もうひとつの「森」 : ラオ人とモン=クメール系諸語族の森林観から(<特集>雲 南およびその周辺)

Abstract

This paper attempts to describe the knowledge of the forest among the Lao, a Tai speaking people living in Lao P. D. R. and Northeastern Thailand, and the Mon-Khmer speaking people in southern Laos, focusing on the ways in which they view two kinds of forest, the sacred forest dedicated to the village guardian spirit, and the forest for the dead, neither which is directly concerned with the modern notion of natural resources. The ways of viewing of forest in their localities differ according to the social experiences which construct social reality in the region with which their practical religions, both Buddhism and spirit cults, are strongly concerned. The representation of the forest today is also affected by the peoples' orientation toward the present government policy and market economy, which reflect the transformation of two types of forest in the region. Religious practices in these localities, which tend to be discussed in too general terms in the recent arguments on forest protection by both native and foreign intellectuals, parallel the ways in which representations of forest are constructed, which configurate productive activities dialectically based on a circular logic of birth and death.