Heritage tourism in southeast Asia

HERITAGE TOURISM IN SOUTHEAST ASIA michael hitchcock, victor t. king and michael parnwell (eds) www.niaspress.dk Heritage_NIAS-pbk.indd 1 04/06/2010 12:14 HERITAGE TOURISM IN SOUTHEAST ASIA Prelims_Heritage.indd 1 09/06/2010 14:32 RELATED TITLES FROM NIAS PRESS The Sociology of Southeast Asia. Transformations in a Developing Region by Victor T. King Tourism in Southeast Asia. Challenges and New Directions edited by Michael Hitchcock, Victor T. King & Michael Parnwell NIAS Press is the autonomous publishing arm of NIAS – Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, a research institute located at the University of Copenhagen. NIAS is partially funded by the governments of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden via the Nordic Council of Ministers, and works to encourage and support Asian studies in the Nordic countries. In so doing, NIAS has been publishing books since 1969, with more than two hundred titles produced in the past few years. COPENHAGEN UNIVERSITY Prelims_Heritage.indd 2 Nordic Council of Ministers 09/06/2010 14:32 Heritage tourism in soutHeast asia edited by michael Hitchcock, Victor t. King and michael Parnwell Prelims_Heritage.indd 3 09/06/2010 14:32 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Edited by Michael Hitchcock, Victor T. King and Michael Parnwell First published in 2010 by NIAS Press NIAS – Nordic Institute of Asian Studies Leifsgade 33, DK-2300 Copenhagen S, Denmark tel (+45) 3532 9501 • fax (+45) 3532 9549 email: [email protected] • website: www.niaspress.dk Simultaneously published in the United States by the University of Hawai‘i Press © NIAS – Nordic Institute of Asian Studies 2010 While copyright in the volume as a whole is vested in the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, copyright in the individual chapters belongs to their authors. No chapter may be reproduced in whole or in part without the express permission of the publisher. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Heritage tourism in Southeast Asia. 1. Heritage tourism—Southeast Asia. I. Hitchcock, Michael. II. King, Victor T. III. Parnwell, Mike. 338.4’79159-dc22 ISBN: 978-87-7694-059-1 Hbk ISBN: 978-87-7694-060-7 Pbk Typeset by NIAS Press Printed in Singapore by Mainland Press Pte Ltd Prelims_Heritage.indd 4 09/06/2010 14:32 CONTENTS Preface and Acknowledgements • vii Contributors • xi Chapter 1: Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia • 1 Michael Hitchcock, Victor T. King and Michael J. G. Parnwell Chapter 2: Courting and Consorting with the Global: the Local Politics of an Emerging World Heritage Site in Sulawesi, Indonesia • 28 Kathleen M. Adams Chapter 3: The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan • 49 Mami Yoshimura and Geoffrey Wall Chapter 4: Outdoor Ethnographic Museums, Tourism and Nation Building in Southeast Asia • 72 Michael Hitchcock and Nick Stanley Chapter 5: Histories, Tourism and Museums: Re-making Singapore • 83 Can-Seng Ooi Chapter 6: World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia: Angkor and Beyond • 103 Keiko Miura Chapter 7: National Identity and Heritage Tourism in Melaka • 130 Nigel Worden Chapter 8: Interpreters of Space, Place and Cultural Practice: Processes of Change through Tourism, Conservation, and Development in George Town, Penang, Malaysia • 147 Gwynn Jenkins Chapter 9: Aspiring to the ‘Tourist Gaze’: Selling the Past, Longing for the Future at the World Heritage Site of Hue, Vietnam • 173 Mark Johnson Chapter 10: Vietnam’s Heritage Attractions in Transition • 202 Wantanee Suntikul, Richard Butler and David Airey v Prelims_Heritage.indd 5 09/06/2010 14:32 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Chapter 11: Handicraft Heritage and Development in Hai Duong, Vietnam • 221 Michael Hitchcock, Nguyen Thi Thu Huong and Simone Wesner Chapter 12: Tourism and Natural Heritage Management in Vietnam and Thailand • 236 Michael J. G. Parnwell Chapter 13: Heritage Futures • 264 Michael Hitchcock, Victor T. King and Michael J. G. Parnwell Bibliography • 274 Index • 309 Figures 3.1: Map of Taiwan showing location of Wulai • 50 3.2: Diagram to represent shifts in multiple identities • 55 3.3: Determinants of the nature of the Atayal’s multiple identities: before 1895 • 58 3.4: An Atayal woman with facial tattoo • 59 3.5: Shifts in the Atayal’s multiple identities: after Japanese colonization, 1895–1945 • 61 3.6: Shifts in the Atayal’s multiple identities: after tourism development, 1945–1990 • 64 3.7: Shifts in the Atayal’s multiple identities: after the rise of democracy in Taiwan and the decline in international tourism in Wulai, 1990 to the present • 68 3.8: Atayal women and a Han Chinese man with facial tattoo stickers • 69 8.1: Map of George Town • 151 12.1: Typical Ha Long Bay landscape • 242 12.2: Ha Long Bay, Vietnam • 243 12.3: Phang Nga Bay, Thailand • 252 Tables 1.1: UNESCO world cultural and natural heritage sites in Southeast Asia • 8 5.1: The Orient responds through the national museums of Singapore: de-orientalism, re-orientalism and reverse orientalism • 100 8.1: Market mix of tourist arrivals, Penang: January–September 2004 and January–September 2005 • 157 vi Prelims_Heritage.indd 6 09/06/2010 14:32 Preface and acknowledgements The lengthy lead in time of this volume on heritage tourism in Southeast Asia requires a word of explanation. Several of the chapters that comprise this collection were originally scheduled to be part of our edited volume, Tourism in Southeast Asia: Challenges and New Directions (NIAS and University of Hawai‘i Press, 2009), but the manuscript ended up being unwieldy and the publishers asked us to prune it. It was a dilemma that had a happy outcome since the publishers agreed to consider a second volume based around the four chapters on heritage tourism in the original manuscript. These chapters were sufficiently interconnected and coherent that they could be lifted out to form the core of a second volume, to which new papers were added. The first volume could then be published with much less difficulty. In this regard we are endlessly grateful to those who agreed to accept a delay in the publication of their papers until we could assemble a companion volume and who permitted us, at relatively short notice, to transfer their work to the heritage tourism book. We have to bear in mind that we began the whole process of assembling and editing the long-awaited sequel to our Tourism in South-East Asia (1993) as long ago as 2005; the delay in publishing the four heritage papers has therefore been considerable. Our sincere thanks must therefore go to Gywnn Jenkins, Mark Johnson, Keiko Miura and Nick Stanley for being so cooperative in allowing us to address our dilemma and in helping us embark on what we believed to be the most constructive way forward. Having said this, and in duly recognizing the obvious delay in publication, the heritage volume is not without a certain rationale and in the event, in our view, the enterprise has proved to have turned out very successfully indeed. vii Prelims_Heritage.indd 7 09/06/2010 14:32 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Two of the co-editors (Hitchcock and King) had already edited a special issue of the journal Indonesia and the Malay World (IMW) (2003a) on the theme of what we, and Ian Glover, referred to then as ‘discourses with the past’, and it seemed to us that we could develop several of the issues which had already been raised and debated in that publication. We therefore had the basis for a much more extended and detailed consideration of the political, economic and socio-cultural contexts within which heritage and the tourism activities associated with it have been developing in the region. More especially what had become very clear to all three co-editors in preparing the first volume was that we needed to devote much more attention to the significance for Southeast Asian governments of UNESCO World Heritage Sites (WHS) and the conflicting pressures, interests and agendas which were being brought to bear on these sites, as well as on the ways in which heritage, whether recognized by UNESCO or not, was becoming a very central element in the promotion of tourism in the region and in the construction and transformation of identities (national, ethnic and local). Three of the four papers which we transferred to the heritage volume focused on globally significant UNESCO sites: Johnson on Hue, Miura on Angkor and Jenkins on the recently designated historic centre of George Town on Pulau Pinang (which along with Melaka was designated as Malaysia’s third WHS in 2008). Incidentally Gwynn Jenkins had also contributed a co-authored paper on George Town to our special journal issue of 2003. Our earlier foray into heritage studies in Southeast Asia has also enabled us to develop a network of researchers, some of whom we could call on at short notice to provide chapters for our new volume. We therefore commissioned and edited several new papers for this second book in addition to writing an extended editorial introduction and an accompanying conclusion, a process which has taken us well over two years to complete. Two of the co-editors stepped in to write chapters afresh in Heritage Tourism: Mike Parnwell has contributed a chapter on natural heritage sites by comparing the WHS of Ha Long Bay in northern Vietnam with a similar but nondesignated site, Phang Nga Bay, in southern Thailand, and Mike Hitchcock along with fellow researchers Nguyen Thi Thu Huong and Simone Wesner, who had worked with him on a field project in northern Vietnam, have given an overview and analysis of some of their fieldwork findings on handicraft industries and tourism in Hai Duong. Some colleagues who had contributed to our 2003 special issue also came forward with chapters for viii Prelims_Heritage.indd 8 09/06/2010 14:32 Preface and Acknowledgements this current book: Nigel Worden kindly agreed that we could include his previously published paper on the theme of heritage tourism in Melaka and Malay-Malaysian national identity (with some revisions and updating by Victor King); Can-Seng Ooi who has been working on the role and use of museums in the construction and reconstruction of Singaporean national identity stepped in at very short notice; and Kathleen Adams has provided us with a substantially revised and updated chapter, based on her 2003 publication, on the local political issues surrounding moves to secure UNESCO World Heritage listing for the Toraja hamlet of Ke´te´ Kesu´ and the wider Torajaland. We were also able to call on fellow researchers who had worked with us before and who had contributed to the conference (and the book which emerged from it) which was organised by the three co-editors and Janet Cochrane of Leeds Metropolitan University in June 2006 in Leeds (see Janet Cochrane, Asian Tourism: Growth and Change, 2008, Oxford and Amsterdam: Elsevier Ltd). Drawing on this circle of contacts we asked Wantanee Suntikul (with Richard Butler and David Airey) to offer us a chapter on the recent work that they had completed on Vietnamese heritage in Hanoi. Finally, and at a very late stage in the editing process, Geoff Wall enquired whether we would be interested in seeking a publisher for a study which one of his postgraduate students, Mami Yoshimura, had undertaken on the cultural heritage of the Atayal of Wulai in Taiwan, a minority group with cultural affinities to Southeast Asian populations. We took advantage of their generous offer and invited them to submit a co-authored chapter. Aside from this current edited book, another positive result of the collaboration on heritage tourism in Southeast Asia which will carry forward some of the issues raised in this volume is the recently launched British Academy-funded three-year research project (2009-2011) undertaken by the three co-editors and Janet Cochrane on ‘The Management of World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia: Cross-cultural Perspectives’. Examining eighteen sites across Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines, the research team will address several major research questions which, among others, focus on the different perspectives on these sites held by the different users and stakeholders, the problems and opportunities involved in managing and developing WHS, and the impacts on them and local communities of increasing tourism pressures. A further word of thanks is due. Of course it goes without saying that we are most grateful for the patience and understanding of our contributors ix Prelims_Heritage.indd 9 09/06/2010 14:32 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia and the very constructive way in which they have supported us in bringing this volume to press. But we would also like to express our special thanks to Gerald Jackson and his team at NIAS Press for the extremely positive and helpful approach they have adopted in ensuring that both our tourism volumes have at last appeared in print. They have gone beyond the call of duty. From what started as a proposal for one ‘longish’ book we have managed to achieve much more in producing two volumes. But because the second edited collection was conceived in and was born and grew from the first we hope that readers will appreciate that there is advantage in considering them ‘in companionship’ as a two-volume set. Despite the enormous effort and time expended by all concerned in producing these two books we think that it has been worth while bringing into the public domain a wide range of established, ongoing and recent research on tourism in Southeast Asia and setting out several potential research agendas for the next decade. Not least we hope that we have demonstrated the advantages of examining and understanding tourism in a region-wide framework and across disciplinary boundaries. We fully intend to continue our research in this collaborative spirit. x Prelims_Heritage.indd 10 09/06/2010 14:32 Contributors Kathleen M. Adams is Professor of Anthropology at Loyola University, Chicago, and an Adjunct Curator of Southeast Asian Ethnology at Chicago’s Field Museum of Natural History. She is the author of Art as Power: Recrafting Identities, Tourism and Power in Tana Toraja, Indonesia, University of Hawai‘i Press, 2006, which won the 2009 Alpha Sigma Award. Her articles on cultural representations, tourism, ethnic relations, museums and the politics of art have appeared in various edited volumes and journals, including American Ethnologist, Ethnology, Museum Anthropology, Annals of Tourism Research, and Tourist Studies. David Airey is Professor of Tourism Management at the University of Surrey, where he has also served as Pro-Vice-Chancellor. His current research interests include tourism education, tourism policy and organisation. He was co-editor of the first book on tourism education and is recipient of the UNWTO Ulysses Award for his services to education. Richard Butler is Emeritus Professor in the Strathclyde Business School, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow. Trained as a geographer, his main research interests are in destination development, tourism in islands and remote locations, and its relationships with local residents. He continues to work on the Destination Life Cycle model (1980, 2006) and also on tourism and indigenous peoples (2007). Michael Hitchcock is Academic Director and Dean of Faculty at the IMI University Centre, Luzern. He was formerly Deputy Dean for External Relations and Research in the Faculty of Business, Arts and Humanities at the University of Chichester. Between 2000 and 2008 he was a Professor xi Prelims_Heritage.indd 11 09/06/2010 14:32 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia and Director of the International Institute for Culture, Tourism and Development at London Metropolitan University. His recent publications include Tourism in Southeast Asia: Challengers and New Directions, NIAS/ University of Hawai‘i Press, 2009 (ed. with Victor T. King and Michael J. G. Parnwell) and Tourism, Development and Terrorism in Bali, Ashgate, 2007 (with I Nyoman Darma Putra). Gwynn Jenkins trained as a 3D designer and moved to live and work in Penang, Malaysia, in 1995. After 11 years of pioneering heritage conservation with a Penang architectural practice and gaining a PhD in Social and Cultural Anthropology supported by the University of Hull, UK, Gwynn continues to live, research, conserve and write from a restored Chinese shophouse in the heart of the old city. Mark Johnson is Senior Lecturer in Social Anthropology at the University of Hull. His research interests are in gender, sexuality, heritage, landscape, environment, migration and diaspora. He has conducted research in the Philippines, Vietnam, Costa Rica and most recently Saudi Arabia. Recent publications include ‘Both “One and Other”: Environmental Cosmopolitanism and the Politics of Hybridity’, Nature and Culture, 3, 1, 2008 (with S. Clisby) and ‘Naturalising Distinctions: Contested Fields of Environmentalism in Costa Rica’, Journal of Landscape Research, 34, 2, 2009 (with S. Clisby). Victor T. King is Professor of South East Asian Studies and Executive Director of the White Rose East Asia Centre, University of Leeds. His research interests are spread widely across the sociology and anthropology of the region, with a particular focus on change and development. His recent publications include The Sociology of Southeast Asia: Transformations in a Developing Region, NIAS/Hawai‘i Press, 2008, and (with William D. Wilder) The Modern Anthropology of South-East Asia: An Introduction, Routledge, 2006 (reprint). Keiko Miura is Lecturer (part-time) in the School of Letters, Arts and Sciences, Waseda University, Japan, and also Research Fellow in the Cultural Property Research Group, University of Göttingen, Germany. Her research interests include heritage conservation, tourism development and local ways of life. Recent publications include ‘Needs for Anthropological Approaches to Conservation and Management of Living Heritage Sites: From a Case Study of Angkor, Cambodia’, in E. A. Bacus, I. C. Glover and xii Prelims_Heritage.indd 12 09/06/2010 14:32 Contributors P. D. Sharrock (eds), Interpreting Southeast Asia’s Past: Monument, Image and Text, National University of Singapore, 2008, and ‘Conservation of a “Living Heritage Site”: A Contradiction in Terms? A Case Study of Angkor World Heritage Site’, Conservation and Management of Archaeological Sites (CMAS), 7, 1, pp. 3–118, James & James, 2005. Nguyen Thi Thu Huong graduated from Hanoi Architecture University in 1993 and worked as an architect in the Ministry of Construction in Hanoi. In 1998 she completed a Master’s Degree in Urban Planning at the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium. Since then she has executed various development projects for different international NGOs and donors. In 2002-2004 she worked as project manager and ran the Handicraft Centre in Hai Duong under the EU Asia-Urbs framework, and at the same time prepared two research papers about handicraft production in Northern Vietnam for the International Labour Organisation. She lives in Munich and is undertaking a second Master’s course in land management and land tenure in the Technical University, Munich. Can-Seng Ooi is an Associate Professor at Copenhagen Business School. His research centres on cultural tourism in Singapore and Denmark. Currently, he is leading a team of researchers looking at ‘new heritage’ or contemporary art in these two countries, and also in China and India. Michael J.G. Parnwell is Professor of South East Asian Development in the Department of East Asian Studies at the University of Leeds. He has a wide range of research interests, including sustainable development, sustainable tourism, heritage management, social capital, localism, Buddhism and alternative development. He has undertaken field-based research in Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam and China. Nick Stanley is Leverhulme Research Fellow at the British Museum and the University of Cambridge. Professor Stanley was formerly Director of Research and Chair of Postgraduate Studies at Birmingham Institute of Art and Design. He has worked on collections and display within museums of Oceanic materials both in Melanesia as well as Europe and North America. His current work is on the artistic production of the Asmat people in West Papua. Geoffrey Wall is Professor of Geography and Environmental Management at the University of Waterloo, Canada. He is interested in the implications xiii Prelims_Heritage.indd 13 09/06/2010 14:32 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia of tourism of different types for destinations with different characteristics, and the planning implications of these relationships. He has explored these themes particularly in Indonesia, China and Taiwan. He is the author, with Alister Mathieson, of Tourism: Change, Impacts and Opportunities, Pearson, 2006. Wantanee Suntikul is an Assistant Professor at the Institute for Tourism Studies in Macau. She gained her PhD in Tourism Studies from the University of Surrey. Her core research interest and expertise are in politics, heritage, social and environmental aspects of tourism and tourism’s potential for poverty alleviation. Her recent publications are mostly about tourism in Laos and Vietnam. Simone Wesner is a Senior Research Fellow at the International Institute for Culture, Tourism and Development at London Metropolitan University. Her research focuses on historical interpretations of cultural values and their impact on current arts and heritage policy development in Europe and Southeast Asia. Recent publications include Hitchcock, M. and S. Wesner (2009) ‘Neo-Confucianism, Networks and Vietnamese Family Businesses in London’, Asia-Pacific Business Review, 15, 2, pp. 265-282. Nigel Worden is Professor of History at the University of Cape Town. His publications include work on Cape slavery and its Southeast Asian and Indian Ocean context as well as public history and heritage in these regions. His current research focuses on the construction of social identities among the underclass of eighteenth-century Cape Town. Mami Yoshimura moved back to Japan in 2007 upon completion of her MA degree in Geography from the University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, and has worked for an international NGO (EDF-Japan) as a programme officer. She will now begin a new career as a gender programme officer for UNDP in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Her research interests lie in the areas of gender, colonialism, and indigenous tourism. xiv Prelims_Heritage.indd 14 09/06/2010 14:32 Chapter 1 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Michael Hitchcock, Victor T. King and Michael J. G. Parnwell What is heritage? This book focuses on disputes and conflicts over what heritage is, what it means and how it has been presented, re-presented, developed and protected, set against a back-drop of the demands, motivations and impacts of heritage tourism. This involves examining the different agents or actors involved in encounters and contestation, drawing in issues of identity construction and negotiation, and requiring the contextualization of heritage in national and global processes of identity formation and transformation (also see Hitchcock, King and Parnwell, 2009). Melanie Smith (2003: 103) usefully summarizes a set of key issues pertaining to heritage, which we shall also revisit in the book; these comprise questions about the ownership of heritage, its appropriate use, access to it as against conservation needs, heritage as a commodity, as entertainment and as an educational medium, and finally the interpretation and representation of heritage forms. The book explores Southeast Asian heritages, their conceptualizations and representations, set against relationships between culture, nature, tourism and identity. The book arises from and develops a previous contribution to the relation between tourism and heritage which two of us presented in a special issue of the journal Indonesia and the Malay World and which explored a variety of cases of the appropriation, creation, presentation and developmental significance of cultural heritage, principally in Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore, with additional case material from mainland Southeast Asia and Taiwan (Hitchcock and King, 2003a). That 1 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 1 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia collection of essays, covering diverse examples of heritage (e.g. cultural parks, temple complexes, archaeological sites, museum exhibitions, ‘living cultural landscapes’, cultural performances), was designed to demonstrate how local communities with varied interests and perspectives interact dynamically with national and global actors, who themselves carry and promote different expectations and images of heritage and the past. One theme in that collection examined the ways in which heritage has been subject to selection, construction and contestation in the context of more general processes of local and national identity formation (Hitchcock and King, 1993b: 3–13);1 that theme is pursued in much more detail in this current book through a range of examples of World Heritage Sites and the presentation of diverse aspects of cultural and natural heritage. Having proceeded boldly to state what we intend to do, we have to accept that heritage is a concept which is difficult to define. Indeed, David Herbert suggests that it is ‘among the undefinables’, though he categorizes heritage into three broad types: ‘cultural’, ‘natural’ and ‘built environments’ (1989: 10–12). In a narrow and simple sense heritage is literally ‘what is or may be inherited’ (Little Oxford English Dictionary, 1996: 294), or ‘something other than property passed down from preceding generations: a legacy; a set of traditions, values, or treasured material things’ (Reader’s Digest, 1987: 721). Melanie Smith, taking the meaning somewhat further and emphasizing human agency, proposes that heritage, as distinct from but related to ‘the past’ and to ‘history’, is ‘the contemporary use of the past, including both its interpretation and re-interpretation’ (Smith, 2003: 82). In introducing the notion of interpretation, which suggests that heritage is created, given meaning and imbued with significance, we move into a much broader conceptualization which pertains to notions of local identity, ethnicity and nationalism, and even global identity. In this latter sense heritage is presented and re-presented as something which relates to the past and which is in some way given special value or significance as ‘treasure’ or ‘legacy’. Therefore it is constructed through processes of selection and elimination, appropriated by the state and its agents, then objectified to become worthy of political, economic and ‘touristic’ attention. The concept of heritage thus refers to tangible and concrete elements of the past (buildings, monuments, artefacts, sites and constructed landscapes), as well as to those aspects of culture expressed in behaviour, action and performance (usually referred to as ‘intangible cultural heritage’) which are interpreted, valued and judged to be worthy of our attention and protection. David Harrison has 2 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 2 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia also argued that what is considered to be ‘heritage’ more generally is in any case a form of performance, display and exhibition; it is an imaginative construct (2004: 281–290; and see Ooi, 2002b: 44). ‘Heritage tourism’ has also proved difficult to define and categorize. Melanie Smith remarks that terms such as ‘heritage tourism’, ‘arts tourism’, ‘ethnic tourism’ or ‘indigenous tourism’ are often used interchangeably (2003: 29–44). However, she prefers to classify them, along with ‘urban cultural tourism’, ‘rural cultural tourism’, ‘creative tourism’ and ‘popular cultural tourism’, as separate sub-types of a broad category of ‘cultural tourism’, recognizing that cultural tourists as a highly differentiated category consume not just the cultural products of the past but also a range of contemporary cultural forms (ibid.; Clarke, 2000: 23–36; Hughes, 2000: 111–122). Cultural tourism is therefore no longer seen, as it was in the past, as ‘a niche form of tourism, attracting small [sic], well-educated and highspending visitors’ (Smith, 2003: 45). Heritage tourism therefore comprises that part of cultural tourism which, according to Linda Richter, is ‘applied by some to almost anything about the past that can be visited’ (1999: 108). Tourism in this case becomes a ‘history-making business’ or at least an activity which commercializes the past (Shaw and Williams, 2002: 203). Heritage is also contested and transformed not only by representatives of the state but also by global actors, including representatives of international organizations such as the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), researchers and foreign tourists, as well as domestic tourists, local communities and their neighbours. It has therefore become a highly politicized project concerned with constructions of identity and conflicts over its character and trajectory (ibid.: 37–38). Black and Wall state appositely that ‘the sites selected to represent the country’s heritage will also have strong implications for both collective and individual identity and hence the creation of social realities’ (2001: 123). In this connection Ian Glover observes, in his examination of the political uses of archaeology in Southeast Asia, that governments ‘attempt to create discourses with the past in order to legitimize and strengthen the position of the state and its dominant political communities’ (2003: 16–17). In newly independent or post-colonial developing states this is an even more urgent task and the need, in Benedict Anderson’s terms (1991: 178–185), to ‘imagine’ the nation leads to the selection and deployment of archaeological finds and heritage sites to present images of national resilience, unity and innovation, often in the context of an ‘imagined’ golden 3 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 3 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia or glorious age of endeavour and achievement which was subsequently eclipsed by colonialism (Glover, 2003: 17). Glover also notes that Anderson traces this appropriation of such elements of heritage as ‘the great monuments of decayed Indic civilizations’ to the late colonial period ‘to give added legitimacy to colonial rule’. He continues: ‘[s]ubstantial resources were put into clearing, excavating, and restoring great temples’, and, paraphrasing Anderson, ‘old sacred sites were incorporated into the map of the colony, their ancient prestige draped around the mappers’ (ibid.; Anderson, 1991: 181–182). In this respect post-independent governments have often had to reposition their archaeological sites to express indigenous achievement and demonstrate the legitimacy conveyed by ancient genealogy as against Western interpretations of the sites as evidence of indigenous failure, inertia and neglect, and which have been rescued for posterity by discerning and civilized outsiders who recognize the value of this cultural legacy. It was the western colonial powers which played a significant part in fostering a sense of states’ historical identity among their dependent populations. This identity was created not simply in opposition to ‘a colonial other’ but also out of the colonial desire and need to delimit, control, administer and defend their possessions, and to differentiate their territories from other neighbouring states, which were in turn invariably in the possession of other competing colonial powers. This process of identity construction involved, among other things, the study and preservation of local heritage, particularly where the colonial administration relied on the traditional authority of royalty, nobility and aristocracy, usually in systems of indirect rule, in order to buttress their political position (Long and Sweet, 2006: 463). A useful starting point in the search for the detailed meanings associated with the concept of heritage is UNESCO’s World Heritage Centre based in Paris and its associated Committee, which designates World Heritage Sites as of either ‘cultural’ or ‘natural’ or ‘mixed’ (both cultural and natural) importance, and more particularly as sites of ‘outstanding universal value’ (http://whc.unesco.org/en/; and see Adams, 2003: 91–93; Hitchcock, 2004: 461–466; Long and Sweet, 2006: 445–469; Smith, 2003: 38, 105–116). Since the late 1960s, heritage has been internationalized by such bodies as UNESCO, which has ‘helped to generate a new set of understandings of culture and built heritage’ (Askew, 1996: 184). The Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage, which was instituted to protect global heritage, was adopted by UNESCO in 1972, and 4 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 4 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia the recent ‘criteria for selection’ of sites to be included on the World Heritage List provide us with a combination of ‘cultural’ and ‘natural’ criteria. Until 2004 these sites were selected using six cultural and four natural criteria, but since then they have been brought together in revised guidelines to comprise a composite list of ten criteria displayed on the Centre’s webpages under the title ‘The Criteria for Selection’. As one would expect the list is sprinkled with superlatives: the first is ‘to represent a masterpiece of human creative genius’, another ‘to bear a unique or at least exceptional testimony to a cultural tradition or to a civilization which is living or which has disappeared’, another ‘to be an outstanding example of a type of building, architectural or technological ensemble or landscape which illustrates (a) significant stage(s) in human history’, and another ‘to be an outstanding example of a traditional human settlement, land-use, or seause which is representative of a culture (or cultures), or human interaction with the environment especially when it has become vulnerable under the impact of irreversible change’. Interestingly one of the ‘cultural’ criteria in the World Heritage Site list (Criterion VI: ‘to be directly or tangibly associated with events or living traditions, with ideas, or with beliefs, with artistic and literary works of outstanding universal significance’) has been given something of a dependent or complementary status, in that the Committee considers that it is not free-standing and that it ‘should preferably be used in conjunction with other criteria’. Heritage using this concept of culture corresponds more or less with a broad anthropological definition. More recently in its Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (2003), UNESCO has affirmed the importance of culture as expressed in oral tradition, performing arts, social practices, rituals, festivals and traditional craftsmanship. Finally, there is a criterion (Criterion II) that partly overlaps with notions of traditions, ideas and beliefs, but which addresses the dimension of cultural exchange and dynamic process within the context of broader cultural regions, that is: ‘to exhibit an important interchange of human values, over a span of time or within a cultural area of the world, on developments in architecture or technology, monumental arts, townplanning or landscape design’. In sum, UNESCO’s concept of cultural heritage is extraordinarily broad, but, given those cultural sites currently on the World Heritage List, the emphasis is still on groups of buildings, monuments and settlements which require some form of protection, conservation and preservation for posterity, and therefore tend to be tangible 5 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 5 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia sites of historical, aesthetic, artistic, architectural, archaeological, scientific, technological or ethnological value rather than a ‘living tradition’. ‘Natural heritage’, on the other hand, refers to areas which embody outstanding physical, biological and geological features and those which have significance in terms of their uniqueness and their importance in the evolution of the natural world. They may ‘contain superlative natural phenomena’ or be ‘areas of exceptional natural beauty and aesthetic importance’. They may be ‘outstanding examples representing major stages of earth’s history’ or ‘representing significant on-going ecological and biological processes in the evolution and development of (…) ecosystems and communities of plants and animals’. Finally, there is emphasis on the importance of natural habitats where biological diversity needs to be conserved, particularly where there are threats to ‘species of outstanding universal value from the point of view of science and conservation’. It is interesting in the Southeast Asian context just how many of the designated World Heritage Sites are ‘natural’, including national parks, as a proportion of the total number of sites; in fact, almost half (see Table 1.1). As of 7 July 2008 the World Heritage Committee had 878 sites on its list; of these 679 (77 per cent) were cultural, 174 (20 per cent) natural and twenty-five (3 per cent) were mixed sites; thirty (3.4 per cent) were also placed on an ‘in danger list’ including the rice terraces of the Philippine Cordilleras. In the Asia Pacific region the majority of the sites are to be found, not unexpectedly, in China, India and to a lesser extent Japan. In Southeast Asia there are twenty-nine World Heritage Sites; seventeen (59 per cent) of these are cultural and twelve (41 per cent) are natural. They are distributed between Indonesia which has seven, the Philippines, Vietnam and Thailand with five each, Malaysia with three (the recently inscribed ‘historic cities of the Straits of Malacca’ in fact includes two sites, George Town and Melaka, both of which are featured in this book), and Laos and Cambodia with two each (Table 1.1). Certain of the cultural sites so designated are perhaps unsurprising: Angkor in Cambodia; Luang Prabang and Vat Phou in Laos; Hue, Hoi An and My Son in Vietnam; Ayutthaya, Sukhothai and Ban Chiang in Thailand; Borobodur, Prambanan and Sangiran in Indonesia; and Baroque Churches and Vigan Town in the Philippines. Bearing in mind Southeast Asia’s rich early, classical and colonial history one might have expected the designation of many more historical and cultural sites, but the process of selection and approval is a highly politicized one at the national and international level, and many of 6 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 6 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia the proposed and potentially designated sites in Southeast Asia, which have not made it on to the UNESCO list, have suffered from the depredations of modernization and development, particularly in such places as Singapore, where most of the built forms of the past have been demolished and replaced with a high-rise, glass and concrete cityscape. It is interesting to note, again perhaps not unexpectedly given the country’s recent turbulent history, that there are no designated sites in Myanmar, but nor are there approved cultural sites in Brunei, and only a handful in the remaining Southeast Asian countries. Southeast Asia is also home to at least one grassroots rebellion against the creation of a World Heritage Site: the sacred temple complexes of Besakih in Bali (I Nyoman Darma Putra and Hitchcock, 2005: 225–237). Here we need to emphasize the major preoccupations of those international organizations which focus on Southeast Asian heritage and which attempt to set a global heritage agenda. Organizations like UNESCO (and its regional office in Bangkok), the World Monuments Fund, the International Council of Museums (and its Asia Pacific Organization), the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), The Getty Conservation Institute, and, at the regional level, the Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization (SEAMEO) and the Southeast Asian Regional Centre for Archaeology and Fine Arts (SPAFA), invariably stress the concepts of ‘tradition’, continuity and ‘unchangeableness’, expressed particularly in built heritage and material culture, which needs to be designated and given special attention, managed, monitored, conserved and protected (http://icom.museum/; http://www.getty.edu/conservation/; and see Vines, 2005). This perspective, which is also expressed in the heritage tourism industry, tends to indulge in nostalgia for the past and in the presentation of the exotic and an idealized and ‘essentialized’ Orient (Kennedy and Williams, 2001), and also a ‘pristinized’ nature. It is also worth noting here that such bodies as UNESCO usually emphasize the importance of continuity in the original fabric of buildings and other physical structures in defining the authenticity of built heritage. Conversely, in East Asian cultures, as expressed in The NARA Document on Authenticity (1994) which originated in Japan, the stress is on the continuity of use in heritage buildings rather than structure and materials, because their fabric is usually periodically renewed and refurbished (Long and Sweet, 2006: 447). 