Complexité de l’insertion professionnelle des femmes sasaks dans l’industrie touristique de Lombok, Indonésie : nouvelle économie et identités locales
In Lombok, a rural Indonesian island, the Sasak community has long practised a syncretic and tolerant Islam. However, since the 20th century, various political shifts affected the island which had the effect of encouraging a more orthodox Islam and reaffirming traditional sasak values. Nowadays, this dynamic reiterates the role of women as wives and mothers, household keepers, as a key element for their religious identity.  In parallel, a fast-growing international tourism, encouraged by the Indonesian state, is forcing a reorganization of women’s work. Women mostly work as clerks in hotels and restaurants which locally are jobs associated with modernity, but also with the travellers’ misbehaviour. As they work outside the household, their purity and their performance as wives and mothers are compromised.  Therefore, women are placed in an awkward position: as their jobs align with national ideals they are also confronting local values. How do these women manage to play these seemingly contradictory roles? What is the impact on their daily activities and their identity, their gender role?  The main objective of this research is to investigate, through an ethnographic fieldwork, the reality of Sasak women who engage in the tourism industry. By focusing on kinship dynamics and gender relations, this research highlights both the day-to-day obstacles and identity issues that Sasak women workers experience as they work. Ultimately, this research updates the relevance of investigating kinship in the study of social changes and highlights the complexity of identity crisis that can experience a community targeted by international tourism.
Lombok identity gender relations Sasak kinship tourism development Sasak women workers professional integration Indonesia