8 th Euroseas conference Vienna, 11–14 August 2015

— The Garbage Dump of Mae Sot: Different Perceptions of the Thai-Myanmar Border
Caterina Sciariada (University of Milan - Bicocca)
The paper examines a group of Burmese immigrants living in a garbage dump in Mae Sot, Thailand (Tak Province), 
and their perceptions of the boundary they live within. Located in the northwestern part of the country, close to the 
Thai-Myanmar border, the dump has been a place of shelter and settlement for about four hundred people since the 
late 1990s. An on-site ethnography was conducted from March to April 2014, as part of a broader research in northern 
Thailand. The garbage dump can be considered as a highly marginalized space because of its geographical location and 
living conditions. At the same time, it is the object of attention for many individual journalists, artists, photographers, 
as well as NGO’s and humanitarian organisations working in the Mae Sot area. Such a twofold representation of the 
dump reflects its political and spatial nature: an “offshoot” of the boundary’s “no man’s land” within Thai territory. The 
suspension of Thai law enforcement inside the rubbish dump is among the reasons that brought the dwellers there 
in the first place, and pushed them to become mostly sedentary. This apparently undesirable “suspended condition” 
allows them to avoid persecutions and life struggles from Myanmar, and at the same time to protect themselves from 
Thai immigration policies. The final point of the paper concerns the disparity between the dwellers’ perception of the 
Thai-Myanmar boundary and those of the plurality of actors coming and going to the dump for different purposes.
— “We Need to Be More Systematic”: Civil Society, Institutionalization and Human Rights in Burma
Matthew Sheader (University of Essex)
In both theory and practice, civil society is central to the promotion and protection of human rights. This can involve 
legal, educational, promotional as well as more confrontational activity, performed by actors varying in status and 
formality, and operating in different degrees of proximity to state apparatus.
Despite a highly restrictive environment, Burmese civil society has been a popular standard-bearer of human rights. 
During SLORC and SPDC rule this was demonstrated by the significance of networks of human rights defenders 
and activists inspired by and, articulating their aims with reference to, the broader emancipatory potential of human 
rights.
Although public protests have become more common and visible since the Thein Sein administration took office, 
equally notable is the growth in number, size and activity of organisations, offering a new set of tools and resources 
for human rights activity. This transfer from one institutional form to another is significant: as the labour of organisa-
tions, the idea of human rights is not merely carried by a different vehicle but must be re-imagined and even contorted 
in order to have purchase and effect on a strategic terrain involving new relationships with the state and other actors.
This paper takes a critical realist approach to the examination of the roles and practices of NGOs engaged in human 
rights work in Burma, situating these amidst political and economic forces which have fostered the emergence of 
organisations and, thus, the reshaping of human rights. I go on to briefly outline the normative significance these 

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changes might hold for the emancipatory potential of human rights. Research is based on experience of direct engage-
ment with civil society actors in Burma since 2005, and from interviews and ethnographic study in recent fieldwork.
— Negotiating Boundaries of Birth Care in a Complicated Borderland
Christiane Voßemer (University of Vienna)
Health Care has become an issue of reform on the agenda of political transformation and donor intervention in Myan-
mar. The proposed paper/presentation takes an actor-oriented (Long 2001) approach to the dynamics of health care 
transformation in a borderland of Myanmar and Thailand, tracing negotiations on birthing care as a field in which 
wider social boundaries are debated.
The borderland of concern is shaped by long-lasting conflict, intense mobility across and within the national bor-
ders, as well as by a complex and changing borderscape (Rajaram/Grundy-Warr 2007) of health care in which state, 
humanitarian, ethnic and community actors (including pregnant women) interact. Practices and negotiations that 
reshape and border spaces of birth care approached and analysed as a site of shifting boundaries of “care”, reproductive 
citizenship and nation within this specific context.
Specifically, the paper looks into different actors’ politics and practices of establishing, challenging and shifting bound-
aries between two spaces of birth care centring the hospital versus the home. It is based on data collected during an 
ethnographical study conducted in 2014/15 in multiple localities having the border towns of Myawaddy (M) and Mae 
Sot (T), as well as Hpa An (M) as closest centres of institutional health care.
 The paper takes as a point of departure the cross-border livelihoods of women from Myanmar with experiences of 
birth in Karen State or as migrants in Thailand. Their struggles for and decisions on birth care in home and hospital 
are traced and interrelated with the knowledges and practices by which different actors define, border and link these 
two spaces of care. As will be pointed out, the ongoing negotiations about spaces of birth care in the borderland centre 
systems of care and safety, yet, implicitly but fundamentally, concern and challenge wider social boundaries related to 
reproductive citizenship and nation-building in the borderland.
— Blurred Borders, Shifting Selves: Liminality and Landscape on the Thailand-Burma Border
Courtney Wittekind (University of Oxford)
The landscape encountered by those in the Thailand-Myanmar border region is one of incongruities. It is simultane-
ously bound by national and ethnic demarcations, yet traversed by the cyclical migrations of those who call the region 
home. Ethnic dress and national flags suggest marked contrasts, yet identifications are intractably intertwined. Despite 
seemingly stable roots, much of the region’s population embraces flexibility and duality, promoting a sense of space— 
and of self— that can be read as “in-between” Thai and Burmese. 
Drawing on visual auto-ethnographic research, this paper explores the experiences of migrating youth along the 
Thailand-Burma border through the lens of “in-between-ness,” seeking to understand how their social liminality re-
lates to the liminal spaces in which they move. I analyze young people’s engagement with physical space and the built 
environment to establish how the experience of existing between social categories produces—and is produced by— 
“liminal landscapes” (Andrews and Roberts 2012), such as borderlands and state peripheries. I show how youth find 
their way in a world of liminality, producing ambiguity between social and spatial binaries, and embracing the sense 
of risk and power tied to the prospect of existing “betwixt and between” (Turner 1967).
In light of recent political, economic and social transformations within Myanmar, this paper also raises questions re-
garding how social and political integration of migrating populations may be complicated by a shifting understanding 
of Myanmar, its borders, and its citizenry. With a surge in returning migrants, refugees, and displaced communities, 
the question of how those with dual affiliations relate to a transitioning Myanmar remains unanswered.
Panel: Rethinking Changing Borneo Societies through Values 
conveners: Isabell Herrmans (University of Helsinki), Anu Lounela (University of Helsinki), Kenneth Sillander (Uni-
versity of Helsinki)

