Books by Kelly Silva
Sérgio Luiz Cruz Aguilar; Isabela Zorat Alonso, Jul 10, 2018
A presente obra é resultado da XV Semana de Relações Internacionais, intensa jornada acadêmica re... more A presente obra é resultado da XV Semana de Relações Internacionais, intensa jornada acadêmica realizada em 2017 na Faculdade de Filosofia e Ciências da Universidade Estadual Paulista “Júlio de Mesquita Filho” (UNESP) – campus de Marília – SP. Apresenta ideias, opiniões, argumentos e questionamentos de acadêmicos, diplomatas e pesquisadores que participaram do evento, por meio de artigos sobre diversos temas das Relações Internacionais.
O evento teve como tema central a política externa e segurança no presente século, embora, em razão da amplitude dessa área do conhecimento, tenha contado com atividades que abordaram outros temas ligados às Relações Internacionais.
Os trabalhos desta obra foram distribuídos em seis partes: Desafios dos Processos de Paz e Questões Humanitárias; Forças Armadas; Desafios dos Processos de Integração Regional; Diplomacia e Relações Internacionais; Governança e Imigrações; e Desenvolvimento.
Os Desafios da Política Externa e Segurança no Século XXI refletem a amplitude das Relações Internacionais e a preocupação em tematizar, desenvolver e aprofundar o estudo dos diversos campos dessa área do conhecimento.
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The Australian Journal of Anthropology, 2020
This article discusses the ambivalent status of local authorities in postcolonial state building ... more This article discusses the ambivalent status of local authorities in postcolonial state building in Timor-Leste. We deploy two sets of empirical data to analyse the role ambiguity plays in particular power dynamics: the East Timorese legislation on community authority, and ethnographic descriptions of a local form of conflict resolution at the village level. The ethnographic analysis points to the fact that local authorities see themselves and are seen by villagers as state representatives. However, the legal framework may be seen as an effort by the Timorese national authority to detach itself from local leaders, but it does so ambiguously. While the state positions local authorities as community representatives of the people it also assigns them an increasing number of functions over time, many of which would be elsewhere considered state responsibilities. We argue that this ambiguity plays a vital role in a long-term strategy to legitimise the state by appropriating local elements of political culture. That being so, local governance complexes are used to transpose and internalise modern practices and projects of social organisation and subjectivation, although they tend to be considered by many as longstanding cultural institutions. K E Y W O R D S development, law/human rights, local governance, politics, social change
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Content:
Prefácio
Apresentação - A construção da administração pública timorense: elenco e ce... more Content:
Prefácio
Apresentação - A construção da administração pública timorense: elenco e cenário
Capítulo 1 - A reunião de Timor-Leste com os parceiros do desenvolvimento
Capítulo 2 - A feira do livro lusófono
Capítulo 3 - As nações unidas e a construção de capacidades
Capítulo 4 - As nações desunidas
Capítulo 5 - Díli em festa e festas em Díli
Capítulo 6 - Retornados e projetos disciplinares para a função pública
Capítulo 7 - Os de fora e os de dentro: novas fontes de conflito e ressentimento
Conclusão - Paradoxos da autodeterminação: algumas perspectivas
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Peer Reviewed Articles by Kelly Silva
Horizontes Antropológicos, 2024
This article discusses the concept, design, and contracting processes of the first phase of the T... more This article discusses the concept, design, and contracting processes of the first phase of the TOMAK program (acronym for To'os Ba Moris Di'ak, translated as Farming for Prosperity in English, and Agricultura para Prosperidade in Portuguese). The program was funded by the Australian government and implemented in Timor-Leste between 2016 and 2021. We argue that these processes elevate the program to the status of a commodity, accessed in the global market by specific mechanisms of competition and subject to certain fetishes. The program's management practices reflect the new role that nation-states have played under the dominance of neoliberalism: as catalysts of competition on multiple fronts. We contextualize the phenomena discussed as products of long-term historical processes related to the reconfigurations of international development cooperation practices. Our analyses are based on documental and digital ethnographies and two decades (2000-2020) of observations in the field of international cooperation in Timor-Leste and beyond.
