EXPLORATIONS a graduate student journal of southeast asian studies Volume 9 Spring 2009 IN THIS ISSUE: Marcos' Philippines and the Thrilla in Manila THOMAS QUINN | Charting the Maritime Realm of the Sama of Southeast Sulawesi, Indonesia LANCE NOLDE | Young Women’s Suicides in Early Twentieth-Century Vietnam LINH VU | The Phenomenon of Indonesian Muslim Dolls | A. BUDIYANTO Dear readers – It is with great pleasure that we present the 2009 issue of EXPLORATIONS graduate student journal of Southeast Asian studies. The following pages touch on a diverse array of topics, from Muslim dolls to a dark period between those darker in Cambodia’s history to linguistic code-switching in Malay to the sea people who call Southeast Asian waters home. Equally diverse are the authors and editors who contributed to this issue, a committed group of burgeoning Southeast Asianists hailing from countries around the globe. In a long list of people to thank, they certainly are the first who come to mind. Their dedication and patience in bringing this journal to print are greatly appreciated. We are equally obliged to Kelli Swazey and Margaret Bodemer, the past editors of EXPLORATIONS, for entrusting us with the journal. Their foresight and organization allowed us to step directly into the operation of what was already a well-oiled machine. Dr. Barbara Andaya and Dr. Liam Kelley provided indispensable faculty support, and we also thank the University of Hawai‘i’s Center for Southeast Asian Studies for sharing their resources, their office, and the assistance of their very talented Outreach Coordinator Paul Rausch. Christian Razukas is the man behind the layout magic, and his many sleepless nights will not be soon forgotten. We also thank the University of Hawaii‘s Student Activity and Program Fee Board (SAPFB) whose generous support made the print version of this journal possible. In many ways, this issue represents the changing face of Southeast Asian scholarship – from the disciplinary diversity of the topics explored, to the identities, nationalities, and research interests of the explorers themselves. Enjoy. ! Editors, ! Rachel Hoerman and Deanna Ramsay EXPLORATIONS is a student publication of the Editors Southeast Asian Studies Students Association in Rachel Hoerman and Deanna Ramsay conjunction with the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa and partially funded by Editorial Staff the Student Activity and Program Fee Board at the Katia Balassiano University of Hawai‘i. Andrea Bertoli The principal mission of EXPLORATIONS is to offer a Michelle Daigle forum for graduate students to present research relating to Phillip Drake Southeast Asia. This forum introduces the work of graduate Jonas Ruel G. Estrada students studying Southeast Asia to others in the field, Mohamed Effendy Bin Abdul Hamid encourages the publishing of scholarship by those from Tamara Luthy Southeast Asia about the region and fosters a sense of Jesica McDonough community among those interested in Southeast Asia from Christian Razukas around the globe. EXPLORATIONS embraces the Matthew Reeder diversity of academic interests and scholastic expertise of its Tani Sebro authors, and hopes to encourage discussion both within and Ithi Sophonpanich across disciplines in topics concerning Southeast Asia. Kanjana Thepboriruk The views expressed in EXPLORATIONS are those of the Jy Xiong authors and not necessarily those of the editorial board. If you are interested in submitting your work to Faculty Advisors EXPLORATIONS, have questions or comments or or are Barbara Watson Andaya interested in participating in the production of Liam C. Kelley EXPLORATIONS, please contact the editors at: [email protected], or EXPLORATIONS c/o CSEAS, CSEAS Coordinator University of Hawai‘i at Manoa, 1890 East-West Road, Paul Rausch Honolulu, Hawai‘i 96822 USA. ISSN 1945-8606 [print] ISSN 1945-8614 [web] EXPLORATIONS: in Southeast Asian Studies Volume 9 | Spring 2009 Articles Playing with Piety: The Phenomenon of Indonesian Muslim Dolls ! A. Budiyanto!!!!!!!!! 3 “Great is Our Relationship with the Sea”: Charting the Maritime Realm of the Sama of Southeast Sulawesi, Indonesia ! Lance Nolde!!!!!!!!! 15 Drowned in Romances, Tears, and Rivers: Young Women’s Suicide in Early Twentieth-Century Vietnam ! Linh Vu!!!!!!!!! 35 The Geopolitics of Cambodia During the Cold War Period ! Sok Udom Deth !!!!!!!! 47 Thailand: The Symbolic Center of the Theravada Buddhist World ! Melody Rod-Ari !!!!!!!! 55 Interrogating National Identity Ethnicity, Language and History in K.S. Maniam's The Return and Shirley Geok-lin Lim's Joss and Gold ! Dashini Jeyathurai !!!!!!!! 65 When Malakas Met “The Greatest”: Marcos’ Philippines and the Thrilla in Manila ! Thomas Quinn !!!!!!!! 