The Highland people of Cambodia

The Indigenous Highlanders of the Northeast: An Uncertain Future

Joanna White

 

Part One—Introduction                                                                                 p. 5

Part Two--Environment and Religion                                                           p. 5

Part Three--Social Organisation                                                                   p. 6

Part Four--Agricultural Life                                                              p. 8

Part Five--The Dynamics of History                                                 p. 10

a) Early history                                                                                                            p. 11

b) The Sangkum period and beyond                                                                p. 14

c) "Retreading the rice husk"--after the Pol Pot period                                               p. 18

6) Aspects of Ethnic Identity                                                             p. 19

a) The village and customary law                                                                    p. 20

b) "Their custom is helping each other"--communal processes                                    p. 24

c) Identity and difference as expressed through mythology                             p. 25

d) "Us" and "them": contemporary understanding of difference                                p. 27

e) Changing behaviour                                                                                                p. 28

Part Seven--Inter-Ethnic Relations                                                              p. 31

a) Khmer perceptions of highlanders                                                              p. 31

b) Khmer value systems                                                                                                p. 31

c) The language barrier                                                                                              p. 32

d) The definition of poverty                                                                             p. 33

Part Eight--A Changing Environment                                                           p. 34

a) Commercial land use                                                                                               p. 34

b) The interface between customary law and commercial interest                                p. 35

c) Socio-economic transformation and the preservation of culture: a contradiction in terms?

Part Nine--Protecting the Rights of Highlanders                                         p. 38

a) Indigenous peoples or minorities?                                                               p. 38

b) Consultation and representation                                                                 p. 38

c) A pluralistic Cambodian society                                                                  p. 39

 

Notes                                                                                                              p. 40

Bibliography                                                                                                   p. 42

 

Relations Inter-ethniques et Spécificité des Populations Indigènes du Cambodge

Frédéric Bourdier

Première Partie - Présentation Générale                                                                 p. 43

Caractères Généraux et Classification Ethnolinguistique                                                        p. 43

Distribution à l'Echelle Nationale                                                                                p. 45

Deuxième Partie - Les Groupes en Présence : De l'Histoire aux Mythes d'Origine

Les Premiers Témoignages : Le Choc d'une Rencontre ou d'une Redécouverte ?                    p. 46

Les Mythes d'Origine comme Manifestation des Rapports Inter-ethniques                              p. 50

Formation et Transformation des Groupes                                                                  p. 52

Troisième Partie - Les Cadres Morphologiques Contemporains du Contact        p. 55

Le Contexte Démographique                                                                                       p. 55

a) Rappel au niveau du pays

b) L'état du peuplement des provinces de Mondolkiri et Ratanakiri

Évolution de l'Implantation Géographique et Ecologique des Populations                  p. 59

Quatrième Partie - Continuité et Changement des Principaux Symboles Identitaires

Un Mode de Vie Sédentaire à l'Intérieur d'un Territoire Circonscrit                           p. 62

Divinités, Ancêtres et Parenté : Des Repères Fondamentaux de l'Identité Proto-Indochinoise

La Terre : Une Source de Vie Respectée                                                                                  p. 65

Une Connaissance de la Nature Assortie d'un Savoir Technique Elaboré                               p. 66

Cinquième Partie - Les Eléments de la Situation Interethnique : La Place des Populations Indigènes dans la Société Globale

Les Premières Tentatives d'Intégration                                                                                    p. 68

Du Traumatisme Historique à la Reconstitution des Villages                                       p. 69

Un Tournant dans les Relations Socio-Economiques                                                   p. 71

La Terre Convoitée                                                                                                      p. 74

L'Impact de la Politique Gouvernementale et des Initiatives Privées Extérieures                     p. 76

Les Autres Facteurs d'Interaction Socioculturelle                                                        p. 79

Sixième Partie - La Perception de l'Autre et de Soi-Même à travers les Attitudes Relationnelles

Les Représentations Sociales Véhiculées au Sujet des Populations Autochtones                     p. 82

Ce que Pensent les Populations Indigènes d'Elles-Mêmes et des Autres                                  p. 84

Les Manières Respectives de Concevoir le Développement                                         p. 86

Septième Partie – Conclusion                                                                                   p. 87

Reconstruction Identitaire ou Elaboration de Nouveaux Repères ?                             p. 87

Assimilation ou Pluralisme Culturel ?                                                                          p. 88

Perspectives                                                                                                                 p. 90

 

Notes                                                                                                                          p. 92

 

Bibliography                                                                                                               p. 96

The Indigenous Highlanders of the Northeast: An Uncertain Future

Joanna White

 

Part One--Introduction

There are over a dozen indigenous ethnic groups living in the highlands of Cambodia. These groups are often referred to as highlanders or hill-tribes, due to the fact that their traditional terrain has always been the upland forested regions where they cultivate hill rice. The northeastern region of the country is inhabited by the most diverse indigenous population, being home to the Brao, Jorai, Kachac, Kraol, Kraveth, Kreung, Kuy, Lun, Phnong, Stieng and Tampuan groups.*1 This report is based both on two months' research in the region carried out among the Jorai, Kreung and Tampuan (in Ratanakkiri province), the Phnong (in Mondolkiri province) and the Brao and Kuy (in Stung Treng province).

 

Due to the limited time available, the information presented here can only be considered representative of the communities with whom I was privileged to spend some time. I have attempted to present the experiences of these people in as representative and balanced a light as possible, and in good faith that this information will be used to enhance the understanding of their situation and their concerns. According to the requests of these individuals, I have preserved their anonymity.

 

In this paper I will outline the current ways of life, varied histories and experiences of these peoples, analyse their sense of their own ethnic identity and their relationship with other ethnic groups, and finally, following the initial aims of this research project, explore possible ways in which their rights can be ensured and protected. For the sake of convenience I will refer to these peoples as "highlanders" or "indigenous peoples"--but this implies a total unity or homogeneity, which is misleading. The highlanders are, in fact, many different ethnic groups with distinct languages, settled in self-contained villages, and wide variations and subtle differences in behaviour can be found both between groups and communities. However, the different highland groups share one common resource: the upland areas of Cambodia. Their religion and whole mode of existence has been founded on their relationship with this environment for centuries.

 

Part Two--Environment and Religion

In general terms the highlanders can be distinguished from their lowland neighbours not only by their long-standing inhabitation of the upland areas but also by their distinctive religion, which is bound to their surrounding environment, and by their use of semi-nomadic swidden agriculture techniques. According to local belief systems, the entire natural environment--the sky, earth, forest, water sources, hills, stones and rice fields-- are populated by a vast array of spiritual forces. These religious beliefs inspire both respect and fear, as the spirits are believed to have the power to influence the health, well-being and prosperity of villagers. For example, the primary forest areas surrounding villages are believed to be inhabited by forest spirits (one Brao elder described how "these trees were born in the time of the gods"), and it is forbidden to cut down trees in these areas. Doing so would arouse the anger of the spirits, resulting in the sickness or even death of the individuals responsible (as termed in the local languages--they would "do us").*2

 

In addition to these spirits of the natural world, spirits of the ancestors are also believed to have the power to protect or, if angered or not propitiated effectively, wreak havoc on the human world. At crucial stages of the agricultural cycle, in cases of illness where supernatural interference is believed to be the cause, in times of severe misfortune, or on other significant occasions (such as weddings or funerals), these various spiritual forces are offered animal sacrifices and rice wine as part of an organised communal ritual. The members of each village are bound together not just through kinship ties but also in a religious sense, as every village has its own guardian spirits which must be regularly propitiated with sacrificial offerings and feasts. Many villages are named after the forest sites and streams close to their location, as well as after the elders who were the first inhabitants of the settlement, and there is a wealth of local mythology concerning distinctive areas surrounding villages. For instance, the Phnong have strong links with the mountains surrounding their villages. Some communities make annual offerings to the spirits here. These practices are related to the belief that people used to live in these mountains and that the ancestors are still there.

