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Comparative study of Indo-Malaysian societies has pointed to watercraft as an important symbol for social organisation. Many Indo-Malaysian communities live on coasts or small islands, where watercraft are a visible feature of daily life. When communities are located inland and lack specialist watercraft, yet boat symbolism plays an important role in their lore and mortuary practices, this leads to the supposition that the watercraft symbolism reflects inherited ancestral beliefs. This contribution documents an example of this kind from Enrekang in the rugged hinterland of South Sulawesi. During a survey of boat-shaped coffins in disused cemeteries in caves and cliff niches, reports were collected on the traditional role of these coffins in transporting the deceased to the spirit world. Radiocarbon dates from the coffins (after calibration) predominantly date to between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries AD, although the antiquity of the coffins themselves may be focused on the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, after allowing for the 'inbuilt age' in timber from long-lived trees. The use of these coffins ceased with the conversion of the populace to Islam, but the boat remains as an important metaphor for the expression of social relations in Enrekang. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the results of research done by the author on anthropomorphic wooden sculptures in the Alor-Pantar Archipelago, specifically in the Tanjung Muna area of Pantar, Indonesia. Using photographs of objects purchased by European art collectors, the author elicited responses in interviews regarding local mythology. She also interviewed local traders and dealers who had sold the sculptures in order to document information regarding their origins. Results show that traditional marriage rules, black magic, and a forswearing of ancestor worship were involved in the sales of the sculptures, and that the sellers clearly thought they were trading things they did not value for something which was of value.

This paper examines two leading social roles in the island of Tidore: that of the traditional clan leaders and that of the civil servants, who advance two competing versions of Islam. While the traditional Tidore Islam espoused by the clan leaders is integrated with ancestor worship, the civil servants espouse a more strictly Qur'anic Islam endorsed by the Indonesian state ideology of Pancasila and modernisation. The two forms of Islam have come to represent a struggle for political power within Tidore society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]