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Anuario Asia Pacifico 2021, 2021
This article consists of a brief analysis of the events that occurred in Timor-Leste
during 2020.... more This article consists of a brief analysis of the events that occurred in Timor-Leste
during 2020. It discusses the development and conclusion of the political crisis that had been
dragging on since the formation of the VIII constitutional government, as well as some of the
administrative challenges the state had to face. We place special emphasis on the socioeconomic
impacts that the Covid-19 pandemic has had on the country and its inhabitants. In
a year in which there has not been excessively noteworthy news about Timor- Leste’s
international politics, human security in its different aspects has become the central aspect to
consider.
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Plural Plureil, 2019
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Revista Museologia e Interdisciplinariedade, 2017
Este artigo discute narrativas de caracterização
de bens culturais imateriais produzidas
e irradi... more Este artigo discute narrativas de caracterização
de bens culturais imateriais produzidas
e irradiadas pelo Instituto do Patrimônio
Histórico e Artístico Nacional (IPHAN). Inspirados
pela teoria do ator-rede, argumentamos
que o objeto das políticas de registro e
salvaguarda de bens imateriais são híbridos
constituídos por associações heterogêneas
de humanos e não-humanos. A justaposição
entre diferentes domínios de ação e a agência
de atores ontologicamente distintos na
conformação dos bens culturais imateriais
registrados como patrimônio nacional é positivada
nas narrativas que os descrevem. Tais
fenômenos, bem como a apreensão dos bens
imateriais como produto de trajetórias históricas
singulares e indicadores de tradições
que sustentam identidades coletivas, são interpretados
como índices de certo romantismo.
Somente quando renomeado como
tradição, produzido a partir de correlações
complexas, o legado colonial figura como actuante
na configuração dos bens reconhecidos
e passa a ser assim objeto de salvaguarda.
No limite, estas políticas elas se voltam à
salvaguarda de formas de ação e interação
sobre o mundo pré-modernas.
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Anuário Antropológico, 2017
This essay examines the social position of women and the implications of gender
representations ... more This essay examines the social position of women and the implications of gender
representations among indigenous peoples in post-World War II Portuguese
Timor. It is a bibliographic critique based on works of academic anthropology
and of certain missionary and colonial administrative ethnographies published
between the 1950s and 1980s. I argue that in general women occupied a
relatively subaltern position in the collective dynamics of social reproduction.
This results from the specificity of local social structures and from the separation
of sex and gender. I attempt to elucidate an apparent contradiction: on the one
hand, femaleness, as a gender classifying principle, is associated with superiority
among many peoples in Timor-Leste and, on the other hand, women are often
in subaltern positions regarding collective reproduction. I argue that the ways the
female principle and the idea of fertility are ritually handled serve the purpose of
producing and reproducing male dominance in the dynamics of collective social
reproduction and the co-opting of women’s power of giving life.
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Oceania, 2018
This article addresses the current praxis and controversies framing marriage prestations in urban... more This article addresses the current praxis and controversies framing marriage prestations in urban East Timor. Drawing on data related to practices, narratives, and social location of agents who stand for and against barlake (the local name for a part or the whole of marriage prestations), it suggests how the association of marriage transactions with different regimes of exchange – namely, gift and commodity – is a means for producing prestige and social distinction between ema Dili and ema foho. The lack of consensus about a single meaning for barlake allows everyone to reproduce their commitments with local and global expectations of modernity. Such phenomena result from ascribing marriage prestations to the gift regime of exchange, regardless of the number or the kind of gift functions implied in them. The controversies surrounding barlake entail a moral narrative of modernity struc-tured by anxieties related to: (1) fixing ontological boundaries between people and things; (2) the alliance effects people search for when carrying out their marriage; (3) the social history and politics of custom associated with Dili as a place of civilized/assimilated people, and, finally; (4) people's historical period of migration to the city.