 

"Before, people used to live in caves in the Namloeuw mountains. They saw the new forests which were created by the gods. Old Father Lenoy came out from the caves and told his people to follow. They brought their buffaloes with them. Some of the buffaloes got their horns stuck in the trunks of the trees in the forest and this blocked the way for everyone else. This is why today the Phnong people live in the forest but some still live far away deep in the mountains…. People also say this about the Rronorr mountains here. When people play gongs in their villages the ancestors at Rronorr also play the gongs; when people feast, so do the ancestors. They do the same thing as us." (Phnong elder, Mondolkiri).

 

The highlanders spend much of their time in or around the forest environment, whether they are working in the fields, watching livestock, gathering firewood, hunting, fishing or looking for fruits and leaves for foods and medicine. They are renowned for their knowledge of this forest terrain and for centuries have been sought out by neighbouring lowlanders wishing to exchange goods for the rare and lucrative products of the forest. Highlanders are known to have a unique detail of definition, categorisation and analysis of the trees, plants and other elements of their environment which does not exist any other language than their own.*3

 

Part Three--Social Organisation

Village structure varies from group to group. Kreung villages are constructed in a distinctive circular fashion with larger houses occupied by the heads of each extended family group built facing inwards towards a central longhouse where village meetings, communal feasts and ceremonies are held. All of the houses in the village are constructed from forest materials, wood and bamboo, and built on stilts, with leaf or bamboo tile roofs. Smaller houses form an inner circle and are built in the vicinity of and often facing the larger houses. These smaller houses are inhabited by unmarried teenagers or individual nuclear families of couples and their children, all of whom are still under the authority of the elders of their family group.

 

The Jorai organise their villages in a different manner. They construct vast longhouses inhabited by each extended family. The inner area of the house is divided into living compartments for each couple and their children. Teenagers often stay together in a designated area. The Jorai have a matrilineal clan system and it is forbidden for those of the same clan to marry. According to Jorai mythology, the clans are named after the place where their ancestors were first born.*4 Some of these clans also have strict food taboos whose roots are also detailed in mythology. For example:

 

"Some of the Chom clan are forbidden to eat beef, and some [are forbidden] to eat pork. This is due to a story from the past. There were two sisters living together. One day the older one was drying her cotton ready to weave when a cow came along and ate it. When the older sister came back to the house and found her cotton had disappeared she was very angry. In the house the sisters kept a bird which knew how to speak, but not very clearly. The bird tried to tell the sister what had happened, but as it could not speak properly the sister misunderstood: the Jorai words for cow ('mmoh') and younger sister ('mmo') are very close and so she thought the bird was telling her that her younger sister had eaten the cotton! When the younger sister returned from the forest the older sister was very angry with her. 'It was not me, it was the cow,' said the younger girl, but the older would not believer her and beat her very badly, forcing her to run away in fear. Later, when the cow was killed, the older sister found her cotton inside its stomach. She realised her mistake and felt terrible pity. She missed her younger sister very much and went to look for her in the forest. She took a pig and made a ceremony to the spirits, praying for the return of her sister. When she found her sister she begged her to return home, and offered her some of the pork. The younger sister could not accept this offer of reconciliation. She said she could not eat the meat of the sacrificed pig as she was afraid it would make her die. She refused to return to the village. From this time on the older sister swore never to eat cow meat again because of her mistake, while the younger sister never ate pig. These taboos have been handed down from generation to generation. The descendants of the younger sister are the Cham people, who speak the same language as the Jorai. (Jorai elder, Ratanakkiri).

 

While within villages there appear to be active allegiances between members of the same clan, and though the different clans have their own village clan elders who deal with clan affairs, there is no formal organisation of clans beyond the village level.

 

Tampuan villages provide a unique case as village structure depends on the geographical situation of the village. Those villages situated close to Kreung settlements are built in a similar manner to the Kreung, whereas the Tampuan in the southeastern areas of Ratanakkiri, bordering on Jorai communities, construct family longhouses like their Jorai neighbours. This latter group, situated near the Jorai, is defined as the Tampuan-loeu (which means "upper" Tampuan, referring here to a spatial geographical sense). All Tampuan follow the same matrilineal clan system as the Jorai and even share some clan names. Some of their religious behaviour depends on their geographical situation. Tampuan villages neighbouring Kreung communities have female spirit mediums with the power of spirit possession like those found in Kreung communities. Tampuan settlements further to the east, however, have spirit mediums who follow a different process of divination which is similar to that used in adjacent Jorai villages. This reveals the dynamic influence neighbouring groups have had on each other over time. Interestingly, in terms of their ethnic identity, both these "faces" of the Tampuan consider themselves to be the original Tampuan, though some of the Tampuan in the southeast describe the other Tampuan villages as "doing Kreung"--in other words, following the Kreung social system.

 

Little time was spent in Phnong villages, so an in-depth study was not possible, but it appears that teenagers live in the same house as their parents until well after they marry and make their own family. Phnong traditional houses are very different from those of other groups: they are built in a circular fashion on ground level rather than on stilts, with a roof made of large leaves. Villagers are divided into several groups (krom), occupying slightly separated areas of the village. These are in fact large groups of families organised by kinship affiliation. This appears to be the legacy of an organisational policy of the government of the People's Republic of Kampuchea (PRK) which the Phnong have retained.

 

Although the above descriptions reveal some of the substantial differences in social organisation, distinct patterns of behaviour and organisation can be discerned. For example, all of the groups studied share a matrilocal marriage system. Among the groups in Ratanakkiri this is organised through a process of marriage bi-locality: a newly married couple first spends several years living and farming with the bride's parents, then moves to the home of the groom's parents, until settling in the bride's village (the time lapse between moves and before settling varies, and is negotiated between the two sets of parents). Among the Phnong in Mondolkiri there is no bi-locality--the groom moves directly to live with the bride in her parental home.

 

Among all groups, respect for the family elders is fundamental. These individuals steward religious ceremonies such as feasts in the fields, offerings in the house for the ancestors or healing ceremonies for family members. It is their responsibility to manage these proceedings and begin ceremonies with an opening prayer (sen) to the spirits over jars of rice wine, inviting them to feast. These elders may also be called upon to mediate intra-family disputes. They also play a role in reminding the family of obligations to the ancestors and for preserving the family's oral history. Villagers described how within some families, the elders are careful that younger family members are taught the names of their recent ancestors in a chronological sequence which they learn by rote. The Phnong call this form of oral history gayow and are renowned locally for being able to recount many previous generations of ancestors.

 

Part Four--Agricultural Life

In traditional upland rice cultivation, forest areas are cleared by family groups and burnt to establish plots of land which are farmed for several years and provide families with their food staple of hill rice, together with fruits and vegetables. The pace of village life is governed by the agricultural cycle. Although villagers talk of lunar months, in practice the different months are invariably defined according to the agricultural work in hand.

 

Some families also cultivate paddy rice, sometimes due to past contact with Lao lowlanders, to contact with Khmers during the Sangkum Reastr Niyum or Pol Pot periods or, more recently, to government encouragement; but in all of these cases, paddy rice cultivation is just an addition to farming upland rice. The importance of retaining a dual system is perhaps exemplified by the practices of one Kreung village in Veunsai district, Ratanakkiri, where families farm paddy rice on one side of the Sesan river and hill rice on the other, which necessitates regular river crossings of people, goods and livestock.

