Folk Psychology, Emotions, and Rasa Theory in West Sumatra

Karl Heider, University of South Carolina

This is a follow-up of an earlier study (see Heider's 1991 Landscapes of Emotion) on Minangkabau emotion. In 2000 and 2001, open-ended interviews led to unexpected information on the folk psychological context of emotion. Most tantalizing are traces of a first millennium C.E. Hindu poetics, Rasa Theory.

Karl G. Heider studied Anthropology at Harvard and Indonesian at Yale and Cornell. He has written extensively about the Dani of New Guinea, the Minangkabau of West Sumatra, ethnographic film and Indonesian cinema. He has made films on Tikal, Dani Sweet Potatoes and Dani Houses. He appeared in The Bridge on the River Kwai as a prisoner of war. He has taught at universities on both coasts and is now distinguished Carolina Professor of Anthropology at the University of South Carolina, where he serves as Associate Provost and Dean of Undergaduate Studies.
See: http://www.cas.sc.edu/ANTH/Faculty/HeiderK/Heider.html

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