to instantiate a sense ofcommon identity. The PDKT, like other Dayak organizations, is a voluntaryassociation. As this paper has demonstrated, in the organization’s current form,its leaders seek to bring a remarkable diversity of voices to the table. Whetherthey will keep their constituents at that table as they continue to rationalizethe organization, negotiate new authority structures, and broker relationsamong members with competing agendas, will be instructive to observe.

Elsewhere, the construction of ethnicity among indigenous peoples has beenshown to “have continuities with aboriginal cultures … but also [to be] a reversalof key, and negative, aspects of the dominant culture of the present” (Sharp 1996,92). From data presented in this paper, it is apparent that constructing a Dayaktradition in East Kalimantan will also involve the reversal of certain culturalaspects that do not contribute to solidarity building. Some peoples share a


history of warfare and mutual raiding for slaves. It is important to keep in mindthat the Dayaks of East Kalimantan have no common myth of origin, no commonlanguage (except the national one), no common religion (although most are Pro-testant Christians), and no common set of customary laws (although an advisorycommittee comprises the kepala adat from each anak suku represented in theorganization). However, they do have the promise of new opportunitiesoffered by regional autonomy, a population that is becoming more educated(with regard to their legal rights), and an anthropologically inclined awarenessthat symbols are dynamic entities that can become a “positive force in an activityfield” (Turner 1967, 20). Although it is unlikely that adat in East Kalimantan willever be completely standardized, to help offset the difference, the PDKT islooking into the possibility of developing curriculum modules for use inschools that will contribute to an understanding of what “we Dayaks have incommon.”

As noted earlier, the betterment of the Dayak peoples’ economic opportu-nities was a central motivation for the establishment of the PDKT. Alongrelated lines, Eric Wolf demonstrates in his discussion of the North Americanfur trade that many ethnic entities among Native Americans took shape inresponse to new economic opportunities presented by participation in theworld system. Collective forms and rituals provided means to bind these newentities together there (Wolf 1982, 194), as they might in Kalimantan. Fornow, the PDKT has few other “means of coercion” at its disposal (Kelly andKaplan 2001).

Yet even as the PDKT works to secure its role as a cultural broker in the thirdmillennium, regional autonomy and decentralization may affect its ability toexpand its participant base. That is, as a result of decentralization, “local commu-nities’ attention [may be diverted] away from ethno-regional concerns andtowards immediate local economic and governmental issues” (Aspinall andFealy 2003, 4), leading, in turn, to the strengthening of anak suku–based identi-ties. One arena in which evidence is already accumulating in this regard istourism. East Kalimantan now ranks fifteenth among the sites that the statehopes to develop for tourism. The head of the provincial office of tourismthere remarked to me during an interview that an important part of East Kali-mantan’s daya tarik (attraction) is that Dayak tarik (Dayak people attract).Local populations are working to establish “culture villages” to secure a portionof the anticipated foreign exchange from tourism that they hope will soonarrive. At the same time, tourism (and the arts) is a potential field for competitionamong groups of Dayaks (Kreps 2003; Schiller 2001b). In this regard, onespeaker at the PDKT convention warned the audience, “We don’t want aculture market war among us. Hornbills are not like fighting cocks that we beton for money.”

As that remark reminds us, the Dayaks of East Kalimantan are accustomed toframing and expressing their understanding of social processes with symbols

90 Anne Schiller

drawn from the natural environment. As this paper has shown, in view of themomentous changes that are sweeping Indonesia, many are consciously search-ing for new symbols that will capture—and shape—who they are and who theywill become. In a discussion that took place on the closing day of the PDKT con-vention, one participant, looking to the future, suggested that perhaps it was timeto abandon the hornbill symbol entirely. He said,

We should think of ourselves in a new way that suits the reformation era.Hornbills are beautiful and handsome, but they are excellent targets forhunters who want their feathers or beaks. Dayaks today are more likedragonflies. They travel together in enormous flights. Everyone hearsthem coming and knows that they are arriving. Now we are likedragonflies.