 

The traditional system of upland rice cultivation is part of a long-term cycle in which new plots of land are cleared every year, allowing previously farmed plots to lie fallow until the forest cover grows again, by which time the land regains its fertility and is fit to be reused. Before clearing new areas of land for hill rice cultivation, spiritual approval must be procured. The head of the family group that wishes to cultivate a new area must first visit the site and make a few cuts to the trees there. Their dream the night after this visit is interpreted as a sign as to whether or not it is acceptable for the plot to be farmed. A dream of catching many fish, for instance, is seen as a good omen; a dream of fire is bad. Signs in the forest around the proposed field are also taken into account--if a snake is seen or the cries of a deer are heard, then the plot will not be cleared. Such signs inform much of villagers' time in the forest. The Jorai, for example, describe how they listen to the call of certain birds when walking through the forest. If the birds are "singing badly" then this is a bad omen and the Jorai they will not stay in the forest. Other groups described how if a tree falls on the path in front of them they cannot continue walking in the forest but must return to the village and make a spiritual offering. One Jorai villager made an analogy between this indigenous system of interpretation and that of the Khmers who visit fortune-tellers. In the same way that Khmers seek the fortune-tellers' advice to inform their actions, the highlanders rely on their own trusted system of divination.

 

If there is a positive dream regarding the use of a proposed new field plot it will be cleared and cultivated.*5 According to traditional customary law, families hold the rights over the land they farm. Every year, at certain stages of the agricultural cycle, different rites are performed: first to ensure the forest spirits are pacified and the work will therefore run smoothly; then when the rice has been planted to ensure the soul of the rice is called to the field for a good harvest. These rituals vary from community to community; the Kreung appear to have the most sophisticated series of rituals, with some villagers holding up to eight in one year.*6 Many of the Phnong hold three ceremonies while some of the Jorai hold even fewer, although a ceremony carried out when the rice is about half a metre high in the fields appears to be carried out by all groups. This is considered a crucial stage which can determine the success or failure of the harvest, and so an offering must be made to the soul of the rice (even the Jorai villagers who cultivate paddy rice still practise this ritual). Another key ritual is when the first harvest is taken in: villagers pray to the soul of the rice to "stay" in the field and ensure a bountiful harvest. Among the Phnong, when it is time to harvest the staple variety of rice, the family assembles at the rice field and makes an offering of the blood of a chicken and rice wine, first in the fields and then at the site of the rra-ay tree (a sacred tree which is transplanted from the forest and is where families tie cows or buffaloes when making large animal sacrifices; one is placed in the rice fields and one outside family houses at the time of a couples' marriage). After making these offerings the older women of the family sing to the soul of the rice, asking for a good harvest and for the family to work well together in their farming. After a small feast, the rest of the day is spent harvesting.

 

It may be worth clarifying at this point a few stereotypes about the nature of the swidden agriculture (or "slash and burn" as it is sometimes termed) practised by the highlanders. One widely held notion is that this method, by its very nature, is damaging to the environment. Prevailing contemporary theories, however, appear to be that this technique is perfectly sustainable and is, in fact, environmentally sensitive as long as population pressure on resources is limited--in other words, there is no drastic reduction in the land available or a sudden increase in the population utilising a given area.  This has been the case to date. Another idea apparently held by many Khmers is that this system of agriculture is so low-yielding that the highlanders who practise it are all starving or at least suffering from severe malnutrition. From the research carried out this is not the case, and many villagers described how they were often in a position to sell a surplus of their rice. The year of this study was in fact atypical, as the preceding year's harvest had been disastrous in many areas. Villagers in Ratanakkiri attributed this both to the loss of the soul of the rice and to uneven weather conditions at a crucial stage in the rice plants' early growth: heavy rainfall was interspersed with prolonged hot periods which killed many of the plants. However, it was not only those farming hill rice who had a bad year--floods in many areas also ruined crops of paddy rice.

 

Contrary to popular perceptions, the highlanders' way of life offers substantial food security, as various vegetables and fruits are cultivated on hill rice plots and other dietary supplements can be obtained from the forest by gathering leaves, plants, wild fruits, hunting and fishing. The regular religious feasts also offer the whole community access to a source of protein (at large animal sacrifices of cows and buffaloes the meat is distributed among every family in the village). At times when rice stocks fall low, villagers eat cultivated tubers and corn or wild tubers from the forest, and in times of severe need there are other traditional methods of security to draw on, which will be discussed later.

 

In short, ideas that the highlanders are desperately poor and starving are dangerously misleading. Their traditional way of life is not simply one of impoverished basic subsistence. As in any society, there are distinctions between rich and poor. One Phnong woman described:

 

"There has always been rich and poor. Before, the rich had elephants and could go a long way to trade salt."

 

Traditionally all families have shared equal access to the common resource of the forest to make their living. Wealth is invariably stored in the form of cows and buffaloes (and in the case of the Jorai and the Phnong, elephants) and the possession of particularly valued goods which have been obtained through a process of exchange between highland groups and outside traders, such as ancient gongs and wine jars. These objects still hold great prestige. Traditionally, livestock and elephants, rice, exotic forest goods such as elephant ivory, animal hides and teeth, wood, feathers, wild spices and herbs, have been exchanged with lowlanders for goods such as ceremonial gongs, pottery jars for storing rice wine (both important elements of religious ceremonies), beads, jewellery, salt and iron. Although many villagers are now becoming more accustomed to the money prized by the lowlanders, and though other material objects are taking on more value, this pattern of highland-lowland exchange is still in operation.

 

According to local beliefs, if there is excessive illness or many deaths in a short space of time, or an "unnatural" death (due to suicide or accident, for example), this signifies negative spirit activity. The highlanders say that the village is in a "hot" place, so they have to move. Another situation when a village moves is when villagers want to farm new areas of forest which are far from the original village site, or when the surrounding population is putting pressure on the land available. The elders then decide an appropriate site for the new village, ensuring the new choice has spiritual approval. Such traditions appear to have given rise to the general conception that highlanders clear land indiscriminately, roaming from area to area and constantly shifting village sites. Although people talked of the tradition of moving villages which is still considered an option in some situations, in many cases villagers considered it to be in their advantage to remain at one site whenever possible. In fact, most of the villages visited during the research had been on or near the same site for several decades (except for the disruptions during the wars and the Pol Pot period). The use of local land was clearly defined according to village boundaries known and respected by the local people.

 

Part Five--The Dynamics of History

The indigenous groups preserve and transmit their history orally in the form of myths and stories handed down by the elders over generations. There is no indigenous written form of their languages, so this practice is vital to the preservation of their historical identity. Many of these stories go back to the original creation of humankind and describe an process of evolution by which the original people became civilised:

 

"A long time ago, the people lived in the forest. They didn't know how to dress, make fire, cook, or how to build a house in which to live. Every day they lived like animals, eating fruits from the forest and catching small creatures from the forest, such as mice, and eating them raw. They had no shelter. One day they took a stone and threw it at a mouse to kill it for food. The stone struck another stone and started a fire which burnt the forest. This taught them how to make fire. After the forest was burnt they took the mouse burnt by this fire and found that it was delicious to eat, so this taught them how to cook. One day they were running in the forest and a thorn stuck in someone's foot. This made them think how they could shape wood into a sharp point and use it to kill animals for food. From this idea came the crossbow.