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Revista Brasileira de Ciências Sociais, vol. 18, número 51, Feb 2003
This paper discusses the events organized by Brazilian State to celebrate the so called “500 year... more This paper discusses the events organized by Brazilian State to celebrate the so called “500 years of Brazil’s discovery”, between 1998 and 2000. It seeks to identify the ideologies
found in these activities, which revealed the images of the nation. It shows that those activities were critical
events for the Brazilian nationbuilding process. Taking for analysis documents, discourses, exhibitions,
museums, and others, the paper suggests the rituals performed at those “celebrations” retake the Brazilian myth of the “three races” and a kind of lusotropicalist ideal, making
possible the reediting of the idea of a “racial democracy” by Brazilian State.
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Horizontes Antropológicos, Jan 1, 2007
The article focus on the conflicts which took place in East Timor in 2005, between the Catholic C... more The article focus on the conflicts which took place in East Timor in 2005, between the Catholic Church and the Government, regarding the role of the religious teaching in the basic school curriculum. The analysis indicates that the debates built around this issue express different State-Nation building projects for that country, so as disputes among different groups in relation to their roles in the independency process. We propose that the events should be understood as a product of the itinerary of certain sectors of the Timorese people during the Indonesian occupation of the territory. We point, that way, to the singular position of the counter-diasporas, former members of the diplomatic front, to whom the Catholic Church (self proclaimed as representative of the "insiders") now opposes. The protests also pointed to a still incipient debate on the building of a national memory, the Catholic Church claiming for a correct acknowledge, by the State, of its own role against the Indonesian occupation.
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Mana
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The purpose of this article is to discuss some of the values that have been mobilized as a source... more The purpose of this article is to discuss some of the values that have been mobilized as a source of political legitimacy in East Timor since the restoration of independence. To do so, it uses as a principal analytical anchor the campaign activities held in the realm of the first round of presidential elections in the country in April 2007. They are placed in perspective through
a comparison with other moments of political conflict. By means of ethnographic observation of electoral phenomenon – rallies, radio and television programs and journalistic coverage – I seek to identify some of the moral and sociological principles on which modern political authority is claimed in the
country by the different groups of its elites. Among other things, I highlight the centrality of the veterans of the Falintil in this field. This fact, associated to the discussion of the public performances of the various candidates during the campaign, is seen as an indicator of the importance that ideas and values such as suffering, recognition and reciprocity occupy in the repertoire
of contemporary East Timorese political culture. I also present a hypothesis about the mechanisms through which the capilarization of modern institutions such as political parties and the Nation State, have taken place in the country: by means of alliances between the cosmopolitan urban elites and local
authorities, mediated by veterans of the resistance.
Key words: East Timor, political culture, elections, recognition, reciprocity
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Anthropological Forum, Jan 1, 2010
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Revista de Estudos AntiUtilitaristas e …, Jan 1, 2012
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Virtual Brazilian Anthropology 9.2
This article discusses certain technologies with which government practices
are diffused on a g... more This article discusses certain technologies with which government practices
are diffused on a global scale and some of the effects of this process. Using
Foucault as a main source of inspiration, the circulation of know-how and
capital are seen as the principal means by which government practices are
irradiated. By analyzing social techniques such as projects, programs, conditionalities, documents, international laws and others, I argue that these
are fundamental conduits for devising and reproducing the global order.
In a second moment, I approach some of the outcomes of developmental
practices in processes of state building and other political dynamics among
recipients and donor countries. I stress some of the political, economic and
social impacts of local appropriations of development actions. Of these, I emphasize those related to capacity building and what I call the misrecognition
effect. The final remarks propose an articulated perspective on government
practices that are shaped by diverse strategies.
