Padaung
The Padaung (pronounced: [ páʡ.dɔːŋ ]; own names Kekawngdu and Kayan ; Burmese : ပဒေါင် လူမျိုး ) are an ethnic group that is attributed to the Karen and is mainly located in southeast Myanmar ( Shan and Kayah states ). Many Padaung women have an unusual tradition: from childhood on they wear a heavy necklace that deforms the shoulders and seems to elongate the neck. Resourceful businessmen thus revived ethno-tourism: Numerous women who moved to Myanmar from the late 1980sThose who fled Thailand or Vietnam are marketed in Schaudörfern as “Long Neck Karen” or “Giraffe (neck) women”.
General
External and own designation
Padaung is a foreign name and has its origin in the Shan language . The women call them Yan Pa Daung ("people wrapped in shiny metal"), alluding to the jewelry . The syllable pa should stand for “all around”, daung for “shiny metal”. The name was adopted by the Burmese and Thais, but both Padaung and the word Long Neck Karen coined by Thai tour operators are reluctant to hear those affected. The term Giraffe Women (" Giraffe Women ") is considered an insult. They used to call themselves Kekawngdu , but today they mostly only use the superordinate tribal name Kayan , which includes four clans. Women from different clans can be recognized by their costume and whether they wear the jewelry on their necks, arms and / or legs. The necklace is the trademark of the Kayan Lahwi clan.
origin
Even in the British colonial period, the Padaung were occasionally assigned to the peoples of the Mon - Khmer group. Their language, however, has striking parallels to the Karen language Taungthu , so that their membership of the Karen is now considered to be certain. As a result, they are also part of the Tibetan Burman peoples. As members of the Karen, the ancestors of the Padaung probably immigrated to Myanmar via southern China. Today it is unanimously assumed that this advance was part of the first wave of the Sino-Tibetan north-south migrations that occurred around the turn of the century in response to the expansion of the Han Chinese into central and southern China. At the latest towards the end of the first millennium and At the moment the first Karen-speaking groups have arrived in what is now Myanmar. (see also: Karen - origin )
habitat
Various sources from the last few decades put the Padaung unchanged at around 7,000 members, but there are no reliable figures from the present. Their traditional settlement area is in the mountainous southeast of Myanmar, west of the Salween River and south of Loikaw , the capital of the so-called Kayah state . It is barely 20 by 20 kilometers in size and extends over heights of 1000 to 1500 meters. Since the beginning of military attacks on the habitat of the hill tribes of Myanmar, many Padaung fled to Thailand alongside members of other ethnic minorities. There are currently around 1000 living in refugee camps and in tourist show villages. On the military-political situation in Myanmar see: Karen - Ethnic cleansing .
Way of life
Almost every available area is used for agriculture on the mountain slopes in native Myanmar. Due to the difficult topography, the Padaung built terraces and a sophisticated system of streams and canals over the centuries, which also provide water in the dry season. The aesthetics of these plants made her known as a master of terrace cultivation. They plant rice, corn, bananas and cotton from which they make their clothes. To round off the menu, they keep pigs and poultry and go on long hunts with trained dogs. Hunting successes, weddings and other occasions are extensively celebrated with a feast and home-brewed strong beer. The Padaung traditionally marry within their own group; Violations of the rules of endogamy will result in exclusion from the community. While in the past possible spouses were mostly chosen by the village elders, today their choice is largely free within the given framework, provided that the parents' consent is given. The usual age at marriage is currently 16 to 20 years. Divorce is possible.
Lore
According to their myth of origin, the Padaung descend from a female dragon with an armored neck: The dragon has transformed into a beautiful young woman and mated with a hybrid - half man, half angel - and gave birth to two offspring. Oral tradition goes on to say that the Padaung family ties used to be matrilineal . Apparently the tradition of matrilocality was maintained, i. H. newly wed couples settled at the home of the bride's mother and spent their lives there. - This still applies to some Karen groups today. However, it is popularly known that the Padaung men fell in such numbers at a time of rampant tribal feuds that survival as a people could only be ensured through the introduction of polygyny , which is said to have sealed the decline of matriarchy. - Polygyny is now a thing of the past. As a relic of the matrilinear order and as an indication of the authenticity of the tradition, however, a. The devotion of men to children is mentioned: Many Padaung men are experienced obstetricians and care for babies more intensively than is usual in patrilineal communities.