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panel abstract
This panel applies the concept of value to understanding processes of contemporary change at so-called resource 
frontiers in Borneo, and as a tool for reconfiguring studies of the populations which inhabit them. Value has in re-
cent times emerged at the forefront of anthropological theory as a major “cross-analytical” category endowed with 
the potential of vitalizing the discipline and making it relevant beyond (see, e.g., special issues in Hau, 2013; Current 
Anthropology, 2014, and Anthropological Theory, 2008). A polyvalent term, used to refer to several distinct types of 
value – cultural, economic, and semiotic – it holds the promise of traversing boundaries between conventional ana-
lytical categories such as kinship, economy, and religion. We propose that the concept may have particular merit in 
making sense of the experiences and ways of life of the societies of Borneo’s forested interior amidst the conditions of 
profound multilateral change that affects them through the expansion of state and corporate control, and concurrent 
processes of radical environmental transformation, economic modernization, cultural globalization, political decen-
tralization, and religious rationalization. Value is understood as constructed and moving across societal and analytical 
boundaries in an ongoing dialogic process interlinking diverse local and extra-local agencies, and various domains 
and concerns such as agro-ecology, social or political organization, religion, ontology, laws, and state, corporate, and 
NGO interests. Our aim is to explore how the local populations – including Dayaks, Malays, and migrants – negotiate 
and understand their predicament through values under these conditions, and how old and new values wax or wane 
or are re-negotiated. Contributions may explore value as expressed, for example, in cultural orientations, moralities, 
socialities, or exchange or subsistence practices, and any value or recognized virtue – e.g., tradition, development, 
relationalism, autonomy, justice, money and “the environment” – which is invoked in discourse or figures as an exem-
plar for action may be considered.
— Rami – Aspiring to Prosperity in ‘Quiet’ Places in Indonesian Borneo
Viola Bizard (University of Kent)
The proposed paper explores Ngaju Dayak villagers’ hopes for prosperity through the semantics of rami (rame, ra-
mai), a key value for Indonesians. Literally translating as busy, noisy, bustling, and crowded, rami denotes an animated 
sense of conviviality, which makes it a highly sought-after atmosphere. The affect of and affection for rami has long 
been observed in many Indonesian societies, pointing to the term’s significance in understanding sociability and, 
hence, ‘the good life’ in the archipelago. 
While Ngaju Dayak villagers experience rami foremost during festivities and joint agricultural labour, it will be shown 
that rami is moreover very much associated with an aspired condition of a prosperous, advanced, and modern urban 
hustle and bustle that stands in contrast to their conceived ‘quiet’ (benyem) rural setting. Villagers may savour urban 
conviviality through media and mobility. Yet, I argue that marginality and associated stigmatization exclude rural 
residents from fully partaking in the ‘modern’ rami, leaving them imagination as the predominant way of accessing 
progress (kemajuan) and prosperity, and hence joining in the affective experience of modernity.
Against this background, I suggest that exploring rami helps to demonstrate that modernity not only means material 
prosperity in the form of consumer goods and financial resources, but equally constitutes an affective state. Unpacking 
the term’s multiple meanings is thus key for grasping the emotional dimension of modernity as well as Ngaju villag-
ers’ aspirations for well-being, and, as such, for shedding light on ‘the good life’ in contemporary Indonesian Borneo.
— Values and Change through Luangan Ritual Performance
Isabell Herrmans (University of Helsinki)
This paper explores Luangan conceptions of the good and desirable as conveyed and negotiated through ritual per-
formance under conditions of rapid change in Indonesian Borneo. Taking as the vantage point a Luangan myth in 
which eight magnificent shamans – so powerful that they could awaken people from death, so popular that they 
could live on ritual salaries alone – were killed because they forgot to take care of their own children, it discusses the 
relation between ethical and economic values in Luangan rituals. As a metacommentary, the myth brings up a theme 
and question both timeless and current: how to balance long-term reproduction of the socio-cosmic order with short-
term maximation of personal gain, how to choose between the needs of one’s immediate family and those of society 
at large? I explore this question by comparing two ethnographic field sites: an East Kalimantan village where I have 
conducted fieldwork since the 1990s, with a marked ethos of social solidarity and a relational ontology, and a nearby 

