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Stunning Males and Powerful Females
Gender and Tradition in East Javanese Dance
By Christina Sunardi UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS PRESS
Copyright © 2015 Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-252-09691-4
CHAPTER 1
Aims and Approaches
This Book in a Nutshell
Stunning Males and Powerful Females is about gender, power, and tradition—topics that are all the more fascinating in the regency of Malang in east Java, Indonesia, a place where the majority of people are Muslim and where cross-gender dance performance is quite common. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork spanning the years 2005 to 2007, this book focuses on ways male and female performers have accessed and embodied femaleness through east Javanese presentational dance and its music in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, examining the perseverance of "female power" in the face of a variety of cultural pressures that work to contain, control, and suppress it. This exploration, informed by what musicians and dancers emphasized to me as I studied music and dance with them, attended and participated in performances, formally interviewed them, and chatted more casually with them, has led to the main argument of this book: Through the continuous transformations performers have made to tradition, they have been negotiating culturally constructed boundaries of gender and sex—sometimes reinforcing these boundaries, sometimes transgressing them, sometimes doing both simultaneously.
I develop this argument through six chapters. This chapter introduces my main aims and analytical approaches. Chapter two contextualizes a cultural ambivalence toward female power, exploring how female dancers and the (mostly) male musicians who accompany them contend with this ambivalence through male style dance. Chapter three considers the cultural ambivalence that has surrounded the expression of female power by males, examining ways male dancers have nonetheless accessed and embodied this power through female style dance. Chapter four demonstrates how performers constructed boundaries of gender through their senses of the past. Of particular importance was the strong connection they made between the female style dance Beskalan Putri, Malangan tradition, and female power, leading me to explore the representation of female power through Beskalan Putri in more detail in chapter five. Through analysis of performer interaction, chapter six brings together the main themes that link the book—power, the negotiation of conceptual and physical boundaries of gender, concern with tradition and preservation, and performers' senses of history—as a means to understand how even the briefest moments of interaction between performers contributed to ongoing cultural processes by and through which tradition and gender are produced. Having benefited from an educational environment in which boundaries between disciplines are sometimes questioned and sometimes ignored, I draw theoretical and methodological approaches from ethnomusicology (my "home" discipline), anthropology, gender studies, dance studies, Southeast Asian studies, and other disciplines—combining interpretive ethnography, textual analysis, and analysis of performance.
Approaching Power
One of my aims is to contribute some new ways of thinking about spiritual power and the ways it is manifested in Java. Benedict Anderson captured many aspects of spiritual power (kasektèn) in his influential essay "The Idea of Power in Javanese Culture," defining it as "that intangible, mysterious, and divine energy which animates the universe" (1990a: 22) and referring to it as "Power" with a capital "p" (ibid.: 23, 19–20 n8). Other translations of this sense of spiritual power in Java include "magical energy" (Koentjaraningrat 1980: 135), "potency" (Keeler 1987: 38–39; Errington 1990: 42), and "spiritual potency" (Errington 1990: 42). The more of this divine energy that a person or object has, the more spiritually powerful a person or an object is (Anderson 1990a: 22–27). Spiritual power is acquired in a number of ways, such as through ascetic practices and/or through the possession of spiritually powerful objects (Anderson 1990a: 23–27; Keeler 1987: 41–48). This power affects others in a number of ways, but seemingly without effort on the part of the spiritually potent person (Anderson 1990a: 54). A sign of a person's potency is refined speech, behavior, and disposition (ibid.: 50–51). The idea is that others are drawn to spiritually potent people, as though "magnetically attracted" (ibid.: 53). Others will seem to simply follow a spiritually potent person's lead. Spiritually potent people thus do not need to make overt commands or force others into compliance; a "request" should suffice (ibid.: 54; see also Sunardi 2011: 45–46). Economically speaking, wealth seems to flow to a spiritually powerful person without that person's pursuing it (ibid.: 53). Others seem to want to give the person money in various forms, including cash, gifts, and employment opportunities.
Anderson developed his analysis of power in Java based on the ways males express and embody it, in effect outlining a dominant, male-centered, aristocratic ideology of spiritual power (Djajadiningrat-Nieuwenhuis 1987: 46; Brenner 1995: 28–29; 1998: 148; Weiss 2006: 55–56; Sears 2007: 54–58). Anderson's essay, however, was not about the issue of gender per se, but about the notion of charisma (Anderson 1990a: 19, 72–77; 1990b: 78; Brenner 1995: 28; 1998: 148; Sears 2007: 54–55; Hughes-Freeland 2007). While I recognize that Anderson was presenting a male-centric, elite masculine sense of spiritual power, I found that the verbal discourse and behavior of performers I consulted (many of whom admittedly were male) did often support many of his ideas, and I thus do draw on his work.