7 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 7 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Table 1.1 UNESCO World Cultural and Natural Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia World Heritage Site CAMBODIA Angkor Cultural 1992 Preah Vihear Temple Cultural 2008 Borobudur Temple Compounds Cultural 1991 Komodo National Park Natural 1991 Prambanan Temple Compounds Cultural 1991 INDONESIA Ujung Kulon National Park Natural 1991 Sangiran Early Man Site Cultural 1996 Lorentz National Park Natural 1999 Tropical Rainforest Heritage of Sumatra Natural 2004 Town of Luang Prabang Cultural 1995 Vat Phou and Associated Ancient Settlements Cultural 2001 Gunung Mulu National Park Natural 2000 Kinabalu Park Natural 2000 Melaka and George Town, Historic Cities of the Cultural 2008 Baroque Churches of the Philippines Cultural 1993 Tubbataha Reef Marine Park Natural 1993 Rice Terraces of the Philippine Cordilleras Cultural (in danger) 1995 LAO PDR within the Champasak Cultural Landscape MALAYSIA Straits of Malacca PHILIPPINES Historic Town of Vigan Cultural 1999 Puerto-Princesa Subterranean River National Park Natural 1999 Historic City of Ayutthaya Cultural 1991 Historic Town of Sukhothai and Associated Cultural 1991 THAILAND Historic Towns Thungyai-Huai Kha Khaeng Wildlife Sanctuaries Natural 1991 Ban Chiang Archaeological Site Cultural 1992 Dong Phayayen-Khao Yai Forest Complex Natural 2005 8 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 8 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia VIETNAM Complex of Hue Monuments Cultural 1993 Ha Long Bay Natural 1994, 2000 Hoi An Ancient Town Cultural 1999 My Son Sanctuary Cultural 1999 Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park Natural 2003 Source: UNESCO World Heritage Centre, World Heritage List April 2009 (http://whc. unesco.org/en/list) In this connection a major concern of international heritage organizations during the past decade, expressed in a number of international workshops, conferences and training initiatives, has been the theft, looting and the illicit trade in the cultural heritage of Southeast Asia, as well as the impact on heritage sites and on local cultures of rapidly expanding tourism activity and globalization. Particular concern has been raised in international organizations about the systematic looting and sale of artefacts from Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and Myanmar, which are often traded across national borders into Thailand. The blame is placed at the door of transnational tourism, local poverty, the internationalization of the art market and global capital flows (see, for example, Galla, 2002; Bradford and Lee, 2004). Concerns and anxieties about the possible debasing of culture and ethnicity, the decontextualization of culture through its ‘simplification’, ‘distortion’, ‘fabrication’, ‘fragmentation’ and presentation as ‘a global product’, the need to make culture ‘better than reality’ in the interest of tourism promotion, and the process of ‘cultural colonization’ and tourism as ‘neo-colonialism’ are presented forcefully by Boniface and Fowler (1993: 2–4, 7, 11–13, 20, 152–162; Ooi, 2002b: 67, 123–138). Indeed, a considerable emphasis in the literature on heritage is the commoditization and ‘falsification’ of the past, and the consequences of these processes (Smith, 2003: 82; and see Harrison, 2004: 283–286). Ooi argues that sometimes such cultural intermediaries as tour guides have an important role in this process in that ‘they teach tourists to consume authenticity’ (2002b: 159). And in this regard Walsh takes an uncompromising stand in his criticism of the heritage industry when he says, ‘History as heritage dulls our ability to appreciate the development of people and places through time.’ It has an ‘unnerving ability to deny historical process, or diachrony. Heritage successfully mediates all our pasts as ephemeral snapshots exploited in the present’ (1992: 113, 149; and cited in Smith, 2003: 82; and see Watson, 2000: 450–456). 9 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 9 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia In this edited book we are mainly concerned with cultural rather than natural heritage, although one of the co-editors provides a comparative chapter on natural heritage management. We focus on cultural forms as heritage because governments, in promoting tourism in particular, tend to focus on those elements which are immediate, accessible, distinctive, impressive, colourful and visible to the ‘tourist gaze’, and whose meanings and significance can be more easily constructed, shaped, changed and controlled (Wood, 1997: 10). Some of these forms comprise World Heritage Sites (as in Angkor, Vat Phou Champasak, and Hue), but others are either much more deliberately constructed or modified forms displayed in museums, cultural parks and urban areas or are intimately interrelated with cultural expressions devised for the purposes of tourism promotion. Because of their unstable and contested characters, these forms enter into the arena of cultural politics and identity. In this exercise, in which international and national players seek to define and control the meaning of a site, landscape, artefact or cultural display and performance, they may seek to disregard or re-define local cultural meanings and perspectives (Adams, 2006; Black and Wall, 2001: 124, 132; Askew, 1996: 203–204). Heritage sites are therefore designated as significant in some way; and their meaning and significance are interpreted and explained by various actors, often with different interests and views. Heritage then becomes a political tool in negotiations over identity, but it is also part of an ‘industry’ – a heritage, tourism and leisure industry – which generates employment, income and development (Herbert, 1989: 12–13; Richter, 1999: 108). History is therefore translated into a marketable commodity and heritage comprises ‘the commodified cladding of symbols of antiquity’ (Boniface and Fowler, 1993: xi; Rahil, Ooi and Shaw, 2006: 161–163). Heritage therefore has various functions and is often the focus of struggle, debate and dispute over its use or uses and what it expresses or represents, a struggle in which those who have more power and authority usually have a more influential say. In his study of the plans to redevelop and rehabilitate Rattanakosin Island, the old inner royal precinct of Bangkok, Askew (1996: 203–204), for example, identifies several key national players in the debates about the character of a re-constructed historical space: purist and elitist architect/landscape planners, the Thai royal family, state agencies interested in tourism development, and national and metropolitan planners concerned to promote Bangkok’s capacity as a generator of national income. These are essentially members of the political and bureaucratic elite 10 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 10 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia and to avoid an overly elitist view of this historic core of Bangkok, Askew calls for a greater involvement of local activists, academics and conservation professionals to draw attention to ‘the ordinary spaces of commerce and residence, of the structures of the older communities now in decline and of some of the typical features of the built environment’ (ibid.: 204). The concept of heritage as used in this book shades into the concepts of culture and tradition; it embodies competing notions of the unchanging and authentic past and the consciously constructed and transformed present and future; and it is bound up with issues of local, ethnic, provincial, national and global identities. However, as we shall see, even the natural environment can be defined and sanctioned as heritage and moulded in particular ways for the tourist market, although it is usually presented and given meaning, as is cultural heritage, as pristine, enduring, authentic and connected to the distant past. Primeval jungles which are preserved and organized in the form of national parks and nature reserves, provide one of the best examples of the deliberate creation and appropriation of nature, usually in the context of ecotourism. Harrison makes the important point, which confirms our view expressed here (and see Parnwell, Chapter 12), that ‘[t]here is nothing “natural” in our appreciation of landscape. We learn to appreciate it through our backgrounds and socialization, but the socialization of the expert may differ from that of the layman, and thus interpretations of what is natural will vary’ (2004: 282). Just like other examples of heritage, landscapes are multivalent, and are sites of dispute, debate and shifting interpretations. heritage and identity The study of the construction, presentation, negotiation and transformation of heritage and our understanding of the politics of heritage owe much to the work of Robert Wood (1984, 1993, 1997) and Michel Picard (1996; and see Picard and Wood, 1997a; and Michaud and Picard, 2001) on the relationships between tourism, identity and the state. In their co-edited book on cultural and ethnic tourism in Asian and Pacific societies, they focus on the relationships between tourism and the state on the one hand and race, ethnicity and identity on the other, and specifically the ways in which identities are commoditized for the purposes of tourism development (Picard and Wood, 1997a). The major question which they address is ‘How are ethnic divisions, symbolized by ethnic markers selected for tourism 11 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 11 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia promotion, reconciled with national integration and the assertion of a national identity?’ (Picard and Wood, 1997b: ix). The state, and particularly the state in the developing world, enters into the relationship between tourism and identity because both are seen to require state-directed political action. Developing countries promote tourism as an increasingly vital sector in strategies for economic growth and development, and they do this on the basis of such resources as their heritage and more widely their culture, or cultures. They also use these resources in the process of creating national identities and ‘to reconcile ethnic diversity and modern nationhood’ (ibid.). Suharto’s New Order government in Indonesia did precisely this in the interests of ‘nationalist ideals’ and ‘the exigencies of economic development’; it ‘defined the boundaries of acceptable ethnicity, simultaneously celebrating and subjugating indigenous groups’ (Morrell, 2000: 257; and see Pemberton, 1994; Picard, 1996, 1997, 2003). In this exercise cultural differences were ‘often reduced (…) to a superficial promulgation of traditional costume, architecture, dance and other art forms’ (Morrell, 2000: 257). Richter also points to the profoundly political character of state-directed and statesponsored tourism in the Philippines under President’s Ferdinand Marcos’s martial law (1996: 233–262) and the more general ‘battle over power and resources’ involved in heritage development (1999: 108). In another example, the government of Singapore had to create an identity for this small city-state after its departure from the Federation of Malaysia in 1965. An important dimension of this identity construction has been heritage and history, though Singapore has no World Heritage Sites and indeed has radically transformed, redeveloped and modernized the cityscape (Saunders, 2004). The government has deliberately constructed a heritage industry (and an identity) and promoted cultural and educational tourism based on its multi-ethnic population, its history, its broader Asian identity, and its strategic gateway location within a wider Asian region (Ooi, 2002b: 214–228). The relevance of these issues to the construction and representation of heritage is obvious: considerations of ethnicity, identity and heritage are combined in the encounter of representatives of the state with local people (Henderson, 2003). Picard and Wood (1997b: viii) observe that ‘[w]ith the proliferation of ethnic tourism, of ethnic museums and theme parks around the world, and of ethnic artefacts consumed not only by tourists but also by members of ethnic groups as assertions of their ethnic identities, ethnicity 12 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 12 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia itself has become increasingly commoditized in specifically touristic ways’. In this arena of national image-making and local constructions of identity the subject of heritage, conceptualized as a tangible and accessible representation of the past and of established tradition, plays an important role (Askew, 1996: 187–191). It is also part of the more general process undertaken by those who hold political power to legitimize and authorize their political position (and see Richter, 1989, 1996, 1999; Rahil, Ooi and Shaw, 2006). This action in turn encourages local communities to contemplate, discuss, debate, negotiate and contest their identities in the face of the attempts by the state to intervene, manipulate and control them. As Wood says ‘[t]he contradictory interests of the states, partly rooted in their desire to promote ethnic tourism, provide room for creative manoeuvre by local ethnic groups, and produce complex forms of mutual accommodation’ (1997: 15; and see Shaw and Jones, 1997). A good example of these processes is that of the hybrid ‘peranakan’ and Eurasian communities of Singapore and the multiple identities and perspectives involved in the promotion of ethnic heritage for tourism purposes there (Henderson, 2003; Shaw and Rahil, 2006). What is also especially interesting in more recent heritage tourism activities is the increasing trend ‘to remember marginalized groups’, ‘the powerless’ and ‘the overlooked’ (Richter, 1999: 115, 122, italics in original). Heritage sites, which are tangible expressions of identities, therefore provide excellent laboratories to explore the meaning and constructions of ‘place’, particularly ‘historical places’ and the identities which are often associated with or claimed for particular locations (Askew, 1996: 184). As Han has proposed, in an interesting study of the construction of images of colonial Singapore, specific places are imbued ‘with an identity, spirit, and personality’; they are sites in time where ‘collective histories and personal biographies’ intersect (2003: 257–258). But there is usually no one image which prevails, rather images and meanings which define and characterize particular sites are conflicting and overlapping; they express relations of power and resistance and competing goals, interests and expectations on the part of those who inhabit, are in some way associated with, or who gaze on a site (and see Yeoh and Kong, 1995, 1996; and Yeoh, 1996). Heritage sites provide opportunities for different ways of ‘seeing and valuing’ (Askew, 1996: 186; Boniface and Fowler, 1993: 20, 152). They are also ‘rarely unchanging embodiments of tradition’ (Adams, 2004: 433). 13 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 13 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Contestation and agenCy The crucial issue of the ‘invention’ and ‘imagination’ of tradition, or heritage, is hardly a new one (Hobsbawm and Ranger, 1983; and see Hitchcock, King and Parnwell, 1993b: 8–16). Culture, heritage and identity are not passed on in an unchanging fashion from one generation to the next; they are not fixed but rather are ‘constantly reinvented (…) reimagined (…) symbolically constructed, and often contested’ (Wood, 1997: 18). Richter reinforces this point in her observation that ‘[e]ven the very substance of a heritage is a political construction of what is remembered – different for many groups in society’ (1999: 109). Social science studies of tourism have been engaged in the examination of the processes of cultural construction and transformation for over thirty years, especially in the context of debates about whether or not tourism undermines, contaminates or destroys previously ‘authentic’ or ‘real’ cultures, and what ‘authenticity’ means (Cohen, 1996: 90–93, 97–98, 105–107; Crick, 1996: 40–41; Ooi, 2002b: 21–31; Richter, 1999: 118–122; Smith, 2003: 20–23). However, attention has increasingly been devoted to the ways in which cultural phenomena are deployed to make statements about identity. As Adams (2006) has observed recently in her detailed and subtle analysis of the ‘politics of art’ among the Toraja of Indonesia, items of material culture are ‘imbued with emotional force’; they embody multiple meanings and ambiguities, and they express meanings in symbolic form. These meanings can be manipulated, transformed and contested and they can also influence particular directions of action and behaviour. Art objects, used to express particular identities, also serve as an appropriate medium for encapsulating conflicting and contradictory narratives. Adams’s apposite remark on the character of art can be applied more generally to heritage in that it comprises ‘a complex arena encompassing contending discourses concerning identity and hierarchies of authority and power’ (ibid.: 210). One of our major tasks is to examine and understand the different ‘heritage narratives’ which are being selected and promoted for tourism and other purposes (Boniface and Fowler, 1993: 11); and to understand the ways in which sites become designated as worthy of heritage celebration (Harrison, 2004). As Harrison observes ‘there is nothing intrinsically sacrosanct about any building, any part of nature, or any cultural practice’ because ‘as one class or pressure group takes ascendancy over another, new perceptions, new views on the past and what was of value in the past, also take over’ (ibid.: 287, italics in original). 14 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 14 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Another important analytical focus in some recent studies of cultural politics and the relationships between identity, tourism and the state is that of human agency. As Wood has remarked, in drawing out underlying themes in his co-edited book, ‘nowhere have local people been powerless or passive’ (1997: 15). To be sure they operate within particular frameworks of constraint, and some states are more interventionist and control and regulate their citizens more tightly, but even then there is evidence of local resistance, ‘subtle manipulation’, rivalry and conflict, and the exercise of options and choice (ibid.: 15, 18–24). The contestation over the temple and religious complexes of Pura Besakih in Indonesia and the local opposition to its World Heritage Site designation is an excellent case in point (I Nyoman Darma Putra and Hitchcock, 2005). Tourism, therefore, tends to encourage the intervention of the state, but it also provides people with ‘new resources for pursuing their own agendas’ (ibid.: 21). In this connection, ‘local cultures develop during the dynamic process of making use of tourism to re-define their own identities’ (Yamashita, Kadir Din and Eades, 1997: 16). The situation in a tourism context is also complex because a range of actors are involved – tourists, tourism intermediaries, local people and state agents in particular. For these reasons state policies on tourism development and identity formation may lead to consequences which they did not intend or foresee. The strong tendency of international and national agencies to plan and manage heritage sites in a top-down manner is inevitably countered by local communities and their representatives, although there are many examples, too many, of the failure to consult these communities, and of the experience of displacement and disenfranchisement (Hitchcock, 2004: 463–465; Lask and Herold, 2004: 399–411; Wall and Black, 2004: 436–439). globalization Finally, certain of the more recent studies of culture, identity and tourism have also turned their attention to issues of globalization, regionalization and cultural hybridization in situations where culture becomes subject to various interacting trans-national forces and ‘inter-country collaborations’ (Yao, 2001; Ang, 2001; Teo, Chang and Ho, 2001; Rahil, Ooi and Shaw, 2006). Globalization as a phenomenon of increasing importance in cultural construction, heritage and identity formation, and in tourism development, has been much more explicitly theorized during the past decade or so. 15 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 15 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia More particularly the dialectical relations between the global and the local (‘glocalization’) and between local and global forces which act both to homogenize and to differentiate local cultures and identities have been examined in some detail (Appadurai, 1990: 295; Meethan, 2000: 196; Smith, 2003: 4–7, 11–16, 99–116). As Kahn has said, in his recent work on changing Malay identities in Malaysia, ‘globalization is as likely to generate difference, uniqueness, and cultural specificity as it is to produce a genuinely universal or homogeneous world culture’ (1998: 9; Boniface and Fowler, 1993: 145–146, 162). But specifically in relation to heritage, Wall and Black have argued pertinently that ‘World Heritage sites constitute extreme examples of global-local interactions’ (2004: 436). Within this context of globalization, governments play key roles in regulating capital and markets, in sponsoring and shaping tourist assets, in controlling and promoting the movement of tourists, and in presenting certain images of the nation and its constituent populations both to its own citizens and to international tourists (Hall, 2001: 18–22). In the hands of government, heritage therefore becomes ‘officially sanctioned brand identities and their storylines’ (Ooi, 2002b: 155). Although we have stressed processes of contestation in relation to heritage, which seems to us to be a more general feature of heritage construction, we should note that in certain cases, at certain times and for certain actors there may be compromise or agreement over the use and meaning of a site. Long and Sweet, for example, have observed, in their recent examination of the World Heritage Site of Luang Prabang in the Lao PDR, that there can be a marked convergence between the heritage interests of international bodies like UNESCO and, in this case, the Lao authorities. The Lao government has been anxious to present a particular vision of national identity by the selective recognition of certain historic locations (2006). UNESCO and national governments sometimes have to reach an accommodation, although their agendas are ostensibly quite different. UNESCO has to work through national governments on national and international projects in order to achieve its universal objective of establishing uniformity in standards of protection and management of its designated heritage sites (Long, 2002). It has to be careful not to infringe national rights and sovereignty. On the other hand, national governments often need international finance, support and expertise; UNESCO recognition of a heritage site also lends prestige to a particular country and provides the opportunity to develop international tourism. There are therefore pressures on both parties to reach an accom16 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 16 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia modation, and, in the case of UNESCO’s and the Lao government’s approach to the interpretation and management of the World Heritage Site of Luang Prabang, there is a ‘shared commitment to the preservation of certain aspects of the Lao past’ (Long and Sweet, 2006: 468). UNESCO wishes to preserve the integrity and historical importance of a particular site but each national government as the ‘states party’ to the World Heritage Convention (Hitchcock, 2005: 181) is usually concerned to present its national heritage in the interests of national goals of identity and unity. What is emphasized in Luang Prabang is Buddhism and its manifestation in temples, the legacy of royalty, the harmonious intermixture of colonial French and indigenous Lao architecture, and that this apparently unchanging urban settlement is ‘a repository of particular Lao essences’ (ibid.: 469). Long and Sweet argue that this site has been ‘idealized’ and ‘Orientalized’; it is not, in this representation, a living, breathing, functioning urban area, or a vibrant cultural landscape, but rather it is presented as timeless, and authentic, the location of ‘a passive visitor experience’ and ‘a large-scale museum display’ (ibid.: 454, 455). Luang Prabang therefore gives expression to an unchanging past, whilst, in contrast, it is the capital city of Vientiane which is presented as the modernizing, fast-changing focus of the Lao nation. However, we suspect that if Long and Sweet had probed a little more deeply they would have discovered alternative discourses, often generated at the local level, about the position and role of Luang Prabang in the Lao consciousness. They might also have discovered different perspectives on the part of international tourists who increasingly visit and gaze upon this royal and sacred capital. Another World Heritage Site, Angkor in Cambodia, which Keiko Miura examines in detail in this book, has also been the site for the interplay of global and national forces, and as Winter (2004: 333) has observed, in his insightful analyses of Angkor, it has provided a national focus for debates about Cambodian identity. Here we can witness considerable differences in the meaning of Angkor for different constituencies so that even global or international actors can differ significantly in their interests and perspectives. Re-discovered and fashioned by the French as an invaluable part of the national heritage of its Indochinese protectorate and as part of their civilizing mission in the East, the ‘once glorious Angkor’ has been used by successive post-independent Cambodian governments to express their changing visions of the nation and its history. Yet in the case of Angkor it is also the site for the imaginings not just of UNESCO experts, national 17 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 17 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia politicians and ordinary Cambodians, but also of international tourists, some of whom will have seen Angkor as the re-created and stereotyped site of an ancient civilization in the Hollywood movie, Tomb Raider (2003). Hardly a neutral, abstract, objective, unchanging, traditional site of historical interest, Angkor embraces a range of meanings and significances: for UNESCO experts notions of architectural and archaeological conservation; for ordinary Cambodians its importance as a living cultural landscape; for political leaders its role as part of an ideology of national revival, power and identity; and for some international tourists at least, Angkor’s postmodern representation as ‘a culturally and historically disembedded visual spectacle’ (ibid.: 66). Another interesting UNESCO World Heritage Site in Southeast Asia from the perspective of global–local interactions is that of Borobodur, a historic Buddhist temple complex, which is situated on a small hill in the Kedu Plain, north-west of Yogyakarta in Central Java. It has not been the subject of detailed primary research but Black and Wall, in their brief comparative study of the UNESCO sites of Borobodur, Prambanan and Ayutthauya, propose that the ‘values which local people attach to a [sic] heritage are different from, though no less important than, the values ascribed to it by art historians, archaeologists and government officials’ (2001: 121). According to Black and Wall the planning process and the evaluation of the importance of these heritage sites of international importance have tended to be formulated in a top-down fashion without meaningful consultation with the local inhabitants. In consequence local cultural meanings and interpretations have tended to be disregarded and local cultural participation in, for example, presenting dance and drama performances for visitors and in interacting with the site have not been encouraged (ibid.: 132–133). An overriding factor in this disregard for local contributions has been the strong commitment of international conservation and heritage agencies to the ‘freezing’ or preservation of a site from outside interference rather than permitting or encouraging local encounters with it. A further consequence of this is that local people are not made to feel that they are stewards of a site or that they have significant cultural and historical connections with it. The perceived authenticity of a site often depends precisely on denying its status as ‘living’ or ‘lived’ cultural heritage. Indeed, when a site is fenced off to help protect it but at the same time visitors pay for the privilege of viewing it the local communities are usually deliberately excluded from it, 18 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 18 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia and, in the case of Borobodur, they have been resettled at a respectable distance from the temple complex. Interestingly, the need for conservation is also often in tension with the need of national governments and tourism agencies to generate revenue. In the case of Borobodur the site has been developed to meet tourist needs in such a way that it has taken on elements of a theme park with tour buses and large car parking areas, fenced off zones, ticket booths, kiosks, vendors, touts and market stalls, security huts and wardens, loud-speakers, and artificially landscaped gardens (Steels, 2007). There is another sense in which national and international interests and perspectives exclude local ones. In the case of Borobodur it has become an instantly recognized national symbol of Indonesia, though it is promoted not as a religious monument in predominantly Muslim Indonesia, but as a cultural monument. It still happens to be a focus of domestic and international Buddhist pilgrimage, but for the Indonesian government it is overwhelmingly a cultural heritage site for the promotion of domestic and international tourism. In her recent study Steels (2007) also reveals that the tourists with whom she spoke were not especially preoccupied with its authenticity or with local meanings or indeed with the concerns of the international heritage agencies. They had very little if any notion of what an ‘authentic Borobodur’ would have been like or should resemble other than that for the international tourists they disliked being harassed by market vendors. For the majority it was a major site on the tourist circuit which they had to gaze upon and at which they wanted to be seen and photographed. It was quite simply a ‘must’ place to visit associated vaguely with a forgotten and romanticized past (ibid.). A major task in the global heritage industry is to create cultural otherness and distinctive tourism products that stand out in the marketplace to present a unique and special national identity. In this connection Sofield has said of tourism that it ‘creates or even re-creates difference, aggressively re-imaging, re-constituting and appropriating heritage, culture and place, pursuing localisation in marked contrast to its globalising influence’ (2001: 104). It does this in its encounter with local communities which are pursuing their own cultural strategies and agendas in order to direct tourism to meet their own needs and interests (Erb, 2000: 710). Local communities in turn operate within particular international parameters, contexts and service standards so that generally tourists can move with relative ease, comfort and safety whilst experiencing otherness, and whilst moving between the 19 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 19 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia familiar and the unfamiliar (Urry, 1990; Lee, 2001). Yet, as we have seen, in the global heritage industry international tourists are but one of the interested parties. summary of the Chapters This book contains twelve substantive chapters based on empirical research which examine the interface of heritage and tourism in Southeast Asia from a variety of perspectives and set in a diversity of contexts. The overall aim of the book is to help with understanding how the notion of heritage is formed, constructed and operationalized, what conservation measures have been put in place and who the self-appointed custodians of natural and cultural heritage are, what tourists are looking for at heritage sites and how this dovetails or conflicts with local needs and interests, and how the tension between the protection and mobilization of heritage resources is rationalized. The chapters address issues of agency, competing discourses, local level interactions, identity, socio-cultural change, and cultural invention. Kathleen M. Adams explores the politics of heritage in upland Sulawesi, Indonesia, which is the homeland of the Sa’dan Toraja people, known for their elaborately carved ancestral houses and spectacular burial cliffs. Drawing on long-term anthropological field research that was initiated in 1984 during the heyday of Indonesian tourism, the chapter examines Toraja’s re-framing of heritage in the post-touristic era, specifically the historical, economic and personal dynamics underlying Tana Toraja’s emergence as a potential World Heritage Site. These are used to illustrate how so-called ‘heritage landscapes’ are, to some extent, products of local responses to and engagements with regional, national and global political, cultural and economic dynamics. Heritage is not only about individual and collective identity, but it is also entwined with economics and with symbolic power. In today’s world of global migrants and international bodies such as UNESCO and NGOs, ‘heritage’ is rarely of merely local or domestic concern. Heritage must be understood in terms of layers of local, national and international romances and rivalries. What many have underscored regarding contemporary tourism sites, Adams points out, is equally true of heritage locales: in seeking to understand the dynamics at play in such sites, we must be attentive to the theme of ‘contested heritage’, and engage not only with local structures and rivalries but also with international relations and global organizations and markets. 20 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 20 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Mami Yoshimura and Geoffrey Wall focus on the reconstruction and reconfiguration of the cultural heritage of the Atayal in Wulai, Taiwan, an ethnic group with strong cultural affinities with Southeast Asia. The Atayal are an indigenous people who have experienced both colonialism and tourism development. During Japan’s occupation, the Atayal were forced to abandon their most important socio-cultural activities: facial tattooing, head-hunting and weaving. The Atayal lost most of their original textiles because many of them were taken to Japan. Today, these textiles are preserved in a few Japanese museums. The Atayal’s textiles are now being reconstructed by indigenous women in Wulai who weave primarily for museums. Others weave for domestic tourists although they have little success in competition with less expensive Han Chinese factory-made woven products. The reintroduction of weaving has required the Atayal to retrace their weaving history and to revive lost skills. It has also opened up an opportunity to create new motifs with imported looms. However, the meaning of weaving has changed from being a representation of the Atayal women’s gender identity alone to the representation of the Atayal’s collective ethnic identity and heritage. It has become an ethnic symbol and a tourism product but the indigenous residents of Wulai are now barely involved directly in tourism businesses, even though symbols of their identity are used to promote tourism. Michael Hitchcock and Nick Stanley also touch on the theme of ‘living cultural heritage’ as seen through the institution of the outdoor ethnographic museum (and see Hitchcock, Stanley and Siu, 1997; Hitchcock, 1998). Using comparative studies from Taiwan and Indonesia they explore the ways in which such museums – which tend to adopt a primordial view of ethnicity and traditional culture – have been used as a means of communicating narratives of nation-building, nationalism and national conscious-raising, and of smoothing the rough edges of inter-ethnic relations. In the main they present their constituent ethnic groups in an idealized manner that has little bearing on modern twenty-first century reality. While the ethnographic museum format remains little changed from its early nationalistic origins, both the context within which it is placed and the audiences to which it reaches out have changed significantly. Nowadays their educational role seems much diminished and their entertainment (and touristic) function is greatly enhanced – creating an awkward amalgam which the authors, following the industry, term ‘edutainment’. 