The Indonesian Resource Centre for Indigenous Knowledge (INRIK) of Padjadjaran University among other things began to study the interaction between people and forest in Mount Halimun region in 1994. As a part of its main study, INRIK has focused its investigation towards the people of Sirnarasa village, district of Sukabumi, West Java.

The community of Sirnarasa is unique because of its social-cultural condition and its interrelationship with the natural environment. The community divides itself into two sub-groups, that is, the so called Warga Kasatuan or warga Kasepuhan and the non-Kasepuhan members. The term non-kasepuhan refers to the community members of Sirnarasa who do not consider themselves as Warga Kasepuhan. The Kasatuan or Kasepuhan members are more concern to their traditional customs, especially in dealing with their agricultural activities and human-environmental relationships. On the other hand, the non-Kasepuhan members treat their traditional custom moderately, more concern to Islamic religious norms, and within certain condition can accept modern agricultural technology.

This paper describes, although superficially, the sociography of Sirnarasa community with the intention to introduce its social, cultural, and economical condition. Hopefully this paper will attract the attention of those who have the interest to conduct certain studies concerning with this community and its environmental settings.

The description is divided into four chapters. The first chapter describes about the geographical condition within which the community of Sirnarasa lives. Chapter two describes some aspects of demographic condition of this community. A relatively detailed description about socio-economic condition of this community is presented in Chapter three. The last chapter of this paper is dealing with the socio-cultural conditions of this community.

We are gratefully thank to Professor Dr. Kusnaka Adimihardja and Dr. Ade Mutangad Kramadibrata for their valuable advices. It seemed that this paper would not be written should Dr. Jan Slikkerveer did not encourage us to write what we know about the community of Sirnarasa, thank you very much for your encouragement, Jan ! We also want to express our thanks to Femmy, Haryo, Budi, Hikmat and Erna, all of them are INRIK staff, who always readily and heartily to give their hands whenever we need to find some data etc.

1.1. Locality

In Southern part of West Java Province, within the realm of misty Halimun mountain, and surrounded by tropical forest, there is a unique village called the village of Sirnarasa. It is unique, because the villagers are normatively can be differentiated into two groups:

The Gunung Halimun (literally: Misty mountain) area is located at 106° 21'- 106° 38' Eastern longitude and 6° 37' - 6° 53' Southern latitude. It consists of several hills mostly around 1000 m. to 2000 m. above sea level and some parts are still covered by tropical dense forest. The forest around Halimun mountain is a preservation forest under the authority of PERHUTANI (Perusahaan Hutan Negara Indonesia - Indonesian Government Forestry Enterprise).
 
 

1.2. Land Use and Bio-physical Condition.

Some parts of the land within the village of Sirnarasa belonged to the government under the authority of Perhutani and the other parts belonged to the villagers either as communal property (tanah adat) or as private property (tanah milik). However, with certain condition and under the permission of Perhutani, the villagers may also cultivate a certain small part of the government forest area.

According to its land use, the land in Sirnarasa village can be differentiated into five category:

(1) Leuweung (forest);

(2) Huma (dry field);

(3) Sawah (wet or irrigated rice field);

(4) Kebon/talun (abandoned dry field, then become a garden planted with some

productive trees such as fruit trees, coconut trees, trees for building materials);

(5) Pakarangan (home garden or house yard).

The People who already got the permission to cultivate some small parts of Perhutani forest usually cultivate the lands as sawah. It is because most the lands are located at the lower area (lowland) and have relatively enough water resources either derive from the water springs or from technical and non technical irrigation. Meanwhile, the huma and kebon/talun are commonly located at the hill area (highland) and their water resources are mostly depend on rainfall.

There are samples of bio-phsical conditions of the soil of Sirnarasa village taken from some parts of Ciptarasa hamlet surroundings as shown in table 1.1. The table shows that the land angle of Perhutani forest area is between 19° -27° , of the forest belonged to the community of Kampung Ciptarasa is between 25° -42.3º and of the sawahs, talun and settlement areas are between 18° -38° .

