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A traffic in Songket: Translocal Malay identities in Sambas

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 May 2010

Wendy Mee
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Abstract

This paper uses the example of songket to explore translocal Malay cultural processes in Sambas, West Kalimantan. I argue these intra-Malay cultural exchanges reframe selected Sambas Malay cultural forms as Malay ‘cultural heritage’, making it difficult to view cultural practices in purely localised terms. Consequently, many cultural forms lose their localised normative values and become aspects of a wider cultural heritage to be preserved, performed and consumed. The paper begins with a discussion of the historical, political and social grounds that forge a sense of translocalism amongst many Sambas Malays. Building on this, the more specific interest in participating in intra-regional Malay cultural exchanges is explained with reference to commodification, internationalisation and institutionalisation.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Southeast Asian Studies , Volume 41 , Issue 2 , June 2010 , pp. 321 - 339
Copyright
Copyright © The National University of Singapore 2010

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References

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7 See also Andaya, Leonard Y., ‘The search for the “origins” of Melayu’, in Contesting Malayness: Malay identity across boundaries, ed. Barnard, Timothy P. (Singapore: Singapore University Press, 2006)Google Scholar. Much of the discussion of the early history of Malayness overlooks Brunei in its focus on Melaka and Palembang. Yet in the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries, before the decisive blow to the region's sultanates following European conquests, Brunei's power extended over the coastal regions of modern-day Sarawak and Sabah, the Sulu archipelago, and the islands off the northwest tip of Borneo. The reign of the fifth sultan, Bolkiah (1485–1521), is often marked as Brunei's ‘golden age’. When the first Europeans visited Brunei in 1521 as part of Ferdinand Magellan's expedition, the navigator Antonio Pigafetta recorded how they rode to visit the sultan on top of ‘two elephants covered with silk’ and described the ‘king's palace’ in the following terms: ‘we entered a large hall full of barons and lords, where we were seated on carpets … At the head and end of this hall was another one, higher but not so large, and all hung with silk drapery, and from it two windows with crimson curtains opened, by which light entered the hall. 300 naked men were standing there with swords and sharp stakes poised at their thigh to guard the king’. See Pigafetta, Antonia, Magellan's voyage: A narrative account of the first circumnavigation, trans. and ed. Skelton, R.A. (Courier Dover Publications, 1994), p. 101Google Scholar.

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10 Franz Schulze (ch. 3) discusses the five Sambas manuscripts known to be in existence: Brandes 156 (Museum Pusat Jakarta); Von de Wall 198A (Museum Pusat Jakarta); Von de Wall 198B (Museum Pusat Jakarta); Schoemann V.25 (Staatsbibliothek Preußlischer Kulturbesitz Berlin) and Cod.Or. 6762 (Bibliotheek der Rijksuniversiteit te Leiden). According to Schulze (p. 201), information on the authorship and date of these manuscripts is difficult as only one manuscript provides this, i.e., Br. 156, which was written in 1853 by one H. Khairuddin bin H. Kamaruddin, a resident of Kampung Angus of Bugis descent, in the service of the Sultan AbuBakr Tajuddin. Schulze (p. 202) also discerns a difference between those manuscripts which emphasise links with Brunei over links to the earlier kingdoms of Sambas and Sukadana. See Schulze, Fritz, Die Chroniken von Sambas und Mempawah: Einheimische Quellen zur Geschichte West-Kalimantans [The chronicles of Sambas and Mempawah: Indigenous sources of the history of West Kalimantan] (Heidelburg: Julius Groos Verlag, 1991)Google Scholar.

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15 Based on the recent evaluation in the National Mid-Term Development Plan 2004–2009 (Rencana Pembangunan Jangka Menengah Nasional 2004–2009), Sambas is one of nine regencies in West Kalimantan identified as ‘daerah tertinggal’ (or underdeveloped / backward district) (Pontianak Post, 3 Apr. 2009), p. 21. See also, Badan Pusat Statistik Kabupaten Sambas, , Kabupaten Sambas dalam angka / Sambas Regency in figures (Sambas: Pemerintah Kabupaten Sambas, 2007)Google Scholar.

