Becoming Spiritual: Documenting Osing Rituals and Ritualistic Languages in Banyuwangi, Indonesia

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Hadzantonis ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Southeast Asia ◽  
Cultural Significance ◽  
The West ◽  
Cultural Symbols ◽  
The Past ◽  
The North ◽  
Spirituality And Religion ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Witch Hunts ◽  
Insight Into

Banyuwangi is a highly unique and dyamic locality. Situated in between several ‘giants’ traditionally known as centres of culture and tourism, that is, Bali to the east, larger Java to the west, Borneo to the north, and Alas Purwo forest to the south, Banyuwangi is a hub for culture and metaphysical attention, but has, over the past few decades, become a focus of poltical disourse, in Indonesia. Its cultural and spiritual practices are renowned throughout both Indonesia and Southeast Asia, yet Banyuwangi seems quite content to conceal many of its cosmological practices, its spirituality and connected cultural and language dynamics. Here, a binary constructed by the national government between institutionalized religions (Hinduism, Islam and at times Chritianity) and the liminalized Animism, Kejawen, Ruwatan and the occult, supposedly leading to ‘witch hunts,’ have increased the cultural significance of Banyuwangi. Yet, the construction of this binary has intensifed the Osing community’s affiliation to religious spiritualistic heritage, ultimately encouraging the Osing community to stylize its religious and cultural symbolisms as an extensive set of sequenced annual rituals. The Osing community has spawned a culture of spirituality and religion, which in Geertz’s terms, is highly syncretic, thus reflexively complexifying the symbolisms of the community, and which continue to propagate their religion and heritage, be in internally. These practices materialize through a complex sequence of (approximately) twelve annual festivals, comprising performance and language in the form of dance, food, mantra, prayer, and song. The study employs a theory of frames (see work by Bateson, Goffman) to locate language and visual symbolisms, and to determine how these symbolisms function in context. This study and presentation draw on a several yaer ethnography of Banyuwangi, to provide an insight into the cultural and lingusitic symbolisms of the Osing people in Banyuwangi. The study first documets these sequenced rituals, to develop a map of the symbolic underpinnings of these annually sequenced highly performative rituals. Employing a symbolic interpretive framework, and including discourse analysis of both language and performance, the study utlimately presents that the Osing community continuously, that is, annually, reinvigorates its comples clustering of religious andn cultural symbols, which are layered and are in flux with overlapping narratives, such as heritage, the national poltical and the transnational.

The Koshi’s Revenge

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cheryl Colopy
Keyword(s):  
The Sun ◽  
The West ◽  
Nepal Himalaya ◽  
Great Range ◽  
Half Century ◽  
The Past ◽  
The North ◽  
Past Half Century ◽  
Great Rivers ◽  
Past Half

The Koshi spoke during the monsoon of 2008. She opened a new path, just as Dinesh Mishra predicted. The river breached an apparently ill-constructed and certainly ill-maintained embankment. A photo taken as the flood began shows the ridge of sand dissolving as water poured through a widening gap in the embankment and flowed southeast. In both Nepal and Bihar, villages and farms that had not seen a flood for the past half century were devastated. The embankments on the Koshi had already breached seven times at various spots downriver. This time the entire river below the Siwalik range in Nepal, where the land flattens, had essentially jumped out of its straitjacket and returned to one of its old channels—one it had flowed down two centuries ago. In Nepal the Koshi River is known as the Saptakoshi, or “seven Koshis,” because seven Himalayan rivers merge to create it. The Tamur flows down from Kanchenjunga in eastern Nepal near its border with Bhutan and India; the Arun comes down from Tibet. Out of the Khumbu comes the Dudh Koshi, the milky blue river that entranced me on the way up to Gokyo. The Dudh Koshi joins the Sun Koshi, which is also fed by the Tama Koshi, which in turn receives water from the Rolwaling Khola and Tsho Rolpa, the threatening glacial lake I visited during the monsoon of 2006. From farther west, toward Kathmandu, come the Likhu and the Indrawati. The latter receives the as yet undiverted waters of the Melamchi Khola. These seven tributaries of the Saptakoshi drain more than a third of the Nepal Himalaya, the wettest and highest of the great range, which includes the Khumbu and Ngozumpa glaciers. The Koshi drains almost thirty thousand square miles. It is Nepal’s largest river and one of the largest tributaries of the Ganga. Less than ten miles above the plains, three of these great rivers come together in a final merging: the Sun Koshi from the west, the Arun from the north, the Tamur from the east.

