For this seminar, I propose to study urban planning documents that have ...
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BALI IN GLOBAL ASIA: BETWEEN MODERNIZATION AND HERITAGE FORMATION DENPASAR, BALI, INDONESIA 16‐18 JULY 2012
KEYNOTE SPEECH – 18 JULY, 11.30‐12.30 Goenawan Mohamad Bali and another 'idea of Indonesia' Recently there has been a persistent report on the rise of intolerance towards non‐Muslims in Indonesia and the non‐existence State interference to curb it. The increasing conservatism, especially among educated Muslims, has not always been an indication of a rift in the society, but rather a much larger presence of religion in Indonesia's politics of identity. Both developments have put 'the idea of Indonesia' conceived and celebrated since the 1920s in crisis. My talk will be an invitation to examine the position of Bali in all this: will Bali, either as a constructed 'Other', or as a continuing 'event' related to the rest of Indonesia, contribute to another 'idea of Indonesia'.
PANELS IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER
AGRICULTURE/ENVIRONMENT Lene Pedersen, Central Washington University, United States Wiwik Darmiasi, Udyana University, Indonesia The Invention of Tradition? The State and Irrigation In Bali This paper explores the (re)invention of tradition in the context of Balinese models of irrigation in response to anthropological debates and state intervention. There has been much focus on the role of the state in relation to Balinese subaks, especially surrounding the issue of ‘subak autonomy’ during the development and management of irrigation in pre‐colonial Bali as well as the ‘massive guidance’ of Green Revolution state intervention. This paper explores a new development in the recent period of Indonesian decentralization, whereby regional and provincial governments now dispense annual funds to subaks. A study of 26 associations in east Bali reveals that these funds are used primarily to render subaks ‘more complete’ in the image of the very irrigation model featured in the literature – based on a socio‐ecological analysis of subak features prior to the development efforts of colonial and nation‐state governments. Building on the perspectives of both state policy and subak actors, we examine the recent state supported (re)invention of tradition and its emphasis on completing the ‘ritual technology’ of local subaks. On the one hand it represents a state promoted (re)enchantment of society in the Weberian sense and support of local governance; but by promoting the replication of one regional system the decentralized state nevertheless joins others in erasing local difference. Agung Wardana, Undiknas University, Indonesia Law as Kurusetra*: The Politics of the Provincial Regulation on Spatial Planning for Bali Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Bali, a province consisting of a small island, is unique both environmentally and culturally. It is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Indonesia with an estimated 3 million tourists visiting Bali annually. However, the rapid development of the tourism industry raises concerns about environmental sustainability, social vulnerability and even the commodification of culture. With regard to environmental sustainability, the Provincial Government of Bali has issued a provincial regulation (perda) on spatial planning, the 2009 Provincial Regulation on Spatial Planning for Bali Province. Since space plays an important role in maintaining culture and social relationship among Balinese, it is clear that the regulation would determine the picture of Bali in the next 20 years. In fact, the regulation is still the subject of ongoing debate among a wide range of interests, from conservation to commodification paradigm, or from sacred and profane viewpoints. However, it seems that both arguments are for the sake of tourism development since the arguments put maintaining the paradise image of Bali (for tourists) as the main objective. Therefore, the paper will examine how law plays a role in conducting debates between conservation and commodification viewpoints with regard to the provincial spatial plan of Bali and the extent to which justice is being accommodated in the regulation. Books, journal articles, regulations, reports, and other sources will be assessed critically for answering the purpose statements above. Keywords: Spatial Plan, Politics of Law, Bali, Environmental Justice ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ * A battlefield among family of Pandawa and Korawa in reaching to be the king of Astina Pura Empire Carol Warren, Murdoch University, Australia Is Nothing Sacred? The Cultural and Environmental Politics of Development Regulation in Bali This exploration of controversies over the regulation of development in Bali concerns the intimate ways in which Balinese identity – particularly the religious dimensions of that identity – has become bound up with environmental and heritage protection. These issues cannot be separated either from local perceptions of the threats and possibilities of globalizing modernity and a pervasive populist critique of capitalist development on the island. Among the highly charged issues connected with ongoing debates over the impacts of modernization, globalization and development on Bali's culture and environment has been the question of commercial development at sacred sites. Interpretations of religious principles prescribing balance in relationships between humans and the natural and supernatural worlds (Tri Hita Karana) and the religious decree (Bhisama) defining the sacred space surrounding temples have been a battleground in the legal and discursive struggles dominating Bali's cultural and environmental politics over the past two decades. In this period, they have surfaced most vehemently in what might otherwise seem the relatively mundane and technical domain of spatial planning and environmental impact assessment. This presentation considers the pervasive dichotomies – sacred and profane, tradition and modernity, cultural value and economic interest, identity and alienation, environmental preservation and use (exploitation), certainty and uncertainty (risk) – that thread through debates surrounding impact assessment and zoning laws, which purport to protect the island's heritage. The politicisation of these binaries confounds regulatory and evaluation practices in profound and often perverse ways. The presentation focuses on impact assessment (AMDAL) of the mega‐ developments in the Suharto period and the struggles over spatial planning laws (RTRW) in the present era of decentralization and reform, while exploring some of the paradoxes of politicizing and technologizing the sacred in the cultural and environmental politics that have characterized Bali's engagement with modernity. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Dik Roth, Wageningen University, the Netherlands Reframing Balinese Water Scarcity: From ‘Culture’ to the Politics of Water? Under the influence of rapid societal transformations, primarily associated with the continuous expansion of tourism, water scarcity has become a major social‐environmental problem in Bali. Growing pressures on land and water resources, transformations of the Balinese economy – especially the changing role of agriculture –, and the important interests in accommodating and expanding investments related to tourism, have turned water into a major object of societal debate, social conflict, and policy‐making. However, Balinese water problems are often framed in a specifically ‘cultural’ way, involving the use of narratives and discourses of a unique Balinese culture invaded and threatened by the forces of globalization. Such framings, narratives and discourses are not neutral: in combination with specific accounts of water history that also stress ‘the cultural’, they influence the world of policy‐making in very specific ways, foregrounding certain dimensions while side‐lining others. One example is the process towards recognition of part of the Balinese irrigated landscape as a UNESCO heritage site. In this paper I intend to critically analyse some key aspects of this ‘cultural’ framing as part of what might be called a cultural politics of water. What images of globalization does it create, and how does it mobilize culture, tradition, and identity? What issues and problems are side‐lined by this cultural heritage focus? What new tensions, contradictions and problems might it create for those depending on key resources like land and water? Are there alternative ways of theorizing and framing these social‐environmental processes, especially transformations of water rights and the role of water transfers? What questions arise for future research of land and water resources?
AJEG BALI AND BEYOND Chair: Henk Schulte Nordholt, Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies (KITLV), the Netherlands This panel aims to investigate the impact of the so‐called Ajeg Bali discourse that has dominated Balinese politics during the last decade. This raises in particular questions about the position of Bali within the Indonesian nation‐state and the nature of citizenship. Jean Couteau, Institut Seni Indonesia, Denpasar, Indonesia Identity in Balinese Visual Arts The issue of identity is an old horse of Balinese studies. Some writings focus on the role of political engineering. Other, more recent ones, try to size up the impact of today's revivalist movement, in particular that sponsored, under the name of ‘Ajeg Bali’ by the Bali Post media group. The paper I am herewith submitting, ‘Identity in Balinese visual arts’, has a narrower scope. It simply proposes to ‘read’ the way Balinese artists, from the post‐colonial generation down to contemporary artists, imagine and present their identity through their artworks. Even though the study is still under way and no final conclusion has been reached, several points can already be underlined: most artworks are purposely iconic of Bali and can therefore be construed as an affirmation of identity; yet, at the same time, most clearly show an attempt to adapt thematically and stylistically, to modernity. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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I Nyoman Wijaya, Department of History, Udayana University, Indonesia Seabad Praktek Hegemoni Ajeg Bali Studi ini berbicara mengenai Ajeg Bali yang muncul sejak 2002. Persoalan itu dilacak ke masa lampau dengan permasalahan utama hubungan antara suatu wacana besar dengan kepentingan mengajegkan Bali. Persoalan yang dibahas dalam studi ini adalah hubungan Ajeg Bali dengan perubahan struktur politik, meluasnya pengaruh agama‐agama non‐Hindu, persinggungan Bali dengan berbagai ideologi politik, munculnya industri pariwisata. Jawaban pertanyaan itu dicari mulai dari tahun 1910‐2007. Suatu hal yang ingin ditunjukkan dalam studi, yakni sebagai sebuah peristiwa budaya, semangat maupun gerakan Ajeg Bali tidak lebih dari sebuah artikulasi yang sangat kuat dari para intelektual organik yang diberi hak istimewa untuk berbicara. Karena itu Ajeg Bali merupakan upaya sepihak para intelektual organik untuk mengajegkan Bali. Di dalamnya Bali dijadikan kata benda kongkret milik orang‐orang Bali Hindu. Sebagai barang milik pribadi, Bali diartikulasikan sebagai konsep kebudayaan, lalu dipermanenkan sehingga Bali identik dengan adat dan agama leluhur yang bersifat nostalgik. Putu Ratih Kumala Dewi, International Relations Department, Airlangga University, Indonesia The existence of Desa Pakraman in Bali in an Era of Globalization Globalization affects all aspects of human life in every region, including culture and civilization in Bali. As a consequence of globalization an intense struggle between local and global cultural values has arisen in Bali. The local cultural value system that people always referred to has been undergoing many changes due to the influence of global cultural values. However, at the same time, this global culture has paradoxically led to an increased awareness of local and regional culture. Globalization, immigrants who come and go and rapid flow of capital in Bali have brought a variety of influences. The Balinese react to these influences by trying to empower themselves and strengthen the resilience of culture through a traditional institution called desa pakraman (traditional village). The existence of desa pakraman is now challenged by both internal and external factors, which has led to a complicated situation. Maria Adriani, Architecture Department, Islamic University of Indonesia, Yogyakarta, Indonesia Rumah Asal: Resilience among Globalization and Romanticism The Balinese are continuously under pressure by global problems, such as the massive influx of cheap immigrant workers, the high cost of living and the invasion of international and Jakarta investors. As a consequence the Balinese are experiencing political instability and ‘horizontal’ conflicts, even at the family level which forms the basic social entity. In this chaos, the Ajeg Bali concept was seized to oppose these tremendous globalization effects. However in reality, the concept Ajeg Bali is mainly used as part of a romantic jargon to strengthen ones political position. This paper aims to observe the rumah asal, the traditional Balinese family compound outside the usual romantic context. It has two objectives. First, it will try to identify that the rumah asal is being used as a part of a strategy to face global problems: harder economy, the degrading of traditional life and ignorant individualism. Second, it will look at how tensions in the rumah asal are spatially managed. The paper is based on research conducted in June 2011 at several family compounds in Kesiman, Denpasar. Social ethnography and spatial analysis have been used as methodologies.
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ARCHITECTURE/URBAN DEVELOPMENT Josef Prijotomo, Department of Architecture, Institut Teknologi Surabaya, Indonesia Becoming both Bali and Modern: The battle in Contemporary Architecture of Bali The Orde Baru era should be identified as the era where Bali experienced a struggle between architectural modernism and architectural traditionalism. Here, space and form as formulated and understood by modernism was found to be in strong contrast to the indigenous Balinese architecture, and consequently became problematic to Balinese architects. The government, professional institutions and architectural schools who were expected to provide assistance to this problem, in fact only suggested normative solutions for an architecture that would combine both modern and traditional aspects. It is interesting to find that becoming modern is, as seen by architects, somewhat easier than ‘becoming Bali’. Balinese‐ness, as a recognizable identity, should be experienced in today’s and tomorrow’s architecture but has find itself in a difficult position due to modern‐ness being the mindset of most Balinese architects. Popo Danes, Putu Mahendra and I Wayan Gomuda, educated at a modern architecture school during the Orde Baru era, are examples of Balinese architects dealing with modernism versus traditionalism. They exhaustively struggled with Balinese architecture as a legacy that needed to be preserved and yet should also represent the present and future of Bali on the one hand , and, on the other hand, modern architecture as a sign of present‐ness, contemporariness, globalization and progress and definitely non‐Bali. Nathalie Lancret, Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS), Paris‐Belleville school of architecture, France Production of the Contemporary City in Bali, between Legacies and Projects Analysis of the spatial changes which make up modern Asia reveals the effects of this clean sweep and the emergence of a new world with forms of indistinct origins. At the same time, we find works which, at different levels, have to cope with previous conditions of settlement, organization and use of space. Recent works have allowed us to identify three types of process: local socio‐spatial resistance and persistence which are often due to the inhabitants and users; distanced re‐readings of heritage by professional, local or foreign actors; the appropriation of these distanced re‐readings when they are accepted in the field. Projected on an architectural scale, or on the scale of the neighbourhood or urbanized zone, these programmes draw on different aspects of legacy. By producing original works, they create elements of differentiation between towns. These observations lead us to formulate a hypothesis of hybridisation which is to be found in situations of tension between legacies and projects marked by the internationalization of the actors, models, formal vocabulary and operational devices. This phenomenon appears particularly strong in Bali. The reasons are plural: a culture of resistance developed over time; a situation of religious enclave that causes strong identity claims; the power of local social organizations; the desire to promote a modern Balinese architecture and urban planning in the context of tourism development and the creativity of Balinese society. For these different reasons, there is something special in Bali in the relationship between heritage and projects, in the way of dealing with elements inherited from the past to create modern architectures and modern cities.
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My purpose is to examine this situation from an architectural point of view. My research on Bali began in the late 1980s. For this seminar, I propose to study urban planning documents that have been prepared for major cities and Denpasar in Bali. Pawda Tjoa, Department of Architecture, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom Bali: Indonesia’s Feral Child? The early years of post‐colonial Indonesia were marked by the efforts of the central government to recreate a unified Indonesian identity through monumental national projects commissioned by the state. These projects were intended to define this new national identity for the rest of the population. Given that President Suharto went as far as encouraging the replication of structures such as the Demak Mosque, which was considered the only remaining item of Indonesian heritage from the pre‐colonial period, these efforts quickly became associated with the process of Indonesianization. They became widespread and triggered certain urban trends that have subsequently become a model for the rest of the nation to follow. While much of Indonesia quickly embraced and adopted the urban trends visible in the capital city, Bali has largely retained its unique identity, with seemingly little consequence to the rest of Indonesia. Yet interestingly, despite having very distinct characteristics both religiously and culturally, it is Bali which plays the part of Indonesia’s public face to the rest of the world. Recently, structures in Bali have provided architectural inspiration for the increasingly prevalent vernacular buildings in other Indonesian cities. It has thus had the same effect which the former First Lady Siti Hartinah had originally intended for the ‘Miniature Project’ in 1970, a project which she hoped would help Indonesia to help rediscover its pre‐colonial heritage. This paper will therefore examine the extent to which Bali has been left outside the formal process of Indonesianization, yet at the same time has influenced the process of urbanization in many cities that follow the model set by the capital city Jakarta.
