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Chapter
2
Myanmafication (1):
reinventing national unity
without Aung San
This chapter deals with the implications for national
unity of Aung San amnesia. In the previous chapter I argued that Aung
San's aim for loki nibbana meant a fight for lut-lak-yeì
in this double sense, namely ‘national independence’ and ‘freedom’.
Since 1962 the generals have placed primary emphasis on the loka
national independence element, while Aung San Suu Kyi insists, following
Aung San and following the democratization of enlightenment after
national independence, that this is no excuse for denying the ‘freedom’
nibbana element
The ideology of freedom serves to overcome constraints
placed upon some person or agency, to do what it would like to do
in the way it would like to do it. A call for freedom is a call for
an ideal state of unconstraint, which is usually phrased relationally.
Both attract attention to the agencies that prevent it from being
realised – for example, the anti-colonial uprisings in Burma held
lut-lak-yeì to be freedom from confinement by the British,
and this has historically resonated particularly well with the Buddhist
movements that sought freedom in the ultimate sense, namely the goal
of nibbana as freedom from samsara. Hence Aung San chose
to describe the struggle he and his army fought as loka nibbana:
this expresses lut-lak-yeì fully in terms of this double meaning
and resonates with the numerous struggles of the past. This is how
in Burmese politics mental culture could become the chief instrument
not only for personal liberation, but for the liberation of the nation.
However, national independence
is a much more tangible and earthly concept than freedom; it does
not mean freedom as an absolute, but the freedom to determine within
certain boundaries. It typically relies not on a call for personal
freedom of movement, but the right to take over agency to control
movements within certain boundaries and to defend these boundaries
from the threat of encroachment by outside agencies. In sum, national
independence is about a lower level of freedom that concerns itself
with the freedom to control substantive territorial boundaries associated
with loka.
During Aung San's political
ascendance, right up until his conversion to civilian status, an indigenous
army was widely perceived as a desirable instrument for attainment
of both, national independence and freedom. However, since 1962 remilitarisation
has meant that the concept of freedom (nibbana) has become
subsidiary to national independence (loka). The generals proclaim
that granting ‘freedom’ in any other way but theirs would necessarily
lead to loss of ‘national independence’ all over again. Saw Maung
stated that ‘I shall do my duty so that my country and my people do
not become enslaved’.
It is in the name of containing the threat to national independence
posed by encroaching foreign interests that Aung San Suu Kyi and the
democracy movement are confined. Their quest, the regime feels, should
not contaminate the sentiments of the masses and should remain at
best a mental event spiritually realised by the opposition leaders
in their enforced privacy, but never implemented for the collective.
Paradoxically then, it
is by postulating and living lut-lak-yeì as national independence,
that the regime, supposedly for the sake of national independence,
has ended up depriving the people of Burma of their freedom. The regime's
partial interpretation of the lut-lak-yeì concept, suggests
limits or boundaries that NLD's interpretation does not. These limits
arise from the country versus person-centred discourse that national
independence and freedom address respectively. Tied up with the struggle
for national independence is the idea of substantiating the nature
of the collective, and the concern to substantiate the nature of purity
and domain, i.e. setting limits to keep some people in and others
out. However, freedom challenges these and transcends the limits.
This paradox of how the army is turning lut-lak-yeì into a
bounded and framed concept based on loka, then, is the subject
of this and the subsequent four chapters.
Hermit
land and the Trojan Horse
The rhetoric of freedom
was bound to come into conflict with the rhetoric of national independence.
To assess the nature of this conflict, let me demonstrate how this
tension can be transposed onto another
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 037/392
tension that historically
operates in Burma, namely the two different interpretations of the
hermit in Burmese political history. Competing views on the role of
the hermit available to us suggest that both models, namely that of
‘national independence’ and of ‘freedom’, go hand in hand. These do
not just divide neatly between ‘Burmese’ and ‘foreign’ views. Nevertheless,
these views are dynamically constituted somewhere at the interface.
The hermit stands, on the one hand, for substantive values such as
‘national independence’ and its associated concepts – ‘historical
continuity’, ‘sovereignty’, and ‘national unity’. However, insofar
as the hermit stands for spiritual practice, and operates independently
from society and at the boundaries of the State, the hermit at the
same time also stands for more absolute universal values of freedom
that reach well beyond the confines of the mundane. These transgress
and unexpectedly modify boundaries. This is the product of successful
practice of mental culture and the freedom to either control events
in samsara through samadhi and supernatural power, or
to cessate rebirth altogether through success in vipassana.
Dorothy Woodman characterised
Burma in the wake of the Ne Win coup as the ‘Albania of Asia’.
Such is a comparison conjured up from the Western imagination. Burma
scholars often prefer to characterise Burma as ‘hermit land’, for
‘they seek to exclude the outside world so that they may find their
own destiny’.
This characterisation was made in the sixties to designate Burma's
isolation on the Burmese Way to Socialism, lasting from 1962 until
the 1988 protests forced the country to open up. Indeed, it is Ne
Win, the person behind this, who was once described by Time-Life
journalist Louis Kraar as ‘spiritually, Asia's most dedicated hermit’.
In the case of Ne Win it meant closure of the country in terms of
economy, but also in terms of knowledge and understanding of what
goes on in the outside world. Indeed, by his moves ‘the state began
to seal Burmese culture from outside influences and to focus public
attention on state-sanctioned cultural activities’.
Today, Burma has supposedly
opened up to the outside world. However, this ‘hermit land’ characterisation
is rearing its head again in a different guise. For example, a recent
report from Reuters entitled ‘Hermit Myanmar avoids Asia money crisis’
points out that the generals are confident that they will not catch
the ‘Asian flu’ because, unlike other ASEAN countries, they have no
money market. Though many hotels built in anticipation of the tourist
boom expected in 1996 lie empty, having either been bankrupted or
still in the process of laying off workers, and foreign companies
have left because the country's business prospects have worsened,
the generals are still surprisingly confident that Myanmar has the
ability to attract all the businesses and tourists that it needs to
fulfill its foreign currency requirements.
The insular approach to
economics in a fast developing Southeast Asia, means that its slow
response and lack of understanding ensure that, as one journalist
notes, ‘it remains very much the hermit country of Asia’.
Today, the exchange rate is controlled, not so much by prudent monetary
policy, but simply by arresting money changers who offer too many
Kyat for the US dollar.
The national bank will offer only 6 Kyat to the dollar. While I was
in Burma in June 1998, any money changer offering over 300 Kyat was
risking arrest, though I could get as much as 350 Kyat. This was accompanied
with restrictions on foreign imports by closure of the borders and
the revoking of import licenses.
As a result of this unrealistic
approach to the economy, however, there was a widening disparity between
income and prices. Prices more than doubled between mid-1997 and mid-1998,
while wages remained the same over the three years prior. For example,
in June 1998 the wages of civil servants and teachers were between
650 Kyat (US$1.86)
for the lowest paid clerks and 2,500 Kyat (US$7.14) per month for
a Director-General. Additionally, civil servants receive a small rice
ration and coupons for travel on local non-air-conditioned buses.
However, the minimum required for a small family is 30,000 Kyat per
month (US$85.50) a month. If civil servants calculate the cost of
dressing for and travelling to work, than all
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 038/392
are literally subsidising
their work with no means of supporting either themselves or their
families. Whole families need to find other ways of making their work
pay, such as bribes, second and third jobs and weekend work, and they
need all family members to pull their weight in order to make ends
meet. In other words, ordinary civil servants too, have come to represent
a form of forced labour.
University teachers solve
their financial problems by charging greatly inflated tuition fees.
But there are more organised ways of bringing in the money. One way
in which these people cope can be witnessed at the international telephone
exchange, where employees follow a new practice. Today they surcharge
each international call by 100 Kyat, which provides them with a considerable,
but illegal, income. They simply do not connect people to get through
if they do not pay this under-the-table fee. Such practices are accepted
because the regime cannot afford to pay people the necessary wages.
This view that Burma can
do everything in its own way, therefore, stands against market forces;
Burma can today no longer afford to act as an independent ‘hermit’
by itself, for it translates into corruption of those who control
exchanges with the outside – whether in the field of knowledge, communication
or trade. Furthermore, today's regime continues to solve not just
its political problems with arrests, but also its economic problems
and, as I will momentarily show, even its cultural problems. In 1994,
after five years of military ‘free market economy’ Burma had the distinction
of having the lowest ratio of exports to GDP in the world, with a
paltry 2%.
However, those who demonstrate total loyalty to the hierarchy of generals,
and who benefit from the new economic exchanges that these relationships
afford are not arrested, but those who eke out a living independently
are.
