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The next event from the "Inimkond" seminar series will be hosted by Dr. Welyne Jeffrey Jehom (University of Malaya, Malaysia) and Dr. Jun-E Tan who will speak on the subject of "Indigenous knowledge as community development tool".  

The seminar takes place on October 27 at 18 o'clock in room A-543.

Dr. Welyne Jeffrey Jehom, a native to Borneo, is an applied anthropologist working as a senior lecturer at the Dept. of Anthropology & Sociology, University of Malaya, Malaysia. Much of her research is focusing on developing indigenous knowledge as a tool to develop rural community from within, empowering the community to take the direction of development that suit their needs.

Dr. Jun-E Tan is a policy researcher focusing on social and solidarity economy (SSE) and sustainable development in Malaysia. One of her current projects, , seeks to provide a platform to integrate the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the global SSE by collecting case studies and lessons learnt. 

This INIMKOND will showcase two anthropologists who will present a case study of Iban weavers from Rumah Gare, Sarawak, Malaysia - a community business that was born out of Dr. Jehom's anthropological work in the community. 

Dr. Jun-E Tan will present some additional case studies of indigenous and local ways of organising communities in Malaysia and focus on certain belief systems that have been useful in economic activities for responsible land use and resource management.

Within this talk, Dr. Jun-E Tan will provide perspectives of social and solidarity economy (SSE) from Asia, particularly on Malaysia and ASEAN, and their relevance with solidarity economy movement in Europe. She will present some cases where indigenous and local ways of organising their communities and certain belief systems have been useful in economic activities for responsible land use and resource management. She will also present a current project of hers, , inviting global collaborations on knowledge sharing on local SSE initiatives.

The lecture questions the role and limits of an anthropologist and focuses also on the issue of development projects that aim to use indigenous knowledge for community development - what is the impact of this kind of initiatives and do they empower the communities as intended. 

Abstract:

"Culture is an important factor that can accelerate development and to ensure its sustainability” (UNESCO, 2013). There have been many attempts to encourage the development and harnessing indigenous knowledge in the state of Sarawak in Malaysia through various government agencies or government-funded agencies. However, how relevant is the development on indigenous knowledge to the indigenous people is still perplexing. With many programs and events to promote indigenous knowledge in the state of Sarawak, particularly Iban pua, there has not been any significant development in the livelihood of the rural Iban women who are engaged in this weaving industry. Therefore, this seminar speaks of the possible hurdles and problems that have long been hindering the Iban women weavers to profit from the pua production. It is based on the argument that harnessing of indigenous knowledge empowers local community in which they can strategise and help themselves in alleviating poverty by having alternative to that of imposed development projects from the state government or in low paid unskilled labor. Nevertheless, the harnessing of indigenous knowledge to local communities need to be done in the way that it is profiting directly and significantly the indigenous communities." 

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