21 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 21 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Can-Seng Ooi examines the ways in which museums in Singapore are used to construct and present identities. He argues against the notion that the West ‘Orientalizes’ and dominates Asian cultures (and see Ooi, 2002b). He states, contra Edward Said, that the ‘so-called Orient is not naïve nor necessarily helpless’; neither is it ‘passive’, ‘docile’ and ‘submissive’. In the case of the Singapore National Heritage Board, which presides over the three major museums in the city-state (the National Museum of Singapore [NMS, formerly the Singapore History Museum], the Singapore Art Museum [SAM] and the Asian Civilizations Museum [ACM]), different kinds of identities are presented in a process of ‘self-Orientalization’ or ‘re-Asianization’, to address the needs of tourism and nation-building in Singapore. Museums operate as ‘contact zones’ between tourists and local identity constructions, and Singapore is presented as a unique ‘Asian’ society which combines modernity and tradition, as well as vernacular notions of the East and West. The NMS presents an image of a ‘unique Asian entity’ which has its own identity and history. The SAM, in turn, provides Singapore with a regional identity; it is a ‘cultural centre’ of Southeast Asia, which in turn is characterized as an ‘aesthetic entity’. Finally, the ACM relates the broad ethnic categories (Chinese, Indian and Malay Muslim) – devised by the government as part of the process of national identity formation – to the great cultural traditions of China, India and the Middle East. In sum, the museums separate and interrelate various dimensions of Singaporean identity promoted by the government, but that identity is ‘essentially Asian and is still exotic’. Keiko Miura draws on several years’ experience of working at the UNESCO World Heritage Site at Angkor in Cambodia, the country’s principal tourism destination, to trace evolving attitudes and policies towards the people and communities whose homes and livelihoods are constructed in and around this globally important heritage site. Historically, conservation and preservation efforts have led to local people being largely excluded from the land they occupied and resources they utilized prior to heritage conservation becoming a national and global concern. But more recently there has been a move to nurture ‘living heritage sites’ where, still within quite strictly controlled parameters, communities can maintain their livelihoods whilst providing a back-drop of human interest and context to the refurbished stone structures of cultural heritage. Even as democratization and participation are being advocated by the international heritage conservation community, particularly in the shape of UNESCO, 22 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 22 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia as a means of ensuring local communities benefit more substantially and directly from heritage tourism development, their translation into effective action at the local level is shown to be severely constrained by prevailing political and personal power structures. Nonetheless, by comparing the Angkor complex with the Vat Phou heritage site in the Lao PDR, Miura suggests that, in relative terms, some progress has already been made with creating a living heritage site at Angkor. Nonetheless, she concludes by advocating a more radical community-based approach to the management of heritage sites, based on the recent experience in Phrae and Nan provinces of Thailand. Nigel Worden looks at national identity and heritage tourism in the historic city of Melaka, which has become a major site of international and domestic tourism, and is represented in Malaysia’s tourist and heritage industries as the place ‘where it all began’, the very source of the cultural and political values and institutions of the Malays and of a Malaydominated Malaysian nationhood. The chapter examines the meaning of this slogan in the context of the cultural policies of the Malaysian state in the late twentieth century, when constructions of the political and religious traditions of the pre-colonial Melakan Sultanate were presented as emblematic of the bangsa melayu or Malay nation. An emphasis on ethnic Malay heritage was accompanied by an indigenization of other Melakan inhabitants, such as the Portuguese Eurasians and the longestablished hybrid Chinese Peranakan, whilst largely ignoring the heritage of the majority Chinese and Indian immigrants who arrived later. The chapter details the various buildings, sites and performances, some real, some imagined and some invented, which collectively make up Melaka’s cultural heritage, and which are presented to tourists in part as a political project of ethnic representation. It also discusses some of the pressures and transformations that have been created by modern developments which have eroded the city’s historical character and integrity, and which were largely responsible for UNESCO’s refusal to grant Melaka World Heritage status until very recently. The chapter ends by considering the impact since the mid-1990s of a new Malaysian national identity that stresses a multiethnic bangsa Malaysia in a more globalized context. Gwynn Jenkins looks at the conservation of the rich and diverse urban cultural heritage of the historic port city of George Town, in the Malaysian state of Penang, as part of wider cross-regional moves to arrest the rapid decay and decline of the historical quarters of the classical ‘Asian 23 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 23 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia city’. She reveals a strong underlying tension between the visions and efforts of the authorities and other stakeholders, who appear committed to promoting new developments in the interests of urban renewal and economic regeneration, including the expansion of tourism, and both the communities themselves and the advocates of sympathetic heritage preservation who promote a vision of living cultural heritage which not only allows continuity in the functions and interconnections of the various ethnic communities which make up the cultural mosaic of George Town but which also offers a more ‘authentic’ cultural resource for consumption by both domestic (the greater segment of the tourism sector) and international tourists. Using two contrasting case studies, Jenkins shows how different the trajectories and impacts of heritage conservation and associated tourism development can be depending on whether they are communityfocused and community-driven, or dominated by external influence and interference. She concludes that the latter threatens the very soul of the city – ‘the connectivity between community, space, place and cultural practice’ – and the very basis of ‘authentic’ touristic experience. George Town, its colonial heritage and its ethnically diverse urban landscape are now under threat from commercial developers and it remains to be seen whether or not the conservation movement and local communities can counter the encroachment of poorly planned new build and renovation. George Town is on the World Monuments Fund ‘watch list’ as a site of global significance whose heritage is in danger, though its recent listing as a World Heritage Site may give some room for optimism. Mark Johnson’s insightful study of the Imperial City of Hue in central Vietnam, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, explores the role of tour guides and conservators/researchers in the making and (re)presentation of Vietnam’s heritage for the ‘tourist gaze’ (Urry, 1990) – what Johnson describes as the ‘carefully ordered and orchestrated process of selective representation inherent in touristic encounters’. Although tourism is presented as an important factor in the dynamics of heritage conservation, the focus in Johnson’s chapter is not on the tourists and their orchestrated readings of heritage and culture, but on certain of the agents of representation – the motivations, interpretations and agendas that lie behind their narratives of place. Johnson echoes some of Ooi’s concerns in his exploration of cultural mediators in Singapore (2002b). Using a case study of the Hue Monuments Conservation Centre, and some interesting qualitative data, Johnson examines not only the interface of tourism development and 24 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 24 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia heritage conservation within the more tolerant and catholic environment of post-reform Vietnam – drawing parallels between the country’s imperial history and current processes of ‘bureaucratic imperialism’ within the official structures of heritage preservation – but also the ambivalent relationship of guides and researchers to the history of the Hue site and in their representations of the site to tourists. Johnson also usefully explores the ‘tourist gaze’ from the perspective of domestic tourists, and reveals a sharp contrast in the knowledge, enthusiasm, attitudes and behaviour of tourists from northern and southern Vietnam towards their country’s cultural heritage. Wantanee Suntikul (with Richard Butler and David Airey) examines three different types of heritage sites in Hanoi (the Ancient Quarter, the Hoa Lo Prison and the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum) and the relationships which Vietnam has with its history in selecting and marketing its heritage as a tourism commodity. Wantanee draws attention to the role of heritage as a ‘cultural anchor’, particularly in a period of economic and cultural transition, and the competing forces at work on those elements which are being subjected to tourism. Many agree that the Hanoi Ancient Quarter should be preserved, but such work would require inhabitants to be relocated to alleviate overcrowding and to enable restoration; the area is also subject to the pressures of modernization and commercial development. Of concern is the danger that, like Luang Prabang in the Lao PDR, it would become ‘frozen in time’ and thus presented as an exotic ‘Orientalized’ spectacle. On the other hand, Hoa Lo Prison stands as a reminder of foreign intervention, serving as the place where ‘Vietnamese nationalists, communists and peasant fighters’ were incarcerated, and where American prisoners of war were detained during the Vietnam/American War. Like the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, the Hoa Lo Prison Museum expresses a strong sense of Vietnamese patriotism, and both are sites of domestic and international tourist interest. Wantanee concludes her investigation with the view that the three sites mediate between different interests involved in heritage tourism – between the domestic and the foreign, the past and the future, economics and ideology, and the individual and the collective. Michael Hitchcock, Nguyen Thi Thu Huong and Simone Wesner take up the theme of heritage as a developmental issue in a case study of Hai Duong, a city lying at the heart of northern Vietnam’s zone of rapid industrialization. A visitor passing through Hai Duong on the main highway linking Hanoi to the port of Hai Phuong might be surprised to learn that the city has any 25 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 25 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia heritage at all, surrounded as it is by gleaming new factory units and other symbols of modernity. The heritage here is not so much the buildings but rather the important handicraft centres that lie in and around the urban areas; these provide employment for large numbers of people and constitute an essential part of the history and identity of the region. Moreover they are an important material and symbolic expression of mainstream Vietnamese culture, which is often overlooked by researchers and tourists more interested in the material culture of the country’s minority populations. Michael J. G. Parnwell’s chapter explores the notion of ‘natural heritage’, and the power relations that lie behind this concept. He uses the examples of Ha Long Bay in Vietnam and Phang Nga Bay in Thailand to compare and contast coastal natural heritage management efforts within and outside the framework of UNESCO World Heritage designation and protection. These two broadly similar drowned karst landscapes have become globally well known (in the case of ‘James Bond Island’ in Phang Nga Bay, as with Angkor Wat and Tomb Raider, this is because of the filming of The Man with the Golden Gun in 1974) for their spectacular limestone towers, islets and both intact and collapsed cave systems (hong). Both locations have come under intensifying pressure from both tourism and other forms of modern development, which have threatened both the aesthetic and intrinsic values of these distinctive landscapes. The chapter traces the responses of various stakeholders to the imperatives of landscape, ecosystem and nature preservation, and identifies a degree of convergence in the strategies adopted by the two countries, despite their obvious political, historical and developmental differences. Movement towards holistic, integrated and community-focused approaches to economic and environmental management can be identified in both contexts, reflecting more general trends in resource conservation which in Thailand substitute for, and in Vietnam are promoted through, heritage management under the auspices of UNESCO. Finally, the editors round off the discussion by drawing out some common themes from the empirical chapters. We reflect on the way that the notion of heritage has been discursively created and developed, allowing considerable scope for politics and political agendas, both internal and external, to become suffused within national projects of heritage promotion. An outside–inside tension is also evident in policies and methods of heritage management, with competing agendas and competitive positioning in the tourism market-place often getting in the way of effective international 26 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 26 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia communication of best-practice. The question is raised as to whether it is both possible and desirable to have a universal model or principle of heritage protection given the huge diversity of contexts to which it must be applied. To what extent do the ways that the territories, structures and practices that constitute Southeast Asia’s cultural and natural heritage have unique meanings, importance and significance to local populations that are at odds with the vision that transnational bodies (such as UNESCO) seek to engender globally? We address such questions in the conclusion by outlining a tentative agenda for future cross-disciplinary and comparative research – in terms of impact mitigation, ownership, inclusion, participatory democracy and the convergence of external and internal conservation agendas – through which a fuller picture of the factors contributing to successes and shortcomings in Southeast Asian heritage management can be generated. note 1 This theme of the politics of heritage has also been taken up in a much more wideranging way by Michael Hitchcock in a co-edited volume with David Harrison; they include case material from Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam and Cambodia, as well as from other parts of the world (Harrison and Hitchcock 2004 [2005]). 27 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 27 09/06/2010 14:34 Chapter 2 Courting and Consorting with the Global The Local Politics of an Emerging World Heritage Site in Sulawesi, Indonesia1 Kathleen M. Adams introduCtion: longing for a globally-aCClaimed toraja October 2006 marked the launch of a much-publicized Toraja Culture Festival, a ten-day event that was to attract upwards of 30,000 visitors to the Toraja homeland in the highlands of Sulawesi, Indonesia, to celebrate Toraja heritage. Touted as ‘Toraja Mamali’ or ‘Longing for Toraja’, the event was heralded as a homecoming festival for Torajas living around the globe, a time for all those of Toraja ancestry to return to their homeland and strengthen Toraja unity and pride, nationally and internationally (www.torajamamali. com). Planned to coincide with Tana Toraja Regency’s fiftieth anniversary year, organizers envisioned the festival as an occasion for overseas Torajas to return and demonstrate their commitment to developing the tourism, educational and agricultural realms in their ancestral homeland. As the Toraja organizers explained on the bilingual ‘Longing for Toraja’ web page: Toraja is renowned for having maintained its traditional culture, from the unique funeral ceremony (rambu solok) to the distinctive handicrafts, also (…) the elegant and inspiring traditional dance and music. Life goes on as it has for centuries, carrying the rhythms of ritual, creativity and culture 28 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 28 09/06/2010 14:34 Courting and Consorting with the Global as precious inheritance for the present generation and the generations to come. It is to continue and pass down this precious inheritance between the sweeping tides of [the] modern world that the Toraja Mamali was announced, forming up to be an act of concern [sic] in making Toraja a world class cultural centre as well as making Toraja a leading region in the sector of education, technology and agriculture. (www.torajamamali.com, accessed 28 February 2008) Tens of thousands of Torajas and over 8,000 foreign tourists made the journey to upland Sulawesi for the ‘Longing for Toraja’ festival. Over the course of the festival these visitors, along with thousands of local residents, witnessed and participated in water buffalo pageants, model village competitions, healthy child contests, as well as the rehabilitation of ‘tourist objects’, schools, major infrastructure arteries and a traditional market. The pinnacle festival day drew 125,000 spectators and was officially opened by Indonesia’s Vice-President Jusuf Kalla beating one of the 300 drums that had been transported from throughout Indonesia for the occasion. On this day Toraja heritage was showcased in a grand carnival fashion, with a parade of traditionally clad Torajas and decorated water buffalos, as well as a traditional musical instrument performance. Official speeches and the unveiling of a spectacular and enormous new monument to Toraja freedom fighters were overshadowed by the long-awaited ‘Mamali Dance’, performed by 2,000 local dancers. As a number of Torajas proudly recounted when I returned in 2008, the size of this traditional dance performance broke all Indonesian records and was widely covered in the Indonesian media. Reflecting on the Toraja Mamali festival, Tana Toraja’s Regent (Bupati) elaborated, ‘Tana Toraja was in need of a trigger to jumpstart it out of its lassitude. We hope that the “Longing for Toraja” festival will be the embryo that revitalizes Tana Toraja’ (quoted in Palar, 2006: 1). While some Torajas were sceptical, for a number of Toraja cultural and political leaders the festival was an opportunity to restore to Toraja what it had been poised to attain a decade earlier during the heyday of international tourism, prior to the current tumultuous era of ‘Indonesian crisis’, when the steady flow of tourists to the region fell to a trickle. That is, the festival carried the twin hopes both of revitalizing much-needed tourism revenues and of reasserting Toraja’s place as a ‘world-class’ culture. In many ways, the ‘Longing for Toraja’ festival was an attempt to rekindle a courtship with the global that had gone badly astray. Just a few years earlier, when Tana Toraja had been nominated for inclusion on the UNESCO World Heritage List, 29 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 29 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia this romance appeared poised to blossom into a long-term relationship. But after several years of little attention and scant visitor revenues, in the minds of some Toraja leaders it was time to call for the reanimation of the heritage-themed courting of overseas Toraja migrants, tourists and international bodies such as UNESCO. This chapter is broadly concerned with the politics of heritage in upland Sulawesi. As the staging of the Toraja Mamali festival suggests, heritage is not only about individual and collective identity, but it is also entwined with economics and with symbolic power. Moreover, in today’s world of global migrants and global bodies such as UNESCO and NGOs, ‘heritage’ is rarely of merely local or domestic concern. Heritage must be understood in terms of layers of local, national and international romances and rivalries. What many have underscored regarding contemporary tourism sites is equally true of heritage locales: in seeking to understand the dynamics at play in such sites, we must be attentive to the theme of ‘contested heritage’, and to engaging with not only local structures and rivalries but also international relations and global organizations and markets (Teo, 2002: 460; Teo, 2003a; Hitchcock, 2004: 463; Burns, 2006: 18–20). More specifically, in this chapter I draw on the case of the emergence of Tana Toraja as a potential World Heritage Site to illustrate how so-called ‘heritage landscapes’ are, to some extent, products of local responses to and engagements with regional, national and global political, cultural and economic dynamics. While there are undeniably certain indigenous Toraja ideas about the meaning and manifestation of heritage,2 these conceptions of heritage are also, to some degree, a colonial and post-colonial product. My aim is to problematize representations of such sites as pristine embodiments of local tradition. I suggest that World Heritage Sites are seldom simply the newly-threatened landscapes of tradition they are imagined to be. Rather, they are the products of a long interplay between the local, the national and the global.3 In chronicling the emergence of a potential World Heritage Site, I am particularly interested in illustrating how transformations of dynamic local places into fixed ‘heritage sites’ is not a ‘natural’ process but rather a political process that can be fraught with calculation, collusion, conflict, collaboration and co-optation. Recently, researchers have begun to push for more attentive analyses of the process of cultural objectification. Writing on the process of reactive objectification, Nicholas Thomas has observed, ‘If conceptions of identity and tradition are part of a broader field of 30 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 30 09/06/2010 14:34 Courting and Consorting with the Global oppositional naming and categorization, the question that emerges is not how are traditions invented? But against what is this tradition invented? Or, in general, how does the dynamic of reactive objectification proceed?’ (Thomas, 1997: 190). In a similar vein David Harrison observes, ‘Whatever elements of the past are presented as heritage (…) they have already passed through a complex filtering process whereby someone, or some group, has selected them. Nothing – but nothing – is automatic heritage material’ (Harrison, 2004: 285; also see Hitchcock, 2004: 463–464). Turning a more refined lens to the history of one locale currently on the Tentative List of Indonesian World Heritage Sites enables us to gain a more nuanced perspective on the politics of the process of cultural objectification, and to better appreciate the complicated roles of local and international agents and agencies in ‘fixing’ dynamic locales. My use of the term ‘fixing’ here is deliberate and meant to evoke the multiple meanings of this word – in the sense of rendering something dynamic into something lifeless and immobile, as well as in the senses of renovating and repairing, and arranging and organizing. As I suggest, we can learn from this case study, for in today’s globalized world even hinterland heritage sites are shaped by multiple forces, actors and agencies from within, around and beyond the nation. I begin this chapter with a vignette concerning the events that led to the selection of a particular Toraja hamlet (known as Ke′te′ Kesu′) for tentative inclusion on UNESCO’s List of World Heritage Sites. In this portion of the chapter I also unpack some of the local reactions to this selection, and contrast these reactions with an analysis of UNESCO conceptions and assumptions pertaining to World Heritage Sites, many of which are entwined with romantic assumptions about ancient life-ways under siege by the contemporary world. I then turn to trace the history of Ke′te′ Kesu′, from its colonial roots to the present, illustrating how the birth of this hamlet as well as its rise to pre-eminence was part and parcel of colonial and postcolonial dynamics. Finally, I turn to address how local contestations over whose heritage was to be elevated to fame ultimately fuelled a re-framing of the World Heritage Site nomination, such that Ke′te′ Kesu′’s nomination was broadened to all of Tana Toraja. Finally, I close with a discussion of the broader lessons emerging from this case study. 31 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 31 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia unesCo enCounters Ke’te’ Kesu’ and tana toraja: the multiple and shifting meanings of heritage sites In April 2001 there was cause for jubilation in the highland Toraja village of Ke′te′ Kesu′ on the island of Sulawesi. Residents had just learned that their rural hamlet was poised to achieve international fame and reverence, on a par with Borobodur or the palaeolithic caves of Lascaux. For their village had just been officially selected for consideration as a World Heritage Site by the Southeast Asian members of UNESCO. Over the previous week Southeast Asian delegates and UNESCO representatives had gathered in Tana Toraja Regency to attend a UNESCO Global Strategy meeting devoted to nominating and reporting on Southeast Asian World Heritage Sites. The selection of Tana Toraja Regency as the venue for this meeting was far from haphazard; it was, in part, the culmination of years of lobbying by local Toraja cultural activists and Indonesian politicians. At the official opening ceremony of their gathering in Tana Toraja, UNESCO delegates were regaled with Toraja dances and ritual processions set against the backdrop of the finely carved ancestral houses that form the core of the hamlet of Ke′te′ Kesu′.4 These UNESCO delegates toured the area in their leisure hours, becoming acquainted with the cultural richness and natural beauty of the region. Ultimately, a UNESCO team appraised the touristically touted Toraja village of Ke′te′ Kesu′, determining that it satisfied many of UNESCO’s criteria for World Heritage Sites. According to Indonesian news reports, Sulawesi government officials and locals were optimistic that Ke′te′ Kesu′ would soon join the ranks of official Southeast Asian World Heritage Sites (Hamid, 2001).5 UNESCO has a clearly articulated definition of what constitutes a World Heritage Site. The groundwork for UNESCO’s role in determining, preserving and protecting World Heritage Sites was established at the 1972 UNESCO General Conference in Venice. At this meeting, UNESCO delegates ratified the World Heritage Convention. As decreed by this convention, UNESCO would embark upon compiling a ‘World Heritage List’, registering unique sites of supreme universal value. The convention stipulated that the governments of UNESCO member countries could nominate sites for inclusion on the World Heritage List. If it is determined that a nominated site meets the established criteria for inclusion on the list,6 it could potentially merit resources for its protection and preservation. In short, the underlying motivation for creating the World Heritage List 32 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 32 09/06/2010 14:34 Courting and Consorting with the Global was the notion that certain locales embodied properties of ‘outstanding universal value’ and deserved international conservation efforts. Today, in keeping with the 1972 Convention, cultural, natural and mixed sites are included on the World Heritage List. Cultural heritage sites are monuments, groups of buildings or locales with historical, archaeological, aesthetic, scientific, ethnological or anthropological value. Natural sites, in contrast, are locales that embody outstanding examples of the earth’s history, biological or ecological evolution, habitats of biological diversity or threatened species, and exceptional natural beauty. Finally, mixed sites, also termed cultural landscapes, ‘encompass both outstanding natural and cultural values that illustrate significant interaction between people and their natural environment over a period of time ‘(Villalon, 2001: 1). The Toraja hamet of Ke′te′ Kesu′ was nominated for inclusion on the World Heritage List as a mixed site or ‘living cultural landscape’. Located on the Indonesian Island of Sulawesi, four kilometres southeast of Rantepao (Tana Toraja Regency’s main town and tourist base), the hamlet of Ke′te′ Kesu′ has long been a magnet for anthropologists, historians, architecture students and tourists. With such local celebrity, it seemed fitting that Ke′te′ Kesu′ would also capture the fancy of the Southeast Asian UNESCO meeting delegates. Heralding the traditional ancestral houses (tongkonan) that comprise the heart of Ke′te′ Kesu′, one of the attendees at the UNESCO meeting commented, The tongkonans [ancestral houses] of Tana Toraja are living heritage in the true sense. They go beyond the sense of ‘home’, being regarded as living symbols of local families who insist on maintaining their religious, cultural and environmental traditions. The tongkonan does not exist in isolation in the Tana Toraja landscape. The vista of Tana Toraja villages – sweeping roofs of parallel rows of tongkonan built at the foot of a hill where ancestors are buried and surrounded by communal rice fields – shows the long interaction of the local population and their environment. The landscape demonstrates a deep relationship with nature that has existed for generations. Preserving the genius loci of Tana Toraja villages goes beyond protecting the unique architecture of the dwellings. It means preserving a total lifestyle while attempting to make the traditional lifestyle, severely threatened by 21st century influences, continue to be relevant (Villalon, 2001: 3). As this commentary underscores, ‘preservation’ is a key theme in the UNESCO World Heritage Site designation. In tandem with this preservationist orientation is the attendant assumption that the ‘traditional’ 33 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 33 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia is under assault by contemporary ‘21st century influences’: The Toraja village of Ke′te′ Kesu′ is celebrated as a utopic7 and quintessential ancestral ‘home’ where humans live as they always have, in harmony with the environment. However, as the UNESCO narrative suggests, this idyllic Eden is endangered, warranting the protection of World Heritage Site designation. Ironically, as this chapter illustrates, the very globalizing forces that prompted Ke′te′ Kesu′’s discovery by UNESCO (tourism and accelerated discourse with the outside world) are now deemed threats to its ‘genius loci’.8 When I first learned of UNESCO’s interest in this Toraja hamlet, I shared in some of the jubilation of Ke′te′ Kesu′’s inhabitants. In the mid1980s, while conducting research on Toraja art and identity, I resided in this highland Sulawesi village for twenty-two months and have made frequent return research visits in subsequent years. While mulling over the implications of Ke′te′ Kesu′’s candidacy as a World Heritage Site, I received a call from a Toraja friend who had been a young boy during my initial research in Ke′te′ Kesu′. My friend was now based in Florida and employed by an international cruise ship line. His income from his job had enabled him to erect a spacious new home with an electricity supply for his mother on a hilltop above Ke′te′ Kesu′ village. My friend’s cruise ship position afforded him regular opportunities to tour celebrated World Heritage Sites and I was anxious to hear his reflections on Ke′te′ Kesu′’s candidacy. Expressing his delight at the designation, my friend immediately underscored that the new status promised to revitalize lagging tourist visits. As he lamented, recent political violence and economic instability in Indonesia had eroded tourism to Tana Toraja, resulting in economic difficulties for village souvenir sellers. With World Heritage Site designation, residents’ livelihoods (now largely dependent on tourism revenues) would be reassured, enabling Ke′te′ Kesu′ers to pay off debts, stage long-postponed mortuary rites, and modernize their homes. The more we talked, the more apparent became the disjunction between his conceptions of the meaning and value of heritage and those of UNESCO. Whereas my Toraja friend stressed the changes and affluence this new status would bring, UNESCO’s emphasis was on the preservation of an imagined past that would stave off modernizing influences. Subsequent conversations with other Ke′te′ Kesu′ers revealed similar disjunctions. Several residents noted that becoming a World Heritage Site would affirm for the world that the Toraja could no longer be dismissed as a backward hill people: now they would become world stars. For this group of Ke′te′ Kesu′ers, World Heritage Site designation was not 34 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 34 09/06/2010 14:34 Courting and Consorting with the Global about the preservation of an imagined past, but rather about amplification, be it amplification of wealth for some, familial prestige for others, or ethnic identity for still others. Some time later, I had the opportunity to talk with several Toraja acquaintances in Jakarta about Ke′te′ Kesu′’s new-found fame. These acquaintances, whose ancestral villages were in other regions of Tana Toraja, had markedly different reactions from those of my Ke′te′ Kesu′ friends. As one declared to me, more heatedly than I’d anticipated, ‘I’m all in agreement with Tana Toraja being a World Heritage Site, but Ke′te′ Kesu′? I don’t agree! That is a political play, not heritage (…)’ While his comments suggested that heritage and politics were separate realms, the more we talked, the clearer it became that he and his friends were willing to do their own political lobbying to ensure that Ke′te′ Kesu′ers could not hijack the fame that was due to all of Toraja for themselves. As the above vignette suggests, ideas about the meaning and value of World Heritage Site designation are multiple and variable. Hobsbawm and Ranger (1983), Keesing (1989), Linnekin (1990, 1991) and others have adeptly illustrated how ideas about ‘tradition’ and ‘heritage’ are infused with the politics of the present. Building on their foundational work, this chapter argues that today, as in the past, heritage sites are stages on which various groups and actors inscribe competing and commingling histories and meanings. In the context of globalization and international tourism, ‘heritage’ and ‘tradition’ become all the more intensely rethought, rearticulated, recreated and contested, both by insiders and outsider packagers, politicians and visitors. Tourism does not simply impose disjunctions between the ‘authentic past’ and the ‘invented past’, as earlier researchers suggested, but rather blurs these artificial lines, creating new politically-charged arenas in which competing ideas about heritage, ritual and tradition are symbolically enacted (cf. Hitchcock, King and Parnwell, 1993a; Wood, 1993; Adams, 1995, 1997a, 2006; Bruner, 1996, 2001; Picard, 1996; Picard and Wood, 1997a; Erb, 1998; Cartier, 1998). I turn now to trace the politics, rivalries and colonial and post-colonial forces behind the rise of Ke′te′ Kesu′, from obscurity to touristic fame to its (ultimately temporary) status in 2001 as one of the newest sites on Indonesia’s Tentative List of World Heritage Sites.9 35 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 35 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia The Toraja village of Ke'te' Kesu': from colonial heritage to ‘tourist object’ What is thought of as Ke′te′ Kesu′ today consists of four stately ancestral houses (tongkonan), an imposing museum shaped to resemble a traditional house, and numerous carved rice granaries and souvenir and handicraft stands. Around the fringes of the plaza are homes of local residents, some Bugis-styled on stilts, others of wood or bamboo, and still others of concrete. A footpath behind the central ritual plaza of the village winds down through a bamboo grove to cliff-side graves. Here visitors can gaze upon ancestral skulls, weathered wooden effigies of the dead, carved sarcophagi, and more recently erected ornate cement tombs. A hundred years ago, this village, as such, did not exist. In stating this, however, it is not my intention to suggest that Ke′te′ Kesu′ is a spurious pretender to World Heritage Site status. In fact, I would emphatically champion Ke′te′ Kesu′’s inclusion on the list of World Heritage Sites, as it is very much a landscape upon which ancestral memories have been inscribed and enacted. At the turn of the century, the four ancestral houses, or tongkonan, that comprise the heart of Ke′te′ Kesu′ were scattered on various peaks, some miles from the current site. It was the advent of colonialism that triggered the birth of Ke′te′ Kesu′ village. Prior to the 1906 arrival of Dutch colonial forces, kin groups lived in scattered mountain top settlements, maintaining ties through an elaborate system of ritual exchanges (Nooy-Palm, 1979, 1986). The tongkonan played (and continue to play) a central role in these inter-group relations. In recent years, Toraja has been discussed as a ‘house society’ in that it is challenging to fully comprehend its cognatic kinship system without an understanding of houses as the orienting point of this system (Waterson, 1990, 1995: 47–48).10 In short, the tongkonan is more than a physical structure: it is a visual symbol of descent and a key marker of heritage for most contemporary Torajans (Adams, 1998a).11 At various tongkonan-centered rituals,12 histories of the founding ancestors and their descendants are carefully recounted and all who trace their descent to the tongkonan being fêted are expected to contribute financially or materially to the ritual expenses. Just as tongkonan are closely tied to ancestry, they are also linked to ideas about rank. Elaborately carved tongkonan, such as those found in Ke′te′ Kesu′ today, were associated with the elite. Commoners and (former) slaves were traditionally barred from embellishing their ancestral homes with such ornate carved motifs. Affiliation with an older named tongkonan established by early, elite ancestors carries more prestige than affiliation with a more recently established splinter-group tongkonan. 36 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 36 09/06/2010 14:34 Courting and Consorting with the Global Tongkonan Kesu′, from which Ke′te′ Kesu′ takes its name, is one of the older, most prestigious tongkonan in the region. In the early part of the twentieth century, the leader of this tongkonan was a politically astute member of the elite named Pong Panimba. Observing that Dutch authorities conferred leadership roles on the nobles located closest to Dutch headquarters in the Rantepao valley, Pong Panimba sagely perceived the disadvantages of his tongkonan’s remote hilltop location. Recognizing that propinquity to Dutch headquarters was a key ingredient for one’s continued authority in the new era of Dutch colonialism, Pong Panimba had his home and seat of authority (Tongkonan Kesu′) relocated from its remote mountaintop site to the valley, clustering it with several other family tongkonan (Tongkonan Tonga, Tongkonan Sepang and Tongkonan Bamba). Since fathers buried the placentas of newborn children adjacent to their tongkonan, these ancestral houses become closely tied to the lands on which they were constructed. Thus, in general practice tongkonans were not to be moved, as their physical sites took on added importance with each generation.13 The decision to break the tie between site and structure would have weighty, requiring lengthy discussions amongst all those affiliated with the ancestral house. Pong Panimba would have had to exercise all of his political skills to grease the path for the move. No doubt, the exigencies of the colonial era made what may well have been a controversial relocation decision more viable – especially since, during this period, Dutch officials began forcing some Toraja families to relocate into the major valleys for administrative convenience (Bigalke, 1981). According to my Toraja mentors, ritual prescriptions were followed that enabled the relocation of this celebrated ancestral house.14 Tongkonan Kesu′s new site was strategically selected, for it was not only physically lovely, but it was also a mere four kilometres from the Dutch colonial headquarters. The move, completed in 1927, proved to be a successful scheme for currying authority in the new colonial context. Pong Panimba was soon named the second head of the colonial ‘Kesu′ District’. By the 1940s, however, the Second World War, the Japanese occupation of Indonesia, and Indonesian independence posed new threats to the family’s security and standing, as well as reinvigorating old rivalries between competing Toraja elites. In the late 1940s, when the newly independent Indonesian government established the government seat far from the Kesu′ District in the southern city of Makale, near the Sangalla adat15 region of Tana Toraja, Ne′ Reba Sarungallo16 (Pong Panimba’s grandson and then37 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 37 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia leader of Tongkonan Kesu’) became concerned. As the new Tongkonan Kesu′ leader, Ne′ Reba observed that rival Sangalla nobles and Sangalla adat were threatening to overshadow those of the Kesu′ area. Ne′ Reba’s misgivings cemented in 1950 when, following independence, the subdistricts of Tana Toraja Regency were formally established: a Sangalla District (kecamatan) was delineated, but no provisions were made for a Kesu′ District. Ne′ Reba astutely recognized that with this new political geography, the name Kesu′ would be lost, as would Kesu′ heritage, traditions and the authority of the Kesu′ nobles. If Kesu′ were to survive in the new post-colonial order, a strategy was needed. However, the 1950s and 1960s were tumultuous times in South Sulawesi (as Muslim insurgencies and secessionist movements posed constant threats to Toraja highlanders), and it was not until the late 1960s when the region was calmed that possibilities to reinvigorate Kesu′ heritage presented themselves. As the first off-the-beaten-track tourists began to trickle into his hamlet in the late 1960s, Ne′ Reba perceived an avenue for ensuring that the name Kesu′ lived on. Drawing on his authority as an elected politician, aristocratic leader and Dutch Reformed Church elder, as well as his substantial charisma, Ne′ Reba lobbied local government authorities to declare his hamlet the first official ‘tourist object’ (obyek wisata or obyek turis).17 Significantly, the name he proposed for this ‘tourist object’ was Ke′te′ Kesu′. In 1974, Ke′te′ Kesu′ was officially recognized as a ‘tourist object’, along with two other sites (Londa and Lemo, both burial sites rather than villages). This was prompted, in part, by a PATA (Pacific Asia Travel Association) conference held in South Sulawesi that year. South Sulawesi police and government officials were drawn upon to promote Tana Toraja and to transport PATA delegates interested in touring the region. The PATA tour featured the three newly-designated ‘tourist objects’. At Ke′te′ Kesu′, delegates admired well-rehearsed dance performances, carving demonstrations and weaving displays. They also listened raptly as Ne′ Reba recounted the history of the development of tongkonan, and the significance of those found in Ke′te′ Kesu′. The tour and Ne′ Reba’s lesson on tongkonan heritage were deemed a success. PATA delegates returned home and began promoting the region as a pristine and fascinating destination for foreign tourists. In these early promotions, as in current-day advertisements, the ‘traditional village’ of Ke′te′ Kesu′ was prominently highlighted. 