2008

Waveland Press

In the tradition of Edward Said and the delineation of Orientalist conceptions of the developing world, Kirk and Karen Endicott have crafted a telling ethnography that demonstrates how an Indigenous tradition has exhibited an enormous measure of progress among gender relations—a measure that surpasses the often specious equality constructed in much of the Western world. The title The Headman Was a Womancould not be more precise in illustrating the Endicotts’ main thesis that gender egalitarianism thrives among the Batek people of Malaysia. Although the Batek are not the first to have operated under this model—of exemplary note are the Iroquois of present-day United States—the Endicotts have colorfully presented the Batek’s notion of gender egalitarianism, as well as its functional capacity within the developing world.

The Batek are one of over a dozen distinct cultural groups of the Orang Asli people of central Malaysia. These Batek number about 800 people and have survived for centuries as a nomadic foraging-gatherer society, adapting to several surrounding commercial enterprises that have resulted in their relocation. Despite the inevitable interaction with the surrounding Malays that accompany such enterprises, the Batek have managed to create and sustain a substantially distinct culture that strays away from the socio-structural precepts of their neighbors.

As the authors consistently articulate, the Batek exhibited a system where neither sex held control over the other or was considered to hold more cultural value than the other. The Endicotts attribute this distinction to at least three factors: (1) the economic independence of its entire people, (2) the practices of decentralizing authority and sharing governance, and (3) the principle importance of nonviolence. In subtle use of a traditionally Western model of dependence for contrastive purposes, the Endicotts showed how the Batek women were economically independent from their male counterparts for all forms of survival. These Batek women were also not subject to male dominance within governing systems, as the Batek culture reinforced self-autonomy and only allowed for oversight of one’s children. Finally, where male dominance might flourish through the mechanism of violent coercion and force, conversely, the Batek had fostered a structural aversion toward violence while establishing a community void of physical abuse and control by either sex.

Notwithstanding these three dynamics, some sociological and anthropological literature would suggest that such egalitarianism emerges as more of a defining device that draws contrast between a subjugated group and a surrounding dominant group. However, the Enidicotts develop a more self-asserting explanation that credits the Batek with developing their own form of egalitarianism. In this explanation the Endicotts reject the notion that the surrounding Malays were circumstantially capable of ever dominating the Batek, and instead attribute the emergence of their egalitarian tenets to satisfying an “ecological and social niche” that supported their peaceful way of life. In this way, the Endicotts remain true to the Batek’s definitions of self and continue along in a methodological tradition of Weberian Verstehen where research subjects are depicted in their own terms.


This well-written and thoroughly researched text is composed of seven chapters, an appendix of Batek terms and a 37-minute video of the Batek in their native habitat. In general, each chapter addresses a separately defined social institution, documenting examples of the Batek practices of egalitarianism. The appendix is a wonderful tool for navigating the text and the accompanying video brings life to the tenor Batek egalitarianism.

This book would be an excellent teaching tool and could be used as a text in a variety of courses including Anthropology, Sociology, Global Studies, Gender Studies, Indigenous Studies as well as any course exploring the developing world. In addition, students of methodology in general and ethnography in particular will certainly find The Headman Was a Womanto be an invaluable reference for conducting research.

Reviewed by Salvador Jimenez Murguia, Ph.D., California State University, San Bernardino

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Tags: Malaysia  Batek  gender  egalitarian  books