The nature-culture network of Taromak continues to expand creating connections with new elements, while also contracting into itself rekindling traditional relationships with places, ancestors and other entities. The Taromak continue to depend materially and emotionally on the interconnections of the landscape, many of which have been severed by government policies that restrict these relations and thus threaten the socio-cultural life of the community. Although the human community continues to push for a
revitalization of these relations especially at places such as Kabaliwa and the old pig farm, a lack of the financial backing, capacity building, and legal support that come from new network entities, again limit the success of these projects. In addition, fairly recent political and religious divisions in the community have had detrimental effects on the human relationships that make up the nature-culture collective.
Although new network actors such as government policies and international markets hinder mutually supportive network relations, many local proposals have been put forth in this chapter as to how to re-establish these connections in light of the presence of the new actors. But in order for these proposals to develop into actual projects, the locally inappropriate legal restrictions on the land must be dissolved. By reinventing places such as Sasuaya and the ghost lake area, the Taromak continue to stake a claim to the future of their landscape as well as their economic and cultural stability. By re-mobilizing the landscape’s rivers the Taromak may also have found a way to maintain mutually supportive roles with other nearby communities, which would in turn strengthen the extended nature-culture network. Finally, the ultimate goal of autonomy represents the Taromak’s aspirations to re-create their mutually supportive position in the collective that now includes an array of new and old, local and global entities. This chapter has shown that in general the Taromak hope that their landscape will move in a trend towards the reclamation of traditional relations, while at the same time reshaping relations with contemporary network actors in locally appropriate ways.
CHAPTER FIVE
Daedae ki Taromak: Conclusions
The preceding chapters have framed the Taromak’s landscape as “the cross-cutting ties of relationships that emerge from or exist in a place (Stewart and Strathern 2003:8)” and have used Latour’s Actor-Network Theory model to explore these relationships and the socio-cultural characteristics that they create. The results of this exploration have shown that by dropping the nature-culture divide, a variety of relationships between entities are revealed, and a more clear understanding of local descriptions of ‘what is going on’ can be obtained. The following conclusions are based on these local descriptions, and often match up with previous anthropological findings.
The unique contribution here is to integrate these diverse entities and relations into a conceptual map that assembles the landscape, shows how it acts, and describes how it may move on.
First of all, the landscape of Taromak has been shown to be made up of a variety of active entities that cannot be divided by the modernist nature-culture dichotomy
(Descola, Palsson:1996). These actors include, but are in no way limited to spirits, millet, chiefs, bird messengers, rain clouds, wild boar, the hundred-pace viper, underground ancestral beings, the Lrangoderesay flower, jaw racks, the clouded leopard; and more recently backhoes, national policies, wet-cultivated rice, international markets,
application forms, Han Chinese, and many more. Key among these entities are the places that not only gather such things as traditional knowledge, resource information, land use rights, historical memories, and landscape changes (Casey:1996, Basso:1996), but also actively connect the Taromak to their ancestors, as in Kabaliwa; define the Taromak’s relationship with other landscape actors such as the hundred-pace viper in the Taidrengelr;
unite the community and justify social structures, as in the origin and migration sites;
maintain relations between the mundane and divine worlds, as in spirit places; and activate conflicts between traditional culture, neighboring ethnic groups, contemporary belief systems, the state, and culture as commodity concepts, as in the spirit house, guardian stone places and other places such as the pig farm. Furthermore the collective entities of Taromak cannot be described as either global or local (Leach:2006) because
the landscape extends its connections to global markets, conservation ideologies and indigenous movements, and influences by Dutch diseases, as well as Japanese and Chinese regimes. Thus, the landscape of Taromak has been described as being
assembled by an array of actors, which Latour would classify as including human, non-human and divine entities that flow between past, present, local and global zones. The diverse entities of the landscape have been described here not as symbols of social characteristics, in fact they have been shown to be the building blocks of socio-cultural characteristics. Although they may have symbolic characteristics, many of them are more actively powerful than mere symbols in that they connect people, ancestors, and global economies; with out them, the landscape would not be only missing a symbol, it, and the socio-cultural characteristics that it supports, would be transformed.
