The Indigene as Divergent and Factionless

Rereading Veronica Roth’s The Divergent trilogy reminds me of the pigeonholing involved in academic discussions on the indigene.

Decades ago, our ancestors realized that it is not just political ideology, religious belief, race, or nationalism that is to blame for a warring world. Rather, they determined that it was the fault of human personality – of humankind’s inclination towards evil, in whatever form that is. They divided into factions that sought to eradicate those qualities they believed responsible for the world’s disarray.

Those who blamed aggression formed Amity…
Those who blamed ignorance became the Erudite…
Those who blamed duplicity created Candor…
Those who blamed selfishness made Abnegation…
And those who blamed cowardice were the Dauntless.

Veronica Roth, Divergent

Dauntless. Erudite. Candor. Abnegation. Amity.  Veronica Roth’s fictive world is not so different from ours in one sense: We tend to divide ourselves into factions each with its own distinctive bylaw, polity, credo, turf, myth, icon, celebrity, and lingo.  And in these factions, the first of the trilogy says, “[we] find meaning, [we] find purpose, [we] find life.” 

Such a social, political and cultural partitioning could have assured the establishment of an ideal world —

·      If only the faction walls were permanent and impregnable. If only the Beatrice Priors did not jump off skyscrapers. If only the Evelyn Eatons just sulked in the dark, dank corners of run-down tenements. If only Jeanine Matthews was not the devil that wears prada.

·      If only society can be ordered by simply making everyone take Roth’s “Faction Quiz” and pigeonholing each one in the process.  But it isn’t – anymore than taking some pop psychology test can actually determine your lifelong temperamental tendencies either as choleric, melancholic, phlegmatic, or sanguine. 

·      If only we can make everyone believe in the noble lie of Plato’s The Republic that we were all born out of the ground with each one automatically assigned to a particular social status based on whether our flesh has a sprinkling of either iron, brass, silver or gold.  If only politicians were truly philosopher-kings.

But if I am reading Roth right, humanity’s survival and productive existence are not found in an artificially created utopia. For as she herself said, “…I realized that my utopia was a terrible place, and no one should ever put me in charge of creating a perfect society.” Nor does humanity’s hope lie in being in a one-dimensional faction – it hinges upon being able to transcend the confines of our personal and social circumstances, by being divergent and factionless: belonging to all factions and at the same time belonging to none.

Which leads me to propose that in framing our perspectives about the world of the so-called “Indigenous Peoples,” we take the concepts of “divergent” and “factionless” both as states of being and processes of becoming, to follow Stuart Hall.  In so doing, I believe, we may be able to tame some wild utopian fantasies and guard ourselves from real-time, counterproductive straitjacketing.

Factionless

“I’m not anyone,” he says. “I’m nobody. That’s what being factionless is.” 

To live factionless is not just to live in poverty and discomfort; it is to live divorced from society, separated from the most important thing in life: community. My mother once told me that we can’t survive alone,but even if we could, we wouldn’t want to. Without a faction, we have no purpose and no reason to live.

Veronica Roth, Divergent

Two notions embedded in the Philippines’ Indigenous Peoples Rights Act (IPRA) definition of IPs are marginalization and resistance, something which resonates with various local and international documents defining or describing IP groups. For instance, Sha Zukang (2009, v), in the foreword to the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs’s publication, State of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, says:

Indigenous peoples are custodians of some of the most biologically diverse territories in the world.  They are also responsible for a great deal of the world’s linguistic and cultural diversity, and their traditional knowledge has been and continues to be an invaluable resource that benefits all of mankind.

Yet, indigenous peoples  continue to suffer discrimination, marginalization, extreme poverty and conflict.  Some are being dispossessed of their traditional lands as their livelihoods are being undermined.  Meanwhile, their belief systems, cultures, languages and ways of life continue to be threatened, sometimes even by extinction.

The same document says:

Of the some 7,000 languages today, it is estimated that more than 4,000 are spoken by indigenous peoples. Language specialists predict that up to 90 per cent of the world’s languages are likely to become extinct or threatened with extinction by the end of the century. (2009, 1)

This prediction does not bode well for the cultures within which these languages are embedded. For as Brower and Johnston put it, “The relatively rapid decline in language diversity parallels declines in cultural diversity” (2007, 13).

This is especially true of what are called the “Disappearing Peoples” of Asia from the Raika of Rajasthan, India and the Peripatetics or gypsies in some parts of South Asia to the Hazara of Afghanistan (Brower and Johnston 2007).

Locally, accounts on some IP groups tell the same stories of marginalization. What Joji Carino (2005, 43) of Tebtebba says of the IPs in the Philippines over a decade ago still rings true today:

The forced displacement of many indigenous communities by development projects is resulting in extreme impoverishment and contributing to urban drift. In the Philippines, some indigenous communities have been displaced from their ancestral lands by military operations, logging concessions and plantation owners, dam-building and eco-industrial zone development and protected areas.

