Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity: Burmese Chinese Migrants in Taiwan

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Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12, 2008, pp. 29-62 (Article)

Published by NUS Press Pte Ltd DOI: 10.1353/jbs.2008.0001

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Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity: Burmese Chinese Migrants in Taiwan

Cultural performances at ethnic festivals in an immigrant context are oft en seen to represent the ideologies of ethnic identity tied to the performers’ ancestral homeland. This article examines how Burmese people of Chinese descent (hereaft er Burmese Chinese) in Taiwan negotiate their ethnic identity between pan-Burmese and pan-Chinese models as exemplifi ed in their presentation of a Burmese festival called Thingyan. The author’s objective is to pinpoint some issues in the representation of diasporic ethnicity and the politics of return migration. Return migrants have returned to their ancestral homeland aft er having been sett led in foreign countries for generations, entangling complex ethnic politics, in which the identifi cation with a home is frequently contestable. The issues discussed touch on a range of domains, in particular the study of diaspora, performances, and cultural tourism, with a primary disciplinary orientation in ethnomusicology. The emphasis on “festivalizing” is on the festive and celebratory aspect of these events through which Burmese Chinese have successfully promoted their ethnic identity in their new home: Taiwan. By analyzing the festival’s performances, this case study aims to theorize the ethnic politics of returning migrants, as well as to examine the ethnic performances at sites where identities are negotiated and shaped. These identities are indeed subject to the ever-changing representations and interpretations of groups and individuals within ethnic politics at the diff erent levels embedded in their double diasporic experiences.

Introduction Since the mid-1960s, Jhong-he City, located in Taipei County in northern Taiwan, has witnessed rapid economic growth. The resul-

The transcription system used in this article is the Standard Conventional System, listed in John Okell’s book A Guide to the Romanization of Burmese (1971:66–67).

29 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu

Fig. 1. Location of Jhong-he (map created by the author) tant job boom brought about by newly opened factories has boosted the sett lement of Burmese Chinese (ﬁ g.1).1 Currently numbering about 40,000, the group makes up 10 percent of Jhong-he’s total population of 409,320 (as of May 2008), and is believed to be the largest Burmese Chinese community outside of Burma.2 Even so, most Taiwanese were not aware of this sizeable Burmese Chinese community until the end of the 1990s. The group’s social visibility increased substantially with the launch of the Thingyan festival in 1998. Since then, the annual event has provided a platform for performances by members of the community to represent, shape, and negotiate their ethnic identity. During Thingyan, which is also called the Burmese Water Festival, people celebrate the Buddhist New Year in a festive fashion by sprinkling, or throwing, water on each other to wash away any bad fortune of the past year and “transit” (thingyan in Burmese) to the new year. This celebration is not exclusive to Burma. In fact,

1 Texas Instruments (Taiwan Limited), which was established in 1969, is the most striking example of this economic expansion. 2 There are no oﬃ cial statistics on the exact number of Burmese Chinese in Jhong-he. Most scholars estimate a ﬁ gure of 40,000. However, according to Su Lian-yin, the previous chairman of Taiwan’s Overseas Chinese from Burma Association, this number may be an underestimate due to the presence of an unknown number of illegal immigrants (interview, June 27, 2006). In addition, the estimate includes some Burmese of other ethnicities, such as Burman, Rakhine, and Shan, who were permitt ed to sett le in Taiwan with their ethnic Chinese spouses and family members.

30 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity the Water Festival is held throughout other Theravada Buddhist Southeast Asian countries, such as Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos, as well as by their respective overseas communities. The Burmese version of the festival is based on the myth of Thagyamin, who was originally a Hindu deity recognized as the king of all Burmese local spirits and subsequently incorporated into Burmanized Buddhism. For devout Burmese Buddhists, a common social practice during the Thingyan holiday (which usually lasts three days) is to engage in the Bouda pugjaniya (“Buddha-worship”) ceremony held in a mon- astery. Nowadays, many Burmese youngsters do not see Thingyan as a religious event. Instead, they view participation in the festival by splashing water and att ending performances as the best way to celebrate the New Year. However, for most Burmese émigrés, engag- ing in any of the Thingyan events is a signiﬁ cant marker of Burmese identity. Since 1998, Burmese migrants in Jhong-he have celebrated Thingyan with an annual festival. Held in mid-April, it is marked by the vigorous throwing of water, Burmese music and dance performances, a joyous ambience, and the sharing of Burmese food.3 In Taiwan, the festival is unique to Jhong-he, home to most Burmese Chinese in Taiwan. Ironically, because of their Chinese ethnicity, most Burmese Chinese festival organizers have litt le knowledge of Thingyan’s heritage and customs, since they view Thingyan as ethnically Burman.4 To create a sense of “Burmeseness,” these Burmese Chinese have presented a version of typical Thingyan performances that they experienced in Burma. Jhong-he’s Thingyan performers oft en learn typical Thingyan styles by choosing performance pieces from a large pool of Thingyan commercial productions, such as kara- oke recordings. Nevertheless, instead of merely mimicking a typical

3 In Southeast Asian countries, the Water Festival typically lasts three days, falling around April 13–16. The exact dates of the festival depend on the New Year of the Theravada Buddhist lunisolar calendar; there is no ﬁ xed equivalent in the Western calendar. However, the Jhong-he Burmese Chinese Thingyan is only a one-day event that takes place on the second or third weekend of April, so as to accommodate the members of the local Burmese Chinese community who have to work during the week. 4 The Burmans are the majority and dominant ethnic group in Burma.

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 31 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu modern Thingyan performance, the Burmese Chinese community in Jhong-he presents a unique mixture of styles by blending diverse elements of Burmese folk and classical traditions, Taiwanese folk traditions, Burmese pop, Mandopop, and Western pop music. For example, a single performance may comprise a collage of divergent elements of musical styles, ostensibly “somewhat improvised and haphazard” (Tsuda 2004:55). Two striking cases are Burmese pop music performances with the dancers dressed in traditional court costumes, and Burmese pop singing accompanied by aboriginal Taiwanese dancers. The performances by these migrants can be said to represent a postmodern pastiche of the imagined past and desired present. In Jhong-he, the Thingyan festival has had a tremendous social impact. The festival’s strong social visibility has made it a popular tourist att raction. Moreover, it has been promoted in the local government’s cultural projects as one model of the integration of tourism, locality, and cultural production. In 2001 and 2002, the Jhong-he Water Festival was publicized with the marketing gim- mick Yi Xiangzhen Yi Tese (One Place with One Cultural Feature) (Chai 2006:12), and listed in the Taipeixian Wenhua Li (Taipei County Cultural Calendar), along with other cultural events.5 The annual Thingyan festival provides Burmese Chinese with a powerful platform to demonstrate and negotiate their identity within the complex situations related to subethnicity and nationality. In the next section, I will introduce the Burmese Thingyan tradition and its advent in Taiwan and then provide an overview of the politics and tactics of identity formation among Burmese Chinese, and the social context of Jhong-he’s Thingyan festival. A brief history of the immigration of these returning Chinese will allow us to trace their double diasporic experiences on their journey from China to Burma and then to Taiwan, a culturally more comfortable home. Their explicitly Chinese-oriented music making in Rangoon is

5 The Cultural Aﬀ airs Bureau of Taipei County Government initiated Taipeixian Wenhua Li in 2001. The “Burmese Water Festival” was listed with sixteen other cultural events in 2001 and with nineteen other events in 2002 (Taipeixian Zhengfu Wenhuaju n.d.).