ART WORLDS Wanda Listiani, Jurusan Seni Rupa Sekolah Tinggi Seni Indonesia (STSI) Bandung, Indonesia Bahasa Rupa Kritik Seni Lukis Bali Kontemporer Peningkatan jumlah seniman kontemporer Bali dan kurangnya ruang pameran yang representatif membuat galeri komersial di Bali fokus pada seni rupa kontemporer. Hal ini terlihat pada galeri komersial yang dulu lebih memberi prioritas pada lukisan yang menggambarkan tema‐tema tradisional kehidupan desa orang‐orang Bali, tarian, upacara pembakaran mayat (ngaben), atau keindahan sawah kini didominasi karya lukis kontemporer. Bahkan seniman Bali yang berkarya gaya tradisional mengalami kesulitan dalam menemukan tempat untuk menggelar pameran di Bali (Michelle Chin, Garuda Inflight Magazine, April 2004). Berdasar fenomena diatas, bahasa rupa kritik seni lukis Bali kontemporer menjadi penting untuk dibahas. Karena aspek muatan kritik menjadi sifat dasar selain aspek estetika pada seni lukis kontemporer yang membedakan dengan seni lukis dan seniman pada zamannya. Penelitian ini menggunakan pendekatan kualitatif dengan metode kepustakaan (library research). Metode riset kepustakaan (Zed, 2004:3) ialah serangkaian kegiatan yang berkenaan dengan metode pengumpulan data pustaka membaca dan mencatat serta mengolah bahan penelitian (karya seni rupa termasuk lukisan Bali kontemporer). Metode yang menggunakan sumber perpustakaan untuk memperoleh data penelitian. Penelitian pustaka membatasi kegiatannya hanya pada bahan‐bahan koleksi perpustakaan dan sumber sekunder yang ada. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Hasil penelitian ini memaparkan bahasa rupa kritik yang ada pada lukisan yang telah dipamerkan di galeri‐galeri Bali yang mempunyai jadwal program pameran karya seni rupa secara reguler tiap tahun seperti Seniwati Galleri of Art , Ganesha Gallery, Sika Gallery Contemporary, Sembilan Gallery, Paros Gallery, Jezz Gallery, Gaya Fusion of Sense, Darga Gallery, Komaneka Gallery dan galeri lainnya. Wayan Kun Adnyana, Institut Seni Indonesia (ISI) Denpasar, Indonesia Nilai Ketradisian dalam Seni Lukis Kontemporer Perupa Bali Seni lukis kontemporer perupa Bali bertema ketradisian hadir dalam dua lingkup medan eksistensi; eksis wacana dan eksis karya. Begitu banyak even seni rupa tingkat nasional dan internasional mengakomodasi seni lukis bertema ketradisian sebagai bagian khasanah ekspresi seni rupa kontemporer global. Pameran seni rupa Asia di Asian Society Galleries, New York, tahun 1996, mengetengahkan salah satunya karya Wayan Bendi (asal Batuan) berdampingan dengan karya perupa‐perupa Asia. Pameran dalam bingkai ‘ Contemporary Art in Asia: Tradition/tensions ini, disampaikan salah satu kuratornya Apinan Posyananda sebagai upaya membawa asap contemporaneity yang hidup di Asia. Di penghujung 2010 di Galeri Nasional Jakarta digelar pameran nasional ‘Ethnicity Now’ mewadahi kekontemporeran yang lahir dari khasanah tradisi lokal, perupa Bali yang dipilih Wayan Bendi dan Made Djirna. Melissa Chiu dan Genecchio dalam bukunya Contemporary Asian Art, 2010, secara tegas mewadahi ekspresi dengan basis lokalitas ini sebagai term ‘Rethinking Tradition’. Artinya, begitu luas apresiasi wacana yang dikumandangkan baik oleh kritikus maupun kurator terhadap keberadaan seni lukis kontemporer bertema ketradisian. Dalam praksis seni perupa kontemporer Bali, dalam dua dekade terakhir, nilai ketradisian dielaborasi ke dalam beragam ekspresi baru. Nama‐nama seperti Dewa Putu Mokoh, Made Wianta, Wayan Bendi, Nyoman Erawan, Made Djirna, sampai generasi terbaru Putu Wirantawan, dan Ketut Teja Astawa secara intensif mengeksplorasi tema ketradisian. Nilai ketradisian merupakan upaya elaborasi kreatif seorang perupa atas unsur tradisi lama, baik itu tentang gejala‐gejala nilai, praksis(teknik), dan juga pencermatan atas artefak tradisi lama. Nilai, praksis, atau pun artefak tradisi lama, diekspresikan dalam berbagai pola‐pola kreatif personal. Konsep pembacaan kembali, pembertanyaan, dan dekonstruksi menjadi kesadaran kreatif perupa kontemporer Bali dalam membaca lingkup tradisi moyangnya itu. Tradisi bukan lagi dipahami sebagai entitas pejal, kaku, dan aksiomatik. Posisi seni lukis kontemporer perupa Bali bertema ketradisian menjadi medan bacaan yang menarik di tengah kecenderungan kegaguan dalam memetakan karakter Asia dalam peta seni rupa kontemporer global. Nilai ketradisian oleh perupa‐perupa kontemporer Bali telah begitu jauh dieksplorasi sehingga memunculkan ragam seni lukis kontemporer dengan karakter yang kuat. Kata kunci: nilai ketradisian, seni lukis kontemporer Bali, seni rupa kontemporer Global A.A. Gede Rai Remawa, Faculty of Visual Art and Design, Graduate School Institut Technologi of Bandung, Indonesia ‘Warnabali’, Intensities and Character: The Concept of Colour and Meaning The revitalization of local traditional knowledge has become a strategic issue in Bali in the last five years. Local Balinese wealth of knowledge in the field of art and design such as: painting, sculpturing, architecture, interior design and wood craft have been brought to the fore to emphasize the importance of preserving it and to experience that this knowledge is, according to a modern theory based on various pragmatic studies, useful throughout society. Design regulation has enabled the past treasures to re‐exist under new circumstances and this leads to the discovery of various new things that at the same time still relate to the past cultural wealth. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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The traditional architecture and interior design of Bali used a lot of natural material such as soft stone and red brick for the foundation and half way up the wall and wood, bamboo, coconut leaf, reed (grass) and palm fibre for the roof and the framework construction. As a consequence of the development of technology and design these materials are not used anymore as they have been replaced by concrete and finishing wall paint plaster which produce less dust and are more solid. The use of wall paint is seen as an improvement for the interior and exterior as it is less dusty, water proof and easier to maintain. The traditional ‘Warnabali’ (cat Bali) which is made from mangsi, taum, kencu, deluge, pere, atal, and bone, consists of seven basic colours: black, blue, red, orange, brown, yellow and white is still often used in the art world. Warnabali is used for paintings, sculptures, statues and masks and also in Balinese architecture for the traditional wooden doors with their accessories and ornaments. Warnabali is based upon the concept of Tri Kono and Nawa Sanggha, which are based on the Kreb Bhuana, Dewa Tatwa manuscripts. Warnabali colours have a visual intensity between gloss and matte and are somewhat softer compared to the colours from the spectrum of Newton. Warnabali black and white are included into the colour not as a shade or a tint. Green and blue have a maximum wave length 610 nanometer, pelung 600 nanometer, yellow, brown, red, dadu and camika 520 nanometer and 560 nanometer, whereas Warnabali colours as orange, white, grey and black do not absorb the colour. Keyword: Revitalisation, character, meaning, intensity, Warnabali, and nawa sanggha Tine G. Ruiter, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands Art Worlds, Global Bali and Heritage In this paper I will describe and analyze changes in ‘Art Worlds’, by focusing on Balinese art collectors‐cum‐traders, Balinese painters and markets for paintings. The concept ‘Art Worlds’ (H.S. Becker, 1982) is instructive for an understanding of the complex and large networks of people involved in creating, marketing and exhibiting of paintings. Bali as a region was opened up already in pre‐colonial times, but the character and the scale of its involvement in the outside world is changing over time. In this paper I will shortly deal with historical changes in the marketing of Balinese paintings on a local and international scale, which started in the 1920s, and especially with art traders and their operations. Periods of a booming Indonesian economy, like in the 1920s and later in the 1980s, show a shift in the class origin of the Balinese art traders away from the aristocracy to the ordinary Balinese. A kind of ‘democratization’, which characterizes also changes in other sectors of Balinese society (Ruiter, 2004). Contrary to the modernization theory of the 1960s, with its characterizing of third world people engaging in the world economy as helpless, passive and suffering men, I show in this paper how Balinese traders in art were active agents in market developments. A recent change this paper will deal with is the involvement of a new group of Jakarta based art collectors‐cum‐traders in the Art Worlds around Balinese traditional paintings and contemporary art paintings by Balinese. In the last part I will deal with the concept of Heritage as it is seen and formulated by participants in the Balinese Art Worlds. In this respect this paper will contribute to the discourse around globalization and ‘tradition’ (H. Schulte Nordholt, 2007). This paper is based on participant observation as a social anthropologist, literature and interviews. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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‘BALI GOES GLOBAL’ Joan Ricart‐Angulo, Universidad Complutense de Madrid / Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain Bali: Riding Modernization Beyond its cultural traditions, its gorgeous landscape, and its delicious gastronomy, the island of Bali is also very well‐known globally for its first‐class waves. Since the 1960s, spots like Uluwatu, Padang‐Padang, Impossibles or Keramas have been a must in any surfing magazine or movie that was worth its name. Therefore, Bali is nowadays a Mecca for one of the most global, and globalizing, sports in the world: surfing. The presence of thousands of wave‐riders on the island every year, has not only made Bali even more famous worldwide, but it has also made surfing, and the industry that accompanies it, one of the agents of modernization that has had an impact on Balinese society. Some of the modernization effects produced by surfing are the same ones of those produced by tourism in general; however, I believe that there are some specific ones that are very particular of the sport, for instance those related to labour patterns. Since the main title of the conference is ‘Bali in Global Asia’, I have tried to add an extra global factor to the analysis of surfing as a modernization agent in Bali. I have spoken to members of the Spanish surfing world (surfers of different levels and ages, photographers, etc.) that have been to the island in different periods of time or that have decided to establish themselves there, and I have asked them to recount personal experiences that can illustrate some of the processes of modernization attributable to surfing. To do so, I’ve counted with the support of the two most important surfing magazines published in Spain: 3sesenta (http://www.3sesenta.com/) and Surfer Rule (http://www.surferruleweb.es/). Thaneerat Jatuthasri, Department of Thai, Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University, Thailand Explore the World of Women in the Panji Stories: A Shared Ideology among Balinese, Malay and Thai Heritage Literature The Panji stories, which are part of the Asian heritage literature, originated in East Java and were widely popular for a period in different parts of Southeast Asia such as Bali, Malaysia, Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia. There are a number of variations of the story, but they all have in common as main theme and a plot the heroic tale that was mostly used in the courts during the pre‐colonial period of the region. The questions; why the Panji stories were significant in the courts around this period and what dominant ideologies are expressed in the stories, should be answered. This paper aims to explore the ideology of women in the Panji stories in which the Balinese, Malay, and Thai versions are chosen as the exemplification. The three Panji stories are respectively that of Malat, Hikayat Panji Semirang and Inao. The paper finds that the ideology of women is one of the prominent ideologies in the Panji stories, and the three versions of the Panji stories share the same ideology. They depict the moral issues and ideas of how a princess or an elite woman should be or act in her life or when is in love, which clearly serve and support the monarchy. The study not only demonstrates the mutual conception of women among Balinese, Malay, and Thai literature in the pre‐colonial period, but also reveals the value and importance of the Panji stories which were once influential and popular throughout Southeast Asian courts before they became part of the Asian cultural heritage in the present time. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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A.A. Gede Rai Remawa, Biranul Anas Zaman and Imam Santosa, Faculty of Visual Art and Design, Graduate School Institut Technologi of Bandung, Indonesia Aesthetics and Space Concept of the Balinese Dwelling House in the Bali Madya Period The concept of the dwelling house of the traditional Bali Madya is an acculturated concept of the Bali Age (Bali Pegunungan) that came into being in the Majapahit Era and the Dalem Waturenggong era in Sampranan Klungkung (1460‐1550). This study is based on an aesthetic and historical approach of the art en design aspects of these dwellings.
BALI: REPRESENTATIONS OF CULTURE Convenor: Mark Hobart, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, United Kingdom ‘Culture’, as Raymond Williams famously remarked, ‘is one of the two or three most complicated words in the English language’. Yet, both aficionados and scholars – not to mention Balinese themselves – happily treat culture and its synonyms as an unproblematic master trope that somehow captures the island’s essence. Balinese culture is at turns primordial, unique, a gem of world heritage; a tourist attraction, a form of capital; the object of scholarly attention; a subject of fascination and inspiration for actors, artists, dancers, musicians, film and television crews; flourishing, under threat, in terminal decline or moribund; in need simultaneously of being preserved, organized, developed, regimented marketed and exported. Either Bali is indeed a thing apart from the rest of the world or else something is amiss. The panel’s aim is to open up critical discussion about what is involved in the profligate and unthinking use of ‘culture’ to sum up Bali. The papers address how, and with what implications, Bali has come to be represented as a discursive fact. We start from the idea that representation is necessarily a matter of representing something as something else. For this reason representing an object in its totality – let alone ‘as itself’ – is an impossibility. On these grounds that we consider how specific practices have been made to stand for Balinese culture as a whole, exemplifying the island’s heritage as special and different. Wakeling reviews the complex history of conflicting representations of gamelan in Bali. Theodoridou examines how theatre has been made into the key metaphor to understand Balinese character, society and the polity. Fox reflects on how the slippery notion of ‘tradition’ underwrites the idea of Balinese culture. And Hobart looks at the social, economic and political conditions underlying rival representations of Balinese as having culture. Richard Fox, Institute for Ethnology, Heidelberg University, Germany The Idea of Balinese Tradition: Mediating Representations of the Past Bali is nothing if not ‘traditional’. On this there has been considerable agreement among scholars, tour guides and television pundits. But what do we mean by tradition? And why might it matter? This seemingly innocuous little term has been made to designate any number of things for as many purposes. Reviewing the literature on Balinese culture and society, we find that it often figures as a loosely conceptualized historical period (‘traditional Bali’) and a cipher for the lost ‘religion’ and ‘spirituality’ mourned in the west. It is a badge of authenticity, and almost as frequently appears as a synecdoche for ‘text’ (‘according to tradition’). It is used to translate adat, but is also translated back into Indonesian as tradisi – which, of course, is not necessarily coterminous with adat. For cultural historians Balinese tradition has been exposed as a ‘discourse’ of identity linked to shifting articulations of economy and polity; while for government officials it is a form of ‘cultural capital’, or modal, to be judiciously deployed for social and economic development. Balinese ‘tradition’ has been all these things, and many others besides. And it is of no little consequence that our approach to social change and ‘modernization’ depends on it for its coherence. This paper will chart a series Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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of tensions inherent in prevailing scholarly usage, and propose some novel ways forward through reference to Alasdair MacIntyre’s later work on the idea of tradition in ethical inquiry. Mark Hobart, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (SOAS), United Kingdom Bali is a Battlefield Culture is a poisoned chalice that Europeans bequeathed to Balinese. Although culture is a notoriously tricky word, and an empty – or at best a floating – signifier, Balinese and foreign scholars continue to talk as if there were an unambiguous object called ‘Balinese culture’. As the incoherencies are pretty evident, what drives this compulsion to reiterate the term uncritically? A brief review of the history of representations of Bali suggests successive interpretive frameworks have little in common beyond the determination to establish Bali as a knowable totality, articulated as culture or some synonym. By contrast, critical cultural studies start not with culture as a coherent totality, but as a site of struggle. Close inspection shows the apparent agreement over ‘culture’ to arise from the hegemonic articulation of a particular class or interest group, which serves to silence alternative accounts. Furthermore what is understood by culture, the human subject and so on is itself similarly contested. So accepting any particular account fails to recognize the antagonistic articulatory practices which constitute culture as a battlefield. If culture dissolves into a myriad of contending representations, then the noble‐seeming aim of ‘preserving Balinese culture’ emerges as fantasy, which requires us to ask in whose interests is such fantasizing. As Bali has been variously articulated as the playground for the pre‐war European haute bourgeoisie through to a mass consumer market, ‘Balinese culture’ has transformed accordingly. Manufactured romanticism and nostalgia disguise the striking absence from discussion of the role of global capital in the commodification of almost every aspect of Bali from land to religion. As how modern capitalism works eludes most theoretical frameworks, Deleuze and Guattari conceived the process as a ‘body without organs’. I consider the implications for our understanding of contemporary Bali. Natalia Theodoridou, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, United Kingdom Do the Balinese have theatre? Balinese performance occupies a special place in Euro‐American theory, not only about theatre, but about the polity and human nature itself. Theatre has been used as a metaphor to translate Balinese character and culture to the West, starting with the systematic documentation and recording of performance by Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson and followed by Clifford Geertz’s description of pre‐colonial Bali as a theatre‐state. Through it is recycling in various registers, from theatre studies to the tourist industry, this metaphor has ultimately trapped Bali between psychic alterity and essential theatricality. Current approaches prove problematic upon questioning the adequacy of the Western notion of ‘theatre’ in engaging with Balinese practices, and whether it might be an imposed, Eurocentric idea that Balinese have been co‐opted into using in the context of the international performance circuit. Since there is no unifying term in Balinese that corresponds to the English ‘theatre,’ it is impossible to talk generically about ‘Balinese theatre’ except by massive essentialization and over‐ interpretation. This in turn seems to be primarily about articulating concerns over the Western world rather than Bali. It is thus reasonable to ask whether scholarship can approach Balinese or any society without acts of cultural translation so thorough that they end up partly constituting their object of study. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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I will employ the idea of ‘audiences’ as an example of the problems of carrying an (already problematic) European idea to Bali, where it does not have the status of positivity, as it does in European discourse. An alternative to perpetuating the study of Balinese theatre and audiences as substances would be to examine, instead, under which conditions, on which occasions and for what purposes various Balinese practices are represented as theatre, thus hinting at the idea of culture as a site of contestation. Kate Wakeling, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, United Kingdom Theory’s Object: Representing Balinese Music‐Making Since Bali’s colonial occupation, Balinese music‐making has been variously represented by Balinese and Western commentators as a series of colourful and contrary objects: from ‘clangour and noise’ to proof of social order; from long‐lost fossil to High Art. In turn, such representations of gamelan music have been deployed to substantiate a number of grand claims as to Bali’s cultural status and heritage. Music’s slippery status as an object of signification has provided Balinese gamelan’s enunciators with a powerful and flexible strategy to support these claims, carried out perhaps nowhere more stealthily than in the act of theorising Balinese music. Combining music’s elusive status with theory’s apparently privileged ability to wield an explanatory power over practice, the theorisation of gamelan music has proved a malleable tool in bolstering imaginings of ‘Bali’, however dislocated such theoretical statements are from the practices they allegedly ‘explain’. Indeed, many theories of gamelan music prove so disengaged from the practices they purport to account for that they may be deemed (after Laclau) ‘empty signifiers’. By situating such acts of representation within the complex agendas of cultural definition long at play in Bali, this paper unpicks the ‘black box’ status of such musical theorising to address gamelan theory as another prop in the fantasy of an essentialised, substantive ‘Balinese culture’. In turn, the paper highlights the disjuncture between such totalising theories of cultural practice and the kinds of active musical understanding that Balinese musicians employ to learn, construct and refine music.
