A Research Project by Julia Saeisetiati and Ary "Jimged" Sendy.
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For the exhibition
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VOICES FROM AN ARCHIVED SILENCE
Curated by Vera and Sally Schonfeldt
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BACKGROUND
In 1855, the uprising led by La Sameggu Daéng Kalebbu started with attacks toward Governor’s office and the burning of the Dutch military installations in Ségéri. A letter from his cousin, Colliq Pujié, was said to have circulated prior to this uprising. The letter was written in bilang-bilang script—a script that combines Hindi-Arabic numbers and Lontaraq, the old Bugi letters. The script was known to be used within a small circle of anti-colonial fighters at the time. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to call the script as secret language now. The letters were from Colliq Pujié, an aristocratic woman from Tanette, a cousin of Daéng Kalebbu. The bilang-bilang script used in the letter was also her invention due to the urgency of spreading and encouraging anti-colonial movements at the time. Ironically, as soon as Colliq Pujié’s daughter We Tenri Ollé was in reign, her kingdom decided to collaborate with the Dutch. The rebellion movements quickly transformed into undermining the authority of this new Tanette’s queen. It is also said that Colliq Pujié’s letters maintains its resistance towards whatever form of power that are driven by ignorance and injustices. In other words, her writings were somewhat in confrontation with her own flesh and blood. Written in such a delicate situation, there is no doubt that these texts have an abundance amount of layers to unravel. It was fascinating for us to discover this rather direct relationship between text —script even— and resistance. Coming from such a precarious reality, we found camaraderie, in Colliq Pujié's live and texts.
Literary-scholar Ahmad Saransi considers Colliq Pujié’s texts as poems. Within Bugis literature tradition, Mr. Saransi considers Colliq Pujié's texts as sureq—a type of writing that was made with the intention to be spoken out loud, to be verbal, using a combination of melodic tones that resembles singing. Last decade, Mr. Saransi published translation of Colliq Pujié's texts into bahasa Indonesia with an open distribution. Almost as ironic as finding out that parts of Colliq Pujié's resistance had to be redirected towards her daughter, we learnt that these kinds of literature are now not so much read, recognized, let alone understood. It’s original forms, the thick antique books, are mostly kept for social status indicators. Some of these literatures would be translated and contextualized by these prestigious families for the sake of exposing their “treasure” hence the limitation of its circulation. Meanwhile in other communities, a different form of exclusivity towards poetry or writings are maintained by limiting their access (understandings and use) as talismans instead of being translated and discussed, let alone be made as discourse.
POSSIBILITIES OF OWNING OTHER’S TEXT
Single Channel Video, 59:09
Inspired by Ahmad Saransi’s translation work that made a bridge between the broader public and Colliq Pujié's works, we locate ourselves —along with all the resources that we have within this project— in the position that strengthen and lengthen the bridge. We want to unravel the ongoing relevance of Colliq Pujié's poetics, works and aesthetics. We want to resonate Colliq Pujié's intellectual resistance and struggle within the contemporary urgencies of South Sulawesi and the post-colonial Indonesia. Taking on Mr. Saransi’s definition, we now approach Colliq Pujié's sureq as poems that are to be sung. We asked Mr. Saransi which Colliq Pujié's sureq that he’d consider as the most relevant for our contemporary situation. To extend what he had done, we want to reintroduce, reflect and, at the same time, perform a sing along of the sureq.
The work begins with a conversation amongst seven people about one of Colliq Pujie's sureq —or poem to be sung— that is relatable to our daily resistance, be it towards the governmental system, global economy, class struggles, etc. They are of different professions: scholar, fisherman, labor, mother, youngster, business woman, an unemployed. They then rehearsed singing it and, eventually, performed a sing-along of the sureq. Coming from the mid 19th century, Colliq Pujie was a noble woman who wrote letters to her peers encouraging them to keep on resisting colonialism. Fascinated with the direct relationship between text and (the act of) resistance, the work tries to formulate an embodiment, a form of ownership, of the text within our contemporary realities.
Gathering these heroes of everyday-life, along with their various resistance qualities, the work was done in the Port of Parepare, a landmark for different struggles surrounding precariousness of labor and working conditions. During the Torajan civil war, the losers had to become slaves, hence being traded through this port. During the Dutch times, the colonial government’s forced plantation act was dependent on the trades happening through this port. Today, the port has a reputation of being the exit gate for Indonesian migrant workers to reach Malaysia, particularly those who are undocumented, hence illegal. It is almost as if resistance is an embedded mood of the Port of Parepare.
VIDEO INTERVIEWS
Along with the work: we also present a selection of video interviews that were resulted from our field research. They are part of the research archives conducted by Angela Wittwer, Ary “Jimged” Sendy, Julia Sarisetiati and Rahmat Arham in Sulawesi, in July, 2019.
Meeting Ahmad Saransi
(Regional Archivist in the Department of Library and Archive of the South Sulawesi Province)
Single Channel Video, 1:09:28
As an expert in literary, it took Mr. Saransi two years to translate 122 poems written by Colliq Pujié. Not only it consists of translation from bilang-bilang script into bahasa Indonesia, the book comes with recontextualization, such as meanings of each diction used, along with expressions and symbols. Published in 2008, the book is titled: “Lontara' Bilang: Mozaik Pergolakan Batin Seorang Perempuan Bangsawan” (Lontara' Bilang: Mosaic of a Noble Woman’s Inner Upheavals). Focusing on a selection of sureq (poems to be sung), the interview unravels the aesthetics of subversive acts and struggles that Colliq Pujié had written and how it connects to Daéng Kalebbong’s strategies in resisting against the Dutch colonial administration in the 19th century.
Meeting Anwar Toshibo
(Lecturer in the Department of Archeology of the Hasanuddin University, Makassar)
Single Channel Video, 1:03:27
Mr. Toshibo is a historian that is concerned about the scarced resources that defines slavery in Indonesia. A book of his “Hamba Sahaya dan Orang Berhutang” (Slaves and People’s Debt, 2002) unravels the distinguishing difference between Dutch-imported commercial slavery and the local social-cultural phenomenon of Minawang (client-patron relations from ancient South Sulawesi times); the dynamics within Dutch politics and Bugi societies; the coffee war in Toraja; and the role of harbors within the complexities of trade, slavery, and coffee war. The timeframe that he looked into was the times when Swiss naturalists Fritz and Paul Sarasin conducted their scientific expedition through Celebes (now Sulawesi). Later on, and until now, their findings dominates the Western scholarly studies on Sulawesi. The interview lays out the historical context of South Sulawesi from mid 19th century to early 20th century and unravel Mr. Toshibo’s arguments in deconstructing the dominating Western perspective on slavery and develop an ethnic-centric perspective that encourages exploration from within the ethnic within and surrounding its own region of locale.
Meeting Sulaiman Manguling
(Pastor and Community Leader in Tana Toraja)
Single Channel Video, 44:44
Mr. Manguling is a community leader with in-depth understanding of history and practices within and surrounding the coffee industry of Tana Toraja, a region that have forever been known as the coffee-producing mountainous area of Central Sulawesi. Coffee has been a commodity of the region even long before the Dutch colonies reached the area. The interview unravels the intrigues of the various coffee wars that turned the losers (of the wars) into slaves of the next power-holders. Consequently, these slaves became trade commodities. These were the kinds of slaves that Fritz and Paul Sarasin encountered and documented during their Celebes (now Sulawesi) expedition.