Toala



The Toala (East Toraja, Luwu, Sada, Telu Limpoe, To Ale) numbered around 30,000 in 1983. They live in the mountains of southwest Sulawesi Island, Indonesia. Toala is classified in the West Indonesian Group of the Austronesian Language Family. Formerly hunter-gatherers, the Toala now work copra plantations and grow rice, maize, and vegetables in their gardens. The people are largely pagan, although Islam has made some converts among them. The Toala were traditionally divided into three subtribes ruled by a hereditary chief; they have since changed to an elected chieftainship.


Bibliography

Kennedy, Raymond (1935). The Ethnology of the Greater Sunda Islands. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University Microfilms.

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