The economy of Burma,
as is its politics and defence, is tied to army patronage. This Myanmar-,
but in particular Yangon army-centred world-view maintains that only
total sovereignty over all transactions within the boundaries of Myanmar
are perceived as maintaining lut-lak-yeì. All transactions
crossing boundaries need to be scrutinised. Awareness of the origins
and intentions of all transactions needs to be heightened just in
case they reference to the outside world. This necessarily places
all power, wisdom and responsibility as emanating from a single institution
– the army.
>Aung San Suu Kyi – the Trojan horse
The advent of Aung San
Suu Kyi, then, created havoc in this tightly confined system (loka),
for not only did she transgress all sacred boundaries herself, but
she did so as the daughter of the martyr who gave his life to defend
these boundaries from foreign interference. The generals perceive
her as Burma's ‘Trojan horse’ who has transgressed all sacred boundaries,
both with her origins, as she comes from abroad, and with her message,
a message of freedom. In the context of such a tightly regulated system
in which corruption is tolerated as a necessity of life in order to
keep sacred the boundaries between inside and outside, she advocates
a value, ‘freedom’, they feel they can ill-afford. In short, she has
become a scapegoat who is introducing the very ‘alien’ values they
had sought to keep at bay indefinitely – she has become Burma's Trojan
Horse.
From another point of
view, however, she is the ‘second martyr of the second independence
struggle’. Aung San Suu Kyi directly challenges and confronts the
generals' hermit minds. For example, in a keynote address the Deputy
Minister of Education summed up Aung San Suu Kyi's views by saying
that ‘colonialism however has taken a heavy toll and we can still
find in our midst sons and daughters of the previous patriotic generation
who look to ex-colonial powers for the upbringing of their progeny
and the re-casting of our institutions.’
When they look at Aung San Suu Kyi they see an icon reminding them
of their own failure, and the psychology of failure is that it is
most easily absolved by exteriorising blame for it rather than confronting
its underlying causes through fundamental political and economic reforms.
The other side of the
coin is that Aung San Suu Kyi, and those who are opposing the current
regime, are also best informed about the relative backwardness of
the country and its underdevelopment vis-à-vis the rest of Asia. In
isolating these opponents, the regime attempts to contain the possibility
that these critical views might ‘contaminate’ the citizens of the
country and inform them about this state of affairs – in other words,
it is protecting its stake by further trojanising the opposition,
demonstrating its foreignness and hopefully thereby making it irrelevant
to Burma's political arena.
This hermit policy in
the sense of total self-reliance, total sovereignty, stands in relation
to hermit life.
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 039//392
But what kind of relationship
is it? For example, when Japan came out of isolation in the Edo period
it also faced great difficulties adjusting itself to an international
community that had adapted itself much better to dealing with trans-national
issues. The Japanese worked to find a new kind of self-image that
would permit it to be an effective player in a larger international
environment, but without becoming ‘foreign’ themselves. This involved
a programme both, of government reform, and of selectively re-enculturing
the entire country and re-manufacturing old values. In Burma, however,
the desperately needed government reforms are being postponed. All
that has taken place so far is the re-enculturing, or ‘Myanmafication’
as I call it. This is an attempt to revive selected aspects of culture
perceived as necessary for a new Burmese polity to play a role in
the modern world. This project in today's world, however, rather than
delivering freedom, is purposely engineered to imprison its people.
Of course, Burma is a
very different country from Japan, with a great deal more independent
minority groups with separate linguistic and cultural traditions that
pose a serious threat to national unity. From the point of view of
the generals, Aung San Suu Kyi is to blame for not achieving their
objective of national unity and national independence. However, the
lack of progress in mending the relationships between the ethnic groups
is due to the fact that there have been no serious efforts under army
control since 1962 to effect national reconciliation, only, as I shall
show momentarily, ‘national reconsolidation’, which is a very different
concept. The emphasis on lut-lak-yeì as national independence
stands in the way of freedom; it is the ignorance, the lack of freedom
to ‘know’, and the lack of awareness and education that ultimately
holds Burma back. As I will later show, ‘awareness’ is a traditional
Burmese value advocated by the senior leaders of the NLD, but unfortunately
not by the generals.
The essence then, is that
while the generals have increasingly had to represent their message
as that of lut-lak-yeì as national independence, concerned
with national boundaries and security, so Aung San Suu Kyi's message
has gradually evolved into lut-lak-yeì as a spiritual quest,
a ‘revolution of the spirit’. The first frames and contains within
loka, and the latter aims, in non-violent fashion, to transcend
and free from the shackles to attain lokuttara. Both deal with
Burma's hermit world in radically different ways.
Burma and the
significance of hermit practice
There is, however, more to the concept of the hermit.
Tinker made his characterisation of Burma as ‘hermit land’ consciously,
for hermits have always played an important role in Burmese stories
as sages who, steeped in mental culture, have answers to difficult
problems, and have the necessary superhuman powers and knowledge to
overcome seemingly insurmountable problems.
First, based on a prophesy
[òbadit\] by the Buddha, Sri
Kitsara was founded with the aid of a hermit who through meditation
had attained the powers of the jhanas [s¥an\ABiva¨\]
– this became known as ‘hermit country’ [req.òpv\].
In this sense, therefore, Ne Win and his officers were not the first
to bring about a ‘hermit state’. His was but a variant of this earlier
hermit state.
Not only are hermits often mythical founders of
Burmese settlements and new royal dynasties, but they are self-reliant
and able to achieve what ordinary worldlings cannot. This particular
Sri Kitsara hermit permitted continuity in the royal lineage by advising
on the appointment of the appropriate new king. Furthermore, when
the Buddha-to-be took the vow to become a Buddha in the presence of
the previous Buddha, he did so as hermit Sumedha.
The hermit's role as mender of lineages between
Buddhas and as kings in the making is mirrored in the hermit's role
in legal matters and in mending lineages of political succession in
Burmese politics. The hermit is part of the broader view that roots
the origins of the legal code, and therefore the ideas of place, identity,
property and crime, in the achievement of Manu, who discovered the
laws of humankind and of the universe, while practising concentration
meditation (samatha) as a hermit.
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 040/392
One interesting example in the new Tatmadaw Museum
is a hermit portrayed on a painting depicting the progress of military
technology. He is represented as the earliest to master the technology
of signalling on the drum by means of sound. This is shown in a sequence
of technologies leading to electronic devices deployed by the army.
This suggests that the hermit, in a sense, provided one of the earliest
superior weapons in war.
Indeed, the chief mender of the modern Burmese
political lineage referred to himself as ‘hermit’. Thahkin Kodawhmaing,
known as the ‘grandfather of Burman politics’, inspired the Dobama
movement and launched the modernist Thahkin politicians, such as Aung
San and U Nu into their political careers. He referred to himself
as ‘hermit-yogi’ [req.eyagI] and aimed, with his poems and with the practice of Buddhist
mental culture, in particular alchemy
and samatha practised in the isolation of Sagaing, to assist
the liberation of the country from the British. Wealth in this hermit
discourse is produced not through trade or industry, but through mental
culture (bhavana). One day, he promised that his meditation
and alchemy would bear fruit, and would produce enough wealth to finance
a better independent future for the country. His view underlies the
Burmese distrust of trade and industry; the economy is driven by Buddhist
values and by the perfection of mental attributes.
Attempts at finding continuity and legitimisation
for the politics of new generations of politicians are thus deeply
rooted in asceticism, and in ascetics who absent themselves from society.
Indeed, the hermit has furthermore been used in biographical episodes
to legitimise politicians as far apart in their political orientation
as former Prime Minister U Nu
and General Ne Win.
Aung San had been assassinated, and so it fell
upon U Nu to sign on 17 October 1947 the Nu-Attlee agreement on Burma's
national independence. One observer put it that national independence
promised socialism because of its association with Buddhism, for after
national independence, ‘socialism was to be adopted because it was
in-keeping with Buddhism rather than the reverse’.
In this respect, as King observed of U Nu, the practise of mental
culture that conjoined the idiom of freedom and national independence
was indispensable.
-
His devotion to meditation is well
known. And this has been no mere personal foible or publicity-seeking
device. For him it is of primary relevance to politics: the man
who meditates is resultingly better able to avoid the pitfalls
that threaten the politician, to discipline himself for the political
struggle, and to formulate his basic policies. Indeed U Nu would
hold meditation to be an absolutely indispensable ‘means of grace’
for the sincere Buddhist statesman. Therefore, when his party
split in 1958 and he subsequently lost political power, he spent
considerable time in meditation; and before beginning the 1959–1960
campaign that returned him to the premiership he also spent some
five or six weeks in solitary meditation. To repeat: there can
be no doubt but that he has consistently sought earnestly to relate
Buddhist principles directly to political practice.