BEING BALINESE – ENGAGING IN NATIONAL AND TRANSNATIONAL NETWORKS
Convenor and Chair: Brigitta Hauser‐Schäublin, Institute for Cultural and Social Anthropology, University of Göttingen, Germany This panel explores the many ways in which Balinese people increasingly engage in national and transnational networks within global Asia. There exists a broad variety of networks, such as Facebook or religious, political and environmentalist organizations, through which members exchange information and also receive moral, ideological or material support from others. Participating in such a network contributes to the strengthening of an individual’s or a community’s position within their own province or vis‐à‐vis other congregations. Being part of such networks – whether religious, political, ecological, or other – can therefore be understood as attempts of individuals or communities to situate themselves anew within Bali and Indonesia. Martin Slama, Institute for Social Anthropology, Austrian Academy of Sciences, Austria Balinese Kisses: The Omed‐Omedan Ritual in an(other) Era of Guarded Morality The Omed‐Omedan is a unique annual ritual staged the day after Nyepi in front of the community temple of Banjar Kaja, Desa Adat Sesetan, Denpasar. It involves young, unmarried members of the Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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banjar who assemble on the street – boys and girls standing in a row opposite to each other. They tow each other (omed‐omedan) until they meet and the first boy of the male row kisses the first girl of the female row. This is repeated until every boy and girl has been at least once at the front of their respective rows. In 2006, in the wake of discussions about Indonesia’s anti‐pornography bill that outlawed kissing in public, this ritual attracted the attention of Indonesia’s national media. For those who opposed the bill, it soon became an example for ‘local Balinese culture’ being threatened by a law that was perceived not only as a severe intervention of the nation‐state but also as a manifestation of Islamist politics. Consequently, Balinese networks within Indonesia were activated, including the minister of tourism, to guarantee the ritual’s continuity. Furthermore, stressing its (trans)national significance, media coverage of the ritual was reinforced as well as (a very limited number of) tourists and, in 2008, a Taiwanese soap opera starlet (filmed by her camera team) were allowed to participate; and the banjar could win energy drink companies and mobile network operators to sponsor the event. The paper aims to analyse the Omed‐Omedan from three angles: First, it situates the ritual in the post‐New Order context of growing assertions of religious and ethnic identities, intensified forms of marketization of ‘culture’, and elite‐driven moral panics that culminated in the anti‐pornography bill. Secondly, it puts the Omed‐Omedan in historical perspective by searching for temporal comparisons with earlier periods, colonial and post‐colonial alike, in which policies also targeted ‘the erotics’ of Bali and aimed to guard the morality of its people. Thirdly, it approaches the ritual by juxtaposing official discourses as represented in the national media with the voices of the young Omed‐Omedan participants. The paper thus attempts to highlight how this ritual was situated anew within local and national realms after the controversial anti‐pornography issue began to haunt Indonesia and Bali in particular. Martin Ramstedt, Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Germany The Entanglements of National and Transnational Buddhist Networks in Bali Unbeknownst to most outsiders, some Balinese – mainly from the northern part of the island – opted for Buddhism when confronted with the obligation to choose one of five religious identities officially recognized by the Indonesian state between 1959 and 1969. In the course of the next two decades, the northern Balinese Buddhist community became very influential in the politics of the Indonesian Buddhist sangha, at the same time entertaining close ties with the Thai Theravada tradition. The significant degree of deregulation of religion instigated by the recent governance reform facilitated increasing ties with the transnational lay meditation movement (Vipassana), for which Bali has become a major global retreat place. In the event, ties with Myanmar, Vietnamese and Singapore Theravada Buddhists have increased. The Chinese pogroms at the beginning of Indonesia's transition from a centralist patrimonial regime to a highly decentralized form of governance prompted an influx of different groups of Sino‐ Indonesians into Bali. They have frequently established their own transnational Mahayana Buddhist networks. Both the Theravada and the Mahayana‐Buddhist networks entertain close relations with international, i.e. Asian as well as Western expats in Indonesia, and Bali respectively. The paper will elaborate on some of the implications of these developments in the context of spiritual tourism and transnational religious politics. Meike Rieger, Institute for Social and Cultural Anthropology, Georg‐August‐University Göttingen, Germany Pakraman, Parisada, Pesantren and PKS Perspectives from a Hindu‐Muslim Balinese Village on Religious and Political Networks My presentation will explore different networks as sources of social, political and economic power positions from an inter‐religious perspective. I focus on religious and political organizations of Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Balinese Hindus and Muslims. While Hindus are the religious majority on Bali but a minority on national level, Islam is the dominant religion in Indonesia but Muslims are only a minority in the Balinese province. Therefore, Hindus are rather engaged in regional networks that underline Balinese culture and identity as inseparably connected to the island and as a source for economic capital (from the tourism industry). However, Hindu Balinese also operate via national organizations, for example the Parisada Hindu Dharma Indonesia, the Indonesian Hindu Council, in order to represent their interests within the Republic of Indonesia and to cooperate with Hindus living in other provinces. In opposition to that, Muslims are mainly active in networks that go beyond Balinese borders, for example social foundations (yayasan), civil organizations (such as Muhammadiyah or Nadhlatul Wathan) or missionary movements (as Jamaah Tabligh) that address Muslims as members of a national or even global Islamic community (ummah). An identification of Muslim networks as explicitly Balinese is rather an exception. Political networks partly transcend religious demarcation lines and involve Hindu as well as Muslim actors (for example political parties such as the PDI‐P or PKS). In other cases, networks' political and religious intentions overlap and strengthen distinct power positions according to religious affiliations. The discussion of these networks aims at deconstructing the idea of a coherent Balinese culture and identity via revealing its various connections to national and global levels and will contribute to understanding shifting power positions and inter‐religious relationships under the conditions of democratization and decentralization. My presentation will be based on one year's fieldwork in Candikuning/Tabanan, a historical Hindu‐Muslim community. Sophie Strauß, Graduate School Society and Culture in Motion, Martin‐Luther‐University Halle‐ Wittenberg, Germany Networking in a Dispute over Tourism Development in Northern Bali In my talk I will examine how local actors involved in a dispute over tourism development in the region of Buyan‐Tamblingan, Northern Bali, make use of networks with national and transnational NGOs and other organizations engaged in environmental, political, religious, adat or tourism issues to foster their respective positions by the exchange of information and various other forms of support.
DANCES AND TEXTILES Ayami Nakatani, Okayama University, Japan ‘Kainku, kain siapa?’: Contemporary Traditional Textiles as Cultural Heritage in the Globalising Bali and Beyond An Indonesian women’s magazine once published a feature article with the title, ‘kainku, kain siapa (my cloth, whose cloth)?’ [her world, November 2003]. In this article, the author expressed her concern about the precarious position of traditional hand‐crafted textiles throughout Indonesia; while some famous foreign designers were willing to adopt the motifs and textures of these textiles into their latest designs, Indonesians themselves were breaking away from the daily or ritual use of their own regional products. This phenomenon could lead, she alerted, to the loss of Indonesia’s heritage. During the past decade, we note an increasingly popular discourse in Indonesian fashion industry that emphasises the cultural and historical significance of acknowledging traditional textiles as the common property of Indonesian citizens. In this vein, some of the well‐known Jakarta‐based Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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designers have consciously incorporated Javanese batik or hand‐woven textiles from different parts of Indonesia to create authentic yet modern clothes for the urban, upper‐middle consumers. More recently, the similar endeavours can also be seen among Balinese designers, who try to make use of songket cloths, which are traditionally worn only in the ritual or ceremonial settings. There is even an attempt of turning sacral poleng motifs into fashion. On the other hand, two organisations based in Bali have been involved with the projects of maintaining and reviving cloth making according to the standard of local tradition. Their efforts are partly directed at preventing further outflow of heirloom textiles from the communities due to the external desire for authentic, antique textiles. Drawing upon the above examples, this paper will discuss the dynamics of the creation and consumption of contemporary, traditional textiles in Bali and the negotiated meanings of ‘tradition’ and ‘heritage’ in the global as well as local contexts. Yulun Huang, Taiwan National Museum of Prehistory, Taiwan Fashion Industry of Traditional Textile in Bali Endek, one of the traditional textile genres in Bali, is more and more frequently seen and worn in different occasions in Balinese society. While the endek consumption is shifting due to the largely changed clothing culture, the endek production is altering in order to match up the market need, which is nowadays much like a fashion market. I assert that both capitalist entrepreneurs and the government have been stimulating the endek fashion industry. For the former, this new fashion leads to a consumption system with a high‐velocity turnover; for the latter, it supports a unique and contemporary Balinese identity within the nation. In this paper, I focus on the exhibition and displaying of this endek‐fashion in different occasions, such as fashion shows, bazaar and daily occasions, to explore the initiation of this newly formed fashion of traditional textile, to see how cultural heritage transforms and adapts itself in the process of modernization. Dustin Wiebe, Wesleyan University, United States Sendratari Kristen: Music and Meaning in a Balinese Christian Context Over the course of the last ninety years, tourism has come to form an integral part of the Balinese economy. Central to this economy is what Michel Picard has termed, ‘cultural tourism’, which has been built upon Bali’s appeal as an exotic oriental paradise, artistically rich and founded upon a unique Hindu social structure. Since 1931, however, small groups of Balinese Christians have begun to form across the island, adding a religious plurality and complexity not often recognized in Balinese socio‐religious discourse. This paper examines the vital role music and tourism has played in establishing an artistic language that challenges the fundamental link between Balinese identity (keBalian) and Agama Hindu, thereby creating a space for Christians in Bali to be both Christian and Balinese. Central to my analysis is the development of sendratari, a dance‐drama genre first developed in Java in the early 1960s but soon imported to Bali. Early Balinese sendratari productions embodied significant artistic innovation, perhaps most notably the movement away from linguistically complex dramatic episodes toward a more linear narrative model. This new way of conveying cultural knowledge – often with a clear beginning, middle, and end – led to the creation of artistic productions that were often aesthetically pleasing (and intelligible) to Balinese and tourist audiences alike. In 1972, a synod council of Gereja Kristen Protestan di Bali (GKPB) passed a bill to officially promote ‘contextualized’ (kontektualisasi) church practices, including the use of traditional Balinese music and dance styles. Soon thereafter, artist members of GKPB began producing sendratari Kristen – a subgenre of sendratari borrowing extensively from Christian narratives. By exploring modern socio‐religious categories germane to Balinese studies (adat/agama, sacral/provan, and wali/bebali/balih‐balihan), I will demonstrate how sendratari
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Kristen is simultaneously challenging these categorical distinctions and creating a platform for a Balinese Christian identity, both in Bali and abroad. Tiffany Strawson, School of Humanities and Performing Arts, Plymouth University, United Kingdom Latihan Menari: The Changing Experience of Training and Teaching Topeng Pajegan in Bali and Beyond This paper addresses the differing training experiences of topeng pajegan in Bali and the various styles of teaching that I have experienced and witnessed, ranging from the traditional gurukala ‘village style’ system, study programmes at ISI and fast track intensive courses for those on a three week cultural holiday. Due to the symbiotic relationship between teacher and student, the economy that passes between them, and the opportunities to teach and travel abroad, I will also comment on the changes emerging in teaching styles, due to the influx and large number of Western students and their differing needs. I will discuss what impact this has in relation to teaching Balinese students and how these teaching styles become a part of a new vocabulary. Likewise I will reflect on being a teacher and ambassador of topeng in my home country England and the intercultural challenges of imparting knowledge in that teaching/learning experience. Issues of authenticity, translation and re‐construction feature as I negotiate this traditional dance form and discuss the ‘gap’ of embodied and enculturated knowledge between Balinese and Western students of topeng within this process of modernization.
ENCOUNTERS WITH BALI Douglas Sanders, Centre for Human Rights and Development Studies, Mahidol University, Bangkok, Thailand Bali in the Global Gay Imagination From early in the 20th century, Bali has been a tropical refuge for disaffected Caucasian artists seeking escape from their homophobic homelands (a more distant alternative to Morocco). The best known figure was Walter Spies who lived in Bali in the 1920s and 1930s, becoming ‘a major force in the artistic life of the island.’ Among the many visitors to his home was the bisexual American anthropologist Margaret Mead, who spoke in his defence when he was charged in an anti‐homosexual crackdown in 1938. He was subsequently deported as a German national in the early part of World War II. In the 1960s and 1970s, Donald Friend, a highly regarded Australian painter lived in Bali, and we have his extensive diaries. A contemporary is the American artist Symon, who has lived in Bali since the 1980s. Within Indonesia, Bali is seen as more relaxed on sexuality issues. Playboy Indonesia, after attacks on its office in Jakarta, moved it to Bali. ILGA Asia realized, when its Surabaya conference was blocked by the Islamic Defenders Front, that Bali should have been the site. Bali led in the protests against the government's proposed anti‐ pornography law, subsequently enacted with some modifications. Yet there is only a very limited public gay scene in Bali, and no effective advocacy organizations (except, perhaps, on health issues). Indonesian gay men are apparently unfamiliar with the stories of the expatriate gay artists, though their works are on display in Ubud museums. Relaxed social attitudes do not produce activist gay and lesbian lobby groups. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Barbara Bicego, Southeast Asian Studies, The University of Sydney, Australia A kitten is falling off the roof in Bali. How should I/we respond? Ethical decision making by Australian women in Bali. In this paper I address the ethical dilemmas encountered by Australian women in Bali, and how they resolve them. I focus on women’s concerns with animal welfare, particularly as this relates to cats and dogs, viewed as companion animals in the west, and women’s experiences of cock‐fighting. Australian women are centrally situated as the interlocutors of their own ethical dilemmas, and the voices of the women themselves form the substance of the paper. I show how Australian women try to resolve their ethical dilemmas from the situated perspective of their own value system, and life experience, while also taking into account what they understand of Balinese perspectives, values, and heritage. By situating their ethical decision making trans‐culturally, Australian women are highlighting their own globalised perspectives, and Bali’s globalised situation. Analysis indicates Balinese attitudes to companion animals are changing, and this raises the question of the situatedness of companion and other animals in the complex dynamic between heritage and modernization in Bali. The dynamic is manifest in the emergence of rabies in Bali, and the attendant debate about how to manage dogs and rabies. In June, 2011 the suspension of live cattle exports from Australia to Indonesia indicated a crisis with respect to mutual understandings of animal welfare, and ethical decision making between the two countries. I question how we can move from analysing personal ethical dilemmas to engaging in meaningful trans‐cultural ethical discussion, between Australia and Indonesia/Bali. My discussion is centred theoretically in the phenomenology of Maurice Merleau‐Ponty, and the embodied philosophy of science of Donna Haraway. The paper derives from interview material for a phenomenological study of Australian women’s experiences in Bali from the late 1960s to the present. Pram Sounsamut, Chulalongkorn University, Thailand Simply Serenity Elegance: Consuming Baliness in the Thai Recreation Business ‘Bali’ is a dream destination for many travellers over the world. It is known by its beautiful and serene beaches and rich cultural atmosphere. Bali has become an icon of a place where one can experience nature, a simple easy life without the complexities and confusions of the metropolitan life. However, not everyone can go to Bali! Therefore some places have been creating an imitation of ‘Baliness’ in their environment for some reason. This research will explore and try to understand; what is the specific motif of Bali that will turn a place outside Bali into Bali; how can you tell that this motif is significant for the architecture and decoration of the place; most of all, how and why do people use this ‘Baliness’ instead of aspects of their real surroundings? This research will also illustrate how and why Balinese style can be compromised in Thai culture. The result of this research will expose the ‘myth’ of Bali in Thailand for the general public, the use of Baliness by the Thai travel industry and the creative economy, and how people consume Baliness with and without Baliness. This research will discuss the pseudo‐influences of Bali on Thailand nowadays, and also the effect of this ideology on the local economy.
ENVIRONMENT/TRI HITA KARENA Didik Murwantono, Islamic Sultan Agung University / UNISSULA Semarang, Jawa Tengah, Indonesia Balinese’s Conservatism in Preserving the Livable Space and its Heritage toward the Existence of Geo‐politics in the Global Era Bali is a well known province for its tourist areas with a distinctive social and cultural background. These potential markets are in a great demand for investors that are expanding their targets of profits. Globalization and capitalism are two undeniable values in relation to the existence of big Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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business in this world. They are a very important agent of change. Therefore, the existence of livable space, mainly in tourist areas must be preserved in line with the life of Bali. It means that the geographical factor can determine whether an area exists. It follows the law of biology that an area or city is born, grows up and then faces death. This is called geo‐politics. Moreover, the competitiveness among nations is very tight in the globalization era. This paper merely highlights, with a socio‐cultural approach, the role of conservatives who are trying to preserve their livable things. In this case, humans are positioned as the main actors and seen in the context of the condition and situation of how they live. At least, with a socio‐cultural approach, people can change their internal environment by themselves without much interference from the government. They can be the agent of determinism in their home. Recently, the issue of livability is perceived as one of the indicators for judging quality of living, mainly in cities. Absolutely, the economic, social and political changes that took place created a new urban environment with several consequences. Some towns on Bali changed considerably from an agrarian‐urban society to a cosmopolitan one. In short, Bali’s urban life is enriched by selecting new elements from other cultures even though the Balinese traditions are still dominant. Moreover Bali with its subsidiary towns has offered a unique multicultural image of urban culture dealing with livable things. Parameters of livability are the environment, the infrastructure systems, culture and health care. In this case, Bali can be a leading province for tourist areas not only in Indonesia but also in Asia. Key words: Bali, tourist areas, livable space, global era, conservatism Dharma Putra Ketut Gede, Centre for Sustainable Development, Udayana University, Bali, Indonesia Tri Hita Karana Accreditation: Lesson Learned from Bali for Sustainable Development Practises Exploration and exploitation of the Balinese nature and culture has become more and more critical compared to the first years of the independence period until the 1980s. Most of the tourism facilities in Bali were developed at the coastal area: Sanur, Nusa Dua, Kuta, Lovina, Candidasa, Tanah Lot, Tulamben, Perancak, Lebih, Pemuteran. The once charming beaches with sacral temple panoramas that seemed to be everlasting have lost the heart and soul of Bali nowadays. Tri Hita Karana (THK) Awards and Accreditation is an initiative based on the local philosophy about harmony and aims to promote sustainable development to prevent the demolishing impact of the tourism industry on the nature and culture in Bali. After 11 years, THK was established in 2000, the program has become well known as the industry, the government and other stakeholders are increasingly committed to follow the program. THK Awards and Accreditation is a national certification in Indonesia and serves as an example for other sustainability organizations. The lack of management skills and funding support is one of the difficulties in reaching the targets of the program. On the other hand, the increase of sustainable development needs in the region is one of the most successful targets of this program. Diane Butler, International Foundation for Dharma Nature Time, Indonesia Living Prayer and Sharing in the Arts & Religiosity at Samuan Tiga and Tejakula, Bali: Models for Intercultural and Interreligious Creative Dialogue At the dawn of this third millennium, growing numbers of forums worldwide have highlighted the need for concrete practical steps to enhance mutual respect among people of different cultures, traditions, and beliefs and intercultural exchanges to ensure environmental sustainability, prosperity, and social peace. Concurrently, there is increasing concern for the conservation of tangible cultural heritage ranging from historic buildings and monuments to cultural landscapes as well as intangible cultural heritage such as oral traditions, performing arts, social practices, rituals, festivals, and knowledge and practices concerning nature and the universe – all of which is
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understood to have originated from practices of prayer, and which remains fundamentally structured on the model of living prayer. This presentation will address the contributions of living prayer and associated creative practices in these abovementioned fields through examples of the arts and dialogues offered by people from varied cultures and faiths since 1999 during Sharing Art & Religiosity in the vicinity of Pura Samuan Tiga in Bedulu, Bali and Sharing Art Ocean–Mountain at the seacoast village of Tejakula, North Bali; seen in tandem with creative transformations that occurred through Sharing Art in and with other cultural environments of the world. Findings indicate that sharing in the arts, religiosity and nature fosters a common field such that traditional rural and modern urban cultures can study and engage in creative dialogue together. Moreover, interreligious innovations that have continued to develop since the seminal deliberation of creative conciliation between Bali Aga, Çiwaist, and Buddhist faith groups at Samuan Tiga circa CE 989 to 1011 and intercultural egalitarian innovations since the seventeenth century dialogue of indigenous and migrant mountain and maritime cultures in Tejakula – constitute a model for furthering bhinneka tunggal ika unity in diversity in the world today. Kirk Johnson, University of Guam, Guam Dewa Ketut Harya Putra, Udayana University, Indonesia Tri Hita Karana: A Nice Catch Phrase for Tourists or the True Foundation for a Sustainable Future (A paper by: Kirk Johnson, Alison Hadley, Mehraban Farahmand and Harya Putra) The Balinese Tri Hita Karana philosophy may be the most well known element of Balinese culture and religion today. It is usually part of every tour guide’s initial lesson to tourists after picking them up at their hotels to be driven around Bali to soak up as much as they can of this rich and ancient culture and natural landscapes that are awe inspiring for both their cascading rice terraces and Hindu Temples and Shrines. Over the past century and more specifically the past two generations, Bali has managed to market itself to the world in a very unique way. The process of cultural commodification is nowhere more apparent than on the island of the gods. Most visitors have an appreciation of the Balinese way of life and the relationships forged and maintained that create what seem to be a vibrant cultural life with familial relationships that are meaningful and fulfilling; a co‐existence with nature that most would love to see in their own communities back home; and an understanding and appreciation of the unseen worlds that harkens back to a pre‐modern era when magic defined one’s existence. But what is the role of this ancient philosophy within the context of modern Bali with its luxury hotels and 5 star restaurants, villas and growing urban sprawls, and litter that continues to build up as consumerism takes hold as never before? This paper explores, through the lens of over a decade of fieldwork and collaboration between the University of Guam and Udayana University, the lessons about sustainability in Bali today. It uses the Tri Hita Karana as the framework for its analysis and proposes that this ancient philosophy, so much written about by academics and lay people alike, may in the end be the last best hope for a people and an environment that continues to struggle to maintain God at the centre of its existence.
