The islands
are administered under the umbrella of the province of West Sumatra, one
of 33 constituting the Republic of Indonesia. They form a lower level adminstrative
unit on their own, the recently formed Kabupaten (Regency) of (the) Mentawai
(Islands) (Kabupaten Kepulauan Mentawai, formerly Kabupaten Padang/Pariaman)
which is further divided into a number of districts, or Kecamatan. The islands
are divided amongst four such Kecamatan: North Siberut, South Siberut, Sipora,
and North and South Pagai which together constitute one Kecamatan. Population
figures (c.2000): North Siberut, 15 161; South Siberut, 14 757. Sipora, 12
840. North and South Pagai, 20 974. (Source Regional Autonomy Website). For further information on Regional Autonomy
relating to the islands click here.
The inhabitants
of the islands in the present can be divided into indigenous and immigrant
populations. The origins of the indigenous people are briefly described elsewhere. They all speak dialectical
variants of the language indigenous to the Mentawai Islands, with most speaking
the Indonesian national language and a minority the Minangkabau language.
The indigenous language dialects are spoken in North Siberut, South Siberut,
Sipora, and the Pagai Islands. Immigrants include people from North Sumatra
(Batak), West Sumatra (Minangkabau) who represent the bulk of the non-indigenous
population, and Javanese, along with representatives at one time or another
of most of the other ethnic groups in Indonesia as well as the odd Euroamerican
residing in a professional capacity (missionary, research, social/humanitarian
aid).
On Siberut
people mostly live in small settlements[1] dotted along
the major rivers or close to the coast. They commute back and forth between
dwellings in the settlement and dwellings located on ancestral land at varying
degrees of distance from it. There they raise pigs and pursue a variety of
horticultural activities, such as harvesting fruit when in season, durian
and jackfruit for example, along with many other naturally occurring species.
Chickens are often raised close to the settlement. Sago palms are also tended
in low-lying swampy locations, usually contiguous with a river. The pith is
processed and forms, along with taro, a dietry staple. Virtually every settlement
has at least one shop where rice and instant noodles along with the basic
items found in any similar establishment throughout Indonesia can be purchased.
Hence rice and noodles are often consumed. These purchases are financed by
a number of petty-trading activities which include the sale of rattan, collected
from the uncultivated areas of forest, and durian when in season (being the
opposite of the durian season on the Sumatran mainland creates demand). A
load of durian might be transported by canoe to the coast, the cash obtained
being used to purchase fish or machete blades and other items rarely obtained
upriver. Trade is almost exclusively dominated by members of the Minangkabau
immigrant group. The religious orientation of most people is Catholicism.
A good percentage follow Islam. Most people are still immersed, although
some more than others, in the beliefs and practices that have their origins
in the period prior to the coming of the world religions[2].
Most people have access to primary education should they wish their children
to attend. A small number of graduates attend secondary school in Muara Sikabaluan
or Muara Siberut, or even in Padang on the mainland where a sizable student
population lives and studies. There are no roads apart from those within
and in the immediate vicinity of Muara Sikabaluan and Muara Siberut.
The situation
on Sipora and the Pagai Islands differs to Siberut to the extent that further
dialectical variants of the language are spoken in each region respectively.
These regions have been subject to colonial and post-colonial influences for
a longer period[3]
resulting in considerable changes in cultural beliefs and practices. Much
of the literature concerning Sipora and the Pagais
portrays beliefs and practices that have all but disappeared. Most communities
are Christian with some Muslim, and are mainly located along, or in close
proximity to, the coast. The presence of these world religions has heavily
impacted upon indigenous cosmologies and belief systems. Raising pigs and
horticulture are important subsistence activities. Sago is not a dietry staple
but rather rice, purchased from Sioban or Sikakap or at a local shop supplemented
with horticultural produce.
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As of the
present (September 2001) much of the information contained in the various
articles constituting the content of this site derive from my own work in
the field of social/cultural anthropology, although
there is a growing body of material from several other contributors (particularly
indigenous people). Therefore I emphasise that the “facts” revealed within
are the product of a particular point of view (seeTheoretical Perspective ).
The issue
here is that the phenomenal world confronting us does not speak to us directly.