religion
Belief in ghosts
The Padaung's religious worldview is animistic (“everything is animated”). Like their neighbors in Kayah State, they believe in countless ghosts and demons. According to the old conception, most are malicious, some are peaceful, and few are good-natured. The evil spirits are regularly offered animal sacrifices or food and drink offerings to appease them, the others only on special occasions, e.g. B. Celebrations. The spirits of the deceased are also considered malicious: after deaths, they are driven out of the village using noise so that they do not haunt or ambush the houses of the bereaved.
Fortune telling
In the worldview of the Padaung, the future view plays an important role. Nobody makes a momentous decision without first hearing the village shaman's prophecy. The wise get their knowledge from dreams or from detailed observations of nature: Sometimes they judge a leaf picked from a tree, the splinter of a bamboo stick or the blood or the intestines of a sacrificial animal. Most of the time, however, they fall back on the tried and tested chicken bone oracle , which is popular with all Karen people. This form of prophecy, in which the bones of a sacrificial chicken are supposed to provide information about the future, serves as a decision-making aid before ceremonies and in matters of individual and community life.
Proselytizing
In the early 19th century, Christian proselytizing began among the hill tribes of Myanmar. American Baptists , but above all Catholic missionaries from Italy, enforced the conversion of entire villages to Christianity. Others turned to Buddhism or stayed true to traditional beliefs. Despite the missionary pressure against " pagan " customs, many rituals, especially cleansing ceremonies and the chicken bone oracle , have survived to this day.
The jewelery
Misinformation
Countless rumors and false reports circulate around the necklaces of the Padaung women ( Brom ). Some come from ethnologists who presented speculative theories as facts, others were circulated by tour operators and disseminated by tourists, but often also adopted by the media and published unchecked.
"Rings"
Contrary to popular belief, Padaung jewelry is not about individual "rings" that are gradually forged around the neck or around arms and legs, but rather high-pitched spirals with a diameter of 30 to 40 centimeters that only come through when put on trained, strong women (formerly shamans), turn by turn, can be adapted to the body shape. The raw material consists of brass and is made in Myanmar. In the past, valuable alloys made of gold, silver and brass or copper were used.
"Giraffe Neck"
The tradition of spiral jewelery gained regional fame as early as the Middle Ages. Repeatedly, Padaung women were presented to the Burmese court as an attraction in the royal palace in Mandalay , later passed around at receptions of the British viceroy and even - like both grandmothers of the Padaung writer Pascal Khoo Thwe - brought to England for the freak show of the Bertram Mills Circus . Soon travelers and anthropologists became interested in it. The Polish-French Asian researcher Vitold de Golish , who visited Burma in the 1950s, provided the first detailed description of the Padaung and coined the term “Femmes Girafes” (giraffe women). For a long time it was puzzled as to how the women's cervical spine could lengthen. The American doctor Dr. In 1979, John M. Keshishian put a padung in front of the X-ray screen and reveals the secret of its anatomy: To his surprise, neither the vertebrae nor the intervertebral discs were stretched. Instead, the weight of the metal had deformed the entire shoulder girdle, including the collarbones and upper ribs, downward so strongly that it gave the impression of an extremely long neck. The flat shoulder spiral , which optically defuses the sagging shoulders, reinforces this illusion.
"Protection from tigers"
What once caused the Padaung to burden themselves with the heavy jewelry and to accept the physical consequences has not been clarified with absolute certainty. The common thesis that the neck spirals once protected women from being bitten by tigers on their necks refer them to the realm of legend.
"Death penalty for adultery"
The claim that adulteresses were previously condemned to "death by breaking their necks" when they removed their necklaces is a legend because the slack neck muscles regain their strength. It is of course conceivable that certain offenses were punished with the removal of the jewelry in order to expose the punished to the disadvantageous consequences and to humiliate them: The break with tradition without valid reasons (e.g. illness) was for a long time considered a disgrace and resulted in exclusion from the community.
