02 Karlström 2005 Heritage Preservation in a Buddhist World

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Spiritual materialityHeritage preservation in a Buddhist world?

ANNA KARLSTRM

Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Uppsala University, Sweden

ABSTRACTThis article explores the role of Buddhism in current heritage preser-vation discussions and practice. Buddhism deals to a great extent withmateriality, but the notion of the impermanence of matter implies thatthe decay of a material world is inevitable and necessary for the con-tinuation of life and rebirth. This forms the platform for a critique ofcontemporary conservation strategies that privilege originality and theidea that our common heritage and archaeological resources should bepreserved for the future and preferably forever. The result is a demandfor a broader outlook among the scholars involved in heritage studiesand research concerning archaeological resource management.

KEY WORDSanimism Buddhism heritage management impermanence Laos materiality preservation spirituality

INTRODUCTION

Is it relevant, or even possible, to impose modern scientific principles ofconservation and preservation in a Buddhist context? That is, a context

Journal of Social Archaeology A R T I C L E

Copyright 2005 SAGE Publications (www.sagepublications.com)ISSN 1469-6053 Vol 5(3): 338355 DOI: 10.1177/1469605305057571

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339Karlstrm Spiritual materiality

where the Buddhist notion of material impermanence governs the percep-tion of reality:

O monks, all karmically constituted things are impermanent; they are notfixed, not comforting, and are characterized by constant change . . . For allbeings, all creatures, all living things, life is limited by death; for them there isno termination of death and rebirth. (translation from Anityatasutra; Strong, 2002: 91)

One of the three characteristics of existence in Buddhism is the imperma-nence of matter. Matter, or the material, is essentially what archaeologistsdeal with. We talk about things that bear meanings of ideological, politicaland economic character according to their contemporary social context.These things are also the main concern in cultural heritage management,which embraces the practices and approaches involved in treating archae-ological remains. Thus our approaches fluctuate and change, depending onideological orientation. Nevertheless, the problem remains that these strat-egies always take Western worldviews as their point of departure. Thepurpose of this article is therefore to challenge current heritage manage-ment praxis, with preservation as its core, by viewing the latter in the lightof Buddhist ideology.

Preservation in Buddhist ideology is a contradiction in terms. Byfocusing on this, my aim is not to suggest an extremist, non-preservationistBuddhist alternative but, instead, to point at fundamental problems inrecent scientific principles of heritage management. The Buddhist extremeis thus used here as a tool, to demonstrate considerations omitted fromtodays heritage management debates.

Recent debates in heritage management are interdisciplinary andinclude interest groups other than archaeologists themselves (Lowenthal,1985, 1998; Skeates, 2000). It is well known that when protecting somethings, others are destroyed (Layton et al., 2001), and it is also suggestedthat destruction is necessary for the appreciation of certain heritageexpressions (Holtorf, forthcoming). Still, the modernist ideal, namely thatthings from the past must be maintained unaltered, is the foundation ofdiscussion on the archaeological heritage. Preservation is the core ofheritage management and seen in contrast to threatening destruction anddecay the Utopian ideal would be to preserve everything (Darvill, 1999:305). Such a formulation contains the implicit understanding that totalpreservation is an impossibility, though worth striving for. According toBuddhist ideology, decay is a constant reminder of death and essential forany celebration of life. Thus decay is crucial for rebirth and finallyenlightenment, the ultimate goal.

I consider current preservation ideology and its desire to protect vulner-able material things as one extreme. Buddhist ideology and its inherentnotion of all matter as impermanent is another extreme. Consequently


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there are two opposing Utopias, dealing with the same material things. Byexamining motives for preservation and motives for non-preservation, thisarticle aims to challenge the conservationist ideal rarely challenged inheritage management, and propose a more nuanced approach in whichplurality not only means balance between preservation and exploitation ofmaterial things, but also takes into consideration the existence of non-preservationist ideals.

As archaeologists and heritage managers we talk about things that havesurvived from a distant or recent past down to modern times. As archaeo-logical remains we call these things material culture, a concept well estab-lished and used for nearly two centuries (Buchli, 2002: 2). For the purposesof this article I choose to replace this concept with materiality, which in myview allows the reader to appreciate the materiality of cultural life and toapproach objects as things embodied, as material characters. It also allowsus to bring to the surface materialitys corollary, or rather complement,namely spirituality. In paraphrasing the term material culture, we wouldfind its equivalent in immaterial culture, which is more in opposition tomaterial culture than spirituality is to materiality.