While it is clear that the Taromak’s landscape is not made up of purely ‘socio-cultural’, or ‘natural’ elements, the question remains: How do the Taromak classify the diverse active entities of their landscape? Along the same lines, this thesis has used ideas such as place, landscape, and space, but has not discussed in detail the question of
whether or not the Taromak would define these terms in the same ways as the scholars discussed above. By answering these questions, future research could develop even more effective models for understanding local conceptions of place, landscape and space.
Latour and other scholar’s classifications and models are only vehicles for entering locally unique landscapes, and they do not provide a complete understanding. Although this research shows that the Taromak’s landscape cannot be broken into socio-cultural, natural, local or global elements, it only provides a window into the complex and dynamic conceptions of the landscape that exist among the Taromak. Nonetheless, the model provided by ANT, and landscape theories, have provided several significant conclusions.
Secondly, the array of entities discussed in this thesis are connected by diverse and dynamic (Bender:1993b, Morphy:1993) relations that in pre-Japanese era times when the Taromak autonomously controlled their territory, were locally determined through systems such as the Tualisiya. The Taromak’s modes of identification and relation with the many entities of their landscape could not be defined as either totemistic, animistic, naturalistic, reciprocal, predatory, or protectionist (Descola:1996), because relations
include a mixture of all of these attributes. In general, locally determined relations had the potential to be conflictive, but this was avoided through relations of mutual support and respect. Internal and external boundaries were often the sites of conflictive relations with neighboring tribes or clans, but they were also the sites of establishing clan and trans-tribal rights and obligations, showing the success of the clans and the tribe in general, and were places of sharing and developing relations with neighbors. Neighbor relations were created by these boundaries as well as an array of other actors, some of which include river waters, shared meat, human heads, mountain products, and river fish.
Relations with the divine were enacted while hunting, growing crops, and interacting with the landscape in general. Other important non-human actors, such as millet, meat, bird messengers, and betel nut, successfully mediated these relations. The diverse spiritual entities that inhabit the landscape, such as the ancestral hundred-pace viper, are considered extremely dangerous, and conflicting relations with them were avoided through the exchange of gifts, mutual protection, claiming ancestral relations, and adhering to taboos, especially in taboo places (Taididingana) or after killing taboo animals. By avoiding conflict with the spirits of the landscape, the subsistence base of the human community could be guaranteed, and the collective of entities could be harmoniously maintained. Thus, the effective resolution of conflict and the sustained, locally determined relations of mutual support between the diverse human, non-human and divine entities of the landscape created and maintained the state of the entire nature-culture collective.
Thirdly, now that it is clear that the landscape of Taromak is an assemblage of human, non-human, divine, global and local active entities that ‘traditionally’ were arranged in relations generally aimed at preserving the entire collective, the way locally unique socio-cultural institutions are formed and maintained through this assemblage of relations can be extrapolated. More specifically, the following relations that were based on the landscape formed social rights and obligations, identities, and other social
institutions. The shared identity (Tuan 1977) of the Taromak and their topogeny (Fox 1997) arise from the origin place in the Taidrengelr area and the migrations through the landscape, which were influenced by swidden agricultural methods and led to cultural similarities between neighboring tribes. The pre-colonial land management institution
was based on place names that defined and categorized the landscape (see appendix 2).