38 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 38 09/06/2010 14:34 Courting and Consorting with the Global the politiCs and praCtiCalities of promoting heritage Around the same time that tourists were discovering Tana Toraja, so were anthropologists and historians. As the reigning Kesu′ noble and as an exceptionally knowledgeable elder, Ne′ Reba was increasingly sought out by foreign and domestic researchers. By the 1970s and 1980s, Sulawesi scholars were making routine pilgrimages to Ke′te′ Kesu′ to interview Ne′ Reba. These scholars later returned home and chronicled Ne′ Reba’s accounts of Kesu′ heritage in their English, French, German, Japanese and Indonesian books and monographs. In this fashion, Eastern and Western academics and their institutions were entwined with the cementing of Kesu′ heritage and the concomitant growing celebrity of Ke′te′ Kesu′.18 After successfully enshrining the name Kesu′ on the touristic and anthropological map of Tana Toraja, Ne′ Reba produced a written history of Tongkonan Kesu′, and began to offer lectures at tourism, architectural and university seminars on the historical significance of Kesu′. By the mid1980s, Ne′ Reba was one of the key lecturers at training sessions for local tour guides and in 1985 he was ceremonially recognized by Indonesian government officials as the ‘founding father’ of Tana Toraja. When Ne′ Reba passed away in 1986, Indonesian dignitaries who had met him on prior trips to the highlands returned for his elaborate pageantry-filled funeral at Ke′te′ Kesu′. A foreign ambassador, several governors, four Indonesian Cabinet Ministers and thousands of guests converged on Ke′te′ Kesu′ for the tenday ritual. The funeral received ample coverage on national television, radio and in newsprint, and was also documented by several anthropologists, further propelling Ke′te′ Kesu′ and the Kesu′ story on to the national and global stage.19 Following Ne′ Reba’s death, it was unclear who was to succeed him in his role as maintainer of Kesu′ s prominence. His brother, Renda Sarungallo, inherited his position as Tonkonan Kesu′’s elder, but he resided in Jakarta, too far away actively to serve as a local promoter of Kesu′ heritage, identity and authority. Those of Ne′ Reba’s sons still living in Ke′te′ Kesu′ were either too young or reluctant to compete with one another for the role of ‘local authority’. All agreed, however, that although tourists still flooded to the village, without Ne′ Reba to promote the kin group’s heritage, the family’s continued prestige was in jeopardy. Once again, they risked being overshadowed by other elites with competing ideas about the meaning of Toraja heritage and competing claims to ancestral glory. 39 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 39 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Initially, Ne′ Reba’s surviving siblings and children decided to pursue the traditional avenue to reaffirm the kin group’s status: they opted to stage a re-consecration ritual (mangrara tongkonan) for their ancestral tongkonan, Tongkonan Layuk at Ke′te′ Kesu′. Typically, for Toraja such rituals are visual affirmations of the glory of the kin group affiliated with the tongkonan being celebrated. All members of the kin group associated with the tongkonan are expected to contribute to the ritual, lending their energy, savings, raw materials, construction skills, vehicles and livestock to the cause. After several years of planning and fund-gathering, the family staged the ritual on 20 January 1990. The event was deemed a magnificent success, drawing thousands of guests, tourists, and even the Jakarta media. A twopage article on the ritual, illustrated with colour photographs, appeared in Kompas, the nation’s premier newspaper. Also, with the aid of local and Jakarta-based sponsors, the family published a 50-page booklet detailing the meaning of the mangrara ritual and the history of the tongkonan at Ke′te′ Kesu′ (Panitia Mangrara, 1990). Published in Indonesian, the booklet not only offered anthropological accounts of the buildings, but also listed the names of the elites currently playing leadership roles in each of the Ke′te′ Kesu′ tongkonan. Today, the booklet is offered to visiting researchers and was most likely circulated as part of the lobbying effort to secure the attention of UNESCO. In addition to staging the tongkonan consecration ritual, the family devised other plans for their re-emergence on the local political stage. In the late 1980s, the family embraced a new avenue to regain their ebbing authority: the institution of a museum. The urban Jakarta kin were well aware of the political role of museums in Indonesia and elsewhere, particularly as the 1980s were a decade of museum mania in the country (with new museums opening on a regular basis). Likewise, propelled by the touristic celebrity of Ke′te′ Kesu′, several of Ne′ Reba’s son’s had spent time overseas, carving traditional houses in museums in Japan and elsewhere. On these trips, they had gained a fuller appreciation of the heritage promotion potential of museums. At the time, the only existing museum in Tana Toraja Regency was a small museum in the Sangalla district, run by a competing elite family. As the Sarungallo family recognized, with Ne′ Reba gone and with no museum of their own, they would be disadvantaged in their ability to receive the same level of recognition as these local rivals. By 1988, the Sarungallo family had opened the Indo′ Ta′dung Museum in one of the ancestral tongkonan in Ke′te′ Kesu′.20 The museum was named 40 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 40 09/06/2010 14:34 Courting and Consorting with the Global after Ne′ Reba’s deceased sister, who had sold Toraja sculptures, antiques, trinkets and textiles out of her home in Ke′te′ Kesu′ until her death in 1985. The core of the museum collection had come from her inventory and the family felt it fitting to honour her memory with the museum. Indo′ Ta′dung had been a popular local figure, with a surplus of humour, charisma and some claim to local fame. Not only had she been married to a Toraja freedom fighter during the revolutionary struggle against the Dutch, but she was recognized as the first courageous Toraja to raise the Indonesian flag in Rantepao following Indonesia’s 1945 declaration of independence. This original flag was still amongst Indo′ Ta′dung’s belongings and was envisioned as a cornerstone of the future museum’s collection. Initially, the museum space and displays were simple, comprised largely of traditional eating utensils designed for elites, ancient knives, relics, and prized ritual textiles. By the mid-1990s, however, the vision expanded. Renda Sarungallo had received an unexpected windfall from an Indonesian cabinet minister to help fund a new museum and ‘bibliotheek’21 structure in the heart of Ke′te′ Kesu′. By my 1995 visit to Ke′te′ Kesu′ construction of the new, expanded museum was well under way. The new museum was designed in the shape of an oversized tongkonan and dominated the hamlet’s plaza. The first floor was to be devoted to displays of Kesu′ heritage objects and the lofty second floor was envisioned as the library and future headquarters for research on Toraja culture and heritage. Here would be housed a collection of scholarly books and manuscripts concerning Toraja culture. In short, as family members told me, the library would ensure that, even though knowledgeable elders such as Ne′ Reba were now deceased, people would continue to perceive Ke′te′ Kesu′ as a source of ancestral knowledge (a legacy no longer embodied in a person, but now in a library and museum structure). That is, the borrowed institution of the museum was to become the font of Toraja culture and heritage. In the spring of 1998, just prior to the collapse of Suharto’s New Order, the Sarungallo family plan appeared to be poised for success. The construction of the new museum was nearly complete and the building was slated to open the following year with a grand traditional mangrara banua ritual (a tongkonan consecration ritual). However, the vision was derailed by the Asian economic crisis and Indonesia’s decline into political turmoil. International and domestic tourist flows to Ke′te′ Kesu′ abruptly dwindled to a trickle and villagers whose livelihood had come to rely heavily on tourist expenditures were increasingly anxious about their futures. On my most 41 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 41 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia recent visit, Ne′ Reba’s eldest son, a quietly reflective middle-aged man, voiced not only his concerns about Toraja’s future economic livelihood, but also his fears that, without village-based tourism revenues, the young generation of Ke′te′ Kesu′ers would come to view their culture and heritage as irrelevant. As he confided, I worry that my children’s generation isn’t going to be interested in their heritage any more. They will see our cultural problems and traditional etiquette as ancient and old-fashioned. Yet, I know that out of ten ancestral Toraja regulations (aturan Toraja), at least five of them are always going to be relevant, no matter when. I am sure of that. What is the proof? The proof is in our architecture. Our tongkonan are held up as examples by people who are not even Toraja – Europeans, Japanese. Even in your Pasadena Rose Bowl parade a few years back, remember, it was the float modeled after a Toraja tongkonan that won the first prize. This shows that Toraja culture is relevant to the rest of the world. We should all be proud of our heritage, and of those accomplishments. As a twin-pronged approach for tackling the economic and heritageconfidence challenges of the post-New Order era, Ne′ Reba’s son had been training young Ke′te′ Kesu′ers to carve utilitarian objects embellished with Toraja designs for export to both the domestic and international market. As he explained to me, in carving utilitarian objects such as coffee tables, clocks and Kleenex boxes embellished with traditional Toraja designs, these young people would discover that their heritage still has value and is still valued in the world. In addition, they would one day take pride in seeing these Toraja-produced objects in homes throughout Indonesia and the world. The penultimate chapter in this saga is the 2001 UNESCO nomination of Ke′te′ Kesu′ as a World Heritage Site. By late 1998, Ne′ Reba’s son had become increasingly concerned about what he perceived to be cultural slippage, as he observed that the new generation was paying less heed to Kesu′ and Toraja traditions. Given the trends he was observing, he feared that Kesu′ and Toraja would soon be lost to new buildings and new people, with traditions and heritage paved over and forgotten. He reflected on how best to convey to his own people as well as to the world that their ‘cultural heritage was a form of wealth that could not be measured in rupiah (…) and that the Kesu′ and Toraja way of life should be preserved’. Drawing on all of his political skills, he slavishly lobbied various ambassadors and politicians, eventually gaining the moral support of the Indonesian 42 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 42 09/06/2010 14:34 Courting and Consorting with the Global Directorate of Culture and earning the assistance of the Japanese Cultural Center. Eventually he and his growing chorus gained the ear of Indonesia’s Minister of Tourism, who then invited the UNESCO Conference for the Asia–Pacific Region to convene in Tana Toraja Regency. As a result of this meeting, through the efforts of Ne′ Reba’s son and others, Ke′te′ Kesu′ was registered for candidacy as a World Heritage Site (receiving registration No. C1038). This designation promised not only renewed celebrity and respect for Kesu′ heritage, but also suggested a timely infusion of financial capital into the village. Initially, the publicity surrounding the UNESCO nomination as well as Indonesia’s enhanced political stability with Megawati Sukarnoputri’s installation as President prompted a resurgence of tourism to Tana Toraja Regency and gave the residents of Ke′te′ Kesu′ reason for optimism. However, following the aftermath of the Islamist suicide aeroplane hijackings and crashing of 11 September 2001 and the Islamist bombings in tourist enclaves in Bali in 2002 and 2005, the shortterm future of tourism in Indonesia began to look precarious. ‘fixing’ World heritage By 2004, Ke′te′ Kesu′’s trek to global celebrity had ended. Apparently, the core issue that toppled the hamlet’s candidacy for World Heritage Site status centred on the thorny concept of authenticity. Although it is possible that local Toraja rivalries and resentments over the hamlet’s rise to UNESCO celebrity were also at play in Ke′te′ Kesu′’s derailing,22 the Regional Adviser to UNESCO for Culture in the Asia Pacific does not acknowledge these issues. Rather, he summarizes why the hamlet was removed from consideration as a World Heritage Site as follows: Both the tourism industry and the heritage profession risk becoming confused about what is real and what is fake. A nomination for World Heritage inscription of the Tana Toraja homeland was put forward recently to the World Heritage Committee, prepared by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism (which at that time were part of the same ministry). However, and in spite of the rhetoric about the importance of protecting the cultural landscape and traditional practices, when the nomination maps were closely examined it was clear that the area that was in fact nominated for protection under the World Heritage Convention was limited to only five structures in the compound of the local tourist office, one of which was a totally new construction in modern materials made to look like a traditional house, while the other four were moved from their original location and 43 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 43 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia rebuilt to the tourist office premises, with considerable alteration to their form and material – and a complete loss of original function. The rejection of this nomination by the World Heritage Committee caused consternation among both the tourism industry and the heritage management office, neither of which understood what was inappropriate about the nomination – a circumstance which demonstrates just how confused the heritage tourism industry has become about what is real and what is not. Local inhabitants, however, welcomed the rejection of this nomination and took advantage of the confusion caused by this so-called ‘set-back’ to heritage tourism to retake control of how – and even if – Torajan heritage is to be shared with visitors (Engelhardt, 2007: 6). Striking about this summary is the assumption that the movement of the ancestral homes almost 100 years ago, the more recent attempts by local tourism agencies to improve the village by adding features such as sidewalks, as well as one local family’s addition of a museum in the form of an ancestral house all added up to what this UNESCO adviser deemed to be ‘fake’. That the ancestral homes continue to be the centre of local ritual activities, that the village has long been home to multiple families and that these families themselves were responsible for many of the village’s transformations did not enter into this particular UNESCO consultant’s calculus of Ke′te′ Kesu′’s authenticity. For him, the yardstick of authenticity had been fixed at some imagined point in the distant past. As he went on to conclude, this was an instance of ‘staged authenticity’ which ‘is always inappropriate and culturally unacceptable’ (Engelhardt, 2007: 6). While Ke′te′ Kesu′ers would be the first to acknowledge that they are savvy players in the game of cultural politics, they would be startled by this characterization of their ancestral hamlet as an inauthentic fiction rebuilt to tourist office specifications. Ultimately, as Engelhardt alludes to in the above quote, other Torajas ‘took advantage of the confusion’ to navigate for a broader conception of the entire region as a heritage site. In June 2005, Indonesian authorities submitted a draft nomination of all of Tana Toraja for consideration as worthy of inclusion on the World Heritage Site List. However, the region still sits on the sidelines awaiting global recognition, as UNESCO deemed its documentation incomplete and advised authorities to finalize it for re-submission (Feng Jing (UNESCO official), personal communication 7 March 2008). 44 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 44 09/06/2010 14:34 Courting and Consorting with the Global As the Tana Toraja case study illustrates, the emergence of heritage sites is not a ‘natural’ process, but rather one born out of complex exchanges, competitions and collaborations between local groups, as well as national and international entities. While there are important ‘Toraja’ indigenous ideas about heritage inscribed in the tongkonan that comprise the village of Ke′te′ Kesu′ (cf. Adams, 1998a, 2006), the hamlet itself is also very much a product of the Dutch colonial past. Moreover, in the course of its evolution over the past century, Ke′te′ Kesu′ has been shaped by other processes and institutions that stretch far beyond the local. While local actors and rivalries between local elites are salient to understanding Kete′ Kesu′s trajectory to candidacy as a World Heritage Site, as well as to understanding its replacement on this list with the broader category of ‘Tana Toraja’, a more informed analysis requires situating this particular cultural landscape into a larger national and global context. As we saw, the mid-twentieth century uncertainties of Indonesian national independence were not without ramifications for Ke′te′ Kesu′, as local districts were reshaped and renamed by new government bureaucrats. This threat of administrative erasure of the Kesu′ name prompted Kesu′ elites to search for alternative means to ensure the longevity and prestige of their heritage. International tourism and foreign and domestic social science researchers became avenues for Ke′te′ Kesu′’s survival. In a similar vein, as Kesu′ers gained in experience outside the region, the western institutions of museums and libraries were embraced as supplementary avenues for fortifying Kesu′ heritage. Finally, as the Asian economic crisis reached Tana Toraja and Indonesian political stability eroded in the late 1990s, Kesu′ers explored new non-touristic avenues to promote their economic survival and simultaneously their heritage. Through marketing modern utilitarian wooden objects embellished with carved Toraja motifs nationally and internationally, Kesu′ers’ livelihood and involvement in producing traditional symbols was assured. In short, while certainly a ‘genius loci’, Ke′te′ Kesu′ is not the static and unchanging embodiment of tradition imagined by UNESCO. And, in fact, when UNESCO advisers became aware of the broad strokes of Ke′te′ Kesu′s history, it was promptly discarded as a candidate for World Heritage Site status, ultimately to be replaced by the broader (and less rivalry-inciting) site of Tana Toraja. The Tana Toraja’s Tentative World Heritage Site status is the product of a long interplay between the local, the national and the global. As we have seen, Ke′te′ Kesu′ers were reshaping and rethinking their notions 45 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 45 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia about heritage, as they encountered multiple forces from within, around, and beyond the nation. Examining Ke′te′ Kesu′’s derailed ascendance to candidacy as a World Heritage Site, and the shift to the broader category of ‘Tana Toraja’, offers insights into the process of cultural objectification, as we come to appreciate better the complex roles of local and international players in ‘fixing’ and promoting this dynamic locale. Moreover, it is highly probable that the case of Ke′te′ Kesu′ hamlet, and ultimately Tana Toraja, is not a unique tale in the annals of UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Rather, it would seem that most locales that successfully gain candidacy for UNESCO World Heritage Site status are places that have undergone similar trajectories, where local, national and international forces have conspired, wittingly and unwittingly, to project these ‘endangered’ sites on to the global stage. notes 1 This chapter is a revised and up-dated version of ‘The Politics of Heritage in Tana Toraja, Indonesia: Interplaying the Local and the Global’, originally published in Indonesia and the Malay World in 2003 (a condensed version of that earlier article also appeared in Current Issues in Tourism in 2004). 2 Here I do not mean to reify the sense that there is a universal ‘Toraja’ perspective on the meaning of heritage. Clearly, ideas about heritage vary between different sectors of the population (elites and those of ‘low’ ancestry, urban Toraja and hinterland villagers, etc.) and also vary regionally. 3 Moreover, it may well be the case that it is precisely this history of overlooked discourse with the wider world (and the concomitant notion of newly-arrived endangerment from the wider world) that enables heritage sites to gain UNESCO pre-eminence. 4 For a brief video clip of this opening ceremony, see the ‘Global Meeting’ section of the web page http://jakarta.unesco.or.id/prog/clturetoraja.html. 5 As of 2008 the World Heritage Committee had 878 sites on its list; of these 679 were cultural, 174 natural and 25 were mixed sites, and only 29 are located in Southeast Asia (see introductory Chapter 1 and Table 1.1). As some Asian observers have noted for some time, the Asian sites have been under-represented (Villalon, 2001: 1). Calling for ‘brotherhood despite diversity’ some Southeast Asian cultural observers have urged that Southeast Asian Cultural Heritage site nominating should not be done in isolation, but rather Southeast Asian sites should be proposed strategically with an emphasis on selecting sites that ‘identify the common cultural thread uniting Asians despite their differences’ (Villalon, 2001: 2). 6 Among the criteria for inclusion of cultural properties on the World Heritage List are the requirements that the nominated site, ‘(i). represent a masterpiece of human creative genius; or (ii) exhibit an important interchange of human values, over a span of time or within a cultural area of the world (…); or (iii) bear a unique or at least 46 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 46 09/06/2010 14:34 Courting and Consorting with the Global exceptional testimony to a cultural tradition or to a civilization which is living or which has disappeared; or (iv) be an outstanding example of a type of building or architectural or technological ensemble or landscape which illustrates (a) significant stage(s) in human history; or (v) be an outstanding example of a traditional human settlement or land-use which is representative of a culture (or cultures), especially when it has become vulnerable under the impact of irreversible change; or (vi) be directly or tangibly associated with events or living traditions, with ideas, or with beliefs, with artistic and literary works of outstanding universal’ (http://whc. unesco.org/opgutoc.htm#debut, downloaded 21 May 2002). Criteria for inclusion of natural properties include the following: That the sites ‘(i) be outstanding examples representing major stages of earth’s history (…); or (ii) be outstanding examples representing significant on-going ecological and biological processes in the evolution and development of terrestrial, fresh water, coastal and marine ecosystems and communities of plants and animals; or (iii) contain superlative natural phenomena or areas of exceptional natural beauty and aesthetic importance; or (iv) contain the most important and significant natural habitats for in-situ conservation of biological diversity, including those containing threatened species of outstanding universal value from the point of view of science or conservation’ (http://whc.unesco.org/ opgutoc.htm#debut, downloaded 21 May 2002). 7 See Andrew Causey (2003) for a stimulating discussion of the concept of utopics in contemporary tourism practices and fantasies. 8 Bruner’s observations that tourism has recuperated the major binary oppositions such as ‘traditional–modern’ long since discarded by anthropology appears to apply to international heritage organizations as well (Bruner, 2001). 9 Because of limitations of space, this chapter’s discussions of Toraja conceptions of these matters concentrates primarily on Ke′te′ Kesu′ elite perceptions and their representations of heritage. 10 In recent years there has been much discussion of the idea of the house as a specific form of social organization. This proposition has captured the attention of many Austronesianists, as it appears to have a great deal of explaining power for many dimensions of kinship practices and orientations. See Claude Lévi-Strauss, 1983, 1987; Waterson, 1990, 1995; Fox, 1987, 1993; Carsten and Hugh-Jones, 1995, and Erb, 1999 for further explorations of this concept. 11 Waterson notes that the salience of the tongkonan may well have grown in recent years, as tourism and cultural efflorescence have become increasingly important in Indonesia (1990). Architecturally, tongkonan structures have become more exaggerated over the past two decades, with the rooftops of newer tongkonan flaring ever-higher and Toraja families incorporating tongkonan motifs into their homes (cf. Kis-Jovak, Nooy-Palm, Schefold and Schulz-Dornburg, 1988). 12 Such as the mangrara tongkonan ritual. 13 As Waterson notes, ‘Some origin-houses associated with very important ancestors have in fact long ceased to exist, but their sites are still well remembered and in theory if the descendants willed it, they could be rebuilt’ (Waterson, 1997:65). Indeed, friends who traced their ancestry to Tongkonan Kesu′ always pointed out its original site when we found ourselves in its vicinity. 47 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 47 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia 14 I was told that certain highly symbolic pieces of the tongkonan would be relocated in such a move, but that generally the entire house is not dismantled and relocated (although this is done with Toraja rice barns, when circumstances call for their move). Beyond this, my mentors did not provide further clarification on the physical logistics of the tongkonan relocation process. Given that it is common practice for Toraja families to completely rebuild tongkonans that fall into disrepair on the same site, using new wood, new carvings and new roofs, I can only conclude that this was what was done with Tongkonan Kesu′. 15 The term adat is ubiquitous in the Malay world and carries complex multiple meanings. Generally translated as ‘custom’, ‘customary law’, ‘tradition’ or ‘behaviour’, numerous writers have explored the nuances of this concept. C. van Vollenhoven published one of the early texts on adat in the Netherlands Indies in 1918, establishing the foundation for subsequent works on the topic. Drawing on ethnographic research, he created classifications for various adat or customary law regions in the Netherlands Indies (1918). Contemporary scholars have turned their attention to examining subjective dimensions of the concept of adat and to chronicling its political manipulations. Zainal Kling, for instance, defines adat as the ‘indigenous body of knowledge and law of the Malay world’ (1997: 45) and discusses adat as the folk-model whereby Malay self-identity is maintained. Ultimately, he suggests that adat is most aptly understood as ‘the subjective understanding of the Malay society of their cultural formations and cultural constructs’ (1997: 46). 16 In previous writings I have used the pseudonym Ne′ Duma. However, he is now deceased and his descendants have expressed their desire to have his memory and contributions better known, be it through anthropological writings aimed at the English-speaking world or via more Toraja-oriented memorials. 17 Wisata translates as ‘tour’, and obyek wisata can be translated as ‘tour object’ or ‘tourist object’. The Indonesian government has promoted the use of these expressions as part of its tourism development project. The very use of these terms suggests a reconditioning of the local gaze, as village inhabitants come to perceive their homes as ‘objects’ for tourists. 18 See Adams 1993a, 1995 for further elaboration of the role of foreign researchers in amplifying particular versions of Toraja heritage and identity. 19 On the final day of the funeral, Ne′ Reba’s body was enshrined in an enormous and spectacular modern cement tomb behind the village by the cliff-side graves. Today, almost twenty years later, guides still pause by his tomb to recount the story of this Kesu′ elder and his final send-off. 20 For a more detailed discussion of this museum, as well as the museum in Sangalla, see Adams, 1997b. 21 It is noteworthy that in describing his vision to me, Renda Sarungallo chose not to use the Indonesian term for library (perpustakaan) but rather the Dutch term. As a Dutch-educated Torajan whose first wife had been Dutch, Renda Sarungallo was clearly inspired by this European institution. 22 As noted earlier, people in other regions of Tana Toraja felt their own villages were equally deserving of World Heritage Site recognition and were irked by Ke′te′ Kesu′ers’ attempt to grab the limelight for themselves. 48 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 48 09/06/2010 14:34 Chapter 3 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan1 Mami Yoshimura and Geoffrey Wall introduCtion Cultural expressions come in both tangible and intangible forms, with associated stories and interpretations. Selected cultural expressions may be commodified as heritage and sold to tourists, and in the process their meaning and significance may be changed. This chapter addresses both the heritage of the Atayal in Taiwan, parts of whose cultural activities were suppressed by colonial powers, and their attempts to reconstruct their culture, identity and heritage within the context of tourism. The contribution addresses questions concerning the changing relationships between culture, identity and tourism as this indigenous people strives to recover from a marginalizing situation that has resulted from colonialism and neo-colonialism. The Atayal are one of thirteen officially-recognized indigenous groups in Taiwan. Although Taiwan is not a Southeast Asian country, the Atayal are speakers of an Austronesian language with many affinities to Southeast Asia. They have experienced both colonialism and tourism development. During Japan’s occupation (1895–1945), they were forced into village settlements and were required to abandon certain socio-cultural activities: facial tattooing, head-hunting and weaving. The Atayal lost most of their original textiles because, during the Japanese colonial period, many of them were taken to Japan. Today, these textiles, most of which are in storage, are preserved in a few Japanese museums, and are brought out only when 49 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 49 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia special exhibitions are held by the museums. Now, in Taiwan, the Atayal’s textiles are being reconstructed by the hands of some indigenous women in Wulai (Figure 3.1), a town about a one-hour drive from Taipei and which has become a tourism destination based on both natural and cultural resources. It is important to note that most of these women weave primarily for museums, using as their models a handful of remaining traditional clothes as well as Japanese books that describe the textiles and provide very detailed pictures of the originals; they reconstruct replicas as well as new works based on the remaining originals and the pictures. Other artisans weave for domestic tourists but they have little success in competition with less expensive Han Chinese factory-made woven products. = language groups ui TAIPEI Wulai Ta n sh Hsin-chu Chi-lung Su-ao SAISIYAT Chang-hua ATAYAL hia Tac T’ai-chung Hua-lien Choshui TSOU BUNUN AMI T’ai-nan Tai-tung RUKAI Kao-hsiung PUYAMA PALWAN YAMI 0 0 50 50 100 miles 100 150 km © NIAS Press 2010. Base map from Mountain High Maps. ATAYAL Figure 3.1: Map of Taiwan showing location of Wulai After the mid-1960s, when tourists started visiting their village, the indigenous residents of Wulai generated most of their income though international tourism (Hitchcock, 2003). However, since the mid-1990s the number of international tourists has declined. The end of the ‘golden era’ 50 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 50 09/06/2010 14:34 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan of international tourism in Wulai began in part because of the opening up of China as a competitive alternative destination. Unlike many other parts of Southeast Asia that the Chinese authorities approved as tourism destinations, the political situation has meant that Taiwan has yet to benefit from the growing number of tourists emanating from mainland China. In the face of a reduction in the number of international visitors, Wulai’s indigenous residents have gradually relinquished their tourism jobs. Some of them have left for Taipei or Sindian to search for new employment. Others have stayed in Wulai where they try to make ends meet. In 1997 some indigenous women who had left their jobs in tourism started to revitalize Atayal weaving. The reintroduction of weaving not only required the Atayal weavers to retrace their weaving history and to reconstruct and revive lost skills but also opened up a novel opportunity to create new motifs with western looms imported from Sweden and New Zealand and to earn income through weaving. The weaving is authentic in that it is undertaken predominantly by Atayal women by hand in their homes, albeit with a modified technology. However, authenticity is a slippery term and, as will be seen, the context in which the weaving is undertaken and the meanings attached to the product have changed. Furthermore, cheaper machine-made, broadly similar products are produced by machine by majority Han entrepreneurs that undercut the hand-woven textiles that require more skill and time to make. This has greatly reduced the ability of Atayal weavers to create textiles as a commercially viable tourism product. The reintroduction of weaving has had multiple effects on the Atayal community. Weaving has changed from being a symbol of the Atayal women’s gender identity alone to a representation of the Atayal’s collective ethnic identity as a whole. Now the Atayal proudly claim their weaving culture as a part of their ethnic identity. It has also become an ethnic symbol and a tourism product, although most of the current domestic tourism market is satisfied by machine-made products. Having experienced sixty-two years of inactivity as a result of traditional Atayal weaving culture being banned by the colonial Japanese from the mid-1930s until its revival in 1997, why did the Atayal decide to weave again? How has weaving contributed to Atayal identity formation? Focusing on facial tattooing, head-hunting and weaving as an entry point for the exploration of changes in Atayal culture, this chapter will demonstrate how the Wulai Atayals’ multiple identities have been changed through their 51 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 51 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia experiences of the post-colonial history of Taiwan and the contemporary history of tourism development. heritage and identity Heritage and identity are closely related concepts and they both occur along a scale-gradient. While the United Nations recognizes special places with universal value, many such places will be unknown to many, or perhaps most, people who may not readily identify with them. At the other end of the scale, individuals have personal heritages and identities. In between there are national and regional heritages and identities, and these may be contested and malleable. The following discussion is concerned with the heritage of an indigenous group and how a particular aspect of that heritage has been variously viewed as a symbol of identity from perspectives that are both internal and external to the group. In recent years, the notion of identity, and with it identity politics, has become relevant within a variety of social sciences discourses (Holloway et al., 2003). But what is identity? There are three main ways to understand identities. First, identities are understood by comparing and contrasting the Self with the Other. The construction of the Other is often characterized by the establishment of dualisms or binary opposites (Aitchison, 2000; 2001), although such a process may result in the simplification and stereotyping of the Other. Gregson et al. (1997: 84–85) defined a dualism as follows: A dualism is a particular structure of meaning in which one element is defined only in relation to another or others. Dualisms thus usually involve pairs, binaries and dichotomies, but not all pairs, binaries and dichotomies are dualisms. What makes dualisms distinctive is that one of the terms provides a ‘core’, and it is in contrast to the core that the other term or terms are defined. Thus dualisms structure meaning as a relation between a core term A and (a) subordinate term(s) not–A. By defining cores and peripheries, norms and deviants, centres and margins, the powerful and the powerless, the process of Othering defines the Self as possessing greater power and status than the Other (Aitchison, 2000). In other words, the idea of Othering suggests that our sense of who we are is not based on a wholly internal process but relies on an external reflection of power relationships between us and them (Crang, 1998). Holloway and Hubbard (2001: 77) also asserted that: 52 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 52 09/06/2010 14:34 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan Your identity – the way you think about yourself and the ways others think about you – is defined not just by what you are but also what you are not. Indeed, we make sense of ourselves by identifying differences between ourselves and others. Adams (1996) suggested that all identity is constructed across difference, and that identity politics are rooted on the politics of difference. It is hard to contest that these differences are important to understanding society (cf. Swain, 2002). The concept of the Other provides a useful vehicle for examining power relationships among people at different places and times (Aitchison, 2001). Thus, the concept of the Other and the process of Othering are important to the understanding of identity formation. Second, our identities are not static but relational. The Self and the Other are produced though social relations of identification and differentiation. Hubbard et al. (2002: 89) also described identity as follows: Human identity is endlessly complex and fluid, and (…) the placing of people into particular pigeon-holes or categories is dependent on the discursive regimes (and power relations) that dominate at any one moment. Our identities are socially constructed and changeable over time. Holloway et al. (2003: 252) has argued that all societies are relational in that ‘they are always constructed and understood in terms of their sameness to, and difference from, others’. Thus, difference is a relational concept that we experience in