East Timor Law Journal
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WEAVING THE COUNTRY TOGETHER: IDENTITIES AND TRADITIONS IN EAST TIMOR
Natali Pride BA (Hons) UNSW 2002
Chapter Three
Timor Lorosae[1] : Inside or Outside Indonesian Histories? Concepts of Tradition and Identity
“…scholars can only recognise tradition in the light of modernity.” [2]
Scratch the surface and the textile sellers at the Pasar Tais will admit to even the casual tourist (of which there are few) with a basic command of Indonesian, Tetum or Portuguese that not all their textile wares are traditional. Many items are clearly modern, especially those with United Nations emblems or ‘Independent East Timor’ woven into their vibrant colours. Some of the rougher textiles are cheap imports from West Timor, being sold as East Timorese.[3] To the untrained eye, many of the more muted colours and rougher fabrics are similar to each other in both construction and technique to the untrained eye, to the extent that the discovery[4] of a traditional textile can often be as difficult as establishing what a traditional East Timorese textile actually is.
The labelling of both textiles and the methods used to create them as traditional raises issues of contested identities, imagined communities and invented traditions. In assigning a textile the label of traditional, it becomes linked with a static and undisputed past, where techniques and symbols, and by implication identities, have remained unchanged. Such terminology suggests a single and homogenous history and a self-awareness which simply did not exist in such simplistic terms in
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1 Timor Lorosae is Tetum for East Timor. Variants on this spelling include Timor Loro Sae, Timor Loro s’ae and Timor Loro S’ae; the meaning remains unchanged. For coherence, Timor Lorosae has been used throughout this paper.
2 Sears, Laurie, Shadows of Empire: Colonial Discourse and Javanese Tales, Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1996, p. 12
3 Niner, Sarah, Report & Update: East Timorese Textiles (Tais) Exhibition & Weaving Women’s Stories, http://www.craftvic.asn.au/project/tais/niner.htm, 5 September 2001, p. 2
4 Precious textiles which have since become heirlooms were never made to be sold. As discussed in Chapter Two, these textiles were used for ritual and ceremonial occasions, thus explaining their near absence at the textiles market.
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East Timor. The re-creation of the past to create a tradition of the existence of an historically autonomous and unified East Timor prior to the Portuguese-Dutch arbitrary delineation of borders on the island is inherently difficult, if not, as I will argue here, undesirable.
As discussed in the previous chapter, the island of Timor, and East Timor in particular, is a melting pot, a “cultural mishmash.” [5] East Timor’s is not a homogenous society, having been continually shaped by the incorporation and adoption of, as well as adaptation to, repeated external influences. A limited definition of what constitutes traditional requires the rejection of numerous other equally valid traditions and experiences. As will be discussed below, East Timor’s experiences in terms of external influences constitute a core component of its history, resulting in multi-traditions – in other words, a history of many traditions of change and adaptation. This chapter aims to explore concepts of tradition and traditional in terms of a developing East Timorese identity discourse. Textiles will again be used as the medium through which these themes will be discussed.
Limited definitions of what constitutes traditional could lead to the relegation of East Timor’s textiles to the past. As East Timor moves towards independence it is developing politically, economically and socially. Yet rather than encouraging the development of textile traditions, in line with the East Timorese tradition of innovation, weavers and sellers have in fact been expected to conform, by a variety of protagonists, among them Indonesian traders, non-domestic tourists, and international workers, to a definition of tradition which roots their material heritage firmly in the past. The richness of East Timor’s material heritage depends in large part on the recognition, by the East Timorese and non-East Timorese alike, of the importance of
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5 Nicol, Bill, op. cit., 1978, p. 4
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encompassing and embracing change rather than denying weavers and designers – often the same person – opportunities to expand and elaborate on their current knowledge.
The terminology of tradition is not just responsible for holding the weavers in the past, also signalling a phenomenon defined by Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger as the “invention of tradition.”[6] The prevailing nationalist discourse mirrors that of the Indonesian nationalist discourse, that of a historically unified and singular East Timor (Indonesia). The argument in East Timor is that this historical precedent validates discussions of identity and in turn legitimates claims to independence. Possible identification of a unique and culturally specific tradition adds clout to these debates on the establishment of a distinctly East Timorese identity. However, the issue of whether this “[…] nationalist myth that East Timor is culturally distinct from West Timor and other adjacent areas” [7] depends in large part on whether or not a singular East Timorese identity even exists.