L = clay
 
 

1.3. Hydrography

The people of Sirnarasa need water both for their daily purposes (such as for drinking, washing, and body cleaning) and for their agricultural field. Generally, they get the water for their daily purposes from some water springs that are quite sufficient during the rain season but become insufficient during the dry season. On the other hand, their needs of water for their agricultural field are mostly depended to rain water supply. There are only some small parts of sawah that can be irrigated by some non technical irrigation. During the dry season, the sawah fields in certain places become dry and the people cannot cultivate it. Instead, they use the field for herding their livestock (sheep, goat, and buffalo) for grassing. At the same time, the peasants plant second crops in some other possible parts of the land. The peasants breed fishes in some other sawah fields that still have some water derived from water springs.

The hydrological pattern of Sirnarasa village shows 4 month of draught time and 8 month of plenty water. If we count the water input and output (through evaporation) around the Halimun region, there is surplus of water on the average of 803.3 mm³ . So, it means that this region has the function as supportive water supply for the surrounding areas. This can be observed through the fact that there are many water springs with water flow capacity around 2.26 litre per second.

1.4. Climate

The maximum temperature in Sirnarasa village during the day time is around 27.5° C-31.2° C and the minimum temperature at night is around 20.3° C-24.6° C. The rain fall density rate is around 2119 mm³ and 3231 mm³ with total rainy days between 165 days and 235 days. In this case there are 2 to 3 month of dry season and 8 to10 months of wet season. The people of Sirnarasa called the dry season as halodo and wet season as rendengan.

2.1. Population

According to Sirnarasa Village Potency List (Daftar Potensi Desa Sirnarasa) dated August 1994, dealing with demographic conditions, there are 1020 households with 4183 family members. It means that the average size of each household is 4.1. It also means that every family has only 2 - 3 children. This average number of children in each family is nearly fit with the ideal number of children (that is, two children for each family) according to the family planning programme implemented in Indonesia. However, it needs to note that the small number of children among the families within the Sirnarasa community is more as the result of traditional rather than formal "family planning."

Table 2.1 below mentions the population of Sirnarasa community based on sex and age distributions.

According to demographic data of Sirnarasa village, the population growth within the concerned community between the period of 1987 to 1994 was about 0.9% annually.
 
 

2.2. Dependency Ratio

According to table 2.1, the dependency ratio of the population of Sirnarasa village is quite low as compared to the dependency ratio of regional and national level. We count that the productive persons (age 15 to 54) have the totality of 2680, while the unproductive persons (age 0 to 14 plus age 55 +) have the totality of 1503, then the dependency ratio is about 56.08% or 0,6. On the other hand, the dependency ratio at regional level is 0.8 and at national level is 0.7. It needs to note that among the rural people, particularly in Sirnarasa village, the children of 10 years old are involved in family economical activities either as payed or unpaid labourers and many of the people aged 55 + are still productive.
 
 

2.3. The Population Composition Based on Formal Educational Level

Up to the present the formal educational level of Sirnarasa people is still low. They who have succeeded to attend elementary school or others but in the same level are about 89.9 %, while they who have succeeded to attend secondary school or others but at the same level are about 5.1 %. There are still about 5.0% of the community members who are elementary school drop-outed. Table 2.2 below shows the statistical data of the educational composition of the population of Sirnarasa.

2.4. The Population Composition Based on Occupation

It has been mentioned above that the productive persons among the community of Sirnarasa are about 2680 individuals. Most of those individuals have at least one kind of primary occupation as shown in table 2.3 below.

3.1. Land ownership

The people of Sirnarasa depend their lives on agricultural economy. There are four types of peasantry among the Sirnarasa community:

a. Landowned peasant (petani pemilik), is a peasant who has a large plot (s) of

land and cultivate his land by himself or hire some labourers to till the land.

b. Landowned peasant and combine himself as sharecrops peasant ( penggarap,

maro), is a peasant who has a small plot of land and cultivate it by himself,

and, on the otherhand, he also cultivates other person’s land in order to get

some additional income by sharing the product with the landowner. Sometimes,

they also share the cost of product. It depends to their agreement.

c. Sharecrops peasant (penggarap, maro), is a landless peasant who cultivates

other person’s land and shares the product or the cost and product altogether

with the landowner according to the agreement they made.

d. Labourer (buruh tani), is a landless peasant who tills other person’s or persons’

land (s) to earn some money or agricultural product from the landowner (s).
 