terms of discrimination, inequalities of power and domination over others. In other words, identity formation stresses differences between others and the self as they change over time. This is important when considering aspects of heritage for it may be valued and interpreted differently by members of a group and outsiders, and these values and interpretations may change over time. Symbols of identity may be invented, as in the case of bagpipes in Scotland, and they may be reinvented, once lost, as in the case under consideration below. Third, our identities are not singular but are multiple. Drawing upon the work of Ewing (1990), Gombay (2005) argued that our identities are not singular but are multidimensional, and these multifarious, inconsistent selves are context-dependent and can shift rapidly. Gombay (2005: 425) further argued that: 53 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 53 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Identity exists at many levels. It exists in private and in public. It is attached both to individuals and to collectives. It varies according to context and scale (…). The composition of identity reflects such things as people’s history, social experiences, and development. Gombay (2005) called this perspective ‘multiple identities’ and also pointed out that the composition of identity reflects social experiences, historical context and origins. By understanding the elements that constitute identity, the socio-cultural and political-economic processes that have affected people can be better understood. ConCeptual frameWorK: shifts in identity formation To understand how the Atayal’s multiple identities have changed, a diagram has been created that can be used as a conceptual framework for displaying changes in multiple identities (Figure 3.2). The darker centre of the diagram shows elements that constitute a group’s multiple identities (e.g. culture, ethnicity, race, gender and place). On the other hand, on the outer ring of the diagram the symbols that represent each identity are shown. Symbols are important identity markers (Schermerhorn, 1974; cited in Ashcroft et al., 2000), therefore a loss or replacement of a symbol affects the construction of the multiple identities and, thus, leads to shifts in identity formation. This diagram is used to highlight how the indigenous peoples’ multiple identities have been modified through their colonial experiences. The diagram can be applied at a variety of scales from the individual to collectivities to illustrate visually how multiple identities have been changed through particular events. The diagram as used here encompasses indigenous, Japanese, and even Han, perspectives on identity. These differ but they are not entirely separate for one informs the other in reciprocal relationships. In future research, such a diagram could be applied to different groups or individuals in the exploration of changes in identity formation and, thus, is viewed as having wide applicability. Study site description Geography and people of Taiwan Taiwan is a mountainous country, located 160 kilometres off the southeast coast of China (Munsterhjelm, 2002). It is a small island that is 377 kilometres long and 142 kilometres wide (Cauquelin, 2004). More than 54 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 54 09/06/2010 14:34 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan Landscapes Cultural symbols Place Culture Gender Gender symbols Ethnicity Race Ethnic symbols Racial category Figure 3.2: Diagram to represent shifts in multiple identities two-thirds of Taiwan’s surface is covered by mountains (Copper, 2003) and this is where the majority of indigenous people now live. In terms of population, there are close to twenty-three million people in Taiwan (ibid.). Although there is disagreement about whether the term ‘ethnic’ accurately describes different social groups in Taiwan, Taiwan’s people are commonly described as being in four major groups: (1) the indigenous peoples; two groups of native Taiwanese ((2) Fukienese or Hoklo, and (3) Hakka); and (4) mainland Chinese (ibid.: 68). The indigenous peoples are usually seen as being ethnically distinct from the other three groups, and they have been broadly defined into two groups: (1) the lowland and (2) mountain indigenous peoples (Copper, 2003). In this chapter, the indigenous peoples that are referred to are those in the mountains. Many lowland indigenous peoples were either killed or assimilated by the Chinese over a long period of time and it is, thus, difficult to trace their indigenous identity. On the other hand, mountain indigenous peoples still 55 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 55 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia maintain their distinct indigenous identity, although their culture has been considerably modified through the influences of their colonial encounters. As of January 2007, thirteen indigenous groups are officially recognised: the Atayal, Taroko, Saisiyat, Thao, Bunun, Kavalan, Amis, Tsou, Rukai, Puyuma, Paiwan, Yami and Sakizaya (The China Post, 2007). These official classifications were originally developed by Japanese anthropologists in the early twentieth century, when indigenous peoples were divided into nine groups (Munsterhjelm, 2002; Hitchcock, 2003). In recent years, some indigenous people such as the Taroko have challenged the government of Taiwan who had continued to use the schemes based on the Japanese classification system (Munsterhjelm, 2002). The result is that the official classification has changed accordingly and is still under debate. While the number of the indigenous peoples recorded by the census might be an underestimate of the reality (Allio, 1998; Arrigo et al., 2002), it is believed that there are roughly 400,000 indigenous people; they constitute only two per cent of the total population of Taiwan (Munsterhjelm, 2002). The Atayal are the second largest indigenous group and they mostly live in the northern part of Taiwan (Hsieh, 1994). Based on linguistic differences, the Atayal people are further categorised into three sub-groups: Atayal proper, Tseole and Sedeq (Hsieh, 1994). While there are common cultural features among the three Atayal groups, there are also regional differences. The Wulai Atayal Wulai is located 27 kilometres south of Taipei city (Hsieh, 1994). The indigenous people of Wulai are considered to be one of the sub-groups of the Atayal proper. The 2004 census showed that Wulai had 767 households and 2192 residents, including 851 indigenous people and 1341 Han Chinese (Wulai Township Office, 2004). The Township of Wulai consists of five villages: Jhongjhih, Wulai, Sinsian, Siaoyi and Fushan. During Japan’s occupation, the Japanese relocated the Wulai Atayal to the five villages to consolidate their administration (Wulai Township Office, 2004). This had many implications for their lifestyles and, consequently, their heritage. Except for Wulai or ‘Ulay’ which means hot spring in the Atayal language, the other villages now hold the Chinese names given by the government (Hsieh, 1994). In Wulai, along the Nan Shih River, there is a natural hot spring that people come to enjoy and, in walking distance, there is the tallest waterfall in Taiwan. 56 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 56 09/06/2010 14:34 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan Methods Following the identification of Wulai and the Atayal as a potential research opportunity by the second author in 2005 and the establishment of local contacts, library research was conducted, initially in Canada and later in Taiwan and Japan, to explore relevant concepts and the documented history of Japanese–Atayal relationships. Field research was conducted for fourteen weeks in Wulai in summer 2006 primarily by the first author with some assistance from Taiwanese colleagues and students. During this period she lived with the most accomplished weaver, interacted with all other weavers in the community on many occasions, participated in many community events, and interviewed numerous officials and other informants, both in Wulai and Taipei. Being fluent in Japanese and English and being able to read some Mandarin, many conversations were conducted in Japanese, particularly with older informants; interviews with officials were sometimes conducted in English. An interviewer/translator was used occasionally when it was necessary to converse in Mandarin, particularly in the early part of the field investigation. Facial tattooing, weaving and head-hunting Before 1895 Prior to colonization by Japan, the Atayal held traditional religious beliefs called gaga (Figure 3.3 ). For their place identity, the Atayal saw the mountains in which they lived as an identity marker. The Atayal also spoke their own language, Atayal. Their language and facial tattoo patterns showed regional characteristics; therefore, they were important identity markers for the Atayal to determine who belonged to which group (identified in the outer ring of Figure 3.3). Prior to colonization, the Atayal men and women got their facial tattoos at the age of fifteen to sixteen when they were ready to get married. The Atayal men got tattoos on their foreheads and chins, in two separate short vertical bold lines, when they proved themselves to be accomplished headhunters (Wiedfeldt, 2003). Once the men were tattooed, they were eligible to get married (Yamamoto, 1999; 2000). Women, on the other hand, had to be meticulous and accomplished weavers before they got their tatoos (Wiedfeldt, 2003): a bold line on their foreheads and cheeks (Figure 3.4) and a wide line from one ear, across the cheeks, through the lips to the other ear, making a V shape (ibid.). Like Atayal men who took many heads, Atayal women who were recognized as great weavers were allowed to have tattoos 57 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 57 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Gaga Mountain Place Religion Atayal language Culture Gender Male: Head-hunting Facial tattooing Female: Weaving Figure 3.3: Determinants of the nature of the Atayal’s multiple identities: before 1895 on other parts of their bodies, such as palms and legs as well as special tattoos on their foreheads (Yamamoto, 1999). In Atayal society, successful male head-hunters were considered to be brave men and their accomplishments were marked by the chin tattoo. Thus, head-hunting was a particularly important ritual for the Atayal men to show their adulthood. According to Yamamoto (1999; 2000), the qualification to have facial tattooing for men changed over time. Originally, only those who succeeded in head-hunting were allowed to have a facial tattoo on their chin (Yamamoto, 1999; 2000). Later, regardless of success in head-taking, Atayal men were allowed to have facial tattoos if they touched the head of a nobleman taken by their father or a sibling (Yamamoto, 1999; 2000). At any rate, head-hunting was a symbolic activity for Atayal men and was required to obtain facial tattooing, and the relationship between facial tattooing and head-hunting was inseparable for the Atayal to define 58 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 58 09/06/2010 14:34 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan Figure 3.4: An Atayal woman with facial tattoo Source: Mami Yoshimura: photograph of part of an exhibit in the Shung Ye Museum of Formosan Aborigines, Taipei, Taiwan. their gender identity as Atayal men. Although head-hunting is no longer undertaken, hunting for game is a respected male activity. Similarly, becoming an accomplished weaver was crucial for the Atayal woman as it promised her a successful marriage with a strong, skilful Atayal man. Traditionally, the Atayal women used backstrap (body tension) looms to weave. The weaver sat on the floor, straightened her legs, put a strap on 59 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 59 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia her back to keep the tension of the warp threads, and then wove a piece of cloth by running the weft into the warp. To make the threads, the Atayal women planted noka or ramie, cut the ramie plant, peeled it, and separated the bark into pure fibres with toothed bamboo tools (Okamura and Zhang, 1968: 31). With regard to weaving motifs, the Atayal women mainly wove plain and twill. The former weaving technique allowed them to make stripe line motifs. The latter allowed them to engage in more complicated motifs such as rhombus patterns, which were the most popular motif woven by them. In terms of colours, white and dark orange were the Atayal’s two most traditional colours for weaving. The Wulai Atayal also used indigo blue because of the widespread availability of the indigo plant in the region. Because a woman’s acquisition of weaving skills was directly related to her ability to get a facial tattoo and then to get married, the Atayal mother passed down her weaving skills only to her own daughters. If someone came to their house when she was weaving, she hid away her looms and any materials related to weaving, including yarns and weaving pieces. It was important for the Atayal women to keep their skills within their family. Once they got their facial tattoos and married, they then wove fabrics to store away for their daughters’ trousseau when they were due to be married. Thus, the Atayal men’s head-hunting and the Atayal women’s weaving represented their gender identity and, in turn, were closely connected to facial tattooing and their cultural identity. Japanese colonization (1895–1945) After China’s defeat in the Sino–Japanese War, Japan officially annexed Taiwan, the Pescadores Islands, and the Liaodong Peninsula via the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895 (Tipton, 2002). Japan then attempted to establish its own empire in Asia and the Pacific, hoping to achieve equal status with the Western nations. Japan’s war victory against China certainly brought Japan into the Western nations’ consciousness as an ‘Asian imperialist’ (Tipton, 2002: 76). However, despite increased recognition from Western nations, Japan was forced to abandon its claim to the Liaodong Peninsula via the Triple Intervention made by the Russian, German and French governments (Tipton, 2002). This situation was resented in Japan which was well aware of its position as the first non-Western state to join the ranks of the nineteenth-century colonial powers (Wong, 2004). The Japanese government was certain that Japan’s colonial practices in Taiwan would be compared to European colonial rule in other parts of the globe; thus, they 60 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 60 09/06/2010 14:34 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan Gaga Mountain Shintoism Place Atayal language Religion ‘The Atayal’ ‘Facial tattooed savages’ Race ‘Formosan race’ Culture Japanese Gender Facial tattooing Female: Weaving Male: Head-hunting Figure 3.5: Shifts in the Atayal’s multiple identities: after Japanese colonization, 1895–1945 determined that Taiwan should become a model colony (Tsurumi, 1977; Lin and Keating, 2005). Accordingly, Japan tried to follow in the footsteps of the West and to exercise its colonial power based on the notions of Enlightenment. Due to Japan’s occupation, the Atayal’s multiple identities were forced to change, at least superficially, to meet the expectations of the Japanese and their anthropologists (Figure 3.5). First, the colonial state of Japan imposed Shintoism as a state religion on the Atayal. The Atayal were forbidden to practice gaga, their own belief, and thus their religious identity was buried (represented by its placement outside the outer ring in Figure 3.5). In terms of cultural identity, the Atayal also learned to speak Japanese as the authorities educated the indigenous children in this language. Facial tattooing was banned by the colonial government to prevent the Atayal from engaging in head-hunting, for these practices were closely linked 61 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 61 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia (Yamamoto, 1999). Women’s weaving was banned after Japan initiated its ‘Holy War’ against the West in the 1930s. Because facial tattooing was closely connected to the construction of the Atayal’s gender identity, the ban severed the links between facial tattooing, marriage and weaving for women and head-hunting for men, helping to bury the Atayal’s cultural gender identity. During Japan’s occupation, a new identity was also imposed on the Atayal: they were racially categorized as an inferior ‘Formosan’ race (Harrison, 2003: 345) and named the ‘facial tattooed savages’ because of their facial tattoo practices (now placed in the outer ring in Figure 3.5). According to Atayal informants, ‘Atayal’ only meant ‘human being’ in the Atayal language (Personal communication, 2006). Until the Japanese classified the indigenous peoples into nine groups, the Atayal did not consider themselves as the ‘Atayal tribe’ (ibid.). In other words, the Japanese were the ones who imposed the idea of tribal identity as the ‘Atayal’ on those indigenous people (Hsieh, 1994). For the colonial-era Japanese, the concept of a savage/civilized dichotomy was important (as it was the Western norm), defining other peoples as inferior, different, deviant and subordinate in Eurocentric epistemologies and imperial/colonial ideologies (Ashcroft et al., 2000). Like other colonial empires in the West, the Japanese wanted to show themselves as the ‘saviours’ of the indigenous peoples to legitimize the occupation of Taiwan (Stainton, 1999: 30). Thus, the production of the colonial Other – the indigenous peoples as savages – was essential for the early part of Japan’s colonization to suggest that Japan was leading the savages towards civilization. The colonial state of Japan separated the colonized people into two groups, Han Chinese and indigenous peoples, to prevent them from cooperating to fight against the Japanese. They classified Han Chinese as ‘common people’ and the indigenous peoples as ‘savages’. The effects of this may linger today as the indigenous people are minorities with lower living standards and life opportunities and they are regarded as inferior by many Han. Furthermore, the indigenous areas were segregated by fortification lines and the indigenous peoples were required to have minimum contact with the outside world. This categorization between Han Chinese and the indigenous peoples, and the segregation of living places between the two groups, promoted linked ideas of place and racial identity. Ashcroft et al. (2000: 26) noted that ‘perhaps one of the most catastrophic binary 62 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 62 09/06/2010 14:34 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan systems perpetuated by imperialism is the invention of the concept of race’. By ignoring the cultural specificity of the indigenous peoples of Taiwan, including the Atayal, Japan’s imperialism placed the concept of race into a simple binary that reflected its own logic of power. Based on linguistic differences, the indigenous peoples were further categorized into nine tribes and the Atayal were recognized as one such by the colonial government of Japan (Harrison, 2003). Finally, the Japanese colonial government forced the Atayal into village settlements (Hitchcock, 2003) and, thus, the Atayal had to modify their mountain life based on shifting cultivation. The colonial government was particularly interested in the Atayal’s area of habitation because of its rich camphor plantations. The ban on head-hunting was also a step in forcing the Atayal men to engage in farming, which had previously been Atayal women’s work. Nationalist China’s colonization (1945–1987) After the Second World War was over in 1945, Japan’s fifty years of occupation also ended. At the same time, Nationalist China’s colonization started. With the Cairo Declaration, Taiwan was placed under the rule of mainland China (Cauquelin, 2004). Chiang Kai-shek and his Nationalist Party, the Kuomintang (KMT), saw their retreat to Taiwan in 1949 as a temporary setback until they could return to mainland China (Cheng, 1994; Manthorpe, 2005). Thus, it was important for the KMT to govern Taiwan as if it were mainland China (Manthorpe, 2005). This mentality led to the Sinicization of Taiwan. To redefine people’s identity and ideology in Taiwan, Chiang Kai-shek’s central government rigorously implemented an entire ‘re-Sinicization policy’ (Cauquelin, 2004). As a part of this policy, it was made compulsory to teach Mandarin in schools and to use Mandarin in the media (ibid.). For the indigenous people of Taiwan, including the Atayal, this transition meant becoming more Chinese, and their multiple identities needed to be shifted again. Particularly in the case of the Atayal in Wulai, the ways in which the Wulai Atayal reconstituted their multiple identities were greatly affected not only by Nationalist China’s colonization but also by the forces of international tourism development. After Japan’s occupation was over, Christianity began to be introduced to the indigenous people of Taiwan, including the Atayal (Figure 3.6). In the case of the Wulai Atayal, missionaries from Canada rigorously converted the Atayal to Presbyterianism. Later, Australian missionaries also successfully converted many Atayal to Catholicism (Wen and Xiao, 1997). After their 63 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 63 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Shintoism Gaga Waterfall Christianity Mountain Hot spring Religion Place Japanese Atayal Mandarin Japanese Culture Gender Facial tattooing Race Dancing ‘The Atayal’ Male: Hunting? ‘Mountain people’ Female: Weaving ‘Noble savages’ Figure 3.6: Shifts in the Atayal’s multiple identities: after tourism development, 1945–1990 conversion to Christianity, their own belief (gaga) and Shintoism were quickly erased from their religious beliefs (represented as lying outside the outer ring in Figure 3.6). In terms of their linguistic identity, the Atayal had to learn a third language: Mandarin. When in 1949 the Nationalist KMT government occupied Taiwan, the Atayal were fluent in Japanese, and had even integrated some Japanese words into Atayal, but the Nationalists forbade the Atayal to speak their hybrid language. All instructions in schools were conducted in Mandarin, and the young Atayal eventually lost their ability to speak their own indigenous language. International tourism development in the Wulai Atayal area encouraged the speaking of Japanese. After 1956, when Chiang Kai-shek established a new tourism policy, the growth rate of the tourism industry exceeded more than 23 per cent annually for two decades (Copper, 2003). The 64 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 64 09/06/2010 14:34 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan tourism industry became a major source of income – foreign exchange – and provided significant employment opportunities in Taiwan, including nearby Wulai. In 1964, the Administrative Office of the Wulai Scenic Area was founded (Hsieh, 1994). The number of tourists coming to Wulai was estimated to average about 3,000 per day from the mid-1960s to the early 1990s (ibid.). The Japanese constituted the largest number of visitors to the area. During this period, tourism revenues became the most important economic resource for local residents (ibid.). It had been a generation since the Wulai Atayal attached the traditional meanings to their facial tattooing rituals, head-hunting and weaving, but it did not take long for them to reinvent their traditions. Tourism was not the major catalyst in reinvigorating their heritage but it played a part in influencing outcomes and meanings by creating a changing market for textiles. The older Atayal women with facial tattoos became photo subjects for the Japanese who came back to Taiwan not as colonisers but as tourists. Meanwhile, young female Atayal wore costumes and danced for Japanese tourists because it was easier for them to earn income by dancing than to weave, which was very time-consuming. The Atayal men were largely absent from the tourism scene, and tourism jobs placed more emphasis on the Atayal women, once again shifting the gendered division of labour among the Wulai Atayal. The Atayal men are believed to have been engaged in some animal-hunting activities, not head-hunting; however, their voices were not collected directly in this research and thus this cannot be confirmed. The Atayal were still categorized racially as ‘Atayal’, but their naming had shifted from ‘facial tattooed savages’ to ‘noble savages’ and from ‘Formosan Race’ to ‘Mountain People’ in the eyes of the Japanese (Figure 3.6). In tourism brochures, the Wulai Atayal were described as ‘simple, wild, healthy and passionate’. According to Jahoda (1999: 11), during the Enlightenment period the idealized noble savage represented a ‘state of closeness to nature, simplicity, freedom and robust health as a counterpoint to what were felt by some to be the evils of a corrupt civilization and lack of liberty’. During the Japanese colonial period, the indigenous people were portrayed as uncivilized, barbaric savages. They were represented as colonial Others who were the subject of Japan’s civilizating and modernizating mission. After Japan’s colonization was over, the Atayal were idealized as noble savages with a strong heritage who were close to nature. Those images were created to manipulate the desires of Japanese tourists who were in search of exotic Others. 65 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 65 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia In terms of their place identity, Wulai’s unique landscapes, with the hot spring and waterfall, were commodified for the Japanese tourists. While the Han Chinese dominated the lower hill of Wulai, the Atayal were displaced to the upper hill of Wulai. After the development of international tourism occurred, the segregation of residential areas between Han Chinese and the indigenous residents became clearer as wealthier Han Chinese were able to purchase land in the valley bottom and gained profits through tourism businesses. Thus, the Atayal were further marginalized within their own community, both spatially and economically. The rise of democracy and the decline of international tourism (1987–present) After the lifting of martial law in 1987, the Progressive Democratic Party (DPP) was created as the first opposition party in Taiwan (Cauquelin, 2004). In 1996 Lee Teng-hui organized Taiwan’s first free and fair presidential election (Manthorpe, 2005). Lee’s victory in the 1996 democratic election was the sign of the complete transition to democracy in Taiwan (ibid.). In 2000 Taiwan organized the second presidential election. The presidential candidate of the opposition DPP, Chen Shui-Bian, broke the KMT’s 55-year monopoly on state power in Taiwan (Simon, 2002). During his presidential campaign, Chen had placed indigenous rights at the centre of his platform. His election was clearly a victory for the native Taiwanese majority and for the forces advocating Taiwanese independence (Arrigo et al., 2002). Meanwhile, the indigenous rights movement was by this time active around the globe. In Taiwan, two organizations, the Alliance of Taiwan Aborigines and the Presbyterian Churches in Taiwan, were organized to promote this movement (Allio, 1998; Stainton, 2002). At the same time, the Wulai tourism enterprise changed its emphasis from international to domestic and cross-Straits tourism. Due to China’s entry into the global tourism market as well as Chiang Ching-kuo’s lifting of martial law, the market trend favoured China over Taiwan in the late 1980s. With shifts in the market, the number of Japanese tourists declined and some indigenous female residents in Wulai left their jobs in tourism. With the advance of democracy, the rise of Taiwan’s independence movement, the growth of the global indigenous rights movement since the late 1980s and the decline of international tourism in Wulai, the Wulai Atayal experienced another big change in their life. 66 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 66 09/06/2010 14:34 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan During the ‘golden era’ of international ethnic tourism development in Wulai from the mid-1960s to the early 1990s, the indigenous residents of Wulai were represented as ‘noble savages’, and in fact this image continues today. By portraying the indigenous residents as ‘classic people’ who do ‘classic works’, the tourism brochures still construct the image of the Atayal as noble savages. Although this English term is not used specifically, the Atayal are described as being brave, honest, simple and in harmony with nature in tourism brochures and are similarly romanticized in Japanese travel writing. Since the Taiwanese-led government positioned the indigenous peoples as a crucial icon of Taiwan’s national identity, the diversity in cultures has been celebrated (Arrigo et al., 2002) and the indigenous people have been encouraged by government policies and funding to ‘reinvent their traditions’. In the case of Wulai, the Atayal women’s weaving culture was selected as a way to promote their indigenousness. As noted above, until Japan banned the Atayal from getting facial tattoos, weaving was a symbol of women’s gender identity. Sixty-two years later, weaving was revitalized, but its meaning has changed for some Atayal: weaving now represents the collective ethnic identity of the Atayal (Figure 3.7 overleaf). In Wulai, all junior high school students are now encouraged to learn the Atayal language and to learn traditional culture. Traditionally, weaving was considered to be strictly a woman’s task, but now all students are free to learn how to weave regardless of their gender. One of the weavers who is in favour of this change expressed her opinion that ‘if we stick to our tradition too much, we will not have enough weavers in the future, and our skills will eventually be diminished’. On the other hand, others are strongly against men weaving, since as we have seen there has been a clear gendered division of labour in the Atayal’s traditional society. For the Atayal males who have difficulty in accepting men’s involvement with weaving, their gender identity can still be constructed through men’s game-hunting activities. Atayal men who go game-hunting were not interviewed directly for this chapter, so this interpretation of contemporary men’s perspectives on the construction of their gendered identity has yet to be confirmed.2 Nevertheless, some evidence gathered via participant observation suggests that this might be the case: although head-hunting is no longer practised, the Atayal men constitute their gendered identity by game-hunting (Figure 3.7). Facial tattooing is still an important symbol of the Wulai Atayal. In Wulai, objects depicting tattooed faces are found in various artistic forms: 67 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 67 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Waterfall Hot spring Gaga Christianity Mountain Place Male: Hunting? Religion Mandarin Gender Female: Weaving Culture Japanese Atayal Ethnicity Race Dancing ‘The Atayal’ ‘Aboriginals’ ‘Noble savages’ Facial tattooing Figure 3.7: Shifts in the Atayal’s multiple identities: after the rise of democracy in Taiwan and the decline in international tourism in Wulai, 1990–present murals, totem poles, tapestry, paintings, framed pictures, business cards and, of course, weavings. The Wulai Atayal have also found a new way instantly to revive the facial tattooing culture by means of stickers; during the festival season, a number of Wulai Atayal men and women decorate their faces temporarily with artificial tattoos (Figure 3.8). In addition, the indigenous residents have been encouraged by the national government to speak their indigenous language again. However, because the tourism development favoured Mandarin and Japanese over the Japanized Atayal language, the Wulai Atayal have struggled to revitalize their own language (Figure 3.7). The Wulai’s hot spring and waterfall are still important landscape features for tourist consumption but most of the supporting businesses are now run by Han people. The fact that entrepreneurs from elsewhere run the businesses associated with the heritage of minorities is a common theme in the tourism literature. 68 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 68 09/06/2010 14:34 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan Figure 3.8: Atayal women and a Han Chinese man with facial tattoo stickers Source: Mami Yoshimura Furthermore, the segregation of places between Han Chinese and the indigenous residents has deepened since the promotion of domestic tourism in Wulai. Some indigenous weavers have attempted to sell their hand-made weaving products, but they have had little success in competition with the factory-made weaving brought in by Han Chinese entrepreneurs. On the upper hill of Wulai, the Wulai Church symbolizes the Atayal’s place and religious identity. The elder Atayal now try to teach gaga to the younger Atayal (at present it still lies outside the outer ring in Figure 3.7), but their religious belief is still very much influenced by Christianity. ConClusion This chapter has explored the Wulai Atayal’s heritage and changing identity and how these have been modified through the experiences of the 69 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 69 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia post-colonial history of Taiwan and the contemporary history of tourism development. The construction of the dichotomy between the civilized and the savage by the colonial state of Japan and its modification to ‘noble savage’ for Japanese tourists has also been discussed. Until the Japanese banned facial tattooing among the Atayal, cultural identity was constituted by the Atayal themselves on the basis of their facial tattoo patterns. These functioned as the Atayal’s identity markers to distinguish who belonged to which communal group, until they were buried by the Japanese colonial regime about 100 years ago. After Japan’s occupation was over, the Atayal’s facial tattooing culture was appreciated as ‘Other’ culture only in the context of tourism. Today, the Wulai Atayal proudly speak of their facial tattooing culture, but using removable stickers, they temporarily reclaim and exhibit their culture only on special occasions (although in 2008 Shayun Foudu, a 33-year-old woman, became the first Atayal woman in 100 years to get her tribe’s traditional facial tattoo: http://www.culturalsurvival. org/images/atayal-woman-taiwan, accessed 24 August 2009). Once forbidden from doing so, the Atayal now celebrate their facial tattooing as well as weaving as a part of their ethnic identity. In the past, facial tattooing, head-hunting and weaving signified their gendered cultural identity, and today they have reconstructed their weaving using imported western equipment and have simulated facial tattoo practices as identity symbols. While it is unclear the extent to which the Atayal men’s hunting activity in the mountains, albeit for different quarry, remains an important identity marker for their construction of place and gender identity (this needs to be further investigated by collecting the voices of the Atayal men), what is clear is that Atayal culture is being modified to meet contemporary values, such as is seen in the commercial production of traditional motifs on tee-shirts and machine-made cloth. Although colonial discourse is produced within the society and the culture of the colonizers, their situated knowledge also becomes how the colonized see themselves. It creates a deep conflict in the minds of the colonized people as it is not consonant with their other knowledge about the world. The ‘weaving for the Atayal’s collective ethnic identity as the Atayal’ is a good example to highlight the conflicts that the colonized people have experienced. Once weaving represented women’s gender identity. Now, regardless of gender, weaving has been promoted as an Atayal ‘ethnic symbol’ by the Han Chinese government. Some Atayal have 70 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 70 09/06/2010 14:34 The Reconstruction of Atayal Identity in Wulai, Taiwan accepted the changes in the meaning of weaving but others still struggle to accept them. Atayal heritage has been commodified and has become a tourist attraction, albeit one among a number in Wulai. It is ironic that the Japanese banned facial tattoos but returned as tourists to photograph elderly women who retained this feature. Textiles, which were once also banned, have been revived and have become a part of the heritage tourism product of Wulai but in two forms: a high quality hand-made product which is essentially a labour of love and, being relatively expensive, does not sell well to a domestic market; and a machine-made product made and sold by Han entrepreneurs who benefit financially from an appropriated and modified expression of Atayal culture. All heritage and identity are constructed through the recognition of differences. Identities are relational and dynamic: they are socially constructed and change over time. Moreover, identities are not singular but multiple. In discussion of the relational construction of identity, Gombay (2005) argued the importance of examining why an identity was invented or adopted by individuals or groups. In the case of the Wulai Atayal, their indigenous identities were also relational, primarily with respect to the attributes of the colonizers, and made up of multiple components such as place, religion, ethnicity, race, culture and gender. These have evolved over time in response to Japanese colonialism, post-colonialism, Han neo-colonialism and tourism. The Wulai Atayal’s multiple identities are intertwined and their reconstruction of multiple identities is an on-going task as their struggles and resistance against powerful ‘Others’ continue. notes 1 Funds for research in summer 2006 were provided under a grant obtained by Geoffrey Wall from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. We thank all Atayal and other residents of Wulai, Taiwan. Particularly, we owe a debt of gratitude to Sa-yun, Alice Takewatan and Philip and Tammy Diller for their great hospitality and friendship. We would also like to thank Janet Chang, Penny Fang, Sally Weng, Yu-Hsin Liao, David Ma, Jenn-Yeu Yang, Tw-Wen Wei, Masaharu Kasahara, Katsuhiko Yamaji, Maoko Miyaoka, Naoki Ishigaki, Taira Nakamura, Yuka Sugino from the Tenri Art Museum, Scott Simon and Jody Decker. 2 It is worth examining how the Atayal men have pursued their gendered identity as male Atayal but this is beyond the scope of this chapter. 71 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 71 09/06/2010 14:34 Chapter 4 Outdoor Ethnographic Museums, Tourism and Nation Building in Southeast Asia Michael Hitchcock and Nick Stanley1 introduCtion Outdoor ethnographic museums in Southeast Asia enjoyed huge popularity in the late twentieth century, not only with tourists – both domestic and international – but also with the governments that were involved in their inauguration. These developments were often linked to international tourism projects involving EU and UNESCO consultants. The creators of these ‘living museums’ did not simply rely on an established format, but often synthesized different and sometimes antithetic approaches, often without clear acknowledgement of their sources. On the one hand they drew some of their inspiration from the world fair or exposition style, which emerged in the nineteenth century and continues today in international trade fairs, while on the other the readily detectable concern with education and entertainment – or ‘edutainment’ – that is widely associated with Disney (Kalakota and Whinstone, 1997: 264) harks back to both the Skansen-style folk museums of Europe and the Disney-style world showcase displays (Hitchcock, Stanley and Siu, 1997). The Southeast Asian open-air museums are laid out in outdoor village style, but differ from their European antecedents in distinct ways. The European Skansen-style museums usually comprised conserved and relocated original dwellings, whereas the Southeast Asian displays are largely based on reconstructions. 