Maskawin dalam Sistem Perkawinan Tukar Suku Isirawa di Kampung Wari, Sarmi, Papua

This paper aims to explore and document the concept and meaning of dowry in the Isirawa people bride exchange system, determines its impact on women and children, and provides a reflective analysis from a feminist point of view regarding the dowry payment system. The research used the feminist ethnography qualitative method through literature studies, interviews, and observations. The results found that the dowry exchange system, when viewed from a positive side, means that women or children are considered very valuable and vital for the Isirawa community, namely to strengthen kinship between families and clumps, to continue the clan, as a tool of peace in a conflict as prevention of domestic violence. However, on the other hand, it has a negative impact that is more detrimental to women, namely limiting women's rights, violence, and unfair treatment of women and children. So, it needs to be criticized and consider changing some parts of the tradition that marginalize them by providing solutions, understandings, and new Christian values not to eliminate the existing culture but continue to enable carrying out the tradition for the welfare of the people without harming the other.AbstrakTulisan ini bertujuan untuk mengeksplorasi dan mendokumentasikan konsep dan makna maskawin dalam sistem perkawinan tukar pada Suku Isirawa, melihat dampaknya bagi perempuan dan anak, serta memberikan analisis reflektif dari sudut pandang feminis mengenai hal tersebut. Penelitian ini menggunakan metode kualitatif etnografi feminis, melalui studi kepustakaan, wawancara, dan observasi. Hasilnya ditemukan bahwa pada sistem tukar-menukar maskawin tersebut jika dilihat dari sisi positif memiliki makna perempuan atau anak dianggap sangat berharga dan penting bagi masyarakat Isirawa, yakni untuk mempererat kekerabatan antar keluarga dan rumpun, meneruskan marga, dan sebagai alat perdamaian konflik seperti untuk mencegah kekerasan dalam rumah tangga. Tetapi, di sisi lain memiliki dampak negatif yang merugikan, beberapa di antaranya membatasi hak-hak perempuan, terjadi kekerasan, dan perlakuan tidak adil terhadap perempuan dan anak. Dengan demikian, perlu dikritisi dan dipertimbangkan untuk mengubah beberapa bagian tradisi yang memarinalkan tersebut dengan bersama-sama memberi solusi, pemahaman, dan nilai Kristiani yang baru, sehingga tidak serta-merta menghilangkan total budaya yang ada. Sebaliknya, tradisi tetap dapat terlaksana untuk menyejahterakan umat tanpa merugikan salah satu pihak.

‘A Woman’, ‘as a Woman’, What Do You Mean?

The article calls attention to a mismatch between the multiple and often seemingly incommensurable understandings of ‘gender’, circulating both within trans and non-trans gender scholarship. Particular attention is paid to the ways in which ‘gender’ is assumed and utilized in feminist ethnography. I argue that the pressing implications that transgender theory and experience have for epistemic habits and ethnographic praxis are yet to be properly acknowledged. Using personal experiences as a non-passing transfeminine ethnographer, I show how a masking of contradicting understandings of gender regularly takes place both in everyday research situations and on levels of academic writing. This, I argue, contributes to upholding cisnormativity in ethnography.Keywords: ethnography, transgender, methodology, feminism’Nainen’, ’naisena’, mitä sillä tarkoitat? Feministinen etnografia, transtutkimus ja läpimenemättömyyden käyttöArtikkeli käsittelee sekä trans- että ei-transsukupuolen tutkimuksessa kiertäviä ’sukupuolen’ määritelmien moninaisuuksia ja näiden keskinäisiä ristiriitoja. Tekstin painopiste on erityisesti tavoissa, joilla sukupuolta ymmärretään feministisessä etnografiassa. Artikkelissa väitän, että transteorian ja -kokemusten implikaatioita episteemisille ja etnografisille käytännöille ei ole tähän mennessä huomioitu kunnolla. Hyödynnän omia kokemuksiani transfeminiininä etnografina näyttääkseni, miten ristiriitaisten sukupuolikäsitysten häivyttäminen tapahtuu sekä kentätyötilanteissa että tieteellisessä kirjoittamisessa. Peittämisen käytännöt ylläpitävät osaltaan etnografian cisnormatiivisuutta.Avainsanat: etnografia, transsukupuolisuus, metodologia, feminismi

Feminist Ethnography in South Korea: Documenting Conversion to Islam in “Multicultural” Korea and the Gendered Struggle for Belonging

This paper presents a feminist ethnographic account of the gendered struggle for belonging in “multicultural” Korea through an in-depth case study of a Korean Muslim woman convert and her family. Centering the informant and her family’s narratives, I explore the gendered implications linked to her conversion to Islam, her sense of belonging and how her inter-ethnic marriage challenges existing notions of labelled “multicultural families” in Korean society. This paper sheds light on the penalties associated with the case study’s religious conversion and marriage choice, demonstrating how she experiences exclusion from mainstream society and her own ethnic community. Far from being an isolated case, I will further convey how it is linked to several others in the literature, highlighting the urgent need for further field research.

“We are fed up …Being research objects!” negotiating identities and solidarities in militant ethnography

This article describes experiences of long-term ethnographic fieldwork on disobedience, disloyalty and dissensus among women in public space in selected (post-)Yugoslav cities. I focus on the opportunities and pitfalls of feminist ethnography and methodology in the context of positionality, engagement and solidarity as essential elements of research into activist networks. In order to problematize the emerging field positionalities and solidarities, I examine the “militant ethnography” methodological approach (Jeffrey Juris), which seeks to move beyond the divide between research practice and politically engaged participation. It is about being among and within the activist network and adopting many identities and roles by constantly shifting between reflective solidarity and analysis. In trying to shed light on the critical self-reflective research process of embodied understandings and experiences, I focus on ethnographic practices embedded in transnational “crowded fields” that encompass the dynamics of relationships and dependencies between knowledge producers.