 

"After learning to make fire, each family would make their own fire. One day it was raining so the rain washed away the fire. One family sat under a tree and used the branches and leaves of this tree for shelter to protect the fire. This is how people first started to build shelters, which later became houses.

 

"At that time, men and women lived freely together with no idea of marriage. When women were pregnant, people did not know how to deliver babies--they would just cut them out from inside the woman, so she would die and men had to take care of the baby. One day a woman was close to having a baby. She was sitting with her husband near a big tree and saw a mouse there. The mouse was also pregnant and as she watched, the mouse gave birth to many babies, yet it did not die. From watching this, they learnt how women could give birth without dying." (Jorai elder, Ratanakkiri).

 

a) Early history

In terms of documented historical sources, it is widely believed that the ancient people who now form the indigenous highland groups and the lowland Khmers share a common ancestry (Morizon 1931; Chandler 1993; Minority Rights Group 1995). From an analysis of their myths of origin (which are often strikingly similar), it can be seen that all of the highland groups studied allude to this notion of common ancestry with early Khmers. In fact, most of the groups consider themselves to be the "original" people and as such the "older brothers and sisters" of the lowland Khmers:

 

"Tampuan people and Khmer people are born of the same parents. Their parents were a dog and a woman who made a family. They had two children: the first was a boy and the second a girl. When the children were born the mother was frightened as she knew that the dog would eat the male child, so she placed the boy high in a tree. When the children grew older, they learnt of this story. The boy came down from the tree and killed the dog. He then fled up to the mountains, leaving his sister and mother behind in the lowlands. The older brother was the beginning of Tampuan, while the younger sister was the beginning of Khmers." (Tampuan villager, Ratanakkiri).

 

"Originally there were too many people on the earth. There was not enough land for them to live on, and so God made a fire to destroy everyone, except for one dog and a woman who were placed in a drum. After the fire came a big flood which drowned the land: only the mountains could be seen. The drum floated in the water. After the waters went down, it left behind red land and white land: red land where the water had not yet risen, and white land where the water rose and fell. This was made white by the oil of the bodies of the people and the fish in the water.

 

"The drum landed on an island. The dog and the woman were curious to see the world outside. They climbed out and found the world to be beautiful. They lived together in the world and made a family. Their first child was Brao, the second was Khmer, the third Lao, the fourth Vietnamese and the fifth, the youngest, was Barang [French]." (Kreung elder, Ratanakkiri).

 

Remnants of this historical link between the Khmer people and the indigenous groups can also be discerned in some areas of traditional belief. The religion of the highlanders, for instance, with its belief in a world inhabited by spirits, is not unfamiliar to Khmers and not dissimilar to many of the beliefs they still hold, perhaps reflecting Khmer indigenous beliefs before the arrival of formalised Buddhism. Many highland villagers are aware of this and describe how Khmers have similar spirits to their own. Indeed, during spiritual possession ceremonies held among the Kreung it is not unusual to observe spirit mediums being possessed by Khmer spirits who speak in Khmer.

 

However, despite this accepted common ancestry in the distant past, at some point the paths of these ancient ancestors of the people of Cambodia diverged. Exactly when this separation took place is difficult to determine, as historical information is limited to the scant details which survive from ancient Chinese travel accounts. Most sources place the time of separation some time between the arrival of Hinduism and the beginning of the Funan era in the third century, and the rise of the kingdom Chenla in the fifth (Maitre 1912; Morizon 1931; Chandler 1993). During this period, while many of the indigenous groups in the region were unified under the influence of Hinduism and evolved into principalities with allegiance to Funan (which later became Chenla, the ancestral kingdom of modern Khmers), some of the groups, by virtue of their distance and isolation of their territory, retained their independence.

 

While the evolution of the Khmer kingdom from this point on is widely documented, recorded history of the indigenous groups which escaped the influence of Hinduism is practically non-existent. This has led to the notion that they experienced centuries of isolation. Such an idea, which led to the romanticised perception of the indigenous peoples as primitive, closed societies living in the wilderness of the forests, unchanged over time and immune to external influences, is historically false. First, there are known to have been different movements of these groups over time. This has been confirmed in part by the linguistic affiliation of the different groups and those in surrounding areas.*7

 

These movements are reflected in the local mythology:

 

"There were many people living on the land, and there was too little land for them to live on. Some people looked for a new place to live and decided to cross a big river. A rope was tied across to the other side. The young people crossed first. They carried nothing, while the older people waited to follow behind them, carrying baskets full of heavy things…. When they crossed a mouse chewed through the rope which guided them across the river, so the old people could not follow. This is why some Brao-Kreung people now still live in Laos." (Kreung elder, Ratanakkiri).

 

Some of these movements have been stimulated by encroaching empires:

 

"In the past, the King of the Jorai and the King of Chams were one and the same, with the people living together in the kingdom of Champa. The Vietnamese wanted to fight the Jorai but could not beat them; many people died in the attempt. So the Vietnamese decided to find a way of capturing Champa. They found a beautiful Vietnamese woman and offered her to the King of Champa as a wife. After the marriage, this woman looked for a way to trick her husband. She took a rice cake and put it under her mat when she lay down. The King heard the crunching sound and wondered what it could be. Crying, his wife told him, 'I am very sick. All my bones are broken.' The King wanted to consult his own 'kru boran' [traditional healer] to find out what was wrong, but his wife would not let him. So the King invited people from everywhere to come and see his wife and see if they could help her. But no-one could help. His wife then told him of a very powerful healer living in Vietnam who could be called. The King agreed. The healer arrived from Vietnam and told him: the 'tongelonge' tree is what is making your wife sick. You must cut it down. (This was a special tree with magic powers. If it was cut with an axe it remained unscathed. It could only be cut down by order of the King, or by the King himself.) The King loved his wife so much that to save her he decided to cut down the tree himself. As soon as he did this, the Vietnamese invaded Champa and killed the King, and the wife went back to her country. The Jorai and Cham people fled from this place. The people all scattered and the Jorai ran to the forests in the mountains of Ratanakkiri where there were no other people. Since that time there has been no kingdom of Champa." (Jorai elder, Ratanakkiri).

 

This tale reflects a strong historical link between the Jorai and the Cham empire, and to many Jorai this affiliation with Cham history is so strong that the fall of this once powerful empire, which was gradually eroded by the Annamites, is described in Jorai mythology as a precursor to the Jorai's westward migration.

 

The northeastern region which is home to the ethnic groups of this study is a fertile and politically strategic arena in which surrounding empires and colonising powers historically have vied for political control and tried to exploit the considerable local resources. Such activities have inevitably affected the indigenous populations. The waterways of the Srepok and Sesan rivers and their tributaries, which connect the northeast to the rest of Cambodia and surrounding areas, have long played a vital role in trade and communications in the region, and have brought their own influences. Because of changing waves of invasion by the Chams, Khmers, Thai and Annamites, no centralised control was ever established in the regions during this period. For centuries the indigenous groups had sporadic contact with Chinese, Lao, Thai and Khmer traders in the region (both the Khmer and Cham empires are believed to have been active in these riverine areas from as early as the eleventh century). Different groups are known to have had different trading specialities, some of which they retain today. For instance, the Jorai are renowned for selling gongs (acting as go-betweens for the Jorai in Vietnam), and the Lao for selling the most beautiful rice wine jars (the Lao are renowned among the Kreung for making the rare, expensive black jars which are believed to be unique because they have a soul).