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transmigration camp in which local Luangans live alongside an ethnically mixed migrant population, where rituals 
are influenced by increasing individualism, shamanic professionalization, monetization of the local ritual economy, 
and objectificationof local tradition. Focusing on different ways of sharing communal meals and paying for ritual ser-
vices in these locations, a ritual economy based on maintaining kin relations is contrasted with what some Luangans 
pejoratively call “business rituals” (belian usaha), referring to rituals that may be prolonged for months on end which 
are financed through gambling, and in which audience participation is divided between close family and outside spec-
tators. While these examples reflect shifting and conflicting value orientations among the Luangans, the paper argues 
that the latter example may simultaneously be understood as a strategic act, serving to maintain precisely those values 
that it is taken to contradict.
— Climate Change Pilot Project and Values in Central Kalimantan: Monetization of Nature and Its Bearing on 
Value Orientations
Anu Lounela (University of Helsinki)
This paper discusses debates and tensions that reflect the differing value orientations of climate change pilot project 
schemes and local populations in Central Kalimantan, Indonesia. It considers village values produced and negotiated 
in a globalized social arena, wherein multiple actors are engaged in imagining and producing what they consider 
“good”. Since the UN-initiated climate change meeting in Bali in 2007, the most important international response 
to deforestation and carbon dioxide emissions has been REDD+, a mechanism for reducing carbon emissions from 
deforestation and forest degradation. Today, there are about 30-40 REDD+ pilot projects in Indonesia, most of them 
located in Kalimantan and Sumatra. In 2010, Central Kalimantan was proclaimed as a climate change pilot province. 
REDD+ is a market-based effort to reduce emissions through forest rehabilitating and conserving practices; on the 
ground these activities often include calculation (of monetary payments, carbon stocks etc.), education (of the local 
populations to do the right thing) and evaluation (of the activities). The global REDD+ narrative objectifies nature as 
a resource whose value can be measured in money, raising the question of what places money, “nature,” and specific 
natural resources such as trees, occupy in the local, socially constituted landscape of values. Based on fieldwork in the 
Ngaju village of Buntoi in Pulang Pisau district, this paper discusses local perceptions of value, nature, money, and 
their uneasy entanglements through the implementation of a local Redd+ project. At a more general level, the paper 
explores local value production practices as they interact with conjoined global conservation and capitalist schemes, 
taking exchange and the question of equivalence of nature and people, and between different peoples and agencies, 
as the pivotal point of the analysis.
— A Song about Feasting and the Giving up of Beads: Reflections on Value in the Kelabit Highlands
Valerie Mashman (University Malaysia Sarawak)
Accepting the position that locating a theory of value is elusive, this paper is ethnographically rather than theoretically 
driven (Otto 2013). The song of Dayang encapsules the Kelabit value system in the pre-Christian era. She recalls her 
childhood marriage to Anyi Loong , her plentiful supplies of rice and livestock and the arrangements for the com-
memorative death feast for her late mother, hosted by herself and her husband, Anyi Loong . An important feature is 
the mobilization of guests to create a monument on the landscape which creates fame (Munn1986). Such a feast is a 
necessary means of maintaining the status of Lun Doo’ as people of quality in Kelabit society . The voice of Dayang 
moves from the feast to the action of giving up her precious beads, the symbols of her own standing, as barter for 
rice to provide for her husband’s extravagant hospitality in offering rice beer to his guests. Standing can change with 
people’s talk, and the song itself has the power to change reputations.
The song makes an emphasis on processes of action, reputation and social relations that create the standing of Lun 
Doo’, and although the ascription this status is muted, these values continue to be embedded in the Kelabit value sys-
tem that prescribe marriage and leadership today. 
— Toward a Ritual Economy of Death – and Life – in Kalimantan
Christian Oesterheld (Mahidol University)
Explanations of inter-ethnic violence between ‘indigenous Dayaks’ and ‘migrant Madurese’ in Kalimantan from the 
mid-1990s to the early 2000s, are often informed by debates on ‘greed’ – or ‘opportunity’ – vs. ’grievance’. This dyadic 

