The Reflection of Indigenous Peoples' Changing Identity in Social, Cultural

RURAL AND URBAN LIFE FOR SARAWAK DAYAKS Albertus1, NARMAC (Natural Resource Management Collaboration) Institute, Jalan Purnama, Gang Purnama 4 Nomor 22B, Pontianak. Handphone: 081351214702, [email protected] and Mira Sophia Lubis2, Urban Design and Sustainable Urban Planning, The Faculty of Engineering, Tanjungpura University, Jalan Ahmad Yani, Pontianak. Dikirim : 6 Maret 2016, Diterima setelah perbaikan : 16 Mei 2016 ABSTRACT The paper envisages rural and urban life of Sarawak Dayak by describing the ways in which the living spaces, job specialization and social interaction shaped them. The urban life promised attraction of good amenities such as university, economic development, transportation networking, health service, prosperity and livelihood improvement. Those trigger the flows of people and goods. Then, city faced serious problems such as traffic congestion, garbage, jobless, slum dwellers, squatter settlements, and social tension. To minimize the city‟s problems, it must be seen as organic order, when the correlative and expressive faculties are potent enough to maintain organic order, the problems can be handled. In this binary, a rural life is portrayed as mountainous area in which the villagers live in the longhouse and practice customary law. In this situation, the mechanism of life will be able to run independently because the village life is like mechanic which can be separated each other. The study refers to the description living spaces named rural and urban spaces, in which these two living spaces need one another. Longhouse and village became city for the inhabitants in the past, and nowadays, modern city become a place for livelihood to replace farming ground. Furthermore, the description of living spaces and the peoples, the factors which have the contribution to fade rural and urban distinction identified. Key Words: Rural-Urban life, Sarawak Dayak, Living Space ABSTRAK Makalah ini menggambarkan kehidupan kelompok masyarakat Dayak di Sarawak, yang tinggal di kawasan pedalaman dan perkotaan, dimana ruang hidup, spesifikasi pekerjaan dan interaksi sosial membentuk mereka. Kehidupan perkotaan menjanjikan fasilitas publik yang menjadi daya tarik, seperti universitas, perkembangan ekonomi, jaringan transportasi, pelayanan kesehatan, kesejahteraan dan perbaikan mata pencaharian. Hal ini memicu pergerakan arus manusia dan barang. Sebagai akibatnya, kota menghadapi berbagai masalah serius, seperti kemacetan lalulintas, sampah, pengangguran, pemukiman kumuh, dan ketegangan sosial. Untuk mengurangi masalah perkotaan maka kota harus dipandang sebagai sebuah organism yang saling berhubungan satu sama lain, ketika kemampuan hubungan dan ekspresif cukup kuat untuk memelihara susunan organ tersebut, maka masalah perkotaan bisa ditangani. Sebaliknya, kehidupan pedalaman digambarkan sebagai daerah pegunungan dimana penduduk desa tinggal di rumah panjang dan menerapkan adat istiadat. Dalam situasi seperti ini, mekanisme kehidupan akan berjalan secara bebas sebab kehidupan desa seperti Jurnal Penelitian dan Pengembangan Borneo Akcaya 21 mesin yang bisa dipisahkan satu sama lain, tidak perlu saling tergantung. Kajian ini merujuk pada pengambaran ruang hidup yang disebut kota dan pedalaman, dimana kedua ruang tersebut bergantung satu sama lain. Di masa lampau rumah panjang dan desa menjadi kota bagi penghuninya, dan sekarang kota modern menjadi tempat mata pencaharian menggantikan tanah pertanian. Selanjutnya, gambaran tentang ruang hidup, masyarakat dan faktor faktor yang berkontribusi mengaburkan perbedaan antara kota dan desa diidentifikasi. INTRODUCTION developing Asian countries in the shortest possible time. This small research project was The progress of Malaysia as truly conducted in Sarawak, especially in the Asia can be seen through the development city of Kuching and its periphery. Kuching and civilization of the cities, and its rapid and its suburban areas recently became a population growth. In fact, the population significant attraction for national and growth of Malaysia is inseparable from the international tourists due to the promotion development and expansion of the cities, of its rich social, cultural, and historical and the industrialization of the rural areas. contexts. This research was also expanded The transformation of cities and their to Miri because Miri is the second largest people is reflected in the changing identity city in Sarawak. The focus of research was of the communities. The Sarawak State the indigenous peoples of Sarawak, better Government realized that to regulate the known as Dayak. In the colonial era, they city‟s growth and avoid population were called Sea Dayak for Iban and Land density, several main attractions of the city Dayak for Bidayuh and Selako. The