Though they are on the same island, with similar ethnicity, language and religion, two Timorese can, by a ‘twist’ of colonial history, be citizens of two different states. Their personal identities were “subsumed” [8] by a new identity when they became either Dutch or Portuguese subjects. Before the delineation of borders the people in the east felt no more of a national affinity or desire to promote this singular identity than those in the west. As mentioned in the previous chapter, the Atoni are occasionally referred to as the ‘real’ and original inhabitants of Timor. They are now the major ethnic group in the west, and are not found in the east. Found
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6 Hobsbawm, Eric, and Terence Ranger, (Eds.), op. cit., 1983
7 Quinn, George, “Indonesia Essential for the Future of East Timor”, in The Canberra Times, 26 June 2001, p. 9
8 Farram, Steve, op. cit., 1999, p. 40
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on either side of the border are the Tetum. Despite the political division and border politics of Timor, ethnic, linguistic and family connections have persisted, with the majority of the Tetum concentrated in the central border region. The political and socio-cultural identification of the inhabitants of the coastal enclave of Oecussi with East Timor is at odds with their ethnic identification - almost exclusively Atoni, these people in fact share their ethnicity with their neighbours in the surrounding districts of West Timor.[9]
East Timor cannot, in fact, lay claim to any specific or representative ethnic group. The diversity of cultures, ethnicities and languages prevalent in East Timor conflicts with the nationalist discourse of an historically unified and homogenised East Timor, an argument which can be applied with equal conviction to the Indonesian experience. “The existence of these different groups on both sides of the border is proof that Timor was not divided along ethnic lines […]”[10] - and nor, for that matter, was Indonesia.
Both East Timor and Indonesia have relied on colonial histories to legitimate claims to unity and independence. Reliance by the Dutch and Portuguese on geographical boundaries such as mountains and rivers to define borders again reflect the similarities between the Timorese experience and the wider Southeast Asian experience of colonialism, whereby geographical features such as mountains and rivers were transformed from their roles as travel routes, by Southeast Asian hill peoples, to representing barriers, by colonial authorities. Establishment of borders across Timor served to rupture “a number of trade paths, in particular the ancient route along which sandalwood and other products had been transported…”[11] Farram
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9 The extent to which a mestizo community has developed in Oecussi remains an under-researched aspect of East Timorese studies.
10 Farram, Steve, op. cit., 1999, p. 39
11 Quinn, George, op. cit., 2001, p. 9
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writes that there was “certainly nothing inherently Dutch or Portuguese about the land, or the people, on either side of the border. Both parties proved this by their readiness to bargain, swapping one parcel of land, and its inhabitants, for another. The fact was that the border regions were among the areas where the colonial power exercised the least control on Timor. It was only after the borders were settled that they began to have real influence there.” [12] Again, the Timorese experience here is not a unique one, and is in fact closely related to standard colonial practices throughout Indonesia, and Southeast Asia in general.
Quinn reminds the reader that Timor was once “knitted…into a single cultural and economic domain”[13] through networks of trade, ritual and kinship. While it was almost certainly never a single state, the “patchwork of small polities, interacting in a dynamic, constantly shifting configuration of alliances and enmities” nevertheless formed a “coherent culture area bound by common elements of culture and trade.”[14] The knitting together of these ‘small traditions’ was also a result of the ‘large traditions’ brought by the Portuguese, including tools such as religion and literacy. Such patterns as found in Timor are also directly applicable to Indonesian patterns, and serve to explain the origins of the phrase Bhinneka Tunggal Ika, usually translated as Unity in Diversity.[15] This national motto dating from the Sukarno period has been propagated by Indonesian nationalists to legitimise the cultural, linguistic and religious diversity of the Indonesian state, a phrase which could well be applied to the East Timorese nationalist cause.
Recent efforts to establish a distinctly East Timorese identity have been affected by the level of political and national unity prior to independence. The extent
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12 Farram, Steve, op. cit., 1999, p. 39
13 Quinn, George, “Indonesia Essential for the Future of East Timor”, in The Canberra Times, 26 June 2001, p. 9
14 Ibid., p. 9
15 Ricklefs, M., op. cit., 1993, p. 256.
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to which the East Timorese experienced a form of national unity has been largely influenced by the factors of religion, language and education. In turn, these factors were the result of a geographical, historical and linguistic situation specific to Timor.
