The Migration of Religions, part 2 of 2
Bali: A Hieroglyphics of the Sacred
By Sumita Chakravarty
Religion, one might say, is the struggle for the soul of a place. In Bali, this struggle still manifests itself between an externally-driven economy of tourism and an internally-driven (for want of a better term) sensibility of the sacred. To the cynical, the two might be closely intertwined, since tourism sites rely heavily on the island’s many temples as sources of attraction, along with its beaches and abundant tropical vegetation.
Given the increasing centrality of tourism as a source of income for many governments in the contemporary world, religious edifices, particularly if they are ancient, have been thrown open to the public: St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City, Rome, the Blue Mosque in Istanbul, the exquisite temples of Kyoto, Japan, virtually the entire city of Jerusalem are some noteworthy examples. But my biggest surprise was in Moscow, where church after church could be visited, but no building of a remotely political nature could be approached!
While place and architecture have become such hallmarks of religion’s grandeur and endurance through time, it is the quotidian and performative aspects of the local religion that reveal its true power. They are the outward manifestations of the process whereby, as in all migrations, certain elements drop away while others are strengthened, added to, and absorbed into a way of life. Bali is known as the island with a thousand temples and some of these are indeed marvels of architecture, but what strikes one is more immediate and sensory: a profusion of little shrines, statuettes and figurines of gods and holy personalities, animals, plant life, and demons, lots and lots of demons (see gallery of images below). Some are laughing, many have their mouths open as though to devour everything, but almost none of them instils fear or revulsion. In the town of Ubud, there are whole streets with workshops that display hundreds of these carvings and sculptures, in sizes that range from very small to several storeys high. Both private homes and public places such as squares and buildings no doubt fuel the demand for these sculptures and provide livelihood for local artisans.
Hinduism migrated to Bali many centuries ago, ostensibly through traders who brought their gods and rituals with them, and these were absorbed into local traditions. Yet, like all migrations, the Hinduism developed in Bali has distinctive characteristics. God is formless, a significant departure from Indian Hinduism in which it is customary to give the divine a human or semi-human form (with a spouse, and a pet animal or helper). The shrines that can be seen everywhere, in homes as well as on the sides of streets, are empty rather than with the figure of a deity. At the same time, all the Hindu gods — Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva, Parvati, and several others — are worshipped. Offerings are made in small squares made of banana leaves, with rice and a sweet or fruit. Hindu festivals are observed and sometimes a whole town shuts down because of it.
Almost fifty years ago, American anthropologist Clifford Geertz, in speaking of conversion by means of the “missionary religions” of Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism in relation to Bali, wrote perceptively:
“For Bali, however, such a course seems precluded. Christian missionaries have never made much progress on the island and, connected as they are with the discredited colonial regime, their chances would now seem poorer than ever. Nor are the Balinese likely to become Muslims in large numbers, despite the general Islamism of Indonesia. They are, as a people, intensely conscious and painfully proud of being a Hindu island in a Muslim sea, and their attitude toward Islam is that of the duchess to the bug. To become either Christian or Muslim would be tantamount, in their eyes, to ceasing to be Balinese, and, indeed, an occasional individual who is converted is still considered, even by the most tolerant and sophisticated, to have abandoned not just Balinese religion but Bali, and perhaps reason, itself.” (Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures, 1973).
Geertz’s prediction that the island’s religious ways could be swept away by modernization has turned out to be wrong: at the end of the second decade of the 2ist century, Bali still remains true to its Hindu beliefs, traditions, and practices. Its “bustling ritualism” and “busy-work routines” seem to mediate between its outer-facing and inner-facing selves.
Perhaps a unique amalgam of the theatrical and the existential, of life as a performance and the world a stage, ideas as old as humanity itself, is behind the lived experience of Hinduism in Bali. The masks that I found casually laid out on the side of a road in Ubud, ostensibly made of local materials of stone and volcanic ash, and more “earthly” than the temple demons, seemed in a strange way to capture the meaning behind Bali’s religiosity. However the Balinese have approached the sacred, having a sense of duality and ambiguity (as foregrounded by the friendly demons and grinning masks) betokens a culture that is comfortable with itself and therefore with the outside world.
In The Fate of Place: A Philosophical History, Edward Casey argues that place is fundamental to our sense of being, so much so that it has been ignored for its very obviousness. Thinkers have been preoccupied with contemplating time at the expense of space and place. Migration, of course, whether of people or ideas, brings us back resoundingly to place as an arena of settlement and struggle, but also politics and competition. Bali is an invitation to us to think deeply about place, its role in religion and culture, its contested status within discourses of migration. As an entity that is perpetually redefined and remade, place has the burden of appearing stable and dynamic at the same time. Such a feat is evident in the performative and theatrical quality of Bali’s visual landscape.