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The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, 14:5, 455-470
In discussing marriage negotiations, this article analyses certain mediations and mediators that ... more In discussing marriage negotiations, this article analyses certain mediations and mediators that make up the dialectics of modernisation among contemporary urban middle-class elites in Timor-Leste. It brings to the fore the way particular Christian
values are strategically used to reproduce, change or even enhance people’s agency regarding customary practices, and to circumscribe the marriage exchanges to the gift
regime. Attitudes about fulfilling customary obligations vary, for they are correlated to the distinct government practices from which they derive. The social profile of brokers and the sources of their legitimacy to perform marriage negotiations are also discussed.
Finally, these negotiations are analysed against the backdrop of contemporary arguments about the syncretic or anti-syncretic character of some social experiences in Timor-Leste.
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Uploads
Books by Kelly Silva
O evento teve como tema central a política externa e segurança no presente século, embora, em razão da amplitude dessa área do conhecimento, tenha contado com atividades que abordaram outros temas ligados às Relações Internacionais.
Os trabalhos desta obra foram distribuídos em seis partes: Desafios dos Processos de Paz e Questões Humanitárias; Forças Armadas; Desafios dos Processos de Integração Regional; Diplomacia e Relações Internacionais; Governança e Imigrações; e Desenvolvimento.
Os Desafios da Política Externa e Segurança no Século XXI refletem a amplitude das Relações Internacionais e a preocupação em tematizar, desenvolver e aprofundar o estudo dos diversos campos dessa área do conhecimento.
Prefácio
Apresentação - A construção da administração pública timorense: elenco e cenário
Capítulo 1 - A reunião de Timor-Leste com os parceiros do desenvolvimento
Capítulo 2 - A feira do livro lusófono
Capítulo 3 - As nações unidas e a construção de capacidades
Capítulo 4 - As nações desunidas
Capítulo 5 - Díli em festa e festas em Díli
Capítulo 6 - Retornados e projetos disciplinares para a função pública
Capítulo 7 - Os de fora e os de dentro: novas fontes de conflito e ressentimento
Conclusão - Paradoxos da autodeterminação: algumas perspectivas
Peer Reviewed Articles by Kelly Silva
during 2020. It discusses the development and conclusion of the political crisis that had been
dragging on since the formation of the VIII constitutional government, as well as some of the
administrative challenges the state had to face. We place special emphasis on the socioeconomic
impacts that the Covid-19 pandemic has had on the country and its inhabitants. In
a year in which there has not been excessively noteworthy news about Timor- Leste’s
international politics, human security in its different aspects has become the central aspect to
consider.
de bens culturais imateriais produzidas
e irradiadas pelo Instituto do Patrimônio
Histórico e Artístico Nacional (IPHAN). Inspirados
pela teoria do ator-rede, argumentamos
que o objeto das políticas de registro e
salvaguarda de bens imateriais são híbridos
constituídos por associações heterogêneas
de humanos e não-humanos. A justaposição
entre diferentes domínios de ação e a agência
de atores ontologicamente distintos na
conformação dos bens culturais imateriais
registrados como patrimônio nacional é positivada
nas narrativas que os descrevem. Tais
fenômenos, bem como a apreensão dos bens
imateriais como produto de trajetórias históricas
singulares e indicadores de tradições
que sustentam identidades coletivas, são interpretados
como índices de certo romantismo.
Somente quando renomeado como
tradição, produzido a partir de correlações
complexas, o legado colonial figura como actuante
na configuração dos bens reconhecidos
e passa a ser assim objeto de salvaguarda.
No limite, estas políticas elas se voltam à
salvaguarda de formas de ação e interação
sobre o mundo pré-modernas.
representations among indigenous peoples in post-World War II Portuguese
Timor. It is a bibliographic critique based on works of academic anthropology
and of certain missionary and colonial administrative ethnographies published
between the 1950s and 1980s. I argue that in general women occupied a
relatively subaltern position in the collective dynamics of social reproduction.