Throughout Southeast Asia, colonial experiences have resulted in a form of cultural imperialism which encourages the retaining and displaying of textiles, to the extent that ethnic and regional differences are exaggerated, to promote the existence of an organic culture onto which external, foreign and colonial influences have been simply ‘overlaid’.[16] The isolation from the natural context of the Malay/Indonesian archipelago as a result of not having a boating culture was compounded by the East Timorese colonial experience, despite many of East Timor’s geographic, ethnic, linguistic and cultural roots being clearly eastern Indonesian in origin. Hull indicates that “[t]he clearest evidence of Timor’s cultural communion with the rest of Eastern Indonesia in the pre-colonial period was the currency of the Malay language as a lingua franca, and the strong influence that the Creole Malay of Ambon… has had on all the languages of Timor, especially Tetum.” [17]
Contrary to the Southeast Asian pattern mentioned above, the pattern in East Timorese histories has been one of retrospective analysis, whereby emphasis has instead been placed on homogeneity rather than heterogeneity. Attempts to emphasise homogeny have drawn upon the colonial experience to define East Timor as different from the rest of the Indonesian archipelago. Morlanes discusses the attempts made to downplay East Timor’s homogeneity: “Within [the] artistic cultural world [of the East Timorese], cultural-political expression and claims for national self-determination are penetratingly and urgently reaffirmed by the assertion that their national culture is distinct from that of all other cultures or linguistic groups. Cultural
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16 See discussion in Lefferts, H. Leedom, op. cit., 1992, pp. 405-417
17 Hull, Geoffrey, “East Timor and Indonesia: The Cultural Factors of Incompatibility”, in Studies in Languages and Cultures of East Timor, University of Western Sydney, Vol. 2, 1999, p. 57
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resistance – artistic and folkloric ideology – features instrument, emblems and symbols, dress, adornments, hair styles, music, folk dances, art, literature and poetry.” [18]
In line with the other Catholic powers of Western Europe, such as Spain and France, the Portuguese policy was one of assimilation. The Protestant powers such as England and Holland, on the other hand, pursued an integrationist colonial policy. These varying approaches in turn reflected fundamental theological differences between the two major forms of Christianity.[19] From a practical point of view Portuguese involvement in native institutions was relatively limited, with few attempts made to change indigenous culture. Although conversion was not forced in Timor, as it had been in other Portuguese colonies, most of the local kings accepted baptism, receiving Portuguese names and aristocratic titles. For most Timorese, however, “[…] the influence of Christianity and of the Portuguese language, though subtly pervasive, was indirect.”[20] Direct or indirect, the result was that many Timorese came to see themselves as Portuguese. The occurrence of sexual relations and marriage between Timorese and Portuguese was an effective means of assimilating subject populations – despite being raised by their mothers, the Portuguese emphasis on assimilation was such that mixed-race offspring were brought up with the language, religion and culture of their fathers. The liurais were converted to Catholicism and given Portuguese Christian names and surnames. Once Catholic missionary activity had been accepted by the liurais, Portuguese rule was tolerated, as there was minimal interference in indigenous affairs. The East Timorese argue that the Portuguese experience in East Timor was significant in creating a sense of an identity distinct from any other in the archipelago, yet this discourse does not
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18 Morlanes, Teresa Farreras, op. cit., 1991, p. 298
19 Hull, Geoffrey, op. cit., 1999, p. 58
20 Hull, Geoffrey, op. cit., 2000
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acknowledge the similarity of experience between Timor and Flores. Dutch claims to Flores were only recognised by the Portuguese in 1859 [21] ; Portuguese names continue to be used on the island to this day, and the influence of Roman Catholicism was extensive. The argument also fails to recognise that Portuguese was in fact the prevalent language in the archipelago until the eighteenth century[22], by which time Malay was increasingly used. Portuguese priests were particularly active in spreading the language, with the Dutch only cancelling payments to Portuguese clergy in Batavia[23] in 1815.[24] While a sense of affinity to Portugal existed to a certain degree, the sheer physical distance between East Timor and various other members of the Portuguese ‘empire’ was such that the “sense of identification was much stronger with Portuguese Timor itself.” [25]
The Catholic Church increasingly acted as a focus for East Timorese identity, as a conduit to the outside world and an important means by which the East Timorese could identify themselves as separate from the majority-Muslim and Dutch-administered Indonesian archipelago. Prior to the arrival of the Portuguese, the diverse mixed-race populations of the coastal town of Dili had adopted Javanese and Makassan clothing.[26] The sixteenth century saw the increasing incorporation of a Portuguese element, to the extent that employment of a Timorese man by a Portuguese family saw even the man’s wife encouraged to wear western-style dress rather than batik cloth and the Javanese-style kebaya blouse.[27] Portuguese missionaries imposed new standards of appearance as a criterion of religious
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21 Ricklefs, M., op. cit., 1993, p. 136
22 Maier, H. M. J., “From Heteroglossia to Polyglossia: The Creation of Malay and Dutch in the Indies”, Indonesia 56, October, p. 45
23 Now known as Jakarta
24 Heuken, A., Historical Sites of Indonesia, Jakarta: Yayasan Cipta Loka Caraka, 1983, p. 79
25 Farram, Steve, op. cit., 1999, p. 40
26 Today in East Timorese villages Javanese batik screen-prints or checked sarongs continue to be popular and are often worn tied like a traditional Timor cloth.
27 Bennett, James, op. cit., 1998, p. 45
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conversion, seeing Western clothing as closely related to standards of decency and morality. The existing clothing of the colonised was frequently denigrated, to the extent that European clothing was issued in mission schools. Morlanes writes that “Native Timorese conducted their lives according to the established social life and Portuguese culture. In larger towns in particular a Timorese culture barely existed… It was even shameful to be seen wearing the tais, the cloth of indigenous manufacture…”[28] These statements indicate the exclusive wearing of European-style clothing by the East Timorese population during the Portuguese period. However, this argument denies the existence of a middle ground between the Portuguese and the Timorese. In any cultural exchange of ideas or material goods, there are two sides to the dialogue. While the Timorese were encouraged to wear Portuguese-style clothing, it was always adopted on Timorese terms; Portuguese clothes were not simply donned without recourse to previous clothing traditions. In turn, we also see the entrance of Timorese cloth into the Portuguese world; for example, smaller tais were frequently used as altar cloths at home and in church.
