Keywords
intangible cultural heritage; Kabasaran; Minahasa; cultural transmission; traditional dance; mixed methods; preservation intention; Indonesia
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Rahman EY, Handayani N, Sultan H et al. Cultural identity, transmission, and preservation of the Kabasaran dance in Minahasa, Indonesia: a convergent mixed-methods study [version 1; peer review: awaiting peer review]. F1000Research 2026, 15:1189 (https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.186254.1)
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Research Article
Cultural identity, transmission, and preservation of the Kabasaran dance in Minahasa, Indonesia: a convergent mixed-methods study
[version 1; peer review: awaiting peer review]
PUBLISHED 20 Jul 2026
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Abstract
Corresponding author:
Eka Yuliana Rahman
Competing interests:
No competing interests were disclosed.
Grant information:
his research was supported by the Indonesian Education Scholarship (Beasiswa Pendidikan Indonesia, BPI), administered by the Center for Higher Education Funding and Assessment (Pusat Pembiayaan dan Pendanaan Pendidikan Tinggi, PPAPT), Ministry of Higher Education, Science, and Technology of the Republic of Indonesia, and by the Indonesian Endowment Fund for Education (Lembaga Pengelola Dana Pendidikan, LPDP). No specific grant or contract number was assigned
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
Copyright:
© 2026 Rahman EY et al.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
How to cite: Rahman EY, Handayani N, Sultan H et al. Cultural identity, transmission, and preservation of the Kabasaran dance in Minahasa, Indonesia: a convergent mixed-methods study [version 1; peer review: awaiting peer review]. F1000Research 2026, 15:1189 (https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.186254.1)
First published: 20 Jul 2026, 15:1189 (https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.186254.1)
Latest published: 20 Jul 2026, 15:1189 (https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.186254.1)
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
Introduction
Cultural identity can be conceived either as a relatively fixed inheritance or as an ongoing process of becoming that is continuously renegotiated under changing social conditions.1,2 For performance traditions recognised as intangible cultural heritage, this processual view has a practical corollary: a tradition survives only insofar as its embodied knowledge is enacted and transmitted by living communities.3 Understanding which social conditions are associated with practitioners’ commitment to sustain a tradition is therefore a substantive empirical question, not merely a rhetorical one.
The Kabasaran dance of the Minahasan people of North Sulawesi, Indonesia, offers a strategic case. A companion historical study traced its evolution from a pre-colonial martial practice centred on vigilance and communal protection, through its formalisation as a ceremonial-administrative duty under Dutch colonial rule, to its contemporary position as a marker of Minahasan identity.4 Existing scholarship on Kabasaran is largely historical and descriptive, documenting its symbolism, organisation, and ritual grammar,5,6 or examining its commodification as a tourist attraction.7 Broader histories of Minahasa provide the regional context for these developments.8,9
Theoretically, dance traditions are embodied symbolic systems: they encode collective memory in movement vocabularies, costume, and ritual sequence, and they are reproduced through performance rather than through text.10–12 Comparative studies of Southeast Asian and other indigenous performance traditions show that identity work, community organisation, and institutional environments jointly shape whether such embodied repertoires persist, adapt, or attenuate.13–17 From a practice-theoretical standpoint, culture supplies a repertoire of strategies that actors deploy under concrete constraints,18 which implies that preservation outcomes depend not only on how strongly practitioners identify with a tradition but also on the mundane infrastructure, teachers, venues, instruments, funding, through which it is transmitted.
Three gaps follow from this literature. First, no study has quantified the associations between cultural identity, community engagement, perceived government support, intergenerational transmission, and preservation intention among Kabasaran practitioners; existing claims about what sustains the dance rest on unsystematised testimony. Second, qualitative accounts of transmission barriers have not been integrated with quantitative evidence within a single design, leaving convergence untested. Third, no structured observational evidence documents how faithfully the movement vocabulary and ritual sequence are reproduced across contemporary performance contexts (ritual, stage, school, and government-sponsored events). Preservation intention is an appropriate proximal outcome because intention is the most immediate antecedent of deliberate behaviour.19
The aim of this study was therefore to examine the contemporary social ecology of Kabasaran preservation using a convergent mixed-methods design. Three research questions were addressed. RQ1: To what extent are cultural identity, community engagement, perceived government support, and intergenerational transmission associated with practitioners’ preservation intention? RQ2: How do knowledge-holders describe the conditions that enable or obstruct transmission? RQ3: How does the fidelity of movement vocabulary and ritual sequence vary across performance contexts, and do the three strands of evidence converge?