AT THE OUTSET

Four years ago, when I was about to finish an archaeological fieldworkseason in Southeast Asia, I first got the idea to write this article. I was inthe initial phase of my PhD research project, in which I aimed at investi-gating the practice of archaeological heritage management in Vientiane, thecapital of Laos. Investigating urban development, mapping archaeologicalsites and identifying threats to cultural heritage was part of my objectives.The dense forest north of Vientiane was almost impenetrable, except forsome limited areas that had recently been burned to clear for new rice fieldsor gardens. Finding archaeological remains and mapping sites throughsystematic field walking was impossible. Instead most of the time was spentconducting interviews with residents of the villages in the area. What fromthe beginning seemed an unproblematic investigation became immediatelyproblematic when confronting the material past. I became aware of a multi-tude of conceptions about these remains. Some were easy to understand,others were not.

Working with Lao archaeologists means working with professionals whoare assumed to be able to speak for parts of a non-Western population. TheLao archaeologists and I share much of a common language of archaeol-ogy as they represent a sort of social elite, often educated in the West.Initially we shared the belief that in general human beings both value andneed the material remains of their past. But as the fieldwork proceeded we



also came to share an interest in local religious systems, which in Laos mixTheravada Buddhism, animism and Hinduism. Even if Buddhism officiallyconstitutes the primary religion,1 the distinction between canonical andpopular Buddhism is here of great importance. In canonical Buddhism,which is more or less institutionalized, materiality is a matter of no concern,whereas in popular Buddhism materiality becomes extremely significant aspeople gain merit and tangible benefits through constantly performingmaterial acts, such as offerings. Thus the prevalent religious reality is betterrepresented by these complex and individual mixes in popular Buddhism.Buddhas teachings on impermanence are not strictly observed among layBuddhists, although they permeate peoples perceptions and worldviews ingeneral. What also is significant in a Buddhist context (whether canonicalor popular) is the circular perception of time, as opposed to a linear one.In such a context heritage is quite differently defined by comparison withthe Western archaeological discourse if it is defined at all. It is a contextin which the material remains of the past are not necessarily perceived asarchaeological. Being part of the Lao archaeologists everyday life andreality, these religious systems had never previously been vocalized, ortaken officially into consideration in their professional lives, and they weretherefore not seen as important or even relevant to our work. In the inter-view situation these salient worldviews became quite obvious for me as anoutsider. I found this idea of plurality compelling, and so my original setof interests changed.

Archaeology and heritage management are both research fields arisingfrom, and thus perpetuating, Western scientific knowledge. These are disci-plines born out of imperialist structures in which particular ideologies andpolitics occupy positions of authority. Only by raising the level of aware-ness of the conceptual structures involved is it possible to realize change.Even though archaeology and heritage management are practised in partsof the world where people consider themselves as Buddhist, the impossi-bility of preservation is seldom taken into consideration, or even discussed.Buddhist archaeology primarily focuses on materiality concerns in earlyBuddhism: its origin, art and architecture, and socio-political relationshipto the non-Buddhist world. More rare are discussions on how Buddhistideologies, cosmologies and values spirituality are related to perceptionsof heritage. However, Denis Byrne claims, in his paper in a World Archae-ology issue on Buddhist archaeology, that current conservation practicesprioritize original, physical structures and fabric over local religious practice(Byrne, 1995: 26681). This results in an exclusion of other discourses, whichmight not even regard the objects as archaeological. I also agree with Byrne,in his claim that religious monuments and objects are primarily spiritual innature and have little to do with the physical continuity of that religionsstructure and form (Byrne, 1995: 267). In such a discourse, spirituality mustbe considered and focused upon when developing conservation ethics or



heritage management programmes. This might lead to a situation where theWorld (read: Western) Heritage Project becomes gradually overthrown orat least dramatically changed, resulting in greater balance between differ-ent discourses, and between materiality and spirituality.

In this article, I depart from Western heritage discourse by exploringmotives for preservation. The following section describes in philosophicalterms the Buddhist idea of impermanence, according to canonicalBuddhism. I am not advocating this ideal as the solution to many of theproblems faced in present archaeological heritage debates, but find itrelevant and challenging to use for discussing larger issues concerningpreservation. Buddhist ideology is based on the canonical ideal, butincludes alternative worldviews, as I have already mentioned. And it is thispopular Buddhist reality that saves us from uncritically adopting an extrem-ist non-preservationist attitude, which will be discussed in the final part ofmy text.

