Reflections on the Human Condition - Api-fellowships.org

26
SESSION I
In his article, “Ethno-historical perspectives on
Buddhist-Muslim relations and co-existence
in Southern Thailand: from shared cosmos to the
emergence of hatred?”, Alexander Horstmann argues
that Southern Thailand is unique in the way that world
religions have been accommodated and integrated into
the social order and local cosmology. This has been
done through local institutions of co-existence such
as intermarriage, local beliefs in common ancestors,
syncretism in healing practices, and reciprocity in
cultural niches. Even today, it is possible to observe
inter-religious marriages, conversions from Buddhism
to Islam and visa-versa; and rituals of one religion
mixed up with elements of the other. This certainly
puts the inter-religious marriage of Nang Jun’s parents
in another perspective.
It is not a forgone conclusion that if the two sisters were
known by Muslim names, they were therefore Muslims.
But while past generations of Thai Buddhists and
Muslims might not think of identifying the heroines
with one religion to the exclusion of the other, modern
Buddhists and Muslims may tend to look for partisan
cultural identity in the past.
In association with this question of ambivalent identity,
we come to an interesting local saying told to me by
local historian Pranee Sakulpipatana, “Surau kap wat,
non gnat kanai (surau or wat, where should I go?)” It is
likely that those who chose the wat (temple) embraced
the Siamese identity together with Buddhism, while
those who chose the surau embraced Islam and the Malay
identity.
Dr. Bradley, who visited Phuket in 1870, noted 200
Malay, 300 Siamese, 200 Siamo-Malay’ apart from a
majority of Chinese. The term “Siamo-Malay” perhaps
provides the clue to the Thai Muslim identity. [Gerini,
1986 (1905)]
Local histories in a place like Phuket and Southern
Thailand often reveal the ambiguity of local identities.
Like the identities of the two Thalang sisters, place-names
are also contested. A Phuket Muslim was told by his
maternal grandmother, “The old people used to call the
ports Bunga, Bukit and Terang. Now they are called
Phang-nga, Phuket and Trang”.
Like the old name of Junk Ceylon, there are at least two
explanations offered for the name Phuket. The common
explanation is that it means “bukit”, the Malay word
for “hill”. In fact, the name was spelt “Bhuket” until
an official name-change in 1967. However, an ancient
Siamese document transcribes the name as “phukej”,
Ref lections on the Human Condition: Change, Conflict and Modernity
The Work of the 2004/2005 API Fellows
which means gem, and this is taken by some as proof
that the name “Phuket” was originally Siamese.
Since Siamese names were recorded in Thai script and
Malay names were written in Jawi or Arabic script, it
will always be difficult to prove primacy of one over the
other. But now Thais will claim that Phuket was never a
Malay word. On the other hand, educated Muslims will
be inclined to believe that they have been denied their
place-names along with their history and language since
there is undeniably a track record of the Thai-ization of
Malay place-names within living memory.
THAI MUSLIMS IN PHUKET
Through the ages, Phuket had a lot of dealings with
Malay traders, particularly from Kedah. According to
Captain Thomas Forrest, writing in the late eighteenth
century, the inhabitants of Phuket in general spoke Malay
“from their intercourse with that people”.
The coastal Muslims of Phuket, Krabi and Trang kept
in touch with relatives in Kedah, Langkawi and Penang
in Malaysia. The older generation used to speak Malay
but that number is dwindling. Virtually all Phuket
Muslims below 50 or 60 years old speak Thai as their
first language. This is in contrast to the “Deep South”
states of Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat where the main
language among the Muslims is still Malay, or rather a
local dialect called “Jawi” (similar to Kelantanese).
Who are the Thai Muslims of Phuket today? Their
identity cards classify them, together with all other
Southern Thai Muslims, as “Thai nationality, Islam
religion”. The Thai Buddhists call them “Is-salam”. In
Thailand, all Muslims are lumped together as “Thai
Muslims” regardless of ethnicity. As well as Muslim
names, they have Sanskritic Thai names which are used
for all public purposes. If speaking the Malay language
is the marker of ethnicity, then these people cannot
be regarded as Malay; nor do most of them regard
themselves as Malay.
Thai Muslim shopkeepers in town include sojourners
of Arab, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Indian and Chinese
origin as well as Malay traders from other provinces
in Southern Thailand. The Thai Muslims in coastal
Phuket, like the people of Langkawi, have highly
different origins and probably came to Phuket by sea
as poor migrants. If certain 19 th century census are to
be believed, most of the Thai Muslims have settled in
Phuket only since the late 19 th century, though most of
them may have originated from nearby coastal areas.