Kathleen M Adams
Biographic Data
| ID | 641918 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Kathleen M Adams |
| GIVEN NAMES | Kathleen M |
| FAMILY NAME | Adams |
| SIGNATURE | ADAMS K M |
| AFFILIATIONS | Loyola University Chicago |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5041-076X |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 44 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 344 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 42 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 2 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1984 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 11 |
Heritage as emancipation
Recognising Shinji Yamashita, Dynamic Ethnographer Par Excellence: A Prologue
This Prologue provides introductory commentary about Shinji Yamashita, the Japanese anthropologist to whom this special issue is dedicated. His trajectory, from his early studies of Toraja (Indonesia) rituals to his work on tourism, migration, and Asian disasters, has been foundational for subsequent generations of anthropologists, as attested by this special guest-edited issue featuring research by his former graduate students. As I argue, in ma…
Nelson H. H. Graburn - a tribute collection
Tourism ethnography and tourism geographies
Death of the One Who Knows: A film by Dana Rappoport. Watertown, MA: Documentary Educational Resources [distributor], 2020. 1 video resource (82 mins.) In Toraja, Indonesian with English subtitles
Valene Smith, tourism, and the remapping of anthropological terrain
This article argues that Valene Smith's contributions were fundamental for mapping out the terrain for what was envisioned as an 'anthropology of tourism.' As the first major collection of anthropological research on the topic of tourism, Smith's 1977 volume Hosts and Guests offered a wide geographical range of ethnographically grounded studies of tourism, charted typologies, and chronicled tourism impacts, much as one would map a 'field of ethno…
(Post-) pandemic tourism resiliency: Southeast Asian lives and livelihoods in limbo
While tourism scholars have sought to problematize the unevenly distributed impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, we know much less about how resilience is cultivated among tourism practitioners and communities whose lives and livelihoods are have been placed in limbo. Drawing on literature at the intersection of critical tourism studies and resilience theory as well as interviews with local tourism practitioners and academics, four historically situ…
What western tourism concepts obscure: Intersections of migration and tourism in Indonesia
Classic Anglo-European definitions of tourism as recreational travel have hindered more nuanced locally-grounded understandings of travel phenomena elsewhere in the world. Moreover, contemporary global labor and educational mobility have produced novel travel forms and behaviors that straddle the Western categories of “tourist” and “migrant.” The purpose of this analysis is to examine Toraja (Indonesia) perspectives on travel which can be instruc…
The Politics of Indigeneity and Heritage: Indonesian Mortuary Materials and Museums
This article contributes to comparative museology by examining curation practices and politics in several “museum-like” heritage spaces and locally run museums. I argue that, in this era of heritage consciousness, these spaces serve as creative stages for advancing potentially empowering narratives of indigeneity and ethnic authority. Understanding practices in ancestral spaces as “heritage management” both enriches our conception of museums and …
The Ethnography of Tourism: Edward Bruner and Beyond
Winner of the 2020 Edward M. Bruner Book Award from the Anthropology of Tourism Interest Group** "Leite, Castaneda, and Adams's volume is a beautiful retrospective of the enduring importance of Ed Bruner's work and legacy in our field, and we have no doubt that it will be used as a central historical, theoretical, and teaching text by many." - Prize Committee What does it mean to study tourism ethnographically? How has the ethnography of tourism …
Afterword: Beyond Anthropology
Local Strategies for Economic Survival in Touristically Volatile Times: An Indonesian Case Study of Microvendors, Gendered Cultural Practices, and Resilience
This article utilizes a qualitative ethnographic approach to examine the economic survival strategies pursued by Indonesian souvenir artisans and handicraft microvendors in touristically turbulent times. Resilience-oriented approaches have offered promising frameworks for understanding regions', destinations', and communities' capacities to adjust and adapt to challenges: this article complements these broader approaches by offering a fine-graine…
