Table Of ContentReturn to Baguia: an ethnographic museum
collection on the edge of living memory
Joanna Barrkman
September 2017
A thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy of
The Australian National University
© Copyright by Joanna Barrkman 2017
All Rights Reserved
Declaration
This thesis contains no material that has been accepted for the award of any other degree or
diploma in any university. To the best of the author’s knowledge, it contains no material
previously published or written by another person, except where due reference is made in
the text.
Joanna Barrkman
September 2017
iii
Acknowledgments
I first sighted the Baguia Collection at the Museum der Kulturen Basel in 2009 during a
research trip supported by the Sidney Myer Trust. The scope and scale of the Baguia
Collection struck me as being extraordinary, particularly in the context of loss experienced
in Timor-Leste in recent decades. It was my good fortune to research an ethnographic
collection held in perpetuity by one of Europe’s most innovative and progressive
ethnographic museums, the Museum der Kulturen Basel. Thanks to Dr Anna Schmid,
Director, Museum der Kulturen Basel, for her interest and stimulating conversations during
my visits to Basel. Mr Richard Kunz, Southeast Asia Curator, has diligently supported this
research; at every twist and turn he has responded with enthusiasm and acumen. For this I
owe him a debt of gratitude. Thanks to other staff who have fielded my requests.
I have benefited greatly from having Associate Professor Christopher Ballard as Chair of my
supervisory panel. Chris’s intelligence, academic rigour and thoughtfulness distinguish his
approach to all that he does. Dr Anna Edmundson, Dr Louise Hamby and Dr Hilary Howes
have also provided invaluable advice and comments. The diverse expertise and knowledge
that each of these supervisors has brought to bear on my research and thesis have been
invaluable: thank you. I also thank: Jo Bushby, Lindsaye Brown, Associate Professor John
Carty, Kay Dancey, Dr Phillipa Deveson, Stella Diao, Kirsten Farrell, Victoria Firth-Smith,
Suzanne Knight, Junran Lei, Adelaide Lopez, Dr Robyn McKenzie, Associate Professor
Inger Mewburn, Karina Pelling, Dr Sharon Peoples, Namita Rai, Professor Laura-Jane Smith,
Candida Spence and Lan Tran.
My research in Baguia in 2014 was supported by the Australian Endeavour Awards
Fellowship. Obrigada to all at Timor Aid who graciously hosted my research visit to Timor-
Leste: Florentino Samento, Rosalia Soares, Felicidade Correia, Francisco Dias Gonçalves
and Carlos de Oliveira (who steered me through night and day; Fiaran oin ba futura!). Thanks
to linguist Camilla Swack and Timor Aid translators: Nini Marques, Uka Pinta and Sergio
Marques, Jacquelina MF Ximenes and to Salustianus Fraga for his diligent transcriptions. Dr
Hilary Howes, Dr Christiane Keller, Richard Kunz and Julia Schult assisted with German
translations: danke schön.
Jacquelina MF Ximenes and Salustianus Fraga ably assisted me in Baguia – thankyou both.
To the many friends I made in Baguia who willingly engaged with me and in vited me into
their homes and lives, particularly Leopoldina Guterres, Maria Freitas, Bernardo Ximenes,
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Martinho Amaral and Pedro Lebre – thank you. I also extend my appreciation to His
Excellency Mr Abel Guterres, Ambassador to Australia , and his family for their generosity
of accommodation at Kaikasa in Baguia. Thanks also to Mana Adelia for her help in Baguia
and to Jose da Costa for his assistance with Makasae terminology for the OCCAMS database.
David Palazón and Victor de Sousa kindly provided invaluable technical support in Dili.
Thanks to friends and colleagues who have read and commented on parts of this thes is,
including Julia Collingwood, Richard Kunz and Dr Matthew Stephen, and to Sue Bassett for
copy editing and proofreading. To other family and friends who have been part of the
journey, thankyou: Trish Barrkman, Jennifer Barrkman, Judi Louise Barrkman, Toni Bauman
and Mick Dodson, Jan Carter, Michael Christie, Anne Finch, Susanne Jones, Christiane keller
and Ludger Dinkler, Suzanne Knight and Brenton McGeachie, Lisa Patamisi and Nicky
Fearn, and Matthew Stephen.
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Abstract
The question of what significance ethnographic museum collections might hold for source
communities in the current era, particularly when collections sit on the edge of living memory,
is explored in this thesis through a case -study of the Baguia Collection and its virtual return
to the Makasae people of Baguia Sub -district, Timor-Leste, in 2014.
The Baguia Collection was acquired by Dr Alfred B ühler on behalf of the Museum der
Kulturen Basel, Switzerland , in 1935 using salvage ethnology methodologies. This diasporic
collection now exists in Switzerland as a record of Bühler’s accomplishments and of Swiss
ethnographic history, and as a time capsule of Makasae heritage.