At the same time, other analysts have enriched understandings of spiritual power in Java and different ways it is expressed, embodied, negotiated, and connected to social status by focusing on issues of gender and examining women's roles and experiences (e.g., Errington 1990; Keeler 1990; Brenner 1995, 1998; Cooper 2000; Weiss 2006). Nancy Cooper productively distinguishes the "pure state" of power, which may be accessed by males and females, and "the gendered uses of power" (2000: 613). She uses the term centripetality to specify a type of "attracting power" that she associates with women (2000: 613). As I build upon this fascinating body of literature I, too, am interested in the manifestation of spiritual power as it is gendered female.
There is a historical precedent for spiritual power gendered female in Java in shakti, a centuries-old "Indic metaphor of female power" (Becker 1988: 385). Shakti, as well as the importance of the unification of female and male forces, was an important component of Tantric philosophy, which, imported from India, was known in Java in medieval times (eighth through sixteenth centuries) (Becker 1993: 3, 8). The modern Javanese concepts of sekti and kasektèn (sakti, kesaktian in Indonesian), are derived from the Indic concept but no longer necessarily gendered female (Becker 1988: 388; Hughes-Freeland 1995: 198). Indic senses of shakti as female energy and its importance to male potency, however, do survive, as Judith Becker and Felicia Hughes-Freeland have shown in their analyses of central Javanese female style court dance (Becker 1991: 116; 1993: 128; Hughes-Freeland 1995: 201). My analysis in this book suggests that Indic senses of shakti survive in east Javanese dance as well.
Using Anderson's (1990a: 33, 53) and Cooper's (2000: 614) metaphor of a magnet to describe the attracting force of spiritually powerful people, I write about spiritual power gendered female as "the magnetic power of femaleness" or "magnetic female power." I am expanding Cooper's notion of centripetality (which she associates with women [2000: 613]) to refer to spiritual power associated with femaleness more broadly—that is, femaleness connected to female bodies and/or to behavior or demeanor commonly accepted as feminine in Javanese society. Viewing the magnetic power of femaleness in this way facilitates my exploration of ways it has been accessed and embodied by women, men, and waria (males who dress and live as female). In some cases I abbreviate my references to the magnetic power of femaleness to "the power of femaleness" or "female power." Critical to a person's ability to access spiritual power, both in its "pure state" and as gendered, is the possession of knowledge (Anderson 1990a: 54–58; see also Sunardi 2011: 46), including a type of knowledge that is itself spiritual in nature.
Ilmu (Spiritual Knowledge)
Ilmu (Indonesian), or èlmu/ngèlmu (Javanese), is a complicated term in Java with different shades of meaning. An Arabic-derived word (Daniels 2009: 41), it has broader meanings as "knowledge" or "science." It also has particular shadings that are more closely connected to mystical beliefs and practices in Java. Other scholars have translated, defined, or described ilmu/ngèlmu as "science" and "a kind of abstract knowledge or supernormal skill" (Geertz 1960: 88); "esoteric knowledge/science" (Mulder 2005: 165); and "mystical knowledge" (Keeler 1987: 235; Daniels 2009: 41). Like Clifford Geertz, who conducted fieldwork in Java in the 1950s, I also found that some individuals talked about ilmu "as a kind of substantive magical power" (1960: 88), suggesting a continuity of some ideas about ilmu. While I recognize that ilmu as it relates to mystical beliefs and practices may mean different things to different people, I have come to understand ilmu as a substantive "packet" of knowledge, often of a secret and esoteric nature that can lead to a remarkable ability to do something by helping a person to access and embody spiritual power, and it is this sense of ilmu that is the focus of this book.
Ilmu exists for many different kinds of abilities, such as to disappear; to fly; to be invincible; to be present in more than one place simultaneously; to win the love of another; and to perform music, dance, and theater (see also Geertz 1960: 88–89). In writing about ilmu and forms of ilmu, I have done my best to be clear in my explanations, examples, and analyses while also respecting the wishes of some performers to keep some aspects confidential. In the context of performance, ilmu is knowledge that enables artists—including musicians, dancers, and puppeteers—to enrapture, mesmerize, and in some cases, heal. This knowledge gives a performer a particular radiance that makes him or her appealing to viewers, even if he or she is not necessarily considered the best technically or, in the case of dancers, the most beautiful or handsome. As I understand it, this is similar to or the same as "the téja (radiance)" that Anderson writes "was thought to emanate softly from the face or person of the man of Power" (1990a: 31).