We accordingly take upon ourselves the deceptively straight-forward task
to speak on its behalf, to tell its story in a way that we feel it would
like the story to be told if it could indeed tell the story itself, to paraphrase
my honours supervisor of yesteryear. This is, thankfully, attenuated by (although
it also complicates) the important truism that the social/cultural worlds
that anthropologists study (or the discerning traveller engages with) are
the product of living and experiencing human beings who, whilst technically
"objects" of "scientific" investigation, are however able to tell their own
stories. Nevertheless the final responsibility for the story told rests with
the one through whose eyes and beliefs that story finds a wider audience.
Despite the inherent (and perhaps intractable) difficulties the intermediary—be
s/he merely “passing through” or acting in some professional capacity, an
anthropologist for example—faces in this task, it is exceedingly important
that the stories told correspond as closely as possible to the original.
The “facts”
related in the pages grouped under the rubric of "Ethnographic Particulars"
and "Mentawai Journal", then, are the result of an encounter between one
concerned to stay as true to the spirit of the original as is permitted by
his disciplinary imperatives and particular theoretical conerns, and a particular
population on the island of Siberut. They are, therefore, compromised, and
form not so much “facts” as interpretations of a particular socio-cultural
reality, at a particular place, at a particular time in world history. Nevertheless
they offer a sound starting point for anyone concerned to learn about the
world inhabited by a good proportion of the people inhabiting South Siberut,
which brings me to another important qualification.
The ethnographic
particulars described throughout these pages can only be said to hold for
the area in which are located the villages of Rogdog, Madobag, Ugai, and
Matotonan. Nevertheless the interested investigator will certainly find that
the cultural conceptions and social practices characterising this area of
Siberut share resonances of various intensities with other regions in Siberut
as a whole, and perhaps further afield on the islands of Sipora and the Pagais
in some circumstances. However since the author has conducted intensive ethnographic
research in just the one delimited region it must be recognised that the
ethnographic particulars described primarily relate to this region.
Bearing
in mind the above qualifications, the “facts” related throughout the following
pages are being made available for public consumption in the hope that those
who engage in any capacity for any length of time with the locals in this
part of the world—or anywhere else on the planet for that matter—will attempt
the (admittedly difficult) task of setting aside deeply entrenched beliefs,
a result of knowledge of “other cultures” coming to them through the stereotypes
bequeathed to them from a period in the early development of the discipline
of social/cultural anthropology. Such stereotypes, to name but a few, include
notions that the non-western world is largely inhabited by “primitives” (which
does not tell us anything apart from what we think we already know), or “stone-age”
peoples (which merely hints at the level of technology that may be relevant
for a particular population) or “noble savages” (more an image embedded within
pictorial and textual representations than an explicitly articulated phrase)
which in essense claims the possession of certain beliefs and values by indigenous
people, the possession of which has yet to be determined.
I exhort
you, esteemed reader—and having got this far you are obviously qualified to
respond to the challenge in the appropriate manner!—to reflect deeply upon
your experience in these islands and ask yourself the question, prior to
taking it upon yourself the task of speaking on behalf of “an-other”, and
subsequently making your “speaking-for” available to the rest of the world
via the ubiquitous medium of the internet, a book, or magazine, (but particularly
the internet) of whether you have yet reached the point in which you are
truly in a position to adequately articulate, describe, and most importantly
evaluate the reality of what you have seen or experienced on your travels
in the Mentawai islands. Minimally I would urge you not to rely upon the
metaphors bequeathed to you by your own cultural/intellectual tradition.
You need to make the attempt to abandon hackneyed concepts such as “primitive”
or “stone-age” and, instead, rely upon the rich source of metaphors that
your hosts use to construct the world in which you find yourself a guest.
In sum a study of the world described in the following pages (particularly the ”Ethnographic Particulars" section) prior to, or in conjuction with, a visit to the Mentawai islands, would be well rewarded by personal enlightenment and, when all is said and done, constitute a contribution to the more accurate portrayal of the socio-cultural world encountered. So it can be considered a springboard forming a solid foundation from which to gain an adequate understanding. It is also a springboard to a consideration of key texts listed in the bibliography of sources—I would direct the reader here to the work of the anthropologist Reimar Schefold, particularly his (1988) publication “Lia”—and, more generally, the development of a more qualitative engagement with a unique part of the world in which some justice is done to the complex socio-cultural reality that exists there.