16 Kahn, Other Malays, p. 82

17 This is not to suggest that people in Malaysia receive Sambas Malays in the same way. On the contrary, there is evidence that there has been a decline in the level of recognition of Indonesian Malays as fellow Malays on the part of Malaysian Malays. Indonesians are increasingly viewed as ‘foreign Islamic nationals’, thus over-shadowing an earlier post-colonial openness towards Muslim Indonesians as ‘Malay co-ethnics’. See Spaan, Ernst, van Naerssen, Ton and Kohl, Gerard, ‘Re-imagining borders: Malay identity and Indonesian migrants in Malaysia, Tijdschrift voor economische en sociale geografie, 93, 2 (2002): 160–72CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

18 For more detailed discussions of the causes and chronology of the violence in Sambas see Peluso, Nancy L. and Harwell, E., ‘Territory, custom and the cultural politics of ethnic war in West Kalimantan’, in Violent environments, ed. Peluso, N.L. and Watts, M. (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2001)Google Scholar and Davidson, James S., ‘The politics of violence on an Indonesian periphery’, Southeast Asia Research, 11, 1 (2003): 59–89Google Scholar. There is not enough space here to discuss the ways in which culture has also been deployed in the aftermath of this conflict. On the one hand, I have observed how reference to Malay culture is used to denounce this violence as not in keeping with the core values of budaya Melayu or ‘Malay culture’. On the other hand, I have also been told that repeated transgressions against ‘Malay culture’ by Madurese provoked a form of defensive violence not unknown in Malay history. For a fascinating discussion of how the West Kalimantan Dayak Customary Law Bureau sought to explain Dayak violence in terms of a distinction between adat (a tradition of warfare and related supernatural beliefs) and religion (the lack of exposure to Christian beliefs), see Schiller, Anne and Garang, Bambang, ‘Religion and inter-ethnic violence in Indonesia’, Journal of Contemporary Asia, 32, 2 (2002): 244–54CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

19 Fahmi, Urai Riza, Selayang pandang: Kerajaan Islam Sambas (Sambas: Istana Alwatzikhoebillah Sambas, 2008, 6th edn), p. 54Google Scholar.

20 Sambas, Kabupaten, Serajah kesultanan dan pemerintahan daerah (Sambas: DINAS Parawisata Pemerintah Kabupaten Sambas, 2001), p. 199Google Scholar.

21 Urai Riza Fahmi, Selayang pandang, p. 57.

22 Singkawang became the capital of the Regency of Sambas in 1953 and remained so until 1999 despite many attempts to have this decision reversed (Kabupaten Sambas, Serajah kesultanan dan pemerintahan daerah, pp. 193–99).

23 Kabupaten Sambas, Serajah kesultanan dan pemerintahan daerah, p. 196.

24 Ibid.

25 Giddens, Anthony, Modernity and self-identity: Self and society in the late modern age (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1991)Google Scholar.

26 Picard, Michel, ‘Touristification and Balinization in a time of reformasi’, Indonesia and the Malay World, 31, 89 (2003): 108–18CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

27 Rituals and practices here would include those associated with the agricultural calendar (e.g., antar ajung and bangas tahun), rituals performed following a period of danger or bad luck (e.g., tulak bala), sampan bedar (rowing boat) regattas to mark important festival days such as Aidl Fitri, and ceremonies associated with the life-cycle such as mandi buang-buang. This is not to deny that for some people many of these rituals and cultural practices still retain great spiritual and cultural legitimacy. Also, it is important to note that not all Sambas Malays necessarily practised such rites in the past, as there is considerable diversity of practice and belief across Sambas Malays — something that the notion of cultural heritage tends to elide.

28 Hitchcock, Michael and King, Victor T., ‘Discourses with the past: Tourism and heritage in Southeast Asia’, Indonesia and the Malay World, 31, 89 (2003): 5CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

29 As discussed by Rodgers, Susan, Summerfield, Anne and Summerfield, John, Gold cloths of Sumatra: Indonesia's songkets from ceremony to commodity (Leiden: KITLV Press, 2007)Google Scholar.