WHY PRESERVE? WESTERN MOTIVES

Despite the great variety of motivations for preserving ancient remains,they nevertheless all derive from modernity, the idea that history was notstructured by destiny, and that reality is not timeless and universal. Physicalremains became crucial to historical understanding in the modernistproject, and this historicity reflected a self-image (Cleere, 1989: 13; Lowen-thal, 1985: 38996). The urge to preserve in our own time is based on thesemotives, but has changed and shifted continuously. Motives for preservationin the heritage management process today have been discussed andanalysed over the years (Carman, 1996; Cleere, 1989; Darvill, 1999; Fowler,1992; Lipe, 1984; Lowenthal, 1985; Smith, 1993). I consider three differentkinds of preservationist motives to be relevant to the objectives of thisarticle: political, academic and social. Of course, different motives cannotbe separated from one another, but I have done so here in an attempt toclarify them and to gain a greater insight into the theoretical and concep-tual bases for, and meanings of, preservation in todays heritage manage-ment. These foundations are bases, which are structured and maintained byWestern scientific knowledge.

Political and instrumental motives revolve around the use of heritage tolegitimize and promote group identities and political alliances. Laws andregulations manifest the belief that information contained in archaeologi-cal sites and things from the past can be lost or damaged or misused, andthat this implies an irreplaceable loss to the public. Senses of belonging toa place or a tradition, that is national and/or ethnic allegiances, requiresymbolic links with the past (Lowenthal, 1985: 396). The need for links to



the past might be universal. If so, I think this need must be expressed indifferent ways, as links with the past must appear quite differently if onestime perception is linear or circular. Today this need is fulfilled by thepreservation of things, physical remains, whose original form and fabricremind us of our idea of the past. To fulfil this need through preservationonly reflects Western scientific needs, based on value systems and ideasabout relative importance that are not at all universal. As an illustration, Iwill now discuss the creation of links with the past, expressed on global aswell as local scales.

Heritage has become an important pawn in the globalization game,dependent on economic power. It has become a commodity to exploit.Globalization might represent Westernization and means a threat to localcultural variation. This global extreme is represented by internationalorganizations, preserving heritage in order to rescue it from damage andpotential destruction. Heritage is on this level considered to be propertybelonging to all nations and all peoples of the world, and is ascribeduniversal value that applies to the whole of mankind. The key to this globalrhetoric is the notion that preservation saves. It stops the disappearance ofitems, which otherwise causes a harmful impoverishment of the heritage ofall the nations of the world (UNESCO World Heritage Convention, 2005).Items worth preserving, says UNESCO, are so because they constitute ourheritage and are key sources of information about an important stage in thedevelopment of the human species. In that sense, we can all claim them tobe part of our common world heritage (Aplin, 2002: 9). The knowledge ofthe existence of heritage, any heritage, is sufficient in order to feel a link withthe past (Lowenthal, 1998: 1347). And so the need for the preservation ofsomething as part of this world heritage, the desire for eternal existence, isnow motive enough to claim preservation. Preservation implies participationof everyone, applied to the international community as a whole. Crucial forsuch a project is a view of the world as a homogeneous entity at least onone level, concerning perceptions of heritage. Rhetorical subtlety is a signifi-cant factor in arguments on this global scale, recognized by a scientificallyoriented audience, by those in authority, and also has a considerable impact.

On the other hand, globalization might provoke a strong localistreaction, reflected in a growing interest in local history, traditions andcultural identity (Logan, 2002: xvii). This other extreme is well exemplifiedby governments who promote the local, for a number of reasons. Govern-ments often strive to distort collective memory a distortion strategicallyaimed at directing the collective by manipulating its history (Kohl andFawcett, 1995: 911). This is done by explaining history in such a way as towin support for particular sets of policies or for the maintenance of theirhegemonic power in the present social order. This deliberate distortion hasits most obvious impact when it is politically used for nationalistic purposes.The past legitimizes. The past gives a more glorious background to a



present that doesnt have much to celebrate (Hobsbawm, 1997: 6). Theinvented past does it even better:

Myth and invention are essential to the politics of identity by which groupsof people today, defining themselves by ethnicity, religion or the past orpresent borders of states, try to find some certainty in an uncertain andshaking world by saying, We are different from and better than the Others.(Hobsbawm, 1997: 910)