This research explores an initial phase of engagement between the residents of Baguia and
the Baguia Collection. Makasae responses to this Collection, which consists of 691 material
culture objects and over 300 historical photos, raise issues pertinent to contemporary
museology practice as it seeks to identify appropriate relational processes in collaborating
with source communities. The research findings support proposals for the flexible, pro-
technological access and digital return of museum collections to source communities, yet
considers the inherent limitations and complexities in this methodology as well.
I argue that the Baguia Collection has shared heritage values and that digital access
arrangements will enhance the restitution of cultural knowledge and its subsequent inter-
generational transmission in Baguia while also providing the Museum der Kulturen Basel
with more updated and relevant information about the Collection. My project demonstrates
that access to digital images of the Collection has enabled residents of Baguia to assert their
cultural authority over the Collection, and that with further digital access they would activate
the Collection to meet their own development agendas. By animating the Collection through
‘acts of transfer’ the Baguia community illustrated the potential for the Collection to become
a source of metacultural production that reinvigorates contemporary Makasae identity and
develops Makasae social and cultural capital, while ultimately enhancing their capacity to
aspire.
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Table of contents
Declaration ........................................................................................................................................ iii
Acknowledgments ............................................................................................................................. v
Abstract ............................................................................................................................................. vii
Table of contents .............................................................................................................................. ix
List of maps ...................................................................................................................................... xv
List of figures ................................................................................................................................. xvii
Acronyms and initialisms ............................................................................................................. xxv
Glossary – Makasae ....................................................................................................................... xxv
Glossary – Indonesian ................................................................................................................. xxxi
Glossary – Portuguese ................................................................................................................. xxxi
Glossary – Naueti ........................................................................................................................ xxxii
Glossary – Tetun ......................................................................................................................... xxxii
Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1
Background to the research ............................................................................................................. 2
Challenges to re-animating historic ethnographic collections .................................................... 8
Twenty-first century museums: shifting paradigms and practices ........................................... 11
Return, restitution and repatriation of museum collections to source communities ............ 21
Museums as relational entities and contact zones ...................................................................... 26
Scope of this research project ....................................................................................................... 30
Thesis outline ................................................................................................................................... 33
Conclusion........................................................................................................................................ 35
The Baguia Collection and the Online Cultural Collections Analysis and
Management System ............................................................................................................ 36
Note on translations, languages and place names ...................................................................... 37
Translations ...................................................................................................................................... 37
Place names ...................................................................................................................................... 38
Chapter 1: The Makasae of Baguia: their history, society and material world ........... 41
The Makasae and Naueti peoples ................................................................................................. 42
Notions of land, clan and duality .................................................................................................. 44
Baguia Sub-district – the land, produce, climate and population ............................................. 48
An historical overview of Baguia and Timor-Leste ................................................................... 56
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Makasae beliefs, social exchange practices and relationships ................................................... 70
The concept of falu and the oma falu............................................................................................. 73
Makasae material culture – the contemporary classification of objects based on customary
concepts ................................................................................................................................. 85
Conclusion ....................................................................................................................................... 93
Chapter 2: The influence of Germanic ethnography and physical anthropology
on the MKB and Alfred Bühler’s work .................................................................................. 97
The roots of European, Germanic and Swiss ethnographic museums .................................. 99
The foundations of Germanic and Swiss ethnographic practice ........................................... 101
The formation of Germanic notions of race ............................................................................ 105
The establishment of European ethnographic museums and salvage collecting ................ 108
Alfred Russel Wallace, mapping, biogeography and human biogeography ......................... 112
Museum der Kulturen Basel........................................................................................................ 116
Paul and Fritz Sarasin ................................................................................................................... 118
Felix Speiser ................................................................................................................................... 121
Alfred Bühler ................................................................................................................................. 122
Wilhelm L Meyer’s role in the 1935 Expedition and the collection of physical
anthropological data .......................................................................................................... 128
Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 134
Chapter 3: The 1935 Expedition and the Baguia Collection at the
Museum der Kulturen Basel ........................................................................................ 137
The 1935 Expedition .................................................................................................................... 138
The collecting process in Baguia ................................................................................................ 151
Packaging and transportation of the field acquisitions............................................................ 162
The accession, documentation and classification of the Baguia Collection, 1936–1937 ... 164
The Baguia Collection and its historical photographs ............................................................. 174
Accessioning the historical photographs into the MKB collection ....................................... 177
The display of the Baguia Collection at the Museum der Kulturen Basel – a Swiss
heritage collection? ............................................................................................................. 180
Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 187
Chapter 4: Engaging with Makasae objects – then and now ........................................ 191
The digital return of cultural and archival material .................................................................. 193
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