It is no surprise perhaps that the new Prime Minister
of such newly independent country should look towards beginnings,
and the significance of this region is that Burma's Buddhism began
originally in Mon country, well before Burmans were Theravada Buddhists.
After a brief rest upon his return from negotiating national independence
in England from 28 October 1947, he went on a nine-day pilgrimage
retreat (‘observe duty day’, ú-bo-hsaung win thi) at the pagodas
around Keilatha Hill in Mon country where he
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 041/392
practised asceticism and supposedly encountered
various yogi and hermits.
Here, he concluded that many saintly and enlightened yogi and hermits
had, to paraphrase a complex verse, ‘put fright in the supernatural
forces by the achievements of their jhanas’.
In the text that describes his experiences, a conjunction
is made between the original efforts of Buddhist missionaries and
Nu's objective in government. Nu's visit, subsequent to the national
independence negotiations he had just concluded, is juxtaposed with
the story of attainment of enlightenment by Sona and Uttara in this
region during the reign of Thiridhamma-thawka, and how, through their
missionary efforts, Buddhism spread across the country. Here, there
is no doubt that, as Mendelson put it, ‘U Nu is presented … less as
an initiator than as a man governed by forces greater than himself
at whose command he places himself’.
The year after he became the first Prime Minister
of independent Burma he set to work on the Land Nationalization
Act 1948 and the Two-Year Plan. In it he defended land nationalisation
as not being equivalent to theft, but as the opportunity for landlords
to make merit by means of charitable gift-giving. Property ‘is meant
not to be saved, not for gains, nor for comfort. It is to be used
by men to meet their needs in respect of clothing, food, habitation
in their journey towards Nirvana or Heaven.’
Such use of nibbana to justify nationalisation is a modern
version of an old theme involved not only in Anawratha's kingship,
which deprived the spirit cults of their rights over lands, but in
the reconfiguration of authority over land as the result of the broadening
of the Buddha's mandala.
At times the hermit has been introduced into politicians'
lives by their biographers as a literary device, a concession to the
cultural sensibilities of the readership and an attempt to contribute
to a decisive climax for readers to enjoy. Nevertheless, these were
all serious men with a mission and they believed in the efficacy of
mental culture as an instrument and as an idiom for freedom. In this
respect, there is a decisive break in the use of the hermit in Ne
Win's biography and that of, for example, U Nu and Thahkin Kodawhmaing.
For the latter, the hermit represented a practice
that would permit attainment of freedom conjointly with national independence.
This is also what loki nibbana meant to Aung San. The hermit
was not just a device to proclaim sacred boundaries for the sake of
‘national independence’, but he signified ultimate and ideal sense
of ‘freedom’ through the actual practice of mental culture. By ‘hermit-yogi’,
a designation he used for himself, Thahkin Kodawhmaing meant the freedom
to come and go, ‘the language of the hermit, it means to go where
you want to go, to come when you want to come, to preach when you
want to preach, to speak when you want to speak and to go out into
the forest …’.
His cryptic rhymes were beyond the understanding of the British colonial
regime, and so he escaped censorship and arrest, in spite of his effective
political writings through the Burmese medium.
The outward-looking leaders in particular, such
as King Mindon, Prime Minister U Nu, and today's senior NLD leaders,
mental culture (bhavana) is more than a literary device or
an excuse to absent oneself from the world; it constitutes a vital
personal practice with real meaning, viewed as necessary for the transformation
of the leaders of the country and its citizens, in order to strive
for everyone's enjoyment of a freedom that does not currently exist.
It is a form of engaged Buddhism, and national independence is arguably
not their primary message.
To Ne Win, on the other hand, the hermit was an
instrument to sanction his person and his control over boundaries.
As leader of the army he was ‘destined’ to protect national independence,
but neither the practice of mental culture nor the concept of freedom
were part of his early repertoire. Indeed, he was reacting against
U Nu's emphasis on these practices. Ne Win's biographer describes
U Nu's support for mental culture with a degree of cynicism, ‘those
who meditated furiously in strategic places which U Nu
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 042/392
passed on his regular visits to the pagoda were
often the regulars on the cocktail circuits’.
By 1974, however, Ne Win finally succumbed to more potent forces in
Burmese society, and finally incorporated mental culture, giving it
central place in the national ideology. Today he is reported to be
practising meditation by his daughter Sanda Win.
SLORC and the SPDC face a worse problem in this
regard. Ne Win personally participated in the national independence
struggle, but the members of these regimes do not even belong to the
generation that led the struggle for the liberation of Burma; hence,
neither national independence nor freedom believably coincide in their
widely unpopular claims to legitimacy. Governing as a collective they
make the best of an inherited ideology that it is the army that protects
the country from what are now extremely remote external dangers, but
they themselves are not the fountain for this ideology. In the process,
Aung San Suu Kyi has been turned into an honorary colonial ambassador
for Britain. In short, their determination to ruthlessly pursue government
in terms of their chosen idiom of fighting for and safeguarding national
independence seriously conflicts with the spiritualised ideal of ‘freedom’
inherited from the national independence struggle. They desperately
need to bring in the idea of the hermit in both senses, independence
and freedom, if they are to secure any place in Burmese history.
The paradox, therefore, is that the idiom of mental
culture has historically been accompanied, not so much with attempts
to close society from the outside world and confine its people, but
rather with liberation from unnecessary political, social and cultural
constraints, and with fostering a broader awareness through international
exchanges. In other words, the hermit-country stereotype is a suitable
designation for those who merely pay lip-service to these practices
as an excuse for self-isolation from the world, who reaffirm their
status in the cosmology, without, as Manu did, finding out more about
what their role and their place in this global world is truly all
about. As NLD's Tin U points out, Burma can hardly be liberated unless
these generals liberate themselves first.
Hence, since 1988 these
regimes have continued to operate the ‘hermit-land’ policy, though
with significant differences from the way the Ne Win regime ‘hermitised’
Burma. This new hermit-land policy is driven by a policy of Myanmafication.
In this part and in the next, I shall attempt to sketch some of these
tensions between the two versions of hermit-life – political self-confinement
(lut-lak-yeì as national independence) versus mental self-transformation
to experience ultimate freedom (lut-lak-yeì as freedom) – as
a tension between a rule-based culture governing loka and aiming
incorporate all Burmese peoples, and a mental culture, aiming to liberate
from all constraints into a neutral and free domain called lokuttara.
Myanmar
or Burma?
As one of the regime's journalists pointed out,
in 1988 ‘Myanmar resembled a house that tumbled down. The Tatmadaw
had to pick up the pieces and build a new one’.
Indeed, Saw Maung himself asserted that during the 1988 unrest ‘the
State Machinery had stopped functioning’
and in the aftermath ‘it is just like building a country from scratch’.
A new house had to be built, and one of the cornerstones of the regime
since 1989 has been the attempt to delineate and reconstruct the entire
country through the programme I dub here ‘Myanmafication’. It is quite
the opposite from the concept of uprooting the house by eliminating
ignorance through mental culture, as implied in the discourse of some
members of the political opposition. (In this latter discourse, the
builder of the house is ‘ignorance’ that perpetuates samsara,
and as I will show later, this must be uprooted by mental culture).
In his speech on 23 September 1988, within five
days of seizing power, Saw Maung asserted with confidence that ‘I
and all my colleagues and all Tatmadawmen most respectfully
and honestly give our word to all rahans [monks], laity and the people
that we do not wish to cling to State power long’. He spoke of ‘handing
over power to the government which emerges after the free and fair
general elections’ and strongly intimated that this was to be in the
near future, immediately after the elections.
Indeed, he said that he was
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 043/392
‘laying the path for the next government’, and
‘I will lay flowers on this path for the next government’.
The army had irrevocably changed its ways since his coup, he asserted,
for it was no longer to be involved in Party politics like before.
In March 1989, Saw Maung asserted that after the elections the legally
elected government would come into power, ‘comprising the representatives
of the people who were elected to the Pyithu Hluttaw’, and that the
army would at that point ‘return to our barracks’ and would not have
a role in politics.
He intimated also that he himself would retire immediately after the
elections.
