Although clear trends towards an ever-increasing involvement in the money economy and the consumer culture were discernible among the Chewong in 1991, they have recently taken a cultural choice to reverse the process and return to their old way of life. Their decisions and actions present a challenge to much contemporary thinking that holds processes of modernization and globalization to be irreversible. At the same time, it could be argued that the Chewong actions may be interpreted as an instance whereby the processes of globalization have resulted in a new self-consciousness about the meaning and value of social life. In this chapter, I shall try to elicit some reasons that may help explain the Chewong choice. This will involve an examination of the deeper meanings of sociality.

As a result of maintaining a relationship with the Chewong over a period of almost twenty years, I have come to revise some earlier interpretations about their understanding of their reality, their environmental orientations, and their cultural values regarding self and others. I shall suggest that concepts about descent and locality are major semantic keys to understanding their exploitation of the forest. I shall further argue that they operate a form of kin- based “ownership” over land areas. This does not correspond easily to Western notions of ownership in the sense that it is not exclusive, not delineated, not individually owned and may not be alienated. I return to this below.

CRITERIA FOR US AND THEM

In cases where social groups place high value on their uniqueness, it is important to examine reasons for such a desire as well as the criteria employed to maintain and re-create a separate identity. My argument as regards the Chewong is that their ontological and epistemological orientations are intrinsically tied to their societal identity. This identity is constituted in relation to two other societal categories with whom they interact: the radical others of Malays and Chinese, and the intermediate others of neighbouring “forest people” (bi? brәte?) groups. The last groups are those designated as Orang Asli by the outside world.