79 Articles (cont.) Consumerism and the Emergence of a New Middle Class in Globalizing Indonesia ! Mohammad Hasan Ansori !!!!!!! 87 Code-switching in Kuala Lumpur Malay: The “Rojak” Phenomenon ! Husni Abu Bakar !!!!!!!! 99 Photo Essay Faun Pii: Northern Thai Trance Dance ! Michael Sakamoto!!!!!!!! 111 Notes from the Field Boxing Day in Cotabato ! Shane Joshua Barter!!!!!!!! 115 Four Days in Papua ! J. Eli Margolis !! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! 117 Being a “Santri” ! Nihayatul Wafiroh !!!!!!!! 123 Book Review Benny Widyono’s Dancing in Shadows ! Alvin Lim!!!!!!!!! 127 A. Budiyanto Playing with Piety The Phenomenon of Indonesian Muslim Dolls A. BUDIYANTO Universitas Gadjah Mada AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY A. Budiyanto is a Ph.D. student at the Indonesian Consortium of Religious Studies at Universitas Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. This paper is part of preliminary research for his dissertation entitled “Framing Piety, Visualizing Islam–Visuality and Identity in the Age of Consumption amongst Indonesian Muslims.” Budiyanto received his M.A. from the Center for Religious and Cross Cultural Studies. The author can be reached at [email protected]. Introduction: Muslim Dolls as Religious considering conflicting opinions among Islamic Visual Culture authorities regarding dolls—but these parents also had pragmatic concerns regarding the safety, educational Muslim dolls are a new phenomenon within value, and affordability of toys. Toy makers developed contemporary popular Islamic culture, particularly in creative strategies in order to take these concerns into Indonesia. While most contemporary Indonesian account. Islamist movements like Salafism (neo-Wahabism) are deeply influenced by transnational Islamist ideologies Muslim dolls and other popular “Islamic”imagery in and thus reject any figures of humans,1 moderate popular culture—such as busana Muslim (Islamic Salafists often allow children to play with dolls. This clothes), Islamic stickers, Islamic music performances, acceptance is based on the Hhadits that spoke about among others—represent a huge material database for Aisyah, the youngest wife of the Prophet, playing with a “religious visual culture.” Currently, there are various type of doll when she was about nine years old. scholars engaged with contemporary Islamic visual Despite this acceptance, many conservatives still argue culture in Indonesia: Budiyanto (2006) and Lukens- that Aisyah’s doll was not precisely a human-shaped Bull (2005) have written about Islamic stickers, while doll. Carla Jones (2007) and Nuraini Juliastuti (2003) have examined Muslim clothing. Most of these scholars have Muslim dolls emerged in Indonesia in 2005, soon utilized various media and cultural studies theories and after the reformation era2 when Islamic movements methods in their study of Islamic visual culture. In emerged more prominently in public spheres, marking recent decades, as Brent Plate (2002) notes, religious a modern turn in the evolution of Islamic movements. scholars have shifted away from “verbal-textual” Along with this transition into modernity, members of doctrines toward the visual and material artifacts various Muslim organizations that married and built constituting religious “practice.”3 families began to consider secular toys for their David Morgan (2000) similarly observes visual imagery’s significance children’s entertainment, particularly dolls. Not only in religious practices: were Muslim parents concerned about whether toys were or were not Islamic in nature—a crucial point Volume 9, Spring 2009 3 Indonesian Muslim Dolls [T]he new study of religious visual culture begins Indonesian Muslims’s reception and interpretation of with the assumption that visual artifacts should not the specifically Indonesian character of these Islamic be segregated from the experience of ceremony, education, commerce or prayer. Visual practices dolls. help fabricate the worlds in which people live and therefore present a promising way of deepening our understanding of how religions work.4 Barbie: A Story of the Globalized ’Secular’ Doll Both Morgan and Plate stress the significance of The birth of the modern doll is represented by the visual imagery, not only as a component of production of a global phenomenon known as Barbie. performances, rituals, and ceremonies, but also for Barbie was created in 1959 by Ruth Handler, and is, in understanding these practices themselves. many ways, an icon of Western consumerism, Beyond contributing to and serving as a lens through celebrating Western aristocratic and bourgeois values which to analyze rituals, religious visual imagery can and lifestyles. To those living in the non-Western serve as a point of departure into discourses relating to world, this ideal of a modern, high-class lifestyle has broader