 

The peasants of Sirnarasa village may cultivate their own land that attained according to their customary law of land ownership. They may also cultivate the land that belonged to the government maintained under the authority of Perhutani unit III West Java province, as long as they can get the permission from the concerned authority.

Particularly among the Warga Kasepuhan, almost all members of the concerned community cultivate their own land. Besides, some of them may also cultivate other person’s land or Perhutani’s land either as sharecrops peasants or as land tenant peasants. Generally, they also cultivate more than one kind of land uses such as sawah (wet rice field), huma or reuma (dry rice field), kebon/talun (fallow or garden planted with productive trees) and pakarangan (houseyard).

The average size of land belongs to every household in Sirnarasa village is 2026,8 m² in the form of sawah, 1953,4 m² in the form of kebon/talun, 542.5 m² in the form of huma/reuma, 38.8 m² in the form of pakarangan, and 272 m² in the form of fish pond. The total average size of land belongs to every household is about 4561.5 m².
 
 

3.2. Economic Activities

The economical activity of the people is closely related with their occupation, such as farmers, traders, or labourers. As farmers, the people of Sirnarasa village do their routine agricultural activities mostly during the wet season (between October and April). They do trading activities mostly during the dry season (between May and August). Their trading activities include selling agricultural products such as rice grains(except among the Warga Kasepuhan), bananas, palm sugar, and so forth, to the local brokers. They can also bring the agricultural products to the market out of the village. Some of the villagers are labourers, either in agricultural activity or in other kinds of job such as coolie, firewood collector, carpenter, bricklayer, and so forth. There are also some villagers who use natural resources to their productive activities such as making bamboo weave handicrafts, tapping aren tree (Arenga pinnate) sap for making brown sugar, etc.
 
 
 
 

3.3 Income

In section 3.1 we have described the average size of land uses among the people of Sirnarasa. Grossly counted, the peasants of Sirnarasa can collect some income in the average of Rp 188-/m² from their wet field; Rp 184,-/m² from their garden ; Rp. 494,-/m² from their dry field; Rp 31,-/m² from their fish pond; and Rp. 660/m² from their house yard. It needs to note that the incomes they can collect from dry field and house yard products seem much higher than the other land uses. It is because the agricultural products generated from both lands have more varieties of plants than the others.

According to the above data, a peasant who cultivates wet field of 2026 m² planted with rice could collect about Rp. 380,888 at the end of harvest time. He could also collect about Rp. 35,9352 from his 1953 m² house yard planted with various productive trees in certain times. He can get another income from his dry field of 542 m² planted with second crops about Rp. 267,748 at the end of harvest time. He can also collect some incomes from the product of his houseyard of 39 m² about Rp. 25,080 in certain times. At last, he can also collect about Rp 8,463 from his fish pond of 272 m² in certain times. Thus, should a peasant possess all of the above land uses with at least the above average of sizes and product capacities per m², then he could get a total income about Rp. 660,643 to earn his family per annum. Moreover, if his family has 5 members (including himself as the head of the family), then the income per capita per annum is about 264 kg of rice.
 
 

3.4. The Use of Natural resources

The village of Sirnarasa is located about 600 to 900 m above sea level. Its natural resources primarily derived from the various land uses and the vegetation grown on its surroundings. The peasants can alternately harvest the agricultural products grown from those various lands uses only once a year, primarily during and at the end of rainy season.

There are some other vegetative natural resources that have some economical value. For example, there are various fruit trees, good quality wood trees that usually used for building materials, coconut and aren (Arenga pinnate) trees that can be manipulated for various productions, and bamboo trees. They can also collect fire woods from the forest for fuel.
 
 
 
 

3.5. Structure and Infrastructure

3.5.1. Housing

In Sirnarasa village there are three types of houses, (1) 75 % are grandstand houses made of woods and bamboo, (2) 14.3 % are semi permanent houses (made of half bamboo or woods and half bricks), and (3) 7.1% are permanent houses (made of bricks). The fact that the majority of houses in Sirnarasa are grandstand type is closely connected with the custom and religious belief of the concerned community. Particularly among the members of Kasepuhan at Ciptarasa hamlet, their customary believe prohibit the people to build permanent or semi permanent dwellings. Moreover, they must use ijuk (black fiber taken from Arenga pinnate tree) rather than roof tile for the roof of the house.

