http://www.easterntimes.com.my/index.php?news_id=1&news_content=6518
Talk on how to preserve Kelabit highlands
By Paula Chang
4/4/08
KUCHING: A talk entitled “The Living Landscape - Documenting and Preserving The Cultural Sites of The Kelabit Highlands”, jointly organized by Angkatan Zaman Mansang (AZAM) Sarawak, the Museum Department and the Sarawak Heritage Society, was presented by Sarah Hitchner at the Tun Abdul Razak Hall yesterday.
Sarah is in Sarawak for a reason. “I plan to become an applied anthropologist specializing in local, national, and international forest resource policy,” she said.
As stated in her published article for ‘Ecological and Environmental Ecology’, an open-access sholarly journal, she picked Kelabit Highlands for her research plainly because of its location which suited her interest in transboundary conservation as Pulong Tau National Park borders the Kayan Menterang National Park in Indonesian Kalimantan.
She shared with the public her research methods, the threats to the sites and suggestions to better preserve them.
With her grant money, she had purchased 7 GPS units for the villages there. Together with training and the GPS units, Sarah hoped that the Kelabit people would be able to continue to document their findings after she left.
She showed pictures of a Kelabit burial site which was destroyed by the vehicles from a logging company.
According to Sarah, “the villagers pleaded to these people to not to proceed but they (the drivers of the vehicles) proceeded anyway.”
Other threats to these sites included natural phenomena, archaeological excavations, local use of megalithic materials, local collection of cultural artifacts (such as beads), looting or vandalism by outsiders and development.
“Although the Kelabit people there want some development, they are afraid that it will be too commercialized.” She said.
“They have told me that they do not want Bario to be the next Mulu,” She added.
As for the villagers who had collected these artefacts, a lot of them said that they had to do it before these get destroyed, she told the audience.
Regarding the preservation of the sites, she said that sometimes the Kelabits were criticized for neglecting the sites. But she found out that they left the sites the way they were in order to preserve them.
The current efforts for protecting the sites include the International Timber Trade Organisation’s (ITTO) sponsored expansion of the Pulong Tau National Park and local initiatives taken by the villagers and guides. The local JKKKs have also resubmitted their proposals to the US Embassy to fence up these sites.
“I’m hoping to just get things started,” Sarah said, adding that much more work would need to be done to fully conserve the Kelabit highlands.
Johnny Lagang, a member of the Kelabit community, had intended to attend this talk but had missed it entirely due to other commitments. He told Eastern Times that he was interested in the talk as he believed that “Bario is getting worse because of logging.” He, however, managed to have Sarah’s email address so that he could keep himself updated on her findings.
As a doctoral student in the University of Georgia, USA, Sarah is currently attached to the Institute of East Asian Studies in Unimas. While in the village of Pa’ Lungan, she stayed with her adopted mother, Sinah Nabun, and adopted father, Nabun Aran. She was also given a beaded necklace by Sinah besides various Kelabit beaded bracelets.
Since the start of her research in the Kelabit highlands, she had submitted the following preliminary reports on her work to the Institute of East Asian Studies, UNIMAS and the Sarawak Museum - ‘The Role of Fruit Trees in Kelabit Agroforestry’, ‘The Living Kelabit Landscape’ and ‘Mapping The Living Landscape’.
Also present at the talk was Ipoi Datan, the assistant director of the Sarawak Museum Department who has been keeping abreast with her works.
Friday, April 4, 2008
Need to mark cultural sites fast
The Borneo Post
4/4/08
Need to mark cultural sites fast
By Puvaneswary Devindran and Leyana Talif
KUCHING: There is a dire need to speed up efforts to mark the cultural sites in the Kelabit Highlands or they may get trampled upon unknowingly when development takes place in the area.
Researcher Sarah L Hitchner said several things need to happen to avert this, like getting the Global Positioning System (GPS) points of the cultural sites so that Forest Department Sarawak could insert them into maps.
According to her these maps will make sure that logging activities, for example, will not intrude into the demarcated areas.
"So there will be record of where the sites are on the map besides demarcations on the ground," she told reporters after giving a heritage talk entitled "The Living Kelabit Landscape- Documenting and Preserving The Cultural Sites of the Kelabit Highlands" at the state Museum here yesterday.
She could not say how many cultural sites in the highlands had been bulldozed as she had not visited these areas.
"I hear a lot of this (destruction) has happened to sites which I have not visited, so it's mostly hearsay…I can't confirm anything," said the researcher who has spent about two years learning about and living in the Kelabit Highlands.