In a lot of ways, untold numbers of Indigenous Peoples may be termed “factionless.” In Veronica Roth’s dystopian Chicago, the Factionless are the pariah, consigned to the forgettable or dreaded fringes of the city. In the same vein, many Indigenous peoples have historically been consigned to the marginal sectors of society, generally invisible in plain sight. For a lot of IPs here and elsewhere, being factionless relegates them to being faceless or defaced entities.

But the story of the IPs in the Philippines is not only about powerlessness in the face of external and internal forces that threaten their very existence.  It is also about resistance. 

“Christina,’I say,’The factionless have all the guns.” 
Veronica Roth, Insurgent

The historic Chico River Dam struggle of the ‘70s to the ‘80s in the highlands of northern Philippines is one prime illustration. Another is an account sometime in 2014 about the Lumads of Mindanao (an aggrupation of 18 ethnolinguistic groups — Atta, Bagobo, Banwaon, B’laan, Bukidnon, Dibabawon, Higaonon, Mamanwa, Mandaya, Manguwangan, Manobo, Mansaka, Subanon, Tagakaolo, Tasaday, Tboli, Teduray, and Ubo) resisting what are considered as repressive national policies. We find this account on intercontinentalcry.org:

Speaking to reporters May 14 from an undisclosed location somewhere in the mountains of Talaingod, Davao del Norte province, on the southern Philippine island of Mindanao, a group of traditional indigenous elders, or datu, said: “We want peace here in Talaingod. But if they take away our land, we will fight. We will fight with our native weapons.” The group was led by Datu Guibang Apoga, who has been a fugitive from the law since 1994, when he led a resistance movement of the Manobo indigenous people against timber and mineral interests, fighting company personnel and security forces with bows and arrows and spears. Wearing their traditional outfits, the tribal leaders threatened to return to arms unless the Philippine government demilitarizes their lands and respects Manobo territorial rights.

Divergent

Every faction conditions its members to think and act a certain way. And most people do it. For most people, it’s not hard to learn, to find a pattern of thought that works and stay that way. But our minds move in a dozen different directions. 

Veronica Roth, Divergent

IPs are not just Factionless, however; they are also Divergents — they do not necessarily conform to stereotypes or fit into a particular ideological mold. Going back to the IPRA definition, we get the impression that it is thorough enough, and that IPs can so easily be categorized as a separate group. But a closer look reveals it to be problematic. For one, it may be questioned whether in today’s increased hybridization of local cultures we can still confidently talk of “homogeneous” societies. Two, one also wonders whether a community needs to satisfy all aspects of the definition to be considered “indigenous” and if not, whether other ethnolinguistic groups in the Philippines which are not in the NCIP list may also qualify to be considered “indigenous” based on at least one of the aspects of the definition.

It does not take an expert in legal construction to note the problems in the IPRA definition.  This issue is to be expected, for even the United Nations has long recognized the difficulty in defining “indigenous peoples.”  Considering the diversity of indigenous peoples, an official definition of “indigenous” has not been adopted by any UN body. Instead the system has developed a modern understanding of this term based on the following:

•  Self- identification as indigenous peoples at the individual level and accepted by the community as their            member. 

•  Historical continuity with pre-colonial  and/or pre-settler societies

•  Strong link to territories and surrounding natural resources

•  Distinct social, economic or political systems

•  Distinct language, culture and beliefs

•  Form non-dominant groups of society 

•  Resolve to maintain and reproduce their ancestral environments and systems as distinctive peoples and communities. 

Nevertheless, the IPRA definition does fit into some of the UNPFII’s description, as well as those of the widely circulated “working definition” penned by Jose Martinez Cobo, a former UN special rapporteur for indigenous people’s concerns:

Indigenous communities, peoples and nations are those which, having a historical continuity with pre-invasion and pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories, consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the societies now prevailing on those territories, or parts of them.  They form at present non-dominant sectors of society and are determined to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral territories, and their ethnic identity, as the basis of their continued existence as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions and legal system.

This historical continuity may consist of the continuation, for an extended period reaching into the present of one or more of the following factors:

1.    Occupation of ancestral lands, or at least part of them

2.    Common ancestry with the original occupants of these lands

3.    Culture in general, or in specific manifestations (such as religion, living under a tribal system, membership of an indigenous community, dress, means of livelihood, lifestyle, etc.)

4.    Language (whether used as the only language, as mother-tongue, as the habitual means of communication at home or in the family, or as the main, preferred, habitual, general or normal language)

5.    Residence in certain parts of the country, or in certain regions of the world

6.    Other relevant factors/

On an individual basis, an indigenous person is one who belongs to these indigenous populations through self-identification as indigenous (group consciousness) and is recognized and accepted by these populations as one of its members (acceptance by the group).

This preserves for these communities the sovereign right and power to decide who belongs to them, without external interference.