Even though there are contradictory opinions about the effects of globaliz-ation on heritage, the effects are arguably obvious. This is in itself a fasci-nating paradox. When we agree to focus on the local, the indigenous andthe values of the intangible in the heritage management process, we nevercease to place it on the world agenda. A significant example is UNESCOslatest proclamation, that includes Masterpieces of the Oral and IntangibleHeritage of Humanity on the World Heritage List. One of the explicit aimsof that proclamation is to protect a specific variety of human culture, butin so doing it becomes an integral aspect of the very process of globaliz-ation that UNESCO views as a threat to the complexity of the culturalinventory and the collective memory of people (Fog Olwig, 2002: 1456).The question is then how a global organization, which operates accordingto general guidelines, can recognize and appreciate the complexity anddiversity of the cultural expressions that it seeks to protect (Fog Olwig,2002). I therefore repeat my opening question, but on a more general level.Is it at all possible to preserve an intangible heritage an intangible heritagevalued because of qualities that are inherently difficult to value? It becomesa contradiction in terms when such a distinctive character is valued by asystem which in itself implies homogeneity.

Academic motives derive from the idea that physical remains from thepast are crucial for historical understanding. This notion is close to thatbehind the origins of the preservation ethic, but it has continuously changedand shifted. The archaeological database must be protected (Cleere, 1989:9), and consequently the focus is on physical remains, their original formand fabric and their materiality. Today this is partly a reaction against theincreasing evanescence of things and the speed with which we pass themby (Lowenthal, 1985: 399), in a society where destructive change is rapidand has accelerated. The more the past is destroyed and left behind, thestronger the need to preserve (Lowenthal, 1985: 399). There is a tendencyto think that preserved remains stay unaltered in museums or as culturalor natural reserves, forever frozen and permanent, eternal sources ofinformation about our past. Preservation is, however, an active process ofmaterialization, where materiality is anything except an empirical reality(Buchli, 2002: 145). It produces rather than preserves. This perspective iscrucial for better understanding the essential Buddhist notion of imperma-nence, which I will focus on in the following part of this article.



These motives are also connected to and result from nostalgia for thepast. As modern life becomes increasingly abstract and impersonal, acommon reaction is a growing nostalgia back to the past (Chase and Shaw,1989). This has its roots in the late eighteenth century, when people startedto ascribe positive values to societies very different and distanced from theirown, and recognized the past as a foreign country (Lowenthal, 1985: 233).A longing to return to the past was developed from this interest. Commongrounds during this period were evolutionist and linear ideas of a worlddeveloping from the simple to the complex, beginning in savagery andending in perfectly rational and civilized society. If parts of the past couldbe preserved, we were thereby to be continuously reminded of our excel-lence and sovereignty. The sympathy and nostalgia for the past was thus animportant part of Romanticism. It was an admiration for past achievements,where the spirit of the Romantics own past was confirmed and highlyvalued, simply because it was their own. The basis for this worldview wasthe linear perception of time. Even though Romanticism passed a long timeago, the idea has been inherited and still today directs us towards heritagepreservation projects.

What I choose to call social motives for preservation include ideological,psychological and spiritual motives. Following my argument that spiritual-ity is to a great extent neglected in heritage discussions, I deliberatelyinclude it among the social motives. If we assume that motives for heritagepreservation are of a social character we then have to consider heritage asidentity, as a wider cultural expression, taking place everywhere and alwayssocially situated. Heritage as identity requires open definitions, which inter-connect with history, continuity, anchorage and memory. Heritage asidentity means that it is situated, and cannot exist in isolation. Or, as GaryEdson puts it:

[. . .] it may be better to view heritage not as a historical truth (fact) but onlyas conditional and hypothetical reasoning calculated to explain the nature ofthings (and people), and not to determine the origins of traditions orpractices. If it is assumed that heritage has no empirical reality, then theprocess of identification is greatly altered and simplified. (Edson, 2004: 343)

Attitudes to heritage must be inclusive, whereby each individual or groupis given the right to speak for their own identity in their own language. Theconcept of heritage is general and should be so. It is then easier to considernon-preservationist ideas when continuing heritage management debates.

It is also possible to depart from an approach where we assume thatcultural homogenization and globalization result in an intuited loss ofidentity. I consider the fear of such a loss of identity as being the mostimportant motive for contemporary heritage preservation. The past that wetry to keep alive by preserving its remains is an imagined one, expressed insocietal traditions and held in social memory. Motives for preservation



could thus be explained in two ways. One is the desire to feel united andaffiliated with the past by imagining that one has already experienced some-thing when it is actually experienced for the first time, for example whenwalking around in a museum looking at preserved heritage objects in show-cases and imagining a continuity or a sense of origin from the person orgroup who once produced and used those objects. Another explanation isthat the heritage creation process is important in itself. At the very momentof preservation we create our own imagination of the past (Edson, 2004:339). By formalizing and ritualizing heritage in this way, we master it. Thatcould well be sufficient motive for preservation.