The Invisible Wall to Keep Migrants Out and Supporters Pleased
The perils of political predictions and the power of the invisible wall
By Berkley Wilson
This was supposed to be a piece about how the Trump administration has erected an invisible wall to slow the numbers of documented migrants to the country and how the President’s favorite cable news network is complicit in helping him build a ‘big beautiful wall’ only his supporters can see. But after recent news of possible ‘high crimes and misdemeanors,’ perhaps this is a meaningless line of thought.
It’s pretty clear the Trump campaign has data to suggest that they need to show him at the border, with a wall under construction, so they can erect a wall in their supporters heads. It will be a wall only they can see. They likely won’t drive down from Ohio and Michigan to fact check Fox News.
Over the summer, the President and his media allies helped get some b-roll footage for use in later campaign ads, showing ‘new wall’ being erected along the southern border. Fox News National Correspondent Ed Henry, one of the few on-air journalists still doing ‘news,’ tagged along as the President toured the construction site. After a brief interview with the President, Henry went on Fox News and reported on the new wall being built:
“We’ve had Democrats on the show saying the President is not telling the truth,” Henry reported. “That’s what they claim when he says and boasts that there’s new wall being built. And I’m here to say: the President is right and they are wrong. And that’s not an opinion, that’s from my reporting with my own two eyes.”
“I was there, there is in fact miles and miles of new wall built, and it’s working,” Henry added.
Henry’s comments were absorbed into the conservative media ecosystem and the president’s claims went unchecked.
According to Politifact, the wall has received about $6.2 billion in funding to build 334 miles of a “new border wall system.” So far, only 224 miles have been completed. This is to erect new barriers in place of existing structures, not a ‘new wall.’ There are 654 miles of border wall in the U.S., according to Customs and Border Protection data, the same number of miles that existed at the start of President Trump’s term.
The Trump 2020 campaign tweeted out the Ed Henry segment, heralding Ed Henry’s ‘news’ credentials as proof of Democrats’ complicity in lying about ‘new wall.’
Team Trump knows that the virtual wall built by the administrative state is far more effective at keeping people out than a concrete barrier in the desert, but there’s a dilemma in the virtual wall: It doesn’t look good on television. It can only be shown in charts and numbers. There is nothing tangible or secure about it. A concrete barrier being lowered into place by a construction vehicle is far more powerful at conveying the image of protection and strength the President seeks to project. The only way to do that is to rebuild the existing wall and get plenty of video for upcoming Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram ads. The Trump team is well aware of the fog that seeps and settles into the media ecosystem during a chaotic campaign. They have conditioned their supporters to disavow all mass media sources of information. They will make assertions and claims using sketchy video and made-up facts. They construct the border wall knowing nobody will fact-check them. And even if they do, so what? The physical wall is merely an aspirational project that will take time. The invisible wall constructed by Trump and his appointees in control of the administrative state is working far more effectively.
According to the American Immigration Lawyers Association, the main federal agency tasked with processing new entrants into the country, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), has become so bogged down that it has reached crisis levels. From 2014-2018, 94 percent of form types processed by USCIS were at a much slower rate. As of 2018, there are over 5.69 million backlogged immigration cases. These delays ripple through the social structure, causing family pain, economic hardship and an increased risk of harm to those seeking asylum. It is a highly effective wall.
If you have stayed away from the news to lower your anxiety but want to know what is going on with the Trump administration’s migration policy, watch John Oliver’s monologue from September 15, 2019 on legal migration to the U.S. Oliver has some personal experience as he came to the U.S. on a green card.
Some of the President’s early key supporters in the media know these facts and have proclaimed his presidency “over” for failing to fight for a border wall and a zero-migration policy.
Ann Coulter, the conservative author, media personality, and once a highly influential source of intellectual ballast for the current administration, recently told the New York Post that the country is ‘doomed,’ because Trump has not lived up to his promise to put a halt to all types of migration. Coulter, interviewed for the ‘Living’ section, takes the reporter on a tour of her neighborhood, The Upper East Side of Manhattan (one of the wealthiest neighborhoods on the planet), a place she deems accepting of her hostility to immigrants, even offering her cupcakes as a token of inclusivity.
In a talk radio interview, Coulter demanded to know when and how the new wall is going to be built saying:
“It’s very suspicious that we can’t get a straight answer from them on is any new wall being built where there was nothing before? Now admittedly I’ve seen about 50 miles on a 3,000-mile border, so who cares? Fifty miles does nothing when you have a 3,000-mile border. “
It’s also very suspicious that she keeps harping on the effectiveness of a physical barrier while the very real invisible wall is far more effective. Coulter once told Vice: “I have been in heaven since June 16—[the] Mexican rapist speech.”
AN UPDATE….
We’ve updated and refreshed our datasets and news archives over the past few weeks. Remember to follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
If you are interested in learning more or becoming a part of the Media+Migration Network, please contact us at migrationmappingproject@gmail.com.