Thank you to our reviewers
Touting Touristic “Primadonas”: Tourism, Ethnicity, and National Integration in Sulawesi, Indonesia
Tourism, Ethnicity, and the State in Asian and Pacific Societies
The expansion of international tourism is changing the relationship between ethnic groups and states around the globe. Yet tourism s importance for the understanding of ethnicity in the modern world has been generally neglected within the field of ethnic studies. This pioneering volume investigates how international tourism development, state policies of ethnic management, and the active responses of local ethnic groups intersect to reshape ethni…
Stanislaus Sandarupa
Families, Funerals and Facebook: Reimag(in)ing and ‘Curating’ Toraja Kin in Trans-local Times
The Sa'dan Toraja of upland Sulawesi, Indonesia have long been celebrated in the anthropological literature for their elaborate procession-filled mortuary rituals, which draw vast networks of kith and kin to mourn, memorialise, and reaffirm familial bonds and obligations. Whether residing in the homeland or abroad, most Torajans underscore funeral rites as the most vital expression of Toraja familial and cultural identity. Although some estimates…
Back to the Future: Emergent Visions for Object-Based Teaching in and beyond the Classroom
This article introduces a special issue ofMuseum Anthropologydevoted to innovative strategies for teaching with objects. Although a century ago anthropology, museums, and objects were intimately entwined, trends in many museology and anthropology courses have drifted toward focusing on ideas and people rather than objects. The contributors to this special issue have cultivated new pedagogical approaches that complement or realign literature-focus…
Identity, tourism
Love American style and divorce Toraja style: Lessons from a tale of mutual reflexivity in Indonesia
The author recounts an episode from her ethnographic research in Tana Toraja, Sulawesi, Indonesia, when she was obliged to shed her comfortably familiar ‘fieldworker’ role and stray from a pre-plotted research agenda into emotionally dangerous terrain. She explores the serendipitous insights that can emerge only when the classic division between the realm of research and one's private life is muddied. By recounting some Toraja responses to the ne…
Everyday Life in Southeast Asia
Read an excerpt Like the book on Facebook
Everyday life in Southeast Asia
The Janus-faced character of tourism in Cuba
Art As Politics: Re-crafting Identities, Tourism, And Power in Tana Toraja, Indonesia (Southeast Asia--Politics, Meaning, Memory)
Public Interest Anthropology in Heritage Sites: Writing Culture and Righting Wrongs
In an era of increasingly contentious identity politics and growing tensions over whose narrative should predominate at heritage sites, public interest anthropology offers a valuable approach for scholars engaged in heritage research. As the articles in this issue illustrate, not only does public interest anthropology offer more nuanced insights into the complex social dynamics surrounding these sites, but this more engaged approach also offers p…
Tourism, Ethnicity, and the State in Asian and Pacific Societies
The expansion of international tourism is changing the relationship between ethnic groups and states around the globe. Yet tourism s importance for the understanding of ethnicity in the modern world has been generally neglected within the field of ethnic studies. This pioneering volume investigates how international tourism development, state policies of ethnic management, and the active responses of local ethnic groups intersect to reshape ethni…
Come to Tana Toraja, “land of the heavenly kings”
Art for Art's Sake in the Paleolithic [and Comments and Reply]
Ethnic Tourism and the Renegotiation of Tradition in Tana Toraja (Sulawesi, Indonesia)
This article examines some of the political and symbolic issues inherent in the touristic renegotiation of Torajan ritual and history, chronicling the strategies whereby Torajans attempt to refashion outsider imagery to enhance their own personal standing and position in the Indonesian ethnic hierarchy. The author suggests that the Toraja case challenges the popular assumption that tourism promotion brings a complete loss of agency to indigenous …
The Janus-faced character of tourism in Cuba
Domestic tourism and nation-building in South Sulawesi
1998). Domestic tourism and nation‐building in South Sulawesi. Indonesia and the Malay World: Vol. 26, No. 75, pp. 77-96
Making-up the Toraja? The Appropriation of Tourism, Anthropology, and Museums for Politics in Upland Sulawesi, Indonesia