The size of the houses is relatively small. The grandstand houses are on the average of 34.1 m², semi permanent houses are on the average of 38 m², and permanent houses are on the average of 32 m².
 
 

3.5.2. Economical Infrastructure

In the village of Sirnarasa there is no market place at all to fulfill the people’s daily economical needs. However, the people can buy white sugar, coffee, cigarettes, snack, soap, tooth paste, and so forth from the small shops nearby. There are many small shops scattered within the village that sell all kinds of goods needed by the people of Sirnarasa. The shop keepers buy nearly all things they need to sell from the big market in Pelabuhan Ratu town that about 20 Km distance from the village of Sirnarasa. They usually go to the market at least once a week. The people of Sirnarasa themselves rarely go to the market place, except when they are facing special occasion (such as preparing for a feast, or facing the Idulfitri day- one of Islamic holidays).

In Sirnarasa there is also no factory. However, there are some small mechanical rice mills. In Ciptarasa hamlet there are some communal rice barns called leuit for the wholle community members of Kasepuhan.
 
 

3.5.3. Transportation

The condition of road facility that connect the village of Sirnarasa to the sub district town of Cisolok is very poor. There is only a small part of the road that covered with stones and asphalt. Here and there the road is steep, slippery (especially during the rain season) and sharply curved. Consequently, during the rainy days it is hard for a car to reach the center of the village and seems impossible to reach several hamlets (such as to Ciptarasa hamlet) that located up of the hill. Certainly such road condition has certain impact to the economic activities of the community. However, there are four old jeeps as public cars that can bring the people of Sirnarasa to Cileungsi village where they can get another public car to travel to anywhere else. There are also some public motorcycles (ojeg) that can be hired by the people to travel in and out of the village.

The public cars have only two routes each day. They start to leave Sirnarasa and Cileungsi villages at 07.00 AM and 10.00 AM. and reach the centre of Sirnarasa and Cileungsi villages at 10.00 AM. and 01.00 PM. The public car that reaches Sirnarasa and Cileungsi villages at 10.00 AM may add one route more to go back to Sirnarasa and Cileungsi villages at 01.00 PM. The cost for traveling with this public car is Rp. 2000,- per person. If people want to hire public motorcycle, they have to pay Rp 5000 per person for one route or Rp. 10,000 vice versa (it started from Cileungsi village to the centre of Sirnarasa village or on the contrary). There are about 20 public motorcycles, so, there is no exact time of departure. However, it is hard to get a public motorcycle late at night.
 
 
 
 
 
 

3.5.4. Educational Facility

In Sirnarasa village there is only three elementary schools and two Islamic religious schools (madrasah) buildings as educational facility for the children. One of the three elementary school buildings located at the centre of the village, one in Ciptarasa hamlet, and the other one in another hamlet. The elementary school for the 3rd to 6th grade started its class at 07.00 AM and ended at 12.00 at noon, while for the 1st and 2nd grade it started at 09.00 AM and ended at 12.00 at noon. The Islamic religious school (madrasah) usually started in the afternoon.
 
 

3.5.5. Health Facility

There is no health facility in Sirnarasa village. If the people want to examine their health, then they must go to the centre of the subdistrict, that is, to Ciloto town. In Ciloto there is a Public Health Centre to serve the need of health care for the entire village communities within the concerned subdistrict. If the people only get unseriuos illnesses such as influenza, cold, fever, cough, headache, etc., they usually cure themselves by drinking unprescribed medicine they can buy from the small shop nearby.
 
 

3.5.6. Religious Facility

It can be said that 100% of the people of Sirnarasa claimed themselves as Moslems. So, the religious facilities within this village are only mosque and langgar (a small house with a single room) where people can do their religious services (shalat). They also use these religious buildings for Qur’anic readings (pengajian). There is only one mosque building that located in the centre of the village while nearly every hamlet (kampung) has one or more langgar.
 