Should the association succeed in achieving its objectives in arenas such asculture, society, and provincial economics and politics, it is certain that otherIndonesians—in Kalimantan and beyond—will realize that these Dayaks havefinally arrived together.

Acknowledgements

This paper is based on findings from the first stage of an ongoing study of Dayakorganizations in East Kalimantan Province. That research was supported by fundsfrom the Fulbright-Hays Faculty Research Abroad Program (1999–2000). Earlierresearch in Kalimantan was funded by the National Geographic Society (1996), NorthCarolina State University (1995), the Association for Asian Studies (1994, 1991), theWenner-Gren Foundation (1991, 1983), Wellesley College (1983), Sigma-Xi ScientificSociety (1983), and a Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad Fellowship(1982–84). I gratefully acknowledge the support of these institutions, as well as the assist-ance of the Indonesian Institute of Sciences. I would like to thank Jay Crain, DavidGilmartin, and Christina Kreps for valuable comments on an earlier version of thispaper; Charles Keyes and other participants in the conference on “ContextualizingEthnicity,” sponsored by the North Carolina State University Center for InternationalEthnicity Studies, for their remarks on a related paper; and the anonymous reviewersat the Journal of Asian Studies for their encouragement and useful suggestionsconcerning this manuscript. I am grateful to H. Suwarna A. F., governor of EastKalimantan; Drs. Yurnalis Ngayoh, vice governor of East Kalimantan; Dra. HelenaNgayoh; and Ir. Rama Asia, regent of the West Kutai District for their interest andsupport throughout the period of my research. I also acknowledge the assistance ofProfessor Ir. H Rachman Hernadi, rector of Mulawarman University, as well as thestaff of the Center for Social Forestry, in particular Drs. Palus Kedok, Drs. Nindan,Drs. Ary Yasir Pilipus, and Drs. G. Simon Defung. I offer my warmest thanks for the gen-erous hospitality extended to me by the family of the late H. S. Abdurrachman through-out my stay in Samarinda, in particular to Sayid Irwan. Finally, I am greatly indebted tothe executive board of the East Kalimantan Dayak Association and to members of thatand other organizations (many of whom asked to remain anonymous) who helped medevelop my understanding of the challenges and opportunities that face East KalimantanDayaks today.


List of References

ADHIATI, M. ADRIANA SRI, and ARMIN BOBSIEN, eds. 2000. “Indonesia’s TransmigrationProgramme—An Update.” Down to Earth 46. http://dte.gn.apc.org/ctrans.htm[accessed October 31, 2006]

ARY YASIR PILIPUS. 2000. “Perobahan Lingkungan Yang Tidak Menguntungkan DalamPengelolaan Dan Pembakalan Hutan di Kalimantan Timur.” In Borneo 2000: Pro-ceedings of the Sixth Biennial Borneo Research Conference, ed. Michael, Leigh,82–86. Sarawak, Malaysia: Institute for East Asian Studies.

ASPINALL, EDWARD, and GREG FEALY, eds. 2003. Local Power and Politics in Indonesia:Decentralisation and Democratisation. Singapore: Institute of Southeast AsianStudies.

BARNES, R. H., ANDREW GRAY, and BENEDICT KINGSBURY, eds. 1995. Indigenous Peoples ofAsia. Monograph and Occasional Paper No. 48. Ann Arbor, Mich.: Association forAsian Studies.

BARTH, FREDRIK. 1969. Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: The Social Organization ofCulture Difference. London: Allen and Unwin.

BATTEAU, ALAN. 2000. “Negations and Ambiguities in the Cultures of Organizations.”American Anthropologist 102 (4): 726–40.

BELL, GARY. 2001. “The New Indonesian Laws Relating to Regional Autonomy: GoodIntentions, Confusing Laws.” Asian-Pacific Law and Policy Journal 2 (1): 1–44.

