[Film Screening and Discussion] The Missing Ox: Collaborative Practices in Studying and Documenting Deathscapes in Contemporary Indonesia

New Idea or Format Details: The Missing Ox: Collaborative Practices in Studying and Documenting Deathscapes in Contemporary Indonesia

The screening of the film and a post-film screening discussion-cum-museum visit session

Film details:
The Missing Ox: Ngaben Massal Taman Kaja, Ubud, Bali, in Pandemic Time
Producer: Rita Padawangi – Associate Professor, Singapore University of Social Sciences
Director: Ari Trismana – Senior Producer, Watchdoc Media Mandiri

Film synopsis:
In Balinese tradition, ngaben is mandatory to usher deceased family members to the next realm. However, ngaben ceremony is often expensive. With the high costs, how can families who are less well-off fulfill their obligations to the deceased? Holding a mass ngaben for one banjar (community) at a time is an effort to cut costs, as has been practiced in Banjar Taman Kaja since year 2002.
In 2022 there were new challenges: Bali's economy has just been hit by the COVID-19 pandemic for more than two years. To what extent has the economic downturn caused by the pandemic affected the implementation of mass ngaben? What changes have occurred to finance the ceremony? What do less well-off residents and banjar communities do to adapt to the needs of the ngaben ritual?
“The Missing Ox” takes us to Banjar Taman Kaja in Ubud, Bali, as they prepared and carried out the 5-yearly mass ngaben, the collective process within the community, as well as joint considerations about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the economy.

Post-film screening discussion-cum-museum visit session
A discussion will follow the screening of the film and will start with brief sharing (5 minutes each) on collaborative practices of a community on the ground with academia and practitioners (filmmaker) to synergize research, outreach, and addressing community concerns. Resource persons in this session include: 1) I Gde Agus Dharma Putra (Lecturer in Hindu Philosophy, Universitas Hindu Indonesia, Denpasar); 2) Rita Padawangi (Associate Professor of Sociology, Singapore University of Social Sciences and Producer of the film); 3) Toetik Koesbardiati (Professor of Anthropology, Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, Universitas Airlangga, Surabaya), 4) Ari Trismana (Senior Producer, Watchdoc Media Mandiri and Director of the film).

The film screening and discussion will take place at the Museum Etnografi dan Pusat Kajian Kematian (Museum of Ethnography and Death Study Center) at FISIP UNAIR, which has a hall that can accommodate up to 40 persons. The discussion will be followed by a guided tour of the Museum in a dialogical format that allows the attendees to interact dynamically with the guide. The museum features exhibits on death rituals and anthropological perspectives on death from various parts of Indonesia, providing an opportunity for direct reflection on deathscapes, rituals, traditions, as well as practices of documentation and representation, directly after the film screening and discussion.

The discussion and museum visit will focus on the following questions: What are the connections between social-economic transformations in Indonesia with evolutions of legends, myths, narratives, rituals, spaces, and environments in everyday life? To what extent can collaborative studies and documentations mitigate potential hesitations to discuss deathscapes? How are possibilities of collaborations among academia, practitioners, and communities in sharing knowledge and practices of traditions? What are the principles, enabling conditions, and necessary actions to start, practice, and strengthen knowledge-sharing collaborations? The visit to the museum will be a platform for direct engagement between academia and members of the public in a publicly accessible academic setting. This engagement also opens the space for those beyond academia to connect with academics, allowing those involved in the session to intensify knowledge-sharing practices through various means of encounter that activate existing spaces in the university: film screening, sharing session, discussion, and an interactive museum visit, to enable exchanges of ideas for future collaborations.