The key social characteristics of an inclusive property system (Carrier 1998) and precedence (Fox 1995(a), (b); Guo 1993; McWilliam 2006) were also based on the assemblage of landscape entities and their relationships. For example the precedence of the Taromak and the Lrabalriyoso clan’s high rank is founded on the origin place;
boundaries demonstrate the rights and obligations regarding sharing the landscape; the Moray’i work trade system maintained the shared characteristic of property and the collectivity of the community; while relations between clans, chiefs, spirits, hunters and other actors associated according to the Madrolroko principle of precedence and the sualro’o system, supported the human community’s subsistence needs, and the social structure. Other landscape actors such as the hundred-pace viper, further supported this entire system by having an ancestral relationship with the Taromak and providing a powerful symbolic source for maintaining the social structure. The human community of Taromak also gained a productive role from their landscape in general through hunting, collecting, cultivating, and managing it, which also maintained the ‘Alakua social
institution. All of these examples demonstrate that the relations between the human, non-human and divine actors of the landscape created and maintained the characteristics of the nature-culture collective. By maintaining the relations described here, the human community of landscape ‘users’ is intertwined with the many other entities of the landscape, whether they be traditional spiritual entities, or contemporary man-made contraptions, such as the backhoe. When these relations are defined by extra-local actors, such as national policies, the human landscape ‘users’ and the ‘physical’ landscape are unraveled, and the nature-culture collective is interrupted.
Fourthly, Latour (1986; 2005) points out that power is only the result of the associations that compose it and that society is a weak result of these associations and thus must be ‘taken care of’. This research has shown that once the relations between the many of the actors landscape have been interrupted, socio-cultural institutions
deconstruct and the power of the collective to ‘take care of’ their society is weakened.
Japanese imperial involvements introduced an array of new actors and relationships (i.e.
imperial use of natural resources, wet-rice cultivation, etc.), which transformed the interconnections of the landscape. Also, Japanese era migrations led to increased
conflicts with neighboring tribes, and agricultural ‘modernization’ changed the people-millet-spirits link, thus influencing the sualro’o system and the social structure. When the KMT government claimed the Taromak’s territory as national territory, the nature-culture network was extended and disrupted through problems such as bureaucratic cash-crop profiteering, and many landscape relations, such as hunting and collecting, were criminalized by global conservation trends promoted by the forestry bureau. This led to the lost role of hunters and other human producers in their landscape. In addition
exclusive land rights policies interrupted sualro’o relations and the social structure of the human community. The Taromak explain that due to the interruption of these
relationships, many social and economic problems have ensued. Thus, the local actor’s ability to define and maintain their associations with the landscape has been usurped by other actors who have created conflicting relationships. Without locally determined mutually supportive associations, the power of the community to maintain their society and nature-culture collective has also been usurped.
The importance of the landscape for the people of Taromak should now be clear.
The landscape and the diverse relations that once intertwined it created and maintained their society. Since then, their connections to sualro’o millet, foreseeing birds and many other traditionally important landscape actors have been blocked by land policies and application forms. This actively influences the Taromak’s socio-cultural characteristics and the wellbeing of their community. Therefore, the active landscape and its network of relations directly influence the lives of the Taromak.
Fifthly, by understanding the importance of the landscape, the Taromak’s
contemporary attempts to recreate the mutually supportive relations that once intertwined it, appears contextually appropriate. These attempts include the reinvention of places such as the Taidrengelr region, the reclamation of the pig farm, and the reconstruction of Kabaliwa for building self-confidence, identity, inspiring collective action and providing other material and emotional benefits. Other attempts are the promotion of tourism and community forestry and returning the river’s role of connecting communities in mutually beneficial ways. By recreating these relations the human community intends to rebuild their active role in the maintenance of the landscape, but in order to do that they must have ample autonomy and capabilities, which they currently lack. This is clear from the
restrictive national policies, occupation of land by non-local entities, financial hardships, lack of collective action, fears of over-development, and apathetic governance, that local people describe as hindering their attempts. Not all, but many of these factors that hinder the wellbeing of the Taromak nature-culture collective arise from locally inappropriate policies and governance, which have broken down the network of relations discussed above.