32 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity detailed to underline its stark contrast with the launch of a Burmese festival in Taiwan. I argue that this shift in their cultural habits owes much to two sentiments: the dream of returning home and nostalgia. Finally, by analyzing their ethnic, bodily, and gender representations, this article examines the Thingyan festival and illuminates the varied, and somewhat paradoxical, ways of celebrating that have helped boost this group’s visibility. The relationship between politics, identity, and performance in Burmese diasporic communities is an underexplored fi eld. A great deal of writing on the Thingyan festival in Burma’s diasporas has centered on its social function as a means of ethnic reinforcement (Cheah 2004:145; Chai 2006:15) and identity formation (Chai 2006:15). However, I argue that, although ethnicity is the major social force in the success of community formation, the importance of expressive cultural practices in representing ethnic confl icts is oft en over- looked. I have been a dancer, musician, and audience member in the Jhong-he Thingyan since 1998. These experiences have allowed me to examine the above confl icts from an interdisciplinary perspective (i.e., ethnomusicological, historical, and ethnopolitical). As a result, my study does not simply refl ect the framework of ethnic politics concerning return migration proposed by the anthropologist Takeyuki Tsuda (2000, 2003, 2004). Instead, by exploring the styles, genres, and bodily representations of the cultural performances, the present study takes the exploration further to understand the multi- layering of this immigrant community’s ethnic structure. Ethnic divisions in Jhong-he’s Burmese Chinese community are complex. Underneath the festive surface of Thingyan music and dance, there are ethnopolitical themes that suggest the existence of internal confl icts. A probe into Burmese traditional performances in Jhong-he’s Thingyan thus uncovers these ethnic confl icts and the modern forms of Orientalism that underlie them. The ethnocentric nature of these politics is portrayed by both the Burmese Chinese immigrants and the local Taiwanese people in their att itudes towards Burmese. The tensions I focus on pertain to the perpetual ethnic negotiations among Burmese Chinese subethnic groups, as

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 33 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu well as the tensions that arise due to the local government’s cultural policies.

Homecoming: Politics and Tactics Identifying the politics of a particular type of migrant society— return migrants—involves two key issues: their discourses about the homeland and the ethnopolitical reception in the ancestral homeland. In diaspora studies, the representation of homelands has been long recognized as constitutive of this identity formation (Cliff ord 1997).6 Yet, while dwelling on the formation of diasporic identity in a specifi c group, Thomas Turino addresses the problems of locating the home. As in the cases of Jews and African Americans that he discusses (2004:5), conceptualizing the homeland for Burmese Chinese return migrants is also bewilderingly complicated.7 Such migrants frequently experience an ambivalent reception in their ancestral homelands. Their perceived place in the homeland is contested, as they are oft en marginalized as migrant minorities due to cultural diff erences acquired abroad and their oft en inferior socioeconomic status. Eventually they experience consanguineous betrayal, pro- voking them to enact identity transformations that can be labeled as re-ethnicization. As Tsuda puts it:

Because they [return migrants] and their forebears have become assimilated into the culture of a foreign land while living abroad for generations, the return migrants oft en ﬁ nd themselves treated as ethnic minorities in their “home” countries. . . . Hence, whatever nostalgic longing and att ach- ment they might have felt toward their ancestral homelands,

6 James Cliff ord suggests that “[i]n the twentieth century, cultures and identities reckon with both local and transnational powers to an unprecedented degree. Indeed, the currency of culture and identity as performative acts can be traced to their articulation of homelands, safe spaces where the traffi c across borders can be controlled” (1997:7). 7 In the Jewish case, the shift ing geo-cultural center and the idea of “the land” as less locality-situated than religiously-situated have made the location of “home” debat- able. In the African-American case, the question of whether modern multinational Africa can be viewed as one homeland equally complicates the issue. Turino identifi es many possible diffi culties in defi ning “the home” (2004:5).

34 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity

return migrants oft en ﬁ nd the reality of their new circum- stances alienating. In response, many adopt a strong sense of national allegiance and identiﬁ cation with the country they left behind, stronger than any they ever felt before. (2004:51)

Driven by this sentiment of nostalgia, some return migrants have taken it further and revived ethnic festivals as explicit cultural markers, selectively emphasizing desired att ributes of the country from which they have returned. Moreover, festival revival and identity representation via a cultural festival are oft en responses to the dominant public discourses about a foreign culture. This performance of identity echoes a strategy common among marginalized groups as they att empt to advance sociopolitical agendas by consciously playing to the stereotypes of them built by the dominant culture (Seeger 1987:136; Magliocco 2005:191; Dürr 2004:127).8 However, there may also be vulnerability when the oppressed groups att empt to reinforce the stereotypical identity norms. Such vulnerability is what Deborah Wong calls “the risk of reinscription, appropriation, or Orientalist misreading” in her case study of Asian-American performances. In addition, she suggests that “[t]he possibility of empowerment stands side by side with the susceptible audience that consumes with the greedy expectation of Orientalist pleasure and is inevitably gratiﬁ ed” (2004:6–7). In line with Wong’s notion, my study of the Jhong-he’s Thingyan festival and its performance focus on the issues related to such empowerment and the co-existing risk of Oriental misreading. In the context of Jhong-he’s Thingyan festival, the return migrants organize performances that evoke varying degrees of Burmeseness. This display of Burmeseness not only ﬁ ts their expectations of what constitutes Burmese culture, but also meets the expectations of local Taiwanese people. Some performances have departed from

8 Such a strategy refers to the postcolonial theorist Gayatri Spivak’s idea of “strategic essentialism.” She considers that it is at times advantageous for oppressed groups to “essentialize” themselves in order to achieve certain purposes (1990).

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 35 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu the Chinese-oriented cultural practices of the festival initiators by focusing on ethnic Burman “model” cultural performances.9 In the past, the vast majority of Burmese Chinese in Burma were reluc- tant to identify themselves with these festival performances and they did not participate. However, aft er relocating to Taiwan, they suddenly found themselves singing and dancing in festivals that commemorate this heritage. Tsuda suggests this might be explained by a sense of counter-hegemonic resistance that emerges in returning migrant communities, as the behavioral expression of an ethnic minority’s counter-identity is constructed in opposition to the dominant majority group on the basis of cultural diﬀ erences (2000:56). More interestingly, in the case of Thingyan in Jhong-he, the ethnic minority counter-identity enacted by Burmese Chinese has recently been greatly empowered via cooperation with some other Taiwanese minorities.