72 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 72 09/06/2010 14:34 Outdoor Ethnographic Museums, Tourism and Nation Building in Southeast Asia In short they are Asian hybrids, part open-air museum and part theme park, that serve a multiplicity of audiences, neither strictly academic nor overtly popular, for which Hendry has adopted the Japanese rendition, tēma pảku, or theme park (Hendry, 2000: 19). A recurring theme, however, in these Southeast Asian ethnographic displays is the role played by nationalism, often of the Herderian kind, in binding together amalgams of diverse peoples. These structures often provided showcases for national construction and national consciousness projects and thus may be understood as forms of codification that express the realities of emergent nations (Hefner, 1994: 94) and the statements of the officialdom that either built them or encouraged their development (Anderson, 1973). It is this latter usage that has attracted the attention of Western analysts (e.g. Anderson, 1973; Pemberton, 1994; Wood, 1997; Hitchcock, 2003), but what this chapter addresses is whether or not these didactic approaches exert much influence on the twenty-first century audiences for whom the priorities of late twentieth century governments in Southeast Asia, many of which were authoritarian at the time, are a thing of the past. The Sarawak cultural village in Kuching, however, remains an interesting exception because the Malaysian government, in order to emphasise its plurality, deliberately privileges Dayak cultures over others at Damai Beach as a mark of a loose federal unity. Within this it also privileges certain Dayak communities at the expense of others. The Chief Minister, as a Melanau, has ensured that the Melanau longhouse towers over others and dominates the site. The point is that this is a state-led rather than a federalled enterprise, so that Kuching can privilege its own communities. nation-building projeCts Like older established countries, the new nations of Southeast Asia have in the twentieth century looked to exemplary pasts to construct narratives justifying their birth and continued existence. Much has been written about the role of ‘invented traditions’ (Hobsbawm and Ranger, 1983) and ‘imagined communities’ (Anderson, 1983) in the evolution of the modern nation state. Diverse and locally bound cultures in these new nations are superseded by standardized cultures, usually carried by literacy (Anderson, 1983; Gellner, 1983). Choices made by the state are embodied in statesupported productions such as the construction of national monuments (Wood, 1984: 366). National identities may be expressed in diverse ways, 73 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 73 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia some of the commonest being: the launching of a flagship carrying airline; the construction of grand capitals laid out according to symbolic principles; the inauguration of schools and universities bearing the names of illustrious national ancestors (Hitchcock, 1998). The open-air village museum that has attracted the most academic scrutiny in this regard is arguably Indonesia’s Taman Mini (taman = garden; mini = miniature) or Taman Mini Indonesia Indah (Indonesia indah = beautiful Indonesia) to give it its full title. Taman Mini serves as a showpiece of the state philosophy of Pancasila (five principles) and may be understood as a kind of codification, involving new forms of expression to address the realities of an emergent nation (Hefner, 1994: 94). Visited by both foreign and domestic tourists, Taman Mini represents the past as an integral part of the future, and serves as a tangible expression of modernization. Anderson argues that the Taman Mini project in particular was intended to make Indonesia known to tourists and to raise national consciousness (Anderson, 1973: 65). Tourism would provide a source of foreign revenue, enhance Indonesia’s international reputation and would serve ‘as a strategy for fostering domestic brotherhood’ (Adamsf 1997c, 156– 157). State propaganda combined with Taman Mini encourages domestic tourism as a means of consolidating national cohesion (Wood, 1997: 20). The situation in Taiwan is somewhat different since, although its indigenous population may be regarded as culturally Southeast Asian, the island is deemed to be an inalienable part of China by the government of that country. The Japanese legacy to the Taiwanese, however, was the development of the South Country characterized by ‘local colour’ (Liao, 2002). Both of these developments lead the Taiwanese to self-exoticize as ‘tropical people’ with a distinct identity which indigenous Austronesian inhabitants served to underscore (see also Chapter 3). Taiwan’s open-air village museums therefore could not be conceived as part of a nationbuilding strategy without offending its more powerful neighbour, though they share many features with those of the ASEAN region. Interestingly, the open-air ethnographic museums of China, which are often concerned with minorities that have ties with Southeast Asia, might helpfully be seen at least partially as an attempt at national consciousness-raising, since China’s policies involve the incorporation of diverse ethnicities into a Chinese-dominated but also internally diverse majority population. The Taiwan Aboriginal Cultural Park (TACP) and the Formosan Aboriginal Cultural Village (FACV) may also be likened to Taman Mini in 74 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 74 09/06/2010 14:34 Outdoor Ethnographic Museums, Tourism and Nation Building in Southeast Asia their approach to questions of national and ethnic identity. Their overviews of Taiwan’s ethnographic heritage are set within a narrative that smooths over the rough edges of real inter-ethnic relations. What also needs to be borne in mind is the intrusion of tourism into arenas usually associated with nation-building. An interesting issue is raised by MacCannell (1992: 158–159), who tries to distinguish the tourist’s approach to ethnicity from earlier ethnological and colonial perspectives; he goes on to suggest that in certain cases, which he does not specify, tourism superficially resembles the behaviour of ethnic separatist movements. The political context is, however, changing as the ‘Taiwanese’ and younger ‘mainlanders’ increasingly emphasize their separateness from China. These changes may be detected in attitude surveys of Taiwanese visitors to the National Palace Museum, particularly among younger age groups (Wu, 1998). Visitors continue to enjoy the splendour of the salvaged heritage of China, but increasingly expect a more explicit Taiwanese focus. mediation of ethniCity In order to appreciate how ethnicity is presented in Southeast Asian openair village museums it is also helpful to consider the so-called ‘primordial’ and ‘situational’ or ‘instrumental’ approaches to ethnicity (Rex, 1986: 26– 27). The first of these perspectives, the ‘primordial’ view, sees ethnicity as dependent on a series of ‘givens’: by being born into a particular community, by adopting its values (e.g. religion) and speaking its specific language, or even dialect of a language, and following a set of cultural practices that are associated with that community (Geertz, 1963b: 109). Generally speaking, Skansen-type museums are constructed on Herderian lines and tend to interpret ethnicity in primordial terms. In contrast, the situational or instrumental perspective offers a more dynamic view that places emphasis on ethnicity as a set of processes and social relations, which may be invoked according to circumstances. The latter approach places emphasis on ethnicity as a set of social relationships and processes by which cultural differences are communicated and maintained. In order that an identity may be understood, it has to be constantly invoked through intentional agency and it may be argued that the open-air museum comprises such agency. The social communication of cultural difference may be observed and described, though these activities 75 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 75 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia are elusive and difficult to quantify analytically, not least because ethnicity cannot be reduced to a fixed system of signs (Eriksen, 1991: 130). The Taiwanese open-air museums differ in some important respects from those of Southeast Asia because classificatory systems adopted by Japanese anthropologists during the Japanese occupation (1895–1945) continue to be used in their layout and interpretation, though no Taiwanese anthropologist has defined the term ‘ethnic group’ (Hsieh, 1994: 185). Like the Japanese, the Taiwanese recognize certain attributes – common language, customs or social organization – as markers of ethnicity, but do not appear to have subjected the ethnic names themselves to great scrutiny. The open-air ethnographic museums of Taiwan provide particularly interesting venues to analyse these processes at a time of change. In view of the on-going commercial and cultural ties between Japan and Taiwan, it may also be helpful to draw a parallel with the Japanese movement known as muraokoshi, which made widespread use of tourism to revitalize rural villages. This approach involved various efforts by villagers and local government officials to revive village economy and society in the face of out-migration, economic stagnation and population aging (Moon, 1997: 182). It is also worth noting that the muraokoshi type of tourism development is often associated with a search for local identity; in many village re-vitalization movements special effort has been made to recreate or rediscover the unique features of local culture that sets the destination apart from what are regarded as the internationalized or bland characteristics of metropolitan culture (ibid.: 183). In many cases what is perceived to be local culture has been reconstructed through careful study and investigation, often with the aid of volunteer groups that were formed to recover forgotten local history and to reconstruct extinct local cultural traditions (ibid.). The resurgence of folklore studies (minzokugaka) in the late 1960s and 1970s paved the way for the development of folk museums, and by the late twentieth century there were more than 200 of them throughout Japan, reflecting the endeavours of numerous amateur local historians and ethnologists (ibid.). The open-air museums of Taiwan stick in the main to the classificatory systems used by the Japanese and do not, with one exception, question their applicability. As Hsieh (1994) has argued, however, the indigenous people were virtually created as distinct groups by the Japanese occupation’s ethnographers. For example, the existence of the Atayal (in the official phonetic spelling) or T’aiya (in the romanization of Chinese pronunciation), 76 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 76 09/06/2010 14:34 Outdoor Ethnographic Museums, Tourism and Nation Building in Southeast Asia the second largest indigenous group, may be dated from 1898 when they were first identified as such by Japanese ethnographers. As Hseih points out the Atayal are a diverse group distributed over eight counties, who may be further sub-divided into three smaller groups: the Atayal proper, the Tseole and the Sedeq. This distinction is based on linguistic evidence, though Taiwanese scholars maintain that a common set of cultural features exist among these scattered people (Hsieh, 1994: 186), though why the ethnonym ‘Atayal’, the name of one of the groups, should be used as the over-arching term remains unclear. Similar observations can doubtless be made for the other eight or nine indigenous groups of Taiwan. To complicate matters the managerial concerns of the state also cut across these issues since the Taiwanese government recognizes 30 shan ti hsiang (mountainous administrative units) for the shan ti jen (literally ‘mountain people’). Another problem with the presentation of identity is that few, if any, of Taiwan’s indigenous people still live in the manner suggested by the reconstructed displays, as is also the case in many parts of Southeast Asia. With regard to the Taiwanese system, the Atayal maintain some traditional features in order to distinguish themselves from the Han and to glorify the culture inherited from their ancestors. ‘Traditional culture’ for them comprises items of material culture and observable activities such as the celebration of the harvest festival (ibid.: 193). What is significant, however, is that the Atayal – who speak Mandarin, live in concrete multi-storied dwellings and who wear the same clothes and share the same values as the Han – still differentiate themselves from the majority (see also Chapter 3). They refer to themselves as Daiyan as opposed to the Mugan (Taiwanese), Kelu (Mainlanders) and Kelang (Hakka) (ibid.). The term Daiyan is said by some Atayal to mean ‘human’ and is a name for themselves alone, whereas others maintain that it is a general name for all the aboriginal people of Taiwan. Hsieh argues that the two separate meanings allow the Atayal simultaneously to claim Atayal and pan-aboriginal identities. Ethnicity in this context may be seen as an adaptive strategy to cope with a complex environment in which the Taiwanese control access to many economic and political resources, especially tourism. Hsieh argues that, in the absence of many of the cultural symbols commonly associated with ethnicity, ethnically oriented tourism fills the gap (ibid.: 196–197). His perspective resembles MacCannell’s observations on the similarities of identities constructed in tourism to those advanced by ethnic separatist groups (Hitchcock, 2003). 77 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 77 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia edutainment in taiWan The Formosan Aboriginal Cultural Village (FACV) in Nantou County, which was completed in the late 1980s, comprises three distinct areas: an Amusement Isle with theme park rides, shows and shops; a European Palace Garden with restaurant, coffee shop and miniature railway; and the Aboriginal Sights and Villages comprising collections of reconstructed buildings representing the nine indigenous peoples. The latter area invokes academic authority through the use of plaques bearing the names and other cultural details of the nine peoples, but confuses the issue with a display area dedicated to ‘Indian Totem Poles’ comprising copies of carvings from the America’s North-West Coast as well as a Maori post from New Zealand. The material culture buildings combine originals and reproductions, and the layout follows the fieldwork (1938–1943) and plans of the Japanese ethnographer Chijiiwa Suketaro. Not all the work is attributed to the Japanese, however, since the men’s house in the Puyuma village is based on research conducted by Wei Hui-lin in 1954. Costumed interpreters drawn from the indigenous people are on hand in the houses to welcome visitors and explain the displays, and to demonstrate crafts and cooking skills. The Naruwan Theatre has a seating capacity of 2,000 and visitors are entertained by ‘the FACV Youth Troupe, made up of enthusiastic and talent [sic] young people from each tribe’. The shows follow the Polynesian Cultural Centre format with a pageant of canoes, dances and games of daring involving the audience. The FACV employs an artistic director, and a backstage team looks after costume repairs, props and make-up. Cloth woven by employees is used both for costumes and for souvenirs, and a sign in the Atayal compound advertises ‘Rent clothes’. In comparison with the FACV, the Taiwan Aboriginal Cultural Park (TACP) in Pin-dan County, which was founded in 1986, has sought a ‘purist’ approach (Stanley, 1998: 76). Built on a steep hillside overlooking a river, the park follows the cultural village format with compounds of houses representing the nine indigenous groups. Visitors enter the TACP via a courtyard containing shops selling indigenous handicrafts, and a museum that displays photographs relating to research by Japanese ethnographers in the late 1890s. The exhibitions cover the material culture of the indigenous people in detail, and there are reconstructions of ritual events such as the canoe launch. The interpretation in the reconstructed dwellings is detailed with maps, diagrams and text in both Chinese and English. 78 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 78 09/06/2010 14:34 Outdoor Ethnographic Museums, Tourism and Nation Building in Southeast Asia The text acknowledges the contribution of the Japanese, but does not shy away from some of the more controversial aspects of the occupation. The Atayal, for example, are said to have lived a more independent existence prior to the arrival of the Japanese, who forced them into village settlements. What is hinted at is that the village format may reflect Japanese imposed norms, though how settlements were organized before this period remains unclear. The text also reflects on the sub-divisions within the different groupings, and mentions cultural exchanges between the Han and the indigenous peoples. The interpretation includes a great deal of botanical information and the TACP’s general impression is more scientific and academic than the FACV’s. There is another exhibition hall within the park that has slide shows on indigenous culture, displays on aboriginal life and narrative boards devoted to Bunun pictographs. A medley of indigenous song and dance performances can be watched in the theatre, which holds around 2,000, and audience participation is encouraged, particularly with regard to the Taiwan custom of catching a soft ball on a long spiked pole. eduCation and reCreation in taman mini Taman Mini’s visitors may be divided into two categories: students and school children who come for educational reasons and those that visit for recreational purposes. There are around four million visitors a year and despite attempts to market the museum internationally, overseas visitors have declined in response to the various crises that have engulfed Indonesia since the fall of President Soeharto in 1998. The site is complex with only the central area being devoted to the collection of traditional houses for which Taman Mini is renowned. The museum’s educational role is largely focused on raising awareness of Indonesia’s arts and cultural heritage, though there is also provision for undertaking environmental studies in the related sites containing the Aquarium, Insect Museum and Bird Park. To reach out to those who are not engaged in educational activities, the museum endeavours to create a recreational atmosphere that will draw the visitors into educational activities that are regarded as enriching. The visitors may be divided between those with leisure or educational expectations, but there would appear to be a considerable overlap between what motivates them. According to a study produced in 2005, 62.07 per cent of all visitors expected to learn about Indonesian art and culture during the course of their visit, with only 33.79 per cent expecting fun and 79 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 79 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia entertainment (Wulandari, 2005: 36). Recreation featured strongly (52.41 per cent) in the reasons for visiting as compared with only 13.79 per cent wishing to learn about Indonesia’s diversity and another 12.41 per cent wishing to learn about Indonesian culture. The study is indicative and not definitive, but the results are nonetheless intriguing since they seem to indicate a mis-match between what is desired and expected by visitors in the twenty-first century and what were the original intentions of the founders, former President Soeharto and the late Mrs Tien Soeharto. In the presidential address that was published in the first official guide, Soeharto makes it clear that ‘By visiting this Park we will know ourselves better, we will know our nation better and we will love our motherland more’ (Soeharto, 1975b: 9). The museum’s nation-building mission may be lost on what appear to be the majority of contemporary visitors and perhaps never was immediately apparent to visitors right from the outset, but another of the founders’ initial motives appears to have stood the test of time. In the official guide, Mrs Tien Soeharto discusses the importance of using Taman Mini to stimulate and develop regional handicrafts to ‘encourage communications, mutual knowledge and understanding among nations’ (Tien Soeharto, 1975a: 13), and according to Wulandari’s study this is pretty much what the contemporary visitor expects today. Wulandari’s study may indicate some of the enduring features of Taman Mini, but she cautions against being overly optimistic about the role of traditional culture in twenty-first century Indonesia, and points out that that the young are more interested in modern technology and Western products than out of date and unfashionable Indonesian traditions. Her conclusion is that the young are not readily receptive to didactic attempts to interpret Indonesian culture, and that they expect to learn in ways that interest them and without any hint of compulsion (2005: 57) and that whatever the founders’ intentions, Taman Mini seems to be heading down the route of edutainment. Interestingly, what seems to have become more explicit in recent years, though it was apparent in the original foundation, is the link between Taman Mini and tourism. The main focus for this is the original pavilions representing traditional houses from each of Indonesia’s provinces, though there is considerable variety in how they manifest themselves. Some pavilions seem to have little connection with the promotion of tourism, whereas others appear to be acutely conscious of the need to use the 80 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 80 09/06/2010 14:34 Outdoor Ethnographic Museums, Tourism and Nation Building in Southeast Asia facilities to promote tourism and other trading activities. One province in particular, Lampung, seems to be making a determined effort to utilize its pavilion to promote its cultural attributes and developmental potential, complete with its own illustrated guidebook, written in Indonesian and English, and an actively engaged pavilion manager. The pavilion is well staffed, well maintained and organizes a busy cultural programme, a complete contrast to some of the other pavilions that appear to be in a state of advanced neglect. Since the fall of Soeharto, Indonesia has embarked on a programme of decentralization, and this may explain Lampung’s enthusiasm to promote itself, though why some of the other regions seem to be less engaged remains unclear. The Irian Jaya pavilion has yet to be renamed and there are still Asmat carvers (and non-carvers) regularly decorating it rather than carving in the enclosure. Following the devolvement of centralized decision-making to numerous Kabupaten (Regencies/Districts) in the provinces and the prospect of the division of Irian Jaya into two provinces, the whole premise of Taman Mini is likely to be thrown into further dramatic disarray. Taman Mini does, however, have some adaptive capacity as is exemplified by the pavilion of the breakaway former province of East Timor, which has become the ‘Museum of East Timor’, a memorial to the period of Indonesian rule. ConClusion Taman Mini, Indonesia’s renowned open-air museum, and its counterparts in Taiwan struggle to make sense of some complex and messy ethnographic realities on behalf of their respective audiences. The issues to be juggled include: contemporary re-evaluations of the work of earlier researchers, notably in Taiwan; a lack of coherence between administrative and ethnocultural boundaries; the need to be educational while simultaneously being entertaining; competition from other sources of information that can often offer more fun; and changes in the political landscape, particularly the move away from overtly authoritarian rule and the tendency to be didactic on behalf of the national interest. Certain themes endure and appear to have contemporary resonance, notably the use of handicrafts as enhancers of cross-cultural communication, but these open-air museums or tēma pảku (theme parks) in Taiwan and Indonesia are starting to look dated in the twenty-first century. Measured alongside Butler’s renowned ‘Tourism Area Life Cycle Model’ (1980), the 81 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 81 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia graph that plots numbers of tourists against time, these museums appear to have passed the consolidation phase at the top of the curve, but whether they will rejuvenate or decline remains a moot point. Not only do both destinations have to contend with declines in international tourist interest, but their local markets have also become re-orientated, especially among the young with their lack of sympathy with pedantic attempts to interpret cultural heritage. Both might benefit from interpretative democratization offering alternative perspectives, not least a history of ideas that shows the circumstances in which they evolved. They might become venues for more serious inter-cultural dialogue using heritage to interconnect different communities and to move beyond national narratives that show a consistent and homogeneous view of history. Such approaches might lead to fresher visions of where they might be going and what issues are at stake – a kind of heritage future as it were. note 1 The authors gratefully acknowledge the support provided by the South-East Asia Committee of the British Academy, and would like to thank Ariel Wu and Anak Agung Ayu Wulandari for their help with this research. 82 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 82 09/06/2010 14:34 Chapter 5 Histories, Tourism and Museums Re-making Singapore1 Can-Seng Ooi At one level, some see Singapore as a developed country. It has developed itself into an economic powerhouse in Southeast Asia since the 1950s, and like many other Asian cities it aims to be the financial and cultural capital of the region. At another level, Singapore is perceived by some as an authoritarian state (Chua, 1995; Ooi, 2005) yet one that is still exotic and part of the romantic Orient. Such conflicting images of Singapore have allowed its governmental authorities to re-imagine and re-market Singapore strategically in the world, so as to attract tourists, foreign direct investments, and talented foreign workers. As I will show in this chapter, in the context of tourism, Singapore attempts to self-Orientalize itself to attract more tourists, and at the same time to re-define many of the Oriental images in order to social-engineer its society and also to assert its dominance in the region. Many researchers are interested in the social impact of tourism. There are at least three broad and interrelated streams of research in this area. The first is the most common. It addresses issues related to problems such as crowding of heritage sites, trinketization of local crafts, commodification of native social practices, sensationalization of indigenous folklores and even price inflation and traffic problems (Cohen, 1988; Philo and Kearns, 1993; van der Borg, Costa and Gotti, 1996; Watson and Kropachevsky, 1994). Some people even see tourism as a form of colonization and treat tourism as ‘whorism’ (Mathews, 1975). But not all social impacts of tourism are 83 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 83 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia negative; studies have shown that over time seemingly alien cultural effects of tourism are welcomed and eventually appropriated into the destination (e.g. Boissevain, 1996; Erb, 2000; Martinez, 1996; Ness, 2003; Picard, 1995). Many researchers are thus advocating a balanced and sensitive approach to the management of tourism development (Chang, 1997; Jenkins, 1997; Newby, 1994; Teo and Yeoh, 1997). A second, related, stream of research addresses the political dimensions in defining and managing the so-called sensitive and balanced approach to tourism development. While few researchers and practitioners disagree on the need for such an approach to tourism development, how is this need translated into practice? For instance, in using Giddens’ ‘Third Way’, Burns (2004) paints a bipolar view of tourism planning. The first – ‘leftist development first’ – view focuses ‘on sustainable human development goals as defined by local people and local knowledge. The key question driving development is “What can tourism give us without harming us?”’ (Burns 2004). The second – ‘rightist tourism first’ – view aims to ‘maximize market spread through familiarity of the product. Undifferentiated, homogenized product dependent on core [elements] with a focus on tourism goals set by outside planners and the international tourism industry’ (Burns, 2004: 26). The Third Way brings different interests together and aims to generate consensus. Burns’ Third Way remains conceptual. Different host societies have found their own ways to bring about sustainable tourism. Comparing Denmark and Singapore for instance, the Danish tourism development strategies aim to protect Danish society from the social impacts of tourism, while in Singapore the impacts are actively absorbed and appropriated into the social engineering programmes of the destination (Ooi, 2002a). Both the Danish and Singaporean authorities claim that their own tourism programmes are well balanced and sensitive to both tourism and local needs (Ooi, 2002a). The definition of a balanced approach is determined within the social and political contexts of the host society. The political process eventually decides which interest groups and lobbies have more influence and say. The third stream of research on tourism impact relates to how the ‘West’ imagines less developed, non-Western destinations. Western imaginations are seen to affect these host societies and bring about another form of colonization. Except for a few studies, such as from Morgan and Pritchard (1998), Ooi, Kristensen and Pedersen (2004), Selwyn (1996) and Silver (1993), this area of research has received limited attention. This chapter is 84 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 84 09/06/2010 14:34 Histories, Tourism and Museums: Re-making Singapore but a small contribution to this stream of research. Studies of this sort tend to examine the insidious effects of destination images on host societies. Not only are the images superficial and caricaturized, but these images are being imposed upon and reified in the host societies, resulting in the so-called West dominating the less developed host communities. Such studies draw inspiration from Edward W. Said’s critique of Orientalism (Said, 1979; Leong, 1997; Ooi, Kristensen and Pedersen, 2004; Selwyn, 1996). The domination of the Orient by the West is the main focus in such studies; I propose a more nuaunced understanding of the Orientalization processes. The so-called Orient is not naïve nor necessarily helpless; the Orient can snap back and even become a colonizing master. This seems to be the case in Singapore. This study compares the three main museums run by the Singapore National Heritage Board (NHB) – the National Museum of Singapore (NMS) (formerly the Singapore History Museum), the Singapore Art Museum (SAM) and the Asian Civilizations Museum (ACM). These museums present and assert various Asian identities of Singapore. This is part of the self-Orientalization process in the city-state. Western tourists have come to place demands on a destination like Singapore to become more Asian. The Singaporean tourism authorities and government attempt to Orientalize Singapore through these national museums, so as to serve the needs of tourism and nation building. This article will question the Saidian-inspired focus on how the Occident dominates the Orient; host societies can and do appropriate and re-invent Orientalist images for their own identity projects. The Orientalism debate should not just be about how the Occident dominates the subservient Orient; powerful groups in host destinations may adopt and revise Orientalist images to draw benefit from the tourism industry and to reconstruct local and regional identities. The Orientalization of host societies must be understood within the local social and political context. In the next section, I elaborate on tourism as a form of domination through a Saidian framework. Subsequently, I present the case of the three national museums of Singapore. These museums were founded by the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) to make Singapore more Asian. The NMS establishes Singapore as a unique country in Southeast Asia, the SAM asserts Singapore as the cultural centre of Southeast Asia and the ACM traces Singaporeans’ ancestral roots to China, India and the Middle East. The section that follows discusses how each of these museums Orientalizes Singapore, and how they each introduce new narratives to shape both 85 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 85 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia tourist and local imaginations. These presented narratives nevertheless must be understood within the social, cultural and political circumstances of Singaporean society. The concluding section summarizes the arguments and advocates a more nuanced understanding of tourism as a form of domination in tourism and heritage research. tourism and orientalism Following the critical footsteps of Foucault (1972), Said (1979) interrogated and challenged Orientalist studies. Said entwined political and cultural imperialism and argued that Orientalists – ‘Western’ writers and academics who study the ‘Orient’ – have misrepresented, and still misrepresent, the Middle Eastern Islamic world in a manner that has eased the way for the West to dominate the Orient. Said argued that Orientalism is not only an academic discipline but an ideological discourse inextricably tied to the perpetuation of Western power. Said reasoned that many Western scholars who study the Orient present and distribute particular images of the Orient, centred on the distinctiveness of the Oriental mind, as opposed to the Occidental mind. Such images create, essentialize and caricaturize the Orient, and the images do not correspond to empirical reality and reduce the significance of the varieties of language, culture, social forms and political structures in the so-called Orient. Hidden in the ideological underpinnings of Orientalism, the Orient is often imagined as inferior, despotic and uncivilized. The logic and premises behind Said’s attack on Orientalism have inspired many scholars to think critically about how people imagine other societies, and how people inadvertently disperse particular geopolitical messages in their activities. Orientalist debates have been extended to the study of places like Africa (Jeyifo, 2000; Mazrui, 2000), East Asia (Clarke, 1997; Dirlik, 1996; Hill, 2000; Hung, 2003) and Eastern Europe (Ash, 1989; Kumar, 1992; Ooi, Kristensen and Pedersen, 2004). Orientalism has also inspired scholars to look at how discourses have come to misrepresent and caricaturize the Other with regard to sex and gender (e.g. Albet-Mas and Nogue-Font, 1998; Lewis, 1996; Mann, 1997; Prasch, 1996), race and ethnicity (e.g. Jeyifo, 2000; Mazrui, 2000) and religion (e.g. Amstutz, 1997; Burke III, 1998; Kahani-Hopkins and Hopkins, 2002; Zubaida, 1995). Similarly, the North–South, Rich–Poor divides are seen as parallels to the Orient–Occident dichotomy. As a result, tacit and biased discourses are 86 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 86 09/06/2010 14:34 Histories, Tourism and Museums: Re-making Singapore highlighted by many anti-globalization lobbies as they protest against the political, economic, social and cultural domination of the West (Chua, 2003; Klein, 2000; Shipman, 2002). Tourism researchers like Clifford (1997), Echtner and Prasad (2003), Morgan and Pritchard (1998), Ooi et al. (2004) and Silver (1993), have also drawn inspiration from Said. Said’s challenge against Orientalism is critical and political. Such a critical perspective identifies who benefits, who is subverted, who disseminates the Orientalist discourses, how the discourses are disseminated and the consequences of reifying the discourses. This approach thus identifies the messages transmitted and the embedded ideological meanings. In this perspective, all messages are seen as constructs that carry unequal relationships between the party that misrepresents the Other and the Other itself – words are chosen to load the presented messages, meanings are accentuated, while other meanings are selectively ignored. So for instance, in referring to the manner Singapore was presented in the British Broadcasting Corporation’s Holiday Programme series, Morgan and Pritchard (1998: 225–228) show how Singapore’s exoticism was selectively constructed with reference to its romantic colonial past, its Chinese medicine (dried lizards, seahorses and scorpions) and its autocratic rule. The programme did not mention that the current government was one of the parties who drove the British colonial masters out in the 1950s, that few Singaporeans use Chinese medicine as the first choice of cure today and that many of the so-called strict rules and regulations are also common in other countries, including in the UK. Implicit in the messages are: Singapore is a successful colonial legacy (thanks to the British); Singapore is still an exotic Asian destination; and Singapore is not a democracy. Viewers will get to experience Britain’s colonial heritage in Singapore, see how those Asians heal themselves and experience life in an autocratic regime. Such types of images and messages enthuse certain viewers and help to sell destinations, but also caricaturize host societies. Such images are Orientalist in character. Firstly, the images are superficial and based on misinterpretations but are presented with authority and as factual. Secondly, the caricatures presented aim to reaffirm widely accepted views of the Other. Thirdly, the misrepresentations are systematically and institutionally disseminated, including through the mass media, tourism promotion activities and everyday hearsay. Fourthly, the messages construct the Other through the viewpoint of modern Western societies and, inadvertently or otherwise, judge the Other through the eyes of the West. Let me elaborate. 