This results from the specificity of local social structures and from the separation
of sex and gender. I attempt to elucidate an apparent contradiction: on the one
hand, femaleness, as a gender classifying principle, is associated with superiority
among many peoples in Timor-Leste and, on the other hand, women are often
in subaltern positions regarding collective reproduction. I argue that the ways the
female principle and the idea of fertility are ritually handled serve the purpose of
producing and reproducing male dominance in the dynamics of collective social
reproduction and the co-opting of women’s power of giving life.
found in these activities, which revealed the images of the nation. It shows that those activities were critical
events for the Brazilian nationbuilding process. Taking for analysis documents, discourses, exhibitions,
museums, and others, the paper suggests the rituals performed at those “celebrations” retake the Brazilian myth of the “three races” and a kind of lusotropicalist ideal, making
possible the reediting of the idea of a “racial democracy” by Brazilian State.
a comparison with other moments of political conflict. By means of ethnographic observation of electoral phenomenon – rallies, radio and television programs and journalistic coverage – I seek to identify some of the moral and sociological principles on which modern political authority is claimed in the
country by the different groups of its elites. Among other things, I highlight the centrality of the veterans of the Falintil in this field. This fact, associated to the discussion of the public performances of the various candidates during the campaign, is seen as an indicator of the importance that ideas and values such as suffering, recognition and reciprocity occupy in the repertoire
of contemporary East Timorese political culture. I also present a hypothesis about the mechanisms through which the capilarization of modern institutions such as political parties and the Nation State, have taken place in the country: by means of alliances between the cosmopolitan urban elites and local
authorities, mediated by veterans of the resistance.
Key words: East Timor, political culture, elections, recognition, reciprocity
are diffused on a global scale and some of the effects of this process. Using
Foucault as a main source of inspiration, the circulation of know-how and
capital are seen as the principal means by which government practices are
irradiated. By analyzing social techniques such as projects, programs, conditionalities, documents, international laws and others, I argue that these
are fundamental conduits for devising and reproducing the global order.
In a second moment, I approach some of the outcomes of developmental
practices in processes of state building and other political dynamics among
recipients and donor countries. I stress some of the political, economic and
social impacts of local appropriations of development actions. Of these, I emphasize those related to capacity building and what I call the misrecognition
effect. The final remarks propose an articulated perspective on government
practices that are shaped by diverse strategies.
values are strategically used to reproduce, change or even enhance people’s agency regarding customary practices, and to circumscribe the marriage exchanges to the gift
regime. Attitudes about fulfilling customary obligations vary, for they are correlated to the distinct government practices from which they derive. The social profile of brokers and the sources of their legitimacy to perform marriage negotiations are also discussed.
Finally, these negotiations are analysed against the backdrop of contemporary arguments about the syncretic or anti-syncretic character of some social experiences in Timor-Leste.
O evento teve como tema central a política externa e segurança no presente século, embora, em razão da amplitude dessa área do conhecimento, tenha contado com atividades que abordaram outros temas ligados às Relações Internacionais.
Os trabalhos desta obra foram distribuídos em seis partes: Desafios dos Processos de Paz e Questões Humanitárias; Forças Armadas; Desafios dos Processos de Integração Regional; Diplomacia e Relações Internacionais; Governança e Imigrações; e Desenvolvimento.
Os Desafios da Política Externa e Segurança no Século XXI refletem a amplitude das Relações Internacionais e a preocupação em tematizar, desenvolver e aprofundar o estudo dos diversos campos dessa área do conhecimento.