A Brief History of Immigration: Double Diasporic Experiences The collective identity of Burmese Chinese remains multiply defi ned due to their intricate nationality status and complex subethnicities. The situation of the Burmese Chinese in Taiwan exemplifi es the extreme tensions between their national and ethnic identities. To begin with, the dilemma of nationality is projected in their double diasporic experiences, suspended as they are between the Chinese and Burmese worlds. This tension stems from their initial migration from China to Burma, and then from Burma to Taiwan, so that they did not feel “at home” in either culture. Some even undertook a third transnational relocation to the United States, Canada, or Australia, but eventually chose to move back to Taiwan. Self-labeled as ethnically Chinese, they have actually inherited diff erent socio-cultural practices and dialects underpinned by their subethnicities. Of the subethnicities, Hokkienese, Cantonese, Hakkas, and Yunnanese are

9 These “model” performances are oft en seen in the cultural shows and media in Burma, such as certain court dance genres. This point is discussed later in this article.

36 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity the predominant Chinese groups.10 In most cases, such subethnicity has thus become the deﬁ ning factor when a Burmese Chinese discusses his/her identity and that of others in the Burmese Chinese community. Moreover, many people like to specify their locality in Burma (town/city/region) as well as their subethnicity; for example, “I am a Hokkienese from Taung-gyi.” However, when diﬀ erentiating themselves from native Taiwanese, they usually describe themselves as Chinese returners from Burma/Myanmar.

From China to Burma Large-scale migration from China to Burma began in the middle of the Qing dynasty (1644–1911 CE). It occurred because of the frequent cross-border trade between China and Burma and the relatively prosperous Burmese economy during that period. Oﬃ cial statistics show the population of Chinese in Burma has grown considerably over recent decades; in 2005, they numbered about one million or nearly 3 percent of the total population.11 The ﬁ rst, second, and even third generations of Chinese in Burma have managed to preserve their cultural conventions and identities because of their strong bonds with their Chinese homeland (Chai 1996:22–32).

10 The terms “subethnic groups” and “subethnicity” are used here to denote the subdivisions of the same ethnic group that are marked by disparate regional prov- enance and languages. Yunnanese, Hokkienese, Cantonese, and Hakkas are all considered Han Chinese. Yunnanese came across the Burma-China border; the other three groups arrived via a marine route from Singapore, facilitated by the British. Hokkienese, Cantonese, and Hakkas are great traders from southeast China, found throughout most of Southeast Asia, while Yunnanese are caravan travelers and traders from southwest China, active on the southwestern border of China with Burma and Thailand. These subethnic groups have distinctly diﬀ erent cultural practices, such as dietary habits and languages, while sharing a common allegiance to China and a common writt en language. As for the numbers, Hokkienese and Cantonese comprise 45 percent of the total Chinese population in Burma, and the third largest group, Yunnanese, makes up 21 percent (Mya Than 1997:119). 11 According to the oﬃ cial statistics provided by the Overseas Chinese Bureau in Taiwan, the number of Chinese in Burma is estimated to have been 350,000 in 1945, and 1,149,143 in 2004 (Statistics Department 2005:76–77).

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 37 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu

From Burma to Taiwan Diff erent factors embedded in Burma’s politico-economic history led to three waves of Burmese immigration to Taiwan. The fi rst wave was in the mid-1950s. As a result of the UN’s reconciliation initiative, more than 10,000 soldiers who had served at Chinese Kuomintang (KMT) outposts in Burma during World War II, and had stayed there aft er the war, were forced to leave Burma and move to Taiwan in 1953 and 1954.12 At that time, Taiwan was governed by the KMT.13 Most of the KMT soldiers belonged to minority ethnic groups, such as the Wa and Jingpo, who inhabit the vast borderlands of Yunnan (a prov- ince in southwest China) and Burma.14 The KMT government sett led them in newly built veterans houses in an area called Zhongzhen Xincun (New Loyalty Village), symbolizing the ex-soldiers’ loyalty to the KMT in wartime. The second wave of Burmese immigration to Taiwan began in the late 1960s as a result of the socialist policies of General Ne Win, who led Burma from 1962 to 1988. His nation building pro- grams privileged Burman ethnic identity, forcing Chinese language schools and Chinese businesses to close in 1965.15 The following year Chinese Communist radicals prompted the anti-Chinese riots in Rangoon in 1966, resulting in the Burmese government’s prohibition of Chinese-organized musical activities in 1967. Since then, forced to att end Burmese schools, the ethnic Chinese have been increasingly integrated into the Burmese mainstream. Specifi cally, the political split in mainland China appears to have been a key factor in triggering the Burmese anti-Chinese riots.16 This split between

12 The acronym KMT stands for the Chinese term Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalist Party). This was the political party that led China until 1949, when it lost control of the entire mainland to the Chinese Communists and withdrew to Taiwan. In Taiwan, the KMT remained the governing political power until the Democratic Progressive Party (DDP) won control of the presidency in 2000. 13 This information was retrieved from the offi cial Web site of the Cultural Aff airs Bureau of the Taoyuan County Government, htt p://www.tyccc.gov.tw. 14 Ethnic Jingpo are known as Kachin in Burma. 15 According to authoritative statistics, the number of Chinese schools was roughly 250 in the late 1940s (Chang 1954:45). 16 Many of my interviewees who witnessed the violent anti-Chinese riots in 1966 mentioned that they resulted from Burmese disaff ection with the radical activities of

38 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity

Communist sympathizers and KMT loyalists (who had political connections with mainland China and Taiwan respectively) infi ltrated Chinese life worldwide. It had a great impact on Burmese Chinese communities, especially those in urban Burma. The local Burmese diff erentiated between these groups by calling the pro-Communist China supporters tayoke ni (red Chinese) and the others tayoke phyu (white Chinese). In urban areas, almost all Chinese schools, organizations, and even individuals embraced this dichotomy. This overwhelmingly political division became a signifi cant factor in the search for a national identity, in addition to the traditional subethnic identifi cations noted earlier. According to Mya Than, the Chinese in Burma had only two options in the 1960s; they could choose to leave Burma or to inte- grate fully with Burmese cultural norms. Among those who chose to migrate to Taiwan, the Chinese in Lower Burma (i.e., Hokkienese, Cantonese, and Hakkas) made up the largest group. Most of them had been educated in Chinese schools in Rangoon and were loyal KMT sympathizers. Their desire to preserve their Chinese identity and be politically and economically free of Burmese repression acted as a catalyst for them to relocate to Taiwan in the 1970s. Ruled at the time by the KMT, Taiwan was viewed as a bastion of traditional culture and was thus more att ractive to most Burmese Chinese than the impoverished Communist mainland. However, very few of the migrants had any ancestral connection with Taiwan. Their decision to move to Taiwan seems to have been an att empt to fi nd a culturally comfortable home. The third large-scale Burmese migration to Taiwan was triggered by the Burmese junta’s crackdown on protesters during the 1988 student movement, led by the Burman pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. For Burmese Chinese, regardless of political affi liation, Taiwan projects the image of a successful self-governed democratic territory, in stark contrast to the less competent Burmese military

Chinese Communist sympathizers in Rangoon. In addition, critical Burmese sources claim that the anti-Chinese sentiment of the Burmese was also reinforced by the Burmese government to deﬂ ect social att ention from the rice shortage.