Land such as supermarkets, bus stations, Dayak were described as docile, meek, government offices, public institutions, weak, friendly, introverted, timid, and and universities must be built in the tender persons who spent most of their suburban areas and peripheries. For lives in the upper rivers and mountainous instance, the Institute of East Asian areas. The Sea Dayak, were described as Studies (IEAS) of the University Malaysia extroverted, brave, cruel, and aggressive Sarawak, the host institution to conduct persons who practiced the bejalai (walk this research, was built in Samarahan. The and adventure) tradition which was the university used to be located in Kuching‟s symbol of the Borneo headhunter. city center. At IEAS, the researcher and Sarawak region as a part of Borneo research consultant carried out seminars, is much visited by the international tourists and used office space and the library for who are called „Mat Salleh’, a term used the research. by Sarawakians for white western tourists “Malaysia Truly Asia” is one from Europe and United States. “Malaysia vision of Malaysia‟s government. “Truly Truly Asia” is the motto which is Asia” is the result of striving to make the repeatedly broadcasted on international vision become reality. It is a blend of television to describe Malaysia as the social, cultural, and historical development example of real Asia. The motto of in the Malaysian people. The aspects in “Malaysia Truly Asia” is the expression of becoming “Truly Asia” are the people, changing identity that directly indicates the nature, and exotic social, cultural, and changing of communities in social, historical life. This research tried to cultural and historical contexts. Malaysia examine the relationship between succeeded in developing its country as one indigenous peoples (Dayak) as basically example of modernized country among inland people, and their new environment in the city. The Dayak and their social, Jurnal Penelitian dan Pengembangan Borneo Akcaya 22 cultural and historical life will be distinct social, economic, or political elaborated on below. systems; (5) their distinct language, Dayak is the collective name for culture, and beliefs; (6) their forming non- the indigenous peoples of Borneo. In dominant groups in society; and (7) their Sarawak, the Dayak consist of Iban, resolve to maintain and reproduce their Bidayuh, and Selako. In the olden times, ancestral environments and systems as their way of life and related culture were distinctive peoples and communities. regarded as primitive, old-fashioned, cruel, According to Benedict Kingsbury (1995, paganistic, backward, and revolving 23), the World Bank promulgated a new around headhunting practices. These operational directive in September 1991 prejudices caused them to experience which states that “the terms indigenous torture, humiliation and harassment at the peoples, indigenous ethnic minority, tribal hands of outsiders. Such treatment, in turn, groups, and scheduled tribes describe made them feel inferior, marginalized, social groups with a social and cultural indifferent, underestimated, and even identity distinct from the dominant society aggressive. Moreover, being inland people, that makes them vulnerable to being they had direct contact with nature. They disadvantaged in the developing process. consulted with and related to natural For the purpose of this directive, elements such as omens, the spirits of indigenous peoples is the term that will be ancestors, and deities. These conditions used to refer to these groups.” Based on enhanced „a shared us feeling‟ among the aforementioned criteria and definition, them as a consequence of having the same it goes without saying that the Dayak fate and destiny shaped by natural ethnic group can be considered Indigenous elements and bad treatment from outsiders. Peoples because all the criteria and the The commencement of the Brooke definitions stated by the UN are valid for era (1841-1941) provided opportunities for them. For the sake of national security and the Dayak to move from the rural to the development, the Malaysian government urban areas. In the urban areas, the Dayak also provided for ethnic segregation in the started to adjust to the new environment Malaysian Constitution of 1957. through self-reliance. It cannot be denied Just as ethnic segregation in that the urban lifestyle had positive and Malaysia was permanently defined in the negative influences on the Dayak‟s Malaysian Constitution of 1957, the culture, local wisdom, and way of life. constitution also mentioned the Indigenous To scrutinize the Dayak‟s identity Peoples of Sarawak and Sabah in article and the possibility of its changing, some 161 A [6] and [7], and named them interviews were conducted and their

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