Guitar Forum: The Flute, Viola, Guitar Trio: Its History, Literature and Performance

1986 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 73-76
Author(s):  
Douglas Hensley
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Chamber Music ◽  
San Francisco ◽  
Classical Guitar ◽  
The West ◽  
Master's Degrees ◽  
Private Lessons ◽  
Additional Information ◽  
The Past ◽  
And Performance

Douglas Hensley has been an active chamber musician ever since he took up serious study of the classical guitar. He received bachelor and master's degrees under the direction of David Tanenbaum from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and he has studied with many other musicians in private lessons and master classes. Over the past ten years he has premiered close to fifty new compositions, performed numerous U.S. premieres and the West Coast premiere of Elliott Carter's “Changes” for solo guitar. For Opus One Records in New York he has recorded Larry Polansky's “Hensley Variations” and David Loeb's “Trois Cansos” with flautist Kenneth Kramer and violist John Casten. He has also recorded a collection of duets with Japanese shakuhachi master Masayuka Koga, “Autumn Mist,” for Fortuna Records of Novato, California. His principal activities are as cofounder (with violist/violinist John Casten) and guitarist of the San Francisco-based contemporary performance ensemble ISKRA, which is made up of flute, clarinet, guitar, violin/viola, doublebass and soprano voice. Anyone with additional information about flute, viola, guitar trios (or other chamber music with guitar), or queries, is urged to contact him at 607-A Frederick St., San Francisco, CA 94117.

Visiting the horned serpent’s home: A relational analysis of Paquimé as a pilgrimage site in the North American Southwest

2018 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 306-324 ◽  
Author(s):  
Todd L VanPool ◽  
Christine S VanPool
Keyword(s):  
American Southwest ◽  
Casas Grandes ◽  
The Past ◽  
The North ◽  
Relational Perspective ◽  
Architectural Features ◽  
The Dead ◽  
North American Southwest ◽  
Insight Into

Paquimé, Chihuahua, was the ceremonial center of the Medio period (AD 1200 to 1450) Casas Grandes world, and the focus of regional pilgrimages. We use a relational perspective to explore the connections that were created and expressed during the pilgrimage. We propose that Paquimé was considered a living city, and that pilgrims actively supported its vitality through offerings of marine shells and other symbolically important goods. A region-wide network of signal fires centered on Cerro de Moctezuma, a hill directly overlooking Paquimé, summoned pilgrims. Ritual negotiations also focused on the dead and may have included at least occasional human sacrifice. While the pilgrimages focused on water-related ritual, they also included community and elite competition as reflected in architectural features such as the ball courts. Central to the pilgrimage was negotiation with the horned serpent, a deity that controlled water and was associated with leadership throughout Mesoamerica and the Southwest. The horned serpent is the primary supernatural entity reflected at the site and in the pottery pilgrims took with them back to their communities. Thus, the pilgrimages were times when the Casas Grandes people created and transformed their relationships with each other, religious elites, the dead, the landscape, and the horned serpent. These relationships in turn are reflected across the region (e.g., the broad distribution of Ramos Polychrome). This case study consequently demonstrates the potential that the relational perspective presented throughout this issue has for providing insight into the archaeological record and the past social structures it reflects.