The definitions sound like a perfect fit for our current understanding of, say, the Igorots in the Philippines as Indigenous Peoples – they occupy areas designated as ancestral lands (the Kalingas claim to have the largest ancestral domain among all the ethnolinguistic groups of the Cordillera – 3,231 km², belong to the minority (a little over a million people in contrast with the Tagalogs who number about 38 million, the Cebuanos who number about 13 million, and the Ilokanos who number about 9 million), many of them can trace their ancestral lineage via a bilateral kinship system, they have they lifeways distinct from the dominant ethnolinguistic groups in the country (e.g. gangsa and gateng, day-eng and daw-es, ballagoyos and bodong), have their own languages they continually use inside and outside their homes, and reside in the Philippines or in the diaspora. Further, they self-identify as Indigenous Peoples.  Nevertheless, as earlier mentioned, no IP group in the Cordillera can be accurately described as homogeneous, given the heightened phenomenon of hybridization.

Parenthetically, Cobo’s definition gets stuck in the traffic snarl of diversity among indigenous peoples. Ken Coates (2004, 9) cites many ethnic groups around the world whose characteristics or conditions do not fit into Cobo’s “working definition.” He mentions, for instance, groups in Africa and India:

The white Afrikaners from South Africa, after the abolition of apartheid, went to the Working Group as an indigenous people. Likewise, the Kashmiri Pundits community of India has been attending the sessions of the Working Group with the blessings of the Indian Government. Both these ethnic communities did not suffer from isolation or discrimination. On the contrary, until recently they were in power and were practising discrimination against others.

The idea of “self-definition” by IP groups also runs into contentious cases among Native Americans. As Cherokee scholar Eva Marie Garroutte (2003, 11) notes, ‘‘Each one assigns divergent meanings to the label “Indian,” and each one sets a framework of rules within which the legitimacy of specific “identity claims” may be determined.

So it is in this sense that the 370 million or so Indigenous Peoples around the world are divergent.  They are so complex as to defy a singular definition or to be consigned to a socio-political straitjacket.

From all these, it may be said that as divergents and factionless, IPs belong to all factions and yet at the same time cannot be confined within any faction.  

This does erase individual distinctiveness; it allows us to have on our chests the tattoos of our factions, but it stamps on our foreheads the mark of our common humanity. 

The factions say, “Faction before blood”; the divergent-factionless say, “Blood before faction.” Factional interest demands that we sport our ideological lenses, the divergent-factionlessthinking adds that the tinted glasses we wear should not make us lose sight of our common ancestry.

Factions turn us into pawns to be manipulated for some utopian ends in a nebulous future, but the divergent-factionlessrecognize us as potentates who can make the here and now liveable. The factional mindset sees the world as black and white, divergent-factionless thinking apprehends the world as a riot of colors.

The factional goal is to freeze us into doctrinaires, the divergent-factionless end is to develop us into latitudinarians – the defrosting of the icy sarcophagus of dogmatism.

“There are so many ways to be brave in this world. Sometimes bravery involves laying down your life for something bigger than yourself, or for someone else. Sometimes it involves giving up everything you have ever known, or everyone you have ever loved, for the sake of something greater.

But sometimes it doesn’t.

Sometimes it is nothing more than gritting your teeth through pain, and the work of every day, the slow walk toward a better life. 

That is the sort of bravery I must have now.” 
Veronica Roth, Allegiant

Factional interest promotes messianic delusions, divergent-factionless thinking promotes respectful individualism.

Conclusion

“I don’t belong to Abnegation, or Dauntless, or even the Divergent. I don’t belong to the Bureau or the experiment or the fringe. I belong to the people I love, and they belong to me-they, and the love and loyalty I give them, form my identity far more than any word or group ever could.” 
Veronica Roth, Allegiant

I have proposed that one way we can view Indigeneity is to regard Indigenous Peoples as both Divergents and Factionless which, in turn, are both states of being and processes of becoming. 

I contend that to consign the IPs in a faction is to fail to appreciate the complexity and dynamism of the worldviews and lifeways they hold or espouse, to make them less of who they can be.

“Every faction loses something when it gains a virtue: the Dauntless, brave but cruel; the Erudite, intelligent but vain; the Amity, peaceful but passive; the Candor, honest but inconsiderate; the Abnegation, selfless but stifling.” 

Veronica Roth, Allegiant

But to become Divergent and Factionless is not an end in itself, for to do so is to turn this dual identity into a single faction.  To become Divergent and Factionless is to recognize that we ultimately belong to communities with whom we share a common humanity and to whom we commit our loyalty at varying levels, that it is not the labels tacked on us that define us but the quality we stamp on our lives. 

“Life damages us, every one. We can’t escape that damage.”

Says “Tobias Eaton” in the final segment of Roth’s trilogy.  “Factions damage our humanity.”  But he adds,

..we can be mended.

We mend each other.”

Who knows, this mending might lend itself to interesting permutations in the lives of Indigenous Peoples. Today, they can be

Divergent.

 Insurgent.

Allegiant.

Tomorrow, they can be, as one wit had put it:

Convergent.

Emergent.

Resurgent.

Detergent. 

Name them all you like, IPs can be all of those. And at the same time, none of those.