Kathleen M. Adams, Making-up the Toraja? The Appropriation of Tourism, Anthropology, and Museums for Politics in Upland Sulawesi, Indonesia, Ethnology, Vol. 34, No. 2, Special Issue on Politics of Culture in the Pacific Islands: Part I (Spring, 1995), pp. 143-153
(Post-) pandemic tourism resiliency: Southeast Asian lives and livelihoods in limbo
While tourism scholars have sought to problematize the unevenly distributed impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, we know much less about how resilience is cultivated among tourism practitioners and communities whose lives and livelihoods are have been placed in limbo. Drawing on literature at the intersection of critical tourism studies and resilience theory as well as interviews with local tourism practitioners and academics, four historically situ…
Everyday life in Southeast Asia
More than an Ethnic Marker: Toraja Art as Identity Negotiator
In this article I suggest that art can be more than a passive ethnic marker. Focusing on the architecturally based carvings of the Toraja of Indonesia, I argue that artistic forms are sites for the assertion, articulation, and negotiation of various hierarchical identities and relationships. I trace the contested transformation of Toraja architectural symbols of elite authority into generalized icons of Toraja ethnic identity. As I chronicle thes…
The genesis of touristic imagery: Politics and poetics in the creation of a remote Indonesian island destination
Although the construction and amplification of touristically celebrated peoples’ Otherness on global mediascapes has been well documented, the genesis of touristic imagery in out of the way locales, where tourism is embryonic at best, has yet to be examined. This article explores the emergent construction of touristic imagery on the small, sporadically visited Eastern Indonesian island of Alor during the 1990s. In examining the ways in which comp…
What western tourism concepts obscure: Intersections of migration and tourism in Indonesia
Classic Anglo-European definitions of tourism as recreational travel have hindered more nuanced locally-grounded understandings of travel phenomena elsewhere in the world. Moreover, contemporary global labor and educational mobility have produced novel travel forms and behaviors that straddle the Western categories of “tourist” and “migrant.” The purpose of this analysis is to examine Toraja (Indonesia) perspectives on travel which can be instruc…
The politics of heritage in Tana Toraja, Indonesia: Interplaying the local and the global
2003). The politics of heritage in Tana Toraja, Indonesia: Interplaying the local and the global. Indonesia and the Malay World: Vol. 31, No. 89, pp. 91-107
Public Interest Anthropology in Heritage Sites: Writing Culture and Righting Wrongs
In an era of increasingly contentious identity politics and growing tensions over whose narrative should predominate at heritage sites, public interest anthropology offers a valuable approach for scholars engaged in heritage research. As the articles in this issue illustrate, not only does public interest anthropology offer more nuanced insights into the complex social dynamics surrounding these sites, but this more engaged approach also offers p…
The Discourse of Souls in Tana Toraja (Indonesia): Indigenous Notions and Christian Conceptions
In Insular Southeast Asia, indigenous religions are oriented more towards practice than philosophy. Geertz's (1973:177) observations concerning in Bali generally hold true for other autochthonous religions of the Indonesian archipelago: Beyond a minimal level there is almost no interest in doctrine... The stress is on orthopraxy, not orthodoxy. Accordingly, discussions of indigenous notions of the soul in insular Southeast Asia rarely center on p…
Cultural Displays and Tourism in Africa and the Americas
Commentary| July 01 2003 Cultural Displays and Tourism in Africa and the Americas Kathleen M. Adams Kathleen M. Adams Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Ethnohistory (2003) 50 (3): 567–573. https://doi.org/10.1215/00141801-50-3-567 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Permissions Search Site Citation Kathleen M. Adams; Cultural Displays and Tourism in Africa and the Americas. Ethnohistory 1 July…
Nationalizing the Local and Localizing the Nation Ceremonials, Monumental Displays and National Memory‐Making in Upland Sulawesi, Indonesia
Club Dead, Not Club Med: Staging Death in Contemporary Tana Toraja (Indonesia)
Tourism ethnography and tourism geographies
Back to the Future: Emergent Visions for Object-Based Teaching in and beyond the Classroom
