Tan Zi Hao introduced some of his works to us, such as The Soil is not Mine (2013) and Endless Possibilities (2013) which fall under the category of nationhood; Negaraku. Bukan. (2014) and The Danger of Translation (2014) that fall under the group of language; Classroom (2012), Attempting Conflict (2012), A Reminder of a Remainder (2015) which fall under body; and also Pest Control (2013) and Xenophoric Shellpickers (2014) which fall under contradiction.
Among all these works, The Soil is Not Mine impressed me the most. Every packet comprises soil from Malay Reservation Lands, soil from the artist's home, a torn copy of the artist's birth certificate, and the artist's sperm. First thing first, Bumiputra (The Son of the Soil), does it means that the soil, the tanah belongs to them? What about us being the non-Bumiputra? Tanah, the place we were born, we stand on it, bury and decompose our dead body in it after we die. What is our relationship with the soil then? Are we just like those germs which inhabiting on the Malay Soil, the Tanah which belongs to Melayu? In this case, we should have identified ourselves as Malaysian-Chinese (a Chinese who come from Malaysia) instead of Malaysian. But, no one can certify who owned the tanah, maybe it's owned by the Bumiputra, maybe it's owned by the non-Bumiputra, maybe, in the most appropriate way - it's owned by no one. Regardless the ownership of the tanah, since it's the place we stay, we should love it, appreciate it, and make good use of it.
You raise an interesting point about the germs (and bacteria and micro-organisms) that inhabit the soil we live on. Perhaps they are the true owners of the soil since they fertilize it and make the soil fertile for growth. I never really considered the biological aspect of ownership before.
ReplyDeleteIn a similar way, it may be useful to think about who cultivates the land we live on. If someone spends their whole lives working the land and cultivating it and making things grow on it, would this mean they have more of a sense of ownership than someone with just a piece of paper to say they own it?
This is often the conundrum faced by the orang asli because they have lived on Msian soil for generations and cultivated it but because they did not have lawyers and ownership certificates, then others can come in and claim that the land was never theirs. This to me brings us back to your questions about ownership and this is why to me, ownership does matter but the problem is how we define the meaning of owning something.