Finally, this issue becomes a question of relativity. Should the Han Chinese majority State be allowed to continue practicing particular relativism (Latour 1993:105), which lets them define the Taromak landscape as Nature and stipulate the Taromak’s relationship with that Nature? Or should the anthropologist’s cultural relativism
(Ibid:104) be adopted which can accommodate the Taromak’s cultural interpretation of a Nature that can only be truly determined with social science? Or could Latour’s
(Ibid:106) symmetrical anthropology provide a relativistic approach that breaks down the Nature-Culture divide, and allows the Taromak to once again mobilize their collective in ways that they see are locally appropriate? This research has shown that the State’s relativistic approach interrupts the relations that entangle ‘nature’ and ‘culture’ and once supported the collective. This research has also shown that the approach of cultural relativism disrupts these relations by underestimating the cultural landscape as a passive text, and relying on the natural or social sciences to define Nature or Culture, thereby ignoring the crosscutting relations that create the two. The contribution of this research has been to show that by combining recent anthropological landscape theories, and Latour’s Actor-Network Theory, a new perspective on the importance of land and territory for socio-cultural institutions and cultural diversity has been developed.
Anthropological explorations of landscapes can learn from the approach of viewing locally unique landscapes as being made up or inter-related diverse un-dichotomized entities; while ANT theory can be adjusted and adapted to local contexts in order to show how cross-cutting associations continue to influence nature-culture collectives.
As the Taromak once again recreate the associations that constitute their
landscape in locally appropriate ways, the wellbeing of the nature-culture collective will once again stabilize. Until then, the lush green millet stalks that sway in the spring
breeze will continue to resist the unmanaged extensions of chaotic contemporary life, bring smiles to the ancestral spirits, and feed the children of Taromak.
APPENDIX I
Landscape Categories in Taromak
The Taromak both divide and share their landscape, but the systems of dividing and sharing are various and overlapping. The landscape categories discussed by Sasala and Liu (2006; 2008) are one method of territorial division according to characteristics of elevation, but there are also other methods of division that adhere to other characteristics of the surrounding environment. In this section general landscape categories are briefly discussed, then the traditional territory is separated into village, swidden agricultural, hunting and river areas, which are discussed individually129.
As mentioned above the traditional territory of the Taromak, including all its mountains, rivers, forests, plains, and plateaus are called daedae, which translates generally to ‘our land/territory/domain’. To specify the land that belongs to Taromak, one could say “Daedae ki Cekelre”, in which cekelre means village. This phrase demonstrates the shared characteristic of the Taromak’s territory, centered not on a notion of being Rukai, but on being a member of the cekelre. The elevations of the daedae can be separated into several levels that include,
1. Lridukua: The lowest flat land area near sea level, which is not suitable for human inhabitance due to its heat, high humidity and the common presence of
mosquitoes.
2. Sisiya: The sloped land in the middle elevations of the mountains (550m-800m), which is a suitable place for people to live and is the traditional living area of the Taromak.
3. Taibelreng: Which literally translates to ‘upper’ and includes the higher elevation areas in the mountains that are cold, not suitable for humans, and are inhabited by many spirits.
4. Dradekai: Describes land deep in the mountains.
129The Taromak will not solely hunt in hunting areas, or cultivate in agricultural areas. At times prey will be obtained within gardens and the land around houses will be cultivated. Therefore, although these divisions exist, they are fuzzy and by no means fixed.
The general landscape of the Taromak can also be categorized according to land gradients, which is an important factor in an environment with common rock and mud slides (Aneidukadu). These land gradients include,
1. Lridukua: Same as above but specifically referring to flat land gradients.
2. Sawdradraza: Refers to steep land gradients.
3. Tantokadra: Refers to a land gradient that is prone to collapse.
These land gradient areas are specifically important while deciding suitable places for constructing a new village, or opening land for swidden agriculture. The above two examples of general environment categorization systems demonstrate that the landscape is often described in terms of traditional nature-culture habitats (Sisiya), and
characteristics important for survival (Tantokadra).
Cekelre, can mean village, residential area, or country. It is also a root of many other words such as Kacekelre meaning the real village, and Zegecekelre meaning
Cekelre, can mean village, residential area, or country. It is also a root of many other words such as Kacekelre meaning the real village, and Zegecekelre meaning