This article introduces a special issue ofMuseum Anthropologydevoted to innovative strategies for teaching with objects. Although a century ago anthropology, museums, and objects were intimately entwined, trends in many museology and anthropology courses have drifted toward focusing on ideas and people rather than objects. The contributors to this special issue have cultivated new pedagogical approaches that complement or realign literature-focus…
Families, Funerals and Facebook: Reimag(in)ing and ‘Curating’ Toraja Kin in Trans-local Times
The Sa'dan Toraja of upland Sulawesi, Indonesia have long been celebrated in the anthropological literature for their elaborate procession-filled mortuary rituals, which draw vast networks of kith and kin to mourn, memorialise, and reaffirm familial bonds and obligations. Whether residing in the homeland or abroad, most Torajans underscore funeral rites as the most vital expression of Toraja familial and cultural identity. Although some estimates…
Valene Smith, tourism, and the remapping of anthropological terrain
This article argues that Valene Smith's contributions were fundamental for mapping out the terrain for what was envisioned as an 'anthropology of tourism.' As the first major collection of anthropological research on the topic of tourism, Smith's 1977 volume Hosts and Guests offered a wide geographical range of ethnographically grounded studies of tourism, charted typologies, and chronicled tourism impacts, much as one would map a 'field of ethno…
Generating Theory, Tourism, and "World Heritage" in Indonesia: Ethical Quandaries for Anthropologists in an Era of Tourist Maniad
This article is broadly concerned with the unique ethical quandaries anthropologists face when conducting research in touristic milieus, as well as the ethical dilemmas that ensue once we have left the field and are engaged in constructing theoretically informed portraits of the communities we researched. Specifically, drawing on experiences in two contrasting Indonesian field settings (Tana Toraja and Alor), I explore the ways in which contempor…
Distant Encounters: Travel Literature and the Shifting Images of the Toraja of Sulawesi, Indonesia
(1991). Distant Encounters: Travel Literature and the Shifting Images of the Toraja of Sulawesi, Indonesia. Terrae Incognitae: Vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 81-92
Come to Tana Toraja, “land of the heavenly kings”
Art for Art's Sake in the Paleolithic [and Comments and Reply]
Distant Encounters: Travel Literature and the Shifting Images of the Toraja of Sulawesi, Indonesia
Distant Encounters: Travel Literature and the Shifting Images of the Toraja of Sulawesi, Indonesia
(1991). Distant Encounters: Travel Literature and the Shifting Images of the Toraja of Sulawesi, Indonesia. Terrae Incognitae: Vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 81-92
Club Dead, Not Club Med: Staging Death in Contemporary Tana Toraja (Indonesia)
The Discourse of Souls in Tana Toraja (Indonesia): Indigenous Notions and Christian Conceptions
In Insular Southeast Asia, indigenous religions are oriented more towards practice than philosophy. Geertz's (1973:177) observations concerning in Bali generally hold true for other autochthonous religions of the Indonesian archipelago: Beyond a minimal level there is almost no interest in doctrine... The stress is on orthopraxy, not orthodoxy. Accordingly, discussions of indigenous notions of the soul in insular Southeast Asia rarely center on p…
Artistic Embodiments of the Self
Allan Hanson and Louise Hanson eds. Art and Identity in Oceania. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1990. viii. 315 pp
Making-up the Toraja? The Appropriation of Tourism, Anthropology, and Museums for Politics in Upland Sulawesi, Indonesia
Kathleen M. Adams, Making-up the Toraja? The Appropriation of Tourism, Anthropology, and Museums for Politics in Upland Sulawesi, Indonesia, Ethnology, Vol. 34, No. 2, Special Issue on Politics of Culture in the Pacific Islands: Part I (Spring, 1995), pp. 143-153
Nationalizing the Local and Localizing the Nation Ceremonials, Monumental Displays and National Memory‐Making in Upland Sulawesi, Indonesia
Ethnic Tourism and the Renegotiation of Tradition in Tana Toraja (Sulawesi, Indonesia)
This article examines some of the political and symbolic issues inherent in the touristic renegotiation of Torajan ritual and history, chronicling the strategies whereby Torajans attempt to refashion outsider imagery to enhance their own personal standing and position in the Indonesian ethnic hierarchy. The author suggests that the Toraja case challenges the popular assumption that tourism promotion brings a complete loss of agency to indigenous …
Sacred Arts of Haitian Vodou Ucla Fowler Museum of Cultural History