However, in the course of the first half of 1989
the regime began to show signs of being unable to tolerate the increased
criticism levelled at it, in particular by Aung San Suu Kyi. By end
May 1989, the regime announced moves that indicated it would not wait
for political measures until a government was elected. The regime
wanted to go on record that the army had done something positive for
the nation. On 25 May the Border Areas and National Races Development
Central Committee was established. This was followed up on 30 May
1989 with the appointment of the 21-member Commission of Enquiry into
the True Naming of Myanmar Names [òmn\ma.Amv\m¥a:
AeKÅAewÅAer:Aqa:mHn\kn\m§ ñpsuer:APµæ>], on which were seated
only four academics, two of whom were specialists in Burmese and two
in English, who were outnumbered by eight members of military rank
and a majority with positions in the civil service.
Burmese place and state names were examined according
to their original Burmese names, i.e. as these were before they were
changed under colonial influence. Since historically they were written
in various ways, the Committee transcribed these into English according
to contemporary pronunciation [er:eta.AmHn\x
Pt\eta.AqM]. This is what the Burmese have long themselves
used in literary and formal vernacular, and so it did not affect the
Burmese pronunciation. It only affected it in languages other than
Burmese, including the languages of ethnic minorities (see table 3).
The Commission was long in deliberating its findings,
holding their 16th meeting in August 1991. However, they nevertheless
rushed the ‘Adaptation of Expressions Law’ to come out as soon as
possible, namely on 18 June 1989. This resulted in the official replacement
in languages other than Burmese of ‘Burma’ and ‘Burmese’ (or whatever
other languages use) with ‘Myanmar’ and the extensive renaming of
many towns, including the capital Rangoon which became ‘Yangon’. It
should be pointed out that this renaming has virtually no impact on
Burmese citizens speaking in Burmese, who continue to refer to both
Myanma as well as Bama (this not unlike formal reference
in the English language to ‘The Netherlands’ while informally using
‘Holland’). It was a measure solely intended to affect references
(both written and spoken) to Burma in languages other than Burmese,
who may not now refer to Burma. At national independence under U Nu,
the country was known as the Union of Burma. Under Ne Win in 1974
this changed to the Socialist Republic of the Union of Burma. In 1988
it briefly went back to Union of Burma, and now we must refer to the
‘Union of Myanmar’, or Pyidaungsu Myanmar Naingngandaw [òpv\eTac\suòmn\maniuc\cM].
Though taking place without referendum, this was
officially endorsed by the United Nations five days after the regime's
declaration. Because of the UN endorsal it has entered into widespread
use, so that it is currently even used by human rights organizations
such as Amnesty International.
Between the announcement of the Law of the Elections
Commission for holding democratic Multi-party Elections on 20
September 1988 and the elections that took place on 27 May 1990, two
hundred and thirty-five political parties emerged. The regime's journalists,
instead of seeing this as a positive development, a step towards coming
to terms with representing the diversity that is Burma, saw this multiplicity
of parties as ‘an image of collapse of national unity’.
Nevertheless, for the regime, such proliferation of parties meant
potential disagreement among politicians and an opportunity for the
army to retain power. They were not unhappy, at first. This changed,
however, when under Aung San Suu Kyi's leadership the NLD during April
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 015/392
Table 3. Myanmar versus Burma
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
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4-87297-748-3, p 045/392
and May 1989 had such success making alliances between many political
and ethnic groups, much like her father's role in the Freedom Bloc
in 1939 and in the AFPFL in 1944, that it looked as if she had the
ability to unify the opposition in a manner that would leave no political
role for the authorities.
The chronology of events leading up to the Adaptation
of Expressions Law was explained in Khin Nyunt's press conference
briefing in August 1989 (see also table 4).
The regime very much despaired over what it regarded as Aung San Suu
Kyi's ‘unfair’ criticism of the military and of security orders 2/88
and 8/88 during her tours of the townships in Ayeyarwady Division
between 14–25 January, and in particular her second trip between 4–6
April 1989, when the Danubyu incident took place. The military was
particularly incensed by the way she encouraged anti-military slogans
by the public during the Thingyan Festival between 13–17 April, which
immediately prompted the setting up of a Committee for Writing Slogans
for Nationals on 16 April (see below). The regime was deeply disturbed
when on 18 April the NLD set up a countrywide umbrella group, and
convened a meeting between 41 parties.
On seeing countrywide alliances emerge between
the NLD, the various political parties and the ethnic groups, the
army felt that the country was slipping from its grip. However, in
mid-April the military was in luck, as an event it had been waiting
for since national independence occurred, namely the collapse of the
Burma Communist Party (BCP). The ethnic cadres of the party had turned
against the BCP leaders and had driven them across the border, declaring
themselves free and independent. The regime entered into agreements
with these groups in the Wa and Kokang states, promising them that
they would be able to retain their weapons and power in these areas
and continue to pursue their opium trade provided that they no longer
fight the Burmese government and would ally themselves with the regime
against other minorities. The military took courage from the fact
that it had allies. It became more assertive and intransigent (and
this developed into a new idea of dealing with minority groups through
ceasefires).
During her subsequent trip to Mandalay and the
Kachin State from 24 April to 26 May Aung San Suu Kyi further incensed
the military with her criticism which she criticized
the way it was dealing with schools. The regime attributed Aung San
Suu Kyi's resistance to the influence the BCP was having on her, despite
the fact that the BCP had already collapsed in April that year. It
seized NLD literature on 12 May at Nandawun Press, and threatened
to take further action at its 26 May press conference.
The regime was affronted when the NLD adopted the slogan ‘defy as
of duty every order and authority not agreed by the majority’, a slogan
the NLD announced in advance and that would extend to all its literature
as of 6 June 1989. The regime took action on 6 June by issuing Directive
No 38 of the Printers and Publishers Registration Central Committee,
which threatened action against those not keeping to the 1962 Printers
and Publishers Registration Law. It was particularly disturbed by
the increasing numbers of calendar days the NLD marked to celebrate
their own political agenda as opposed to the calendar days marked
by the regime. In particular, it was Aung San Suu Kyi's decision to
include Martyrs' Day among these days, and not to ask for permission
from the authorities to visit the mausoleum, that the regime interpreted
as a mark of defiance of its authority – this was to precipitate her
house arrest.
Table
4. Context of `Adaptation of Expressions Law'
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
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With the country's mood swinging against the army,
and with a track record of unpopular action, the regime was badly
prepared for the elections. It pursued two moves that it felt might
restore people's faith in the army in the hope this would improve
thereby the electoral chances of the National Unity Party it supported.
First, seeing how Aung San Suu Kyi had gained significant support
from the ethnic minorities, subsequent to the collapse of the BCP
it developed a policy of negotiating ceasefires with armed ethnic
groups who were tired of fighting the regime. This was not, as Martin
Smith has pointed out, altogether without positive benefits from the
point of view of the ethnic groups, for it permitted them a respite
from the endless fighting, and an opportunity to develop their local
economy.
However, it would appear that the army wished to take the credit for
willingness among the ethnic groups to negotiate peace, rather than
leaving this goodwill to be harvested by a civilian political party
under the leadership of Aung San Suu Kyi.
Here, however, I wish to focus on the name changes,
another benefit the army felt they contributed to Burma. The SLORC
presented the name changes as a testament of its patriotic spirit,
its goodwill for the country, and as a milestone in the history of
the revolution that would bring the ethnic groups of Burma together.
Since in its view it represented the final liberation of Burma from
colonialism, and a return to ethnic harmony, it presented this as
their major contribution to Burma's historical records. The decision
to rename the country in languages other than Burmese was the beginning
of an attempt to dictate this new reading of Burma's image abroad
in the hope that it would help fight these popular and apparently
communist and foreign-influenced democrats. Indeed, as Saw Maung put
it, all foreigners, but in particular all Burmese, must accept this
renaming much like French- and German-speaking Swiss nationals also
fully accept their own Swiss nationality, for ‘what is important is
that all Myanmar citizens should possess the spirit of true Myanmar
citizenship no matter what race’.
It is this motivation to build up national unity that underlies the
renaming, and from the military point of view there was no better
statement of its authority over the country than demonstrating that
it had the power to take back from the British all the names that
symbolised their rule so divisive to ethnic harmony.
The place names that were changed were invariably
considered to be imperialist ‘English’. Since the regime made the
form of democracy as advocated by Aung San Suu Kyi to be a ‘foreign’
idea initially introduced by the British, and since Aung San Suu Kyi
had married an Englishman and had strong connections with England,
the idea was conceived to use the image of the colonial past and the
struggle for national independence to revive anti-colonial and anti-foreign
sentiment in order to rally and unify the Burmese people against ‘Anglophile’
ways of life. To reinforce this impression, the state-controlled press
covered news from the West selectively to demonstrate how foreign
ways of life are full of sleaze and miscarriages of justice. A month
after the Expressions Law, Aung San Suu Kyi was placed under house
arrest, and the other senior NLD leaders were gaoled.