Figure 3.1 At what point does something become ‘traditional’?
(Photo: http://www.etimortais.org)____________________
28 Morlanes, Teresa Farreras, op. cit., 1991, pp. 55-57
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Farram writes that there was “nothing natural, or inevitable, about the borders which came to describe East Timor and West Timor.”[29] The process of determining borders was a long one, involving continuous negotiation. “Once they were defined, however, the borders took on a solidity which they have retained until today.”[30] In the words of one political geographer: “The passing of time tends to give borders, like accumulated wealth, respectability, regardless of their shabby or bloody origins.”[31] The varying colonial experiences of West and East Timor were instrumental in both establishing new, and cementing pre-existing, cultural differences: “After the borders were defined the two colonial powers began to assert their influence on their respective sides of the borders. The regions of East Timor and West Timor then began to take on some real meaning. In the process the people on both sides of the borders were separated from each other. The commonality between the two was diminished, although never completely, and the differences between them were exaggerated.”[32] Hull argues that without the colonising efforts of the Portuguese, “there would be today [1999] no major cultural (and potential political)
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29 Farram, Steve, op. cit., p. 39
30 Ibid, p. 39
31 Short, J. R., An Introduction to Political Geography, London: Routledge and Keegan Paul, 1982, p. 127
32 Farram, Steve, op. cit., 1999, p. 40
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differences between East Timor and West Timor, or between East Timor and the neighbouring islands of Eastern Indonesia.”[33]
Following the finalisation of borders[34], the island was administered in two parts, the Portuguese in the east (and the enclave of Oecussi) and the Dutch in the west, for almost three decades. World War II saw the Indonesian archipelago divided into three regions by the Japanese. Kalimantan and Eastern Indonesia were administered under the same command, and controlled by the navy. Timor was the exception, administered as a single entity under “a tough military occupation…”[35] Dunn believes it is reasonable to assume that the Japanese “…would have taken heed of the colony’s neutral status…and [Japanese presence] might not have gone beyond a military mission”[36] had it not been for the arrival of just over 400 Australian and Netherlands Indies troops in 1942. Timor was singled out as strategically important, and governed repressively as a result.[37] The Japanese occupation of the archipelago had different outcomes for the West Timorese and the East Timorese. Following the end of World War II, the colonial powers of Portugal and Holland both attempted to resume more or less where they had left off, with varying degrees of success. The Republic of Indonesia declared its independence in 1945, achieving sovereignty in 1949 when the Dutch finally relinquished their colonial possessions. West Timor had been exposed to the cultural characteristics and symbols of the Dutch – as had most other parts of the archipelago; “… this meant that people could sense some commonality with people in other parts of the Indies, as they were all Dutch subjects
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33 Hull, Geoffrey, op. cit., 1999, p. 56
34 Steve Farram (op. cit., 1999) gives two dates for this event: “In June 1914 the border question was finally settled.” (p. 50) and “The final settlement of the border question in Timor was reached only in 1916.” (p. 51). Cotton dates the finalisation of the border issue as 1913 (Cotton, James, “East Timor: Political History Lecture Online”, Department of Defence, 18 November 1999 http://www.pol.adfa.edu.au/resources/timor4.html). The difficulties encountered within the literature indicate the ongoing problem the border issue represented for Portuguese and Dutch authorities.
35 Dunn, James, op. cit., 1983, p. 20
36 Dunn, James, op. cit., 1983, p. 19
37 Ricklefs, M., op. cit., 1993, p. 199
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within the Netherlands East Indies.” It was therefore “…fairly easy for many of its people to have a sense of belonging in the new state of Indonesia.”[38]
The East Timorese case, however, was different. Despite being ruled as one island under the Japanese, the island had once again been divided by the returning colonial powers. With a small population, isolated from access to or knowledge of the anti-colonial sentiments of other Portuguese colonies, any nascent nationalist movements there may have been were soon quashed by the returning Portuguese authorities; “…East Timorese ethnic and nationalist symbols were fragmented or nonexistent owing to the cultural intrusion and imposition of Portugal’s value systems, and the long history of ethno-linguistic heterogeneity… the East Timorese, deeply influenced by centuries of Portuguese colonialism, [were] denied the opportunity to develop and express their own subjective understanding of identity.”[39] Morlanes ignores several important points here. Whether or not the weakness of the East Timorese nationalist movement during and immediately following World War II is wholly attributable to the effects of Portuguese colonial policies is debatable. Important here is the realisation of the many positive effects of the Portuguese presence. Despite the existence of small kingdoms and unofficial “culture area[s]”,[40] the island had not been organised into any coherent or unified structure prior to the arrival of Europeans. Portuguese rule was typically patchy – their influence was not as deep as Morlanes suggests. Nevertheless, the Portuguese didn’t just divide, exploit and neglect, regardless of whether or not this was their aim. Though limited in extent compared with the experiences of other colonies, East Timor was nevertheless exposed to tools which would, in time, be useful for unification, such as the Roman alphabet, and a shared religion and language, through its colonial experience. The use
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38 Farram, Steve, op. cit., 1999, p. 40
39 Morlanes, Teresa Farreras, op. cit, 1991, p. 110
40 Quinn, George, op. cit., 2001, p. 9
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of these tools as instruments following the imposition of Indonesian rule will be discussed below.