GENDER Sita Thamar van Bemmelen, VU University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands Mechanisms of Preserving Balinese Culture and Identity: Gender‐based Inclusion and Exclusion through Ritual and Customary Law Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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For long, Balinese and outsiders have been concerned about Bali’s capacity to survive as a society with distinct cultural characteristics. In particular international tourism booming since the 1970’s has often been pointed at as the force possessing great potential for undermining Balinese culture. However, the Balinese have been able to preserve their culture, in rural as well as urban contexts. The first relevant question is therefore which social features characterizing Balinese social organization have enabled the Balinese to do so. This paper discusses the tenacious effort to preserve the main pillars of Balinese society – patrilineal kinship in combination with a caste system derived from Hinduism – as a strategy adopted by the Balinese to shield the ‘open fortress’ against outside influence. The Balinese act out this strategy in two areas considered crucial by them: religious ritual and customary law. Ceremonies held for individual members (upacara yadnya) continuously reproduce social differences based on caste and gender. The preservation of customary law pertaining to marriage, divorce and inheritance is another powerful means serving the same purpose. The global call for eradicating all forms of gender based discrimination since the mid‐1970’s has not bypassed Bali, reaching the island’s population through the policies of Indonesian government. Its effects, however, have remained insignificant as far as the religious ritual and customary law are concerned for reasons explained in the paper. One might also raise the question whether upholding the pillars of society in the present way serves the interest of Balinese in preserving their inherited culture and religion best. Looking into the mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion helps to come up with an answer. Ariani Ratna Budiati, Centre of Southeast Asian Social Studies, Gadjah Mada University, Indonesia Lifestyle of Payangan Women and Two Teenage Soap Operas This paper is discussing the Payangan community in Bali that is holding on to its traditional beliefs but at the same time is open for the external cultural flux through television. This paper aims to understand how Payangan women give meaning to the two teenage soap operas Janji Jaya (The promise of Jaya) and Impian Cinderella (Cinderella Dreams) on television. This paper shows how social and cultural environments have a role in understanding the meaning of soap operas. The women form an active audience as they are being in a dialogue with the soap opera. In that way they are open to social and cultural influences coming from the particular stories. This research is carried out by using qualitative methodology, participant observation and in depth interviews. Keywords: women, television, village community, teenage soap opera Wayan P. Windia, Fakultas Hukum, Udayana University, Indonesia Era Baru untuk Wanita Bali: Proses Penyusunan dan Respon Masyarakat terhadap Hukum Waris Adat Bali Dalam sepuluh tahun terakhir, wacana tentang kedudukan perempuan Bali dalam keluarga dan masyarakat semakin merefleksikan gagasan kesetaraan gender. Dulu wanita Bali tidak pernah diperhitungkan dalam pembagian warisan, namun sejak Oktober 2010 Mejelis Utama Desa Pakraman Bali memutuskan bahwa wanita Bali berhak atas warisan dalam keluarganya. Hal lain yang diputuskan Majelis adalah peluang wanita melakukan bentuk perkawinan ‘pada gelahang’, yaitu model perkawinan yang menempatkan kedudukan wanita dan laki‐laki setara di hadapan hukum adat Bali. Paper ini akan membahas proses dan perjuangan Majelis dalam menetapkan hukum adat baru tentang kedudukan wanita Bali dalam warisan dan perkawinan serta bagaimana respon public terhadap ketentuan adat baru ini. Hal lain yang akan dibahas adalah mengapa baru sekarang gagasan kesetaraaan gender di depan hukum adat Bali bisa ditetapkan oleh sebuah lembaga adat tertinggi. Makalah ini memberikan argumentasi bahwa selain karena faktor‐faktor Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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bangkitnya kesadaran baru atas kesetaraan gender, juga karena tidak adanya alasan bagi masyarakat Bali untuk menomorduakan wanita dalam kehidupan sosial seperti yang terjadi selama ini. Respon masyarakat terhadap perubahan kedudukan wanita dalam perkawinan dan pembagian waris ternyata beragam, dalam arti ada yang menerima dan ada yang menolak. Penolakan dan penerimaan itu tidak berkaitan langsung dengan pendidikan tetapi lebih karena intensitas mereka terhadap nilai‐nilai adat yang dihayati selama ini.
GLOBAL COLLABORATIONS AND BALINESE PERFORMANCE HERITAGE Convenor and Chair: Margaret Coldiron, University of Essex, United Kingdom Discussant: I Wayan Dibia, Institut Seni Indonesia (ISI) Denpasar, Indonesia Today, the global face of contemporary Balinese culture is most often represented by images of traditional Balinese performing arts. However, the traditional performing arts of Bali are dynamic, at once embedded in and emblematic of ‘traditional’ culture yet not divorced from modernization and innovation. This panel brings together distinguished international scholars and practitioners of Balinese performing arts who regularly collaborate with Balinese artists both in Bali and overseas. The papers will reflect upon the globalization of Balinese heritage and its transmission through international collaborations that fuel creative developments at home and abroad. What does this international creative ‘traffic’ mean for Balinese culture? What is the position of the foreign practitioner of Balinese performing arts globally and locally, inside and outside of Bali? Can the intercultural and the traditional be compatible? Lynn Kremer, Department of Theatre, Holy Cross College, United States Creating New Work: Balinese and American Collaborations Lynn Kremer, Theatre Professor at College of the Holy Cross, will discuss her theatrical collaborations with Balinese artists, I Nyoman Catra, Desak Made Suarti Laksmi, I Wayan Dibia, I Made Bandem, Ni Luh Suasthi Bandem, and Made Wianta. Production photos and video clips from Chitra, Mimpi, Coraline, and Shackled Spirits will illustrate the broad range of subject matter and style global connections can foster. Margaret Coldiron, University of Essex, United Kingdom Kreasi Baru for International Audiences: The Adventures of Lila Cita & Lila Bhawa Nearly 20 years after Patrice Pavis’ gave us his ‘hourglass’ model for evaluation of intercultural performance, it is now widely acknowledged that the intercultural flow in performing arts today travels in all directions and is not merely a case of parasitic ‘Western’ artists feeding off the rich traditions of Asia. The London‐based Balinese gamelan ensemble Lila Cita and the Indonesian dance troupe provide useful case studies for the examination of contemporary transnational, intercultural interaction. Moreover, the new works created for the ensembles by Balinese and Western composers and choreographers prompt interrogation of just what is (or can be) meant by notions of the ‘traditional’ in a living musical landscape that has ever been characterised by continuity and change. The work of Lila Cita will be considered in relation to other ‘international’ Balinese gamelan ensembles Sekar Jaya (based in the San Francisco Bay area) and Çudamai, (based in Pengosekan, Gianyar) sketching out a picture of hybridity and innovation in the world of ‘global gamelan’. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Linda Burman‐Hall, Professor of Music, University of California ‐ Santa Cruz, United States New Works for Balinese Gamelan Semar Pegulingan by Non‐Balinese Composers The traditional music of the Gamelan Semar Pegulingan, a court ensemble revived before independence by Canadian ethnomusicologist Colin McPhee, has subsequently become well known and highly regarded within the international gamelan community for its refined classical style. This paper will identify and contrast traditional and non‐traditional Balinese elements in two recent works commissioned for the Gamelan Semar Pegulingan at the University of California‐Santa Cruz by two diverse non‐Balinese composers: Sundanese composer Nano S (April, 2008) and American composer Bill Alves (May, 2010). Both of these composers incorporate key elements of the Balinese musical heritage in their works, and both modernize the traditional Balinese Semar Pegulingan by the addition and juxtaposition of Indonesian and global elements. Whereas Nano S creates a conversational dialogue between characteristic Balinese and Sundanese melodic, rhythmic and textural styles, Bill Alves creates a foundation based on elements of Balinese tradition upon which layered melodic lines played on two electric guitars are overlaid. Although the processes by which the conventions of Gamelan Semar Pegulingan are modernized by the two composers differ, their compositional strategies serve as metaphoric models for Balinese cultural interaction with the world. Selected passages from both composers' works as recorded for forthcoming CD release at the time of the premieres will be played to facilitate discussion.
GLOBAL ENCOUNTERS IN BALI Pamela Allen, University of Tasmania, Australia The Ubud Writers and Readers Festival: An International Forum for Indonesian Writers? From modest beginnings in 2004, the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival (UWRF) has developed into a high‐profile international literary event. One of the key missions of the Festival is the promotion of Indonesian writers, both established and emerging. During the last four years in particular the Festival has sponsored the participation of Indonesian writers, has published bilingual anthologies of the works of emerging Indonesian writers, and has organised fringe and satellite events at venues in Bali and elsewhere in Indonesia. A satellite event of the UWRF, the first Bali Emerging Writers Festival (BEWF) was held in May 2011, with the stated aim of supporting the advancement of younger generations of Indonesian writers. The two‐day festival brought together fifteen of Bali’s promising young writers (across a variety of genres – from blogging to literature to theatre and film) to present their own work and to engage in a dialogue with a number of established Indonesian writers. Focussing on the creative output of many of the writers who have participated in either the UWRF or the BEWF, and including case studies of some of those writers, this paper examines the role and significance of these international literary events for promoting Indonesian literature and writers to a global audience. In particular I focus on the place of literary translation, the notion and symbolism of ‘fringe’ events in a festival, the patronage of high‐profile Indonesian writers, and media coverage. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Ni Luh Sutjiati Beratha, Faculty of Letters, Udayana University, Indonesia Developing the Balinese Language in the Global Era The Balinese language is an asset for national culture because through the varieties of local languages, national cultural values in the country can be preserved. The Balinese language as a medium of communication plays an important role in Balinese society as well as in national development. The use and function of the language and the development of the attitude of the speakers towards the language makes that people love, are proud of, and are loyal to their own language. The Balinese language is an important component of the Balinese culture as its value is based on Balinese society. Local languages are ‘the essence of national culture’ so they need and must be developed. This can be achieved by choosing a good method for teaching the language, i.e. by applying a pragmatic approach. The pragmatic approach means teaching that the function of the language is a medium of communication and that it is used by its speakers in various ways depending on the context, the participants, the events, the audience, the channel, and the socio‐emotional climate. This approach so far is considered to be the best method in teaching a language. Developing the Balinese language in the global era is a necessary task. Ketut Suarjana, School of Public Health, Udayana University, Indonesia Opinion of Balinese People regarding the Presence of Non‐Natives in Bali The presence of pendatang (non‐natives) is a regular topic of concern in conversations among the people in Bali regardless of their socio‐economic status. It is also a popular discussion in newspapers and various articles. This discussion triggered the Program Studi Ilmu Kesehatan Masyarakat/PS IKM (Universitas Udayana, Bali) to carry out a rapid assessment on the opinion of the people about pendatang. The survey was carried out among a) the population of one banjar in the centre of Denpasar since the people there are in frequent contact with pendatang in daily economic and social activities and among b) senior students of the PS IKM being a potential group of future leaders. A focus group discussion was also organized among the people of the banjar and the students. In addition to that, informal discussions were held with several responsible persons from the government and business sector in Bali. The survey is not representative for the entire population of Bali. The result of this rapid assessment reflects a general dilemma. Apart from general feelings of anxiety about the presence of pendatang their presence is also appreciated. Respondents express their concern about pendatang creating problems within the social community. There are various contradicting opinions about the influence of pendatang on the economic activities. Some say that pendatang increase the supply of goods and services and create new types of occupations. Others argue that the pendatang take over the jobs and the land of the local people. The influence of pendatang on the Balinese culture is demonstrated in the commercialization of the cultural performances. The Hindu religion and customs however remain intact. Although the pendatang rarely participate in the local community’s activities their presence does not disturb the harmony of life of the Balinese. This rapid assessment is a basis for further in depth study. Keywords: Opinion, Balinese People, Non‐Natives George Quinn, Austalian National University, Australia The Muslims Saints of Bali
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Pilgrimage to Islamic holy graves in Bali has blossomed in the last 20 years. These sites are located not only around the coast but also in the hinterland of the island, even in the centre of Denpasar. There are at least ten graves that are centres of devotion by Muslims. For many, pilgrimage focuses on seven principal figures known as the Wali Pitu (Seven Saints). Each of the Wali Pitu plays a significant role in the devotional life of its local Muslim community and in the construction of local Islamic identity, but their graves also draw visitors from other “traditional” Muslim communities of Bali and from Bali’s growing population of Muslim migrants. They also attract large numbers of visitors from other parts of Indonesia, especially from East Java. Collectively, the Wali Pitu have acquired special status through a “myth of discovery” that first appeared little more than a decade ago. Each Wali Pitu site also hosts a unique narrative of origin. Most of these narratives seem to have evolved to give expression to the problematic status of Muslims in the midst of Bali’s overwhelmingly Hindu population. They claim a place for Muslims in Bali’s history and, in some cases, defer to the authority of Bali’s Hindu rulers, but at the same time they give expression to Islamic identity and even to a sense of grievance. The Wali Pitu of Bali are part of Indonesia’s burgeoning and heavily commercialised Islamic pilgrimage “industry”. Bali’s Wali Pitu pilgrimage was probably inspired by the Wali Songo (Nine Saints) of Java, and it shows discursive similarities with other configurations of Muslim saints that have emerged recently, in particular the Wali Pitue (Seven Saints) of South Sulawesi and the Wali Telu (Three Saints) of Lombok.
HERITAGE AND THE GLOBAL CONTEMPORARY IN BALINESE ART Convenor and Chair: Adrian Vickers, The University of Sydney, Australia Discussant: Thomas Freitag, Griya Santrian Gallery, Sanur, Indonesia The international image of Balinese art has tended to focus around the Ubud style which became dominant in the second half of the twentieth century. By moving away from the centrality of Ubud, this panel seeks to investigate the simultaneous existence of ‘traditional’ or ‘classical’ Kamasan painting with forms of contemporary art. In investigating the forms of painting, we will also examine the varieties of what is represented, and what such representations say about Balinese concepts of ‘heritage’ in a globalised context. Peter Worsley, Department Indonesian Studies, School of Languages and Cultures, University of Sydney, Australia Brayut Paintings and Gender in 19th and early 20th century Bali Balinese paintings provide a cornucopia of information about Bali’s nineteenth and early twentieth century heritage. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, painters from Kamasan, when telling their painted stories, illustrated events and places which were familiar to them in their everyday life. To this end they made use of a painterly style which Balinese of the time regarded as realistic, one which enabled them to produce representations of the world in which they lived – at least we can conclude as much from contemporary folk‐tales (satua) which they told about painters. These same stories also teach us that Kamasan paintings aroused strong emotions – great admiration for the skill of a painter who represented the world in a realistic manner or anger because the portrait of his royal female subject revealed all too clearly that the painter may have had a too intimate knowledge of her. The present paper examines a selection of Brayut paintings in collections in Amsterdam, Bali, Leiden and Sydney to explore what they have to say about gender Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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relations in Bali in the period of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The paper also discusses issues concerned with placing these paintings and their representations of gender relations in a social and cultural history of nineteenth and early twentieth century Bali. Siobhan Campbell, University of Sydney, Australia Bali in Global Asia: A View from Kamasan Mangku Muriati is an artist working in the classical painting tradition of Kamasan village in East Bali. While often considered to be adhering to stylistic conventions and narratives depicted by generations of artists before her, her paintings are actually pertinent statements of an active engagement with contemporary Bali. Through ongoing explorations of the epic narratives, Muriati is uncovering new and unchartered ways of describing and commenting on the world around her. While this can be taken as a tangible expression of one Balinese response to processes of urbanisation and modernisation, Muriati's paintings can also be located in an artistic tradition that is seen by many urban Balinese as an important expression of their cultural heritage and one increasingly sought after by those that seek to reengage with so‐called traditional cultural and religious practices. Chris Hill, Murdoch University, Australia Mokoh Dewa Putu Mokoh, who sadly passed away in 2010, was a village painter steeped in tradition but whose work has a distinctive and modern look. Born in the early thirties in the village of Pengosekan he was mentored by two uncles who were well known artists, Gusti Ketut Kobot and Gusti Made Baret. Later in his career he was befriended by Mondo, an Italian artist, and his work took on a more contemporary feel although he continued to use traditional techniques and materials. His early training, combined with his idiosyncratic thinking and acceptance of modern influence has resulted in some of the most interesting Balinese paintings of recent years. Adrian Vickers, Asian Studies, The University of Sydney, Australia Balinese and Contemporary Indonesian Art The category of ‘modern’ art seems at first to be unproblematic, but looking at Balinese painting from the 1930s to the present day shows that divisions into ‘traditional’, ‘modern’ and ‘contemporary’ are anything but straight‐forward. Looking beyond the myth that modern Balinese art was a Western creation, this paper also shows that revision of the historiography of Balinese painting has implications for understandings of modern Indonesian art as a nationalist project. In particular, the roles of Balinese in forming contemporary Indonesian art has implications for breaking down divisions between of Indonesian culture into categories of ‘regional’, ‘national’ and ‘global’.
