The glossy guide book image of Bali is of a timeless paradise whose people are devoutly religious and artistically gifted. However, a hundred years of colonialism, war and Indonesian independence, and tourism have produced both modernizing changes and created an image of Bali as ‘traditional’. Incorporating up-to-date ethnographic field work the book investigates the myriad of ways in which the Balinese has responded to the influx of outside influence. The book focuses on the fascinating interrelationship between tourism, economy, culture and religion in Bali, painting a twenty-first century picture of the Balinese. In documenting these diverse changes Howe critically assesses some of the work of Bali’s most famous ethnographer, Clifford Geertz and demonstrates the importance of a historically grounded and broadly contextualized approach to the analysis of a complex society.

This book offers a comprehensive examination of spatial and environmental governance in contemporary Bali. In the era of decentralisation, Bali's eight district governments and one municipality acquired a strong sense of authority to extract revenues from within their territorial borders while disregarding the impacts beyond them which has exacerbated environmental, cultural and institutional issues. These issues are addressed through reorganising space. In reality, however, such re-organisation has predominantly been in order to provide space for tourism investments and market expansion. The outcomes of reorganising space are in fact shaped by the dynamics of power that interface with increasingly complex legal and institutional structures. These complex structures provide more arenas for vested interests to manoeuvre, but at the same time provide different forms of legitimacy for local forces to challenge the dominant process. The book demonstrates the mechanisms through which social actors mobilise legal-institutional arrangements to advance their interests.

A Literary mirror is the first English-language work to comprehensively analyse Indonesian-language literature from Bali from a literary and cultural viewpoint. It covers the period from 1920 to 2000. This is an extremely rich field for research into the ways Balinese view their culture and how they respond to external cultural forces. This work complements the large number of existing studies of Bali and its history, anthropology, traditional literature, and the performing arts. A Literary Mirror is an invaluable resource for those researching twentieth-century Balinese authors who wrote in Indonesian. Until now, such writers have received very little attention in the existing literature. An appendix gives short biographical details of many significant writers and lists their work.

Ritual and World Change in a Balinese Princedom is an ethnography of a contemporary Balinese princedom as it engages with globally influenced circumstances. A ritual of ancestral deification serves as a vehicle for talking about the Balinese negara (or state), power, subject formation, and local approaches to the changing nation-state. The stage is set in chapter one with a narrative of the large-scale ritual performed by a minor noble house in the highlands of eastern Bali, presented as it unfolds in counterpoint with the national political upheaval surrounding President Suharto''s fall from power in 1998. Through the lens of the ritual we observe the deliberate reconstitution of ancient forms of caste hierarchy, from where we go on to look more closely at the ritual''s political dimensions, and at how and why the various participants became involved. Two discourses join in a surprising way, as questions posed about modern politics and the broader meaning of the ritual lead back to issues debated at the level of the nature of the Balinese state. In the modern era, where the princedom lacks obvious forms of power to coerce, the question that rises to the fore is "why?". Why do the subjects still follow and work for the princes? This question recurs as subsequent chapters investigate what the ritual reveals about the dynamics of the princedom, why it was significant, and how it relates to other aspects of Balinese culture, society, history, and politics. Ritual and World Change examines local approaches to being princes and princely subjects, but also to being subjects of and agents in the nation-state in times of turmoil. This book is part of the Ritual Studies Monograph Series, edited by Pamela J. Stewart and Andrew Strathern, Department of Anthropology, University of Pittsburgh. "An absorbing story about a small kingdom in the mountains of Bali in the process of recreating itself, exploring the contrast between the state as a material reality and as an imagined order created through performance." -- J. Stephen Lansing, Professor of Anthropology, University of Arizona and Santa Fe Institute "A remarkable portrait of a Balinese Princedom, deftly linking political and ritual lives at the local level with influences from the nation state in an era of globalization. The maligya ritual becomes a complex site where readers can negotiate the terrain between scholarly and indigenous claims concerning ritual performance, politics, and the fluctuating face(s) of kingship." -- Kaja McGowan, Associate Professor and Director of Graduate Studies, Department of the History of Art and Archaeology, Cornell University "Pederson has produced a compelling account... A key contribution to the regional literature, this book is written well enough to appeal more widely to those interested in ritual and in the intersection of religion and politics." -- CHOICE Magazine "As well as contributing to the general theory of ritual, Pederson''s book is of additional value in that she situates Balinese royal ritual in its Southeast Asian and Austronesian context, contributing to a growing body of work concerned with the deconstruction of Bali as a unique and isolated cultural enclave." -- Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology "This lively and highly readable work -- free of turgid theoretical jargon -- will be very useful to students and teachers... This is a very good, engaging, and humane book which will be widely read and inform debate for some time to come. It is beautifully produced, elegantly written, and includes many excellent photographs." -- Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute "This is one of the best books on ritual in Bali ever published... [It] is a well-documented and well-written study with a clear and well-organised analysis... Lene Pederson has written a beautiful and accessible book that deserves a wide readership, especially among those with an interest in how kingship and ritual manifest themselves in modern contexts." -- Anthropological Forum

Few countries as culturally rich, politically pivotal, and naturally beautiful as Indonesia are as often misrepresented in global media and conversation. Stretching 3,400 miles east to west along the equator, Indonesia is the fourth most populous country in the world and home to more than four hundred ethnic groups and several major world religions. This sprawling Southeast Asian nation is also the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country and the third largest democracy. Although in recent years the country has experienced serious challenges with regard to religious harmony, its trillion-dollar economy is booming and its press and public sphere are among the most vibrant in Asia. A land of cultural contrasts, contests, and contradictions, this ever-evolving country is today rising to even greater global prominence, even as it redefines the terms of its national, religious, and civic identity. The Routledge Handbook of Contemporary Indonesia offers an overview of the modern making and contemporary dynamics of culture, society, and politics in this powerful Asian nation. It provides a comprehensive survey of key issues in Indonesian politics, economics, religion, and society. It is divided into six sections, organized as follows: Cultural Legacies and Political Junctures Contemporary Politics and Plurality Markets and Economic Cultures Muslims and Religious Plurality Gender and Sexuality Indonesia in an Age of Multiple Globalizations Bringing together original contributions by leading scholars of Indonesia in law, political science, history, anthropology, sociology, religious studies, and gender studies this Handbook provides an up-to-date, interdisciplinary, and academically rigorous exploration of Indonesia. It will be of interest to students, academics, policymakers, and others in search of reliable information on Indonesian politics, economics, religion, and society in an accessible format.

Professor Boon places our current understanding of Bali within the context of historical views of Balinese life and religion, beginning with the initial Dutch contacts after 1597. Based on field work in Indonesia as well as historical research, this book is the first thorough study of Balinese social and cultural dynamics.