New Spaces for the Enactment of Kui Culture: Heritagisation and (Re)Invented Traditions

This chapter explores the relationship between the AHD and heritagisation at three sites: the Surin Elephant Round-Up, Ban Taklang/Elephant World, and Wat Pa Ajiang. Heritagisation is presented through these examples as a means of reclaiming agency or further compromising agency, as it is controlled by different actors (external or internal to the community) and for different audiences. While all three sites involve aspects of Kui elephant heritage, the Kui only have direct agency in the heritagisation of Wat Pa Ajiang, although this is also directed by an AHD led by monks. The Kui are not the primary audiences of the Round-Up or Elephant World, where Kui heritage is presented as the heritage of the province and nation.