HERITAGE/IMAGES Hedi Hinzler, retired ass. prof. Faculty of Archaeology, Leiden University, the Netherlands First Time in Bali ‐ Bali and Foreign Culture Motto: The Balinese have always had, even more than other Indonesians, a genius for absorbing and then changing ideas and knowledge from other countries. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Sri Owen, Indonesian Regional Food & Cookery, Frances Lincoln, London, revised edition 1999:121. Contents The topic of my paper is part of my research on material culture, objects and food introduced and imported in Bali from the fifteenth century onwards from various parts of the world. The ways in which these new items were used and adapted to Balinese standards and eventually quite often exported to the areas of origin in a much later period of time will be investigated and analyzed. This means that, for instance, a Chippendale chair, introduced in the 18th century in Bali as a modernity, is now part of cultural heritage of Balinese palace culture, as well as an adapted version made by a carpenter in the service of a palace and given to royalty in a western country in the 19th century, and that a newly produced type of such a chair in a Balinese village factory, sold in Asia, Europe or elsewhere in the 20th and 21st centuries may be considered as a Bali‐in‐global‐world item. I want to restrict myself in this paper to: the first bicycle, the first car, the first chair, the Maggi bottle and the first tourist guide. Their introduction, impact, use, adaptation and alterations are interesting, amazing and quite often hilarious. Marieke Bloembergen, Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies (KITLV), the Netherlands The Makings of Old Bali in a Globalizing World: Archaeology, Religious Practices and Heritage Politics in Bali, 1920s‐2010s This paper focuses on archaeological interventions in the Pejeng‐Bedulu area in the valley of the Pakerisan River (Bali, South Gianyar). The area is known for its richness of antiquities (arca). Since western archaeologists started to investigate these in the 1920s, the arca provided proof for previously unknown pre‐Majapahit kingdoms on Bali. Some of the detected arca became tourist attractions. To the local population, who took part in the archaeological activities in many ways, the arca are considered to be extremely sacred. Our aim is to assess the colonial legacies in contemporary archaeological heritage politics in Bali. Focusing on the Pejeng‐Bedulu area, we thereto investigate, in the framework of several regime changes in colonial and postcolonial Indonesia, the interactions between local religious practices and identity politics on the one hand, and (state supported and/or international) archaeological knowledge production and heritage formation on the other hand. At the moment this is a very relevant topic, as since 2007 this area is part of a competition (now with three other sites in Bali) to become enlisted as Unesco world heritage. But heritage concerns are not new. In the 1920s the Dutch archaeologist Stutterheim, representing the colonial state’s Archaeological Service, conducted here, at the instigation of the local ruler Tjokorde Gde Raka Soekawati and with the assistance of local villagers, the first ‘modern’ archaeological survey. Since the 1950s, the state‐ directed regional conservation department and archaeological museum came to be situated here. Nowadays many local residents work for these institutions, hold a degree in archaeology and make ‘heritage’ part of daily life. We argue that the colonial legacies entail the development of ‘local genius’ ideas and community‐based archaeology ideals. Both contributed to the (re‐)creation of alliances among scholars, elite, priests and temples and thus to new hierarchies and potential conflicts – at location and within wider Bali. Raechelle Rubinstein, Indonesian Studies, School of Languages & Cultures, University of Sydney, Australia Capturing Bali: Photographs from the 1860s Within a few years of the development of photography in Europe (1839), it had captured the imagination of the public. However, it was not until photochemical advances led to the wet collodion process in 1851 that photography really took off. The 1850s, coincidentally, was a period Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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of major colonial expansion and consolidation by European nations, and the success of the wet collodion process saw the spread of photography to the colonies where it was typically used not only for capturing panoramas and the images of European residents, but also for documenting non‐ European races and local monuments and antiquities. Bali did not escape the lens. The first photographs taken there – there are 44 and they are mainly of Balinese people – were taken from December 1864 to early 1865 in Buleleng, which had been absorbed into the Dutch East Indies in 1849. These images are the work of Isidore van Kinsbergen, a distinguished photographer who resided in Batavia. Three years later in Batavia, van Kinsbergen made two further photographs of Balinese. These 46 photographs have survived in archives, ethnographic and military museums and private photograph albums in Europe; some have even been published in books. However, if any copies of the photographs were given to local Balinese people, none appear to have survived. This presentation will discuss the circumstances under which the photographs were made, who and what they depict, and their circulation in Batavia and beyond, drawing on archival and other historical material. It will also consider heritage formation by relating how two of these images were ‘returned’ to Buleleng in the 1990s, to a rapturous homecoming. Benjamin Hegarty, Monash Asia Institute, Monash University, Australia Visualising Bali: Indigeneity and Cultural Heritage Formation in the Post‐colonial Indonesian State The representation of Bali in Indonesian visual cultures (particularly visual art and architecture) forms a complex site of contested representation of how the dominant ideology has appreciated, appropriated and crucially represented its constituent cultures and traditions. Rather than drawing on colonialist and racialising ideologies which follow in a smooth historical transition from what Said described as Orientalism, an exploration of the representation of tradition in postcolonial Indonesian visual cultures reveals a far more nuanced site of exchange between the subjugated subject and the dominant ideology, which posits important questions about the role of tradition within the vocabulary of the nation. For those Balinese subjects depicted as tradition personified by the dominant discourse, it is an opportunity to chart their influence on visual representation within wider currents of cultural politics. It also serves as a chance to expand beyond the usual debates within both Asian and Western art history about primitivism which usually revolve around the impact of tribal art on modern visual arts which excludes or negates the role of the postcolonial urban artist and indigenous subject (or subaltern) altogether. Particularly, I will seek to show how the representation of Balinese tradition in visual culture in Indonesia has sought to support the ‘truth’ of being Indonesian (and indeed its opposite) through the construction of discursive networks of knowledge. By rejecting the notion of the subject as constructed by the dominant discourse (which itself is fragmented and discontinuous) it would therefore be possible to engage in a reading of postcolonial Indonesian visual culture which acknowledges the visualised subject’s voice, while seeking to understand the discontinuous ideological and discursive forces that frame it. In applying critical theory to the representation of Balinese culture in the context of the dominant (Indonesian) ideology, this paper represents a timely intervention – one that seeks to interrogate the role of indigeneity in cultural heritage formation at this critical juncture between modernity and post‐modernity in the post‐colonial state.
KOMUNITAS, AND QUESTIONS OF HERITAGE IN BALI Convenor and Chair: Emma Baulch, School of Culture, History and Languages, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Australia Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Discussant: Rudolf Dethu, Bali Creative Festival, Indonesia One feature of democratic Indonesia is the diversification of the sites for producing knowledge about Indonesian cultures and social change. Such diversification entails a move away from viewing universities and developmentalist bodies – both governmental and non‐governmental – as the most authoritative platforms from which to reflect on cultures, and forcefully shape their development. Over the past decade, small scale communities, or komunitas, have blossomed all over the archipelago. These komunitas are generally loosely organized and shy of bureaucratic regimentation, yet prolifically make and distribute a wide array of cultural productions, including film, music, photos, literature and food. Their significance as sites for reflecting on cultural change should not be underestimated, nor should their role in moves to democratize the production of knowledge in and about post‐authoritarian Indonesia. Komunitas considerably extend and enrich movements for socio‐cultural change formerly led by non‐government organisations and the campus‐based student movement. The proposed bilingual panel presents three such Bali‐based komunitas, Taman 65, Semut Ireng and Akarumput, and aims to provoke discussion about how, in form and content, these komunitas play a role in both modernising Bali and in producing its heritage. Vifick Bolang, Semut Ireng, Indonesia Komunitas Semut Ireng: Melihat Bali dari Lubang Jarum Komunitas Semut ireng adalah komunitas non profit yang bergerak di bidang fotografi. Berdiri pada 9 oktober 2009, komunitas ini telah aktif mengadakan workshop & pameran fotografi di berbagai tempat di Bali, bahkan sampai Sumbawa (Nusa Tenggara Barat). Dalam konteks fotografi, era digital barangkali adalah era yang sangat maju dalam sejarah teknologi fotografi. Tak hanya fotografer, banyak sekali orang‐orang yang menggemari fotografi secara otodidak. Kecanggihan teknologi semakin memudahkan kita dalam menghasilkan foto dalam kehidupan sehari‐hari. Namun, tentu tidak semua orang‐orang itu benar‐benar mengerti tentang esensi dan filosofi dari fotografi itu sendiri. Fotografi mungkin sudah jarang dimaknai sebagai ‘melukis dengan cahaya’. Intinya adalah memotret, mendapatkan foto yang bagus dan cukup. Oleh karena itu, komunitas semut ireng mencoba memperkenalkan kembali nenek moyang dari kamera, yaitu camera obscura atau pinhole, di Indonesia dikenal dengan istilah Kamera Lubang Jarum. Kamera Lubang Jarum (KLJ) adalah kamera yang bisa dibuat dari kaleng atau dus yang dilubangi sebatang jarum. Dalam dunia digital yang serba cepat ini, proses imajinasi dianggap tidak penting lagi, itu adalah kuno, namun hasil akhir akan menentukan segalanya. Persepsi ini memang telah ditanamkan semenjak akhir tahun 1999, menjelang meledaknya teknologi fotografi, yang menghabisi era fotografi silver halide (film). Maka mereka yang lahir dan besar di era teknologi fotografi digital, menyikapinya dengan cara berbeda, membuang jauh proses teknis perekaman. Cara berfikir instan inilah melahirkan generasi‐generasi yang melihat bahwa segala sesuatunya dihitung oleh durasi, kecepatan dan akurasi. Disinilah metode rekam lubang jarum melawan. Anak Agung Gde Putra, Taman 65, Indonesia Problematika Komunitas dalam Melawan Lupa Tragedy 65 di Bali Anak Agung Gde Putra, Participant, Taman 65 Pasca tragedi 65 di Bali tidak hanya menciptakan trauma dan diskriminasi negara bagi keluarga korban namun juga sebuah titik‐titik api konflik di kemudian hari. Keberhasilan pembangunan pariwisata di Bali menjadikan tanah sebagai barang paling berharga karena menjadi sasaran untuk dibangun hotel, villa, ruko, mall, rumah kontrakan ataupun kost‐kostan. Seringkali para tahanan korban politik tidak diikut sertakan dalam pembagian waris sebab mereka berada di bui. Tanah Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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bagian mereka diklaim menjadi hak milik pihak keluarga Tapol yang selamat. Sangat mungkin sekali kisah tragedy 65 yang sengaja digelapkan negara akan muncul ke permukaan ketika seorang anak bertanya kepada bapaknya yang eks Tapol ‘di mana tanah kita?’ ‘kapan di sabot’ atau ‘mengapa bisa disabot?’ Keluarga penyabot akan berusaha meredam ingatan tentang tragedy itu agar tak muncul ke permukaan. Salah satu tujuan awal terbentukanya Komunitas Taman 65 adalah untuk melawan lupa. Sebagian besar anggotanya adalah satu keluarga besar baik itu dari ‘pelaku’ ataupun ‘korban’ (walaupun banyak juga dari luar keluarga). Komunitas ini mengantarkan saya untuk melihat betapa ruwetnya dampak dari pasca tragedy ini di tataran keluarga. Politik ritual, pariwisata dan persoalan waris menjadikan ingatan tentang tragedy sejarah paling gelap di negara ini berada dalam ruang tarik ulur, antara dinggat atau dilupakan. Komunitas Taman 65 berada dalam ruang tarik‐ulur itu. Rebekah Moore, Akarumput, Indonesia Akarumput (Grassroots) Online and on the Streets: Seeds Sown for Sustainable Living and Community Action in Indonesia’ In industrializing Indonesia, environmental crises resulting from natural disasters, overpopulation, pollution, deforestation, and poor waste management threaten the nation’s biodiversity and intensify the human crises of economic inequity, poverty, and disease. Mainstream news media provide insufficient information on Indonesia’s environmental issues, and governmental and educational institutions and NGOs largely fail to implement affective strategies to combat environmental degradation – thus taking knowledge production from acquisition to application. In such an environment, alternative modes for knowledge production are a necessity. This presentation examines a Bali‐based organization that combines online news reporting and grassroots action to address local environmental and social concerns: Launched in 2011 by a collective of environmental advocates, artists, academics, and journalists, Akarumput (Grassroots) is a bilingual, online media source (webzine) featuring articles on such topics as Indonesia’s CSR standards, wildlife conservation, and cooperative agriculture. Committed to environmental and social health in Bali, Akarumput also features stories on local musicians, artists, and activists. Akarumput is also a consultancy agency for community‐driven environmental and social initiatives; it has produced programs on urban farming, fundraising concerts for environmental nonprofits, street‐side murals, art workshops, and book and album launches. Akarumput’s approach to news reporting and community action reflects Gibbons’ model for decentralized knowledge production (1994) and evokes the organization’s name: Akarumput’s team works with other local community organizations (komunitas), across diverse backgrounds and disciplines, in formal and informal settings to address local needs. Although focused at the grassroots level, Akarumput examines and implements models for sustainable living and community action that have far‐reaching applicability. With continued improvements for its online presence (including a mobile version of its website) and increased financial support for offline initiatives, Akarumput may play an important role in the recovery of environmental, economic, and social well‐being in Bali and beyond.
MIGRATION, SOCIO‐ CULTURAL CHANGE, AND INTER‐RELIGIOUS HARMONY IN BALI AND LOMBOK Convenor and Chair: I Ketut Ardhana, Udayana University, Indonesia Discussant: Yekti Maunati, Research Center for Regional Resources, the Indonesian Institute of Sciences, Indonesia Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Bali is, like other societies in the Southeast Asian region, a multicultural society marked by long history of migration and influences of external cultures. There are many ethnic groups that can live side by side in Bali, such as the Javanese, the Madurese, the Bugise, and the Sasak. The indigenous Balinese form the largest group, while other ethnic groups mentioned above are the minorities. Migrants and their cultural Diaspora have significantly contributed to the creation of Bali as a multicultural society. They have affected the life of the Balinese and their dominant culture on this island. It is not only the Diaspora of the migrants or ‘pendatang’ that has brought vital changes and development to Balinese daily life. The foreign tourists or ‘bule’ who have become constant visitors of Bali also have their share in shaping the new face of Bali. Consequently, due to the increasing amount of outsiders, Bali has not only undergone significant social and cultural changes, but has also become prone to problems such as terrorism, sexually transmitted diseases and drug‐related crime. Apart from the ethnic migrants, the cross‐marrying between the Balinese and foreigners is also adding up to the diversity and complexity of inter‐ethnic relationships and this has become a pivotal point of discussion. The Balinese as a dominant ethnic group play a major role in the administrative and bureaucratic sector, whereas the other ethnic migrants dwellers in Kampung Muslim and Kampung contribute particularly on micro‐economic level. The Balinese can be categorised into those living on the main island, Bali, and those living on the neighbouring island of Lombok. The Balinese living in Lombok form a minority amongst the indigenous Sasak, who are predominantly Muslim. As far as the Balinese in Bali and Lombok are concerned, this panel will highlight significant issues on how the Balinese live as a dominant group in Bali amidst other ethnic migrants, and how the Balinese live being an ethnic minority themselves amongst Sasak Muslims in Lombok. The two ethno‐religious groups do not only have a history of conflict, but also a history of reconciliation and negotiation which is celebrated through a joint festival called the Pujawali and Perang Topat held annually at Pura Lingsar. The Lingsar temples area is a shared religious site for the Balinese and the Sasak and forms the sacred landmark for developing a culture of tolerance, harmony, and mutual support between the two ethnic groups in Lombok. This panel also attempts to elucidate the Lingsar festival as an arena where the Balinese and the Sasak negotiate their internal relationships through ritual symbols. I Ketut Ardhana, Udayana University, Indonesia Minority Ethnic Groups Coping with the Bali Bombings From a historical perspective the Balinese have experienced living in conflict particularly since the end of the nineteenth century. However, in the beginning of the twentieth century, particularly when Bali was under colonial power, the Dutch created a new political atmosphere by promoting Bali as a peaceful island. This new image benefited the Dutch as it became easier to get access to ruling the Balinese in the context of Pax Neerlandica ‘rule and order’. Since the promotion of the new image of Bali, the Balinese had been living side by side in a harmony with other ethnic groups such as the Javanese, the Buginese, the Madurese, the Timorese. The notion of harmony and balance indeed has become an important aspect of the Balinese life. This notion, however, became disturbed when the Bali bombings took place in 2002 which made the Balinese aware that their life was not safe any longer. This unsafe feeling was particularly influenced by the fact that that the bombers were not the Balinese themselves, but outsiders. Today, the Balinese are very careful to associate with minority ethnic groups in Bali. Meanwhile, the minority ethnic groups are not provoked by this situation. It seems that they still attempt to live side by side with the dominant ethnic group, the Balinese by promoting certain local values. Kampong Muslim and Kampong Christian are examples of this. This paper will analyse several issues: First, why are the Balinese very sensitive towards conflict issues, though they prefer to live side by side in a harmony and in a balance? Second, to what extent do the Balinese depend on tourist visits influenced by the notion of living in a harmony and Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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balance? Third, how do minority ethnic groups cope with the Bali bombings as the bombers are not the Balinese, but outsiders? Fourth, what kind of value system can be adopted/adapted to anticipate the problems between the Balinese as the dominant group and the minority groups being marginalized? By having a better understanding of such issues, I expect to also understand the formation of a multicultural society in Bali. Erni Budiwanti, Centre for Regional Resources, Indonesian Institute of Sciences (PSDR), Indonesia Balinese Beyond Bali: The Lingsar Temple Festival in West Lombok Revisited The history of the development of a culture and society is embodied in its mythology, and preserved in ritual conducts. Lombok is only 70 miles to the east of Bali. It is part of the chain of the Lesser Sunda islands, with the Lombok Strait separating it from Bali to the west and the island of Sumbawa separated by the Alas Strait to the east. With a total area of about 4,725 km² (1,825 square miles) and 3,000,000 people, the island has diverse cultural life that includes various ethnic groups. Sasak Muslims are the natives who make up the majority (85%) of the Lombok population. Balinese Hindu’s, account for less than 10%, and then there are minorities of Sumbawanese, Bugis, Javanese, and Chinese all contributing to the unique cultural tradition of Lombok. Complex patterns of Balinese migration imbued with subjugation in the early 18th century, followed later by voluntary migration in the later centuries have formed the Balinese community in Lombok. The last king of Lombok, Anak Agung Ngurah Gede Karangasem, reigned over western Lombok and oversaw the development of the arts and the construction of an impressive number of palaces equipped with beautiful temples and gardens. The royal cultural heritage of the Balinese rulers is particularly evident in the beautiful palaces, gardens, and temples at Narmada, Suranadi, Suranadi, Mayura, and Lingsar. Balinese princes who established control over west Lombok built these gardens in 1727 as a summer palace. Balinese dominance in western Lombok left behind religious legacies, such as the Lingsar Temple, dating from 1710; and the Pura Meru – the biggest temple in Lombok located at Cakranegara – built in 1720 during the reign of Anak Agung Ngurah Made. This temple symbolizes the Hindu unity on Lombok Island. Today, the Balinese have lived alongside the Sasaks for generations, and there are still more people from Bali migrating to Lombok. Hinduism is the primary religion embraced by the Balinese in Lombok, while Islam is the predominant religion of the Sasaks. The Balinese Hindu and the Sasak Muslims worship completely different supernatural beings and devote themselves to a distinctive set of religious ideas and conducts. This gives Lombok diversity in its population in terms of festivals and rituals. Both groups follow distinct ritual events held according to their specific lunar calendar based around the cycle of new and full moons. However, the Balinese appear to integrate peacefully with the Sasak people despite the years of vicious history between the two. Both groups share a festival held annually around November‐December at the Lingsar Temple, called Perang Topat. Perang literally means war and Topat is a kind of dish made out of cooked rice wrapped in woven young coconut leaves. It means: food fight. At the Lingsar temple both Hindu and Muslim services are held. Accompanied by drums and gamelan music, processions with colourful offerings, and dancing attractions, the Perang Topat festival serves as one of mutual understanding and shared excitement. In this event, religious and cultural differences are set aside. At one level it is a respected religious tradition; on another, it has been embraced as a mutually‐shared cultural celebration. This festivity shows another example of seeing Balinese and Sasak being socially integrated in Lombok. The two religious ethnics do not only provide historical evidence of conflict, but also reconciliation and negotiation at different episodes of time. This paper attempts to analyse the festival as an arena where different social and religious groups, the Balinese and the Sasak in particular, negotiate their internal relationships on a symbolic level. Balinese migration does not only flow their culture of origin and create their bicultural identity as being Balinese in Lombok vis a vis Balinese living in Bali. It also helps further to promote Lombok as a diverse but unified multi‐cultural society. The Lingsar Temple where the Balinese share the Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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religious site and festivity serves to justify their long historical, cultural existence in Lombok as well as the mutually‐strengthening relationship between them and their Nyame Sasak. Sri Sunarti Purwaningsih, Research Center for Population, Indonesian Institute of Sciences LIPI, Indonesia Migration and Social and Cultural Change: Special focus on the Risk of HIV/AIDS Transmission Bali is a well‐known tourist destination, since the Dutch colonial time. Since then, many people from outside Bali come and go to Bali as a tourist. As a result Balinese people are interacting with people from various demographic and cultural backgrounds. This interaction has both positive and negative consequences. Immigration and tourism has benefited the local economy but has also changed peoples lifestyle. AIDS cases found in Bali indicate that people in Bali are at risk when it comes to sexual transmitted diseases. Our study in 2000 found that, in the regions of Bali HIV was becoming a phenomenon amongst young people especially beach‐boys. They thought that sexual relations with foreigners were not risky as they were convinced that foreigners were free from HIV. This paper will analyse some issues in relation to migration and the AIDS and HIV phenomenon. Amongst others the paper will discuss the relation between the mobility of the population and the negative impacts on people lives such as HIV/AIDS. Finally, the paper will discuss local knowledge that can be used to prevent the transition of HIV. Muchammadun, Department of Islamic Community Development, Faculty of Dakwah, IAIN Mataram, Indonesia Lombok's Balinese Cultural Heritage By researching Balinese historical remnants in Lombok, this research paper aims to describe what made Balinese migrate to Lombok in the 16th century, what aspects of their beliefs were Hellenized to the local wisdom of Lombok, and what cultural heritage and main Balinese values have remained in Lombok. Such research will enable the completion of the Balinese heritage theme and enrich the perspectives of Balinese culture on the neighbouring island.
