Anita Lundberg

Being Lost at Sea: Ontology, Epistemology and a Whale Hunt

This article probes the sense of loss attendant upon beginning fieldwork in the whale-hunting village of Lamalera in Eastern Indonesia. This feeling of ontological absence was heightened when four boats were towed away by a harpooned whale, a tragedy which invoked the origin story of the first whale hunt that tells how Lamalera ancestors disappeared at sea. Each of these tales, those of the ethnographer and those of the whale hunters, speaks of the psychoanalytic fear of lack. Yet the details of their narration suggest that the syncopated moments in these heroic quests are cracks through which a different story may begin to emerge. Informed by theories ranging from feminism to phenomenology to anthropology, this article proposes that the space of no-thing offers new ways of being and knowing. Syncope is thus a vital moment in the stories that inform our lives, whether these be fiction, tales of adventure, fieldwork experiences, cultural performances and myths - or the disciplined story of the practice of anthropology itself.

Time Travels in Whaling Boats

Reading this article is to embark on an adventure through certain ethnographic and archaeological texts about a specific form of boat construction. The voyage sets out from the village of Lamalera in Eastern Indonesia where whaling boats continue to be built according to traditions passed on by the ancestors. However, while researchers write about boats, they simultaneously board the boats in order to construct the sequence of their narratives. Whether they journey back through the eastern archipelagos in search of the origin of a boats design; or follow the plank by plank construction sequence; or whether they find a leak in previous boat building discourse - all are involved in intricate relations of becoming through the materiality of the very boats they desire to observe and describe. Narratives are premised on unquestioned notions of linear time and travel. In this article, however, readers find themselves carried along on a different voyage, where time and travel are always in the here and now.

Voyage of the ancestors

The people of the subsistence whale-hunting village of Lamalera in Eastern Indonesia continue to hunt whales according to the traditions of the ancestors, and through this ritual practice the memory of the ancestors is brought to life. Similarly, in the retelling of the myth of the heroic origin voyage the ancestors are reawakened. This paper engages in a rereading of texts that seek to trace the Lamaleran origin myth back to its beginning. It suggests that even as we write about myths we are simultaneously originating our own stories through them. Thus, as academics journey via these myths back through the islands of the eastern archipelagos in search of origins - from Lamalera on the island of Lembata, to the land of Lepan Batan, through the province of Maluku and back to Sulawesi - the structure of this story acts to originate their own discourses. All such origin stories are involved in intricate relations of becoming through the very myths they desire to uncover.

Asian-Australian nexus: an educational challenge

The Asian century raises a number of challenges that derive from convergence, global multicentredness, and the emergence of a more engaged diverse world. Some nations use multiculturalism as a tool to address these challenges. However, in a diverse and globalizing world, it is appreciating what we share in common rather than notions of difference that will become more important in enabling harmonious and evolving relationships to prosper and feed creativity.

A Gift of Whale Meat On the Flesh of the No-Thing

This article arises from a performance of the exchange of whale meat as experienced during ethnographic fieldwork in the subsistence whale hunting village of Lamalera, Eastern Indonesia. The animist-Catholic beliefs of Lamalerans serve to sustain this ancestral ritual. Underlying orthodox western analyses of gift and exchange is a notion of economics based on a principle of scarcity. The article demonstrates how this assumption is associated with the psychoanalytic fear of lack, and offers an alternative reading of gift and exchange informed by: feminist theories of an economy of excess; Confucian notions of the ceremonial; and Buddhist and Taoist philosophies of no-thing as the space of never-ending potential.

Living cities: tropical imaginaries

This special issue of eTropic concerns living cities in the tropics and how they are conceived through the imagination. The collection of papers reminds us that urban environments are both created and creative spaces concerned with peopled and lived experiences and their interaction with material, cultural and natural environments. The issue is interested in processes of tropical space and place-making, with an emphasis on key areas that make up lived cities in the tropics: architecture, design, creative industries and economies, circular economy, neoliberalism, displacement, heritage, urban myths, narratives, cultural and natural landscapes, sustainable practices, and everyday life.

Global discourses and power/knowledge: theoretical reflections on futures of higher education during the rise of Asia

Abstract This paper re-reads a selection of critical interdisciplinary theories in an attempt to open a space in higher education for cross-cultural dialogue during the rise of Asia. Theories of globalization, deterritorialization, power/knowledge and postcolonialism indicate that students and academics have the ability to re-imagine and influence globalization processes in higher education. The current power effects of global discourses restrict the imaginaries and territories of globalization – leading to specific enactments in ways that prioritize western understandings of higher education. The paper argues for the need to explore hegemonic discursive formations of globalization to uncover processes of “othering” and the subjugation of knowledges. In this regard, a postcolonial perspective can help by opening up scenarios for the future of higher education in the Asian Century.

Borderless Psychology in South East Asia: History, Current State and Future Directions

Psychology is well underway in becoming a borderless science and discipline, with universal knowledge that can be applied in countries across the globe. This study explores the history and current status of psychology education in Australia, Singapore and Malaysia as these are major areas in which transnational exchanges in psychology education take place. The data accrued from research for this article informs discussions on the universality of psychology education today and raises important questions about the future of the discipline in Asian societies.

Transnational Psychology: A Case Study of South East Asia

In the last two decades transnational education has intensified. This paper provides a case study of transnational education in South East Asia by mapping historical and current transnational psychology education in Australia, Singapore and Malaysia. Given psychology’s roots in Europe and the United States of America, and its close interrelation with norms of ‘western’ societies, the data accrued from research for this paper raises important questions regarding how South East Asian countries are dealing with foreign influence through education.