BOULANGER, CLAIRE. 2000. “On Dayak, Orang Ulu, Bidayuh, and Other Imperfect EthnicCategories in Sarawak.” In Borneo 2000: Proceedings of the Sixth Biennial BorneoResearch Conference, ed. Michael Leigh 44–66. Sarawak, Malaysia: Sarawak Devel-opment Institute.

COHEN, ABNER. 1969. Custom and Politics in Urban Africa: A Study of Hausa Migrants inYoruba Towns. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.

CONLEY, WILLIAM. 1976. The Kalimantan Kenyah: A Study of Tribal Conversion in Termsof Dynamic Cultural Themes. Nutley, N.J.: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing.

CONNOLLY, JENNIFER. 2004. “Becoming Christian and Dayak: A Study of ChristianConversion among Dayaks in East Kalimantan, Indonesia.” Ph.D. thesis. NewSchool University.

CRAIN, JAY, and VICKI PEARSON-ROUNDS. 2000. “Constructing the Lun Dayeh: Contradic-tions Past and Present.” In Borneo 2000: Proceedings of the Sixth Biennial BorneoResearch Conference, ed. Michael Leigh, 23–43. Sarawak, Malaysia: Institute forEast Asian Studies.

DEGENNE, ALAIN, and MICHEL FORSÉ. 1999. Introducing Social Networks. Trans. ArthurBorges. London: Sage.

DENTAN, ROBERT, KIRK ENDICOTT, ALBERTO GOMES, and M. B, Hooker. 1997. Malaysiaand the “Original People”: A Case Study of the Impact of Development on Indigen-ous Peoples. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

DOVE, MICHAEL. 1997. “Dayak Anger Ignored.” Inside Indonesia 51: 13–14.FULCHER, MARY. 1983. “Avoidance and Ambiguity in Inter-Ethnic Relations: Population

Resettlement in East Kalimantan.” Borneo Research Bulletin 15 (2): 108–13.GUIBERNAU, MONSTSERRAT, and JOHN REX. 1997. The Ethnicity Reader: Nationalism, Mul-

ticulturalism, and Migration. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell.HALL, STUART. 1986. “On Postmodernism and Articulation: An Interview with Stuart

Hall.” Journal of Communication Inquiry 10 (2): 45–60.

92 Anne Schiller

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH. 1999. Communal Violence in West Kalimantan. New York:Human Rights Watch.

ILUN, Y. NATHAN. 1983. Rapat Damai Di Tumbang Anoi [Peace Conference at TumbandAnoi]. Palangka Raya: Balai Pengabdian Pada Masyarakat Universitas PalangkaRaya.

KAHN, JOEL, ed. 1998. Southeast Asian Identities: Culture and the Politics of Represen-tation in Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand. New York: St. Martin’sPress.

KALTIM POS. 1999. “Putra Daerah Jangan Diartikan Suku Asli” [Don’t Construe RegionalSon as Original Tribe]. October 31.

KALIMANTAN REVIEW. 1999. “Participate Mapping for the Conservation and the Preser-vation Justice and Natural Resources.” English, ed., 2: 23–25.

KAMMERER, CORNELIA, and NICOLA TANNENBAUM, eds. 1996. Merit and Blessing in Main-land Southeast Asia in Comparative Perspective. Southeast Asian Studies Mono-graph No. 45. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University.

KELLY, JOHN D., and MARTHA KAPLAN. 2001. Represented Communities: Fiji and WorldDecolonization. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

KEYES, CHARLES, ed. 1981. Ethnic Change. Seattle: University of Washington Press.KING, VICTOR. 1993. The Peoples of Borneo. Oxford, U.K.: Blackwell.KIPP, RITA. 1993. Dissociated Identities: Ethnicity, Religion, and Class in an Indonesian

Society. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.KREPS, CHRISTINA. 2003. Liberating Culture: Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Museums,

Curation, and Heritage Preservation. New York: Routledge.LI, TANIA MURRAY. 2000. “Articulating Indigenous Identity in Indonesia: Resource Poli-

tics and the Tribal Slot.” Comparative Studies in Society and History 42 (1): 149–79.——. 2001. “Masyarakat Adat, Difference, and the Limits of Recognition in Indonesia’s

Forest Zone.” Modern Asian Studies 35 (3): 645–76.LÖFFLER, ULRICH. 1996. Land Tenure Developments in Indonesia. Eschborn: Deutsche

Gesellschaft fur Technische Zummenarbeit GmbH.MAGENDA, BURHAN. 1991. East Kalimantan: The Decline of a Commercial Aristocracy.