87 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 87 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia It is a challenge for foreign tourists to know the host society because their visits are relatively short, they lack local knowledge and they rely on filtered information from tourism mediators (Causey, 2003; Ooi, 2002b). A large majority of tourists have shallow, stereotypical and essentialized images of foreign destinations because their images are built from sources, including travel reviews, news stories, guide books and tales from family and friends, many of which are not reliable. For instance, movies help generate interest and create narratives for the consumption of places. Popular movies such as Braveheart and The Lord of the Rings have respectively promoted Scotland and New Zealand as tourist destinations. Not all movies-promoted narratives and images are positive and accurate. The Hollywood blockbuster, Tomb Raider, which is partly set in Angkor Wat (Cambodia), makes references to (non-existent) secret passageways, Egyptian hieroglyphs (in a Buddhist complex!) and subservient natives (submitting to the bad guys). To many conservationists, such references create new narratives for tourists that undermine the efforts to conserve the ancient Buddhist temple complex and introduce a more serious and historically accurate form of cultural tourism. (Winter, 2003) While Western tourists harbour Orientalized images, these images are also being institutionalized and promoted by the non-Western destinations themselves. That is partly because the large numbers of affluent Western tourists are important for the local tourism industry. And these tourists’ preconceptions have to be factored in when promoting the destination. For instance, Singapore is found to be clean, developed and efficient by most tourists, but promoting such modern achievements alone will not persuade Western tourists to come (Ooi, 2002b). While these modern-day comforts are important, Singapore, like many other Asian destinations, still needs to percolate and distil its Asian essence into tourist-friendly products to attract Western tourists. The Asian images constitute Singapore’s unique selling proposition to the West; the modern comforts are essential but not unique selling points (Ooi, 2002b: 127). Many Western tourists are still drawn to exotic places that are different and relatively untouched by modernization (Errington and Gewertz, 1989; Jacobsen, 2000; MacCannell, 1976; Silver, 1993; Sørensen, 2003). And many of the promoted images feed into the ‘Western consciousness’ (Silver, 1993). Besides providing the images Western tourists want, tourism promotion agencies also know that tourists’ preconceptions affect tourists’ experiences. Tourists seek out and affirm their preconceptions during their travels (McLean and Cooke, 2003; Prentice, 2004; Prentice and Andersen, 2000). Western tourists do not constitute a monolithic entity, and neither do 88 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 88 09/06/2010 14:34 Histories, Tourism and Museums: Re-making Singapore they have a single Orientalist tourist imagination, thus tourism promotion agencies have to figure out and imagine what Westerners generally want from their destinations. These agencies – by frequently employing the help of major advertising companies based in Western cosmopolitan centres, as observed by Pritchard and Morgan (2000) – attempt to meet the various demands of Western (and also non-Western) tourists; they not only present Orientalist images of themselves, they also reify those images. As a result, ‘authentic’ cultural products are also created and staged for tourists. These products range from ‘Voodoo’ shows in Haiti (Goldberg, 1983) to selling Jewish ‘religious’ objects (such as skull caps and candles) in Israel (Shenhav-Keller, 1995) to visiting an ‘original’ Manggarai village in Indonesia (Allerton, 2003). Many exotic images freeze the host society in the past and ignore the changes and developments that the society has achieved. These images and reifications feed into the Orientalist tourist imagination. Therefore, researchers such as Echtner and Prasad (2003) and Silver (1993) have suggested that Third World representations in tourism foster a particular ideological position that places developing countries in an inferior position. These places are seen as backward, the natives eager to serve and the destination just a cultural playground. Even museums, which are often institutions of authority and scholarship, have come to perpetuate the Orientalist imagination. Museums function as ‘contact zones’ (Clifford, 1997). Contact zones are sites where geographically and historically separate groups establish on-going relations. Clifford (1997) examines the ways ‘primitive’ societies are represented in ‘civilized’ museums, which reflect an on-going ideological matrix that governs how ‘primitive’ societies respond to and are perceived by ‘civilized’ people through these museums. Museums construct the Other under their own assumptions and worldviews, and the Other re-imagines itself in, and responds to, the exhibitions. Museums have become sites for people to reflect on who they are, and the ideological matrix behind the identities presented is partly shaped by the imagination of the Other (Ness, 2003). In sum, researchers have argued that tourism can be a form of domination, not just in terms of tourists’ presence and meeting tourism demands. Tourism can also transmit a set of inaccurate discourses and misrepresentations to less developed and non-Western countries (Morgan and Pritchard, 1998; Ooi, Kristensen and Pedersen, 2004; Selwyn, 1996; Silver, 1993). As a result, ‘tourism marketing is one of the many forms of Third World representation that, in sometimes subtle but nonetheless 89 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 89 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia serious ways, serves to maintain and reinforce colonial discourse and the power relations and ideology it fosters’ (Echtner and Prasad, 2003). Inadvertently or otherwise, these caricaturized images may form the basis for non-Western destinations to imagine, re-invent and transform themselves (Morgan and Pritchard, 1998; Ooi, Kristensen and Pedersen, 2004). In considering tourism as a form of imperialism, there is a tendency to focus on how tourists dominate the destination as if the host society is passive and submissive. The view of a docile and submissive host society is not correct, as I will show in how the museums in Singapore Orientalize the city-state. maKing singapore more asian In 1995, while facing fierce competition in the tourism industry, the Singapore Tourist Promotion Board (STPB) (present-day STB)2 and the Ministry of Information and the Arts (MITA) released a blueprint to make Singapore into a ‘Global City for the Arts’. Among other things, Singapore was to have the NMS, SAM and ACM (Chang, 2000; Chang and Lee, 2003; Singapore Tourist Promotion Board and Singapore Ministry of Information and the Arts, 1995; Singapore Tourist Promotion Board, 1996). These three museums were to showcase the island’s unique Asian identities. From the late 1980s, Singapore began to find its modern and efficient image less attractive, as tourists flocked to more exotic destinations in Southeast Asia (Singapore: National Tourism Plan Committees, 1996). Singapore was being perceived as just another modern city. The thrust of the tourism strategy since the mid-1990s has been to communicate the image of Singapore as a destination where the modern blends with the old; the East blends with the West (Ooi, 2004). So despite the city’s ubiquitous modern manifestations, the STB tries to show that aspects of the exotic East are actually embedded in Singapore’s development and progress. For example, tourists are told that many skyscrapers in Singapore are built with the ancient Chinese practice of geomancy in mind, that there are many restaurants serving international western dishes with Asian spices and that most Singaporeans are able to speak their own version of English (known as Singlish) besides standard English. Other attempts at making Singapore more Asian include conserving and enhancing Chinatown, Little India and the Malay Village, selling tour products that 90 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 90 09/06/2010 14:34 Histories, Tourism and Museums: Re-making Singapore highlight the Asian soul in the city-state’s modern settings and producing souvenir products that accentuate Singapore’s Asianness (Chang and Teo, 2001; Ooi, 2002b). The creation of the three museums, all managed by the National Heritage Board (NHB), is yet another attempt to make Singapore unique and more Asian. These museums tell locals and foreigners about Singapore’s ‘Asianness’, with each museum constructing, interpreting and asserting different Asian identities for the city. The museums took on an even more significant role in the Singaporean economy when, in 2000, the MITA pushed the 1995 initiatives further and envisaged Singapore as a ‘Renaissance City’ (Singapore: Ministry of Information and the Arts, 2000). Building and expanding on the 2000 Renaissance City report, the government-commissioned Economic Review Committee–Services Subcommittee Workgroup on Creative Industries (ERC–CI, 2002) produced the most ambitious and comprehensive blueprint yet on the creative economy, which includes explicit and specific plans to develop Singapore into a creative economy. The arts, culture, heritage and tourism are considered central in Singapore’s emerging creative economy. The NMS, SAM and ACM feature prominently in this scheme of things. These museums are part of a stock of icons indicating that Singapore is culturally vibrant and creative, and will help drive Singapore’s fledgling creative industries and tourism needs. the national museum of singapore The NMS, housed in a purpose-built neo-classical museum building, has had a chequered history since its founding in 1887. It underwent dramatic changes and was named the National Museum in 1965, after Singapore became independent. It then became the Singapore History Museum in 1996. In December 2006, after the building was expanded and renovated, the museum became the National Museum of Singapore. The NMS will have none of any generalized images people may have of Singapore as just another Asian country. It aims to showcase trends and developments that have characterized and influenced Singapore, highlighting the emergence of contemporary Singapore (Singapore Tourist Promotion Board and Singapore Ministry of Information and the Arts, 1995). In its new permanent exhibition on Singapore’s past, it starts with Singapore as a fishing village known as Temasek some 700 years ago, then moves to Singapore’s colonial past (from 1819 to 1963). The visitor is 91 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 91 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia shown how, during Singapore’s colonial period, the island went through difficult times: poverty, social problems, racial conflicts, the Second War World, the struggle for self-rule and the communist threat. Then in 1963 Singapore became part of Malaysia, but that merger ended dramatically in 1965. Fortunately, the viewer is told, economic successes came soon after Singapore’s independence in 1965, thanks to the actions of the efficient and effective People’s Action Party government. One has to use an audio guide to get through the exhibition because the exhibits are labelled only with numbers. The emphasis is on story-telling. There are many video presentations – interviews, reconstructions of accounts and documentaries – to enliven the stories. The basic message from this Singapore history gallery is that Singapore is not British, nor is it Japanese or Malaysian; Singapore is a unique Asian entity. Since its independence in 1965, the People’s Action Party government has promoted a ‘Singaporean Singapore’ policy. This policy aims at giving equal treatment to all citizens regardless of their ethnicity. Singaporeans of different ethnic groups are encouraged to interact. In sum, the NMS story tells visitors that Singaporeans have their own identity. The Singapore history gallery is complemented by the ‘Singapore Living’ permanent exhibitions, which focus on Singaporean lifestyles in the past, including women’s fashion, the local film industry, early family structures and food cultures. The permanent exhibitions challenge any simplified preconceptions that Singapore is like its neighbours in Southeast Asia. A distinctive Singaporean identity has been actively engineered and has now emerged. The Singapore population may have started with migrants from the region but Singapore is now a unique country and society. the singapore art museum In contrast to the NMS, the Singapore Art Museum (SAM) presents a Southeast Asian regional identity for Singapore. The museum opened in January 1996 and showcases contemporary Southeast Asian visual arts (SAM, 2007; www. nhb.gov.sg/SAM/Information/AboutUs/AboutUs.htm). It is one of the first art museums with international standard museum facilities and programmes in Southeast Asia. Dedicated to the collection and display of twentieth-century Singaporean and Southeast Asian modern and contemporary art, the SAM joins a league of new-generation museums around the world with wellexecuted exhibitions and community outreach programmes. It houses the 92 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 92 09/06/2010 14:34 Histories, Tourism and Museums: Re-making Singapore national art collection of Singapore and has the largest collection of twentiethcentury Southeast Asian art owned by any public institution. The SAM plays a big part in the programme to develop Singapore into an internationally acknowledged arts city and the cultural centre of Southeast Asia. Besides the SAM, the newly opened Esplanade–Theatres on the Bay (a gigantic complex by the sea and right in the city centre) also play a significant role in promoting Singapore as a contemporary art destination, but by offering visual art performances. In contrast to the NMS’s message that Singapore is unique in Southeast Asia, the SAM presents Singapore as having strong and closely intertwined relationships with Southeast Asia. Singapore was a founding member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), along with Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand, in 1967 as an anti-Communist political alliance. Other countries have since joined: Brunei, Burma (Myanmar), Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. The current ten member states adhere to different religions, speak different languages and were colonized by different foreign powers in the last centuries. Some were even recent enemies; for example, Vietnam occupied Cambodia between 1979 and 1989, and was a Cold War adversary of the original ASEAN members. The SAM bundles Southeast Asia into a single aesthetic entity; perhaps because the area’s countries are geographically close, the countries are also assumed to be culturally similar. Despite the fact that Southeast Asia is heterogeneous and does not have a clearly distilled identity, the SAM nevertheless builds on the perception that many people around the world conceive Southeast Asia as a region. The SAM has now formulated yet another Southeast Asian identity, as an aesthetic region. The SAM acknowledges that the artistic communities in Southeast Asia and their experiences are diversely rich (Sabapathy, 1996). Thus the museum employs a harmony-in-diversity strategy to affirm Southeast Asia as an aesthetic entity. Common themes are used to bring disparate works of art together: ‘Nationalism, revolution and the idea of the modern’, ‘Traditions of the real’, ‘Modes of abstraction’, ‘Mythology and religion: traditions in tension’, ‘The self and the other’ and ‘Urbanism and popular culture’. The SAM’s curators are constantly reminded by their bosses that they have to maintain their museum’s unique proposition by presenting a Southeast Asian identity in their exhibitions. The construction of such an aesthetic region is however politically sensitive despite pronouncements of close friendship amongst ASEAN 93 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 93 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia members. For instance, ASEAN foreign ministers declare that ‘[w]hile fully respecting each member country’s sovereignty and national property rights, ASEAN recognizes that the national cultural heritage of member countries constitute the heritage of Southeast Asia for whose protection it is the duty of ASEAN as a whole to cooperate’ (ASEAN, 2000: point 1). But the SAM’s actions to identify themselves as the exhibition centre of the area are perceived as signs of Singaporean cultural imperialism by other Southeast Asian countries. Individual countries want to keep their national art treasures at home. Other Southeast Asian countries want to be the contemporary art centre for the region too. the asian Civilizations museum The Asian Civilizations Museum (ACM) is the first museum in the region to present a broad yet integrated perspective of pan-Asian cultures and civilizations. As one of the National Museums of Singapore under the National Heritage Board, we seek to promote a better appreciation of the rich cultures that make up Singapore’s multi-ethnic society. (ACM, 2007a: www.acm.org.sg/themuseum/aboutacm.asp) The first wing of the ACM opened in April 1997 in the former Tao Nan School building on Armenian Street. It expanded in March 2003 to include the 14,000 square metre Empress Place colonial building next to the Singapore River, in the heart of the financial district. While Singapore’s forefathers came to settle in Singapore from many parts of Asia within the last 200 years, the cultures brought to Singapore by these different people are far more ancient. This aspect of Singapore’s history is the focus of the ACM. The Museum’s collection therefore centres on the material cultures of the different groups originating from China, Southeast Asia, South Asia and West Asia. (ACM, 2007a: www.acm.org. sg/themuseum/aboutacm.asp) Besides being Singaporean, every citizen of Singapore has been assigned an ethnic identity. They are boxed into the Chinese, Malay, Indian and Others (CMIO) ethnic model – 99 per cent of the Singaporean population are considered either Chinese (77 per cent), or Malay (14 per cent), or Indian (8 per cent). There is also the miscellaneous category of ‘Others’ (1 per cent). The CMIO model is politically defined, and is central to the state’s nation building and social engineering programmes (Benjamin, 94 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 94 09/06/2010 14:34 Histories, Tourism and Museums: Re-making Singapore 1976; Chua, 1995; Pereira, 1997; Rudolph, 1998; Siddique, 1990). The ancestries of the Chinese, Malay and Indian communities are officially broadly defined as from China, Malaysia/Indonesia and the Indian subcontinent respectively. This model over-simplifies the immigration patterns and cultures of Singaporeans’ forebears. These three countries/regions are not homogeneous within themselves, and the ACM acknowledges, but does not dwell on, the diversity. For instance, in the case of China, Confucianism is simply epitomized as Chinese society (ACM, 2007b: www.acm.org.sg/ themuseum/galleries4.asp): In Chinese society, the patriarchal system, based on Confucianism, placed the father at the head of the family, just as the emperor was the head of state. Great care was taken to respect and look after one’s elders and ancestors. Many stories were written to eulogise exceptionally filial acts. With the emphasis on the broad concepts of being Chinese, IndianHindu or Malay-Muslim, the museum suggests that Singaporeans should be proud of their ancestral pasts because these pasts are the sources of Singaporeans’ Asian ethnic identities. In contrast to the NMS, which shows that Singapore is a relatively new country, the ACM reclaims historical links to China, India and the Middle East. While Singapore is in the middle of the Malay-Muslim world in Southeast Asia, the ACM chooses to trace the Singaporean Malay-Muslim population to the Middle East. Malaysia and Indonesia are Singapore’s immediate neighbours. The accentuation of Singaporean ethnicities via other countries’ pasts is a double-edged sword. While Singaporeans are asked to associate themselves with the pasts of other countries, they can also easily associate themselves with the present social and political situations in these same countries. Since Malaysia and Indonesia are Singapore’s immediate neighbours, the Singaporean government officially acknowledges that Malay Singaporeans are at a greater risk of split loyalty if Singapore has conflicts with either of its two neighbours (Ooi, 2003: 82–83). Since almost all Malays are also Muslims, the ACM concentrates on the Muslim aspects of the Malay Singaporean population and links this group’s heritage to the Middle East. Despite the difficulties in acquiring precious artefacts for its own collection – as governments in other countries jealously protect their own heritage – the ACM is still able to bring together priceless material heritage from the above-mentioned places (apart from Malaysia and Indonesia), offering visitors a sweeping view of Singaporeans’ ‘ancestral heritages’ 95 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 95 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia (Singapore Tourist Promotion Board and Singapore Ministry of Information and the Arts, 1995). Through loans, acquisitions, donations and travelling shows, some of the spectacular exhibits include items like eighteenthcentury calligraphic implements from Iran and Turkey, seventh-century Tang dynasty sculptures from China, and eighth-century architectural fragments from nagara temples in India. To promote the museum, it organizes so-called blockbuster exhibitions to attract even more visitors; these exhibitions include Buddhist artefacts from Indochina and treasures from the Vatican. The ACM is a site that shows off the glorious heritages of old Asia. The grandeur and glory of Singaporeans’ ancestors are celebrated, and the values embodied in the artefacts are said to be internalized in Singaporeans today. Unlike the NMS, in which Singapore’s identity is accentuated by the country’s differences from its neighbours, and the SAM, in which Singapore is said to represent Southeast Asia, the ACM asserts Singaporean ethnic identities by claiming ancestral links to selected historical periods of particular Asian countries and communities. These links are the deep roots of Singapore’s Asianness. touristifiCation and orientalization proCesses in Context The NMS, SAM and ACM are national institutions that assert Singapore’s Asianness. They not only play a part in the social engineering programmes, but also play a central role in making Singapore more Asian for western tourists. As mentioned earlier, Singapore has developed into a modern city and the STB realizes that Singapore has lost the exotic Oriental charm that many western tourists expect and demand. The museums are attempts to re-Orientalize and self-Orientalize Singapore. Adorno and Horkheimer (1972) argue that there is a tendency for the culture industry to systematically insert secondary meanings, replacing original meanings in cultural artefacts. The self-Orientalization processes in the national museums of Singapore can be understood in this context. Let me explain. In museums, stories are presented and meanings are added to artefacts. New interpretations and meanings are often inserted into the exhibits. For example, the Museum of Scotland tells stories and stages myths of Scotland in the context of contemporary political and cultural understandings of the country (Cooke and McLean, 2002; McLean and 96 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 96 09/06/2010 14:34 Histories, Tourism and Museums: Re-making Singapore Cooke, 2003; Newman and McLean, 2004). Meanings and contexts behind the exhibits are inevitably modified too; for example, scholars such as Hudson (1987) and O’Doherty (1986) point out that an exhibit, such as an old painting or a piece of sculpture, usually has an original functional setting in a church, temple or home, which encourages a mood of relaxation and contemplation, but when it becomes an exhibit in a museum it is uprooted into a ‘neutral, unnatural atmosphere, where it has to compete for attention with many other works of art. In these circumstances, the emotions become anaesthetized, the intellect takes over and museums become temples of scholarship’ (Hudson, 1987:175). Museums used as spaces for representation inevitably interpret and re-contextualize the exhibits. The NMS, SAM and ACM have created and inserted stories and narratives into their exhibits. These stories constitute part of the self-Orientalization of Singapore. There are however variations to the Orientalization process in these museums. First and foremost, the SHM, SAM and ACM are engaged in the ‘reasianization’ process (Hein and Hammond, 1995). This process is not unique to Singapore. The process of reasianization is found among many Asian countries trying to seek and re-establish their relations with their Asian neighbours (ibid.). Particularly in the 1980s and 1990s, when the AsiaPacific region was economically vibrant, many Asian countries, like Japan, Malaysia and Singapore, tried to assert their dominance. Many scholars and researchers also predicted then that many far eastern economies would eventually overtake western economies. Such a view inspired the reasianization process, as many Asia-Pacific countries thought that they would collectively dominate world economics and politics in the twentyfirst century. Alongside the reasianization process was the process of ‘reverse Orientalism’ (Hill, 2000). This process entailed the attribution of a set of cultural values to East and Southeast Asian societies by Western social scientists in order to contrast the recent dynamic progress of Asian development with the stagnation and social disorganization of contemporary Western economies and societies. The contrast provided legitimation for some of the nationbuilding policies of political leaders in such countries as Singapore and was incorporated in attempts to identify and institutionalize core values. Many people saw the economic success of the Asia-Pacific region as stemming from Confucianism. Confucian values, as supposedly practised in Japan and the Asian tiger economies (namely, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and Hong Kong, and now China), offer a set of work ethics – 97 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 97 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia hard work, collective mindedness, thriftiness – that has an affinity with capitalism (Hofheinz and Calder, 1982; Kahn and Pepper, 1979; Vogel, 1979). Suddenly Confucianism and Confucian values were seen as positive by many inside and outside the region. Previously they had been seen as antiprogress and anti-development (Hill, 2000). In the 1980s the Singaporean government started to celebrate Singaporeans’ Asian roots and began the reverse Orientalism process (Hill, 2000). That process has not stopped. Confucianism has since developed into another strain of Orientalist discourse (Chua, 1995). Confucian values have equivocally come to mean Asian values in Singapore, tending to privilege the Chinese and marginalize the Malays and Indians. Regardless, the Singapore government has embarked on a social engineering programme that has been Confucianized, so that Singaporeans will learn about social discipline, social solidarity and community responsibility (Chua, 1995; Hill, 2000; Lam and Tan, 1999). The pride in being Asian has also been translated into tourism, with Singapore branding itself ‘New Asia’ in 1996 (Ooi, 2004). That brand and the current brand, ‘Uniquely Singapore’, communicate the idea that Singapore is in an economically, socially and culturally dynamic region (Ooi, 2004). The NMS, SAM and ACM are part of the reasianization process to celebrate the expected rise of Asia. Singapore proudly self-Orientalizes itself because the images that the world has of Asia are changing for the better. The Singapore government could even use the positive parts of the Orientalist discourses to engineer and persuade Singaporeans to be hardworking and authority-respecting subjects (Chua, 1995). But there are different Orientalization strategies used in the three national museums of Singapore. While celebrating Singaporeaness, the NMS attempts to de-Orientalize visitors’ perceptions of Singapore. As presented earlier, the images that the NMS presents of Singapore are specific and detailed. The NMS asserts Singapore’s uniqueness in Southeast Asia; Singapore is very different from its immediate neighbours. The NMS gives historical examples of how Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and other neighbouring countries disagreed and had violent conflicts. There are also exhibitions to show the distinctiveness of various Chinese communities in Singapore, showing that the Chinese in Singapore speak different languages and have different customs, beliefs and practices. Furthermore, Singapore is shown to be special because it has become an economically developed society due to good government, unlike most of its neighbours. In other words, Singapore 98 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 98 09/06/2010 14:34 Histories, Tourism and Museums: Re-making Singapore is both Asian and modern but in its own way. The NMS challenges Orientalist images visitors may have of Singapore as just another Asian country. It boasts of the city-state’s economic and social successes despite the strife and challenges facing an unstable Asia. In contrast, the SAM creates a new set of Orientalist discourses on Southeast Asia. It re-Orientalizes Singapore and the region. It firmly asserts Singapore as leader in Southeast Asia and constructs a set of Orientalist narratives about Southeast Asia as an aesthetic region. As mentioned earlier, the region is diverse: it has more than 500 million inhabitants, officially made of 11 different countries, and within most of these countries there is a variety of languages and cultural differences. In terms of contemporary art, there is a wide variety, ranging from Chinese ink paintings to Javanese batik, Vietnamese impressionism to Singaporean abstract sculptures. It is a difficult task to construct a Southeast Asian art genre, but the museum honestly tries to do so by presenting the diversity of visual art forms from the region and then creating themes to connect the works. The SAM celebrates the diversity of Southeast Asia but claims that the region is a somewhat artistically unified region. This unity invents yet another Southeast Asian regional identity. Effectively, it introduces a new set of Orientalist discourses on how to view the region. The promoted narrative firmly places Singapore as the art centre of the region. Therefore, the SAM is trying to replace the old Orientalist view of Southeast Asia that ignores the art in the region with a new view of Southeast Asia that makes Singapore the art and cultural centre. It re-Orientalizes Singapore and the region with its own narratives. The ACM reaffirms certain Orientalist views of Asia, having even bigger ambitions than the SAM, in the sense that it is presenting the material cultures of the major ancient Asian civilizations. It does not attempt to claim common roots with China, India and the Middle East. Instead, the museum works within the confines of common views of China, India and the Middle East. These places are perceived as homogeneous social and cultural entities, and Singapore is constructed as a site where all these cultures influence the modern city-state. The fact that the long histories of these civilizations have been chequered with political revolutions and social evolutions is not emphasized. For instance, the vast differences between dynasties, between Chinese languages and between communities are glossed over by the idea of a single Chinese civilization. The oneChina culture impression is not only held by most people in the world 99 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 99 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia but is also actively promoted by China; Singapore also takes the view of a single Chinese culture in its ethnic engineering programme (Leong, 1997). The ACM reaffirms the generalized ideas of Chinese, Indian and Islamic civilizations. In other words, like the SAM advocating Southeast Asia as a somewhat homogeneous bloc, the ACM reaffirms the view of Asia in terms of dominant clusters of civilizations. While the curators know that the situation is much more complex, the messages they communicate are basically that Asia is culturally rich and diverse along certain pre-defined boundaries of civilizations. Table 5.1 The Orient responds through the National Museums of Singapore: de-Orientalism, re-Orientalism and reverse Orientalism NMS SAM ACM The main messages • Singapore has its own cultures and identity • Singapore is distinct from other countries in the Southeast Asia • Singapore is part of Southeast Asia • Southeast Asia offers a unique genre of art • The SAM is the place to experience Southeast Asian art • Singapore is Asian • Asia is exotic and rich in history • Singapore society has deep Asian roots Type of Orientalization processes It de-orientalizes any simple images people may have of Singapore as just another Asian country It re-orientalizes Southeast Asia by presenting a Southeast Asian art genre It affirms Orientalist images that Asia is made up of clusters of civilizations Ways to attract more tourists to Singapore • Celebration of Singaporean society • Singapore is a ‘Global City for the Arts’ • Experience Singapore as a unique country in Southeast Asia • Celebration of Southeast Asian art and culture • Singapore is a ‘Global City for the Arts’ • Experience the best in Southeast Asian art and culture • Celebration of ancient Asian civilizations • Singapore is a ‘Global City for the Arts’ • Experience different, exciting and rich ancient Asian heritages Role in social engineering and nation-building • Reverse Orientalism: be proud of Singapore • For national education • Singapore has a difficult history and the current government has brought about stability and prosperity • Reverse Orientalism: be proud of Southeast Asia • To promote art among Singaporeans • Singapore is the cultural capital of the region • Reverse Orientalism: be proud of being Asian • Singaporeans should know their roots and they can see their ancestral pasts in the ACM • Encourage Singaporeans to accept prescribed ‘Asian values’ 100 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 100 09/06/2010 14:34 Histories, Tourism and Museums: Re-making Singapore The three museums present Singapore and the region differently. These different messages and strategies are developed out of the needs of tourism and nation-building. Table 5.1 summarizes the arguments that I have put forward on the different forms of Orientalization in the national museums of Singapore. Indeed, while serving the tourism functions, these museums have also become platforms for the Singaporean authorities to re-Orientalize and reverse Orientalize the city-state. Despite being visibly modern and developed, Singaporeans are reminded that they are Asian with good work ethics and high moral values. Tourists are shown that Singapore is essentially Asian and is still exotic. The Orientalist discourses that the museums have developed also allude to Singapore’s superiority to its neighbours. Singapore has inadvertently become the imperialist in the region. ConClusions The comparison between the three national museums shows how Orientalist discourses can be subverted, reclaimed and celebrated. Orientalism is not just about the Occident misinterpreting and controlling the Orient. It goes further, suggesting that the Orient can manipulate notions of itself with caricaturized images. The SAM has created another set of Orientalist narratives for Southeast Asia, a set that celebrates contemporary art from the region with Singapore in the centre. The ACM celebrates Asia not by inventing a new set of Orientalist discourses for Asia but by affirming the Orientalist imagination of Asia as being divided into sets of ancient civilizations. The NMS contrasts with the SAM and the ACM by celebrating Asia but also arguing that Singapore is different from other Asian countries, emphasizing the fact that Singapore is doing much better economically and socially than its neighbours. New and secondary meanings can be easily added to cultural products. Therefore, in the context of the national museums of Singapore, that which has been presented and articulated must also be understood within the context of use. All knowledge is created within its age and is necessarily contingent, no knowledge can be unaffected by the circumstances under which it comes to be (Burke III, 1998). With this holistic approach, presented stories and histories must then be read and understood as constructions by museum mediators within the contexts in which the stories function, rather than as objective and unadulterated accounts of reality. This chapter has 101 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 101 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia read the main stories of the three national museums of Singapore within the tourism and local social-engineering context. The Singaporean identities constructed are meant to attract tourists, assert Singapore’s role as a cultural centre for the region and generate pride in Singaporeans’ ancestral pasts. In that process, Singapore has become more Asian, and has created a domineering presence in the region by claiming cultural spaces from around the region. The ambition to become the cultural capital of the region will undoubtedly be challenged by Singapore’s neighbours for decades to come. notes 1 Data for this empirical study were collected between 1997 and 2006. Besides visits to and documents amassed concerning the museums, interviews and discussions were held with top officials in the ACM, SAM, NMS, National Heritage Board and STB. 2 The Singapore Tourist Promotion Board (STPB) became the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) in November 1997. 102 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 102 09/06/2010 14:34 Chapter 6 World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia Angkor and Beyond Keiko Miura1 introduCtion Since the inception of the World Heritage Programme in the 1970s, popular destinations of nature and culture tourism considered to have ‘outstanding universal value’ have been nominated as World Heritage Sites. By mid2008, 878 properties had been inscribed on the World Heritage List: 29 are found in Southeast Asia,2 all of which have been put on the list since 1991.3 This rather recent special branding of heritage sites has added a considerable boost to the development of Southeast Asian economies and prestige, primarily through increased tourism revenue. At the same time it has led to tensions at different levels within the communities concerned as well as rapid socio-cultural changes. World Heritage Sites have become a new genre of community, both imagined and real. A new community entails a new social space, new values and borders, which are often contested among stakeholders. This new genre has become an important subject matter of study requiring multidisciplinary approaches. Comparative studies are also considered highly beneficial to our understanding of the nature of such communities. As compared to the rapidly growing number of nominated Sites and the enormous problems which accrue from nomination, there has been little comprehensive research conducted on the processes of change before and after nomination. An urgent matter is to examine what emerges upon creating a new community or demarcating a certain area as such, and what it implies to have such a site 103 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 103 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia for the various interacting communities concerned, both geographical and professional. The former category includes the interplay of local, provincial, national, regional or international communities, as well as processes taking place within the respective communities themselves, while the latter category includes the interactions between experts on conservation, tourism and community development. In other words, the study of World Heritage Sites provides us with fairly clear evidence of ‘knowledge interfaces between local communities (their practices and discourses) and external agents of change, who have their own practices and discourses’ (Pottier, 2003: 2). As Pottier assumes, nevertheless, there is no clear-cut distinction between ‘local community’ and ‘external agents’. The production of knowledge is embedded in social and cultural processes imbued with aspects of power, authority and legitimation: the act of producing knowledge involves social struggle, conflict and negotiation (ibid.: 2). This chapter is therefore not a straightforward study of tourism in Southeast Asia, but of the complex social, cultural, economic and political ramifications and dynamic processes of change surrounding the designation of certain areas as World Heritage Sites. My particular concern here is sites with resident populations, the so-called ‘living heritage sites’4 – another new category of community. The main issues at such sites are often antagonistic triadic concerns and discourses about conservation, tourism and local ways of life. Even though a balance between the three elements is emphasized, the reality often proves to be far from ideal. Local ways of life tend to be subordinated to concerns about conservation and tourism development. Tensions among various stakeholders become more intense in developing countries due to the limited economic resources available. In other words tourism in World Heritage Sites cannot be discussed in isolation, but must include reference to discourses about the conservation of monuments and sites and the maintenance of local ways of life. This chapter attempts to study various constructions of the image of the heritage site, in the minds of local people, experts, policy-makers and national authorities, set against the reality – the institutional and legal frameworks – as well as the contestation over conservation, tourism and local ways of life. It also intends to show that in a given span of time the stakeholders modify their approaches as a result of interaction and negotiations among them. By demonstrating the nature and the processes of contestation, I wish to highlight the complexities and diversities in understanding heritage, tourism and site management, as well as the 104 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 104 09/06/2010 14:34 World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia: Angkor and Beyond educational values and social benefits that accrue from such contestation and negotiations. As is shown later, negative consequences developing at the sites are becoming lessons to be learnt by policy-makers and various authorities, who are reformulating and modifying their policies and strategies in managing the sites so as to make them acceptable to a wider community. This only confirms their mutual dependence, reciprocity and influence, reflecting rapidly interacting world communities. World Heritage Sites with high profiles have undoubtedly become political and economic icons of hope, prestige and capital for Southeast Asian countries. Two case studies are presented here to highlight the main issues, namely, of the Angkor World Heritage Site in Cambodia (hereinafter called Angkor), inscribed on the World Heritage List and the List of World Heritage in Danger at the same time in 1992, and of the Vat Phou5 and Associated Ancient Settlements within the Champasak Cultural Landscape (hereinafter called the Vat Phou site)6 in Laos, which was included on the List in 2001. The choice of these sites for discussion is to do with my own involvement with the work of the Culture Sector of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in Cambodia for nearly six years from November 1992 to August 1998, and two following years of doctoral fieldwork in Angkor, together with the familiarity and availability of relevant data for the Vat Phou site. The study begins with a brief examination of shared issues across the regional sites. It is followed by an analysis of the significance of Angkor as a turning point from former approaches towards the concept of heritage and site management by international conservation agencies and specialists. Case studies of Angkor and the Vat Phou site are then introduced, first with reference to socio-cultural resources and the management framework of the sites and the significance of the sites in the minds of people at various levels, and second with an illustration of the tensions among the three main concerns: heritage conservation, tourism development and local ways of life. Finally, recent policy emphases concerning the human dimension of heritage values and the effective use of heritage are discussed. The conclusion highlights the importance of negotiating conservation, tourism development and local ways of life, which may assist with the democratization processes in countries with World Heritage Sites in the region. 