Oceans of Sound: Sama Dilaut Performing Arts

9 September 2010

Registration 9:00 A.M, Program 9:30 - 18:00 

The conference wil be hosted by the International Institute for Asian Studies and the University of Amsterdam. 

Venue
University of Amsterdam
University Theatre, Theatre Hall
Nieuwe Doelenstraat 16
1012 CP Amsterdam

The maritime Sama peoples make up one of the most widespread cultural groups within the southeast Asian island region. They can be found in the Philippine Sulu Archipelago, southwestern Mindanao, Sabah, Borneo, east Kalimantan, and Sulawesi, and across many of the eastern Indonesian islands. One specific, so-called "sea-nomadic" Sama group refers to itself as the “Sea Sama” (Sama Dilaut, also known as Bajau Laut).

In this conference, we will look at the Sama Dilaut's performing arts, focussing onkulintangan and other types of instrumental music, song repertoire, and dance. Music and dance are central to the Sama Dilaut’s identity negotiation and maintenance of cultural memory. Music and dance are direct tools in the processes of identity negotiation that localise the Sama Dilaut ‘in-between’ rather than ‘here’ or ‘there’. ‘In-between’ like the beach is in-between the land and the sea, which is difficult to define sharply because of a constant coming and going of high and low tides that blurs the line between the one and the other; but also ‘in-between’ like the present is a bridge between yesterday and tomorrow. This ‘in-between’ is, at the same time, the clear space of the Sama Dilaut’s ‘Own’.

PRELIMINARY PROGRAMME Oceans of Sound: Sama Dilaut Performing Arts
Thursday, 9 September 2010, Amsterdam
Registration (9.00 - 9.30)

Session 1 (9.30 - 11.00)
Birgit Abels (IIAS & Universiteit van Amsterdam, the Netherlands): Opening

Nicole Revel (CNRS, Paris, France): Kata-kata: Sama Dilaut epics, collected in the last decade of the 20th century for "Philippine Oral Epics Archive", Ateneo de Manila University

Matthew Santamaria (Asian Centre, University of the Philippines, Manila): Expanding Knowledge, Extending Ties: Sama Dilaut Music and Dance in the 21st Century

- Coffee -
Session 2 (11.30 - 12.30)
Hanafi Bin Hussin (University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia): Balancing of Spiritual and Physical World: Experiencing the Rituals of the Sama dilaut (Bajau) in Sitangkai, Tawi-Tawi, Southern Philippines and Semporna, Sabah, Malaysia

Bernard Ellorin (University of Hawai’i, Honolulu, USA): From the Kulintangan to the Electronic Keyboard: Sama Traditional and Contemporary Music in the Southern Philippines and Malaysia Timor

- Lunch -

Session 3 (14.00 - 15.30)
Benny Baskara (Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta, Indonesia): “Gambus”, the traditional music of the Bajo people in Wakatobi Islands, South East Sulawesi, Indonesia

Judeth John Baptist (Senior Assistant Curator of Sabah Museum, Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia) & Patricia Regis (formerly director of Sabah Museum): Magpa-igal Jin: a ritual dance, linking the Past with the Present among the Sama Dilaut of Sabah

Chandra Nuraini (Université de La Rochelle, La Rochelle, France): Iko-iko, the epic songs of the Kangean archipelago Bajo people

- Coffee -

Session 4 (16.00 - 18.00)
Documentaries:
1) Birgit Abels (IIAS & UVA) & Judeth John Baptist (Sabah Museum): Oceans of Sound: Sama Dilaut performing arts

2) Lamberto Avellana (†): Badjao (1957)

3) Nannette Matilac (Filmmaker, Manila): Sayaw Sa Alon, Dancing on the Waves