MIXED PANEL Solita Sarwono, NEDWORC Association, the Netherlands Balinese Women: Caught Between Work and Socio‐Religious Obligations The Balinese calendar contains many religious days, each of which is commemorated with ceremonies, some more elaborated than others. Needless to say, women play a crucial role in the preparation of the ceremonies involving hours, even days of unpaid labour in cooking and decorating the offerings. This naturally affects women’s productivity in their employment as the vast majority of Balinese women work outside the house. Quite frequently women must take one day (or more days) off work to assist the family and relatives in performing various religious and traditional ceremonies. Female shop‐owners sometimes close the shops to help their family, relatives or the banjar (neighbourhood community) in preparing and performing traditional ceremonies, or they have to work extra hard when their female employees take a leave for similar reasons. Men also take part in various ceremonies and rituals but their participation is less frequent and less time consuming. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Nowadays the Balinese women’s involvement in the traditional and religious ceremonies can be reduced by sharing the work load with female members of the family or by purchasing (rather than making) the sweets and decorations needed for the offerings. Yet no adult woman is totally exempted from this socio‐religious duty despite her profession and position in the work force, as a consequence of tradition and social pressure. How do working women resolve these conflicting roles? To what extent do the socio‐religious obligations affect Balinese women’s productivity? Based on observation and interviews with Balinese women some of the issues relating to the conflict between work and social obligations will be highlighted. Renata Lesner‐Szwarc, Nicolaus Copernicus University, Torun, Poland Being Balinese in Global Asia: The Role of the Dance in the Process of the Self‐Identification In the present world self‐identification is very important in relation to ‘global ecumens’ and to the all‐embracing pressure of popular culture. An essential aspect of this relation is that the existence of ethnic groups must be confirmed socially and ideologically with the general acknowledgement, that they are culturally different. Moreover these cultural differences can be seen in social practices, such as religion, marriage or the language. The present Balinese identity is hybrid. Islanders live at least in two worlds; the traditional and sacral world on the one hand and the rational and materialistic on the other. They live in these worlds simultaneously with both modernities and traditions and formulate their own ethno‐ scenery. The Balinese in global Asia represent the model of the multi‐segment identity which can be pictured by the Russian doll – matryoshka. The importance of the cultural identities’ constructions is a global phenomenon that appears clearly in examples of consumption, policy and art. The paper will focus on performing arts – dance, as the fleeting form of expression, which is very important in the process of self‐identification in modern global Asia. The dance, being the artefact and the cultural message, strengthens social ties. In Bali dance determines the main element of the culture and the total social fact (after M. Mauss). Dance is an element of the culture and a carrier of cultural contents. In the creation of Balinese identity it’s a foot‐bridge among the present day and a tradition. Yulianto Mohsin, Cornell University, United States New Technology Meets a Thousand‐Year‐Old Culture: Why and How People Use Electricity in Balinese Villages Bali has long enjoyed a status as an international tourist destination since the Dutch colonial period. The government of Indonesia continued to promote the island as a place for tourism and during the New Order period it started to systematically develop the island as a ‘window of Indonesia’. One part of the development endeavours was to electrify the whole island, not just in the designated touristic places such as Kuta, Sanur, and Nusa Dua. Balinese rural electrification begun with the inauguration of the Pesanggaran power plant in 1975, which started earlier than the New Order rural electrification program in 1979. Although the state electricity company declared all Balinese villages electrified in 1995, not all hamlets within those villages have received electricity, particularly in the districts of Karangasem, Klungkung, and Bangli. A few recent hamlets in the district of Bangli even received electricity as late as in 2011. This research will examine the history of electrification on the island within the context of the Indonesian national village electrification program. By focusing on Bali, it will account for the differentiation in regional electricity coverage, especially when the government's stated goal of rural electrification was to evenly distribute development. I will also examine what people in the village think about electricity. By conducting Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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interviews, I will figure out what factors influenced their need for and their uses of electricity in their homes and communities, whether having electricity shape their perception of becoming modern, the kind of development the hamlet residents envisioned and realized using electricity, and whether the introduction of this new technology brought about some cultural changes there. For comparative purposes, in my study I will use two hamlets, one electrified before 1995 and one recently.
MUSIC David Harnish, University of San Diego, United States Between Traditionalism and Postmodernism: Multiple Identities of the Balinese Performing Arts Institution, Çudamani Çudamani is a sekaa (communal arts troupe) and a sanggar (arts organization) in the Balinese village of Pengosekan committed to studying and teaching Balinese music and dance. As part of their mission, Çudamani leaders have sought out and provided teaching residencies for elder music and dance teachers to train Çudamani members on the arts and culture of earlier decades. Beyond studying and teaching, Çudamani’s mission is to provide voluntary service (ngayah) performing at temple festivals. Between the emphasis on ngayah, the service of teaching village children and young adults, and the great respect given to the elders, Çudamani can be viewed as a strongly traditionalist organization, preserving and expanding tradition and following the true spirit of a sekaa and a sanggar. The organization, however, also creates and stages avant‐garde music and dance pieces. The director, Dewa Berata, and his brother, Dewa Alit, are well known contemporary composers with arts academy backgrounds; Dewa Berata’s wife, American Emiko Susilo, contributes Western and pan‐Asian expertise. Thus, Çudamani is an innovative, globalizing force. The club has performed internationally and, on two tours, mounted ‘Odalan,’ a staged representation of a temple festival. This production brought both acclaim and criticism. Çudamani is postmodern in the sense that it avoids totalizing forms, embraces contradictions and pluralism, and challenges high/low, local/global, and traditional/contemporary dichotomies. This paper explores the multiple identities and indigenous (post)modernity of Çudamani and positions the organization in contemporary Bali. Brandon Yu, University of California, Santa Cruz, United States Gamelan Sekar Jaya: A History Gamelan Sekar Jaya's roots lie in the Center for World Music but also in the grit and community of the musicians that helped to first initiate what was originally going to be a 6‐week class. The class never stopped and eventually was pushed by I Wayan Dibia to create it's first grand seminal moment, a tour in Bali in 1985. This class, now many classes on dances and four different gamelans, continues to today in Berkeley, California. It's doubled in members since its inception but still has the same great hunger and respect for Balinese arts and community, some of the vital elements that drive groups to excel and develop. Compiling oral histories with various articles and reviews, I examine the way Sekar Jaya holds its position to continue as a power house of Balinese energy in the American community as I build a history of its inception and how it became the group it is today. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Andrew McGraw, University of Richmond, United States Heritage Abroad: Reflexivity and the Robotic Gamelan Developed in New York in 2008, the gamelatron is a robotic Balinese orchestra performed by an individual via a laptop interface. It appears regularly at Portugal’s Boom festival, Burning Man, and other pilgrimage sites for the ‘mobile freak diaspora’ (D’Andrea 2007) where it facilitates altered‐ state meditations. The ensemble alloys the tribal‐Oriental(ist) and science‐futuristic motifs that characterize psytrance culture generally (St John 2009). In response to accusations of appropriation and misuse by members of the American gamelan subculture, its creators suggest that the project will ‘preserve’ Balinese heritage into the future (beyond even the lifespan of Balinese culture itself) and are currently developing ways in which the device could ‘record’ and ‘playback’ repertoires from ‘endangered’ repertoires such as slonding. I argue that the gamelatron extends a fantasy of cyborg posthumanism in which information is imagined to circulate unchanged among different material substrates (Hayles 1998), as if music’s essence was pure information (figured as ‘heritage’) rather than embodied performance in a dynamically evolving culture. Members of the American gamelan subculture protested against the gamelatron’s rejection of live sociality, sensing in it a neoliberal celebration of individual control over collective interaction. In ‘performance’ the gamelatron becomes a prosthesis of the individual composer/performer. But the unique uses to which the American gamelan subculture had put the tradition – as a utopian collectivity disengaged from the law of profit, as a critique of Western musical systems and their often exclusionary associations with gender, class, and race, as a medium for new hybrid composition ‒ similarly divorced the heritage (as information) from its original contexts. Both the American gamelan subculture and the contemporary heritage/HaKi discourse in Bali are engaged in reflexively creating the very traditions they purport to represent. I argue that the gamelatron merely extends the implications of both discourses, in which heritage is imagined foremost as ‘information,’ to its logical, and problematic, conclusion. Christopher J. Miller, Department of Music, Cornell University, United States Paper will be presented by Andrew McGraw, University of Richmond, United States A Different Kind of Modernism: The Sound Exploration of Pande Made Sukerta In the late 1970s a vibrant scene of new music composition emerged at ASKI, the academy for traditional performing arts in Surakarta, a historic center of traditional Javanese culture. Central to the academy’s mission was the perpetuation of the artistic legacy of the Surakarta court. At the same time, concerned with creating a contemporary existence for these and related traditions, it began to encourage experimentation, giving rise to a radically innovative approach to composition that involved not just Javanese musicians, but also those from other regions. This paper focuses on the contributions of the Balinese musician Pande Madé Sukerta, who played a central role in developing a compositional practice based in the exploration of sound. Through exploring sound, Sukerta and his colleagues sought to step outside tradition, to escape its constraints, and to create something new. They were driven by an idea of the new whose genealogy in Indonesia can be traced back to Sutan Takdir Alisjahbana’s call for a new Indonesian culture. But far from truly abandoning tradition, they instead incorporated elements from the regional traditions that they were simultaneously engaged in studying and teaching into compositions that were otherwise decidedly not traditional. The idiomatic character of these elements remains unobscured, but at the same time they are reframed. Their work might thus be taken as postmodern, but perhaps more accurately should be characterized as post‐pre‐modern with a modernist impulse acting as a catalyst. In the end, it may be best to describe it simply as a different kind of modernism. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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RELIGIOUS CONCERNS Alexandra Landmann, Master Studies in Religion, Universitas Hindu Indonesia, Denpasar, Indonesia Hindu Dharma Indonesia: From legal acknowledgment to formal Hindu education The organizational model of the religion class in Indonesia is rooted in a specific historical, socio‐ cultural, political, and legal context, which is fundamentally different to European models of religious education. In contrast to classical Islam and modern Islamic states, Indonesia recognizes Asian religions as equal in status with religions of the book. Besides Islam and Christianity, Hindu Dharma and Buddhism were finally recognized as state funded religions in 1965. This recognition had important consequences for the Indonesian model of organizing five confessional religion classes and faith‐ based education systems. The national basic norm Pancasila provides Hindus with room to manoeuvre, who use the public space strategically in order to the make their voices heard, to participate in the government, and receive state funding and legal protection. The Balinese are a rare case of a religious and ethnic minority being simultaneously an ethnic and religious majority. Therefore, the Balinese provide an outstanding case to analyze how Indonesia’s religious and educational policies do deal with that particular ethnic and religious minority. In addition, how do the Balinese themselves use the constitutional and legal framework to establish the Hindu religion class in public schools and a private Hindu education system from the level of pre‐school to higher education? Unlike the Muslim or Christian based education systems, the Hindu education system is still marginal and minuscule. Its funding is discriminative. Funding and expansion are linked to national policies, and the personal networks of Hindu agents are given the mandate to organize the Hindu administration and education system. Gde Dwitya Arief Metera, Center for Religious and Cross‐cultural Studies (CRCS), Gadjah Mada University, Indonesia Economic Transformation and Cultural Spaces: Understanding New Religions in Bali as an Urban Phenomenon Latest ethnographic accounts on contemporary Balinese religious identity by Howe (2001, 2005) suggest a dynamic picture of three competing religious systems of Adat, Agama Hindu and new religious movements like Sai Baba. His account, however, has not explored much of the contours of Bali’s religious landscape and how these three religious systems are lived in a specific locality. In this paper, I describe how in Singaraja Agama Hindu and Sai Baba are mostly embraced by the city people. While in the villages, the people are exclusively followers of Adat tradition. I discuss several factors that make Agama Hindu and the Sai Baba movement generally an urban phenomenon. I question how change can take place in Bali in regard of the economic and demographic context that may have contributed to the people’s different mode of religious articulation. The economic transformation from agricultural economy to modern industrial economy in Bali has changed people’s occupations and forced urbanization. I argue that the transformation also creates two emerging cultural spaces of Workplace in the city and Home in the villages of origin. Workplace is where people are bound to modern disposition of time and Home is where people are bound to Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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traditional disposition of time. These two cultural spaces determine people’s mode of religious articulation. As people move from their villages of origin to the city, they also adopt a new mode of religious articulation in an urban context. I suggest that to understand the emergence of new religions and the new mode of religious articulation in Bali we have to look at specific transformations at the economic and demographic level. Keywords: economic transformation, new religious movements, Balinese religious identity, cultural spaces Nazrina Zuryani, Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, Udayana University, Indonesia Sarad and Jatah: Socio‐religious Food for Heritage Representation Tradition nowadays is becoming an increasingly modern invention (Hobsbawm and Ranger:1993) as it has been subjected to an important transformation because of the impact of the capitalist or monetary economy. In Bali, it is particularly evident in the field of offerings. Sometimes offerings are being rationalized in order to be less expensive (Connor; Ngaben ngirit), for instance when holding a mass cremation. In other circumstances spectacular and expensive offerings are used. This paper explores this phenomenon in relation to big 'utama' offerings of Sarad (pulagembal) and Jatah (sate tungguh) that goes along with the modern Bali of the cosmic 'one‐ness' = God. Key words: Offerings, tradition, Sarad, Jatah, monetary economy, cosmic dualism. Michel Picard, Centre Asie du Sud‐Est (CASE, CNRS‐EHESS), Paris, France Agama(?) Hindu(?): An enquiry about the interpretation of Balinese religion as “Hinduism” In this paper, I will question the related categories of “religion”, “agama”, and “Hinduism”, with a view to investigating the processes through which educated Balinese elites construed and promoted the project of a Balinese religion as “Agama Hindu”. In brief, I intend to investigate what the construction of “Hinduism” as a world religion in the 19th century can teach us about the invention of a Balinese religion as Agama Hindu in the 20th century. Besides the emphasis put on monotheism in response to criticisms levelled by Muslims and Christians alike, both these movements have been influenced by orientalism, colonialism and nationalism. They have, moreover, been marked by a proselytizing drive which was originally foreign to them both. Specifically, in order to have their religion officially acknowledged by the Indonesian Ministry of Religion, educated Balinese elites, in the manner of their Indian predecessors, resolved to reform the ritual practices of their fellow coreligionists by borrowing prevailing religious norms – in the case in point, those pertaining to Abrahamic religions ‐ all the while presenting their reforms as a restoration of their magnified Hindu heritage. In retrospect, it appears that the contemporary Hinduization of the Balinese religion is the result of a misapprehension. If it has indeed allowed the Balinese to counter Muslim and Christian proselytism, their adhesion to Agama Hindu was effected at the expense of a denial. Far from restoring their Indian heritage as they claimed, by means of internal rationalization and alignment with transnational Hinduism the Balinese reformers have in fact dissociated themselves from their religious roots. By thus renouncing their ancestral practices ‐ be they of Indian origin ‐ in order to embrace a Neo‐Hindu orthodoxy which was perfectly alien to them, they assumed that they could withstand the Abrahamic religions on their own ground. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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RITUAL PRACTICES Lene Pedersen, Central Washington University, United States and Ron Barrett, Macalester College, United States Before the Cremation: The Experience of Dying in Bali This paper explores how Hindu‐Balinese beliefs impact people’s approach to death in Bali, Indonesia. We consider both philosophical views and lived realities for dying people and their families. Bali is renowned for the attention lavished on cremation ceremonies, and there is a large ethnographic literature on Hindu‐Balinese mortuary and post mortuary rites. However, no studies have been published on the human experiences of dying that lead up to these rites. To what extent do these practices and their underlying beliefs serve to affirm or deny death for people facing the end of life? The answers may yield new insights into Balinese worlds, and the broader challenges of human suffering, bereavement, and the role of belief systems in the dying process. These issues are particularly relevant given recent trends of aging in Southeast Asian populations, and the interaction of traditional and modern beliefs and practices of caring at the end of life. This preliminary study is a collaboration between two anthropologists, one a former hospice nurse with ethnographic experience in Indian Hindu religious contexts, the other with several years of Balinese ethnographic experience, including research on post‐mortuary ceremony. I Wayan Redig, Department of Archaeology, Faculty of Letters, Udayana University, Indonesia The Dragon Worship in the Balinese Temple of Besakih Besakih is a temple complex located in the Karangasem regency, exactly on the south western slope of Mount Agung and is referred to as the Mother temple of the Balinese Hindu. The name ‘Besakih’ comes from the word ‘Basuki’, which is derived from the word ‘wasuki’ which means ‘salvation’ in the classical Sanskrit language. Whereas in the Samudra Manthana mythology the same name ‘besuki’ in fact refers to the Dragon God, Naga Besukian who inhabited Mount Agung, the main volcano in Bali. Within the temple complex there are around 20 main temples available. Pura Penataran Agung ‘Great Temple of State’ forms the center of the complex and is Bali‘s main place of worship. This central temple is dedicated to Siva, the most prominent Hindu deity in the temple complex. Two other temples that can be connected to this temple are pura Gelap and pura Kiduling Kereteg. However they are a representation of a dragon, the mythological king of the serpents. It is worth to be mentioned that the mythology and legends of dragons are not only found in Bali but also in several countries throughout Asia. In China for example the Chinese dragons are legendary creatures in the Chinese mythology and folklore, and have mythic counterparts among the Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Bhutanese, Western and Turkish dragons. In contrast to European dragons, which are considered evil, Chinese dragons traditionally symbolize potent and auspicious powers, with particularly control over water, rainfall, hurricane, and flood. As mythologies and legends are prevalent in different parts of Asia (including Bali), in this article we going to scrutinize if they share common features or not. And if not, what are the underlying reasons. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Thomas Reuter, The University of Melbourne, Australia An Ancient Temple and a New King: Revitalisation, Ritual and Politics in Bali A series of extraordinary events culminated in October 2010 in the celebration of an eleven‐day ‘ritual for the revitalisation of the whole cosmos’ (karya pengurip jagat bali kabeh) at Bali’s most ancient and continuously active spiritual sanctuary – the former state temple Pura Penulisan, high up in the misty highlands of the island. The celebration also constituted a religious and cultural ‘revitalisation’ in the anthropological sense, because this ritual had not been held in two centuries. Finally, this extraordinary religious performance also marked an astonishing political revitalisation. The great ritual attracted more than one hundred thousand participants and, more importantly, the scale of the ritual itself – comprising the sacrifice of twelve water buffaloes rather than the usual one – signalled that a new ‘king’ had come to be associated with this ancient state temple after a lapse of more than six hundred years. Indeed, it was largely by celebrating this high‐level ritual that a local resident and member of the temple’s congregation managed to install himself as the ruler of the entire regency of Bangli, within which the temple is located. This was made possible in the first place by a political liberalisation and decentralisation of the Indonesian state from 1998 onward, which has brought autonomy to the regions and triggered a tsunami of revitalisation movements that has swept the entire archipelago, including Bali. How Pura Kauripan came to regain the character of a state temple by producing a new ‘king’ makes for a rather interesting tale in itself. My ultimate aim in this paper, however, is to show how these events shed light on the broader late modern phenomenon of cultural revitalisation, which has become an important international trend in response to globalisation – not just in Bali and Indonesia but worldwide. Emiliana Mariyah, Cultural Studies, Udayana University, Indonesia Ni Luh Nyoman Kebayantini, Faculty of Social Sciences, Udayana University, Indonesia Commodification of Upakara as a Creative Industry in the Globalization Era: Studies on Hindu Bali Community in Denpasar Bali is famous for its culture and strong religious ceremonies, those are Dewa Yatnya, Rsi Yatnya, Pitra yatnya, Manusia Yatnya, and Budha Yatnya. The five forms of the ceremony can not be separated from the onslaught of globalization that demand efficiency. According to Bagus (1991) Bali experienced a shift from agrarian to industrial societies that are characterized by a tight regulation of time, space, labour, and capital. The Balinese also do not fully live communally, they are now required to act effectively in the face of life, including setting up and running religious ceremonies. They simply buy a wide range of needs of religious ‘upakara’ (Wijaya, 1991:24). Based on this back ground, this study would examine: (1) what is the practice of ‘upakara’ commodification in the creative industry, (2) why is there such ‘upakara’ commodification (3) what are the strategies to develop the creative industry without compromising the value of the Balinese Hindu culture?. The research was conducted in Denpasar that has a heterogeneous society consisting of busy working people that have not enough time to make ‘upakara’ themselves. We have conducted a qualitative approach and used the commodification theory to address the issues: the discourse theory of knowledge/power, theory and practice of deconstruction. Data has been obtained from observations, focus group discussions and in depth interviews that were held with selected informants (triangulation). The results of the research will be used to draw up recommendations for the development of strategies for Balinese culture sustainability. Keywords: Creative Industry of ‘upakara’, Balinese Hindu society and globalization Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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SUBAK Convenor: Rachel P Lorenzen, Resource Management in Asia‐Pacific Program, College of Asia and the Pacific, The Australian National University, Australia Chair: D.A. Wiwik Dharmiasih, Dept. of International Relations, Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, Udayana University, Indonesia Discussant: Lene Pedersen, Central Washington University, United States The subak is the rice farmers’ organisation in Bali to deal with the irrigation, planting and celebration of rice. For centuries, farmers as members of one or several subaks have grown rice on a myriad of rice terraces, sharing water through an intricate system of water temples and irrigation canals. Amid general trends of rural diversification across Southeast Asia and a fast‐growing tourist industry this traditional organisation has lost its significance in today’s Balinese economy and life. Non‐agricultural entities are competing with the very resources of rice farming reducing at an alarming pace the availability of land and water to continue to grow rice. Likely, climate change will further impact on the subak’s resources. The current trends pose a challenging task to the subak and the farmers. What incentive structures need to be put in place for farmers to continue to grow rice? Clearly, new technologies are needed to counter climate change, to increase production to meet the future needs of the growing population and to develop new marketing strategies that allow for a better market penetration of local produce. The panel discusses findings of current research on the subak as well as possible strategies, adaptation responses and inherent issues to compete in a growing competitive and global environment. Rachel P Lorenzen, Resource Management in Asia‐Pacific Program, College of Asia and the Pacific, The Australian National University, Australia Three Plausible Futures of the Subak amid Contemporary Pressures of Urbanisation and Rural Transformation A growing population and a diversifying rural economy are threatening the future of the subak, once the mainstay of Balinese society and economy. The pressures are placed on the subak’s resource base: land is being converted to residential and industrial settlements, new stakeholders have emerged demanding water, and attractive off‐farm employment combined with better education opportunities lure the younger generation away from rice farming. Although there is a declining trend in rice calorie consumption in Bali in the past 10 years, rice will remain the most important staple food. This is also reflected in the National Government’s development plan which foresees a revitalisation of agriculture including maintaining rice production levels at a minimum of 90 per cent of domestic demand. With the imminent threats to the subak and its resources it is questionable whether rice production can be maintained at such levels in Bali. To this end, I present three scenarios situated 25 years ahead of time based on current trends and issues and assuming varying degrees of government intervention, resource pressure and farm Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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household capacity. The scenarios are not a forecast, but a structured narrative of possible futures of the subak encouraging discussion about the place and value of the subak in Balinese society. The analysis shows, that in peri‐urban areas and near tourist centres where competition for resources is high the subak may disintegrate unless protective measures are enforced. Ultimately, the future survival of the subak lies in the hands of Balinese society, the government and the farmers: a society willing to purchase local farm produce, a government able to implement and monitor its regulations and farmers empowered to negotiate with other stakeholders and access new and better‐priced markets. Ni Gst.Ag.Gde Eka Martiningsih, Agriculture Faculty of Mahasaraswati Denpasar University, Indonesia Social Capital of Women on Subak This paper presents part of my field research findings in Subak Wangaya Betan (SWB), Mengesta Village between 2009 and 2010. I conducted interviews with several subak members, head of subak, the leader of a local agricultural NGO (Somya Pertiwi), priests, academics, government officials and women members of the subak. The focus in this presentation is on the activities of women members of SWB. According to my field research findings, women members have complex roles in their daily life. While there have been several researchers investigating SWB and the impact of the transformation to organic farming, none have examined women’s roles and their participation in these changes. The research has shown that women undertake many important roles in Subak activities such as providing family foods, managing plantation in the field and also in ritual festivals which are continuously conducted in the subak temple. The primary finding of this research is that the ritual is actually internalized in women who regularly conduct the rituals. There are symbols made in the rituals. The symbolization could only be a suggestion or an awareness that has become a meaning. This meaning can be implemented continuously in real life in order to preserve agriculture and the environment for a sustainable development. It will also drive the community to be aware of food security and biosecurity issues. Takeshi Takama, JICA, Japan Daryono, Indonesia Agency of Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Region III, Indonesia Rice Production, Water & Climate Change in Bali: A vulnerability approach Bali is, as a small island of Indonesia, likely to be affected by climate change, impacting various aspects such as rising sea level, drought, flood, as well as food security. Together with East Java, Bali produces 22% of rice in Indonesia and its wet season is shorter than in other major rice producing regions. The purpose of this paper is to show a vulnerability approach to assess the climate change impacts on rice production based on literature reviews, statistical assessment, stakeholder/policy assessment and interviews with farmers. Rice harvesting area has been reduced in Bali by ca. 8% in last 10 years and there is a sign of decline in its productivity, which affects their rice production. Climate change is likely to magnify the impact by delaying a wet season or making a dry season drier. A vulnerability concept includes three components: namely exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity. Therefore, rice production is not determined by only exposure to a weather‐related disaster, but also by the location and timing of the hazard (sensitive) as well as farmers’ capacity to adapt to and cope with the hazard.
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This paper suggests how adaptive measures should be implemented to handle rice food security with climate change. Rice farmers in Bali should be supported with proper adaptation measures, which are based on a well‐focused vulnerability assessment. I Wayan Windia, Fakultas Pertanian, Udayana University, Indonesia Agrotourism for a Sustainable Development of the Subak in Bali The subaks (and the traditional village) are two of the Balinese cultural heritage institutions. As a cultural heritage, both institutions are often regarded as Bali's cultural warranty. The subak functions as the manager of the irrigation and agricultural systems, while the traditional village functions as manager of the traditional village customs and religious activities. Both institutions manage different domains. The subak manages the rice fields with the hydrologic and natural boundaries, and traditional village manages the areas with administrative boundaries. The continued existence of the traditional village is still considered to be safe. The traditional village will continue to exist because it serves as a shelter community for the village members. But the existence of the subak is considered very alarming. Rice field and irrigation run by the subaks are continuing to experience reductions. Studies are required to examine the sustainability of the subak in Bali. Tourism is a fast developing economic sector in Bali. The subak needs to get into the tourism sector such as for example developing agro‐subak (agrotourism) as a region. This activity will allow (i) farmers’ and subak’s income improving, (ii) generating pride among farmers, (iii) increasing employment, and (iv) reducing farmers’ interest in selling their rice fields. The development of an agro‐subak will encourage the development of both, a sustainable agricultural sector as well as a sustainable tourism sector. The tourism sector in Bali cannot exist without the support of a present and viable agricultural sector. Agrotourism based on the subak allows for the integeration of the primary sector (agricultural activities) into the tertiary sector (tourism).
TEXTS Andrea Acri, Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore, Singapore Modern Hindu Intellectuals and Ancient Texts: Reforming Shaiva Yoga in Bali This paper aims at providing a fresh perspective on the modern, reformed version of ‘Balinese Hinduism’ in the light of the premodern religious discourse, describing the elements of continuity and change on the basis of text‐historical and theological data that have so far insufficiently been taken into account by scholars. It attempts to show that the Javano‐Balinese religious tradition is characterized by a remarkable continuity, especially when it comes to its exegetical and text‐ building practices, but also by important elements of changes. To investigate the historical and cultural dynamics behind such changes—in particular the treatment of Yoga in selected textual sources—is the main concern of this article. Robin Tatu, University of Hawaii at Manoa, United States Balinese Babad in the 21st Century: From Rajas to Wargas This paper considers evolving uses within Bali of babad, the textual genre focused on the history of a particular descent group, or warga. Once the purview of royalty and brahmana priests, babad have become one important means for all Balinese to confirm the status of, and their connections to, their ancestral past. By the 1990s, the newspaper columns, radio talk show, and Indonesian Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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translations of babad by Jero Mangku Gde Ktut Soebandi helped stimulate greater genealogical interest. Today, the babadbali.com website extends access to a cyberspace audience largely made up of Balinese living off‐island. Some families hold readings to honour Saraswati day or the anniversary of a group temple; others consult babad experts to clarify questions of descent and sponsor accompanying topeng performances. Yet Soebandi himself pronounced that ‘most babad are nonsense’ – omong‐omong. What are the controversies surrounding babad and will they influence continued use of the texts? Ronald Jenkins, Theatre Department, Wesleyan University, United States Nyoman Catra, ISI (Institut Seni Indonesia) Denpasar, Indonesia Digitizing Balinese Lontar I would like to describe the process of collaborating with the Balinese Office of Culture and faculty from ISI Denpasar on a project that has digitized hundreds of lontar from the PusDoc collection and made them accessible at no charge worldwide on the website archive.org/details/bali. I would co‐ present the website with Dr. Nyoman Catra of ISI Denpasar who has co‐directed the project with me for the past two years. Our presentation would consist of introducing the website to those who do not know of its existence and documenting the obstacles that remain to make it function as an ideal site for Balinese and foreign users. Dewa Made Dharmawan, Institut Seni Indonesia (ISI), Denpasar, Indonesia Overcoming the Obstacles in Preserving and Digitizing Lontar Dharmawan will discuss the process of cleaning and preserving the lontars and the problems faced in digitizing thousands of palm leaf lontar manuscript pages.
TOURISM/HERITAGE I Wayan Ardika, Department of Archeology, Faculty of Letters, Udayana University, Indonesia Geringsing: Sub‐Ethnic Identity and Globalization Geringsing is a double ikat textile which is only produced by the people of Tenganan Pageringsingan. It is highly demanded by the villagers of Tenganan Pageringsingan particularly when ceremonies are taking place in the village. The villagers believe that geringsing has a magic power and that it can protect them from any disease or illness (known as gering). Today the Balinese people also use geringsing for several ceremonies which relate to manusa yadnya (life cycle ceremony) and pitra yadnya (ancestor worships such as a cremation or ngaben). Since geringsing is only made by the village of Tenganan Pageringsingan, and it is also highly demanded by the local people, therefore, it can be considered as an identity of the people of Tenganan Pageringsingan which form a sub ethnic group of Balinese. Due to tourism development and the globalization process, geringsing now has gone to the global market. Foreign tourists also need geringsing, and it is now produced as a mass product in the village of Tenganan Pageringsingan. Every household at Tenganan Pageringsingan now produces geringsing. New motifs and colours of geringsing are also being made at Tenganan Pageringsingan. Geringsing that identifies the people of Tenganan Pageringsingan as a sub ethnic group of Balinese is still being preserved and it has developed in terms of motifs and colours. It also gives economic benefits to the local people. Since geringsing is produced as a mass product however its quality has undergone some degradations. The commodification process is also taking place at Tenganan Pageringsingan. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Luh Kitty Katherina, Rural and Regional Research Group, School of Architecture, Planning and Policy Development, Institut Teknologi Bandung, Indonesia Sustainability of Intergovernmental Regional Cooperation Toward Global Tourism in Bali Development of tourism in Bali cannot be separated from the role of all governments in managing tourism in Bali. The Province of Bali is a small island that is divided into nine autonomous regions, which are highly dependent on the neighbouring regions. Tourist attractions in Bali are spread across the regions, but the hotels and restaurants are mainly found in Badung and Denpasar. This situation creates inequality of income and welfare among the regions. To overcome this issue, since 1972 the kabupaten/kota governments in Bali have agreed to share revenues from the tourism industry, which flow from regions with higher revenues to those with lower revenues. The paper aims to describe the process, challenges and key factors that affect the sustainability of this regional cooperation. The cooperation has been undergoing several changes, including shifts in leadership up‐and‐down in the tourism industry in Bali. The influence of global tourism, which brings along new values to Bali, has not weakened the cooperation. The fact that the cooperation is based on the principle of mutual trust plays an important role in Balinese culture. Keywords: Bali, cooperation, sharing revenue, global tourism, culture tourism Pi‐Chun Chang, Department of East Asian Studies, National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan Tourism, Heritage, and Place Identity in Bali This study explores the official and the local versions of Bali to see if global tourism has caused heritage erasure and undermined a wider sense of belonging in Bali. The island of Bali has long been characterized by the Indonesian government as the destination of tourism, especially spiritual tourism and eco‐tourism. Accordingly, the importance of global tourism is for Bali local heritage to be culturally represented. The scope of what is deemed worth preserving has also expanded dramatically, extending now to environments, artefacts, and activities that, in the past, would have been considered beyond the scope of attention. Yet, the development of infrastructure and modernization caused a series of socio‐economic problems as the Indonesian government promoted Bali as the island of global tourism. This study explores how the official promoted Bali tourism and what are local responses and reactions by examining the official reports and tourism policies and local news reports. This study will firstly examine the changing definition of ‘heritage,’ and what ‘heritage’ means in Bali. Secondly, this study will see how heritage in Bali has connected with tourism. Then, the official reports and the local news will be explored to see the contestation between global tourism and local heritage. Finally, the relationship between tourism, heritage and place identity will be analyzed.