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 39 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu dictatorship. This contrast boosted the desire of the Burmese Chinese to sett le in Taiwan. In recent years, despite the Taiwanese government’s introduction of a more restrictive immigration policy for many migrant groups, Burmese Chinese brides and students have been allowed to move to Taiwan to seek a bett er life (Chai 2006:2). Thus, there has been an exponential growth in this group’s population. Many immigrants in this latest wave are ethnic Yunnanese, who originally were residents of Upper Burma.17 Because the majority of them speak ﬂ uent Yunnanese, a language similar to the Mandarin Chinese that Taiwanese speak, they have assimilated easily into the Taiwanese mainstream. In contrast, most children of the immigrants from Lower Burma are Burmanized Chinese who integrated into the Burmese mainstream; hence, the children only speak a litt le Chinese. The recent boom in Yunnanese immigration to Taiwan has resulted in ethnic political issues about control of the Thingyan festival; this will be explained later in this article. As most of the earlier immigrants from Burma chose to reside in Jhong-he, a large number of later returners from Burma have also chosen to sett le there. This geographical concentration is one of the forces that have facilitated the formation of a distinctive sense of Burmese Chinese identity.

The Trajectory of Musical Practices in Rangoon18 Forming a diasporic identity, seeking cultural roots, and resisting or assimilating into the dominant culture are common experiences

17 Many interviewees considered that the major factor in this large migration of Yunnanese was the increase in wealth derived from boom businesses, such as jade and gold. Many Yunnanese were thus able to relocate from impoverished areas in Upper Burma to cities, and then to Taiwan. Some interviewees also commented that most Yunnanese students study harder than other ethnic Chinese in Burma, so they ﬁ lled most quotas of overseas Chinese students permitt ed to get a higher education in Taiwan. A large number of them successfully pursued careers in Taiwan aft er graduating. 18 Many ethnic Chinese musicians in Jhong-he and Rangoon have provided oral his- tories for this reconstruction of a brief musical history of Rangoon’s Burmese Chinese. They are Lin Fan-Yuan, Yo Fu-Yen, Chen Yong-Jia (A-One), and He Tsai-Fung in Jhong-he; and Lin Yin-Hua and Tsai Han-Zai in Rangoon.

40 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity for immigrants. Flourishing musical practices can be ascribed to the diff erent coexisting agendas that generate multiple voices in the communities. Diverse musical practices have stood out in Rangoon’s Burmese Chinese communities because of the people’s ancestral or political connections to their homeland. The connections deter- mine what musical genres and styles each musical group performs and who the audience is. Before the Burmese socialist government banned Chinese musical activities in 1967, bands, music clubs, and performing troupes sponsored by cooperative associations thrived. The vast majority of these musical groups were subethnically defi ned, in addition to the politico-territorial split between China and Taiwan that appeared as a fi ssure in Chinese solidarity during the late 1940s. A wide variety of musical genres, brought from ancestral towns by diff erent subethnic groups entertained the community and fulfi lled socioreligious needs. In the 1950s, musical troupes based on subethnicity were still popular. For example, when Buddhist ceremonies were held in the Hokkien temple Qingfu Gong in Rangoon’s Chinatown, event organizers oft en hired Hokkien folk music and theatrical troupes, such as Hokkien puppet shows, to perform. Other folk theatrical genres, such as Hanju (Han opera) and Yueju (Cantonese opera), were also found in Hakka and Cantonese community events respectively. The beginning of the 1950s was a political turning point that opened up a musical scene with a rich diversity of genres and groups. Many Chinese-language schools therefore became bastions of entrenched political ideologies: some supported the KMT in Taiwan (e.g., Zhongzheng High) while others supported the Communist regime in mainland China (e.g., Nanyang High). In contrast to Burmese schools, music education was not only obligatory in Chinese-language schools; it was also designed to strengthen their political ideals through nationalistic songs and texts. In addition, students were encouraged to join music clubs, such as brass bands, choirs, and pop bands. Benefi ting from this, many graduates continued their musical interests and became signifi cant fi gures in musical groups in their communities.

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 41 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu

Less happily, because of political developments since then, many musical troupes acquired political labels that indirectly contributed to a surge of anti-Chinese sentiment. During the drastic political upheaval sparked by Chinese Communists in the 1960s, there were two major ideologies among pro-Communist musical ensembles. The fi rst stressed preserving and disseminating traditional songs and dances of the cultural heritage that originated in the mainland. It was motivated by the people’s nostalgia for an ancestral and national homeland. The second ideology promoted Communist ideas through artistic performances sponsored by Communist propagandists. A musical play permeated with heavy Communist ideology would be typically showcased during a period of inter-Chinese strife, particularly at the beginning of the Cultural Revolution (1966–76). This pursuit of political ends resulted in the Burmese government’s prohibition of such musical activities between 1967 and 1978. Many Burmese Chinese view that politically sensitive decade a dark phase in Burmese Chinese musical activities. Alongside the Communists’ promotion of politics-penetrated arts, pro-KMT musical troupes rep- resented Taiwan-derived artistic traditions or KMT political thought. All these politically affi liated organizations staged large-scale performances during Chinese festivals, such as Chinese New Year, to promote their political affi liations. Pop bands gained popularity in the 1960s. Such bands normally consisted of two guitarists, a bassist, a keyboard player, and a drummer (fi g. 2) and showed a strong Western soft -rock infl uence. Many Burmese Chinese youths formed pop bands and performed contemporary Chinese pop songs from Taiwan and Hong Kong. At the beginning of the 1970s, many associations that promoted common commercial interests among ethnic Chinese businessmen became well-known sponsors for pop bands. At that time, an annual fl oat parade was organized to showcase diff erent pop bands during Chinese New Year in Rangoon’s Chinatown (fi g. 3). Sponsored fl oats featured the musical artistry of their affi liated pop bands and singers, as well as elaborate decorations, to represent an association’s business success and wealth.