Redrawn boundaries
‘Burma’ and ‘Myanmar’ have never been void of political
connotations, but the regime has politicised them to the extent that,
unless one hyphenates or brackets references to Myanmar-Burma, using
either today commits one to make a political statement for or against
the regime. In the words of Taylor, ‘the dimensions of political conflict
in Burma are symbolised by the inability of the most visible antagonists
to agree on the name of the State when speaking and writing in languages
other than that of most of the population of the country itself’.
It is difficult to eradicate two centuries of English
language use. Furthermore, though most accepted the official renaming
as the result of its acceptance at the United Nations, many politically
aware people in the English-speaking world persisted in continuing
to use ‘Burma’ and ‘Burmese’. Aung San Suu Kyi made it a point to
continue to refer to Burma. British and American broadcasting stations
similarly did so in their broadcasts, which elicited an indignant
response from the regime's journalists.
-
However, the Leik's [English] wife
Puppet Princess Mrs Michael Aris, (together with the Leik broadcasting
service and publications) and their Anglo-Saxon kin Kan [American]
broadcasting station and newspapers have all along continued to
use the term Burma. This is tantamount to a heinous disregard
and insult on the Myanmar people. A few days back a so-called
representative of the Kan and a spokesman of the Japanese Foreign
Ministry were engaged in a discussion on Myanmar which
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of
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1999, ISBN 4-87297-748-3, p 048/392
-
went on the air, when the uncultured
Kan was heard to refer to Burma. Every time he did that, the cultured
Easterner official was heard to turn around saying Myanmar. In
retaliation to such misdemeanour, I, Myo Chit, will be referring
in all my articles to the British as English or Leik. And I urge
all other writers of articles to do just the same as Myo Chit.
And I also urge the Government of Myanmar not to recognise letters
and publications which refer to us as Burma and to ban their being
brought into the country.
Furthermore, when Albright referred to the country
as ‘Burma’, a member of the regime replied indignantly that
-
To our regret, Ambassador Albright
exceeded the bounds of decency and courtesy normally accorded
to one another among the members of the United Nations when she
addressed my country as ‘Burma’. As my country has officially
communicated to the Secretariat the change of the name of my country
from ‘Burma’ to ‘Myanmar’ to address the country otherwise is
a show of arrogance which stems from disregard for the principles
of sovereign equality and for the accepted norms of behavior among
the members of the United Nations. We strongly object to this
reference. We believe that it should be corrected accordingly
in the official records of the Fifty-first United Nations General
Assembly.
The journalist Nawrahta suggests that the regime
was right in shaking off these attacks and proceeds to relate this
to the need to restore and celebrate ancient royal heritage.
-
Even these changes, made to enhance
nationalist spirit and national pride, did not escape criticism.
The country previously known as Siam had now been renamed Thailand.
But people wrinkled their nose when Burma was changed into Myanmar.
Some elements, not fearing the sin of blasphemy, mocked: Must
Buddha be also called Muddha? [a play on the change from b(urma)
to m(yanmar)] Some predicted that currency notes inscribed with
the words the Union of Burma would now be rendered invalid.
-
The Tatmadaw ignored these vitriolic
attacks and slanderings and proceeded to do what it had to do.
The Tatmadaw preserved the ancient cultural heritage. The Mandalay
Palace was restored to its original grandeur. The Moat was dredged.
The Kambawza Thadi Palace of King Bayint Naung covered up by the
town of Bago for very many years is being excavated.
Large sums of money have to be spent in the preservation
of ancient cultural heritage for the purpose of enhancing pride in
one's nationality …
Nawratha is evidently irate about Nyo Tun, one
of Aung San Suu Kyi's youth wing members, who had joked that the regime
would almost rename the Buddha into Muddha [Ak'¨udk
rk'¨vdkY ajymif;&rvdk jzpfaeNyD] to which the regime took
such offence.
The fact is, however, that use of Bama is not necessarily less
old than Myanma, it just was not as regularly used in writing.
Rebuilding palaces in response to these criticisms
was not an empty gesture. As we will see, the regime went well beyond
renaming. It proceeded to redefine wholesale the political, cultural
and social structure of society. This is reminiscent of past political
renewals immediately after national independence and under Ne Win.
It was, however, more extensive than the first decade after Ne Win
seized power, who had also placed himself in the position of reinventing
society and culture and who had also proclaimed his authority over
Burma by renaming.
Myanmafication reasons
Myanmafication, in my view is principally a response
to losing Aung San as a support for their actions. Furthermore, with
no BSPP ideology to guide them, the regime was rudderless.
Second, there was the increasing presence of foreigners
and foreign money in Burma as a result of the Direct Investment Law
enacted in September 1988, which came into effect in May 1989. Also,
as already noted in the introduction, the foreign media had greatly
influenced the Burmese democracy movement, and the regime felt Burmese
people had to be primed to deal with foreigners and their increasing
influence ‘correctly’, and foreigners in turn, had to be put straight
that Burma was owned by ‘indigenous’ people (the army) and that the
role of foreigners would be strictly limited to help the country become
modern and wealthy, but would not affect ancient Burmese value systems
and Burmese culture.
Third, and most importantly, this falls within
the tense period between January and June 1989 that led up to Aung
San Suu Kyi's house arrest, when the SLORC escalated its confrontation
with Aung San Suu Kyi
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 048/392
and the NLD. They were looking for instruments
by means of which they could defend the idea that they were in charge
of the country, while her popularity so evidently swept the country
at that time. Through her appeals to the soldiers and the ethnic minorities,
she was percolating into their most sensitive domains. During this
period, her canvassing trips were increasingly disrupted by soldiers,
and crowds attending her speeches were intimidated. She was supported
across the country, not just by Burmans, but by most ethnic groups
and by foreigners, and was furthermore threatening to boycott all
the regime's initiatives. The regime behaved as if it were the last
of the Mohicans, the last representation of indigenous loyalty against
a tide of ‘foreign’ ideas and ‘foreign’ support for the opposition,
for whom Burma's boundaries no longer seemed an impediment. A rhetoric
emphasising Burma's boundaries, national independence and its ancient
culture, they hoped, would help assert their territorial rights.
The
demerits of Myanmafication
As a newly opened up country, it is understandable
that the regime should focus on making it easier for tourists and
businessmen to navigate, which requires romanised versions of place
names to be calibrated with local pronunciation. Furthermore, there
is no reason why it should not encourage pride in the country by renaming
streets after Burmese personalities instead of British figures. However,
the regime has ended up making a mountain out of a molehill, and unnecessarily
complicating people's lives.
There are several points to be made about the linguistics
behind the Myanmafication project – the political agenda to find a
linguistic terms that encompasses all nationalities, the problem of
literary versus colloquial Burmese, the problem of accuracy in transcribing
Burmese language, the variation in pronunciation within Burma and
its discrepancy with references from outside, and finally, the issue
of forcing speakers of languages other than Burmese to accept the
illusion of national unity in Burma.
Since the 1920s, attempts have been made to find
a single term in Burmese, the majority language, that would encompass
all national ethnic groups. This all-encompassing concept has oscillated,
in Burmese, between Bama (Burma) and Myanma (Myanmar).
Burmese nationalist sentiment had been aroused by the Buddhist shoe
question in 1917, prohibiting the British to wear shoes in sacred
Buddhist monasteries and pagodas (displaced from palace shoe question
in the 19th century), to a more overt political dyarchy question in
1920, and whether Burma should strive to attain self-government as
part of India or as a separate country. This led to the formation
of the Greater Council of Burmese [Myanma] Associations (GCBA).
This was known originally known formally in Burmese as Am¥oi:qa:tp\epåc\:suòmn\maAqc\:K¥op\ýkI:
(usually shortened to òmn\maAqc\:K¥op\ýkI:),
where Myanma was understood as representing the whole country
and all its diverse peoples.
However, in the 1930s the radical leftist politicians of the Dobama
Party, showing their dislike for the politicians of the 1920s, referred
instead to Bama [bma]
as the collective designation for all national peoples.
Their party was known in full as ‘the Us-Burman Party concerned with
the whole of Bama’ [bmaNiuc\cMluM:Siuc\ratiu>bmaAsv\:ARuM:ýkI:].
In 1974 the BSPP once again turned this around, referring to Myanma
as the collective term.