 

4.1. Socio-cultural Characteristics of the Community

The Sirnarasa community consists of two sub-groups:

(1) The Warga Kasepuhan. They are some members of Sirnarasa community that claim themselves as the members of Kasatuan Adat Banten Pakidulan (literally mean western Banten traditional custom units). They tend to maintain and respect their ancestral traditional norms and values. The Warga-Kasepuhan both who live within and without the village of Sirnarasa give highly respect and obey their traditional leader, the Sesepuh Girang. The people from outside of the village recognize this sub-group as warga Kasepuhan (literally mean Kasepuhan members; while Kasepuhan means Elders).

(2) The non-Kasepuhan members are the rest and majority of the community of Sirnarasa village. They just call themselves as urang Sirnarasa (literally mean the people of Sirnarasa). Due to literary and scientific purposes, The INRIK termed non-Kasepuhan to this sub-group as contrasted with warga Kasepuhan. The non-Kasepuhan members treat their traditional custom including its norms and values moderately. They are more give respect to the formal leaders (village officials) and some informal leaders such as ulamas (Islamic religious scholars), teachers, and rich landowners. However they also give respect to the Sesepuh Girang.The contrast between those two sub-groups will be more clear in the following description.

Both Warga Kasepuhan and non-Kasepuhan are Moslems. However, the Warga Kasepuhan are more syncretic than the non-Kasepuhan members. The Warga Kasepuhan still strongly believe to their ancestral spiritual beings and to Dewi Sri-the goddess of rice and fertility- and to the natural spiritual power. Certainly those animistic and dynamistic believe are non-Islamic.

The central of Kasatuan Adat Banten Pakidulan or Warga Kasepuhan is at Kampung Ciptarasa (hamlet of Ciptarasa) within Sirnarasa village. The hamlet of Ciptarasa located separately in the highest place of northwestern side of the village. At the highest place of the hamlet there live the Sesepuh Girang (highest leader) of Warga Kasepuhan with his family in a big woven bamboo walled scaffolding house. Inside the house we can find modern furniture, transistor radio and color television that its electrical supply comes from electrical generator. Surrounding the house there is a large houseyard. At the left front of the house there is a big meeting house completed with a stage that usually used for communal religious ceremonies and staff officials’ meeting. At the right front there is a small mosque (mushollah). Near below of the front yard there are two units of elementary school building. In the back yard of the house there are three units of large leuit (traditional rice storage building) and bathroom. Below the Sesepuh Girang’s complex of dwelling and down along the right and left side of the only main street, there are rows of houses dwelled by the leader’s kindred (some of them are his official staff) and his loyal followers. Some of these houses complete with small leuit. Within this hamlet we can also find some saung lisung-an open hut, within it there is a mortar made of hollowed wood for pounding the rice grains.

According to Sesepuh Girang, the members of Kasepuhan are not only those who live in Kampung Ciptarasa. On the contrary, thousands of them live in many places in and out of West Java. However, it needs to note that actually many of Kasepuhan "members" who live out of Kampung Ciptarasa are only as symphatizers and of course do not follow the Kasepuhan traditional custom.

Actually, Kampung Ciptarasa is a new hamlet because formerly the central of Kasepuhan located at kampung Cisarua, some hundred meters below the present kampung Ciptarasa. The movement of this central locality to its new place is actually a part of their religious belief. They believe that once in a time they (especially Sesepuh Girang and his core staff and their family members) have to move to a new place following to their ancestor’s instruction through wangsit (vision) accepted by the Sesepuh Girang. This process of movement will continuously happen and will ended when they find the place mythologically called Lebak Sampayan (literally mean the valley (we) depend to) or Lebak Ngampar (literally mean the wide valley). Moreover, they belief that if someday they can reach that ideal place, they will reach prosperous life. It is because of the existence of periodical local movements among the Kasepuhan that their system of agriculture is classified as swidden agriculture.

The Warga Kasepuhan, in many cases of their agricultural activity, are still practicing their traditional norms which among other things are as follows:

It has mentioned above (see page...) that the non-Kasepuhan members, instead of obeying to the Sesepuh Girang, they are more oriented to formal leaders such as towards the head of the village (kepala desa), the police and military officials who are on charge as village governmental security body (Badan pembina Desa), and towards some informal leaders such as Ajengan (Islamic scholar), rich landlords, teachers, kokolot (respected elders). Moreover, it seems that they are more concern to Islamic norms and values, so that their interest towards their ancestor spiritual beings and traditional religious ceremonies concerning with agricultural activity have to be minimized because the practice of those beliefs are against the Islamic dogma (sareat Islam).