Nonetheless, she pointed out that the Kelabit people knew the importance of marking the cultural sites there and had submitted proposals to get funding to do this.
She said the people there wanted the demarcations done but they needed money to buy the material and transport them there.
According to her, the Kelabits had even requested for assistance from the US Embassy and it went through a channel with other applicants for the other cultural preservation projects.
However, their request did not get through the first time probably because the proposal was not specific enough, she said, adding the proposal had been sent for the second time.
Hitchner said the people were also looking at different options on how to get the funding and these included the possibility of raising money within the Kelabit community itself.
On the marking efforts, Hitchner said International Timber Trade Organisation (ITTO) had done some considerable amount of work to mark the cultural sites there.
She said ITTO projects had been able to put up some yellow plaques and red paint and tape in some places which she deemed as 'a good start to many more'.
She said that cultural sites, many of which could be easily missed given the overgrown shrubs, should be fenced up and the areas within them cleared.
"Well, I think the process of documentation has started but there's still a lot more that needs to be done," she added.
Meanwhile, Hitchner passionately talked about the unique culture and history of the Kelabit people.
Her talk also covered the importance of the cultural sites in Pa' Lungan.
She touched on the theoretical framework of her research which touched on the historical ecology of anthropogenic landscape, political ecology of conservation and the participatory/emancipatory resarch methods.
The doctoral candidate from University of Georgia, USA also stressed that archaeological excavation, collection of cultural artefacts by locals, logging and also clearing of forest for agricultural purposes could pose grave threats to the sanctity of the cultural sites.
Some 50 people attended the heritage talk which was organised by State Museum Department together with Angkatan Zaman Mansang.
4/4/08
Need to mark cultural sites fast
By Puvaneswary Devindran and Leyana Talif
KUCHING: There is a dire need to speed up efforts to mark the cultural sites in the Kelabit Highlands or they may get trampled upon unknowingly when development takes place in the area.
Researcher Sarah L Hitchner said several things need to happen to avert this, like getting the Global Positioning System (GPS) points of the cultural sites so that Forest Department Sarawak could insert them into maps.
According to her these maps will make sure that logging activities, for example, will not intrude into the demarcated areas.
"So there will be record of where the sites are on the map besides demarcations on the ground," she told reporters after giving a heritage talk entitled "The Living Kelabit Landscape- Documenting and Preserving The Cultural Sites of the Kelabit Highlands" at the state Museum here yesterday.
She could not say how many cultural sites in the highlands had been bulldozed as she had not visited these areas.
"I hear a lot of this (destruction) has happened to sites which I have not visited, so it's mostly hearsay…I can't confirm anything," said the researcher who has spent about two years learning about and living in the Kelabit Highlands.
Nonetheless, she pointed out that the Kelabit people knew the importance of marking the cultural sites there and had submitted proposals to get funding to do this.
She said the people there wanted the demarcations done but they needed money to buy the material and transport them there.
According to her, the Kelabits had even requested for assistance from the US Embassy and it went through a channel with other applicants for the other cultural preservation projects.
However, their request did not get through the first time probably because the proposal was not specific enough, she said, adding the proposal had been sent for the second time.
Hitchner said the people were also looking at different options on how to get the funding and these included the possibility of raising money within the Kelabit community itself.
On the marking efforts, Hitchner said International Timber Trade Organisation (ITTO) had done some considerable amount of work to mark the cultural sites there.
She said ITTO projects had been able to put up some yellow plaques and red paint and tape in some places which she deemed as 'a good start to many more'.
She said that cultural sites, many of which could be easily missed given the overgrown shrubs, should be fenced up and the areas within them cleared.
"Well, I think the process of documentation has started but there's still a lot more that needs to be done," she added.
Meanwhile, Hitchner passionately talked about the unique culture and history of the Kelabit people.
Her talk also covered the importance of the cultural sites in Pa' Lungan.
She touched on the theoretical framework of her research which touched on the historical ecology of anthropogenic landscape, political ecology of conservation and the participatory/emancipatory resarch methods.
The doctoral candidate from University of Georgia, USA also stressed that archaeological excavation, collection of cultural artefacts by locals, logging and also clearing of forest for agricultural purposes could pose grave threats to the sanctity of the cultural sites.
Some 50 people attended the heritage talk which was organised by State Museum Department together with Angkatan Zaman Mansang.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)