TOURISM, HERITAGE AND PEACE IN GLOBAL BALI Convenor: Shinji Yamashita, The University of Tokyo, Japan Chair: I Wayan Ardika, Faculty of Letters, Udayana University, Indonesia Discussant: Kathleen M. Adams, Loyola University Chicago, United States / Adjunct Curator, Field Museum of Natural History, USA Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Tourism in Bali dates back to the 1920s under the Dutch colonial regime. After Indonesia’s independence, especially since the late 1960s, Bali has grown successfully as a prime tourist destination in Indonesia by highlighting its cultural heritage based on Hindu religious traditions. However, the Balinese tourist industry has experienced serious challenges recently due to such negative incidents as the bombings by Muslim terrorists in the Balinese resort of Kuta in 2002 and 2005. Examining the cultural processes in Bali after the Kuta bombings, this panel discusses tourism, heritage and peace within the framework of contemporary Bali in the age of global tourism. The papers in this panel will pay special attention to Bali’s search for alternative forms of tourism under the global code of ethics for tourism, risk/safety management in local communities, cultural politics of heritage security in relation to tourism, and the multicultural peace movement shown in the Gema Perdamain (‘Echo of Peace’) events since 2003. In so doing, the panel explores the socio‐ cultural dynamics of contemporary Balinese society in Global Asia. Hiroi Iwahara, Department of Cultural Anthropology, The University of Tokyo, Japan Politics of the Global Code of Ethics for Tourism: Balinese Search for Alternative Forms of Tourism Since the 1990s, with growing concerns over the negative impact and risks that conventional mass tourism development poses on the host community, ‘alternative tourism’ has come to be sought out both globally and locally. Its stakeholders propose and promote it by labelling it as community‐ based tourism or ecotourism which principally aims to foster the sustainability of the host community. In Bali, there has been a long discussion among academics, intellectuals, and policymakers over ways to accommodate the rapid development of tourism, which corresponds to the flow of global tourism, with its unique culture. Today, due to rapid social and environmental changes, environmental and social sustainability has become an important objective for the future development of tourism in Bali. With this, village community‐based tourism has gained attention among policymakers and NGOs. In July 2011, the World Tourism Organization (WTO)’s first seminar on Tourism Ethics for Asia and the Pacific region was held in Bali. The WTO’s ‘Global Code of Ethics for Tourism (GCET)’ which was adopted by the General Assembly in 1999, calls for the moral support of workers in all tourist sectors for the development of tourism. First, this presentation will examine the context of GCET along with Balinese tourism development. It will then focus on the activities and campaigns of a Balinese NGO which was invited to present at the seminar to promote GCET through village community‐based tourism. Finally, this paper will identify how the participants of Balinese village community‐based tourism recognize today’s tourism‐related issues. Kosuke Hishiyama, Faculty of Law, Economics and Humanities, Kagoshima University, Japan Local Security and Globalization in Bali: Three Case Studies The primary purpose of this presentation is to clarify the influence of globalization in the field of local security in Bali. More specifically, this paper attempts to answer the following research questions: 1. What factors pattern local security? 2. How do the inhabitants perceive their respective districts and their need for local security and safety? 3. What kinds of local security are suitable for these communities in the era of globalization? I will answer these questions by analyzing three case studies which were made in three distinct areas in Bali: Sanur, Tuban, and Denpasar. For my analysis, I draw on the following conceptual frameworks. First, the crisis of the public sphere under the neoliberalism in which citizens are likely to create an enclaved lifestyle and to lose mutual involvement. Second, the influence of risk and surveillance society in which individualism is brought out and new forms of local of participation and exclusion are established based on risk. Third, the emergence of privatism under the influence of urbanization and globalization in which the traditional autonomy of Balinese local communities are weakened. These theoretical frameworks will help illuminate the connections and issues between globalization and local security in the three case studies I present. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Michael Hitchcock, Macau University of Science and Technology, Macao Heritage, Tourism and Security: The Balinese Case Heritage is a contentious issue not least because it is often disputed. There are many examples globally of ethnic groups and nations laying claim to the same illustrious ancestors or prestigious sites. If one’s heritage is open to tourism then a whole series of different issues become relevant. Tourists may read different messages than what was intended and their presence may encourage people with a grievance to take advantage of their presence. An attack on tourists may heighten the publicity of one's cause and attacks on heritage are a strike against an important symbol of identity. In both respects Bali is vulnerable, but the needs of security need to be balanced against the economic importance of tourism and local cultural practices. Shinji Yamashita, Department of Cultural Anthropology, The University Tokyo, Japan Gema Perdamaian or ‘Echo of Peace’: Tourism, Religion and Peace in Multicultural Bali Tourism in Bali has experienced serious challenges through such negative incidents as the bombings by the Muslim terrorists in the Balinese resort of Kuta in 2002 and 2005. The inter‐faith measures enacted as part of the crisis management for Balinese tourism after the bombing on 12 October 2002 are particularly interesting. These measures included joint prayers to promote inter‐ religious harmony such as the prayer for world peace, Doa Perdamainan Dunia dari Bali (‘Prayer for Peace of the World from Bali’) on 21 October 2002, which was attended by the minister of religious affairs, who is himself Muslim. In this event the bombings were then interpreted by Balinese as an expression of the anger of gods, a consequence of bad karma. Therefore, an elaborate ceremony, involving the most powerful priests, was carried out on 15 November 2002 in order to cleanse Bali of the trauma of the bombing and restore peace. Since then the ‘Prayer for Peace’ – Gema Perdamaian, literally ‘Echo of Peace’ – has continued to be held on 12 October every year. By focusing on this event and the Balinese peace movement after the bombings, this paper discusses a new relationship between tourism, religion and peace within the framework of multicultural Bali in the age of transnationalism.
TRADITIONAL CULTURE, MEDIA AND IDENTITY IN CONTEMPORARY BALI Convenor and Chair: Helen Creese, The University of Queensland, Australia Discussant: Robin Tatu, University of Hawaii at Manoa, United States Since the fall of the New Order, the electronic media have increasingly served as a vehicle for the revival of local tradition (adat), religious values and the construction of regional identities throughout Indonesia. In Bali, contemporary cultural and literary production has readily embraced the ‘electronic stage’. Traditional literary performance genres, threatened with extinction in the late twentieth century, have been revitalised not only through increasing levels of institutional promotion and support but also through their strong presence in interactive format on radio and television. The development of these new textual modes in Bali provides a significant case study for examining the impact of global technologies on local cultural and socio‐political practices. Presenters in this panel will explore local Balinese responses to global technologies and examine how traditional culture, specifically linked to technological change, is imagined locally. Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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Helen Creese, School of Languages and Comparative Cultural Studies, University of Queensland, Australia Textual Traditions, Identity and Cultural Production in Contemporary Bali This paper will present preliminary findings from a new three‐year project funded by the Australian Research Council that explores the revitalisation of the traditional verbal art form of Balinese textual singing and interpretation (makidung/ mabebasan) in Bali both in its literary and customary ritual contexts and in its transformation into a vibrant form of popular culture in the broadcast media. The central research question underpinning this project is how and why a ‘traditional’, esoteric, cultural practice, threatened with extinction a generation ago, has captured the imagination and interest of so many ordinary Balinese, particularly in the decade of democratisation and radical social and political change in Indonesia since the fall of Suharto in 1998. The answer lies in the enduring and dynamic nature of these textual traditions and their intersections with the complex mosaic of ethnic, religious, political and cultural factors that underpin contemporary Balinese concerns with local, national and transnational identities. I Nyoman Darma Putra, Jurusan Sastra Indonesia, Fakultas Sastra, Unud, Indonesia New Composition in Textual‐Singing Tradition: Articulation of Social Concerns and Cultural Identity in Sing‐Back Radio and TV Program in Bali In the last two decades, a textual singing tradition known as makidung or mabebasan has become a popular interactive, sing‐back radio and TV program in Bali. Mabebasan is the singing and interpreting line by line of traditional Balinese poems in a highly stylised language. It involves at least two people, a singer (pangewacen) and an interpreter (paneges), who can switch roles. Texts sung and interpreted during mabebasan are taken from a huge corpus of traditional Balinese literature, especially poetic genres such as gaguritan, kidung, and kakawin. Although participants of sing‐back radio and TV programs often select verses from the available poetic corpus, they often also create new compositions related to particular moments or contexts. These include the dangers of drugs, gambling, the importance of health and cleanliness in life, and the importance of parental supervision of children watching TV. This study identifies new compositions of tembang verse, discusses dominant themes and their social contexts. This examination is expected to provide an understanding of how Balinese have revived their age‐old textual singing tradition through a new media and how this practice is used as a way to articulate social concerns and Balinese cultural identity within the context of Indonesian culture. I Dewe Gede Windhu Sancaya, Faculty of Letters, Udayana University, Indonesia Dagang Gantal: Dari Dunia Virtual Membangun Realitas Dagang Gantal adalah sebuah nama program acara yang disiarkan oleh RRI Denpasar melalui saluran frekuensi 95, 30 FM Programa IV. Programa IV ini oleh RRI Denpasar diklaim sebagai saluran untuk melestarikan serta mengembangkan budaya Bali. Acara Dagang Gantal ini memiliki sejumlah aspek yang sangat menarik. Salah satu di antaranya adalah tentang latar belakang sosial para pendengar yang terlibat aktif di dalam acara ini. Hampir sebagian besar yang terlibat di dalamnya adalah para wanita. Wanita‐wanita yang terlibat aktif melakukan interaktif dan menembangkan bait‐bait geguritan (tembang macapat) tersebut kebanyakan adalah para ibu rumah tangga, yang relatif lebih banyak menghabiskan waktunya di rumah sambil mengerjakan pekerjaan domestik; atau para wanita yang berprofesi sebagai pedagang, baik pedagang di pasar tradisonal maupun warung yang ada di rumah mereka. Bahkan ada di antaranya yang berprofesi sebagai pedagang lumpia di pantai (pantai Seseh, Badung. Dari pengakuan para wanita tersebut, banyak di antaranya yang mengaku sedang stress. Melalui acara
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Dagang Gantal tersebut mereka bisa terhibur dan melepaskan stres dengan cara tertawa bebas dan bernyanyi. Sebagian dari para wanita tersebut bahkan tidak pernah bertemu satu dengan yang lainnya. Meskipun demikian, mereka berperilaku seperti orang yang sudah saling mengenal dengan baik, hanya dengan cara saling menyebut (calling) nama‐nama mereka satu sama lain, apabila mereka berhasil ‘menembus’ saluran telepon RRI yang sedang menyiarkan acara tersebut. Uniknya, hampir sebagian besar di antara mereka memakai nama alias (bukan nama sebenarnya). Melalui dunia virtual radio inilah mereka telah membangun suatu realitas. Dalam kenyataan sehari‐hari mereka hampir tidak punya waktu untuk saling bertemu. Namun melalui dunia virtual ini mereka merasa justru lebih mengenal satu dengan yang lain secara pribadi. Jarak fisik yang ada di antara mereka, telah ‘dihilangkan’ melalui acara Dagang Gantal. Suasana keakraban yang dibuat melalui dunia virtual tersebut biasanya berlanjut pada janji‐janji untuk bisa bertemu secara nyata di suatu tempat yang mereka sepakati. I Wayan Suardiana, Jurusan Sastra Bali, Fakultas Sastra, Unud, Indonesia ‘Kidung Interaktif’ sebagai Salah Satu Media Pemertahanan Bahasa Bali lewat Ranah Modern Makalah ini menganalisis sejauh mana acara ‘kidung interaktif’ di radio dan TV di Bali memberikan kontribusi dalam pemertahanan pemakaian bahasa Bali. Penelitian ini dilakukan lewat media komunikasi radio yang terdapat di Bali baik yang ada di Denpasar (RRI) maupun lewat Radio Global dan Radio Meganada yang terdapat di Kabupaten Tabanan sebagai daerah pinggiran kota provinsi Bali. Dipilihnya media ini, mengingat ketiga stasiun radio itu menggunakan media yang unik dalam mempertahankan bahasa Bali agar senantiasa menarik untuk diikuti oleh pendengar. Acara matembang interaktif ini dilakukan secara rutin mulai dari hari Senin sampai Sabtu dengan presenter terpilih di bidangnya. Berdasarkan pengamatan, bahasa Bali mampu dikomunikasikan dengan baik oleh penyiar dengan pendengarnya, baik menyangkut bahasa yang arkais (kuna) maupun bahasa modern dengan unsur serapannya. Secara keseluruhan, pemakaian bahasa Bali lewat ‘kidung interaktif’ tidak saja membantu pelestarian bahasa Bali tetapi juga menumbuhkan rasa bangga pada penuturnya dan sekaligus mengembangkan bahasa Bali dengan istilah‐istilah baru. Tampaknya ke depan, pemertahanan bahasa daerah se‐Nusantara mesti dilakukan dalam segala ranah, khususnya media komunikasi seperti radio dan televisi agar tidak tergerus oleh pengaruh globalisasi sebagaimana dilakukan dalam bahasa Bali.
VIOLENCE RECONSIDERED – BALINESE POLITICS BETWEEN TRADITION AND MODERNITY Convenor and Chair: Akihisa Matsuno, Osaka School of International Public Policy, Osaka University, Japan Discussant: Mr. Farid Hilmar, National University of Singapore, Singapore This panel aims to understand the nature of Balinese experiences in post‐independence politics, particularly in the 1960s, in the tradition‐modernity framework. While violence had been a routine part of politics in traditional or colonial Bali, post‐independence politics brought in new paradigms and methods to it. The newly emerged nationalist paradigm added a new dimension, but the realignment of groups, overshadowed by Cold War, was soon trapped into struggle over access to resources. The paper of Douglas Kammen re‐examines the political conflict and mass violence in Bali in 1965‐1966 by placing the PNI at the centre of analysis. It seeks to show how the conflict within and over the PNI at the national level played out in Bali during the first half of 1965 Bali in Global Asia: Between Modernization and Heritage Formation 16‐18 July 2012
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and how the peculiarities of PNI factionalism affected post‐1 October 1965 coalition building and the targets of mass violence. In doing so, the paper offers a number of challenges to the conventional portrayal of the counter‐revolution in Bali. The paper of Akihisa Matsuno argues that modus operandi used in the destruction of PKI in 1965‐1966 was very much modern in the sense that it was systematic, well‐organized and carried out with a clear command and mobilization. It reconstructs events from October to December 1965 to show what happened was a completely new experience of the Balinese society. The paper of John Roosa and Ayu Ratih is based on oral history interviews with eight widows and informal discussions with many more from a variety of regions in Bali. It describes how widows and fatherless children lived quietly in a society that enforced a silence on the discussion of the killings, and discusses their efforts to provide for their children, maintain their dignity, and properly honour their murdered husbands. Douglas Kammen, National University of Singapore, Singapore The PNI and Mass Violence in Bali, 1965‐1966 This paper seeks to contribute to our understanding of the political dynamics in Bali before and during the anti‐Communist pogroms of 1965‐1966 by examining the reporting in recently declassified US diplomatic telegrams. The information in these telegrams is often sketchy, based on second‐hand information, and leaves a great deal unexplained. Nevertheless, this material helps to sheds new light on the nature of political polarization both before and after the September 30th Movement. A close reading of the US diplomatic reports in tandem with other primary sources, the scant secondary literature and oral interviews reveals struggles within and over the Indonesian National Party (PNI). In focusing on the PNI, this paper shifts away from the victims of anti‐ Communist violence to focus on the political manoeuvring of Governor Sutedja and the right‐ and left‐wing factions of the PNI in Bali. Akihisa Matsuno, Osaka School of International Public Policy, Osaka University, Japan Prelude to Extermination ‐ October‐December 1965 in Bali The paper reconstructs events in Bali of the period from the immediate aftermath of the September 30 Movement to early December 1965 based on newspaper survey and witness accounts. The period starts with internal purge of Sukarnoists within security institutions such as military and police, and quickly comes to an outright persecution of communist party members and their sympathizers. Arrests and killings were carried out in a well‐organized manner as very much a modern operation with a clear command and systematic mobilization. They were not a result of a spontaneous reaction of community affected by traditional cultural notions. The image of commuity‐level's fighting in the description of the Balinese experience in 1965 does not fit facts, either, because in most cases perpetrators were brought in from a different community. Without security force's active command, such a mobilization would not have occurred. John Roosa, University of British Columbia, Canada Ayu Ratih, Indonesian Institute of Social History, Indonesia Trusting in Karma: Widows in Bali After 1965 Those killed in the mass violence in Bali in 1965‐66 were largely men. In the aftermath, the island was filled with tens of thousands of widows and fatherless children. They lived quietly in a society that enforced a silence on the discussion of the killings. Those whose loved ones had disappeared lived in a constant state of indecision as to whether to mourn a presumed death or hope for a future return. This paper is based on oral history interviews with eight widows and informal discussions with many more from a variety of regions in Bali. It discusses their efforts to provide for their children, maintain their dignity, and properly honour their murdered husbands.
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