Memory is another concept that could help us to better understand themotivations for preservation. Awareness of the past is always based onmemory (Lowenthal, 1985: 193). Memory is also related to the loss ofidentity, or rather the fear of it. Our contemporary society is dominated byan increased flow of information. To become a good citizen or a person witha strong character, one must remember all this information. The more weremember, the better. Simultaneously, with increasing information flow, thedemands on remembering as much as possible are also increasing. The moreinformation we need to keep in our memory, the more difficult it is to keepit there implicitly, inside the mind. We must therefore collect things orobjects that can help us remember and move our memories in an explicitdirection, outside of the mind, to the outside world (Derwinger, 2005;Yates, 1966). This is an explanation as to why we so desperately seek topreserve the past and its objects. It is here not only interesting but crucialto note the fact that while we in the Western part of the world forceourselves to remember as much as possible, others practice the art of forget-ting. According to the art of forgetting, to best remember the essentials, itis desirable to have an implicit in-the-mind-memory. It has been argued, byAustralian aborigines, that people in the Western part of the world do notknow what to remember and what to forget, and that their uncertainty asto how to relate to the past is a reason for preservation (Lowenthal, 1998:29). In China, permanence is appreciated through words exalting othersenduring thoughts, rather than through things (Lowenthal, 1998: 20).Consequently, forgetting means that what is remembered is not recalledthrough materiality, but in ones mind, through emancipated physicalremains. At the risk of crude generalization, I want to emphasize this point,as I will return to related ideas in the last part of this article. I also want tobring it up because almost all of what I have examined so far evolves fromWestern perspectives. Even with the best of intentions and a holisticapproach in current heritage debates (where local communities areinvolved and indigenous groups teach heritage managers how to identifyand manage heritage, and where we emphasize small scale features insteadof monumentality as the predominant reason for preservation), we assume



that all people in the world live in a reality where, for example, the Buddhistnotion of the impermanence of matters does not exist.

WHY NOT? THE BUDDHIST DILEMMA

Together with unsatisfactoriness and absence of a Self, impermanence iscentral in Dharma the teachings of Buddha. These three characteristics,or marks, of existence can serve as separate doctrines, but are also closelyinterdependent.

Unsatisfactoriness (duhkha) is at the core of the central conception ofBuddhism. The entire teaching of Buddha evolves from an understandingof the unsatisfactory nature of all phenomenal existence and an under-standing of the way out of this unsatisfactoriness (Strong, 2002: 324). Thiscourse, called the Four Noble Truths, covers definitions of unsatisfactori-ness, how and why it arises, how to end it and finally the way to achieve thisobjective the path to purification and deliverance through right under-standing, thought, speech, action, livelihood, effort, mindfulness andconcentration. It is a framework for grasping the processes of experiencein life, and the Four Noble Truths are best understood as phenomenologi-cal categories in those processes (Robinson and Johnson, 1997: 3442).

The doctrine that there is no Self in individuals, called absence of a Self(anatman), means that there is no permanent I or mine. There is seeing,feeling, experiencing etc., but not an unchanging never-ending Self or Soulbehind the scene. Body and soul are two sides of the same matter. Betweenthey who die and they who are born is continuity, but no identity. This couldbe applied not only to the life of people and things but also to the life ofthoughts.

Impermanence (anitya), or inconstancy, is an attribute of all conditionedphenomena. It simply means that all beings and all things arise, live andpass away, in circular motion, until the final extinction is reached. Thisultimate goal, nirvana, is attained when the being or the thing is free fromor has relinquished the unsatisfactory state. The term nirvana can also beequated with enlightenment and implies a freedom from desire, and adestiny not to be reborn again (Bechert and Gombrich, 1984: 789, 15970;Robinson and Johnson, 1997: 3442; Strong, 2002: 902, 106).

The interrelation between unsatisfactoriness, absence of a Self andimpermanence could further be summarized as follows (albeit generalized):Happiness in life is dependent on unsatisfaction to the extent that bothhappiness and life are impermanent. That is, things are unsatisfactorybecause they are impermanent. They do not last forever, or even for amoment, but are in a constant state of change. As a consequence of this,



neither feelings, thoughts, things nor life are completely under control andtherefore cannot be regarded as ones identity, as identity denies the exist-ence of a Self underlying the phenomenon of experience.

