Fort At Lio Mato And The Life Of Government, Brunei Connections And Brooke Histories

This paper takes the history of the Fort at Lio Mato, recorded as being built in 1911 during the time of Brooke Resident R.S. Douglas and events leading to its institution, through the voice of a Kelabit oral history. According to the Kelabit oral history, "the life of government," ulunperitah began in the time of Brunei rule in the Baram and continued with the establishment of the Fort at Lio Mato, opening of new routes for trade and new alliances gained by peacemaking. This oral history provides an opening to discuss two points: the perception of "the life of government" having its origins in the time of Brunei rule, the role of local people in the making of the fort. This shifts the historical emphasis away from Brooke records to a layered history at the frontier of the Ba ram district, which was the geographic and economic hinterland of Brunei before cession to the Brooke administration in 1882. This is a history not determined by territorial boundaries, but it is gleaned through people who moved freely across vast tracts of north-eastern Borneo

Becoming like us : Conversion and Penan-ness at Long Beruang, Sarawak

How did the Penan of Sarawak, East Malaysia stop their nomadic life and become settled farmers and retain their identity as Penan? This article presents the memories of settled Kelabit and the neighbouring Penan of a time when they were reluctant to meet one another, when the Penan were nomadic. Their lifestyles were very different: the Penan were wary of outsiders, and the Kelabit children were scared of the Penan. The processes which brought about change between these two groups were motivated by the Kelabit urge to evangelise to the Penan. They began meeting and sharing food. Gradually, the Kelabit farmers encouraged the Penan ‘to become like us’, to settle as their neighbours at Long Beruang and become Christians like them. Eventually the Penan became successful padi-farmers and made their livelihood from both the forest where they hunted and foraged and from the padi fields where they grew rice. However, this did not lead to the assimilation of the Penan by the Kelabit but to a greater deliberate expression of Penan identity. This appears to be in keeping with phenomena elsewhere in the world, which suggest that when an ethnic group is under threat from external forces and assimilation, people assert their ethnic identity

Stones and Power in the Kelapang: Indigeneity and Kelabit and Ngurek Narratives

There are traces of early settlement in the lower Kelapang River in Sarawak, Borneo indicated through stone graves, menhirs and stone mounds. Recollections of histories of these sites by the local Christian Kelabit population are hazy, and until the recent resurgence of interest in the stone culture in the area, people were reluctant to visit these places as they were associated with death and the spirit world. A contemporary Kelabit narrative outlines previous occupation of the area with the Ngurek as ‘our people’, and paradoxically states that the Kelabit alone built the stone monuments. This in line with other claims in the highlands of an exclusive association with the stone culture, and can be understood as one of latent indigeneity as it highlights attachment to territory and excludes other groups. Parallel Ngurek narratives in circulation link their settlement in the Kelapang to a time when the Ngurek had supernatural power that enabled them to cut stone. These stories also explain the loss of this supernatural power, the decline of the culture of stone grave and mounds, and the reduction of their population after the Ngurek community left the area. Exploring the gap between parallel accounts of histories in the area creates a future opening for a more dynamic heterogeneous history of the Kelabit highlands and the stone culture. This indicates a need for reconsideration of notions of indigeneity and identity

The Story of Lun Tauh, "Our People": Narrating Identity on the Borders in the Kelabit Highlands

"Stories across Borders: Myths of Origin and Their Contestation in the Borderlands of South and Southeast Asia" edited by Monica Janowski and Erik de MaakerThis article shows, through a historical narrative set in precolonial times in Sarawak, Borneo, how people think of themselves in two contrasting ways, one fluid and one more fixed. The first is lun tauh, which means "our people." This presents a fluid, inclusive identity through the course of warfare, alliances, and migrations across watersheds and borders. It differs from the second way in which the narrative presents people as thinking of themselves—with the ethnic label "Kelabit, " which came into use with the colonial state. The article goes on to investigate how the relational concept of lun tauh and the reified notion of "being Kelabit" coexist with and interrogate one another and contribute to the identities of peoples who transcend national borders and undergo processes of division and separation across natural boundaries, be they rivers, rapids, or ridges. The notion of lun tauh shows that alternatives to bounded exclusive ethnic identities are particularly evident in the borderlands, demonstrating that cultural identities transcend ethnic constructs and territorial borders. This leads to a different way of looking at ethnicity, which is focused less on discrete groups and more on the construction of social identities on the basis of context. The two forms of identity—the fixed reified notion of "being Kelabit" and the wider inclusivity of lun tauh—coexist as strategies for survival for a marginal people, operating at different levels. The narrative demonstrates how local perceptions of ethnicities and identities are bound up with ways for creating larger groups, creating allies, remembering kin across borders, and struggles to claim territory

A History of Lun Tauh Our People at the Borders of the Kelabit Highlands : from Warfare to the Life of Government and to the Life of Christianity

The Kelabit are about to forget their past. This is because since embracing evangelical Christianity in the 1940s, they no longer recite epics, legends or narratives relating to warfare, headhunting and their previous belief-system. This thesis provides an unprecedented insight into Kelabit values and their worldview through the recital of three historical narratives from a longhouse on the edge of the Kelabit highlands, located in northern Sarawak, one of the East Malaysian states on the island of Borneo. The first narrative is about warfare and the migrations of lun tauh, “our people.” The second is about the life of government and the third story is about the life of Christian prayer. The aim of this study is to provide a context and understanding of the purpose of the headman-narrator in telling the narratives using an anthropological approach to deal with his subjectivity. The research problem is to establish the meanings of these three oral historical narratives, of three different episodes in longhouse history, which the narrator calls “stories of history” cerita sejarah. Geertz’ interpretative approach using the process of “jungle fieldwork,” entails letting the narratives shape the research journey. Although these three narratives are about episodes that mark transformational change, I argue that there is an underlying continuity uncovered through the value system which prizes the quality of doo’- ness, goodness, or prestige which is both inherited at birth and acquired through effort. This provides an opportunity for an analysis of the mobility (iyuk) of value which continuously generates the standards of doo’-ness which enhance social relationships and provide the means for the bringing together and consolidation of lun tauh, “our people”. Furthermore, another continuity through the narratives is the voice of the headman-narrator who urges for the conventional values of unity and peace in the longhouse at a time when his authority is facing challenges. In the process, I uncover another common thread that runs through each of the three narratives, the quest for the good life, ulun nuk doo’. In the first narrative, this is at Long Di’it where “our people,” lun tauh find the soil is fertile for abundant harvests of rice. In the second narrative, the good life is living the life of government, with consensus in the community, reinforced by the values of peace-making. In the final narrative, the good life comes in the era of the life of prayer; a time that is free from omens, a time of change, yet a time for extended sociality and living close to the Penan. This is history garnered through the value indigenous people give to their experiences, which is unlike national and post-colonial histories that represent people on the margins as the helpless victims of colonial power. This approach to history can only be fulfilled by using oral histories which demonstrate how indigenous peoples manage their lives through their value system and how these perceptions account for their actions. This affirms their agency and their capacity to impact episodes of history

Gender analysis: Shifting cultivation and indigenous people

In this chapter, we focus on gender issues within shifting-cultivation systems, particularly those demonstrating farming innovations and improved fallow management. We have mined our own field experiences, the relevant literature and materials from this volume in order to draw conclusions, in the expectation that these conclusions will inform future research and the application of more gender responsive programming and policy