The 1974 Lisbon coup should not be seen as the first opportunity the East Timorese had had to declare independence and announce separation from Portugal – an important opportunity arose following the end of World War II. Rather, the Portuguese departure was the first time the East Timorese actually availed themselves of the opportunity to announce independence; three political parties quickly sprang up, with civil war soon breaking out as they struggled for power. Jakarta had no intention of tolerating an independent state within its own archipelago, but how far it was prepared to go to prevent this was not clear until Indonesia invaded East Timor on 7 December 1975. On 17 July 1976 Indonesian President Soeharto declared East Timor to be Indonesia’s 27th province.[41]
With a common Dutch colonial background, Indonesia had long been united politically and culturally through the use of a common Malay language. A direct result of Portuguese colonialism in East Timor was a decline in the use of the Malay lingua franca and a simultaneous rise in the number of Portuguese speakers among the ruling elite. The “primacy of Portuguese to the complete exclusion” of Malay-Indonesian indicated the “cultural assimilation of East Timor’s native ruling class”,[42] and continued until the last third of the twentieth century. When Indonesian troops entered East Timor at the end of 1975 they encountered a population that could neither speak nor understand their language. [43]
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41 Schwarz, Adam, A Nation in Waiting: Indonesia’s Search for Stability, Sydney: Allen and Unwin, 1999, p. 204
42 Hull, Geoffrey, op. cit., 1999, p. 61
43 Ibid., p. 58
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However, as the language of the elite, Portuguese is understood by no more than 15 percent of the East Timorese population.[44] Many – around thirty percent of the population – speak Tetum, but again, this is not the indigenous language of many of the Timorese. In fact, there are at least nineteen distinct languages across the island, and sixteen indigenous languages in East Timor belonging to two different language families or phyla.[45] With the construction of new schools post-1975, and an active education program, Indonesian soon emerged as the language spoken and understood by the majority of the population.[46]
While Morlanes argues that “…language emerges as a diametrically opposed factor”,[47] the reasoning behind her argument is unconvincing. She sees Tetum as “in contradiction to Portuguese, the language of the oppressor and also the language of culture and domination.”[48] However, according to Hull, Tetum couldn’t survive, in terms of grammar and vocabulary, without Portuguese. Neither are the Portuguese necessarily viewed by the East Timorese as “oppressor[s]” – following the aggressive and often brutal approach of the Indonesians, many East Timorese increasingly came to view their Portuguese predecessors with “rosy”, “nostalgic” and “amnesiac”[49] attitudes. Rather than being a “focus of contradiction and conflict within the ethno-nationalist process”[50], language in fact now emerges as one of the strongest arguments in support of East Timorese unity.[51] The recent designation of Portuguese as one of two official languages (the other being Tetum, as well as the two working languages
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44 Editorial, “East Timor gets its tongues in a tangle”, in Deutsche Presse-Agentur, April 15, 2002
45 Hull, Geoffrey, The Languages of East Timor: Some Basic Facts, Dili: Instituto Nacional de Linguística, Universidade Nacional de Timor Lorosae, 2002
46 Editorial in Deutsche Presse-Agentur, op. cit.
47 Morlanes, Teresa Farreras, op. cit., 1991, p. 39
48 Ibid., p. 39
49 Hull, Geoffrey, op. cit., p. 62
50 Morlanes, Teresa Farreras, op. cit., 1991, p. 39
51 James Dunn (op. cit., 1983) believes priests were the first to put Tetum into script, over a century ago. (James Dunn, personal communication, June 2002)
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of English and Indonesian)[52] again emphasises the role of the colonial experience in setting East Timor apart from the rest of the (Dutch-influenced) Indonesian archipelago. Quinn sees the re-establishment of the Portuguese language as the most extreme manifestation of attempts by the elite to resurrect a “pseudo-colonial image of East Timorese distinctness.” [53] The present-day political debate raging over the use of language within East Timor is proof enough of the contested identities, between class and between generations, within this new nation.[54] Recently elected President of East Timor, Kay Rala ‘Xanana’ Gusmao has explained the reasons behind East Timor’s adoption of Portuguese as such: "Portugal gave us this identity historical, cultural and religious that allowed us to be different from the Indonesian archipelago…It is not nostalgia, it is fundamental to our identity."[55] Legislator Mario Carrascalao, leader of the opposition Social Democratic Party, has acknowledged the friction the adoption of Portuguese has caused among young people[56], but argues, “Portuguese will give us an identity. It is part of our cultural background. We were colonised by Portugal for 450 years.”[57] The adoption of Portuguese in fact prevents the blending back of East Timor into the archipelago.
