Culture and Privilege in Capitalist Asia - Jurusan Antropologi ...

A.B.SHAMSUL 93
to the second ‘theory’, the term Orang Kaya Baru was coined and came into
popular use to refer to people who had just recently become rich, or to orang yang
baru jadi kaya, whose behaviour is rather odd and ‘not really like the “real” rich
people’. The way it is used in this context indicates that the emphasis is on the
word Baru, not on Orang Kaya, because the term as a whole refers to those who
have just become rich, but who adopt behaviour that is perceived as not in the
repertoire of the ‘really rich’. Similarly it is used for those who are not really rich,
but who behave oddly in trying to make out that they are.
It could be suggested that the second ‘theory’ represents a strong subalternist
tendency, because the way Orang Kaya Baru is understood and used–such as in
the form of gossip, rumour-mongering or through the expression of envy or even
uncouthness–conforms with the practices that Scott (1985) describes as ‘weapons
of the weak’, or as an articulation of ‘everyday forms of peasant resistance’. Antlöv
(this volume) observes that in West Java the term ‘OKB’ has these subalternist or
‘negative’ connotations, because to call someone an OKB is considered derogatory
and is sometimes meant to insult the person.
A closer examination of how the term ‘OKB’ has been used in the Malaysian
public arena reveals that it is popular among the rich (kaya), the ‘comfortable’
(senang) and the poor (miskin). In fact, amongst the elite in Malaysia, both rural
and non-rural, the term ‘OKB’ has frequently been used in election campaigns
where it is meant to criticise or to accuse, in an indirect manner, people who
become well off through corrupt means. In movies, songs and comedies it has been
used to expose the ironies in the behaviour patterns of individuals or groups of
OKB individuals, such as the instance I mentioned above involving refrigerators in
a village without electricity.
Interestingly, amongst Malay-speakers in Malaysia, the term Orang Kaya Baru
has recently been replaced in the popular parlance, and in scholarly analysis, by
another term, Melayu Baru, referring mainly to Malays who have become senang
(lit. comfortable) or kaya-raya (very wealthy) as a result of the implementation of
the long-term pro-Malay affirmative action policy, called the New Economic Policy
(NEP), between 1971 and 1990 (Rustam A.Sani 1993). Viewed from the top down,
the Melayu Baru consist of corporate players, political elites and the professional
middle class, a perspective on the ‘new rich’ not dissimilar to the one suggested by
Robison and Goodman (1996:5). But, it is significant to note that the term also has
an ‘everyday’ meaning at the grassroots level–in daily conversation by Malaysians
from all ethnic groups and walks of life, be they Chinese workers, Malay peasants
or Indian schoolchildren. In this context the term is used as a phrase or cliché to
‘make fun of’ others, both negatively (perli, giat, kutuk–an expression of ridicule)
and positively (puji, sokong, ampu bodek–an expression of praise).
This cultural construction of the social meaning of the new rich in Malaysia is in
itself an interesting phenomenon to observe. It enriches our knowledge regarding
how the new rich are being perceived and inscribed into popular minds and
memories. In analytical terms, ‘the people’ themselves–in this case Malay-speakers
–are social actors who contribute and witness actual lives, acting as their own