Dayak’s Sociocultural Situation Through Locality in Lumholtz’s Through Central Borneo Travel Writing

Abstract

This research is intended to discuss the portrayal of the sociocultural situation of Dayak as indigenous people in Borneo through the locality in Through Central Borneo travel writing. This research also discovered the self and the other concept through the author’s interaction with people in visited places. The focus of this research is on the passage of the Mahakam River only. The locality studied in this research is bound to a specific cultural context in the East Kalimantan, particularly in the Mahakam River area. This research fits descriptive qualitative research. The data are taken from the travel writing only, in the form of words, phrases, and sentences that meet the aim of this research. The outcomes show that the locality defines the sociocultural situation of Dayak. It can be seen through the place, social organization, habit, object, convention, ecology, character, and belief. Many layers of the author’s choices in describing the sociocultural situation in the travel writing bring the issues of revealing the self and representing the other in the concept of ‘different’ between the author and the visited people.