42 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity

Fig. 2. An all-girl pop band called Jingongzhu (Golden Princess) performing at a wedding ceremony in Burma. The key members, the four Ho sisters, eventually moved to Taiwan in the late 1990s. (Photograph taken in 1989; courtesy of He Tsai-fung)

Fig. 3. The ﬂ oat designed for the Fengming Yuetuan (Phoenix Singing Musical Band) performing in the Chinese New Year parade in 1982. (Photograph courtesy of Chen Yong-Jia)

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 43 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu

The ﬂ oat parade ceased in the late 1980s aft er a large number of musicians and singers migrated to Taiwan. Many of them have since appeared as the featured musicians, singers, or even the organizers of the Water Festival for the Burmese New Year in Jhong-he. There are still some pop bands in Rangoon’s Chinatown, although the number of performances has decreased. These pop bands are no longer exclusively Chinese, and their repertoire now includes songs sung in Burmese, and songs appropriated from the Burmese, Indian, and pan-Chinese (Taiwan, Hong Kong, and mainland China) music scenes. In addition, rather than joining these pop bands associated with the Chinese past, young ethnic-Chinese musicians in Rangoon prefer to play in rock ’n’roll, heavy metal, rap, and hip hop bands.

Dreams of Returning Home and Nostalgia The current population of the Jhong-he Burmese community is made up of immigrants from the second and third waves of immigration mentioned earlier. Initially, Burmese Chinese immigrants in Taiwan eagerly re-ethnicized themselves as Chinese, by adopt- ing a political sense of Chineseness with strong emotional ties to their perceived homeland and the KMT political party.19 However, they subsequently found this simplistic identiﬁ cation problematic. The Taiwanese government describes them as Guiqiao (Returning Overseas Chinese), and Burmese Chinese call themselves Bama/ Myanma-pyan (returners from Burma/Myanmar), which both con- note their desire to return home and their Chinese allegiance. Even so, many local Taiwanese treat the returners as social and ﬁ nancial inferiors, and as Others.20 This has shatt ered the Burmese Chinese dream of embracing their home, underscoring the illusory nature of the move back to their motherland. In response, they have cultivated a collective Burmese identity that I call “counter-nostalgia.” I argue

19 This sense of Chineseness was ﬁ rst connected to the KMT, and later to the other two political parties that split from the KMT in the late 1990s, the Xindang (the New Party) and then Qinmindang (The People First Party). 20 Most Burmese Chinese, especially newcomers, make a living by working as unskilled laborers because of their relatively poor command of Chinese. Therefore, many Taiwanese treat them as low-status Others, the same way they treat temporary workers from other Southeast Asian countries.

44 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity that returning migrants’ nostalgia for a “home,” which may shift from their ancestral home to a culturally comfortable home, is then constructed upon their return. Therefore, counter-nostalgia is used to emphasize this shift . A sign of this nostalgia among Burmese Chinese in Jhong-he is the advent of the Thingyan festival, launched by the Xinmianhua Lianyihui (The New Burmese Chinese Society), which was subsequently incorporated into Miandian Guiqiaoxiehui (The Society of Burmese Returning Overseas Chinese) around 2000. Many Burman performing arts are used to construct and deliver a sense of Burmeseness. The primary issue at play here is the manner in which these performing arts serve as national symbols not only to invoke the sentiment of nostalgia, but also to heighten the visibility of this ethnic group in Taiwan.

Thingyan in Jhong-he In a diaspora-situated festival, interaction between cultural representations and the public is crucial to the understanding of Chinese Burmese identity. The German anthropologist Eveline Dürr notes that “[i]n a mutual process, culture is interactively and symbolically created, transmitt ed and consumed. The mediator between the cultural protagonists and the festival visitors is the body and the metaphoric messages conveyed through style, gesture, dance, sound, smell and taste” (2004:128). By investigating the metaphors conveyed through musical and dance performances in Jhong-he’s Thingyan, this study att empts to discover the ethnic negotiations between Jhong-he’s Burmese Chinese and identity politics.

Typical Thingyan Performance Music and dance form an essential part of the Thingyan festival, creating desirable feelings of a festive ambience, joviality, and exuberance. Now recognized as the Burmese New Year festival, Thingyan and its performances are publicized as part of the national heritage and held with large-scale community or government patronage.

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 45 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu

The standard Thingyan performance is by origin a Burmese folk tradition.21 Nevertheless, one can see an eclectic mix of music and dance types in most large-scale Thingyan celebrations today, and a specifi c musical style has become the Thingyan staple. A typical Thingyan musical style has catchy, lively, and fl owing melodies; danceable, strong thingyan taw (a specifi c rhythmic patt ern played exclusively for Thingyan music on the folk doebat drum); a Western soft -rock chic achieved by incorporating a jazz drum set; and lyrics depicting scenes related to Thingyan symbols, such as padauk fl owers, water- throwing, and the New Year celebration.22 Thingyan performances also incorporate the female yein (female group folk dance form; see fi g. 4) which is also performed solo. As markers of Thingyan, these features evoke a salient Burmeseness. In particular, for the past two decades, since the fi lm Thingyan Moe (The Thingyan Rain) achieved great success in 1982, songs like Nwe Ma (“The Summer Girl”), which featured in the soundtrack, have been annual staples at the festival.

Two Ethnic Negotiations The Burmese Chinese conception of authenticity is a key issue that needs to be investigated in this discussion of ethnic negotiation. Issues of authenticity in Burmese Thingyan performances connect to ideas of heritage, tradition, and culture-bearers. They are oft en diffi cult to articulate, since the essence of authenticity is subject to diff erent perspectives on the subject. This sense also raises a fundamental issue of who has the power to authenticate, echoing one of anthropologist Edward Bruner’s senses of authenticity as “authorized, certifi ed,

21 A historical account (Aung Naing 1980:32) notes that, in the court of the ancient Burma, some Burmese classical instrumental music, such as the music of harp and mouth organ, was performed to celebrate Thingyan. However, the present-day style of the Thingyan performance springs from the folk tradition, and a folk ensemble composed of folk drums, cymbals, and shawms is used to create a joyful feeling (Khin Myo Chit 2004:21). 22 The padauk is the gum-kino tree (Pterocarpus macrocarpus). It bursts into bloom with its tiny fragrant yellow fl owers only in the fi rst light showers of April when Thingyan is held. Burmese therefore regard the padauk as “the fl ower of Thingyan” (Kyi Kyi Hla). htt p://www.roadtomandalay.com/MyanmarMiscellany/thingyan.pdf (accessed August 13, 2006).

46 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity

Fig. 4. Yein dance from the 2006 Thingyan Festival in Jhong-he, Taiwan. (Photograph by Chuang Jia-yen) or legally valid” (1994:400). In the arena of world music, Timothy Taylor notes that the notion of this authenticity became increasingly common in the postmodern situation: metropolitan consumers seek pre-modern/untainted sonic experiences and ethnicized “native” musicians (1997:21–23). While the authentic music maker is expected to hold a singular position of “native,” the metropolitan consumer is allowed to purchase a variety of subject positions for him/herself, depending on fashion and whim. Applying these ideas to my study, I found that two principal ethnic negotiations play out in the Jhong- he Thingyan festival: one between Chinese and Burmans, and the other among subethnic groups.