III.—The Pre-Cambrian Rocks of Wales

1893 ◽  
Vol 10 (9) ◽  
pp. 396-401
Author(s):  
Henry Hicks
Keyword(s):  
Recent Article ◽  
British Isles ◽  
The West ◽  
British Geological Survey ◽  
England And Wales ◽  
North West ◽  
The Past ◽  
The North ◽  
History Of ◽  
Lithological Character

In a recent article on the Pre-Cambrian Rocks of the British Isles in the Journal of Geology, vol. i., No. 1, Sir Archibald Geikie makes the following statement: “There cannot, I think, be now any doubt that small tracts of gneiss, quite comparable in lithological character to portions of the Lewisian rocks of the North-West of Scotland, rise to the surface in a few places in England and Wales. In the heart of Anglesey, for example, a tract of such rocks presents some striking external or scenic resemblance to the characteristic types of ground where the oldest gneiss forms the surface in Scotland and the West of Ireland.” To those who have followed the controversy which has been going on for nearly thirty years between the chiefs of the British Geological Survey and some geologists who have been working amongst the rocks in Wales, the importance of the above admission will be readily apparent; but as it is possible that some may be unable to realize what such an admission means in showing geological progress in unravelling the history of the older rocks in Wales during the past thirty years, a brief summary of the results obtained may possibly be considered useful.

scholarly journals Smart Techniques in Urban Planning: An Insight to Ruled-Based Design

2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 114
Author(s):  
Carlo Pisano ◽  
Giuseppe De Luca ◽  
Ahmadreza Shirvani Dastgerdi
Keyword(s):  
Urban Planning ◽  
Implementation Process ◽  
Rule Based ◽  
The North ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
And Performance ◽  
The City ◽  
Insight Into ◽  
Significant Factors ◽  
Design Techniques

In the last decades, the ideology of managing the city form and performance through pre-determined plans has gradually lost its validity. Some contemporary urban planning theories suggest the application of smart design techniques for managing urban complexity. However, the proposed approach has partially been experienced in practice, and more research on how to integrate them into urban planning is needed. This study aims to present an insight into the rule-based design as a smart design technique for a shift from pre-determined urban plans to design rules. The methodology is based on a comparative analysis between the experiments of some cases in the north of Europe. Research findings highlight that the capacity to deliver variety with harmony, the distinction between the roles of code writer and building designer, the potential to support the implementation process and to prescribe specific qualities, both for the spatial and organizational purposes, are significant factors for the integration of smart design techniques to urban planning.

Archaeology of Identity and Dissonance

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bernice Kurchin
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Identity Formation ◽  
North Africa ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
West Indies ◽  
Historical Time ◽  
The West ◽  
The Past ◽  
The North ◽  
Multiple Dimensions

In situations of displacement, disruption, and difference, humans adapt by actively creating, re-creating, and adjusting their identities using the material world. This book employs the discipline of historical archaeology to study this process as it occurs in new and challenging environments. The case studies furnish varied instances of people wresting control from others who wish to define them and of adaptive transformation by people who find themselves in new and strange worlds. The authors consider multiple aspects of identity, such as race, class, gender, and ethnicity, and look for ways to understand its fluid and intersecting nature. The book seeks to make the study of the past relevant to our globalized, postcolonized, and capitalized world. Questions of identity formation are critical in understanding the world today, in which boundaries are simultaneously breaking down and being built up, and humans are constantly adapting to the ever-changing milieu. This book tackles these questions not only in multiple dimensions of earthly space but also in a panorama of historical time. Moving from the ancient past to the unknowable future and through numerous temporal stops in between, the reader travels from New York to the Great Lakes, Britain to North Africa, and the North Atlantic to the West Indies.