 

In addition to the long-standing trade in goods in the region, there was also trade in the human commodity of slaves. Chinese sources in the late thirteenth century describe how the majority of people living in Angkor were slaves taken captive from the highland areas. This slave trade continued until the nineteenth century, with representatives of the Thai, Lao and Khmer empires raiding hill-tribe villages. Early nineteenth century sources describe village settlements as heavily defended during this period, and the opposition which some of the invaders faced at the hands of the hill-tribes contributed to a general perception of these people as fierce warriors, particularly the Jorai and Sedang tribes.

 

The indigenous groups have their own collective history of this period of slave trading, which has been handed down through the generations and is remembered principally as a time of warfare between different groups. One Kreung elder described how the Thai came down the river to indigenous settlements and demanded "taxes" of slaves. Rather than lose members of their own community, the Kreung captured individuals from neighbouring groups to fulfil the Thai demands. Such intrusions had a wide impact on the life of the indigenous population; both the migration of some groups into new areas and warfare between neighbouring tribes are tied to the impact of this flourishing slave trade. The different highland groups experienced different forms of contact and shared different relationships with neighbouring powers. Phnong villagers recall a period when they were fighting against the "Jorai-Lao," which suggests there was some collaboration between lowlanders and the Jorai at this time. After this period it is known that the Jorai still maintained a close relationship with dominant powers in the region and even until the end of the nineteenth century, the sadet of the Jorai paid tribute to the Kingdom of Cambodia (Dournes 1977).

 

In the latter half of the nineteenth century, the Thai withdrew from the region, leaving it to the French colonisers and their Khmer counterparts who attempted to govern the population and were able to exert considerable influence even in the remote areas of the northeast. They began the concerted exploitation of the fertile upland areas, establishing extensive rubber, pine and coffee plantations. Communications with neighbouring Vietnam were developed through the construction of roads. Local villagers were enrolled to assist with these new initiatives, and to form part of the military force of French Indochina. A Jorai villager described how many people died during heavy, dangerous road construction work carried out with the use of explosives, and some villagers described how those who had contact with the French and who had been "named" by them were expected to pay annual taxes to the colonising power.

 

Some resistance to this French colonisation was recorded, particularly in the eastern areas of what was then Kratie province (now Mondolkiri), where several outposts were attacked and French settlers massacred (again, this perpetuated the warrior-like reputation of the highlanders, in this case the Phnong). Some parts of the region were infamous for not being "subdued" until the late 1930s. During this period the groups living close to the border with Vietnam, due to their geographical position, were drawn into the ongoing international military conflicts. Older Jorai villagers recall the invasion of the Japanese during the Second World War, which reached even  the villages (as one elder described: "the Japanese had knives; the French had guns"). This was followed by war between the French and the Vietnamese, which also had a considerable impact. The French provided the local hill-tribes with arms and tried to move some villages for their own safety, but people described how they were so frightened and alarmed at such events that they fled to the forest.

 

b) The Sangkum period and beyond

After Cambodian independence in 1954, Prince Sihanouk was swift to continue the economic development of the region initiated by the French, and in 1959 the new province of Ratanakkiri was created in what had been the eastern area of Stung Treng province, closely followed in 1960 by the creation of Mondolkiri province (previously the eastern area of Kratie province). This period marked a significant turning point in the history of contact between the highlanders and the Khmer lowlanders. Despite regular contact with various different lowland groups throughout history, including long-standing trade networks with Lao settlers in the riverine areas, the Sangkum period and its policies brought drastic changes unparalleled in previous experience. During this period the highlanders came into more intense contact with Khmers than ever before.

 

Groups of Khmer soldiers and their families were posted to the new provinces to implement a general policy of integration of the hill-tribe peoples into Khmer society. Education and economic development programmes were carried out which aimed to settle the hill-tribes and transform both their existing methods of agriculture, which were considered environmentally destructive, and their general lifestyle, which was seen as backward and archaic. One of the aims of such policies was the genuine desire to improve the standards of living of the population (hence the establishment of schools, some clinics, "fair-trade" exchange centres). But there is no doubt that other political and economic interests also lay behind these changes--to assert control over a strategic area bordering the neighbouring state of Vietnam (traditionally perceived to pose a threat to Cambodia's sovereignty), and to exploit the considerable commercial farming potential of the region.

 

The region became the most important in the country for the settlement of Khmer "pioneers" from other provinces and farmers were offered government assistance to shift from lowland provinces to these sparsely populated areas. Public statements and propaganda of this time reveals an intense drive to establish and affirm Khmer ownership not only of the material resources in this area, but of the peoples living here. Government statements describe the region which the diverse indigenous people inhabited as "Khmer territory," and these groups were to be welcomed into the "Khmer community" so that such "disinherited brothers" could be offered permanent protection. Highland youths were targeted to "persuade their elders to transform their archaic way of life" (Cambodia Today, 1959:5; 1962:43). It was during this period that the term "Khmer-Loeu" (upper Khmer) was coined to define the highlanders as an ethnic group with the stated aim of "national consciousness replacing the group or clan spirit" (Cambodia Today, 1962:43). This did not appear to work exactly as desired (as will be described later, the "group spirit" is crucial to highlander identity); however, whether as a result of this policy or in the light of the more recent experience of the 1993 elections, the indigenous peoples are today highly aware of themselves as citizens of Cambodia.

 

In the early 1960s in Mondolkiri province, two hundred and fifty soldiers and their families constituted the "first wave" of Khmer settlers who began an education programme in the province. They were later followed by settlers from the provinces of Kompong Cham, Takeo and Prey Veng. Those who arrived during this time remember how there was no direct pressure on the indigenous groups to change their lives, yet at the same time they were shown how they could "follow Khmers." One of the first settlers stated: "we taught them how to live, hygiene and health, what to wear, how to make paddy rice fields." However, some villagers remembered this period very negatively as a time when they "had to do like Khmers," stating that they preferred the relative freedom they have experienced in more recent years. At the same time, some strong relationships were developed between the Khmer settlers and local people, which in some cases still exist today. In Mondolkiri a fair number of these Khmers even married Phnong women.

 

Many villagers throughout the province identified the changes which had taken place since the arrival of the Khmer settlers in the area. It was during this period that some villagers stopped wearing traditional clothes, such as loincloths and hand-woven sarongs, and stopped building traditional houses. The influence of monetarisation appears to have begun to affect villagers' behaviour at this time; some recalled how during this era they first began selling their livestock for cash. This period appears to have had a varying impact on communities, depending on their proximity to the new settlers. Many villagers recall this changing time when Khmers arrived, as one Kreung villager put it, from "Khmer land" (dey khmae) in other provinces. In O Reang district, for example, which was one of the main bases of the Khmer settlement programme, there seems to have been a substantial impact. Villagers here describe themselves now as "halfway between" (peak kandal) Phnong and Khmer. They said they had lost many of their traditions since this time and, with the deaths of their elders, also appeared to have lost a sense of their oral history.

 

This period of transformation was not without its difficulties. Some Kreung villagers described how they were forcibly moved from their villages to make room for a rubber plantation and how they had to work in increasingly bad conditions. This finally led to what they called a "revolution" of Kreung, Lao and Khmers against the Khmer and French management, which actually led to armed confrontation.

 

During the early 1970s, the Sangkum process of integration was thrown into disarray by international politics. Once again, the population of this region was caught between the wars of nation-states and subjected to interference from every side. During the Lon Nol period (1970-75) the northeastern region was bombed by US warplanes seeking to destroy the Ho Chi Minh trail, the supply line of the North Vietnamese.