Prefácio
Apresentação - A construção da administração pública timorense: elenco e cenário
Capítulo 1 - A reunião de Timor-Leste com os parceiros do desenvolvimento
Capítulo 2 - A feira do livro lusófono
Capítulo 3 - As nações unidas e a construção de capacidades
Capítulo 4 - As nações desunidas
Capítulo 5 - Díli em festa e festas em Díli
Capítulo 6 - Retornados e projetos disciplinares para a função pública
Capítulo 7 - Os de fora e os de dentro: novas fontes de conflito e ressentimento
Conclusão - Paradoxos da autodeterminação: algumas perspectivas
during 2020. It discusses the development and conclusion of the political crisis that had been
dragging on since the formation of the VIII constitutional government, as well as some of the
administrative challenges the state had to face. We place special emphasis on the socioeconomic
impacts that the Covid-19 pandemic has had on the country and its inhabitants. In
a year in which there has not been excessively noteworthy news about Timor- Leste’s
international politics, human security in its different aspects has become the central aspect to
consider.
de bens culturais imateriais produzidas
e irradiadas pelo Instituto do Patrimônio
Histórico e Artístico Nacional (IPHAN). Inspirados
pela teoria do ator-rede, argumentamos
que o objeto das políticas de registro e
salvaguarda de bens imateriais são híbridos
constituídos por associações heterogêneas
de humanos e não-humanos. A justaposição
entre diferentes domínios de ação e a agência
de atores ontologicamente distintos na
conformação dos bens culturais imateriais
registrados como patrimônio nacional é positivada
nas narrativas que os descrevem. Tais
fenômenos, bem como a apreensão dos bens
imateriais como produto de trajetórias históricas
singulares e indicadores de tradições
que sustentam identidades coletivas, são interpretados
como índices de certo romantismo.
Somente quando renomeado como
tradição, produzido a partir de correlações
complexas, o legado colonial figura como actuante
na configuração dos bens reconhecidos
e passa a ser assim objeto de salvaguarda.
No limite, estas políticas elas se voltam à
salvaguarda de formas de ação e interação
sobre o mundo pré-modernas.
representations among indigenous peoples in post-World War II Portuguese
Timor. It is a bibliographic critique based on works of academic anthropology
and of certain missionary and colonial administrative ethnographies published
between the 1950s and 1980s. I argue that in general women occupied a
relatively subaltern position in the collective dynamics of social reproduction.
This results from the specificity of local social structures and from the separation
of sex and gender. I attempt to elucidate an apparent contradiction: on the one
hand, femaleness, as a gender classifying principle, is associated with superiority
among many peoples in Timor-Leste and, on the other hand, women are often
in subaltern positions regarding collective reproduction. I argue that the ways the
female principle and the idea of fertility are ritually handled serve the purpose of
producing and reproducing male dominance in the dynamics of collective social
reproduction and the co-opting of women’s power of giving life.
found in these activities, which revealed the images of the nation. It shows that those activities were critical
events for the Brazilian nationbuilding process. Taking for analysis documents, discourses, exhibitions,
museums, and others, the paper suggests the rituals performed at those “celebrations” retake the Brazilian myth of the “three races” and a kind of lusotropicalist ideal, making
possible the reediting of the idea of a “racial democracy” by Brazilian State.
a comparison with other moments of political conflict. By means of ethnographic observation of electoral phenomenon – rallies, radio and television programs and journalistic coverage – I seek to identify some of the moral and sociological principles on which modern political authority is claimed in the
country by the different groups of its elites. Among other things, I highlight the centrality of the veterans of the Falintil in this field. This fact, associated to the discussion of the public performances of the various candidates during the campaign, is seen as an indicator of the importance that ideas and values such as suffering, recognition and reciprocity occupy in the repertoire
of contemporary East Timorese political culture. I also present a hypothesis about the mechanisms through which the capilarization of modern institutions such as political parties and the Nation State, have taken place in the country: by means of alliances between the cosmopolitan urban elites and local
authorities, mediated by veterans of the resistance.
Key words: East Timor, political culture, elections, recognition, reciprocity
are diffused on a global scale and some of the effects of this process. Using
Foucault as a main source of inspiration, the circulation of know-how and
capital are seen as the principal means by which government practices are
irradiated. By analyzing social techniques such as projects, programs, conditionalities, documents, international laws and others, I argue that these
are fundamental conduits for devising and reproducing the global order.