However, at no time were the terms Myanma(r) or
Bama(r) used in English until this particular 1989 regulation, when
for the first time these concepts were forced upon languages other
than Burmese, in preference to Burma, Burmese and Burman or their
equivalent in other languages.
Neither Myanma nor Bama, from which Myanmar and Burma
are derived, are neutral terms‚ as both are strongly associated with
the Burmese language, the language of the ethnic majority. Furthermore,
the generals gave no clear thought
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
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or guidance as to how the various derivatives
from these terms should behave in different syntactical positions
in English and in other languages.
When Aung San Suu Kyi was asked ‘how do you feel
about Burma being renamed Myanmar?’ she answered:
-
No one
should be allowed to change the name of this country without referring
to the will of the people. They say that Myanmar refers to all
the Burmese ethnic groups, whereas Burma only refers to the Burmese
ethnic group, but that is not true. Myanmar is a literary word
for Burma and it refers only to the Burmese ethnic group. Of course,
I prefer the word Burma.
The regime has blamed the people who sided with
Aung San Suu Kyi on this issue as uncivil and as placing emphasis
on personal ends rather than historical truth. Interestingly, one
of her critics turned this criticism on its head and warned that her
continued use of ‘Burma’ would culminate in a personality cult that
would produce a dictator.
What Aung San Suu Kyi means is that in Burmese
a distinction between literary and colloquial language permits the
use of two terms in parallel, namely Bama naing ngan [bmaNiuc\cM]
(‘territory conquered by Bamar’), and Myanma naing ngan
[òmn\maNiuc\cM] (‘Myanmar dominion’),
the literary and official reference. The differences between official
and informal colloquial Burmese are not easily summed up, however,
as most expressions tend to mix both styles to a greater or lesser
extent. Nevertheless, what is certain, however, is that the former
is more ornate and elaborate, and is more commonly found in historical
records than the latter. This prompts John Okell to refer this as
‘elevated’ in style because it has ‘formal and literary connotations’.
Though there are complex linguistic arguments about
the way Burma and Myanmar relate to oneanother as the result of shifts
in pronunciation over time,
there is in reality little difference between the two in terms of
meaning. The following table 5 are the dictionary glosses for
Myanma-Bama:
Table 5. Dictionary glosses of Bama and
Myanma
|
Dictionary
|
Bama [bma]
|
Myanma [òmn\ma]
|
|
[1] The Universal Burmese-English Dictionary,
1978
|
(no word bama – only adjective bma
as in bmaòpv\)
|
òmn\ma
Burmese òbahî
|
|
[2] òmn\maABiDan\Ak¥¨\:K¥op\x
1979
|
‘colloquial pronuncation of Myanma’
[òmn\mahUeqaska:luM:kiu ræt\SiueKÅewÅraÒ
Tæk\eqaAqM]
|
‘ethnic groups who have lived from time
immemorial in Myanmar’ òmn\maNiuc\cMtæc\NHs\kalrHv\sæAs¨\
ASk\p¥MnMH>sæaAtUtkæAeòKsiuk\enTiuc\eqatiuc\:rc\:qa:lUm¥oi:
|
|
[3] Myanmar-English Dictionary, 1993
|
1. Bamar: Burmese; Burman. 2. Same as
Myanma [òmn\ma …]
|
n 1. the people of Myanmar. 2 (a) Same
as bma n; Bamar; (b) (no
longer current) Burmese; Burman
|
If Bama and Myanma are merely alternatives
to one another, then why would the regime insist that Burma be known
as Myanmar? The fact is that since the 1962 coup, colloquial language
has been regarded as subversive and associated with undesirable political
opposition (which, in turn, is mostly equated with ‘communism’).
To write in colloquial fashion may under certain circumstances attract
the accusation of having communist sympathies, as indeed, is one of
the principal accusations against Aung San Suu Kyi. It has not been
encouraged in print except in literary entertainment such as the many
monthly magazines and
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
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4-87297-748-3, p 050/392
dialogue in a novel. For the most part, to win
a literary prize, for example, one must not write in colloquial Burmese.
Given the continued denotational (though evidently not connotational)
equivalence between Burma (Bama) and Myanmar (Myanma)
in the Burmese language, the renaming then, can only be understood
as an extension of the rules of censorship already operative within
the country towards the foreign community. Hence, virtually all the
pro-democracy groups, when using English, use the designation Burma
consciously in defiance of the regime.
In forcing the application of the literary reference
Myanmar under all circumstances, and in having its machinery of censorship
in place over the media, the regime hopes to centralise and assert
maximum control over grass-root ideas about the country, glossing
over all variations of views that might disagree with its narrow vision
of the country. While the Burmese people themselves may continue to
use Bama pyei (Burma) in limited contexts such as unofficial
speech, the regime has insisted on forcing all English speakers, and
the international community as a whole, most of whom know nothing
about such distinctions, to implement the literary over the colloquial
version of the country's name even when they are speaking rather than
writing.
Foreigners are fearful of appearing ethnocentric.
In asserting that ‘Burma’ is an inappropriate ‘colonial’ name for
the country, and is disrespectful, thus the regime has itself politicised
the international (not the indigenous, which had already been politicised
long before) reference to the country. The ruling therefore pertains
entirely to how foreigners, and in particular English-speaking foreigners,
should refer to Burma. It is part of an overall scheme to play up
the contrast between a literary, centrally-controlled concept over
which the army can assert control (tradition), and the varied grass-roots
colloquial concept of the people (foreign).
A choice must be made between either representing
spelling through transliteration (literal letter by letter representation
of the Burmese word) or representing pronunciation through transcription
(purely by sound). Thus according to the first ‘General’ becomes perhaps
buil-khyup, while according to the latter it becomes bo-gyok.
The regime chose transcription for its simplicity, but this introduces
complexities of its own. The advantage of the transliteration system
is that it is most accurate in relation to the written form, but its
drawback is that it is difficult for laymen to read. The advantage
of the transcription system is that it is easy to read, but its drawbacks
are that it bears little or no relation to the written script and
cannot reflect the many ways in which pronunciation might vary between
speakers. Even expert linguists find both systems notoriously difficult,
and since the regime did little to seek the advice of linguists, it
has not improved on the accuracy of its chosen transcription in its
name changes.
The Burmese language is notoriously difficult to
represent unambiguously in roman script. In particular, pronunciation
is a bad guide to spelling. In his Guide to the romanization of
Burmese, John Okell gives the romanised example of batha
[Baqa], meaning ‘language’ or
‘subject’. This word can represent any one of twelve different pronunciations,
each of which could be spelt in Burmese in several different ways;
one pronunciation alone has seventy-two spelling possibilities.
Many linguistic features of the Burmese language, such as tones and
glottal stops, cannot possibly reflect both spelling and pronunciation
in ordinary romanised script.
Myanmar has become a combination of both methods
– the ‘myan’ element is transcribed, and the ‘mar’ element is transliterated.
To be consistent either way, would result in ‘myanma’ or ‘myamma’
under the transcription system, or ‘mranma’ under the transliteration
system. The idea is that when referring to the name of the country
we would use the ‘r’ to reflect level tone ‘a’. When used as an adjective
in the English language (e.g. Myanma Ceramic Industries) or a possessive
in the Burmese language (e.g. the newspaper Myanma's Light
[òmn\ma.Alc\:]), the ‘r’ is
dropped to represent the creaky tone ‘á’. Okell suspects, however,
that the ‘r’ is sometimes not even a phonetically expressed feature
of Burmese grammar but simply serves to express a mood on the part
of the speaker or author.
As an anti-colonial measure the introduction of
the ‘r’ sends an ambiguous message. It is a late
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
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4-87297-748-3, p 051/392
Victorian and early Edwardian practice of indicating
a preceding long ‘a’ in English, which died out in England, but has
been preserved only in Burma. This would indicate that, rather than
moving away from the colonial period, the generals are unthinkingly
recreating it and have further complicated and mystified Burmese place
names.
In short, the effect of introducing the ‘r’ into Myanmar means that
it is no less misplaced than the ‘r’ in Burma; it has merely changed
place.
If these changes defeat logic, it has caused much
confusion with non-Burmese speakers, especially the French, who invariably
pronounce the ‘r’ as a consonant rather than a lengthened vowel ‘a’.