 

Many older people in hill-tribe communities vividly recall the fear instilled by the sight of the war planes and the sound of the forest being bombed around them, forcing them to flee from their villages (fascinatingly, planes and helicopters have become part of their cultural iconography, represented in ritual decorations, drawings and weaving). Huge bomb craters are still visible in some areas. In addition to the bombing, Lon Nol's soldiers raided villages to steal chickens and livestock. In particularly badly affected areas whole villages dispersed, as people no longer dared to live in large settlements and so scattered into small family groups in more remote areas, cultivating small patches of land.

 

To some this was part of a continuous cycle of disruption to their lives. As one Jorai elder described:

 

"The people of this village ran to the forest many times, first when the French and Japanese were fighting, then when the Vietnamese and French were fighting, then during the Lon Nol period when the aeroplanes came, and after that during the Pol Pot time."

 

Such a long period of insecurity in their history was often offered as an explanation by Jorai villagers as to why their settlements became more and more widely scattered far in the forest, and some villagers described how it is only in recent years that they have felt secure enough to start basing themselves near the roads.

 

It was during the same period of the late 1960s that the Khmer Rouge began to use areas of Ratanakkiri province as a base, at a time when they were still collaborating with the Vietnamese across the border. Many areas in the province had a Khmer Rouge presence from this time, and some relationships were built up with the local people. It is unclear exactly what kind of cooperation took place, but it may well be that the Khmer Rouge's early ideology had support among some communities who had suffered extensively in preceding years.*8 Since this time the highlanders have borne a general reputation of being pro-Khmer Rouge and a highly active driving force in the movement. This notion is supported in part by the theory that the treatment accorded to the indigenous peoples of this region may have been notably less harsh than in other areas (Mysliwiec 1988). One partial explanation for this difference in treatment may be that the highlanders were considered by the Khmer Rouge to have been less corrupted by outside influences, such as western education, and so fewer people were systematically eradicated for this reason. The fact that there may be some similarity between the communal elements of the village life of these groups and some of the Khmer Rouge communal models, another fact cited as evidence of the close link between the highlanders and the Khmer Rouge, may say more of the influence the villagers had on the Khmer Rouge than the nature of their inter-relationship throughout the whole period. Of course, Khmer Rouge policies and approaches from the late 1960s until the end of their control in 1979 were not static and it is difficult to generalise about the entire period. Suffice it to say that the highlanders' experience of these years has yet to be fully documented in their own words.

 

Personal accounts which were given of this period showed striking variety. Some villagers described how they and other highlanders were Pol Pot soldiers, but that they had no choice in this; others described how they initially supported the ideas of the Khmer Rouge movement, but when they understood the reality of some of the extreme policies they fled to Vietnam and later returned with the Vietnamese to liberate Cambodia (indeed, this can be confirmed by the fact that many highlander men later became senior military figures in the People's Republic of Kampuchea); some villages located on the border with Vietnam and Laos managed to flee and settle with relatives and ethnic compatriots across the borders. The majority of villagers, however, remember this time as one of fear, physical hardship and living on a near-starvation diet--one Kreung villager compared the current rice shortage to these times: "This year there was not enough rice. People say the soul of the rice is lost, it has gone away, just like in the Pol Pot times." They described how when the Khmer Rouge took control they were forcibly moved to different areas away from their villages. In some areas several villages were merged together, in others villagers were sent en masse to larger settlements such as Veunsai and Lumphat districts in Ratanakkiri and Koh Nyek in Mondolkiri.

 

In these work settlements, families were divided and people were forced to live in communal houses and cultivate paddy fields in work groups. They were forbidden to wear indigenous dress such as loincloths, hand-woven sarongs and decorative jewellery (as one Phnong man recalled "we were told this was part of the old times, we had to change"). Long hair, worn by both women and men, and traditionally adorned in distinctive fashion by different groups, was cut short. Those that were aware of what was to come hid objects of value: some described how they buried their gongs and wine jars in secret places in the forest.

 

Traditional rituals such as animal sacrifices and spiritual ceremonies were outlawed and villagers who had played a vital role in religious activities, such as spiritual healers and elders, did not dare speak of this for fear of being killed. One Kreung spiritual healer (arak) described her experience of this time:

 

"I still saw the spirits in my dreams and they asked for animals to be given to them, they still made people sick, but I did not dare make offerings to them--I only sometimes gave a chicken in secret."

 

Some of the experiences of the indigenous peoples during this period are distinctly different from popular perceptions of Khmer experiences. Due to their ethnic make-up and different historical background, the Pol Pot period led to certain changes and impressions which were not shared by Khmers. For instance, as there were so many diverse ethnic groups living in the northeastern provinces, this resulted in these different ethnic groups working and living at close quarters with each other. Some groups who had lived quite separate from each other described how this allowed them to develop a greater understanding of each other and each other's languages. They described how they were split into different work groups, with local people conversant in Khmer used as interpreters; during work time they used Khmer, but after work they would talk together in their own languages. While there had been some contact between groups before, such as through trade, this had never resulted in such intense contact. Some also referred to this time as one when their relations with the Khmer people improved, as they lived and suffered alongside each other, their situation was one of equals which allowed them to understand one another better. At this time some villagers learnt their first Khmer, which proved useful to them.

 

As people could not turn to traditional spiritual systems of healing, they relied on their knowledge of herbal medicine from the forest and on medical supplies provided by the Khmer Rouge authorities. Many local people, including those already practising as traditional herbalists and traditional birth attendants, were trained as health workers and many of these are now working in the government health system, providing an important link between the state system and local communities. As a result of this input, some villagers even describe how healthcare was in fact better during this time than any period before or since.*9 Such exposure to and acceptance of medical drugs led to the current situation where traditional and western methods of healing are sought in parallel.

 

Innovative changes such as these are seen as the few positive aspects of what was considered a very painful and disruptive time. Yet instead of seeing the Pol Pot period as one where identity was destroyed, it can perhaps be considered one where indigenous beliefs and practices were not eradicated, just suppressed. This is reflected in the response of villagers at the end of the Khmer Rouge period when they reconstructed their lives and their cultural identity.

 

c) "Retreading the rice husk"--after the Pol Pot period

Directly after the arrival of the Vietnamese in 1979, virtually all of the highlanders returned to the site of their original village wherever possible (as one villager described: "we wanted to go back to the village of our birth"). For many this was a long trek, and those who could salvaged any goods or livestock of theirs which had been requisitioned by the Khmer Rouge. Back in their original villages, those who had hidden possessions in the forest sought them out. Villagers described how they experienced a real feeling of impoverishment during this period as valued objects and possessions (particularly livestock) had been lost. Some of the previous distinctions between rich and poor members of the community no longer existed, as all people had suffered material losses.

 

Their behaviour at this time reveals how villagers reconstructed their identity and may provide some clues as to nature of highlander identity today. First, village units were reformed. In many cases villages were re-established on their original site (a process which the Jorai call "retreading the rice husk"). In other cases this was not possible, as it was found that the old place was too "hot" in terms of spiritual activity and so new sites were found nearby. All villages took on their old names and village elders who had survived the Khmer Rouge regime stewarded religious offerings to the spirits to re-establish the severed relationship with tutelary spirits and thus re-establish their group identity.*10

 

People returned to their old system of agriculture, and in areas where paddy rice had proved successful, some villagers continued to farm using this technique in addition to farming hill rice. This post-Khmer Rouge period appears to have been one of relative calm and stability. The People's Republic of Kampuchea (PRK) government exerted some control over villages; for example, in many areas villages were relocated closer together for easier access and contact. However, this appears to have been tempered with tolerance for a considerable degree of autonomy (as some villages even now remain far apart, in their original sites). Villages were left with their own systems of self-government and were supported with arms in order to enable them to protect themselves against possible Khmer Rouge incursions.