Most of the non-Kasepuhan members are farmers. Actually, their agricultural techniques and methods are not so much different with what their fellows have at Kampung Ciptarasa. However, there are several characteristics that belongs to the non-Kasepuhan:

4.2. Social Solidarity among the Community

Within the daily life of Sirnarasa community, both the members of Kasepuhan and non-Kasepuhan still maintain their spirit of solidarity and cooperatives. They show their sense of solidarity between their kin, friends, and neighborhood especially if there is someone who gets ill, death, or makes a feast related to stages along the life cycle (such as birth, circumcision, marriage). During the hajatan (feast), for example, a week before the peak of the ceremony, most of the kin's members, friends, and neighbors of the family who conduct the feast come to give some help in various works, preparing the foods, and collecting woods for fuel. If the family is not rich enough, some of its kin's members, friends, and neighbors will contribute it with rice, meats, etc. The family who conducts the feast will always remember their contributions and will return them as much as what they get or even more when their kin, friends, and neighbor get their turn to conduct feasts. Sometimes, between neighbors, friends, and kin’s members they send foods or agricultural products reciprocally. These kinds of reciprocal contributions and presents are called eurihan that since long ago has been institutionalized by the people of Sirnarasa.

Among the warga Kasepuhan, the cooperative activities include both inter-individual and communal interests. The inter-individual cooperative is manifested in rice field cultivation-that is called liliuran. The communal interest is manifested in sparing a small part of rice product. After the harvest time, every family has to spare as much as two pocong (bunches) of rice (one pocong is about 1 liter of rice) in the communal rice storage named leuit si jimat-the amulet. In time of famine, families those have no rice may lend some amounts of rice taken from this communal storage. The Warga Kasepuhan have also built cooperatively the elementary school buildings, meeting house, and repairing the village road and water drainage within their hamlet. Such cooperative activity may be conducted accidentally whenever in need.
 
 

4.3. Social Organization

Among the community of Sirnarasa there are some formal and non-formal social organizations. The formal organizations are including the Taruna Karya (abbreviated as TARKA) or youth organization and the Pembinaan Kesejahteraan Keluarga (abbreviated as PKK) or family welfare movement. According to its name, the TARKA members are at the most the young people among 15 to 25 years old. Their activities are including sports, art (music and dancing), martial art, and mutual cooperation. The PKK is actually a kind of women organization. Within that organization some the "elite women" of the community assembled to do some activities dealing with family welfare both for the benefit of their own families and the community. They conduct skill education and training for women(such as making cake and cookies, dress making, etc.) to their community members. They also help to succeed the Public Health Center’s mission to increase the health of children and mothers by joining themselves in the Pos Pelayanan Terpadu (abbreviated as POSYANDU) or merged health services post that held monthly within their neighborhood areas.

There are also some non-formal organizations such as traditional music and dance association, arisan (a circular lottery among the neighborhood wives), patron-client relationship, and mutual cooperation among the neighborhood. All of those social organizations reflect the communal life of sirnarasa villagers.

The patron-client relationship does not only happen dealing with economical activity (e.g., between the landlords and their laborers) but also concerning with their social stratification. Among them there are some honorable elders who may function as advisers to the community members to solve their problems. The relationship between patrons and their clients seems stronger among the Warga Kasepuhan rather than among the non-Kasepuhan members.
 
 

4.4. Kinship and Marriage

The community of Sirnarasa village is a part of Sundanese tribe of West Java. Their kinship system is based on bilateral rule of descent. Consequently, every individual claims the consanguinial and affinal families both from his/her father and mother side. It is true that among the people of Sirnarasa the nuclear family is the basic and most important kin group. There is also a tendency that some of the married children of a family prefer to stay or build their houses within the house yard of their parents as long as the yard is large enough for them. So, there are some clustered families among the community of Sirnarasa. However, the kindred members from both parents’ side-especially the close once-of every individual also have important role in dealing with cooperative activities.

