Modernity and Malaysia: Settling the Menraq Forest Nomads (The Modern Anthropology of Southeast Asia)

215 Pages·2007·2.34 MB·English

by  Alberto Gomes

Chapter title i
Modernity and Malaysia
Bringing together over thirty years of detailed ethnographic research on
the Menraq of Malaysia, this fascinating book analyses and documents the
experience of development and modernization in tribal communities.
Descendents of hunter-gatherers who have inhabited Southeast Asia for
about 40,000 years, the Menraq (also known as Semang or Negritos) were
nomadic foragers until they were resettled in a Malaysian government-
mandated settlement in 1972. Modernity and Malaysia begins with the ‘Jeli
Incident’ in which several Menraq were alleged to have killed three Malays,
members of the dominant ethnic group in the country. Alberto Gomes links
this uncharacteristic violence to Menraq experiences of Malaysian-style
modernity that have left them displaced, depressed, discontented, and dis-
illusioned. Tracing the transformation of the lives of Menraq resulting from
resettlement, development, and various ‘civilizing projects’, this book exam-
ines how the encounter with modernity has led the subsistence-oriented,
relatively autonomous Menraq into a life of dependence on the state and
the market.
Challenging conventional social scientific understanding of concepts such
as modernity and marginalization, and providing empirical material for
comparison with the experience of modernity for indigenous peoples around
the world, Modernity and Malaysia is a valuable resource for students and
scholars of anthropology, development studies and indigenous studies, as
well as those with a more general interest in Asian studies.
Alberto G. Gomes is Senior Lecturer and Program Convenor of Sociology
and Anthropology at La Trobe University, Australia. His books include
Looking for Money (COAC and Trans Pacific Press, 2004) and Malaysia and
the Original People (with R. Dentan, K. Endicott, and M. B. Hooker, Allyn
and Bacon, 1997).
ii Modernity and Malaysia
The Modern Anthropology of Southeast Asia
Editors
Victor T. King, University of Hull
Michael Hitchcock, London Metropolitan University
The books in this Series incorporate basic ethnographic description into a
wider context of responses to development, globalisation and change. Each
book embraces broadly the same concerns, but the emphasis in each differs
as authors choose to concentrate on specific dimensions of change or work
out particular conceptual approaches to the issues of development. Areas of
concern include nation-building, technological innovations in agriculture,
rural-urban migration, the expansion of industrial and commercial employ-
ment, the rapid increase in cultural and ethnic tourism, the consequences of
deforestation and environmental degradation, the ‘modernisation of tradi-
tion’, ethnic identity and conflict, and the religious transformation of society.
The Modern Anthropology of Southeast Asia: An Introduction
Victor T. King & William D. Wilder
The Changing Village Environment in the Southeast
Applied anthropology and environment reclamation in the northern
Philippines
Ben J. Wallace
The Changing World of Bali
Religion, society and tourism
Leo Howe
Modernity and Malaysia
Settling the Menraq forest nomads
Alberto G. Gomes
Chapter title iii
Modernity and Malaysia
Settling the Menraq forest nomads
Alberto G. Gomes
iv Modernity and Malaysia
First published 2007 by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
By Routledge
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Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group,
an informa business
© 2007 Alberto G. Gomes
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library,2007.
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All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
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information storage or retrieval system, without permission in
Writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from
the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Gomes, Alberto G., 1954–
Modernity and Malaysia : settling the Menraq forest
nomads / Alberto Gomes.
p. cm. – (Modern anthropology of Southeast Asia series)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Indigenous peoples–Land tenure–Malaysia–Kelantan.
2. Indigenous peoples–Malaysia–Kelantan–Social conditions.
3. Indigenous peoples–Malaysia–Kelantan–Government
relations. 4. Kelantan–Ethnic relations. 5. Kelantan–Social
conditions. I. Title.
GN635.M4.G66 2007
306.095951–dc22
2006039594
