On the afternoon of July 10, 2023, Dr. Sophie Chao, Lecturer at the University of Sydney’s Department of Anthropology, delivered an online lecture titled “Plantation Expansion, Food Sovereignty, and the Cultural Meanings of Hunger in West Papua” to the faculty and students within and outside of the Institute for International and Area Studies (IIAS), Tsinghua University, and later, communicated with the audience. The lecture was presided over by Wang Lingqi, doctoral candidate of IIAS Southeast Asian Studies Group, and attended by the faculty, students, and professionals from Tsinghua University, Cornell University, Chiang Mai University, etc.

In the one-hour lecture, Dr. Sophie Chao first gave an overview of her key research findings and thoughts on multispecies studies in Southeast Asia and her observation of the origin of indigenous communities in West Papua, which sparked great interest among the audience. Then, Dr. Sophie Chao reviewed how the region has suffered a food crisis caused by deforestation and occupation of arable land for the purpose of economic development. She showed a map of local oil palm plantations and some photos taken by her to illustrate how Marind people in West Papua perceive hunger in their long-valued context of “food-forest-environment”.

Dr. Sophie Chao also recounted how today’s oil palm industry and food system have led to a new and different type of hunger among Marind people, and emphasized that it is not conventionally seen universal or singular hunger. Instead, it is a kind of hunger that multiplies along cultural, political, and multispecies lines, and impacts various aspects of morality, education, and even everyday life. Finally, Dr. Sophie Chao guided the audience to think about the causes of such hunger. The discussions extended from historical and political perspectives to ontological debate over capitalism and justice. It was pointed out that there is asymmetry of relations between “eating and being eaten” and between “feeding and being fed” in both nature and capitalist society, that is, hunger suffered by one is a necessary precursor for satiety of another. Discussions from an ecological perspective led people to ponder over the challenges to local food sovereignty, as well as food politics shaped by the tension between local realities and various global forces.

After the lecture, eight participants were invited to engage in the two-hour online discussion. In a space of equal footing dialogue, Dr. Sophie Chao discussed with the participants from different backgrounds about the theoretical and practical difficulties in work and research, such as how to carry out field study in conflict areas like West Papua or the southern Philippines, the implicit racial discrimination faced by Chinese scholars, the language and diverse narratives of dialogists, as well as the relationship between language, power, and colonialism. Everyone’s field work is unique and hard to replicate, and each participant’s personal attributes, backgrounds, and interpersonal interactions are all the result of a particular environment. Dr. Sophie Chao described these issues as “a constructive form of confusion” and responded to the discussions citing her own experiences in field study and reading, as well as the experiences of her friends. She also encouraged the participants to proceed with and go deep into their studies. At the end of the discussion, Dr. Sophie Chao raised a question: have you ever thought for whom you are writing for? She said that when she was first asked this question in graduate school, she felt struck with awe: do we need to write for anyone else except for the committee? In fact, thinking about this question can prompt more extensive dialogues. “Anthropology is precisely a discipline about asking good questions and giving diverse answers,” she noted.

Dr. Sophie Chao is a Lecturer at the University of Sydney’s Department of Anthropology and winner of Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA). Her research investigates the intersections of capitalism, ecology, indigenousness, health, and justice in the Pacific region. She is the author of In the Shadow of the Palms: More-Than-Human Becomings in West Papua and a co-author of The Promise of Multispecies Justice.

Text Editor: Cao Changhan

Proofreader: Southeast Asian Studies Group