The influence of the Catholic Church has also continued; following the massacre of East Timorese men and women at Santa Cruz cemetery in November 1991 by Indonesian armed forces, a decision was made by the clergy to adopt Tetum – rather than Indonesian - for church services. Many of those killed at Santa Cruz were students from the Portuguese language Catholic school, and there was a concern
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52 http://www.un.org/peace/etimor/etimor.htm
53 Quinn, George, op. cit., 2001, p. 9
54 Cohen, Margot, “East Timor Attempts to Revive Portuguese Language”, Far Eastern Economic Review, 11 April 2002; Also Editorial in Deutsche Presse-Agentur, op. cit.
55 Editorial in Deutsche Presse-Agentur, op. cit.
56 For most East Timorese under thirty years of age, Indonesian is the language of everyday discourse. Around fifteen percent of the population are believed to understand Portuguese, though this figure is even less for those who actually speak and write Portuguese as well. (Editorial in Deutsche Presse-Agentur, op. cit.)
57 Kammerer, Peter, “Divided by an uncommon language” in South China Morning Post, May 19, 2002
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these students were being targeted. Numbers of people adhering to Catholicism also rose - in 1975 only 30% of the population claimed Catholicism as their religion; by 1990 the figure had risen to 80%.[58] This dramatic rise is also attributable to the enforcing of the Indonesian concept of Panca Sila;[59] required to choose between five religions[60], most East Timorese chose Catholicism.[61]
Indonesian assumptions that East Timorese were willingly being released from ‘colonial oppression’ saw the imposition of “[…] a false Batavo-Indonesian identity, one which many of the inhabitants of the new province could not, and would not, accept.”[62] Women, pressured to change their tais designs by Indonesian authorities to look more Indonesian, showed their resistance to the occupation by weaving words like Timor Lorosae (Tetum[64]), Timor Leste (Portuguese) or East Timor into the cloth, rather than Timor Timur, Indonesian for East Timor. The ongoing influence of Portuguese rule meant that many East Timorese never developed a sense of belonging in Indonesia, expressing itself covertly through the medium of textiles whenever possible.
East Timor soon found itself a part of Indonesian histories, one of the clearest examples being the case of Taman Mini Indonesia Indah.[64] This enormous theme
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58 Cribb, Robert, op. cit., 2000, p. 182
59 Panca Sila, or five principles, is a concept first raised by the future President of the Republic of Indonesia, Sukarno. They are: belief in one supreme God; justice and civility among peoples; the unity of Indonesia; democracy through deliberation and consensus among representatives; social justice for all. Panca Sila was later used by President Soeharto as a weapon, and is seen as “[…] synonymous with and justification for an integralist view of the state.” (Schwarz, Adam, op. cit., 1999, p. 10)
60 Islam, Buddhism, Hindu, Protestant or Catholic.
61 The East Timorese were not the only people required to nominate one of the five state-approved religions. For example, the island of Bali was only registered by the Ministry of Religion in 1962. The influence of Panca Sila was not immediate
62 Hull, Geoffrey, op. cit., 1999, p. 63. The phrase ‘Batavo-Indonesian’ used here by Hull refers to the economic, political and cultural dominance of Java, and its capital, Jakarta, throughout Indonesia. In addition, transmigration policies have moved large numbers of Javanese throughout the archipelago; these factors have contributed to the resentment often felt by the populations of regions other than Java.
63 Timor Lorosae literally means Timor, where the sun rises, in Tetum. The Indonesian variant, Timor Timur, also refers to Timor as being in the east – and thus where the sun rises.
64 Literally “Beautiful Little Indonesian Park”, although translated by Cribb as “Beautiful Indonesia in Miniature Theme Park” (Cribb, Robert, op. cit., 2000, p. 182)
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park in Jakarta has a man-made lake at its centre, around which are 27 houses, each representing one of the then 27 provinces of Indonesia and built in the traditional style of that region. This miniature archipelago generally follows the layout of Indonesia’s provinces. East Timor is far flung, not bordering on any other provinces – in the far corner of the park, several provinces removed from East Nusa Tenggara which, technically, it should be bordering. Equidistant from the space assigned to Jakarta is Irian Jaya (West Papua), a region which has increasingly vocalised its wishes for autonomy and independence.
Indonesia’s aggressive approach to incorporating East Timor within the Republic at any cost may seem at odds with the somewhat insignificant position assigned East Timor within Taman Mini Indonesia Indah. However, the far-flung location of East Timor does in fact reflect its place within fringe Indonesian histories. That is, various rituals, such as headhunting, the textiles associated with these rites of passage ceremonies, and the dualistic beliefs which bring the rituals and the textiles together, link East Timor not just with West Timor, but with many other archipelagic islands, and therefore not on the fringe of Indonesian histories, but in the histories of Indonesia’s cultural and physical fringe. Figure 3.2, below, is a diagram[65] of Taman Mini Indonesia Indah, showing not only the geographic distance of East Timor from every other province, but also the political distance of the province from Jakarta.