ISBN0–203–96075–0 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN10: 0-415-42253-1 (hbk)
ISBN10: 0-203-96075-0 (ebk)
ISBN13: 978-0-415-42253-6 (hbk)
ISBN13: 978-0-203-96075-2 (ebk)
Chapter title v
Contents
List of illustrations viii
Preface x
List of Abbreviations xiii
1 Introduction 1
The Jeli incident 1
Tribal communities in the modern world 3
The violence of modernity 5
Modernizing Rual 6
Field research 7
Chapter outline 8
2 Social and cultural milieu 10
‘Layer cake versus marble cake’: ethnic classification 11
The question of identity: who are the Orang Asli? 16
Who are the Menraq? 18
The ‘Semang’ social pattern 25
Egalitarianism, personal autonomy, and headmanship 30
‘We people’ versus ‘strangers’: interpersonal relations 31
Gender relations 35
Spatialized consciousness 36
Deities, shamans, and the supernatural realm:
Menraq religion 38
Conclusion 40
3 Modernity, development, and tribal communities 41
Modernity 42
Development 43
Malaysian modernity 46
vvii MCoondteernntisty and Malaysia
Agricultural modernization 51
Modernity and tribal communities 52
Development for the Orang Asli, then and now 56
Summary 61
4 Rual Resettlement 63
States and sedentarization 63
Orang Asli resettlement 65
The Rual Resettlement 71
Settlement pattern and spatial organization 79
Rual demography 83
Social and political re-organization 89
Plans for the future 90
Summary 91
5 Menraq as foragers 93
Opportunistic foragers 94
Gathering 96
Hunting 98
Fishing 102
Forest collecting and trading 105
Wage labour 109
Swidden farming 110
Generalized reciprocity 111
Summary 114
6 From foragers to commodity producers 115
Resettlement economy: a tool of development 116
Rubber and oil palm cultivation 117
Animal husbandry and fish farming 119
‘Greening’ the village 120
Ecological changes 121
Dependent economy 123
Commodity production, commoditization,
and market dependence 124
Commoditization and the practice of sharing 127
Privatization of ownership 130
Social differentiation 131
Gender inequality 135
Summary 138
ChaCptoenrt etinttles vviiii
7 Social and cultural change 140
Education 140
Cultural modification 146
Islamization 148
Displacement and spatial re-ordering 153
Health, nutrition and disease 157
Electronic media invasion 162
Summary 163
8 Conclusion 165
The Menraq 165
Modernity 167
Modernization 168
Marginality 168
Mobilization 169
The Jeli incident revisited 170
Glossary 172
Notes 175
Bibliography 182
Index 195
viii Modernity and Malaysia
Illustrations
Plates
1 Traditional Menraq lean-to shelter (1976) 28
2 Manok Hamlet at Rual Resettlement (1979) 28
3 The main section of Rual Resettlement in 1975 73
4 Rual Resettlement in 1978 74
5 Rual Resettlement in 1979 74
6 Menraq taking advantage of the relative coolness under
a house (1979) 75
7 A section of Rual Resettlement in 1987 75
8 A section of Rual Resettlement in 2006 76
9 Menraq woman returning from gathering firewood (1979) 97
10 Two Menraq women gathering vegetables (1979) 97
11 Menraq man with fishing cast net (1979) 103
12 Menraq selling rubber sheets to RISDA officer (1987) 118
13 Timber trucks passing through Rual Resettlement (1979) 123
14 Menraq family ‘on the move’ (2002) 133
15 A government-built concrete house next to a traditional
bamboo-walled house at Rual (2006) 133
16 Menraq women and children (2006) 137
17 Menraq school children with food rations (1976) 142
18 Rual School (1979) 143
19 Rual School (2006) 143
20 Menraq walking along road at Rual Resettlement (2002) 147
21 Surau (Prayer House) at Rual (2006) 151
22 Menraq house at Manok Hamlet. Note the satellite dish
on the roof-top (2006) 163
Figures
4.1 Rual Menraq population, 1978 85
4.2 Rual Menraq population, 1988 85
4.3 Rual Menraq population, 1998 86
CIlhlaupsttreart itoitnles iixx
Maps
2.1 Location of Orang Asli groups in Peninsular Malaysia 15
4.1 Location of Rual Resettlement 72
4.2 Places of origin of various bands at Rual Resettlement (1972) 77
4.3 Map of Rual Resettlement (1978) 80
4.4 Map of Rual Resettlement (1988) 81
4.5 Map of Rual Resettlement (1999) 82
Tables
2.1 Orang Asli population by linguistic affiliation 14
4.1 Age and sex composition of Rual Menraq population (1978) 83
4.2 Age and sex composition of Rual Menraq population (1988) 84
4.3 Age and sex composition of Rual Menraq population (1998) 84
4.4 Rual Menraq fertility levels for 1978, 1988 and 1998 86
4.5 Number of children born to living ever-married women, 1978,
1988 and 1998 87
4.6 Number of live births to post-reproductive (> 45 years)
Menraq women 87
4.7 Surviving children of post-reproductive Menraq women 89
4.8 Comparison of surviving children with total liveborn children
per post-reproductive woman 89