105 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 105 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia shared issues At the time of inscription on to the List, the criteria for inclusion and the socio-political and economic frameworks show considerable differences among the sites with resident populations. There are, however, shared issues: tensions around the universal values of cosmopolitanism (vis-à-vis the local and the national); discourses of ownership and management; tensions between conservation, tourism development and local ways of life; patterns of exclusion; and the symbolic meanings attached to these sites (cf. Bianchi and Boniface, 2002: 80). The gap between the policies and practices of site management is another salient issue across heritage sites. The notions of heritage and tradition are selected, constructed and represented by various actors, including the state, international agencies and local communities in the context of nation-building and tourism development (cf. Hitchcock and King, 2003b: 6), and conservation and community development. Questions of authority, authenticity and aesthetics are closely tied up with the notions of heritage and tradition (Hitchcock and King, 2003c: 163);7 authenticity and aesthetics are particular concerns of conservators and visitors.8 The significance of Angkor as a turning point Before the inscription of Angkor as a cultural World Heritage Site in 1992, the management approach of earlier nominations, such as Sukhothai and Ayutthaya in Thailand, and Prambanan and Borobudur in Indonesia, was to remove the local residents from the sites to conserve and recreate them as historic parks, primarily for tourism. Black and Wall (2001: 129–130) mention the negative impact of removing the local residents from the sites, especially in Borobudur and Prambanan where local people’s spiritual and emotional ties with the monuments and the land around it are weakened because of relocation and the erection of fences around the monuments. It also entails the reduction of economic opportunities. As a result, ‘the relationship between residents and government officials was adversarial, tense and sometimes violent’ (ibid.: 129). By learning from negative past experiences, the inscription of Angkor as a World Heritage Site showed a stark shift in policy-formulation from that used for earlier cultural heritage sites. The clear shift can be seen in the underlying criteria, which have moved from just preserving the monuments and sites as representing a ‘frozen idealized past’ devoid of people, except tourists and conservators, to making the site ‘living’ and more integral with 106 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 106 09/06/2010 14:34 World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia: Angkor and Beyond local people who are therefore not to be resettled. Nevertheless, we have seen unfortunate official responses at both Angkor9 and Vat Phou: internal marginalization, restricted movement and restricted access to erstwhile cultural and socio-economic resources, and visible and invisible ‘barriers’ erected as new boundaries. The situation at the two sites has made tense the relationship between the local community and the incumbent authorities. Conflicts between conservationists and tourism promoters are also severe, for the former consist of international conservation agencies and experts in conjunction with a minority of local experts, while tourism promoters represent local governments and business-oriented groups, both local and international. The local governments are also divided into various groups, and there are individual players, all of whom strive for more personal economic and political gains over the control of the sites. On the one hand, there is a high-level contestation over access to and control of cultural and natural resources at the sites; on the other hand there is little concern about the lives of local populations, who tend to be restricted in their access to ‘their’ heritage sites, or who become a neglected community. Since 2004, however, the situation has seen some improvement in Angkor, for the Cambodian government finally publicly acknowledged the rights of local villagers whilst prohibiting any illegal activities by various state authorities or private individuals. What is happening in Angkor also reflects the democratization process that is taking place in Cambodia in general, on which the presence and voices of the international community have had a strong bearing. For the situation of the Vat Phou site, we will have to wait and see whether or not the same trend is to come soon. There are nonetheless strong possibilities that Angkor will serve as an iconic site to influence the ways by which other World Heritage Sites in the region are managed and represented. Cultural landscape Sites nominated on the basis of ‘cultural landscape’ criteria began to emerge from 1992,10 in respect to the human–nature interactions that have led to the creation of such landscapes (UNESCO–World Heritage Centre, 2008: 14, 86–87). Angkor was not designated as a ‘protected cultural landscape’, though the areas along rivers such as the Siem Reap River and Puok River are included in a zone of ‘protected cultural landscapes’ (cf. Autorité pour la Protection du Site et l’Aménagement de la Région d’Angkor/APSARA, 1998: 192–196, 213).11 Whether nominated with reference to the criteria of 107 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 107 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia cultural landscapes or not, sites that include local inhabitants are regarded as ‘living heritage sites’. An example in the region of a living heritage site, referred to as a ‘living cultural landscape’, is the rice terraces of the Philippine Cordilleras, inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1995 (Reyes, 2005: 48).12 The issue of the local Ifugao population here is not to do with exclusion, but more to do with the negative impact of tourism development or difficulties in managing economic life there, including the deterioration of the meaning of traditional rites and dance performances for the local population, the lack of strong economic benefit from tourism to the local community, the degradation of natural resources, consequential shortages of water for farming (ibid.: 48–50), inaccessibility to modern equipment due to the narrowness and steepness of the rice terraces (Engelhardt, 1997: 3), and the outflow of younger inhabitants as economic migrants to urban areas, leading to a decrease in the number of original inhabitants willing to continue farming. This critical situation of conserving Ifugao rice terraces was taken seriously by UNESCO, which designated it as a World Heritage Site in Danger in 2001.13 Using a more comprehensive approach to give protection to the site as well as local ways of life is a large step forward to improve the ethical dimension of managing a living heritage site. As demonstrated briefly above, however, designation alone is not enough to make the ideal become a social reality. There are complex ramifications surrounding what is available and desirable to local inhabitants to achieve their objectives, which at times may conflict with the expectations and needs of the state and/or the international community. Angkor: its socio-cultural resources and its management framework The most outstanding of Angkor’s socio-cultural resources are no doubt its numerous monuments and sites produced during the Angkor period of the Khmer14 civilization, a period that developed extensively from the ninth to the fifteenth centuries CE. Angkor refers to this period and is used as a general term for the monuments and sites built during that time. There is however a prevalent confusion between Angkor and Angkor Wat. The latter was created in the first half of the twelfth century CE and is at the centre of Angkor. It is also the largest religious monument in the world. Angkor itself was one of the most powerful and advanced civilizations in mainland Southeast Asia, which was ruled by deified kings with a 108 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 108 09/06/2010 14:34 World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia: Angkor and Beyond pronounced hierarchy, extensive irrigation systems, and a programme of temple building. At its height, the kingdom stretched from the vicinity of Vientiane in Laos to much of the Malay Peninsula and from the southern part of Vietnam to the borders of Pagan in Burma.15 In the mid-fifteenth century CE Angkor was sacked by the Siamese and was under Siamese influence or control until 1907 when Siam ceded Angkor to the French. The French recognized the immense value of the Angkor heritage, and several missions, both official and private, were organized to investigate the scale, condition and quality of the monuments and sites, as well as to bring back to France a number of artefacts from Angkor even prior to 1907. While some temples such as Angkor Wat and Bayon had apparently been used for worship by the local population, the monuments and sites in general were full of rubble, destabilized walls, and lichens, and nature was taking over the structures (cf. Dagens, 1995: 48–114). Angkor’s legacy is not only historical buildings and infrastructure, but also socio-cultural traditions, including dance, theatre, games, beliefs, rituals and ways of life. Paying attention to the monumental heritage alone, Angkor Park was established in 1925 (Tashiro, 2005) and opened in the next year as a kind of open-air archaeological museum, which was managed by French conservators as such until 1972. Aesthetically pleasing cultural traditions had been appraised and promoted by the French, but not certain other aspects of local practices such as resin-tapping and logging, as shall be discussed later. The World Heritage nomination brought about the segmentation of the site according to various aspects of protection. It has created confusion and contestation over whose heritage Angkor is, what to protect and to what extent local practices should be allowed to continue. The area designated as the World Heritage Site covers 401 km², centring on the heart of Angkor civilization. The Site is separated into three areas: Roluos, Banteay Srei and Angkor (including Angkor Wat16 and Angkor Thom – the large city or capital built from 1190 to 1210 CE). Five zones were created: Zone 1 – Monumental Sites; Zone 2 – Protected Archaeological Reserves; Zone 3 – Protected Cultural Landscapes; Zone 4 – Sites of Archaeological, Anthropological or Historic Interest; and Zone 5 – The Socio-Economic and Cultural Development Zone of the Siem Reap/Angkor Region. By the early 1990s not only had two decades of war damaged the monuments and sites, but long negligence of management had caused them to fall into alarming conditions of destabilization and decay. They had also 109 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 109 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia been subject to rampant destruction, theft and illicit traffic of artefacts. Following the nomination of Angkor as a World Heritage Site, the Tokyo Conference in October 1993 created an international framework for managing the monuments and sites, i.e. the International Co-ordinating Committee for the Safeguarding and Development of the Historic Site of Angkor (ICC) . It was decided then that Japan and France would co-chair and UNESCO act as the standing secretariat. ICC was mandated ‘to meet periodically to set priorities and monitor the conservation work on the site as well as to mobilize the necessary funds’. Angkor was then (and probably is still now) considered as one of the largest conservation workshops in the world. Tourism and conservation were in the mind of UNESCO and the international community initially, but more to use tourism revenue for the conservation of the monuments and sites (cf. UNESCO, 1993: 15) and also to prevent excessive and rapid tourism development. As a national body responsible for the management of Angkor, the APSARA Authority (hereinafter called APSARA) was established in 1995. A special police corps for the protection of cultural heritage (the so-called ‘heritage police’) was established in 1997. By 2004 Angkor was considered not to be at risk any longer and was removed from the World Heritage List in Danger.17 While Angkor has steadily made progress in establishing the management framework required through the World Heritage nomination, it has been perceived differently by different groups of people, even though its outstanding socio-cultural value has been reconfirmed by all. Angkor as imagined The nomination of Angkor as a World Heritage Site has led people of various social levels from diverse social backgrounds to consider and reconsider what Angkor means to them, the local communities, the nation and the world, while taking into consideration what has happened to Cambodians over the last three decades. On pondering the historical experience of Cambodians, Azedine Beschaouch, UNESCO’s former Scientific Advisor for Angkor, said: The last 25 years have been a period of intense philosophical reflection for the Cambodians. They have asked themselves whether the decline of the Angkor Empire (…) signalled the end of a Cambodia that was peaceful and highly cultured, and whether they themselves were part of another Cambodia, one which is destructive and barbaric. Angkor above all allows 110 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 110 09/06/2010 14:34 World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia: Angkor and Beyond them to be reconciled with their own history: aligning themselves to this great civilization allows them to draw a line under the barbaric times (UNESCO/Boukhari, 2002). For Sok An,18 Minister in Charge of the Council of Ministers and the Chairman of the National Tourism Authority of Cambodia, Angkor is the national legacy par excellence, so that ‘in all services from those of the airport, visitor accommodation, tourist sites and departure points from Cambodia, workers, all levels of relevant officials and people in general should behave well, [and] use proper language and decorum, displaying the Khmer national identity that is a legacy of the glorious generation of the Angkor era’ (Sok, 2001: 3). Sok’s emphasis on the national importance and pride surrounding Angkor was shared with the then heritage police chief. For the latter, Angkor is the unique legacy of their ancestors that can give them great pride not just locally, but internationally. He said, ‘How could the Khmer act in an appropriate way in order to respect the honour of Angkor, which does not only belong to a few people? We have to know how to give honour to our ancestors. If the Khmer had no Angkor, nobody would recognise us.’19 For this French-educated Khmer anthropologist and former director of the Heritage and Culture Department of APSARA, ‘Angkor is a living heritage site: it has not only ancient temples, but also villages that have existed from the past until the present. The Angkor heritage is not only the temples, but includes monks, rich people and poor people (…) I would not actually move villagers from the site where they have been living. I just wish them to live in balance with the environment.’20 He also emphasized the emotional and healing dimension of heritage elsewhere, saying that ‘in times of despair, Angkor is the only reference point’ (UNESCO/Boukhari, 2002). Many local villagers seem to find it difficult to express their overwhelming feelings towards Angkor. The words of a Buddhist monk from the village in front of Angkor Wat gave the author the feeling that the most powerful presence of Angkor is in one’s mind: ‘I have lived all my life seeing Angkor Wat. I cannot imagine living in a place without it.’ Angkor for him is a homeland, inseparable from his life and everyday living. As is clear from the above, Angkor is imagined and valued in a variety of ways in the minds of all concerned. In reality, however, the significance of Angkor for local inhabitants has been little considered. They have never been invited to the ICC and have rarely been provided with other venues to 111 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 111 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia voice their concerns; rather, they have been given orders or criticism from above. Very little was known about what they considered ‘their’ heritage to be or how their lives have been interwoven into the site. Local inhabitants and their heritage According to the survey of the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC), the entire population of Zones 1 and 2 was estimated at approximately 22,000 in 1992. This figure is unreliable, for many areas then had land mines, and the security of the area had not been safe enough to conduct an accurate population census. Nonetheless, we see a sharp increase in the population in the space of six years. The national population census of 1998 states the population at 84,000. In 2005, the number had reached 100,000, including 18,500 households according to the survey of APSARA. The two zones consist of five districts, 19 communes and 102 villages (Khuon, 2005). Most inhabitants are rice farmers, though they consider themselves as ‘forest’ people, or people who dwell in the forest region and depend on forest products for subsistence. They have traditionally owned certain lands within the temple sites as well as made use of natural resources within the Angkor complex. In the compounds of Angkor Thom and Angkor Wat they have an ancestral heritage of rice fields in the form of ponds, lakes and the moats of Angkor Thom. Likewise, parts of the large temple sites such as Ta Prohm temple have been cultivated by local villagers through several generations. Trees, especially those yielding resin or fruits, are owned by certain villagers, who care for them. Resin provides an important supplementary income for them as well as being used to make torches for both home consumption and sale. Logs not only provide firewood, but are also utilized to make charcoal for domestic use and the market. Other forest products constitute an important subsistence economy in terms of food and craft materials.21 Temple compounds where forests are not dense provide cows with grass to graze. Moats, ponds and lakes are bathing places for water buffaloes. International restoration and conservation teams have provided labour opportunities for local populations since the late 1980s, as had the French conservators since the early twentieth century. In the Guidelines for Management Article 17 local residents are mentioned: ‘Give residents of the protected sites priority of employment in the matters of site management and preservation work’ (APSARA, 1998: 218). Based on this, APSARA has 112 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 112 09/06/2010 14:34 World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia: Angkor and Beyond also provided jobs in site maintenance, initially as part of the food-for-work project of the International Labour Organization (ILO), and it later created jobs for temple guards recruited from local villages. Some local residents also produce handicrafts, mainly woodcrafts, and/or sell souvenirs or drinks in Angkor. Since the end of the Pol Pot regime in 1979 local villagers, in particular the followers of the eight precepts, started voluntarily to take care of Buddha and Hindu statues in the temples. Some of the Hindu statues have been venerated as powerful local tutelary spirits called neak ta. The most powerful neak ta in the region is called Neak Ta Ta Reach (royal neak ta) in the form of Vishnu guarding the western gallery (the west is the front) of Angkor Wat. During the war-time in the 1970s local villagers fled to Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom to avoid shelling from the Lon Nol side in Siem Reap, when the Angkor area was occupied by the Khmer Rouge guerrillas. Angkor monuments thus not only provided local inhabitants with spiritual and moral protection but also physical shelter. Generations of local inhabitants have established close relationships with the monuments, in terms of constructing original buildings, conserving and maintaining them, and keeping the site vital by continuing to live and work there and believing in its sacredness and its symbolic values. The temples also provide them with spaces for praying, learning, merit-making, meeting people, protection and artistic performances. Prior to the establishment of schools in the villages, Angkor Wat monasteries were the only places where boys could be educated and become monks to learn about Buddhism. Since 1979 seven monasteries have been created on the ancient temple sites in Angkor Thom. Many of the monks of the monasteries in Angkor Thom and Angkor Wat are from local villages. Among them many abbots and senior monks had been restoration workers during the French management of Angkor. The monasteries have also served as culture centres where people from other communities can meet, and exchange news and knowledge. In particular, Angkor Wat has seen the highest level of national (and international these days) artistic performances, and been the place for traditional New Year games22 for people in the Angkor area. Local villagers also have their ancestors’ ashes housed in the stupas or buried in the compound of Angkor Wat monasteries. In short, Angkor is closely linked to the everyday life of local villagers as well as to their memories and to their ancestors’ practices. It is their homeland and an integral whole; religious life and socio-economic life 113 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 113 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia are inseparable. Both the continued relevance of the site to local villagers’ everyday living, and its symbolic and inspirational importance for the nation, make the site ‘a living heritage site’. This is not just because Angkor has continued to be a worship-site. It is essential to understand that it has long been safeguarded by local inhabitants as their personal and national heritage, which is now considered a world heritage. angKor: Conservation, tourism development and loCal Ways of life Local inhabitants of Angkor have had a close association with the sites for generations. At the international level of discourses over ‘Save Angkor’, the issue of local inhabitants has been little discussed. While it is true that their contribution as a valuable labour force for restoration and conservation work is usually mentioned, the main focus of discussion is on the conservation of the Angkor monuments and tourism development. The year 2001 saw a significant change in the political atmosphere vis-à-vis Angkor, when the Cambodian government voiced its strong concern over speeding up the promotion of tourism development in Angkor. Conservation versus tourism development The primary interest of the international community has been with the restoration and conservation of the monuments and site, whereas the main concern of the Cambodian government since the late 1990s has clearly been with tourism development, in particular with the profit from tourism to be used to overcome the political and socio-economic ills of the country. The difference in priority envisaged by the two camps was clear from the outset, and has been proved by subsequent words and actions. At the beginning, the ICC was busy co-ordinating international restoration and conservation teams’ projects, reporting periodically on the progress made as well as setting technical standards and ensuring international co-operation rather than competition. Tourism development was slow in comparison because of the prevalence of land mines, occasional incursions of Khmer Rouge guerrillas into the Angkor area, and the general insecurity of the site after dark. Meanwhile, the Cambodian government agreed a contract for collecting entrance fees charged to visitors with a private company called the Sokha Hotels Company (more popularly known as Sokimex) – one of the largest private 114 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 114 09/06/2010 14:34 World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia: Angkor and Beyond companies in Cambodia. The company has a close association with the ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP). UNESCO and the international community initially envisaged that the entrance fees23 collected from visitors would be used for conserving and managing the site. This situation became a salient point of dispute between the two camps at ICC. The Japanese government was especially critical and voiced its disagreement with the system since it is the largest donor country to Cambodia. Even though severe criticism could not completely change the situation, partial distribution of royalties to APSARA has gradually been achieved. In April 1999 US$1 million of annual revenue was distributed to APSARA. Between 1 September 2000 and 31 December 2000, the distribution of royalties to APSARA and the Sokha Hotels was set at 70 per cent and 30 per cent respectively. Since 2001 APSARA has arranged to receive 70 per cent of the profit if the total revenue exceeds US$3million, 50 per cent if less (APSARA, 2000: 2–3). The contract was renewed in August 2005 and runs until 2010 (De Lopez et al., 2007: 7). Apart from entrance fees, ICC has also had to deal with a number of covert agreements made between the Cambodian government and entrepreneurs, or proposed schemes from the latter to the former. Prominent examples include a sound and light show scheme by a Malaysian company, YTL, in Angkor Wat in 1996;24 the construction of hotels in the protected zone; and several private karaoke establishments25 within Zone 2: at least one was established by a high-ranking military officer. The sound and light show, private karaoke establishments, and a lift in Angkor Wat were cancelled. The scheme for a sound and light show in Angkor Wat has resurfaced recently, as have new projects for moored Sokimex hot-air balloon flights over the site near Angkor Wat and the construction of a cable car to Phnom Bakheng (cf. ICC, 2001: 32–34). The air balloon scheme was permitted and can be seen to the west of Angkor Wat. While zoning boundaries had been unclear to most social actors until lately, some clearly exploited the situation and began to build or plan to build hotels within the protected zone. One hotel was built, partially blocking an ancient canal which was discovered when the construction was nearly completed. After serious criticism was levelled, all such plans were reviewed. Consequently some plans were scrapped, while it was requested that other architectural plans be modified in order to restrict the number of rooms and keep the height below that of the Grand Hotel d’Angkor at the centre of Siem Reap town. 115 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 115 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia In addition, APSARA had long been ineffective because of internal political strife, inadequate financial and human capacity, and relative isolation from other well-established Cambodian authorities, who tend to see APSARA as a development impediment and often ignore its authority. A crucial point was reached with the dismissal by the cabinet in 2001 of the Director-General of APSARA, who was a confidant of the former king, Norodom Sihanouk, and also a staunch French-educated architect and conservationist. He was replaced by his deputy, and Sok An, Vice-Minister, became the Chairman of APSARA. Within two months of the dismissal of the Director-General, a National Seminar on Cultural Tourism took place in both Siem Reap and Phnom Penh, in which the author participated. At the opening speech in Phnom, Sok An (Sok, 2001), then as the Minister in charge of the Council of Ministers and the Chairman of the National Tourism Authority of Cambodia, expressed the government’s intention and determination to promote ‘cultural tourism’ more effectively and expressed his hope that ‘the strategy to develop cultural tourism can be given even greater impetus’. At the session in Siem Reap, a representative of UNESCO emphasized the need for the conservation of historical monuments to be carried out in harmony with the development of Angkor: Angkor was a ‘human heritage’. He recommended to the national authorities that the tourist development action plan take ‘quality of life’ into consideration. As some of the priorities for consideration he mentioned communications, comfort (service facilities), entertainment, culture, place, tradition, and the sensitization of the local community to ensure that they should participate in the tourist development and profit from it. Local ways of life Through the ICC, UNESCO has repeatedly emphasized the human dimension of Angkor heritage and stressed that the revenue from tourism development be fairly shared with the local community. On the part of the Cambodian government, their emphasis on urgency in tourism development was claimed as necessary to provide more employment opportunities to the rural poor and as a pre-requisite to the alleviation of poverty throughout the country. Local villagers, however, have not gained much from tourism development. For instance, positions in hotels are mostly taken by urban and better-educated people who know English or another foreign language 116 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 116 09/06/2010 14:34 World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia: Angkor and Beyond and have connections to recruiters or owners. A lack of formal education and connections to ‘the rich and powerful’ means that rural people often end up working at construction sites with highly exploitative working conditions. Some work as gardeners for large hotels, others are fortunate to be recruited for free skills-training programmes to produce silk or cotton textiles, wood- or stone-carving, lacquerware, or carpentry. Yet others are studying English or other foreign languages to become unofficial tourist guides.26 Although they have largely been ignored in policy-making and representation in the international forum of discussions over Angkor, this is not the most serious predicament to befall the local villagers. The nomination of Angkor as a World Heritage Site has become a convenient excuse for the many representatives of the national authority to demand that the local villagers stop their traditional socio-economic practices in Angkor. Many traditional practices have been banned by the heritage police under the Ministry of Interior since April 2000, without prior consultation with APSARA. This ban includes cutting trees, collecting forest products such as resin, the cultivation of rice, grazing cattle, killing birds, entering the forest, bringing cutting instruments or firearms inside Angkor Thom, and the increase of land cultivation within the Angkor complex. Releasing water buffaloes into the moat of Angkor Wat and releasing cattle on its banks have also been banned on grounds of sanitation and aesthetics (Kingdom of Cambodia, 1999). No compensation or alternatives were provided in the course of imposing the ban, which narrowed subsistence options for local villagers. Many are now obliged to seek temporary wage labour in hotel construction or other work that provides no security and is highly exploitative in most cases. Even before the ban was imposed, the local villagers were exposed to the abuse of power by the heritage police. It is widely known that the heritage police have been exacting money from Cambodians working in Angkor, regardless of whether they are vendors of souvenirs or drinks, caretakers of religious statues, collectors of edible ants’ nests, beggars or rice cultivators. Many of Angkor’s large trees, especially Yeang27 trees which yield resin, have been logged illegally since 1979. This was especially severe during the Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia from 1979 to 1989, when extensive logging took place in Angkor by both the Vietnamese and Cambodian military. The then heritage police chief, himself a native of Angkor, however, 117 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 117 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia blames the destruction of forests on the local villagers, whilst admitting that some of his men have also collaborated with them. Because of the increase of antagonism which had developed between the local villagers and the heritage police, a meeting was organized at Ta Nei temple by APSARA in July 2000. It invited major stakeholders of the site, including representatives of local authorities, the then heritage police, Buddhist monks, village chiefs and vice-chiefs, representatives of a local NGO, international organizations and researchers. At the meeting the then heritage police chief threatened local villagers with arrest, imprisonment, and the death sentence for many of the illegal activities, but finally compromised on the collection of firewood. The then chief, nonetheless, declared that the site was for the world, not for some local families. In his mind local heritage was unimportant; it should be subordinated to a higher cause and wider concerned parties. The then heritage police chief quoted laws and regulations that concerned the protection of the national cultural heritage, promulgated prior to Angkor’s world heritage nomination. These are based on the old conservation philosophy and policies of freezing the past, almost completely eradicating human interactions in the monumental zone. While some representatives of the local authorities demonstrated a certain degree of sympathy towards the local villagers, they mostly went along with the heritage police ban. Only the representative of the local Department of Forestry strongly challenged the stance of the heritage police chief. NGO workers and international researchers also voiced their support for the continuation of rice cultivation on the site because some families have no other rice fields or any immediate alternatives for survival. Both the national and international sector of forest conservation and management have emphasized the importance of incorporating local participation in their tasks; their appeals have largely been ignored by other sectors of the Cambodian authorities. It was not the first time that local practices in Angkor had been restricted. Upon creating the Angkor Park in 1925, the French (although not of one view as regards local inhabitants) tried to restrict resin-tapping and tree-cutting, but enforcement was not strict. While the people living within the sites of Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom were moved outside the moats, they were nevertheless allowed to cultivate rice and to continue the collection of forest resources other than resin. The French authorities proposed removing the monks from Angkor Wat, too, but reconsidered 118 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 118 09/06/2010 14:34 World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia: Angkor and Beyond because the name of Angkor Wat would be meaningless without monks, according to a local achar (ritual officiant). The ultimate French exclusion of local inhabitants from and the restriction of their practices on major monumental sites has been emulated by the Cambodian authorities at various stages in the past and today with more intensity and cynicism, though local inhabitants cannot be physically removed from the residential areas now because of the government decision in September 2004 (APSARA, 2005).28 An order promulgated by the government in the same year confirms that some of the bans delivered by the heritage police continue to be effective, including resin-tapping and releasing cattle in the Angkor site (ibid.).29 Irregularities occurring at Angkor and conflicts between various levels of the national authorities and local communities have recently been taken seriously by the government. It has issued several official documents, which clarify and endorse the exclusive authority of APSARA in the management and development of the site and in matters of land use. At the same time, the government has, for the first time, clarified some of the rights of the local villagers such as residential rights and rights to manage the land inherited from ancestors, while strictly prohibiting land transactions with outsiders or for establishing service sector facilities (ibid.). This is a favourable change for the local community, but its implications and implementation are as yet unclear. the vat phou site The Vat Phou site shares several characteristics with Angkor. Firstly, both sites are credited to Khmer kings for the construction of the monuments. Secondly, the areas designated within the World Heritage Site are large and are inhabited. The important linking point of the two sites is that the zoning of the Vat Phou site and the criteria for its nomination reflected the lessons learnt from the shortcomings found in Angkor, particularly the failure to designate the entire site as a cultural landscape. Yet, the problems that have occurred after nomination have turned out to be similar, i.e. the marginalization of local inhabitants and the subordination of local ways of life to the needs of various levels of national authorities. 119 Heritage_Tourism_2.indd 119 09/06/2010 14:34 Heritage Tourism in Southeast Asia Socio-cultural resources The main inhabitants of the Vat Phou site30 are Lao people,31 but the site is mainly associated with the Khmer. The present residents however make use of the site as a sacred place and, at the same time, as a place for living. According to a Khmer inscription at the site, it was the heartland and the sacred site of the pre-Angkor kingdom of Chenla (sixth to eighth centuries CE) (Ishii and Sakurai, 1985: 76–80). Khmer legends say that the area around Vat Phou was the birthplace of the Hindu god, Shiva (Nishimura, 2004a: 49). In particular, Phou Kao, the hill behind Vat Phou temple, with a gig