Christianity and the Worldview of the Kelabit Society, Sarawak, Malaysia
The purpose of this study was to examine Christianity and the worldview of Kelabit society, which is one of the small indigenous groups in Sarawak, East Malaysia. There were four objectives outlined in this study. Firstly, the study examined the spread of Christianity in the Kelabit highlands, Sa...
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English English |
| Published: |
2009
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/9850/1/FEM_2009_9_A.pdf |
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| Summary: | The purpose of this study was to examine Christianity and the worldview of Kelabit
society, which is one of the small indigenous groups in Sarawak, East Malaysia.
There were four objectives outlined in this study. Firstly, the study examined the
spread of Christianity in the Kelabit highlands, Sarawak and Malaysia. Secondly, it
was carried out to determine the religiosity of the Kelabit. Thirdly, it was done to
identify the worldview of the Kelabit, and finally it was aimed at analyzing the social
changes experienced by the Kelabit society and their worldview.
Both qualitative and quantitative research methods were applied for this study. Data
from the qualitative research were collected through in-depth interview with fortyone
respondents who were selected from among social, religious and educational
leaders of the Kelabit society. Participant observation was also conducted by the
researcher in the villages in Bario, Sarawak. Meanwhile, qualitative data were
arranged by encoding them into thirteen topics. The topics were classified by three important themes, which included religiosity of Christianity, worldview and social
changes of the Kelabit. The qualitative data were analyzed by interpreting according
to the three main themes. In addition, the quantitative data were also obtained by
distributing one hundred questionnaires among the Kelabits who are residing in
Kelabit Highlands, Miri, Kuching and Kuala Lumpur. The quantitative data were
analyzed using SPSS version 15.0.
There are four findings yielded in this research. Firstly, the Kelabit society has been
influenced by the spread of Christianity through the Australian and American
missionaries in the early stage. As a result, the Kelabits converted to Christianity and
experienced the Christian revival. Secondly, the Kelabit has unique religious
practices which include various church activities such as early morning prayers and
worships. Moreover, their religiosity is strongly related to their social lifestyles.
Thirdly, the present worldview of the Kelabits is influenced through the years by
animism, Christianity and Christian revival. Finally, the study also revealed that the
worldview of the Kelabits has shaped their society. |
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