Between Chinese and Burmans. The ﬁ rst negotiation is between ethnic- Burmans and ethnic-Chinese. Because of their lack of expertise in creating a Burman-oriented Thingyan festival, the Burmese Chinese initially gave the privileged label of a more “authentic” Thingyan to

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 47 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu ethnic Burmans.23 They endeavored to invite ethnic Burman culture- bearers to perform a Burman heritage. “Chinese have very minimal knowledge of festivalizing Thingyan. Only Burmans have the abil- ity to do it right,” said a respectable 69-year-old teacher, a Burmese Hakka, in this community (interview, June 15, 2006). In order to recreate the folk spirit, ethnic Burmans in Taiwan presented the folk doebat (double-headed horizontal drum) ensemble and folk dance forms (e.g., yein, U Shwe Yoe dance: see fi g. 5). What these initiators exclusively showcased was the ethnic Other in the form of the subaltern Burman body. This suggests a Burmese Chinese position, where they can occupy a place outside Burman identity retaining their social delineation as it existed before their migration to Taiwan. Buried at the bott om of their consciousness, this ideology refl ected the main goal of the earliest festivals precisely; i.e., to promote a sense of community among Burmese Chinese by evok- ing a shared experience in their collective Thingyan memory. The incredible success of the fi rst Thingyan festival immediately alerted the Burmese Chinese community to the potential market for such staged public events. From 1999 on, rather than merely leaving the festival performances in the hands of the ethnic Burmans, they took more artistic control of the proceedings. In recent years, promoting an explicitly Burmese Thingyan tradition has not been the most important goal; hence ethnic Burman participation has been somewhat reduced. Interestingly, in 1998, as the festival organizers focused on ethnic authenticity, they stressed the authenticity of musical precision and thought the Burman doebat drummer’s rhythmic patt ern (thingyan taw) was dubious. “The rhythmic patt ern didn’t sound thingyan taw to me. I know these Burmans are not musicians, and they are even poorly educated,” said one festival organizer (interview, May 18, 2006). In response to this bold statement, I would admit that the presence of an ethnically Burman performer is not a guarantee of a more “authentic” performance, as Burmans were possibly asked

23 Ethnic Burmans are usually invisible in this community because very few of them are allowed to stay in Taiwan with their Burmese Chinese spouses.

48 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity

Fig. 5. U Shwe Yoe dance from the 1998 Thingyan Festival in Jhong-he, Taiwan. U Kyaw Win, dancing the main character U Shwe Yoe (with umbrella), and U Tin Swe, the drummer at the back, are both ethnic Burmans. (Photograph by the author) to perform music in which they were not well-trained. Rather, they were innocently trying to present a culture that is entitled to their ethnic peculiarity. The hasty and harsh judgment on the part of the organizer reveals a certain degree of ethnic prejudice. Nevertheless, for those Burmese Chinese who are ignorant of Burmese Thingyan music, the appearance of the Burman performances indeed lived up to their ethnicized expectations and resulted in a successful outcome: eventually Thingyan was able to continue as an annual festival.

Among Subethnic Groups. The second ethnic negotiation to be addressed occurs among subethnic Chinese groups. Ironically, to att ract the att ention of their fellow ethnic Chinese in mainstream Taiwanese society, they actually present a very Chinese version of Burmeseness. This version is embedded in their diasporic experiences and their ethnic imaginations, which diﬀ er markedly depending on

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 49 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu which subethnic Chinese group gains the upper hand. Indeed, the geographical disparities of the four subethnic Chinese groups lead to a varied level of Burmese acculturation: the Hokkienese, Cantonese, and Hokkas in Lower Burma are more deeply Burmanized. In contrast, the Yunnanese are more att uned to general Chinese culture because of their geographical connections to China. This polarity has had a substantial impact on the Jhong-he Burmese Chinese community. The polarity between Yunnanese and the other three dominant subethnic groups became noticeable in Jhong-he aft er 1988, when a large number of Yunnanese received permission to sett le in Taiwan. They tried to maximize business profi ts by establishing sound rela- tionships with their Chinese compatriots, and some began to fi ght for partial control of The Society of Burmese Returning Overseas Chinese. As a result, they initiated collective participation as Burmese Yunnanese in the community’s events, including Thingyan in 2001. One might easily fi nd some ethnic stereotypes about Yunnanese emerging among fi rst- and second-generation non-Yunnanese in Jhong-he’s Burmese community. “The ethnic solidarity amongst Yunnanese is stronger than that of other Burmese Chinese,” said one member of the Burmese Chinese community. When asked about Yunnanese joining the Thingyan organization, however, they oft en refer to Yunnanese minimal knowledge of Burmese cultural heritage and the resulting inability to present an “authentic” Thingyan performance. Regardless of the authenticity question, when the dominant power shift s between these two groups, the types of performance change. Prior to 2001, Chen Tswer-fan, an ethnic Cantonese, was a Thingyan performance organizer. Apart from the typical Thingyan songs and folk yein dance performances, she insisted on producing Burmese dance and music items from the Burman classical tradition. Figure 6 depicts the minthamee aka (“princess solo court dance”) performed in 2006 in the anyeint form.24 This merging of Burmese

24 Anyeint refers to a public burlesque that combines comedians' slapstick with solo singing and dancing performances by a princess.

50 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity

Fig. 6. The anyient performance took place at the 2006 Jhong-he Thingyan, featuring a minthamee (princess) and four comedians. In this picture, minthamee Liang Mei-yue is on the left and the comedian Wang Jian-hua on the right, with a sprinkler spraying water onto the stage. (Photograph by the author) classical performances into Thingyan is not common in a typical modern Burman Thingyan celebration in Burma. Although Ms. Chen was aware that Thingyan is by origin a folk tradition, she appeared to be more interested in promoting a strong Burmese identity than ensuring the festival’s authenticity. In contrast, since 2001, the organizational power has been partially transferred to the Yunnanese. Among them, another festival organizer Chang Biao-Tsai has promoted the performance of Burmeseness by including more dances of the Shan and Baiyi ethnic minority groups. The Yunnanese, the Shan, and the Baiyi are inhabitants of both Burma and Yunnan. Due to frequent cultural exchanges, Yunnanese normally associate these two ethnic groups’ dances with their idea of Burmeseness on the basis of their own experience.