Methods
Study design
A convergent mixed-methods design was used: quantitative and qualitative strands were collected in the same period, analysed independently, and merged at the interpretation stage through a joint display.20,21 The qualitative interview component was conducted and reported with reference to the Consolidated Criteria for Reporting Qualitative Research (COREQ).22 The design extends the companion historical study4 by shifting the analytical object from the past evolution of the dance to its present conditions of reproduction.
Setting and participants
Data were collected between February and June 2025 in five districts of the Minahasan region: Tondano, Amurang, Kawangkoan, Langowan, and Tomohon. For the survey, 120 active practitioners (dancers, musicians, educators, and community leaders involved in Kabasaran activity for at least one year) were recruited purposively through dance groups (sanggar) and community networks, with quota balancing across the five districts. For the interviews, 15 knowledge-holders were selected through maximum-variation purposive sampling across roles (senior dancers, cultural leaders, a patabea musician, educators, a tua adat, a choreographer, a youth dancer, and a cultural researcher; 9 male, 6 female; age range 23–61 years; mean cultural experience 17.5 years). Interviews lasted 45–72 minutes (mean 58.7). Eight performance events were observed (14 February–3 June 2025), covering funeral and wedding ceremonies, an independence celebration, a cultural festival, a community rehearsal, a school exhibition, a government-sponsored event, and a closed elder knowledge-sharing session.
Quantitative measures
The questionnaire comprised 21 items rated on a five-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree), operationalising five constructs derived from the companion historical study and the intangible-heritage literature: cultural identity (CI, 5 items; e.g., the salience of Kabasaran to Minahasan self-understanding), community engagement (CE, 4 items; participation in collective Kabasaran activity), perceived government support (GS, 4 items; adequacy and consistency of institutional support), intergenerational transmission (IT, 5 items; experienced access to, and involvement in, elder–youth knowledge transfer), and preservation intention (PI, 3 items; commitment to continue practising and transmitting the dance). Internal consistency was estimated with Cronbach’s alpha.23 Because the instrument was developed for this study, its construct validity evidence is limited to internal consistency and the pattern of inter-construct correlations; this is acknowledged as a limitation.
Qualitative data collection
Semi-structured, face-to-face interviews followed a guide organised around five domains: cultural identity, transmission barriers, community resilience, government and institutional roles, and future outlook (the full guide is available as Extended data).24 Interviews were conducted in Bahasa Indonesia or local Minahasan dialect, audio-recorded with permission, transcribed verbatim, and translated into English for analysis. Structured non-participant observation used a standardised log recording event type, duration, performer composition, intergenerational mix, costume completeness, integrity of the ritual sequence, and an ordinal rating of movement-vocabulary preservation (low to very high) assigned jointly by two observers with reference to the movement inventory documented in the companion study.4
Analysis
Quantitative analyses (Python 3.11; NumPy, SciPy) comprised descriptive statistics, one-sample t-tests against the scale midpoint, Pearson correlations, and ordinary least squares regression of preservation intention on the four predictors. Collinearity was assessed with variance inflation factors (VIF).25 Because CI and IT were very highly correlated (r = 0.94) and their VIFs exceeded conventional thresholds, a parsimonious model excluding CI was estimated alongside the full model, and both are reported. Age and years of practice were examined as covariates but excluded from the final models because they were almost perfectly collinear with each other (r = 0.99) and non-significant when entered. Group differences were tested with Welch’s t-test and Cohen’s d.26 Interview data were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis,27,28 with a framework matrix mapping the five interview domains onto inductively refined themes; credibility was supported through source triangulation across interviews, observation, and survey results.29 Integration used a side-by-side joint display organised by meta-inference.21
Ethical considerations
The study was conducted in accordance with the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki. Ethical approval was obtained from the Research Ethics Committee, Universitas Negeri Manado (Ethical Clearance No. XII/2025). All survey respondents and interview participants provided written informed consent prior to participation. Observation of ceremonies followed adat protocol: audio-visual recording of sacred segments was not conducted where elders withheld permission, and written consent was obtained for the researcher’s presence at the closed knowledge-sharing session.
Results
Sample characteristics
Table 1 summarises the survey sample. Respondents (N = 120) were on average 37.0 years old (SD = 10.7) with 10.9 years of practice experience (SD = 8.1); dancers constituted the largest role group, and the five districts were nearly equally represented.
Table 1. Characteristics of survey respondents (N = 120).
