Chicago Studies in Practices of Meaning. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2012. xvi, 301 pp. (B&W photos.) US$27.50, paper. ISBN 978-0-226-73198-8.
In Laughing at Leviathan Rutherford shows that in the portrayal of West Papua, studies dating back to colonial times frequently massaged reality to affect a specific audience, portraying a level of dependency of Papua that suited colonial purposes. Adversely though, the colonialists were themselves over time used as an audience by the very “stone-age men” they described. Papuans had (and still have) a vested interest in portraying a particular image of themselves and so manipulate reality to their own advantage. Laughing at Leviathan deconstructs a series of portraits adding context or enhancing detail in a way that illustrates how the “reality” portrayed is layered. In the volume Rutherford provides a pastiche of essays based on earlier work (ranging from 1998 to 2008), implicitly making the point that her argument has been maturing over years.
Basically Rutherford sets out to “spur political thought by examining the uneasy relationship between sovereignty and audience” (1). Having set out what she means by the pursuit of sovereignty and the role played in this pursuit by audiences in the first chapter, she explores these themes in seven different settings. The first half of the book, “Geographies of Sovereignty,” focuses on a changing political landscape where we meet a variety of different audiences with their own specific interests that gradually give shape to West Papua as we know it. The second chapter, entitled like the volume itself “Laughing at Leviathan” (the title refers to an essay by John Furnivall), comes to grips with Dutch colonial policy of the nineteenth and twentieth century. Rutherford shows how West Papua with all its challenges increasingly became a near-obsession to create (and perpetuate) the perfect colony. In “Trekking to New Guinea” the setting changes: West Papua becomes “this obvious solution” for the problems the Dutch colonial administration had with the Netherlands Indies’ changing demographic structure. By the early twentieth century migration to the Netherlands Indies had become commonplace and an educated Indonesian elite demanded its place in local society. As a result both the poor white settlers and local mixed-bloods became increasingly marginalized. Rutherford explores the different audiences motivated to intervene and capitalize on West Papua as a solution to this budding social problem.
In “Waiting for the End in Biak” the scene alters dramatically: centre stage is the dramatic murder in 1998 of Papuan demonstrators raising the Papuan Morning Star flag on Biak Island. Rutherford explores the motivations of the various actors and audiences involved. She does not limit this to the event itself, but extends into Papuan and Indonesian nationalism. She also refers to the attempts by Filep Karma, the organizer, to invoke international interest for the plight of the Papuan population.
In the second half of the book, “Signs of Sovereignty in Motion,” Rutherford’s approach is more semiotic in nature, focusing on how audiences are addressed. Again, the first essay takes us to the second half of the nineteenth century, Biak and Numfoor. “Frontiers of the lingua franca” looks into the missionaries “inventing” Christian terminology in the languages of yet-to-be-converted peoples. Straightforward translation of terminology would not purge existing beliefs. Use of Malay was similarly ambivalent in the eyes of the missions. In “Institutional Power and Interpretative Practice” the focus remains on the development of Christianity on Biak/Numfoor, but we are taken through the mutual evaluation of Christian concepts by different audiences. Again, this is not limited to the immediate surroundings, the development of the local Protestant church. It also extends to the Koreri movement that in various forms lasted from before World War II to well into the 1990s reacting not only to Dutch, but also to Japanese and Indonesian bids for sovereignty.
The final two chapters relate to events that occurred since the turn of the twenty-first century, both based on visual documents. “Third-Person Nationalism” focuses on the video “Why Papua Wants Freedom.” Rutherford concludes that this video—though it addresses a nationalist Papuan audience and was purchased by many Papuans—in fact contains a message that sustains Papuan dependency, “[providing] fodder for an Indonesian multiculturalism” (201). “The Appeal of Slippery Pronouns” focuses on two YouTube fragments. The first shows Filep Karma, the organizer of the 2008 flag-raising, speaking during a similar event four years earlier. This rousing speech is paired to a fragment based on Obama’s “Yes, we can” speech, but containing a variety of images of Papuans being tortured by Indonesian soldiers. In both cases the role of the international—especially an American— audience in the solution of the present stalemate in Papua is stressed.
In her epilogue “Beasts and Sovereigns,” Rutherford picks up several strands of dialogue from the volume. She points out that her intention was not to solve, but “[to offer] a starting point for further reflection, by tracing the effects, in a particular setting, of the uneasy relationship of sovereignty and audience … [the various actors] all participate in the various dimensions of the real-world interdependencies that bedevil every quest for supreme and absolute power” (248).
Does Rutherford achieve what she sets out to do? In my opinion both yes and no. She does convincingly show how different audiences pursued and still pursue sovereignty for Papua. She also shows shifts in the meaning of sovereignty for Papua depending on audience and setting. Problematic in her argument is the centre stage position of Biak and the Biak people throughout most of the volume, certainly when the focus is on present-day West Papua. For how representative is Biak? West Papua is culturally and linguistically extremely diverse and there is no clear-cut Papuan identity as yet. Biak does have the longest and widest-ranging experience with outside contact. Similarly, the Biak myth of Koreri—with its culture hero Manarmakeri—is one of the most complex and extensive appropriations of outside cultural influences we can find in Papua. Yet, the question is will these aspects eventually become central to Papuan identity and an inalienable part of the Papuan claim to sovereignty? Even though Rutherford acknowledges the question, she—perhaps rightly so—also avoids it, offering Laughing at Leviathan as a starting point for further reflection on the subject.
Sjoerd R. Jaarsma
Papua Heritage Foundation, Hilversum, The Netherlands
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