If, as it is concluded above, in accordance with Western notions ofheritage management the fulfilment of desire often is the motive forpreserving or inventing heritage, then it should not be possible to perceiveof heritage in a strictly Buddhist context. Inherent in the heritage idea is adesire for eternal existence, an insatiable search, a craving for pleasures orchallenges fuelling the life flame. In Western societies this desire is encour-aged, whereas in a strictly Buddhist worldview such desire is one of themain reasons for unsatisfactoriness. The ongoing thirst for possession andsatisfaction of desires, the search for pleasure without realizing that thereare no objects or ideas that will ever satisfy the senses or the mind, has tobe eliminated. Otherwise, those governed by desire will forever be boundto the wheel of existence and will never reach the goal of final extinction(Strong, 2002: 1003). Consequently, from a strictly Buddhist perspective,desire would be considered the primary motive for preserving heritage. Thethree characteristics of existence therefore make heritage preservationirrelevant or even impossible.

IN REALITIES

A significant distinction between canonical and popular Buddhismconcerns materiality. Although they consider themselves pious Buddhists,most people in Laos have enthusiastically adopted capitalist materiality.Primarily this holds for those living in and around the main cities, a groupthat includes approximately half the population of the country (Sisouphan-thong and Taillard, 2000: 36).

Materiality not only forms a distinction between canonical and popularBuddhism, but also a common interest for Buddhists and heritagemanagers. I will here take up materiality (decay and consumption included)to illustrate the discrepancy between Western perceptions of heritagepreservation and Buddhist ideology including Dharma, even when it is notused in its extreme.

In February 2004, I excavated a temple site, together with staff from theLao authorities and residents of the village where the investigations werecarried out. The site is located in Ban Viengkham, 70 km north of Vien-tiane. After we had finished the work, we wanted to bring one of the exca-vated sema stones to the National Museum in Vientiane to include it in anexhibition about recent archaeological work in ancient Ban Viengkham. Itdid not take long before we understood that this was impossible. Thevillagers did not dare to let anything leave the ancient temple site. After



attending numerous meetings in the village we were finally allowed toborrow the stone, and include it temporarily in the exhibition. Later on, aspart of my interview investigation, I discussed the incident with monkSayadeth Khampee from Vat Ong Teu in Vientiane together with Mr KandaKeosopha, a former monk now employed as an archaeologist at theNational Museum. Let us catch a glimpse of what was said in our discussionabout materiality on that occasion.

AK: [. . .] the villagers did not allow us to take the stone to Vientiane.

SK: Yes, because people believe that there are spirits in there and theyworship the spirit, the secret things . . . it has not very much to do withBuddhism, it is animism. Because the Lao people have believed inanimism for a long time before the Buddhist came in.

AK: But if this group of people in the village, who did not allow us to take thestone without making a ceremony first, if they were Buddhist monks allof them, what do you think would have happened?

SK: Buddhist monks are not afraid of the spirits, but they do agree to thepeople, to the tradition. Before we do something with the sacred things,we have to ask the villagers [. . .] We care, we care about the material ifit is very old or if it is an image of the Buddha for example. Yes, we carefor it.

AK: So, a Buddha image is more important than a stone?

SK: Yes.

KK: If in the doctrines of the Buddha something is said to be important, thenyou have to care for it. If you exactly follow the Buddha, no problem totake away anything. What you want you can take, because the materialwas not important for Buddha. The material is in your mind . . . inBuddhism spirituality is the most important.

[. . .]

SK: Materiality for me is the statue of the Buddha. It is a very importantsymbol when I pray or conduct a ceremony. Because the statue is therepresentation of the Buddha . . . but the most important is spirituality.

Evident in this discussion is the distinction between villager and monk,between popular and canonical Buddhism but also that together they areinseparable. Societal Buddhism is based on the existence of them both andcannot function without one or the other. And, as monk Khampee pointsout, materiality may be a matter of concern, if it is considered a symbol ora representation.

The first Buddha image is said to have been produced 400 years afterthe death of Buddha, but legends indicate that depictions had already beenfashioned during his lifetime. There is, for example, one tale in the Pannasa-jataka that tells of King Pasenadi of Kosala, who made a sandalwood image



so that the inhabitants of Sravasti would have something to worship whenthe Buddha was out of town (Strong, 2002: 3941). Buddha images are usednot as idols, but as objects of representation. When a Buddhist is offeringflowers, or lighting a candle before the Buddha image, it is not an act ofworship because the Buddhist is not praying to anyone. Flowers that soonfade and flames that die speak to the Buddhist and remind her or him aboutthe impermanency of all conditioned things. The image serves as a mediumfor concentration in which inspiration to find the right way can be found.This applies not only to the Buddha image, but also to many sorts of objectsor actions that create moments of inspiration. Thus inspiration is connectedto material things in our surroundings or to a change of states in whichdifferent materials are involved.