Descriptive statistics, reliability, and correlations
Table 2 reports construct-level results. All scales showed satisfactory internal consistency (α = 0.82–0.94). Cultural identity (M = 4.24, SD = 0.47) and preservation intention (M = 4.40, SD = 0.52) were high, whereas perceived government support fell significantly below the scale midpoint of 3 (M = 2.73, SD = 0.37; t(119) = −8.11, p < 0.001). Preservation intention correlated most strongly with intergenerational transmission (r = 0.96) and cultural identity (r = 0.94); its correlation with perceived government support was small (r = 0.21, p = 0.023). The very high correlations among CI, IT, and PI (r ≥ 0.94) indicate substantial shared variance and limited empirical distinctness among these three constructs, a point taken up in the regression diagnostics and the limitations.
Table 2. Descriptive statistics, reliability, and Pearson correlations of study constructs (N = 120).
| Construct | Items | α | M | SD | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Cultural identity (CI) | 5 | 0.91 | 4.24 | 0.47 | — | |||
| 2. Community engagement (CE) | 4 | 0.85 | 3.79 | 0.51 | 0.82*** | — | ||
| 3. Government support (GS) | 4 | 0.82 | 2.73 | 0.37 | 0.10 | 0.49*** | — | |
| 4. Intergenerational transmission (IT) | 5 | 0.94 | 3.55 | 0.50 | 0.94*** | 0.86*** | 0.31*** | — |
| 5. Preservation intention (PI) | 3 | 0.92 | 4.40 | 0.52 | 0.94*** | 0.86*** | 0.21* | 0.96*** |
Correlates of preservation intention
Table 3 presents the regression results. The full model (Model 1) explained 93.7% of the variance in preservation intention, F(4, 115) = 430.30, p < 0.001; however, VIFs for CI (16.28) and IT (13.74) far exceeded the conventional threshold of 10, and the CI coefficient was not statistically distinguishable from zero (p = 0.063), reflecting the near-collinearity between CI and IT rather than the absence of a bivariate association (CI–PI r = 0.94). In the parsimonious model (Model 2; all VIF ≤ 4.97), intergenerational transmission was the dominant correlate (β = 0.78, p < 0.001), community engagement retained a positive association (β = 0.26, p < 0.001), and perceived government support showed a small negative partial association (β = −0.16, p < 0.001) despite its weakly positive bivariate correlation with PI, a sign reversal that should be interpreted as a conditioned (suppression-type) effect rather than as evidence that support undermines intention. Given the cross-sectional, self-report design, all coefficients are associational; no causal ordering is claimed.
Table 3. Ordinary least squares regression of preservation intention on study constructs (N = 120).
A generational contrast reinforced the centrality of transmission: respondents younger than 30 reported significantly lower transmission scores (M = 3.30, n = 38) than those aged 30 or older (M = 3.66, n = 82), Welch’s t = −3.81, p < 0.001, d = 0.75, indicating that the practitioners on whom future continuity depends currently report the weakest access to transmission.
Qualitative findings
Reflexive thematic analysis of the 15 interviews yielded five themes ( Table 4). Cultural identity was described as a lived inheritance enacted through performance rather than an abstract affiliation; transmission barriers concentrated on youth out-migration, the mortality of elder knowledge-holders, material costs, and the absence of Kabasaran from school curricula; community resilience took the form of informal apprenticeship, inter-village collaboration, and emergent digital documentation; the institutional role of government was described as inconsistent, recognition without funding; and the future outlook was conditionally optimistic, contingent on schools and policy champions.
Table 4. Themes, subthemes, and illustrative quotations from interviews (n = 15).
Observational findings
Table 5 summarises the eight observed events. A consistent gradient emerged: performances embedded in ritual contexts (funeral, wedding, community rehearsal, and the closed elder session) preserved the full or training ritual sequence with high to very high movement-vocabulary fidelity and, in most cases, genuine intergenerational participation, whereas stage-oriented contexts (independence celebration, festival, school exhibition, government event) presented abbreviated or adapted sequences with moderate to low fidelity. The school exhibition was choreographed without elder consultation and conveyed the movement vocabulary at the lowest observed fidelity, while the elder knowledge-sharing session, closed to recording under adat protocol, demonstrated the richest documented vocabulary (23 distinct movement items).
Table 5. Structured observation of Kabasaran performance events (February–June 2025).
Integration of strands
Table 6 merges the three strands. The strands converge on transmission as the pivotal and most vulnerable mechanism: quantitatively it is the dominant correlate of preservation intention and is weakest among the young; qualitatively it is the theme around which barriers cluster; observationally its fidelity varies systematically with the presence of elders. The institutional dimension shows an expansion pattern rather than simple convergence: low perceived support and a negative partial coefficient in the survey are elaborated by interview accounts of recognition without funding and by the observed decontextualisation of a sponsored performance.
Table 6. Joint display integrating quantitative, qualitative, and observational strands.
