Genealogy, diaspora, and social environment

Abstract

The material of my lecture was collected during a fieldwork in Indonesia (in the islands of Java and Bali) in the years 2003 - 2005 in cooperation with my colleague Martin Slama. Like in other regions of the Yemen, the traditional society in the Hadramawt is characterized through the existence of social groups which are percieved in an hierarchical order. In the Hadhrami as well as in the Western literature, there are different partitions of these social groups, and - this is important to state - the hierarchical ranking of this groups can become disputed and unstable in certain historical situations, as will soon be seen. The place at the uppermost end of this existing hierarchy in the Hadhramawt is taken by the sada (sg. sayyid), at least as they themselves perceive it. But this position may be disputed by the next following group, the mashayikh (sg. shaykh), or by parts of the tribal population. The armsbearing tribal population, the qabā'il (sg. qabīlī), form the third societal layer. The places at the lowest ranks of the Hadhrami society is taken by "weak" persons (dha'if, pl. dhu'afa'), mainly the peasants, certain professionals, and formerly the slaves.