 

So what was lost from these years of subjection to the ideology and social control of the Khmer Rouge? It is difficult to be sure of what was lost, what changed and what remained, as there is so little accurate detail of the situation of the Cambodian highlanders immediately preceding the Pol Pot period against which comparisons can be made. The one exception to this is a study based on fieldwork amongst the Brao in the late 1960s which offers precise detail on the agricultural methods and religious rituals of a village Ratanakkiri (Matras-Troubetzkoy 1983). This village still exists today very much as it was presented in that study. Despite some movements and change over time (some members of the original village have now broken off to form another village), the village is now situated very close to its original site. As one villager described:

 

"We remembered this place from Sihanouk's time and wanted to come back to the old place. There is enough land here, and there are trees for us to make our houses."

 

One intriguing change to this group is the fact they no longer identify themselves as Brao but Kreung. Although the Brao, Kreung and Kraveth groups have long been recognised as sister groups with very similar languages and forms of social organisation, this is a direct change in ethnic self-definition which can be discerned among many villagers in the southern areas of Ratanakkiri who now call themselves Kreung. This change appears to reflect the impact of the wider politics on people's lives. Some villagers related this change in self-definition to the associations of different groups with the Pol Pot regime: the Brao were associated to some extent with the Khmer Rouge, whereas many Kreung were renowned for fighting to liberate Cambodia, and so after the Pol Pot period many Brao people chose to change their identity. An addition, as related by some Kraveth villagers in northern Ratanakkiri, was that the Pol Pot regime, the angka, redefined the names of these sister groups according to geographical location to facilitate administrative purposes. Whatever the reasons, what it means to be Kreung or Brao at a village level may still not be so different. It is significant that some of these groups refer to each other as "Brao-Kreung" or "Brao-Kraveth," which implies that Brao is still identified locally as the original denomination, and in their language they use the term brao as a qualifier to describe certain rituals and much of their mythology.*11 For these groups, these labels may be more relevant to outsiders than to themselves (as one Kreung woman said when referring to her relatives living in the north, "they call me Kreung, so I call them Kraveth").

 

Apart from this particular change which affected the Brao, Kreung and Kraveth groups, more generally the most striking changes to highlanders' lives appear to be in certain aspects of material culture, particularly that of physical dress and decoration. Today, the older generation still have vivid memories of how they lived in earlier times. Some villagers can still recall the different physical markers of the various groups which distinguished them from each other. For example, Phnong villagers described how Phnong women used to wear small buffalo horns in their hair, decorated with peacock feathers, while the men used to tie coloured cotton bands around their heads and wore necklaces with small bells. Both men and women wore beautiful jewellery of coloured beads. Stieng men were immediately recognisable as they wore their hair cut short at the front. As one Phnong villager said, talking of these physical changes, "before we did differently and could see who we were… we didn't get confused like we do now." Rich people were distinguished by wearing spiral bangles and anklets; but these are now worn only by few older women. There are still elderly Brao who have tattooed faces, and the elderly generation among all the highlander groups still have filed teeth and elongated ear lobes from previous times when ivory ear plugs were worn. These traditions have now died out and all that are left of them are the visible reminders of the older generation and stories of the past.

 

The loss of such ethnic markers cannot simply be attributed to the impact of the Khmer Rouge period. As described earlier, the Sangkum period with its integrationist policies had already initiated changes in some people's lives, and what occurred can in some senses be seen as the inevitable increasing material influence of contact with lowlanders and their way of life. When asked about the beginnings of these changes many villagers did not refer to the Khmer Rouge era but referred to when "Khmers first came here" or, more specifically, the Sangkum period.

 

What may be more usefully emphasised is the fact that after years of disruption villagers chose for the most part to return to their original village community and to revive certain traditions which even now, despite increasing contact with outside influences, have survived. These customs are therefore a fundamental cornerstone of highlander life, and as such provide some clues to their contemporary identity and community life as it exists today.

 

6) Aspects of Ethnic Identity

The strength of indigenous people ultimately rests on the kinship groups and the way the groups individually and collectively conduct their political, economic and religious affairs (Beauclerck 1988).

 

a) The village and customary law

The kinship groups of Cambodia's highlanders organise themselves in self-governing villages. The strong social cohesion of this communal group is provided not only by the extensive kinship networks which exist but is further enhanced by the villagers' sense of membership in their particular village in a religious sense, as they all share a relationship with the tutelary spirits of their village. Every year, and at opportune times if it is felt that there has been unusually severe and widespread case of sickness or misfortune, the village as a whole offers a communal feast to these tutelary spirits. Even if individuals leave the village, following the system of marriage bi-locality, they still return to their home villages for important ceremonies and retain strong ties there, both in a kinship and spiritual sense. Among the Kreung, in times of sickness it is the spiritual medium of the home village who is turned visited to discern which spirits are causing an affliction. It is at times of important spiritual ceremonies when group identity is at its strongest. For example, if a large animal sacrifice is made to the spirits by any members of the community (this can be for a variety of reasons: a healing ceremony, funeral, offering of thanks for a good harvest, etc.) then all villagers will assist with and participate in the feast.

 

Anyone residing in a village is expected to conform to the traditional authority of the group which rests with the village elders. These are a group of older male villagers, chosen and accepted by community consensus as "those who know how to speak" and "those who know the difference between right and wrong." They play a multiple, inter-connected role in the life of the village, both as the guardians and implementors of customary law, as arbitrators and decision-makers in disputes between villagers. Their authority is reinforced by their knowledge of spiritual affairs. The elders steward important communal ceremonies such as cow or buffalo sacrifices and village feasts. They are instrumental in preserving and handing down the collective identity of the group in their role as storytellers of the myths and legends which make up both the village and the ethnic group's social history. In situations where villagers gather together, such as at communal feasts and spiritual ceremonies, the elders will often recount such stories, and in every village there are always at least several individuals admired for their skill at telling ancient stories with a wealth of detail, brought to life with their own personal embellishments.

 

Strong leadership and effective systems of decision-making are crucial to the survival of close-knit communities such as highlander villages. It is therefore understood that the elders' advice and decisions will be respected and followed, thus maintaining good working social relations at village level. An instructive example of this is the situation of one Phnong village visited, where some of the villagers had converted to Christianity during their stay in Vietnam in the Khmer Rouge period. Although these families and individuals no longer follow the traditional religious belief system or carry out any of the associated rituals, and while they live as part of one krom in a particular area of the village, they still consider themselves subject to the authority of the elders of the village, who are not Christian.

 

If the authority of the elders is not respected or there is irresolvable conflict among this traditional leadership, then the community can no longer function. The differences leading to such divisions can be, for example, determining the location of a new village site. Divisions may also simply be due to irreconcilable differences between different elders and their followers. In such cases it is necessary to break the village into smaller communities. It is not rare to come across villages where such a situation has arisen and the village has divided into two communities, each following its own group of elders. As one Kreung woman put it, "one mountain can only have one tiger."

 

Customary law is vast and complex and we cannot hope to offer an exhaustive account of all its variations in this limited study. Instead we will give a description of some of its most apparent features. First, there are rules that govern the relationship with the local environment which are founded on religious beliefs concerning the power of the spirits of the forest. As described above, customary law governs the cutting of primary areas of forest and villages are usually surrounded by areas of dense forest which remain untouched. Villagers described how, when exploring unknown areas of forest to be cut or cultivated, it is often customary procedure to consult with elders to confirm that this is acceptable and these areas are not home to powerful forest spirits.