Materiality is essential in merit making as well. The ethic of merit makingin Buddhism aims to obtain a better situation either in this or a futurelifetime (Strong, 2002: 2831, 7880). Merit making forms the basic frame-work for the everyday life and practice of a lay Buddhist, and is acquiredthrough generosity, virtue and meditation (Robinson and Johnson, 1997:77). The primary way to make merit is giving, a reciprocal action betweenlaity and the community of monks and nuns (sangha). The laity givematerial things, such as food and other supplies, to members of the sangha,who in turn give the laity teachings of Buddha (Dharma). Even though onlyone of ten different ways of making merit concerns material matters, it isstill the act that most obviously permeates the laypeoples everyday lives.By constructing a religious monument, for example a temple or a stupa (thatis, a mound built of brick or stone, originally to enshrine the relics ofBuddha but today built as burial or memorial monuments in general), theconstructer (who could be an individual, a family, a village or any othercollective) makes merit. The more costly the act, the better are the chancesfor increased merit.

In December 2000, the old sanctuary (sim) at Vat Ou Mong in Vientianewas being replaced by a new one, as an act of merit making. The village hadsaved money for years and finally the plan could be realized. This is howAlan Potkin, freelance consultant in environmental planning and at thetime resident in the same village, Ban Ou Mong, describes what happenedthat day:

Between 11 and 13 December, 2000, at the full moon of the winter solstice,the people of the village (ban) gathered for the festive demolition of the oldimage hall at Vat Ou Mong, to be replaced with a new sim; seen to be amerit-making activity that would much enhance the beauty and prestige ofthe temple compound. The un-reinforced masonry building, which dated tothe 1920s, was cracked in several places, some of the woodwork was termite-damaged, and the roof structure and tiles had been rapidlydeteriorating. But the interior, which was completely covered with wonderfulnave murals illustrating the Phralak-Phralam (the Lao Ramayana)



painted during only thirteen days in 1938 by the talented but inexperienceddraftsman-monk, Thit Panh, with the help or hindrance of seven boy novices was still perfectly intact. (Potkin, 2001)

Potkin documented the frescoes and preserved a few fragments. This simwas one of only a few rare structures comprising depictions of the belovedepic, and one of the oldest in Vientiane. During the process of demolition,which was also documented by Potkin, the villagers who were gathered atthe temple site seemed quite happy about the pulling down of the struc-ture, shouting and clapping their hands.

Which approach to heritage preservation is here the most appropriate?Is it possible to bridge the obvious divide between a sophisticated preser-vationist sensibility where the Lao cultural patrimony should be conserved(Potkin, 2001), and the perceptions and priorities of the local communitywhere the old sim is laid in ruins, the villagers make merit and by doing sotake part in and hand over the intangible and ever changing heritage of aBuddhist community? If it is possible, how can we then bridge this divide,to best meet as many demands as possible? Or is it desirable to even try?This is an example of the difficulties in discussing preservationist idealsaimed at conserving a heritage and the ethic of merit making as alternativesolutions to the same problem, as their respective frameworks are mutuallyincompatible. The framework for discussing preservation is that the sim inquestion is considered archaeological. In the case of merit making the simis not conceived or constructed in this way at all.

Decay, following Buddhas final lesson on impermanence, is inevitable.Restoring a ruined religious monument is similar or equivalent to buildinga new monument. Restoration is also an act of making merit. But thisrestoration is meant in a totally different way than is implicit in recentscientific principles of conservation and preservation. It is a restoration ofan idea of the prestige of the original, rather than of the physical form ofthe original. In a Buddhist context, abandonment, decay and impoverish-ment are continuously balanced against the process of maintenance andrestoration (Byrne, 1995: 2745). Suddenly a monument is considered to beworn out and of no use for merit making. What remains then are the sacredobjects, objects animated with power through rituals impregnated byBuddhist as well as animist ideas, but free for anyone to plunder. Plunder-ers are often pious Buddhists, seeking sacred objects or amulets to use intheir everyday religious life, and should be seen rather as relievers thanplunderers. The plundering could be seen as a releasing of the amulets,which allow them to pour forth into the greater world (Byrne, 1995: 276)and be of further use, because the amulet itself holds more value than thefact that it was buried under a monument.

