Universitas Indonesia Conferences, 7th International Symposium of Journal Antropologi Indonesia

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The Intertwined of Hierarchy and Precedence in Huaulu Universe: How the Actualization of Gender Quality Making Values of Things
Muhammad Rifqi Damm

Building: Soegondo Building
Room: 707
Date: 2019-07-25 10:30 AM – 12:00 PM
Last modified: 2019-06-21

Abstract


The order of things in Huaulu universe is organized based on binary principles, in which the most fundamental principle, according to Valerie, is the binary opposition based on gender. Nearly all of other binary organizations—order–disorder, culture–nature, to mention some of them—are structured in parallelism with gender distinction: male–female. The fact that gender is fundamentally human’s property makes it reasonable to placing human at the center of the universe. In this case, man (male human) assumes the center of the center. Following Dumontian line of thought, Valerie argues that man can assume the central place due to his quality as unmarked term which encompasses man–woman distinction. It is because man has both qualities of masculine and feminine that he can stand in opposition with woman, but also encompasses it. This paper agrees with Valerie in placing man at the very center of Huaulu universe but disagrees in understanding why it is so. What is missing in Valerie’s account is the notion of precedence: a man becomes human before he is a man by earning manhood or masculinity through initiation ritual. Based on my interpretation of Valerie’s findings and my own first-hand ethnographic data, I argue that what makes a man or a woman human is their feminine quality. Informed by some ethnographic evidences, I infer, then, that the unmarked term is not the man itself, but his feminine property. Furthermore, it is the actualization of this feminine property that determines the valuation of things in Huaulu universe—by lifting them from something natural to cultural, from something disordered to ordered.