30 For a discussion of other Indonesian examples see Revival of tradition in Indonesian politics: The deployment of adat from colonialism to indigenism, ed. Jamie Davidson and David Henley (New York and London: Routledge Press, 2007).

31 Surahman, ‘Pengaruh pemberian kredit PT. Bank Negara Indonesia (PERSERO) terhadap produk pengrajin kain tenun adat Sambas di Kecematan Sambas’ (M.A. Thesis, Fakultas Keguruan dan Ilmu Pendidikan, Universitas Tanjungpura, Pontianak, 2000).

32 See Uchimo, Megumi, ‘Socio-cultural history of Palembang songket’, Indonesia and the Malay World, 33, 96 (2005): 205–23CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kerlogue, Fiona,‘Jambi batik: A Malay tradition?’, Indonesia and the Malay World, 33, 96 (2005): 183–204CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Rodgers, Susan, Summerfield, Anne and Summerfield, John, Gold cloths of Sumatra: Indonesia's songkets from ceremony to commodity (Leiden: KITLV Press, 2007)Google Scholar.

33 Kerlogue, Fiona, ‘Interpreting textiles as a medium of communication: Cloth and community in Malay Sumatra’, Asian Studies Review, 24, 3 (2000): 335–47CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The one exception here would be the songet worn by the Pangeran Ratu (and his wife) on formal occasions and in formal photographs, which is made of yellow silk with silver thread.

34 It remains unclear when Brunei's elites first defined themselves as ‘Malay’. According to Anthony Reid, it was relatively late in comparison to other Malay kingdoms, suggesting the influence of British classificatory systems on their self-identification as Malay. See Anthony Reid, ‘Understanding Melayu’, p. 22. It has also been argued that this proclamation is ideological and politically motivated to legitimate the sultan's political control. See Talib, Naimah, ‘A resilient monarchy: The Sultanate of Brunei and regime legitimacy in an era of democratic nation-states’, New Zealand Journal of Asian Studies, 4, 2 (2002): 134–47Google Scholar.

35 I was able to confirm weavers' comments as well as see their work situation for myself when I visited Brunei in August 2009.

36 I have translated the word serantau as diasporic as there is no English word that adequately covers the meaning of serantau. The word is related to the verb merantau (‘to migrate / leave one's home’) and to the word rantau (which can mean ‘shoreline’ and ‘abroad’). The word serantau therefore connotes a group of people with the same cultural / ethnic origins who have travelled over water in search of a better life but who still retain a sense of their common origins.

37 For a discussion of a similar initiative in Makassar, South Sulawesi, see Morrell, Elizabeth, ‘Strengthening the local in national reform: A cultural approach to political change’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 32, 3 (2001): 437–49CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

38 Personal communication, Abdi Nurkamil Mawardi (June 2008).

39 Worden, Nigel, ‘National identity and heritage tourism in Melaka’, Indonesia and the Malay World, 31, 89 (2003): 31CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

40 Andaya, ‘The search for the “origins” of Melayu’, p. 56.

41 As expressed in one newspaper heading: ‘Bukti seni budaya Melayu Kalbar diakui dunia: Potret penerima penghargaan pelestari budaya dari PM Malaysia’ [Evidence West Kalimantan Malay arts and culture acknowledge by the world: Portrait of a recipient of an award for the preservation of culture from the Prime Minister of Malaysia] (Pontianak Post, 24 Nov. 2007, p. 22).

42 PERINDAGKOP, DINAS, ‘Laporan utama’, Buletin Ekonomi (Sambas: Pemerintah Kabupaten Sambas, 2005), p. 7Google Scholar.

43 Mempawah is a city in the Pontianak Regency of West Kalimantan and the earlier seat of the Mempawah sultanate.

44 Anthony Reid, ‘Understanding Melayu’, pp. 22–3.