การเปลี่ยนความเชื่อทางศาสนาของชาวอูรักลาโว้ย: กรณีศึกษาชุมชนสังกาอู้ เกาะลันตา จังหวัดกระบี่

Abstract

This thesis aimed to investigate a major religious transformation of the Ulak Lawoi ethnic group after the 2004 tsunami disaster. This natural tragedy influenced some of the Ulak Lawoi members to change their faith from ancestral spirits to Christianity. Objectives of this research are 1) to define Ulak Lawoi identity under the change of religion after the Tsunami. 2) inspect conflicts that develop in the religious conversion on social and cultural issues as well as the current Ulak Lawoi ethnicity. Ethnographic methods and participatory observations were applied for the data collections. The study found that the arrival of Christianity in Lanta Island, Krabi had caused impacts and changes on the ethnicity, dimension of religions and cultural and social practices. The approaching of Christianity took place under conditions for the Ulak Lawoi community to receive urgent assistance after the tsunami attack. Becoming Christians was hence beneficial to the recovery and restoration of the livelihood. For such reason, the Sang Kha Ou community began to define “Ethnic identity” into two sub-groups, which are “primitive Ulak Lawoi” and “Christian Ulak Lawoi”. The separation situated ethic distances, which resulted in “us and them” later. Under such ethical split of Ulak Lawoi shaped social exclusion from looking at ethnic boundaries in terms of different religions. While most Ulak Lawoi still valued and respected the spirits of their ancestors, Ulak Lawoi Christians had abandon “ancestral spirits” and turned to worship “God”. The dissimilarities in religious ideologies had led to conflicts in the community, especially the early stage of becoming Christians. Nevertheless, as time went by the ethnic borders had been integrated into a new Urak Laowi. The primitive and Christian Ulak Lawoi reunited under spaces of cultural and social activities, which reflected the implication of the existence of Ulak Lawoi. Even the tsunami wave had damaged and created changes particularly momentary apertures in their ethnic borders, the strong cultural bond, and sense of kinship in the Sang Kha Ou community reconnected them through crossed social and cultural beliefs. Between them, there was an emergence of consciousness of “We are Ulak Lawois Sang Kha Ou” or “Lu Moh Lawoi”