SACRED ARTS OF HAITIAN VODOU. UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History (October 22- July 14, 1995), Center for the Fine Arts, Miami (Fall 1996), The Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago (February 1-April 13,1997), Museum of African American History, Detroit (Fall 1997), National Museum of Natural History, Washington, DC (Fall 1998), New Orleans Museum of Art (January-April 1998), Baltimore Museum of Art (June-August 1998
Domestic tourism and nation-building in South Sulawesi
1998). Domestic tourism and nation‐building in South Sulawesi. Indonesia and the Malay World: Vol. 26, No. 75, pp. 77-96
More than an Ethnic Marker: Toraja Art as Identity Negotiator
In this article I suggest that art can be more than a passive ethnic marker. Focusing on the architecturally based carvings of the Toraja of Indonesia, I argue that artistic forms are sites for the assertion, articulation, and negotiation of various hierarchical identities and relationships. I trace the contested transformation of Toraja architectural symbols of elite authority into generalized icons of Toraja ethnic identity. As I chronicle thes…
Introduction: A Changing Indonesia
Home and Hegemony: Domestic Service and Identity Politics in South and Southeast Asia
The politics of heritage in Tana Toraja, Indonesia: Interplaying the local and the global
2003). The politics of heritage in Tana Toraja, Indonesia: Interplaying the local and the global. Indonesia and the Malay World: Vol. 31, No. 89, pp. 91-107
Cultural Displays and Tourism in Africa and the Americas
Commentary| July 01 2003 Cultural Displays and Tourism in Africa and the Americas Kathleen M. Adams Kathleen M. Adams Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Ethnohistory (2003) 50 (3): 567–573. https://doi.org/10.1215/00141801-50-3-567 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Permissions Search Site Citation Kathleen M. Adams; Cultural Displays and Tourism in Africa and the Americas. Ethnohistory 1 July…
The genesis of touristic imagery: Politics and poetics in the creation of a remote Indonesian island destination
Although the construction and amplification of touristically celebrated peoples’ Otherness on global mediascapes has been well documented, the genesis of touristic imagery in out of the way locales, where tourism is embryonic at best, has yet to be examined. This article explores the emergent construction of touristic imagery on the small, sporadically visited Eastern Indonesian island of Alor during the 1990s. In examining the ways in which comp…
Public Interest Anthropology in Heritage Sites: Writing Culture and Righting Wrongs
In an era of increasingly contentious identity politics and growing tensions over whose narrative should predominate at heritage sites, public interest anthropology offers a valuable approach for scholars engaged in heritage research. As the articles in this issue illustrate, not only does public interest anthropology offer more nuanced insights into the complex social dynamics surrounding these sites, but this more engaged approach also offers p…
Generating Theory, Tourism, and "World Heritage" in Indonesia: Ethical Quandaries for Anthropologists in an Era of Tourist Maniad
This article is broadly concerned with the unique ethical quandaries anthropologists face when conducting research in touristic milieus, as well as the ethical dilemmas that ensue once we have left the field and are engaged in constructing theoretically informed portraits of the communities we researched. Specifically, drawing on experiences in two contrasting Indonesian field settings (Tana Toraja and Alor), I explore the ways in which contempor…
Art As Politics: Re-crafting Identities, Tourism, And Power in Tana Toraja, Indonesia (Southeast Asia--Politics, Meaning, Memory)
The Janus-faced character of tourism in Cuba
Everyday Life in Southeast Asia
Read an excerpt Like the book on Facebook
Everyday life in Southeast Asia
Love American style and divorce Toraja style: Lessons from a tale of mutual reflexivity in Indonesia
The author recounts an episode from her ethnographic research in Tana Toraja, Sulawesi, Indonesia, when she was obliged to shed her comfortably familiar ‘fieldworker’ role and stray from a pre-plotted research agenda into emotionally dangerous terrain. She explores the serendipitous insights that can emerge only when the classic division between the realm of research and one's private life is muddied. By recounting some Toraja responses to the ne…
Sociology (26 works) · Political science (18 works) · Tourism (17 works) · Asian Studies and History (16 works) · Anthropology (15 works) · Geography (15 works) · Law (14 works) · Archaeology (13 works) · Art (11 works) · Diverse Aspects of Tourism Research (11 works)