The tradition
application
The girls receive their first necklace, a spiral around 10 centimeters high, when they are around five years old. The shaman ( bedinsayah ) consults the chicken bone oracle to determine a favorable day on which skilled elderly women perform the ritual act. During the ceremony, the girls are also given silver-colored bracelets and a multi-turn spiral under each knee. Depending on its growth, the neck spiral is removed every two to three years and replaced by a heavier one with more turns. At around 15 years of age, the four- to six-turn shoulder spiral is added: it is flatter than the neck spiral and has a larger diameter, which is why it rests on the shoulder base and covers the lower edge of the neck spiral. From now on, a delicate third spiral rounds off the necklace: it is twisted vertically around the turns of the shoulder spiral and worn as a movable "extra" in the neck. The aesthetic adaptation of the spirals to the body takes several hours, depending on the bending effort and the number of turns. As adults, at the latest when they get married, women receive the jewelry that they often wear for life: The neck spiral then has 20 to 25 turns. Together with the shoulder spiral, the shiny tower made of polished metal can tower 30 centimeters and more over the shoulders. More and more young women nowadays do without the shoulder spiral, while the full leg jewelry, which traditionally reached from the ankles to below the knees, has been barely visible for a long time.
origin
There are many legends about the origin of the custom, which is said to be around 1000 years old. Based on the myth of origin, according to which the Padaung descended from an armored female dragon, the women wear the necklace to commemorate their mythical "dragon mother". Tradition, however, mentions limitations: only selected girls who were born on an auspicious day with a waxing moon are said to have been granted the privilege of the golden armor. From a rational point of view, the custom is usually explained with the previously common woman robbery: The shiny jewelry and the anatomical consequences would have made Padaung women recognizable from afar and therefore uninteresting for robbers. Women from other Karen groups, such as those of the Kayaw (“Big Ears”), would have lengthened their earlobes with weights and worn leg spirals for the same reason.
Further development
When the robbery of women went out of fashion, the jewelry survived as an amulet . According to their animistic view, it was able to ward off not only robbers but also disaster and banish demons because it gave women occult powers. In his award-winning memoir From the Land of Green Ghosts - A Burmese Odyssey , Padaung author Pascal Khoo Thwe writes:
“When we got sick, our grandmothers let us touch the“ tank ”. But that was only allowed to use his magical powers - to cure an illness or to ask a blessing for a trip. The "rings" were portable family shrines ... The women stowed their money in them. To us children they therefore appeared like walking Christmas trees, full of treasures and wondrous powers. "
Under the pressure of the Christian proselytizing that began around 1820, the role of the necklace was reinterpreted: the amulet advanced to the ideal of beauty and a female status symbol that has shaped the identity of the Padaung to the present day. From then on it signaled wealth, dignity and sublimity: the higher the spiral, the higher the rank of the wearer; their social standing and the chance of getting married increased with the number of turns. However, after the Second World War, the tradition experienced a decline. The advance of Christianity and increased contact with the outside world prompted women for the first time to cast off the spirals forever; others denied them to their daughters. It was not until the marketing of the custom in Thailand that - despite physical impairment - provided a new upswing.
The burden of beauty
The tank weighs up to 10 kilograms on the shoulders, and between 15 and 20 kilograms are sometimes added on the arms and legs. The shiny corset costs freedom of movement, it makes swallowing and hygiene difficult. Nevertheless, field work, fetching water and going to the market were traditionally done by women. In the scorching midday heat, they slide a rag under their neck corset: it should soak up the sweat and prevent the throat from rubbing against the coil. Apparently it is less strenuous for them to turn their entire upper body than just their head, which accelerates the relaxation of the neck muscles ( atrophy ). Their voices sometimes sound dull and resemble a hoarse cooing from the depths of a well. For a minimum of comfort, the women rest their heads on a stool. Those who have also decorated their legs - from the ankles to the calves to below the knees - with spiral jewelry will be noticed by the slowed pace. These women struggle to bend their legs while sitting, so they usually stretch them out and expose the soles of their feet, which is frowned upon according to Buddhist etiquette. Careful care is required so that the spirals retain their golden yellow shine: They are regularly cleaned with wet straw and then polished with white artificial pearl necklaces. Amazingly, Padaung women can cope with steep terrain (terraced fields) and ladders (stilt houses) despite restricted freedom of movement, while the girls like to play volleyball. The weight of the jewelry does not appear to have any adverse effects on their health or life expectancy. The widespread claim that women with necklaces have to drink with straws because they cannot tilt their heads back is also wrong: it is enough to tilt the glass a little higher.