Although there is no strict rule concerning with marriage preference, however, the people of Sirnarasa prefer to get their spouses of the same religious background who live within the same village. It needs to note that they do not conduct endogamy what so ever. Their marriage residence is more neo-local rather than the other forms of marriage residence with a tendency of temporary uxorilocal.
 
 

4.5. Social Stratification

The social stratification of rural communities in West Java is commonly based on the criteria of community membership originality, wealth (the size of landownership and property), formal position (such as governmental official ), age, and skill. So it is among the community of Sirnarasa. However, superficially the differences of social status among the people are not so clear, except should it refers to certain formal and informal leaders. In other word, physically they seem homogenous. Their awareness of social status differences is clearly manifested in their social inter-relationships. The people belong to lower social status will show their respect towards them of higher social status. Some of those elite figure in Sirnarasa village are:
 
 

1. Kepala desa or lurah (the head of the villagers) and his main staffs have strong

influence of authority among the non-Kasepuhan members;

2. Sesepuh Girang (see page ...), as a traditional informal leader, has influential

power and highly respected by the Warga Kasepuhan. He is also respected by

the non-Kasepuhan members;

3. Kokolot or Olot among the non-Kasepuhan members and Baris Kolot among

the Warga-Kasepuhan are honorable elders among their own sub-community;

4. Ajengan and Ulama (Islamic religious scholars) are higly respected by the non-

Kasepuhan members;

5. Kuncen (the janitor of sacred place);

6. Lebe (mosque official, especially concerning with marriage);

7. Dalang (the person who has the skill and knowledge of performing traditional

wooden puppet show or wayang);

8. The wealthy farmers;

9. School teachers;

10. Kepala dusun (the head of a village sub-division area);

11. Ketua Rukun Warga (the head of a village sub-sub-division);

12. Ketua Rukun Tetangga (the head of a neighborhood area).
 
 

It needs to note that the above entry of village elite does not mention the real hierarchy of the social status that exist among the community of sirnarasa. The entry should be treated as a tendency, because to get the real one it needs special research about it that we have not yet done in detail.

The people of Sirnarasa sometimes asked for advises from one or several of those elite figure whenever they got a certain problem to solve it. To show their respect towards the above elites, the people of Sirnarasa never forget to invite them when they conduct ceremonies both concerning with special events along the life cycle and farming activities.

As an addition, the social status of an individual (especially the head of the family) can also be identified from the amount of money he contributes to finance the development programs of the village. Actually, it is the village government that proposes the amount of money or materials (such as rice or building materials) to the head of the households. The village government arranged the proposal base on the size of land or other wealth qualification that belong to the concerned households. The concerned household can use the proposal as reference in deciding what kind and amount of contribution they can possibly give to their village dealing with its development program. Considering the wealth criterion, the people of Sirnarasa can be classified into three classes, that is, the first class, the second class, and the third class. Those classes can be associated with high class, middle class, and lower class. The community expects those who belong to the first class to contribute more money or materials than those who belong to the other classes should there are development program within their village.
 
 

4.6. Religion

It is almost 100% of the people of Sirnarasa claim themselves as Moslem. However, some of them are still practicing animistic and dynamistic systems of belief, especially among the Warga Kasepuhan. This syncretic religious belief (Islam and animistic and dynamistic) is apparent when we observe their agricultural activities and their folk mythology.

Before doing certain stage of major agricultural activities-such as clearing the land, beginning to cultivate the land, beginning to plant the rice, beginning to harvest, and so on- the Warga Kasepuhan and some of the non-Kasepuhan members always try to find the best day to begin with by counting it according to their traditional date system. They belief that each day has its own value that can affect their activity-resulting success or fail. They also use certain leaves and Herb’s to protect their rice field against thieves and pests. They put certain leaves and Herb’s on the woven bamboo wall of their rice storage (leuit) to protect the rice against rats. The people of Sirnarasa-especially those among the Warga-Kasepuhan- show their respect towards Dewi Sri (the goddess of rice and fertility) and their ancestors by calling their names in nearly every religious ceremonies-especially concerning with agriculture and stages along the life cycle ceremonies.
 
