Networks of a Diaspora Society

This project explores the networks of the Hadhrami diaspora in Indonesia. It represents the extension of a previous research project based at the Social Anthropology Unit, Austrian Academy of Sciences, bearing the title "Hadhramis in Indonesia. Ethnic Identity of Yemeni Diaspora Groups Today". Having conducted field research in the core region of the Hadhrami diaspora in Indonesia, i.e. the island of Java, as well as in Sumatra and Bali, the current project extends its focus to peripheral regions in Indonesia, namely to Central and North Sulawesi (Palu, Gorontalo, Manado), the Moluccas (Ternate) and West Irian Jaya (Sorong). Furthermore, the current project includes the Hadhramaut as a research site, since it became clear during the previous project that diaspora networks between Indonesia and the Hadhramaut are gaining in importance. This project studies three networks of relationships: the networks between the Hadhrami communities and the host societies in Indonesia, the networks connecting the diaspora with the Hadhramaut, and the global networks of the Hadhrami diaspora as facilitated by global media and communications. Thus, theoretically this project relies on current approaches in social and cultural anthropology that connect the study of diaspora societies with research on phenomena of contemporary globalisation. Furthermore, this project has its focus on the constructions of homeland and diaspora, of centre and periphery, among Hadhramis in Indonesia. In addition to the study of Hadhramis` integration into the local societies and of their transnational relations, this project focuses also on the intraethnic relations of Hadhramis who are divided into two groups in Indonesia: the so-called `Alawiyyin or sada, claiming descent from the prophet Mohammad and practicing a traditional, Sufi influenced Islam, and the other Hadhramis, who are active in or at least closely associated with the modernist/reformist Islamic organisation al-Irsyad. Given its methodological emphasis on ethnography and comparison, this project is designed to partake in a wider reflection on the method of comparison in anthropology. In fact, this project studies regional variations by comparing the different research sites in peripheral eastern Indonesia among themselves and with the research sites of the previous project in Java, Sumatra and Bali. Topics that will be compared are Hadhramis` relations to the local population, their transnational relations and their internal relations, namely between the `Alawiyyin and the Irsyadis. Topics that suit distant comparison concern `Alawiyyin religious practice by comparing their religious and ritual life in Indonesia with the Hadhramaut. Furthermore, the rich work of historians on the Hadhrami diaspora enables the researchers of this project to study temporal variation.

The project explored Hadhrami communities in peripheral regions in Eastern Indonesia, i.e. Central and Northern Sulawesi (Palu, Gorontalo, Manado), the Moluccas (Ternate) and West Papua (Sorong), by comparing them with Hadhrami settlements on Java, Indonesia`s central island. These comparisons generated the following results: Today`s settlement pattern in Eastern Indonesia points to a less strict implementation of colonial policies, i.e. of the so-called pass and quarter systems that obliged Hadhramis to live in separate city quarters. Compared to Java, it was thus easier for Hadhramis to develop relations with the local population which led to the closer inter-ethnic relations that can be observed today. Concerning the institutionalisation of the diaspora, in Central and Northern Sulawesi the first Hadhrami organisations were founded later than on Java. The major Hadhrami organisation Al- Khairaat was founded in Palu, Central Sulwesi, in 1930 by Sayyid Idrus Al-Jufri, a Hadhrami sayyid (pl. sada) or descendant of the prophet Mohammad. Al-Khairaat represents today the biggest Islamic organisation in Eastern Indonesia. It became clear during the project that its growth was rendered possible by the incorporation of non-sada Hadhramis and local Muslims. Hadhramis in Eastern Indonesia thus do not represent a "divided minority", as they do on Java, where the two groups, sada and non-sada Hadhramis, are organised in different institutions and cannot attract such a large following among local Muslims. Al-Khairaat has also contributed to considerable changes within the Hadhrami communities in Eastern Indonesia through its women`s organisation Wanita Islam Al-Khairaat (WIA) enhancing the role of Hadhrami women in education and in public life. Furthermore the project can show that today Hadhrami women increasingly enter the business domains of their fathers and husbands. As well, they have developed their own business networks which contribute to their expanding agency. The project could also show that in current times of heightened mobilities, in which Indonesia is not only crossed by transnational flows but also experiences a "globalization within" the country, Hadhramis in Eastern Indonesia were able to intensify and extend their kin and trade networks to Java, especially Jakarta, whereto Hadhramis from Eastern Indonesia have been migrating in greater numbers since the 1970s; a process that influences their centre-periphery, homeland-diaspora relations and imaginations. Finally, it became clear that since the fall of Suharto in 1998 Hadhrami networks in Indonesia, i.e. particularly relations between Java and Eastern Indonesia, were influenced and to a certain extent strained by violent interreligious conflicts and by Islamist radicalisms, since Hadhramis - as this project is able to show - occupy different positions in opposition to and within Islamist movements.