In a second moment, I approach some of the outcomes of developmental
practices in processes of state building and other political dynamics among
recipients and donor countries. I stress some of the political, economic and
social impacts of local appropriations of development actions. Of these, I emphasize those related to capacity building and what I call the misrecognition
effect. The final remarks propose an articulated perspective on government
practices that are shaped by diverse strategies.
values are strategically used to reproduce, change or even enhance people’s agency regarding customary practices, and to circumscribe the marriage exchanges to the gift
regime. Attitudes about fulfilling customary obligations vary, for they are correlated to the distinct government practices from which they derive. The social profile of brokers and the sources of their legitimacy to perform marriage negotiations are also discussed.
Finally, these negotiations are analysed against the backdrop of contemporary arguments about the syncretic or anti-syncretic character of some social experiences in Timor-Leste.
do poder local, argumento que o reconhecimento e a incorporação de dimensões dos complexos locais de governança têm se dado de modo a transformá‑las em vias para geração de efeitos de pacificação, integração e monopolização do poder. Ao mesmo
tempo, os usos da kultura servem à transposição e internalização de práticas e projetos modernos de organização social e subjetivação. Exploro as críticas à partidarização das eleições locais como um ato de resistência e agência de setores das populações rurais
aos projetos de apropriação política de aspetos de suas dinâmicas de reprodução social pelas elites nacionais baseadas em Díli.
addressing discourses and political projects that respond to the revival
of kultura in Timor-Leste, and examining the perception of some East
Timorese priests that Catholicism is being weakened by this revival.2 From the priests’ perspectives, the relations between kultura and Christianity are associated with conversion to Christianity. They expect that conversion to Christianity implies discontinuity − a break with practices and beliefs in local spiritual agents (cf. Keane 2007). I examine how my interlocutors try to explain the continuity of Timorese people’s commitments to these institutions and their agents. In other words, how they try to make sense of the way in which adherence to Christianity is not effecting (nor, for some, should it effect) discontinuity or rupture. Furthermore, I explore how Catholic clergy attribute the revival of kultura to what they see as a superficial, formalist, passive and low-quality adherence to Catholicism by some Timorese people. Given this fact, some of my interlocutors present projects for purification and monopolisation of faith (Latour 1994) to confront the ‘spiritual ecologies’ (Palmer 2015), which characterise the mystic practices of most people. Nevertheless, not all clergy in Timor Leste agree with these attempts to rid Catholicism of the remnants of customary practices; there is no overall consensus on the appropriate relationship between kultura and Catholicism. There are ranks within the Church that defend the coexistence between kultura and Christianity, arguing in favour of the need for inculturation.
I identify among my interlocutors three distinct projects that shape the
relationship between kultura and Christianity and motivate interactions of clergy with their parishioners: the first, a project for a tactical use
of kultura as a transitory means for the introduction and strengthening of
Christianity; the second, a project that supports an enduring coexistence
and mutual reinforcement of kultura and of Christianity, with some
selectivity; and the third, a project that seeks the extinction of kultura,
because of its supposed incompatibility with Christianity.
Ita maun alin… o livro do irmão mais novo : afinidades antropológicas em torno de Timor-Leste / org. Kelly Silva, Lúcio Sousa. Lisboa, Colibri. p.21-28
Apoios: IELT /CEMRI
an anthropological perspective, this introduction seeks to map potential methodological and theoretical questions for discussing such equation. One also outlines
registers and historical and contemporary genealogies of artistic practices in order to suggest clues and challenges to be pursued by further studies in the area. The analysis of the articles which this dossier is made up of allows to discuss the developmentof political appropriation of art by various actors, revealing the emergence of new orientalisms and mediation processes, both local and international, in the making of art worlds in East Timor.
Art, agency and power effects in East Timor.
Cadernos de Arte e Antropologia , Vol. 4, No 1 | 2015