Even seasoned Burma specialists make mistakes. Burmese speakers themselves
do not implement the regime's directives consistently. For example,
some Burmese intellectuals leave out ‘r’ in Myanmar on their name
cards, even where it is part of an official country name implemented
by the regime. More often than not, a lack of clarity about this naming
system means that many simply do not know what the rules are. For
example, sometimes there is reference to Myanmar Railways, and sometimes
to Myanma Railways. Burma's flagship national airways was renamed
from Burma Airways to Myanma [Burmese] Airways. In 1995 after the
joint venture with Singapore, the company became known as Myanmar
[Burma] Airways, while Myanma Airways continues to exist as a separate
entity. Also, what is the logic of referring to Myanmá [Burmese]
Alin [òmn\ma.Alc\:] as ‘The Light of Myanmar’ where it should strictly
speaking be ‘Light of Myanma’. Indeed, in Burma some also follow foreign
reference by journalists by using ‘Myanmar Alin’.
With this confusion, some speakers prefer to coin their own words,
and so in several articles, and in particular in Japan, I have encountered
the newly-coined designation ‘Myanmarese’ for the language of Burma.
Pagan has been renamed Bagan. Though usually pronounced
with the initial ‘B’, this is in fact written in Burmese with the
initial ‘P’ [pugM].
Were one to transliterate the name and write it down, it would therefore
be perfectly legitimate to use Pagan.
Therefore, if accuracy of pronunciation is to be
the overriding point, then at least some of the changes the regime
has made are not only highly doubtful, but also extremely confusing.
To be truly accurate, would have meant writing place names in a phonetic
script better able to reflect pronunciation. However, this would have
the disadvantage of being difficult to represent on ordinary fonts
and typewriters, and those not initiated in phonetics would still
find this difficult to pronounce.
Even a phonetic script could not begin to resolve
the problem of variation in pronunciation between dialects and languages.
The British arrived in Lower Burma, far away from the capital in Upper
Burma. Apart from taking over names from the Portuguese and Dutch,
many names are likely to have come into English through whatever were
at that time the locally spoken and written languages. For example,
as already mentioned, the regime decided to rename Rangoon as Yangon.
Though this is closer to the pronunciation by the majority, we do
not know whether Rangoon entered English through Arakanese, through
a monk steeped in Pali or even through the pronunciation of some of
the communities speaking Indian languages, all of whom pronounce ‘y’
as ‘r’. To insist on Yangon, is to insist on a rather simplistic one-dimensional
view of these linguistic complexities and variations. It is, indeed,
to rewrite history.
In dictating its version of pronunciation, the
regime glosses over contemporary and historical linguistic diversity
in the history of relations within and outside Burma and demonstrates
intolerance for variation. As one observer notes, many changes ‘are
unfamiliar, politically sensitive or rejected by different ethnic
groups and parties’.
This is an ill-omen for the declared democratisation programme.
Perhaps the most important aspect of Myanmafication
terminology is not so much the attempt to transcend so-called ‘colonial’
naming systems of the past through censorship of colloquial expressions,
but the attempt to give the illusion of a unified Myanmar. The introduction
of Myanmar into English is not merely substitution for the English
word Burma. It is also an attempt to engineer connections between
what were distinct terms in the English language. In SPDC English,
Myanmar merges two hitherto distinct terms – Burmese (the language,
the ethnic groups, and nationality) and Burma (the country). The term
Bamar
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 052/392
supplants Burman (the dominant ethnic group).
In American English, Burmese and Burman are sometimes used in the
inverse sense of British English. If this were to be accepted in English,
then the regime would have succeeded in eliminating the distinction
between country and language. However, the concept Myanma [òmn\ma]
as used in the Burmese language permits even less diversity than the
English Myanmar. Though there are attempts to reserve the colloquial
Bama [bma] for ‘Burman’,
and to use Myanmar for matters related with the Union as a
whole,
this turns out to be not feasible since the two terms in Burmese continue
to be colloquial and literary alternatives to oneanother as before.
In the Burmese language Myanma remains as strongly linked to
the majority Burman ethnic group as did Bama (even the most
recent government dictionary includes ‘Burman’ as one of its meanings).
In sum, this means that, though the regime ostensibly claims to distinguish
between Burmese and Burman, this distinction only works in the English
language, but in Burmese it in fact ends up saying that Burma and
Burmese are Burman.
The implication of the preceding discussion is
that the renaming of Burma to Myanmar represents the singularisation
and simplification of the country from a Burman centrist point of
view, but its obfuscation for everyone else. Than Tun has pointed
out that the concept of Myanmar, or Mirma in his transcription
method, is strongly identified with royal history. It was first used
by King Kyanzittha [1084–1113] ‘to describe how the palace was built’.
Later it was used to describe the king's residential town rather than
the country.
Similarly, before he renamed what was formerly known as Dagon, King
Alaunghpaya renamed it ‘end of strife’ (Yangon) in celebration of
his conquest over the enemy [rn\kun\ty\].
To insist on Myanmar and Yangon, therefore, is also to emphasize and
celebrate past royal victories over the various ethnic groups along
with foreigners, and add insult to injury by having languages other
than Burmese – including minority languages – make this change in
reference. Yet it is represented as a step towards racial harmony.
This permits a very different view of the enormous revival of the
palace tradition by the regime since 1989. It is a revival of the
old technique of place-making.
To ‘Myanmify’ is to unify
In practice therefore, in Burmese the concept Myanma
has come to represent the ultimate illusion of unification of the
country, encompassing all five separate meanings: the language, peoples,
nationality, country, and also the ethnic majority as unified through
royalty.
The changes of name are politically motivated. Though some authors
have observed this change as ‘suggestive of cosmetic reform’,
this Myanmafication is in fact the unambiguous Burmanisation of place
names, the attempt to make all place names conform to Burman pronunciation
overriding all other grass-root variation in the many languages present
in Burma. It therefore should be read as the attempt to Burmanise
Burma – it is Myanmafication.
In the absence of external enemies, the regime's
desire to be seen to conquer foreigners, to extend its censorship
to the international community, goes back further in history before
the date the law was enacted. Indeed, it has resulted in the retrospective
renaming of Burma to Myanmar even in verbatim quotes from British
colonial records.
In other words, the reach of the Myanmafication programme is so extensive
and so unmitigating, that the regime is prepared to tamper with the
language in which historical sources themselves were cast. This is
symptomatic of the regime's inability to tolerate divergent views,
even where they are part of historical records. The regime is using
Myanmar to crowd out all alternative concepts of unity that various
ethnic groups and foreign languages might have expressed throughout
history. In this sense, then, Orwell is quite right when he says that
‘in Burma the past belongs to those who control the present’.
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 053/392
The name of the country now divides all who refer
to it. For example, it divides one tourist guide from another, as
Wilhelm Klein's The insight guide to Myanmar versus Nicholas
Greenwood's Guide to Burma (of which the second edition is
dedicated to Aung San Suu Kyi), and the shorter Alternative guide
to Burma, both published in 1996.
Scholars are similarly divided over the naming of the country. Some,
such as Taylor, sometimes use ‘Burma-Myanmar’. Also, Callahan, seek
to transcend this divide by arguing that ‘those who call the country
Burma have somewhat warped readings of a troubled historical time,
while those who call it Myanmar seem trapped in a time warp’.
As I will show below, Myanmafication, though it
initially originated in response to containing Aung San Suu Kyi and
her demands for democracy, has turned into a programme that fits in
snugly with a number of other military interests. In practice the
thinking that gave rise to Myanmafication has led to unnecessary confinement
and relocation of vast numbers of people, destruction of communities,
simply in order to secure total control over the physical borders
that this concept implies. Just as it ‘myanmafies’, it also ‘foreignises’,
leading to the accusation that many Burmese have been turned into
foreign agents. The primary cause, as Saw Maung states, is that
-
These foreigners who live so far
away from us and are so very different from our culture, traditions
and language have been agitating and inciting to cause disintegration
of the Union since our country's independence was regained. They
have been doing this for a great many years since when Myanmar
Naing-ngan was first plunged into servitude.
Instruments
for Myanmafication
Diverse instruments were put in place to develop
and study Myanmar identity. Research into Myanmar history and culture
are the sole purpose of the Myanmar Historical Commission. The more
specifically ASEAN-oriented issues fall under the new Myanmar Institute
of Strategic Studies.
It should be noted that, although my overall tone
is critical of the Myanmafication programme and its instruments, this
should not be extended to all those who are implicated in it. I am
aware that among those who organise and attend the conferences, there
are people of independent mind who are committed to do what they can
to take things beyond the realm of propaganda, and who have a critical
approach and the intention to use their knowledge to improve the situation
in the country. But unfortunately their scope is very limited, to
say the least.