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 51 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu

However, this impetus was later tempered by the fact that the “princess solo court dance” oft en receives more Taiwanese news coverage because of its sumptuous and dazzling court costumes. As a result, in recent years, Chang’s troupe has performed the “princess solo court dance” in order to compete with Chen’s troupe. These examples demonstrate how ethnic inequalities can arise depending on who has the most infl uence in festivalizing Thingyan. By maintaining a fl exible concept of the Thingyan tradition and its performance, the most infl uential individuals or groups adopt some of their familiar or preferred art forms in order to support their sense of Burmeseness. Their interest in promoting a compelling Burmese identity relates to their double diasporic experiences. Previously, in order to forge an ethnic Chinese identity in Rangoon, they found it necessary to reinforce a sense of Chineseness by celebrating the Chinese New Year and holding large-scale stage shows and fl oat parades. The shows in Rangoon’s Chinatown were used to fi ght for a prominent ethnic visibility predicated on ethnic heritage, a silent resistance to the Burman regime’s ethnic oppression. Now, surprisingly, they have found themselves in the reverse position in Taiwan, celebrating the Burmese New Year by enacting the Burman artistic tradition. Members of the Burmese Chinese community strive to strengthen a sense of Burmeseness on top of their ethnic Chinese identity. Chen Tswei-fan claimed, “We are Burmese Chinese; we must display our Burmese heritage to local Taiwanese,” despite her minimal knowledge of Burman culture as well as her previous presentation of exclusively Chinese ethnicity.25 This new emphasis on Burmese identity suggests a dramatic change in the community’s self-image. It addresses what Tsuda calls “counter-hegemonic resistance” (2000:56). Such resistance is analo- gous to sociologist Manuel Castells’ “resistance identities,” which are “generated by those actors that are in positions/conditions deval-

25 Born in 1942, Chen Tswei-fan was a loyal KMT follower who chose to immigrate to Taiwan in the late 1960s. She now actively participates in community activities as an initiator and core member of The New Burmese Chinese Society.

52 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity ued and/or stigmatized by the logic of domination, thus building trenches of resistance and survival on the basis of principles diﬀ erent from, or opposed to, those permeating the institutions of society” (1997:8). In the same spirit, members of the community in Jhong-he strengthen their Burmese identity by performing an artistic tradition that had previously been alien to them.

Bodily (Mis)representation of Burmese Court Performance To represent the concept of cultural heritage in modern diasporic festivals, cultural inscription and encoding through bodily performances is a ubiquitous phenomenon. By masquerading in traditional outfi ts, expressing patt erned physical movements, and/or display- ing bodily practices, the corporeal body symbolizes the group that it is presenting. In theorizing the performance of the body in arts, much discourse has focused on race and gender. Cultures are also conceived as being bodily experienced (McClary and Walser 1994; Monson 1995; Wong 2000). Much work on these topics has prob- lematized the representation of “Other” bodies by members of a dominant culture. One can locate the issue of performing Jhong-he’s B urmese Chinese body in the moments when community members act as performers of classical court arts. In festivals particularly, there are experimental and playful ways in which bodily representation provides forms that allow performers to challenge and reshape their ethnic, artistic, and gender identities (Dürr 2004:129). Although visual representation of the body is powerful, it can enact misrepresentations and stereotyping. In the 2001 refi ned-style performance (fi g. 7), the only public live thachin gyi musical performance in Jhong-he, Burmese Chinese found the solemn image and physical bearing of the Burman court performers easy to emulate, based on their ethnic imagination. The clothes worn by the performers were similar to those of the female stage musicians and dancers at the Mandalay court (1857–85): hsang- myeit (a coiff ure with a top knot and loose hair left hanging on one side), htamein sein (a sashed skirt with a train), and so on. It is note- worthy that Burman history is used in this case to emphasize the

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 53 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu local ethnic identity. This is diff erent from the case in the Burmese government-patronized contexts, where such courtly performances are associated with the courtly authority of the junta.26 However, in Burma, the refi ned musicians have not usually dressed in this way since the musicians’ lost their courtly performing contexts in the late nineteenth century. The images of female court clothes are used by Burmese Chinese to evoke a salient Burmeseness, and cater to the Taiwanese popular demand for exotic bodies. In summary, diff erent types of Thingyan representation are based on individualized experiences of a double diaspora. This representation can be achieved because Burmese Chinese maintain a fl exible approach to the Thingyan tradition and performance. They aim to deliver a sense of Burmeseness. Whoever has the most infl uence in festivalizing Thingyan decides what aspects of Burmeseness that per- son, or the subgroup he or she represents, wishes to convey, and the decision results in the picture of Burmeseness that local Taiwanese receive. Burmese Chinese oft en freely appropriate music and dance forms from other ethnic groups, such as Shan and Baiyi, as well as to de-contextualize and borrow from Burman classical genres. By chan- neling diverse classical elements (costumes, hairstyles, and music) into a performance, the Burmese Chinese successfully articulate an explicit, fresh, and classical sense of Burmeseness. They believe that these ethnic portrayals enable them to display a Burmeseness that looks and sounds exotic and diff erent. This rhetoric and tactics fi t well with the recent promotion of multiculturalism in mainstream Taiwanese society, and with the resulting focus on tourism.

Festival Shifts: Spectaculars, Stereotyping, Resistance While Burmese Chinese positioned this festival at the outset as a communal social event, the Taiwanese government soon began to seize upon it as a site for cultural tourism that gloriﬁ es its version of

26 This style of dress is also seen in Burmese-sponsored musical performances, such as those in the Burmese media and in the Sokayeti national performing arts competitions.

54 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity

Fig. 7. In the 2001 Jhong-he Thingyan, Ma Tei danced in minthamee aka (on the right), accompanied by thachìn gyì, where the author played a Burmese harp and the vocalist, U Kyaw Win, sang while keeping time with fi nger cymbals and a wooden clapper. (Photograph by Gregory Talovich) multiculturalism. In response to this att ention from Taiwanese society, Jhong-he Thingyan has undergone two shift s. The fi rst shift corresponds to the commonality of the modern festivals that many scholars have identifi ed: “a shift away from the original ritual functions of festivals, towards an increasing spectacularization” (Richards 2007:261). In recent Jhong-he Thingyan festivals, the grandeur of the backdrops depicting court scenes and the performers’ costumes speaks to this spectacularization. Some argue that this shift suggests “a carnivalesque reversal of the everyday” (Richards 2007:261) in which commodifi cation and tourism co-emerge as covers, allowing playful identity change and legitimizing deviant practices. The cultural tourism specialist Greg Richards argues that this spectacularization reinforces the existing social order (Richards 2007:261). For example, in previous Jhong-he Thingyan festivals, an ethnic Chinese man’s drag-queen-like perfor-