Modern Indonesia Project Monograph No. 70. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University,Southeast Asia Program.

MAYBURY-LEWIS, DAVID. 2002. Indigenous Peoples, Ethnic Groups, and the State, 2ndedition. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

MILES, DOUGLAS. 1976. Cutlass & Crescent Moon: A Case Study in Social and PoliticalChange in Outer Indonesia. Sydney: University of Sydney Centre for Asian Studies.

MONIAGA, SANDRA. 1993. “Towards Community-Based Forestry and Recognition of AdatProperty Rights.” In Legal Frameworks for Forest Management in Asia: CaseStudies of Community/State Relations, ed. Jefferson Fox, 131–50. Honolulu:East–West Center, Program on Environment.

——. 1998. “Advocating for Community-Based Forest Management in Indonesia’sOuter Islands: Political and Legal Constraints and Opportunities.” In IGESInternational Workshop on Forest Conservation for the Asia and Pacific Region,120–31. Japan: Institute for Global Environmental Strategies.

NAGATA, JUDITH. 1981. “In Defense of Ethnic Boundaries: The Changing Myths andCharters of Malay Identity.” In Ethnic Change, ed. Charles Keyes, 87–116.Seattle: University of Washington Press.

OAKES, TIM. 2000. “China’s Provincial Identities: Reviving Regionalism and Reinventing‘Chineseness.’” Journal of Asian Studies 59 (3): 667–92.

ORTNER, SHERRY. 1973. “On Key Symbols.” American Anthropologist 75 (5): 1338–46.


PELUSO, NANCY, and EMILY, HARWELL. 2001. “Territory, Custom, and the Cultural Politicsof Ethnic War inWest Kalimantan, Indonesia.” In Violent Environments, ed. Nancy,Peluso and Michael Watts, 83–116. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.

PEMBERTON, JOHN. 1994. On the Subject of “Java.” Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.PIETERSE, JAN. 1996. “Varieties of Ethnic Politics and Ethnicity Discourse.” In The Politics

of Difference: Ethnic Premises in a World of Power, ed. Edwin Wilmsen and PatrickMcAllister, 25–44. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

ROOSENS, EUGEEN. 1989.Creating Ethnicity: The Process of Ethnogenesis.Newbury Park,Calif.: Sage Publications.

RUTHERFORD, DANILYN. 2003. Raiding the Land of the Foreigners: The Limits of theNation on an Indonesian Frontier. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.

SCHILLER, ANNE. 1997a. Small Sacrifices: Religious Change and Cultural Identity amongthe Ngaju of Indonesia. New York: Oxford University Press.

——. 1997b. “Religion and Identity in Central Kalimantan: The Case of the NgajuDayaks.” In Indigenous Peoples and the State, ed. Robert Winzeler, 180–200.New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press.

——. 2001a. “Talking Heads: Capturing Dayak Deathways on Film.” American Ethnol-ogist 28 (1): 32–55.

——. 2001b. “Pampang Culture Village and International Tourism in East Kalimantan,Indonesian Borneo.” Human Organization 60 (4): 414–22.

——. 2001c. “Religione e la Lotta Politica degli Indigeni nel Kalimantan: Commenti dalCampo” [Religion and the Political Struggle of Indigenous People in Kalimantan:Notes from the Field]. Quaderni Asiatici 55/57: 201–12.

SCHILLER, ANNE, and BAMBANG GARANG. 2002. “Religion and Interethnic Violence inIndonesia.” Journal of Contemporary Asia 32 (2): 244–54.

