[Anthropgrad] Midterm review seminar Friday 10 am

[Jenny Munro]

Jenny Munro will present her midterm review seminar on Friday 10 August in
Coombs Seminar Room A at 10:00 am. Please come and share your insights.

“Now we know shame”: Dani experiences of education and colonialism in
Wamena and Manado, Indonesia

In this seminar I will present some results and analysis from my fieldwork
on issues of education, colonialism and the experiences of university
students from Wamena in the central highlands of Papua who are living and
studying in Manado, North Sulawesi. Students in my research are indigenous
Dani, one of three main ethnic groups from around Wamena. Highlanders’
experiences of Indonesia are marked by practices and ideologies that
scholars have called ‘colonial’ – including racial and cultural
discrimination by authorities and settlers, violence from the military and
police, and attempts at forced assimilation to Indonesia’s vision of
modernity. Students are the first generation to experience the Indonesian
school system in its entirety, a system described as one of the foremost
ways the nation-state spreads its ideals of citizenship and modernization.
Through school and other domains, the Indonesian state advances an
overarching orientation for good citizens: modern progress. Alongside a
history of denigrating ‘backward’ populations and practices, positioning
people like the Dani as ‘estranged’ Indonesians, the nation-state
continues to emphasize improvement, betterment, and personal and social
transformation. But there are real and complex impediments to
self-improvement, including those now well-entrenched stereotypes of
cultural and racial deficiencies. As I will discuss, my thesis tracks
students’ experiences of Indonesian ideals and judgements. In doing so I
explore students’ complex positioning - being arguably between cultures,
both marginalized and successful, and ultimately well-versed in Indonesian
ideals and judgements but still subject to them.