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65 “Taman Mini Indonesia Indah (Beautiful Indonesia in Miniature Theme Park), Diagram 5.54 in Cribb, Robert, op. cit., 2000, p. 182
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Figure 3.2
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In contrast to the spatial considerations at play within the theme park is the Indonesia Indah series, produced in conjunction with Taman Mini Indonesia Indah.[66] Here, Volume Ten: Busana Tradisional overtly emphasises the importance placed by Indonesia on including East Timor within Indonesian histories. Focusing on costume and material adornment, Busana Tradisional[67] features a ‘traditionally’ costumed East Timorese couple in the very centre of its cover. With chapter division correlating to provincial division, East Timor is assigned its own section, in which Indonesian ideas of what constitutes traditional East Timorese costume are vividly expressed. The Indonesian solution to regional disunity is best expressed through the development of regional costumes, which was aimed at strengthening and reaffirming the unity of Indonesia within the framework of a nation state: “The old order was gone forever and new ideals had to be formulated through new dress codes.” [68] The transformation of ‘traditional’ clothing into national costume contributed to the unification and definition of Indonesia’s boundaries. However, while Linda Welter writes in her description of Greek national dress that “…identification of what is more accurately described as ethnic or regional dress as ‘national dress’ helped to unify diverse populations and define national boundaries”[69], it also represents, in the case of East Timor, the arbitrary nature with which East Timorese ‘traditional’ costume was selected, when ‘traditional’ East Timorese dress is in fact defined individually in terms of regional variation and personal circumstance.
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66 Literally ‘Beautiful Indonesia’. This series focuses on the “traditions, customs and cultures of the people of Indonesia”, and also looks at music and architecture, among others
67 Yayasan Harapan Kita/BP 3 Taman Mini Indonesia Indah, Indonesia Indah: Busana Tradisional – Buku ke-10, Jakarta: Yayasan Harapan Kita/BP 3 Taman Mini Indonesia Indah, 1998
68 Nordholt, Henke Schulte (Ed.), Outward Appearances: Dressing state and society in Indonesia, 1997, KITLV Press, Leiden, p. 20
69 Welters, Linda, “Ethnicity in Greek Dress”, in Eicher, J.B. (Ed.), Dress and Ethnicity, Oxford; Washington: Berg Publishers, 1995, p. 54
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Morlanes writes that, post 1975, the East Timorese went through a process of “interpreting their collective identity and discovering an East Timorese identity by discarding Portuguese elements and symbols and replacing them with East Timorese ones. Elements of the indigenous life became symbols of nationalism.”[70] However, this overly simplistic argument does not take into account the subtle adoption of many Indonesian cultural practices and concepts, which have contributed to the formation of a separate East Timorese identity, such as ideas of adat[71] clothing, the use of the left hand for personal hygiene practices, and the use of Islamic words to describe what are essentially East Timorese practices.[72] The influence of Indonesia on East Timorese textiles has been dynamic in terms of raw materials, motifs and concepts, even to the extent that an Indonesian word, selendang, is understood by all East Timorese (that is, regardless of linguistic background or fluency in Indonesia) to describe the third textile form, the scarf. The Provincial Museum in Dili, built in 1995, mirrors Javanese and even Balinese architecture, yet, prior to the 1999 razing of Dili, over ninety percent of the exhibits showcased East Timorese material and cultural heritage. Here too we see the ambiguous impacts made by colonisers – for that is essentially what the Indonesians represented for the East Timorese, a colonial power – contributing cultural concepts as well as perpetuating a cycle of exploitation and even violence. While it cannot be denied that the Indonesian emphasis of state over region imposed an artificial cultural homogeneity on East Timor, subordinating regional
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70 Morlanes, Teresa Farreras, op. cit., 1991, p. 124
71 An Arabic word incorporated into Indonesian, adat is used to mean traditional. It is to note the ironies raised by the use of this word by Indonesian authorities to codify East Timorese traditions. In turn, the Dutch were the first to codify Indonesian adats. Indonesia’s colonial experiences were repeated in East Timor, with Indonesia inheriting the role of categoriser previously filled by the Dutch.
72 For example, the use of the Islamic word mahar (literally brideprice, but usually referred to in the literature on East Timor as bridewealth) to discuss what is essentially an East Timorese practice. Departmen Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan, op. cit., 1993-1994, p. 10
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autonomy, desires and identities in its wake,[73] it is also important to acknowledge the adoption of various Indonesian cultural practices, an acknowledgement which will require the modification of history on the part of the East Timorese.
Figure 3.3 East Timor Provincial Museum, Komoro, Dili, February 2002. “The museum was not intended as a political instrument,
but identified itself within the context of contemporary professional museum practice in Southeast Asia…” [74] During the period
of United Nations administration, the Museum was converted into the United Nations Military Hospital; however, the basic
architecture remained the same. The future of the building is unknown at this stage.