SEBILANG, BARNABAS. 1999. “Pernyataan Penghapusan Kelas Demulun DalamMasyarakatLun Dayeh.” Unpublished statement.

SELLATO, BERNARD. 1994. Nomads of the Borneo Rainforest: The Economics, Politics, andIdeology of Settling Down. Trans. Stephanie Morgan. Honolulu: University ofHawai‘i Press.

SHARP, JOHN. 1996. “Ethnogenesis and Ethnic Mobilization: A Comparative Perspectiveon a South African Dilemma.” In The Politics of Difference: Ethnic Premises in aWorld of Power, ed. Edwin Wilmsen and Patrick McAllister, 85–103. Chicago: Uni-versity of Chicago Press.

SUARA KALTIM. 2000. “PUTRA DAERAH DIUTAMAKAN.” APRIL 5.——. 2001a. “Tokoh Gado-gado” [Vegetable Salad Personage]. March 21.——. 2001b. “PDKT ‘Gerilya’ Rendam Konflik Lapisan Bawah” [PDKT “Guerilla” Sub-

merges the Bottom Class Conflict]. March 22.SUPARLAN, PARSUDI. 2000. “Ethnic and Religious Conflicts in Indonesia.” In Borneo 2000:

Proceedings of the Sixth Biennial Borneo Research Conference, ed. Michael, Leigh,97–125. Sarawak, Malaysia: Institute for East Asian Studies.

SURYADINATA, LEO, EVI ARIFIN, and ARIS ANANTA. 2003. Indonesia’s Population: Ethnicityand Religion in a Changing Political Landscape. Indonesia’s Population SeriesNo. 1. Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.

SUTLIVE, VINSON. 1978. The Iban of Sarawak. Arlington Heights, Ill.: AHM.TAMBIAH, STANLEY. 1985. Culture, Thought, and Social Action: An Anthropological Per-

spective. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.TIEN, THOMAS et al. 2000. “Quo Vadis Dayak Islam.” Kalimantan Review 55 (5): 4–6.TSING, ANNA. 1993. In the Realm of the Diamond Queen: Marginality in an Out-of-the-

Way Place. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.

94 Anne Schiller

TURNER, VICTOR. 1967. The Forest of Symbols. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.URANO, MARIKO. 2002. “Appropriation of Cultural Symbols and Peasant Resistance

Movements to Timber Industry in East and West Kalimantan, Indonesia.” Paperpresented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association,Boston, Mass.

VAN KLEIJNENBREUGEL, H. 1987. Sejarah Paroki “Kristus Raja” Barong Tongkok 1937–1987 [History of “Christ the King” Barong Tongkok Parish]. Samarinda: Publisherunknown.

VAN KLINKEN, GERRY. 2002. “Indonesia’s New Ethnic Elites.” In Indonesia: In Search ofTransition, ed. Nordholt, Henk Schulte and Irwan Abdullah, 67–105. Yogyakarta:Pustaka Pelajar.

WEST KALIMANTAN SOLIDARITY FOUNDATION. 2000. Homepage. http://www.dayakology.com [accessed October 31, 2006].

WINZELER, ROBERT, ed. 1997. Indigenous Peoples and the State: Politics, Land, and Eth-nicity in the Malayan Peninsula and Borneo. Southeast Asian Studies MonographNo. 46. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University.

——, ed. 1998. Indigenous Architecture in Borneo: Traditional Patterns and New Devel-opments. Proceedings Series No. 5. Williamsburg, VA: Borneo Research Council.

——. 2004. The Architecture of Life and Death in Borneo. Honolulu: University ofHawai‘i Press.

WOLF, ERIC. 1982. Europe and the People Without History. Berkeley and Los Angeles:University of California Press.


Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.

Activism and Identities in an East Kalimantan Dayak Organization.pdf

Documents

Transcript of Activism and Identities in an East Kalimantan Dayak Organization.pdf