 

Burial grounds are sacred and surrounding areas of forest should not be cut. Some groups, such as the Jorai, demarcate these areas to warn others of this taboo. In one Phnong village visited a case was described whereby one family had inadvertently cleared some forest in one of these areas and, after a village meeting, was fined one pig and a jar of rice wine for an offering to the spirits of the dead, and seven chi of gold*12 which was divided among the families whose burial ground had been disturbed. Such beliefs may differ between groups. For example, the Phnong's tradition of planting the sacred rra-ay tree at the site where each family makes cow or buffalo sacrifices means that even when the village moves site the old site with these trees remains sacred and cannot be cleared, because it is a crucial element of the relationship of these families with their ancestors and the spiritual world. Disturbed such sites will provoke serious spiritual repercussions.

 

According to customary law, a family has rights over the land which it cultivates and over the produce of old plots which are fallow and may be farmed later (these old plots are considered valuable as they provide the benefits of long-term cultivation of fruits and vegetables). Fallow plots which are to be reused may change hands over time and be used by different families. If there is any dispute between families who wish to farm the same plot, it is resolved through mediation and invariably the two contesting parties divide the plot. All the plots lie within the boundaries of a village, recognised by neighbouring villages. The boundaries of family plots must be respected and among some groups strict laws apply to the infringement of boundaries. Among the Kreung, for example, families must pay a debt if trees felled when they are clearing their fields fall across neighbouring plots, or if their fires spread to other plots.

 

There is a vast realm of customary law which governs social behaviour. This is related to the power of ancestors who, if angered, may punish through misfortune, sickness and even death. The mechanisms by which this is enforced are standard: if a recognised customary law has been infringed, it is usual for a meeting to be called and village elders to decide upon an appropriate fine. The different highlander groups distinguish themselves from each other in areas of social law and custom: what may be severely punished in the context of one group may be resolved with a less lenient fine by another. Pre-marital pregnancy is one particular case in point. If this happens among the Phnong a strict fine is levied against the family of the boy responsible who has broken the social taboo (or, if he cannot be identified, the family of the girl in question). A recent case was described whereby a family was fined twenty pigs for this infringement. Among the Kreung studied, a smaller offering is acceptable.

 

Customary law ensuring the obligations of married couples is extremely strict and extends to many realms of behaviour. Physical violence by a husband against a wife is strictly punished. If a wife is expecting to deliver a baby the husband must be available to support her or he will be fined. Infidelity carries heavy fines and if a separation (effectively a divorce) is desired by one party then this has to be negotiated and, depending on the circumstances, will often require payments to any aggrieved party. Most villagers described how divorce is a rare and difficult process, though it does happen occasionally. As one Kreung woman described, "…if only one wants to leave and for no good reason, then it might cost them five buffaloes."

 

To assist in maintaining good relations between partners, marriage mediators are selected by couples before their wedding (among the Phnong both the bride and the groom have their own mediators; among the Kreung if a couple from the same village are marrying they have one mediator, but if it is a marriage between villages then each chooses their own mediator). At the wedding ceremony the mediators play an important role in assisting with rituals and the wedding feast. In future years, if there is any dispute between the couple and their respective family groups the mediator will play a vital role in resolving problems. This role can be adopted by both men and women (some women described how they choose a female mediator as she is valued as in a situation of dispute because she is able to tell "women's stories" well). Discussing such traditional systems and comparing them with what they knew of Khmer society, some highlander women described how they felt that respect for women was strong in their communities. The idea of men taking a second wife (whether officially or unofficially), which is fairly common in Khmer society, is quite an exceptional occurrence amongst highlanders. Villagers described how this might happen "one time in a thousand," and the permission of the first wife would have to be sought, and strict rules would govern such a situation, such that if the second wife was to be bought a sarong, then so would the first wife. The traditional moral values underlying such social behaviour can be discerned in some of the mythology recounted by elders. For example the Phnong have a story of the spirit of "Play Stream" in Mondolkiri.

 

"A long time ago there was a man called Meleck Kwun. One day he shot a wild pig with his crossbow. The arrow hit the pig but it ran away and Meleck Kwun followed it, right to the mouth of Play Stream. Nearby, he saw people harvesting in their rice fields. They asked him where he was going, and he told them that he was following a wild pig. The villagers told him it was their pig. He didn't believe them so went further along the stream and met Old Man Koran, who is the spirit of the stream. The old man asked Meleck Kwun, 'Where are you going?' When Meleck Kwun said he was following a pig, Koran said, 'That's my pig--if you don't believe me I'll show you the arrow.' So he took out the arrow which Meleck Kwun had shot and gave it back to him. Then Meleck Kwun believed him. He took the arrow and turned to leave, but Old Man Koran took out a jar of rice wine and offered the pig for a feast saying, 'Meleck Kwun, I have wanted to meet you for a long time. Now I have met you I want to offer you this pig and rice wine.' Then he brought a young girl along, his daughter, and offered her to Meleck Kwun as his wife. Meleck Kwun did not agree to this as he already had a wife, but Old Man Koran said this would insult him and so Meleck Kwun had to take this girl as his wife. They married in the forest and then went back to his house. He asked his first wife if she agreed to his taking this second wife and she agreed. After the daughter of the spirit came to live with them, Meleck Kwun became a rich man. One day he went to visit Kratie province without his wives. He took a servant girl with him. During the journey he slept with this girl. The daughter of the spirit was at home in their house, but she knew what he had done. When he arrived home she told him that she would return to Play Stream. Meleck Kwun admitted he had done wrong. He followed her and asked her to stay, promising to repay her, but she would not agree. She left him and since that day he has been a very poor man."

 

The system of customary law is not of course simply a system for establishing punishment for its infringement. Like any system of law it acts as a deterrent and also keeps villagers aware of their obligations to the ancestors or the power of the spirits. The deterrent is not only the cost of fine but cost in a spiritual sense. For example, if the forest spirits are angered by the cutting of primary forest they can cause sickness or death; similarly if the ancestors are angered they can intervene in human affairs. It should perhaps be noted that crimes common in larger-scale societies such as theft, physical violence, rape and murder are practically unheard of among the highlanders. When asked about such situations villagers immediately emphasised the enormous fine which would have to be paid for such an action, but noted that they had never come across such situations. Similarly, the fines levied are significant not only in a material sense but in a spiritual sense, as at least some portion of the penalty will be used for a sacrifice and feast.

 

If there is a claimed grievance against individuals and families then the elders must adjudicate. If a compensatory payment has to be made there is a process of negotiation, through mediation, on an agreeable price. Mediation is a crucial aspect of conflict resolution and there are defined systems for ensuring problems are resolved as amicably as possible. In cases of dispute, the two parties agree on a mediator to "manage" the case and work towards a solution (in theory this can be men or women, but in all the cases observed the individual selected was a man). During the cases observed, village meetings were held to resolve the situation. The case was presented by the mediator and then both parties and were given the opportunity to state their respective positions. Other villages who attended the meeting freely offered ideas and contributed to the discussion. The elders offered their advice and a decision was made by them as to who was in the wrong. This party was then obliged to pay compensation which was negotiated at length. Cases of intra-family disputes which cannot be resolved internally are also mediated at village level, and so this system can be turned to by individuals within families wishing for wider representation and support in resolving their disputes. Such a system renders all individuals and families accountable to the wider community for their behaviour.

 

The overriding importance placed by highlander communities on negotiation to create social unity has been recognised by the Khmers since their first intensi