Discussion
This study provides the first integrated empirical account of the contemporary conditions associated with the preservation of the Kabasaran dance. Three findings warrant emphasis. First, intergenerational transmission, not identity salience per se, was the dominant correlate of preservation intention, and it was precisely the youngest practitioners who reported the weakest transmission experiences. Second, perceived government support was the only construct below its scale midpoint and displayed a negative partial association with preservation intention once transmission and engagement were controlled. Third, observational evidence located the reproduction of the movement vocabulary almost entirely in ritual-embedded, elder-anchored contexts, while the formats through which most external audiences now encounter Kabasaran (festivals, school exhibitions, sponsored events) transmit a simplified repertoire.
The centrality of transmission is consistent with accounts of dance traditions as embodied communities, in which continuity depends on sustained co-presence of skilled bodies rather than on archival documentation alone.13,14 The observed fidelity gradient extends the commodification literature on Minahasan and Balinese performance7,17: adaptation for stage and tourism does not merely change the audience, it changes what is transmitted, because abbreviated sequences omit exactly the ritual and movement elements that elders identify as non-negotiable. The finding that a government-sponsored performance omitted the pre-ceremony ritual, and that the lead dancer reported discomfort with this decontextualisation, illustrates the mechanism concretely.
The negative partial coefficient for government support requires careful, non-causal interpretation. Because the bivariate GS–PI correlation was weakly positive, the sign reversal under adjustment is a suppression-type phenomenon: at comparable levels of transmission and engagement, respondents who perceive stronger institutional support report marginally lower personal preservation intention. At least two readings are compatible with the data. Communities facing institutional neglect may internalise responsibility for continuity, a compensatory mobilisation consistent with the resilience theme; alternatively, reliance on external sponsorship may partially crowd out personal commitment. The present design cannot adjudicate between these readings, and the coefficient should not be read as evidence that support harms preservation; it indicates, rather, that support as currently delivered is not the channel through which preservation intention is sustained.
Several limitations bound the inferences. The design is cross-sectional and all survey constructs are self-reported, so common method variance may inflate inter-construct correlations.30 The very high correlations among cultural identity, transmission, and preservation intention (r ≥ 0.94) indicate that discriminant validity between these constructs was not achieved in this sample31; the explained variance of the regression models (R2 ≈ 0.94) is correspondingly high and should be read in that light, as shared variance among closely related identity-practice constructs rather than as strong causal structure. The instrument was newly developed and lacks external validation. Purposive sampling of active practitioners excludes lapsed practitioners and non-practising Minahasans, whose perspectives are essential for a complete account of erosion; the observational sample (eight events) is small and confined to one region and one five-month window. Future research should employ validated multi-item instruments with formal measurement models, longitudinal designs capable of tracing transmission trajectories, and sampling frames that include those who have exited the tradition.
Notwithstanding these limits, the convergence across strands supports a clear policy implication: safeguarding investments should be redirected from performance sponsorship toward transmission infrastructure, structured elder–youth apprenticeship, remuneration for elder teachers, curriculum integration developed with (not merely about) adat authorities, and community-controlled documentation of the movement vocabulary while the remaining elder knowledge-holders can still teach it. The community’s own innovations, informal apprenticeships, inter-village collaboration, and social-media teaching, already indicate where such investment would be absorbed productively.
Conclusions
Among Kabasaran practitioners in five Minahasan districts, preservation intention was high and was most strongly associated with intergenerational transmission, the very dimension that younger practitioners reported as weakest. Qualitative and observational strands converged with this pattern, showing that the dance’s full ritual and movement repertoire currently survives in elder-anchored ritual contexts while circulating publicly in simplified form. The findings are associational, but their triangulated consistency indicates that the decisive variable for Kabasaran’s continuity over the coming decades is the institutionalisation of elder–youth transmission. Safeguarding policy that funds performances without funding transmission addresses the visible surface of the tradition while leaving its reproductive mechanism unsupported.
Ethics and consent
Ethical approval was obtained from the Research Ethics Committee, Universitas Negeri Manado (Ethical Clearance No. XII/2025). All participants provided written informed consent prior to participation. The study was conducted in accordance with the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki, and observation of ceremonial events followed adat protocol regarding recording and access.
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how to cite this article
Rahman EY, Handayani N, Sultan H et al. Cultural identity, transmission, and preservation of the Kabasaran dance in Minahasa, Indonesia: a convergent mixed-methods study [version 1; peer review: awaiting peer review]. F1000Research 2026, 15:1189 (https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.186254.1)
NOTE: If applicable, it is important to ensure the information in square brackets after the title is included in all citations of this article.
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