Using ilmu, male and female performers gain the power of presence to affect audiences emotionally—making them feel happy, enthralled, in love—physically—giving them the shivers, widening their eyes, freezing their expressions—and sometimes spiritually—healing their hearts and minds. Without ilmu, a performer may be very good, even excellent, but she or he will not be able to embody the spiritual power necessary to strongly affect those watching. Musicians and dancers implied that ilmu was a critical component of a performer's competence. After I had learned a dance well enough to perform it, several of my teachers encouraged me to obtain ilmu, indicating that this was necessary in order for me to reach the next level of proficiency—that is, the ability to truly captivate and affect the audience.
Ilmu in the performing arts is closely related to affect and effect, which many Javanese artists talk about in terms of rasa, a Sanskrit-derived term for feeling, mood, and/or taste that is closely tied to the artist's deep understanding of the art (such as the dance or a musical composition) (Walton 2007; Weiss 2003: 23; Benamou 2010: 244). Susan Walton writes, "[t]he rasa magnetizes the viewer, pulling her or him into the dramatic situation so that the viewer can relish the work in an almost gustatory way, experiencing it in mind and body" (2007: 32). Also emphasizing the element of affective power, Sarah Weiss explains that "[i]n performance, rasa is the force that reflects the unification of the performer with the performed" (2003: 38). The deep understanding of the art that is necessary to perform with rasa—to affect viewers—includes technical skill gained from experience, and also ilmu gained in diverse ways. In other words, for those artists who emphasize the importance of ilmu, the assumption is that one needs ilmu to truly perform with rasa; technical skill is not enough in itself.
Paradoxically, ilmu has no form and is invisible, but it does have substance, like an invisible gas, and is transferable (Geertz 1960: 88). Transmission often involves the movement of ilmu from one person's body to another's so that the recipient comes to have, hold, own, or incorporate it into his or her own body. In short, ilmu can be embodied and is "embodiable." Transferring ilmu may be a conceptual process. My teachers gave me ilmu in "bits" of knowledge about dance technique, the character portrayed, or the meanings of a movement or composition title conveyed verbally.
Ilmu may also be more tangibly transferred. Some performers identified objects—including parts of dance costumes and daggers (keris)—that contained ilmu. The implication is that an individual absorbed the ilmu contained in these objects by wearing them and thus became able to access the spiritual power necessary to perform efficaciously. A couple of performers transferred ilmu to me in the form of chants, spells, and prayers conveyed aurally or written on paper. I was assumed to gain ilmu as the words permeated my body in a variety of ways, including aurally, through the touch of the person giving them to me, and/or by possessing the words on a piece of paper and by committing the words to memory, whether or not I understood the meanings of the text. One of my dance teachers also instructed me to ingest the words—to tear up the paper on which the words were written, put the pieces into tea or water, and drink the infusion. Doing so, I would literally internalize the ilmu the words contained. The power and knowledge attributed to the possession of words in Java is also manifest through shadow puppet play stories in which "a piece of writing" is a "powerful weapon" (Anderson 1990a: 58).
Ilmu can also be transferred by osmosis. My teacher who instructed me to ingest the words on the paper encouraged me to come frequently to his house so that my abilities as a musician and dancer would improve by just being near him as his ilmu permeated into me. One important implication is that a person does not necessarily have to rationally grasp ilmu in order to gain it, be affected by it, or affect others with it. I was repeatedly told, however, that a person who does not have sufficient inner strength to receive, possess, and embody certain kinds or amounts of ilmu risks illness, insanity, and even death (see also Geertz 1960: 321; Keeler 1987: 253).
There are a number of ways an individual may gain the inner strength (and enough of it) necessary to productively possess ilmu. While a special few are endowed with enough inner strength from birth, most people need to gradually develop it, often by making some sort of sacrifice, often in the form of asceticism (Keeler 1987: 44–48). Many temporarily give up physical comforts as they engage in ascetic practices such as fasting, going without sleep, abstaining from sex, meditating, and soaking in rivers late at night (see also Geertz 1960: 311, 321–326; Keeler 1987: 41–48; Mulder 2005: 51). Other forms of sacrifice are material—such as the money I forfeited to fly to Java, to pay for lessons, and to sponsor recording sessions. Sometimes sacrifice was inadvertent, as when an individual fell ill, unintentionally sacrificing health and physical comfort as he or she received ilmu. In making a sacrifice, a person strengthens his or her mind and body to be a container that is strong enough to hold spiritual knowledge, a potent substance.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Stunning Males and Powerful Females by Christina Sunardi. Copyright © 2015 Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. Excerpted by permission of UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS PRESS.
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