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framework of analysis has an equivalent in recent discussions on the concept of value(s). The literature on Dayak-
Madurese conflict frequently contains, as a subscript, a focus on different ‘cultural value systems’ (contributing to per-
ceived inequality and ‘grievance’) which contrasts with a focus on competition for economic value through political 
positions and ethnic hegemony in the context of Indonesia’s decentralization process. This paper suggests that anthro-
pological value theory can inspire an alternative reading of Dayak-Madurese conflict by considering cultural-histor-
ical elaborations on the commensurability of death – and life – in Kalimantan. I argue that late colonial endeavors to 
reconcile hostile ‘Dayak’ tribes, particularly the peace-making ceremonies in Tumbang Anoi (1894), have encouraged 
a renegotiation of ‘Dayak’ values and identity and, at the same time, initiated a system of the commodification of souls. 
The ensuing ‘ritual economy of death’ has contributed to a transition from retributive to compensatory ideals of justice 
in Kalimantan, suggesting links between cultural and economic aspects of ‘value’. Based on a review of local histories 
of Dayak-Madurese conflict since the 1950s this paper demonstrates that the frequently invoked incompatibility of 
Madurese and Dayak ‘cultural values’ needs to be contextualized in the two groups’ divergent approaches toward the 
valuation of life, the symbolic meaning of death, and ideas of the circulation of souls.
— Roadside Socialities: Navigating Change and Valuescapes on Indonesia’s Resource Frontier
Kenneth Sillander (University of Helsinki)
In interior Kalimantan, roads are major symbols and vehicles of change, conduits of extensive natural resource extrac-
tion and environmental transformation, and often the most tangible expressions of infrastructural development. In 
local people’s imagination, roads promise to bring money and material welfare: business opportunities and govern-
ment services. For isolated upriver peoples such as the Bentian of East Kalimantan, who have long been ranked lowly 
in the regional political and moral geography as viewed from the state centre, roads also seem to offer a revaluation 
of their social status, and a way out of marginality. Like several other Bentian villages, the small hamlet of Sembulan 
where I have conducted most of my fieldwork has recently become almost deserted after most families have taken up 
residence along a dirt road constructed by an oil palm plantation company. The inhabitants have built houses which 
are strung out over a distance of several kilometres along the road. This has halted a tendency of increasing residential 
concentration in nucleated villages which have long been perceived as ideals and epitomes of modernity, and entailed 
a return to a more scattered residence, reminiscent of the traditional pattern of dispersed residence in farmhouses. 
In this paper, I explore the multifaceted significance of roads for the Bentan, focusing on the importance of roads in 
local social landscapes and valuescapes. What values influence conceptions and uses of roads, and what does roadside 
residence and access to roads mean for local social relations and livelihoods?
 
X.  Religions in Focus
Panel: The Bureaucratization of Religion in Southeast Asia: Expanding or  
Restricting Religious Freedom?
conveners: Mirjam Kuenkler (Princeton University), Tomas Larsson (University of Cambridge)
discussants: Mirjam Kuenkler (Princeton University), Tomas Larsson (University of Cambridge)
panel abstract
As a recent literature establishes, the arena in which most states engage questions of religion in public life are either 
the judiciary or the bureaucracy. Between the poles of the judicialization and bureaucratization of religion, South-
east Asian states have generally opted for the latter: quite elaborately staffed departments or even state ministries of 
religion regulate matters of faith, religious authority and also often religious law. Yet, why, how, and with what effects 
nominally secular states bureaucratize religion is still poorly understood. What are the consequences of the bureau-
cratization process for religious freedom and the widely diagnosed ‘crisis of religious authority’? And how do Muslim 
and Buddhist-majority states compare regarding levels and procedures of the bureaucratization of religion?
The panel will comparatively discuss the histories of bureaucratization in order to identify patterns and path depen-
dencies. Particular attention will be paid to how the type of religion (Islam, Buddhism, Catholicism), colonial legacies, 
intra-religious contestations, and regime type (democracy/authoritarianism), affect processes of the bureaucratization 

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of religion, and which types of bureaucratization appear to be more benevolent in terms of protecting religious free-
dom than others.