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SAC News:Introducing the Culture and RightsForum at the SACby Alexandra DalferroIn the month of October at the Princess MahaChakri Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre, researchers andproject staff have traveled across Thailand, delved deep intoarchives, and designed and updated databases. Dr. TrongjaiHutangkura, leader of the SAC’s Publicity and NetworkingDivision, has been teaching himself to read and write theancient Thai alphabet of the Sukothai period so that hecan better understand the manuscripts he researches. TheBarefoot Anthropology team spent a week in Mae Hong Sonlending support to Karen villagers as they developed culturalsafeguarding activities. Dr. Narupon Duangwises hosted aseminar on sexuality called “Handsome Gay Kings: When GayMen Long for Masculinity.” These are only a few examplesof the diverse events and processes that occur at the SACon a monthly basis, and they illustrate the organization’s vastscope of interest and engagement. What, then, do theseprojects have in common? How can they be related to oneanother in ways that illuminate shared themes and challengeand enrich objectives and methods? The recently launchedCulture and Rights Forum attempts to address these questionswhile introducing core concepts of cultural rights to SAC staff.The forum will also emphasize how research, documentation,archiving, and communicating on cultural issues need to takeinto consideration the rights of source communities.The Culture and Rights project commenced in 2009as a multi-sited, field-based research initiative for Thai andinternational scholars. As the research progressed, ProjectDirector Dr. Alexandra Denes and Project Advisor Dr. CoeliBarry realized that the ideas and discourse surrounding cultureand rights resonated implicitly with the work of the SAC, andthey wished to draw out and interrogate these embeddedconcepts along with SAC staff. They envisioned a structurethat would allow sustained commitment to the discussion ofculture and rights at the SAC, thereby creating a space forcontinual reflection and institutional identity building. Aftermuch careful planning, the Culture and Rights Forum wasborn. For the next ten months, through June 2013, SAC staffwill meet at least once a month for half-day sessions to4discuss issues ranging from sexuality rights to communityinvolvement in and access to digital heritage. Forum FacilitatorJan Boontinand, a PhD candidate at the Institute for HumanRights and Peace Studies of Mahidol University with manyyears of experience working with Thai NGOs, will guide eachsession, helping to stimulate dialogue that links material frompresenters back to the work of the SAC. Dr. Barry affirms thatthe forum can also be referred to as a “laboratory,” as shewishes to highlight the unique, experimental nature of thisprogram. It is Dr. Barry’s hope that the opportunities the forumwill provide for reflexivity, communication, and connection willstrengthen the SAC’s thematic framework and enable staffto solidify around a more collective identity.The first Culture and Rights meeting was held onSeptember 26th. Participants began by sharing aspects oftheir work that make them feel passionate as well as theirexpectations for the forum. Dr. Barry then gave a generaloverview of the concept of cultural rights and presented herthoughts on Michael Brown’s introduction to his book, WhoOwns Native Culture? Brown explores the operationalizationof cultural rights theories by indigenous groups who haveused this rhetoric to call for repatriation of sacred objectsand control over cultural meanings and replication. Fearingthat the procedures and strategies surrounding these claims,not to mention the cultural forms in question, will becomeincreasingly standardized and codified via intellectual propertylaws, Brown decries practices of litigation and legislation thatturn culture into property and instead advocates approachesthat establish the inherently relational, context-dependentnature of the ownership problem. In his reaction to the forumso far, Chewasit Boonyakiet, a research assistant at the SAC,echoes Brown’s concern, “In Thailand, we don’t really usethe vocabulary of rights yet – we refer to it as heritage that