 

4.7. Specific Custom and Values

Some specific custom and values are more apparent among the Warga-Kasepuhan rather than among the non-Kasepuhan members because the previous ones are more traditional than the later. Their agricultural activities in some respect are closely related to their cosmological concept that can be traced back to their ancestral belief. They call this belief as tatali paranti karuhun. The Warga Kasepuhan regard that the universe is not only as an ecosystem but more as the whole unity of ecosystem and social system and both are in orderly interrelationship. They also believe that the disturbance of that orderly interrelationship between the physical and the non-physical components that exist in this universe may cause catasthrope to human life. Among other things, the Warga-Kasepuhan express their belief through the conviction that they are the descendants of Pancer Pangawinan. The term pancer pangawinan has many interpretative meanings. One of those interpretative meanings is ‘the focus of coupling’. It means that the Warga Kasepuhan is the central place of uniting every coupled thing that deals with real world and spiritual world in order to reach harmonious life. Among the human beings the ultimate goal is to unite with the Almighty God. It seems that there is a "doctrine" among the Warga Kasepuhan that regarded as wangsit (ancestral order) that says "cing saha nu bisa ngawinkeun langit jeung bumi, manusa jeung kamanusan, eta nu disebut pancer pangawinan" (they who able to marry off the heaven and the earth, the man and the humanity, may be called as pancer pangawinan).
 
 

The Warga Kasepuhan conduct more religious ceremonies concerning with their agricultural activities. To say some, they conduct mitembeyan ceremony when they begin to plant rice and ngukusan when they begin to harvest. They conduct those ceremonies in order to ask the "permission" of the "owner" of rice and other plants that is Dewi Sri or Nyi Sri (the goddess of rice and fertility). They believe that every thing in this world is belonged to somebody or authority. So, they have to "tell" the owner or the authority when they want to begin to grow and ask for their permission when they want to harvest (mipit kudu amit ngala kudu bebeja).

When the harvest time ended (usually between June and August), the Warga-Kasepuhan begin to prepare for conducting the greatest ceremony of the year, that is the Seren Taun or thanks giving festival. The ceremony it self goes on several days and thousands of people attend it joyfully. Those who attend the ceremony are both from within and without the village of Sirnarasa. They are invited guests (some of them are high rank government officials), those who are recognized as Warga-Kasepuhan but reside outside the village of Sirnarasa and the rest are outsiders who are interested to watch the whole procession of Seren Taun.
 
 

Conclusion

The community of Sirnarasa village-especially those who claim as the Warga-Kasepuhan- in some respects are traditional agriculturists. However, the non-Warga Kasepuhan have already influenced by modern agricultural technology while the Warga-Kasepuhan still preserve their traditional agricultural practices and customs. It is very interesting that two groups of local people of single ethnic that life within the same village without any geographical obstacle, for long have relatively different orientation.
 
 

The Warga-Kasepuhan seem still maintain their harmonious relationships with their environment. These harmonious relationships between humans and their environment are manifested through their mythology, cosmological concept, and agricultural practices. We can expect more understanding about indigenous agricultural knowledge-particularly among the Sundanese rural people-through intensive research within this local area.
 
 

References

Adimihardja, Kusnaka, 1989, Manusia Sunda dan Alam Lingkungannya: Suatu

Kajian Kes Mengenai Kehidupan Sosiobudaya dan Ekologi Komuniti

Kasepuhan Desa Sirnarasa Jawa Barat Indonesia. Thesis. Fakulti

SainsKemasyarakatan dan Kemanusiaan. Universiti Kebangsaan

Malaysia.Bangi.

___________________1992. Kasepuhan: Yang Tumbuh di Atas yang Luruh.

Pengelolaan Lingkungan Secara Tradisional di Kawasan

Gunung Halimun Jawa Barat. Bandung, P.T. Tarsito.

Adimihardja, K. and Iskandar, Johan. 1993. Kasepuhan: Ecological influences on

Traditional Agriculture and Social Organization in Mt.Halimun of

West Java, Indonesia. Paper. Presented at Pithecanthropus Centenial

1893-1993 International Scientific Congress : Human Evolution in Its

Ecological Context, Leiden 26 June - 1 July 1993. Padjadjaran

University.

INRIK, 1955. Hubungan Timbal Balik Masyarakat Pedesaan dengan Hutan di

Kawasan Gunung Halimun Jawa Barat. Research Report. UPT INRIK

Padjadjaran University, Bandung.