Spiritual Ecology and Identity in Crisis: Indigenous Lived Meanings of Forest Conservation Amid Modern Pressures in Southeast Asia

Abstract

This study explores how indigenous communities experience and interpret forest conservation as a deeply spiritual and identity-rooted practice in the face of accelerating modernization. Specifically, it seeks to answer the research question: How do indigenous forest custodians make meaning of their conservation practices amid modern ecological and sociopolitical pressures?

Moving beyond technical conservation models, this study employs an interpretative phenomenological approach (IPA), selected for its emphasis on capturing the lived, subjective realities of participants. Data were collected through in-depth, semi-structured interviews with nine forest custodians from a tropical Southeast Asian region, all of whom were selected through purposive sampling based on their sustained role in community-based forest stewardship. The interviews were transcribed, thematically coded, and analyzed using multi-stage IPA procedures involving iterative coding, contextual interpretation, and cross-case synthesis.

The findings reveal that the forest is perceived not as a utilitarian resource, but as a sacred entity integral to spiritual heritage, ancestral connection, and intergenerational responsibility. Participants described conservation as a moral and cosmological duty, expressed through ancestral rituals, symbolic resistance to ecological intrusion, and narratives of profound loss resulting from external development agendas.

The study highlights deep tensions between indigenous cosmologies and state-led conservation frameworks, which often marginalize or erase spiritual meanings in favor of technocratic and extractive paradigms.

By uncovering the inner worlds through which indigenous communities relate to their environment, the study calls for a reimagining of environmental policy—one that honors cultural sovereignty, spiritual ecology, and the lived experiences of local custodians. The insights contribute to environmental humanities and indigenous studies, offering a human-centered perspective on sustainability that is often absent from conventional conservation discourse.