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 55 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu mance was greatly applauded in 1998–2001, and a dance composed of cultural performances of Burma’s seven largest ethnic groups was oft en presented (1999, 2000, 2001, 2003, and 2005). This shift (i.e., the spectacularization, commodifi cation, and tourist packaging) is frequently characteristic of festivals initiated for minority cohesion, of which the Jhong-he Thingyan is a good example. To take this discussion further, I argue that, if a minority group’s primary ethnic identity is ever contested by the hegemonic power, their possible resistance may eventually defy the existing social order, leading to another shift in festival practices, as has happened in this case. The second shift in the Jhong-he Thingyan festival stems from Burmese Chinese resistance to the Taiwanese/hegemonic promotion of regional tourism, which involves misinterpretation of this group’s ethnicity. Based on the modern version of multiculturalism, the hegemonic strategy of ethnic integration oft en leads to deeper cultural encroachment. For example, to achieve mass appeal, Taiwanese offi - cial statements and the mass media have packaged Burmese Chinese in a romanticized fashion. Such ethnic stereotyping or even misconceptions eventually led in 2001 to a striking fi ssure between the local government’s promotion of a single intercultural Water Festival by merging Thai and Burmese elements and Burmese Chinese insis- tence on an exclusively Burmese Thingyan. Along with the idea of merging Thai and Burmese elements into a single festival, the Taipei County government not only relocated the Water Festival from Burmese Street to a larger square close to Jhong-he’s Metro terminal, but also renamed the Burmese Water Festival the Jhong-he Water Festival. These actions were all part of the government’s plans to boost a larger scale of tourism enterprises in Jhong-he. The Thingyan organizers found this unacceptable and thus continued to hold their version of the Water Festival concurrently with the government sponsored event. This “twin-festival” phenomenon prompted some debate about ethnicity issues and governmental involvement in local aff airs. Viewed from a larger perspective, the occurrence of “twin- festivals” is in fact a common type of festivalization shift , echoing

56 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity what Sabrina Magliocco calls “festival reclamation,” which is a form of resistance to modern festivalization. 27 Burmese Chinese fought for what they perceived as their ethnic-Chinese superiority over Thais, most of whom stay in Taiwan temporarily, working as low-income laborers. This resistance resulted in unexpected publicity, drawing unprecedented Taiwanese att ention to the uniqueness of the Burmese Chinese, as distinct from other peoples. Here, Burmese Chinese strategic shift s in the emphasis of their ethnic identity are triumphantly eff ective on the Thingyan platform, i.e., highlighting Burmeseness in contrast to mainstream Taiwanese culture on the one hand, and Chineseness compared to Thai ethnicity on the other. Yet, the entrenched misconception of the Taiwanese is somewhat diffi cult to eradicate. The electronic fl yer (fi g. 8) used to publicize the Jhong-he Water Festival in 2004 depicts the Thai style, instead of the Burmese style, since most Taiwanese consider the Burmese and Thai cultures as very similar. The Taiwanese government’s misleading appropriation of the Jhong-he Thingyan springs from Taiwanese racial stereotyping in general. For most Jhong-he citizens, Miandian Jie (Burmese Street), or its offi cial name Hua-Xin Jie, is known as a neighborhood densely populated by Burmese Chinese. It also has a cluster of shops infused with Burmese cultural markers, such as script, entertain- ment products (fi g. 9), language, food, and religious artifacts. The att ention given by most Taiwanese citizens to this social group must be att ributed to the increasing promotion and publicity of the Thingyan festival in Taiwanese discourses. Proponents of Taiwanese cultural policies have ensured the successful incorporation of this festival into the national project for celebrating multiculturalism and

27 “. . . a phenomenon in which subjugated groups reclaim or re-appropriate (re)presentations of them created by the dominant culture. Festival reclamation may entail the re-appropriation or recreation of a separate festival as an exquisitely local celebration aft er a larger festival has become a tourist att raction. Thus when a town’s primary festival no longer performs an identity narrative to which the population can subscribe, the community may choose to transform the festival through new activities, or to designate a new, separate festival to perform the identity with which the community identiﬁ es” (quoted in Richards 2007:262).

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 57 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu

Fig. 8. The electronic ﬂ yer advertising Jhong-he’s 2004 Thingyan.

Fig. 9. Man Thiri, a variety store on Burmese Street, which sells Burmese commercial audio-visual productions; the Burmese script explains that it carries Burmese, Shan and Indian music and movies. (Photograph by the author, November 2, 2005)

58 Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 Festivalizing Thingyan, Negotiating Ethnicity locality, as well as promoting tourism. In addition, common descrip- tions linked to the émigrés’ motherland, such as Jinsanjiao (Golden Triangle) and Nanyang (South Asian Ocean), have been used to strengthen Taiwanese impressions of the mysterious and exotic Jhong-he Burmese Chinese. Some terms, such as the joint Tai-Mian (Thai-Burmese) and Dongnanya yimin (Southeast Asian immigrants), are also intended to connect Burmese Chinese with the more familiar terms habitually used by Taiwanese to group foreign inhabitants in Taiwan.

Conclusion Ethnic festivals or intercultural festivals are now commonplace in most metropolises, since they are melting pots of disparate peoples. Festivalizing a subculture in a diasporic community highlights issues of heritage and tradition, along with the promotion of multiculturalism and tourism. However, an understanding of collective identity formation cannot be achieved by only studying that community’s festivals. Instead, one needs to unpack the intricate politics in the conﬂ icts and negotiations that occur behind the scenes. In studies where performances are the research focus, I suggest that these festivals can act as mediums for the display of transnational or diasporic identities by promoting a tangle of ethnicities, nationalities, locali- ties, and historical understandings, to raise their visibility in a new society. To festivalize Thingyan is to celebrate a moment of empowerment despite the Burmese Chinese community’s generally low social status. This echoes Deborah Wong’s notion that “[t]he festival does feel good. But this is partly the relief that comes when you stop banging your head against the wall—a temporary release from the everyday racist gaze of the city” (2004:133). As my study shows, the Thingyan festival articulates a multi-faceted Burmeseness, whereby Burmese Chinese and local Taiwanese can reference their individualized values, memories, cultural understandings, or imaginations based on their past experiences. However, this articulation of Burmeseness through Burman arts oft en fails to present a Burman version of authenticity. Rather, it speaks to these

Journal of Burma Studies, Volume 12 59 Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu two dominant groups’ dual-faceted Orientalist cultural stereotypes and misconceptions of Burman/Burmese and their traditions. Jhong- he’s Burmese Chinese partially manifest and retain their Chinese identity and subethnic aﬃ liations even while performing Burmese arts. Through a dynamic process of identity negotiation conducted within the parameters of their double diasporic sensibilities, the Jhong-he Burmese Chinese have moved from a place of social invis- ibility to being a noted community in Taiwan. This shift shows that Burmese Chinese enact important and ongoing artistic self-representation.

Hsin-chun Tasaw Lu is a research fellow in the Institute of Ethnology at Academia Sinica, Taiwan. She received her PhD in ethnomusicology in 2006 from the University of California, Los Angeles, with a dissertation entitled “Constructing Musical Identities among Burmese Classical Musicians in Burma and Its Diasporas.” From 2007 to 2008, she worked as a postdoctoral fellow in the Center for Burma Studies at Northern Illinois University under an International Fellowship funded by the American Association of University Women. Although her principal geo-cultural specialty is Burma, Southeast Asia, and their diasporas, her research focus also includes Asian American music and avant-garde musical fusions among art- ists across the Asia-Paciﬁ c region. Other scholarly interests include the issues related to representation, globalization, and identity as exempliﬁ ed by modern cultural performances. She can be reached at: [email protected].

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