Morlanes’ argument that East Timorese elements and symbols replaced the discarded Portuguese ones also fails to acknowledge that the East Timorese in fact drew upon elements of Portuguese life to distinguish themselves from Indonesia. East Timorese leaders such as Jose Ramos-Horta have publicly and repeatedly voiced their opposition to Acehnese and Papuan rights to autonomy, arguing these separatist
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73Molnar, Andrea K., “Use of Traditional Textiles of Ngada”, in Brydon, Anne and Sandra Niessen (Eds.), Consuming Fashion: Adorning the Transnational Body, Oxford/New York: Berg Publishers, 1998, p. 54,
74 Bennett, James, “East Timor Museum: A Past and No Future?” in ART AsiaPacific Australia, no. 30, 2001, p. 39
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regions belong within the Indonesian Republic as they share a common colonial background. East Timor stands alone as the only region in the archipelago not to have a Dutch colonial background – and it is this point which East Timorese political and nationalist leaders have been forced to emphasise, realising so little of their non-colonial history points towards a homogenous East Timorese state. Indonesian integrity is therefore vital to East Timorese definitions of identity – a political break-up of the archipelago would suggest the shared colonial history was no longer relevant, and therefore challenging East Timor’s reliance on colonial history for proof of homogeneity.[75]
The assignation of a ‘traditional’ costume by Indonesian authorities, which was expected to represent the many different circumstances and experiences of East Timor, symbolises the perpetuation of East Timor as a “sleepy colonial backwater.”[76] Within the sphere of tradition, the donning of a particular ethnic or regional costume – whether by choice or by force – by a specific group indicates a connection between these wearers and a designated past. East Timor, having been assigned a set tradition under Indonesian rule, could be seen as assuming a somewhat feminine role. With women’s bodies often the repository for ‘tradition’[77], Bridgewood argues that when ‘traditional’ dress is worn by women it can be seen as an attempt to preserve or recreate a real or imagined past.[78] The next challenge will be whether a surrendering of an invented homogenous past occurs, allowing East Timorese weavers – and in turn, the East Timorese in general – to pursue new ideas and approaches without recourse to their shared and varied histories.
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75 This point is briefly explored by Quinn, George, op. cit., 2001, p. 9
76 Ricklefs, M., op. cit., 1993, p. 301
77 Chapkis, Wendy, Beauty Secrets: Women and the Politics of Appearance, London: Women's Press, 1988
78 Bridgewood, Ann, “Dancing the Jar: Girls’ Dress at Turkish Cypriot Weddings” in Eicher, J.B., op. cit., 1995, p. 30
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Shepard Forman testified before the United States Congress that “Timor did not come under the aegis of the early Javanese/Islamic principalities and, historical conjecture not withstanding, Indo-Javanese and Islamic influences barely can be noted, except insofar as Dutch hegemony later effected the spread of some ideas, particularly in the political domain, to western (now Indonesian) Timor. East Timor, under Portuguese rule, was largely exempt from those influences.”[79] However, as mentioned in Chapter Two, Timor paid tribute to two ancient Javanese kingdoms, suggesting an ongoing connection with its regional neighbours. There is a need for East Timor, “[…] for its own survival as a small society [1999], to be reintegrated into its geographical context and fulfil its vocation as a member of the Eastern Indonesian region.” [80]
A glance at a map with Timor as its focus – that is, in the centre of the map, rather than far east as it is typically represented in maps of the Indonesian archipelago – does not show Timor, and for that matter, East Timor, in isolation. The island is surrounded by other islands. Denial of geographic context in an attempt to establish an East Timorese identity wholly separate from Indonesian identities is unhelpful in ascertaining the dynamics behind the particular historical experiences on the island. East Timor’s ambiguous role inside and outside Indonesian histories necessitates not only acknowledgement of the varying colonial experiences on the island, but also recognition of how profitable fringe Indonesian cultures can be in providing models for understanding East Timorese concerns.
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79 Forman, Shepard, (Testimony before US Congress, 28 June, 1977), in Human Rights in East Timor. Hearings before the Subcommittee on International Organisations of the Committee on International Relations of the US House of Representatives, 28 June and 19 July 1977, Washington: US Government Printing Office, 1977, quoted in Dunn, James, op. cit., 1983, p. 2
80 Hull, Geoffrey, op. cit., 1999, p. 66
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Figure 3.4 Locating Timor in the centre of a map, rather than on the edges of a Java-centric map, changes the perspective,
placing Timor within its region and linking it to the nearby Moluccas, New Guinea, and Northern Australia. (Map: Encarta 2002)
Retrospective homogenisation of East Timor’s past has been aimed at emphasising the integral role of Portuguese colonialism in determining a distinct East Timorese identity. The danger for textiles in this retrospective approach lies in the potential for loss of distinctions such as village of origin, kinship groups and social status, as well as the intricacies of technique and method.[81] East Timor’s textile industry has increasingly found itself directly affected as historical discourse and the debate over contested identities develops. The following chapter will explore the directions in which the East Timorese textile industry is now taking.
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81 Leibrick, Fiona, op. cit., 1994
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