Buddhism encourages spending rather than saving, which is reflected ineconomic systems examined by Melford E. Spiro in the 1960s. His case



study was Burmese, but Buddhist notions are more generally applicable.He introduces his article in American Anthropologist as follows:

The Buddhist world view, and especially its notions of rebirth and karma,provide a cognitive orientation within which religious spending is a muchsounder and much more profitable investment than economic saving . . .(Spiro, 1966: 1163)

By spending, and directing the surplus towards merit making, the spenderbecomes a consumer. Consequently, in this case, consuming heritagebecomes the prerequisite for maintaining its value. Heritage consumptionis the act, which some may call destruction and some conservation, that weall agree on forms a crucial part of the heritage management process.Conservation and preservation may delay decay, but death and decay awaitus all, people and objects alike. In common we have our materiality(Pearson and Shanks, 2001: 93). Materiality is the main concern that wemust gather around as creators of the past, Buddhist as well as non-Buddhist. In a Buddhist world, spirituality is experienced through materi-ality. In a non-Buddhist world, identity is preserved through materiality.

The teachings of Buddha, the true Dharma, were themselves subject tothe laws of impermanence (Strong, 2002: 89). What Buddha taught wastherefore supposed to be changed and reinterpreted, or even lost andforgotten. It would have been easy to suggest that when working in acontext where the notion of impermanence is valid for all things, thereshould be no point at all in bothering about the history of that specificcontext. But the fact that Buddhas teachings themselves were imperma-nent saves us from leaving any of those areas out of research in history orarchaeology. What further saves us from ignoring them is the fact that theyare in most cases not purely Buddhist. Buddha cannot be seen as a protec-tor, but rather a refuge or a converter (Strong, 2002: 219).

In Laos, this means that Buddhism co-exists with animism, as alreadydiscussed. Buddhism admits polytheistic traditions and has done so fromthe very beginning. In animism, spirits function as protectors of differentthings, villages, trees or houses. The relationship between the practice ofBuddhism and the worship of spirits is in one way very complex, but inanother way very simple and without contradictions. They might well bemixed or run parallel. In this context, animism is on a par with Buddhism,with which it forms an integral whole. Animism means simply to furnishmaterial things with a spirit, a soul or a self. If simply extreme animism isfollowed, this might lead us back to our point of departure, the one thatcalls for unquestioned heritage preservation. But by illustrating that differ-ent ideologies and worldviews co-exist in one and the same reality, unques-tioned perceptions on heritage preservation become impossible. This is oneof the conclusions that can be drawn from the present attempt to challenge



present scientific principles of preservation, rather than advocating non-preservationist ideals delivered through Buddhist ideologies.

Even though intangible heritage is taken into consideration and conser-vation strategies are formulated in consultation with indigenous groups, thefundamental aim and necessity of preservation is still unquestioned. So,learning from the Buddhist example where heritage preservation is imposs-ible, we cannot simply turn back to unquestioned preservation, even thoughthe real situation involves a blend of true Buddhism, animism and otherbeliefs. I think general alternative strategies for dealing with a heritage thatis constantly changing are difficult to easily find. We might rather be ableto continue debating preservation ethics in a somewhat more humble way,where a situated, particular and non-essentialist approach is argued for.What is needed is imagination and sensitivity, to put heritage managementinto practice in a constructive and intelligent way, so that the peopleinvolved recognize their rights in justifying the same values as they considerimportant and sacred.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Anna Klln for inspirational discussions all along the way,which have encouraged me to develop ideas and arguments for this article, and forher perseverance in commenting on the text at different stages. Thanks are also dueto Peter Schalk for generous contributions to my understanding of the Buddhistworld. I am most grateful to Timothy Darvill and Johan Hegardt, for their valuablesuggestions and comments on earlier drafts, and to the four anonymous reviewerswho helped me to finalize the text by offering their critical comments. Warm thanksto Neil Price, for the loan of his English and for making the thoughts behind thesentences clearer. Finally, I wish to thank Cornelius Holtorf, whose elaboratecomments and critique have been crucial.

Note

1 There is a complex multi-ethnic population in Laos, represented by the Lao anda minimum of 131 different ethnic minorities (Chaze, 1999). Cultural andreligious diversities make a study of the country as a whole impossible, or atleast extremely difficult. Therefore I have chosen to focus on that part of thepopulation (6585% according to various official sources), who considerthemselves Buddhists.

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ANNA KARLSTRM is a PhD candidate at the Department ofArchaeology and Ancient History, Uppsala University, Sweden. Herprimary research interests include heritage studies in general, but arebased on experience of working in Laos over the last 10 years, and withheritage management projects in Sweden.[email: [email protected]]


02 Karlström 2005 Heritage Preservation in a Buddhist World

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