Committee for the Compilation of Authentic Data of Myanmar History
(CCADMH)
In the wake of the unravelling of BSPP ideology,
and with the Aung San factor now working for Aung San Suu Kyi and
the NLD, there emerged a desperate need for alternative views of history
from which to build up a new enduring concept of the State. If before
the elections the SLORC described itself as a temporary measure, after
losing the elections Khin Nyunt described the SLORC in terms of ‘an
historical requirement’ that can only be discerned as the result of
possessing superior knowledge of Burmese history.
-
The SLORC is an organisation which,
after seriously scrutinising and reviewing the course of historical
change in Burma, is providing guidance to ensure that a good historical
course takes place on the legal path with discipline. … As political
scientists well know, political developments in a country are
determined by causes and effects which are interlinked. A country's
location, physical geography and inhabitants, and their customs
and national character determine the developmeents in that country
and cause history to run into cycles.
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 054/392
On 5 May 1989, General Saw Maung, who frequently
expressed doubts about his own knowledge of Burmese history in his
speeches,
had prepared for this re-interpretation of the role of SLORC by ordering
the formation of a committee to correct errors in the interpretation
of history. The SLORC on 31 May 1989 thus formed the 11-member Committee
for the Compilation of Authentic Data of Myanmar History (CCADMH)
[òmn\ma.qmiuc\: òPs\rp\AmHn\m¥a: er:qa:ñpsuer:APæµ>],
headed by Dr Khin Maung Nyunt, an academic who continues to perform
an important role in the cultural policy of the regime and who propounds
his academic views on ‘national consolidation’ and Myanmar culture,
discussed below.
One role of this Committee would appear to provide
informed correctives to the foreign media.
The aim of the Committee seems to have been to construct a new role
for the army in Burma's history that would stand up in future. The
fact that it involved deconstructing Aung San and diluting his role
into the larger forces of history goes without question. This focused
on three main historical periods: the ethnic minority question and
the 1947 Constitution (including the Pinlon Agreement), the politics
of the 1958–62 period, and the period of political change between
1962–74. These were published in five volumes between 1994 and 1997
as The History of the Army [tp\meta\qmiuc\:].
This urge to come to terms with history follows
the Ne Win initiative that involved a reinterpretation of history
from a royal chronicle (yazawin) to a peoples’ history (thamaìng).
In chapter three ‘The transformation of the history of human society’
[lU>eBac\qmiuc\:f eòpac\:lµer:tra:]
in The System of Correlation of Man and his Environment [lUNHc\.
pt\wn\:k¥c\tiu>f Avmv qeBatra:] (17 January 1963) the concept
of history is officially changed from a ‘royal chronicle’ to ‘the
history of countrymen’ in the form of thamaìng.
-
That is why the main emphasis of
human history is on the strength of the masses, and on the working
people. That is why human history is no longer known as the royal
chronicles of the kings, but has become solely the history of
countrymen.
-
Tiu>eûkac\.lU>qmiuc\:f
ADik lUm§Ac\Aa:sumHa Alup\lup\eqa òpv\qUlUTupc\òPs\qv\X Tiu>eûkac\.
lU>qmiuc\:hUqv\ razatiu>f“razwc\” mhut\mUpµòpv\qUtiu>f
qmiuc\:qalH¥c\ òPs\epeta.qv\X
This regime, however, was more interested in finding
ideas for propaganda than serious historical research. When it realised
that it could not harness leading scholars to join its cause this
Committee was merged later in 1993 back with the more reputable Myanmar
Historical Commission.
The
Myanmar Historical Commission (MHC)
The Myanmar Historical Commission [òmn\maNiuc\cMqmiuc\:APµæ>]
(MHC) was originally founded as the Burma Historical Commission in
1955, with the objective of producing a standard history of Burma.
With U Kaung as chairman, it comprised retired history professors
and other academics from other disciplines, retired ambassadors, a
staff of compilers, research officers, archivists and librarians.
The Commission has sometimes been presented as equivalent to early
commissions dedicated to the task of compiling history under royal
governments.
In 1998, the MHC was headed by Sai Aung Tun, ex-Principal
of the Institute of Foreign Languages. It also included as member
Ni Ni Myint, wife of General Ne Win, who is also Director of the Universities’
Historical Research Centre (UHRC) [tkïqiul\m¥a:qmiuc\:quetqn@an]
founded in 1986.
On the occasion of the Rangoon University Diamond
Jubilee in 1995, the MHC and the UHRC joined together and began to
organise the first annual international seminars Burma had seen since
1962 under joint sponsorship by the Japan Foundation (Bangkok) and
Chulalongkorn University. The first conference, held between 15–17
November 1995, was on the theme ‘Traditions in current perspective’,
for which twenty-one scholars gathered to give papers on the occasion
of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations with a further fifty-nine people
in attendance.
The theme was described by the education minister as ‘relevant and
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 055/392
opportune’ in light of current changes.
The second conference was held between 2–4 December
1996 in Rangoon at the Council Chamber of the Convocation Hall on
Thai-Myanmar Studies. The third conference, held in January 1998,
presented research papers on the theme ‘Southeast Asian Seaports and
Maritime Trade’ at the International Business Centre, Rangoon.
The fourth held between 16–18 December 1998 on ‘Post-colonial society
and culture in Southeast Asia’.
The MHC and UHRC are walking a tightrope. From
the point of view of the academic community in Burma and the few scholars
invited from abroad, the academic venues they organise represent a
unique opportunity to present research on Burma, which has not been
possible since the 1962 coup. However, these venues are clearly manipulated
as a political instrument of State. Internally, those who participate
feel the regime is attempting a facelift of the Ministry of Education
after the breakdown in 1988 in the relationship between the students
and the autorities. But in a broader sense, they are required to come
up with narrow answers to narrow policy-questions set by the regime.
Members of the academic profession, like any other
profession in Burma, are desperately underpaid, lack opportunity for
independent research and are unable to disseminate their findings
uncensored. Given the way many of these projects are being organised,
and their popular presentation in the press, a question mark arises
over the ethics of participation. The opening speeches to these events
by high government officials such as General Khin Nyunt, Chairman
of Myanmar Education Committee, and Secretary-1 of the State Peace
and Development Council, testifies to the central importance of these
conferences to Burma's image building. The papers in these conferences
are billed with ‘Myanmar’ in the title.
In his preface to the first conference on traditions,
General Khin Nyunt explains that our cultural heritage and our traditions
are ‘of serious concern to us’, and explains why the State made ‘uplift
of national prestige and integrity and preservation and safeguarding
of the cultural heritage and national character’ one of its main social
objectives. He explains how the regime took the initiative to rebuild
palaces, pagodas and monasteries, but that it is ‘the enthusiastic
and energetic response and participation of the people which have
made them a success’. The history of conflict the military has experienced
with students spurs Khin Nyunt on to point out that cultural tradition
is particularly important for the youth, who ‘in their formative stage,
are more susceptible to influences which are alien to our tradition’,
and he proposes that the education system should ‘disclose and preserve
Myanmar cultural traits’, and must engage in ‘promoting and strengthening
the patriotic spirit and Union consciousness of the youth’. He explains
how his initiative involved reviving monastic education at the primary
level to form the youth's ‘moral character’. The University of Rangoon
has a motto ‘with truth and loyalty’, and General Khin Nyunt argues
that this ‘enjoins not only a search for knowledge but also service
to the nation’, as the University of Rangoon ‘is a tradition of knowledge
in the service of the nation and its people’.
As for the second conference on maritime trade,
the Minister of Education summed up its significance by saying in
his closing speech that this conference is ‘an indication of Myanmar's
active participation in the recording and dissemination of Southeast
Asian history and culture, as well as being a dynamic member of ASEAN’.
We should take this idea of ‘dissemination of Southeast Asian history
and culture’ literally, namely the regime desires to make culture
its political centrepoint, both internally within Burma, and externally
within ASEAN.
Myanmar
Institute of Strategic and International Studies (MISIS)
MISIS was formed in July 1992, largely in order
to have a counterpart to the many ISIS namesakes in other ASEAN countries.
Its Chairman, U Ohn Gyaw, was until recently Minister for Foreign
Affairs.
It has organised a number of workshops in conjunction with other institutes
in other ASEAN countries, including: ‘A Workshop on Asean’s Structure
and Mechanism’, 10–11 April 1997.
However, it is often confused with the much more high-profile Office
of Strategic Studies (OSS) (see below).
(c) ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman.
Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. ILCAA Study of Languages
and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series 33, Institute for
the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999, ISBN
4-87297-748-3, p 056/392
Office
of Strategic Studies (OSS)
Founded in 1994, this is a military intelligence
agency that |
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