Invasion of the New Zealand Coastline by European Sea-Rocket (Cakile maritima) and American Sea-Rocket (Cakile edentula)

2011 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 260-263 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger D. Cousens ◽  
Jane M. Cousens
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
North America ◽  
West Coast ◽  
Congeneric Species ◽  
The West ◽  
The Past ◽  
The North ◽  
Cakile Maritima ◽  
Cakile Edentula ◽  
North And South

AbstractOn the west coast of North America and in Australia, there have been parallel cases of sequential invasion and replacement of the shoreline plant American sea-rocket by European sea-rocket. A similar pattern has also occurred in New Zealand. For 30 to 40 yr, from its first recording in 1921, American sea-rocket spread throughout the eastern coastlines of the North and South Islands of New Zealand. European sea-rocket has so far been collected only on the North Island. From its first collection in 1937, European sea-rocket spread to the northern extremity of the island by 1973, and by 2010, it had reached the southernmost limit. In the region where both species have occurred in the past, American sea-rocket is now rarely found. This appears to be another example of congeneric species displacement.

Teaching With ‘Mikrokosmos’

Tempo ◽  
1968 ◽  
pp. 12-15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ylda Novik
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Sight Reading ◽  
The Past ◽  
Twentieth Century Music ◽  
Four Score ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Insight Into

In teaching Mikrokosmos to some four score children over a period of several years, I have realized that it serves numerous musical purposes beyond just that of being another series of pieces and studies for pupils. In addition to laying a strong and richly varied foundation for the understanding and performance of twentieth-century music, it presents almost unending varieties of situations for facilitating sight-reading and transposition. The work offers virtually every pianistic and musical problem to the student, and interestingly enough, its use gives him increased insight into music of the past as well as of the present.

Recognition, Deference, and Respect: Generalizing the Lessons of an Asymmetric Asian Order

2009 ◽  
Vol 16 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 105-118 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brantly Womack
Keyword(s):  
The West ◽  
Meiji Japan ◽  
End Of History ◽  
Western Modernity ◽  
The Past ◽  
Rise Of China ◽  
History Of ◽  
World Economic ◽  
The End Of History ◽  
Insight Into

AbstractAs many distinguished academics and officials have pointed out, the current rise of China is not a completely new phenomenon, but rather the return of China to a position of regional centrality and world economic share that were considered normal less than two hundred years ago.1 This fact underlines the importance of history in putting the present into perspective, and at the same time, to the extent that all history is history of the present, it requires a reevaluation of the structure of China's traditional relationships. Hitherto, China's place in modern social science has been in an exotic corner, a failed oriental despotism. To be sure, traditional China did collapse, and today's China is a different China rising in a different world. We might assume that China is rising now precisely because of its differences from traditional China, that it is the last step toward the end of history rather than a resonance with the past. However, the convenience of such an assumption makes it suspect. If China is simply the latest avatar of Western modernity, then it requires of the West some readjustment, but not rethinking. However, the only certainty about China's rise is that it is a complex phenomenon, and the convenience of constructions such as China-as-Prussia or China-as-Meiji Japan derives from their preemption of open-ended study rather than from their insight into complexity. To the extent that China is China, both past and present require reconsideration.

Myth, History, and Literature in Virgin Land

Prospects ◽  
1978 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. 125-133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Trachtenberg
Keyword(s):  
American West ◽  
Social Memory ◽  
The West ◽  
Cultural Symbols ◽  
The Past ◽  
Virgin Land ◽  
The Social ◽  
Collective Imagination ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
The Impact

Professional historians will surely agree that the writing of history is itself an act of historical consequence. If history is, as Carl Becker argues, “the artificial extension of the social memory,” and if social identity and behavior depend in part on memory, then created versions of the past are a serious matter. They can have decisive effects on the present. Henry Nash Smith's Virgin Land is an exemplary form of a creative history which extends, refines, and enlightens social memory. And it does so in a particularly significant way, by pioneering a new area for study, a new territory in the landscape of memory. It is the area of a general cultural consciousness—“the region of culture,” as Leo Marx puts it, “where literature, general ideas, and certain products of the collective imagination—we may call them ‘cultural symbols’— meet.” Henry Nash Smith himself describes as his aim to trace “the impact of the West, the vacant continent beyond the frontier, on the consciousness of Americans.” His territory is consciousness in relation to a complex historical actuality, the American West.

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