Acceptance of jewelry
To remove the jewelry, the diameter of the tightly fitting spirals is manually expanded. Those who undergo a medical examination (e.g. X-rays) usually put the jewelery back on for aesthetic reasons, as the skin underneath has welts and bruises and is light-colored. In addition, the hanging shoulders become visible, and after years of wear the armor has a considerable support effect, without which the head can only be kept upright with effort and hardly be turned. Women who take off their necklaces forever complain of severe discomfort at first: they make do with neck supports and lie a lot. The muscle wasting is obvious and the risk of breaking your neck in a fall increases. While the neck muscles quickly recover, the deformations of the skeleton are irreversible. Women often wear a wide scarf to hide their sagging shoulders.
Marketing of the customs
Beginnings in Myanmar
When the Karen rebels intensified armed resistance after the coup under General Ne Win (1962), the Kayah state was closed to tourism. Nevertheless, the Burmese state tourism authority relied on the Padaung as a draft horse and repeatedly brought women from the restricted area to selected places in order to display them in front of tourists. However, bloody military actions on the Karen Territory triggered the first waves of refugees to Thailand in the 1980s. The Padaung also got caught between the fronts: displacement, rape, forced labor, the systematic murder and destruction of villages by the military regime prompted many to join the stream of refugees (see: Karen - ethnic cleansing ).
Show villages in Thailand
In the late 1980s, the first "Long Neck" show village was opened in the neighboring northern Thai province of Mae Hong Son . To the women who referred it, a life in the open-air museum seemed more meaningful than idly in a UN refugee camp hoping for the end of the conflict in Myanmar. The tourism project became a big hit and two more villages were soon built near the border. However, everyday life for women is dreary. They sell their likeness on postcards, weave, offer souvenirs for sale and not only suffer from the fact that they are not allowed to leave the villages. Although they have always been used to curious glances, and they don't mind the clicking of the cameras, they often have to accept that their privacy is violated. This is ensured by watchdogs who want to satisfy the paying customers: for an entrance fee of 250 baht (approx. 5 euros) per person, they occasionally show the women and even open the back of their blouses to demonstrate their sagging shoulders. The husbands do not protest. They only appear marginally in the Schaudörfern and suffer from the social upheavals. Since women have been providing for families with their income, the role of the former heads of families has wavered: They do jobs that women used to do, or pass the time playing and drinking. The desire to return to Myanmar one day, if the political situation permits, is equally present among men and women. Contacts with the tribesmen across the border are kept unofficially.
Cash flow
The sale of tickets and souvenirs is a lucrative business, of which the Padaung only get a fraction: women with jewelry are paid around 1,500 baht (approx. 30 euros) a month to run the souvenir shops, while those in the Men living in Schaudörfern receive a so-called "rice allowance" (food allowance) of 260 baht (approx. 5 euros) per month. That's just enough to survive. Whoever collects the lion's share of the revenue is guarded like a state secret. Unofficial sources state that the amount will be divided: a third will go to tourism managers, a third to Thai political functionaries and various authorities, and the last third to be used for the procurement of weapons and ammunition in the war chest of the Karenni rebel army in Myanmar to defend against the regime.
criticism
"Human Zoo"
For a long time, the Thai tourism industry has lived, among other things, from marketing the mountain tribes in the north of the country as "culturally intact". Advertising brochures pretend that a trekking tour illustrates the traditional way of life of these peoples. - The argument that tourist dollars would help to preserve ancient cultures has been cashing in for decades. The reality is different: the supposed insight into “archaic” worlds including indigenous music and dance performances is a Kafkaesque show. Today the inhabitants of the mountain villages are informed in good time by mobile phone when a group of tourists is approaching and changing is due. The Padaung Open Air Museum business is an evolution of this concept. Eight show villages are now to be in operation, the most recent was opened in May 2008 at the seaside resort of Pattaya in the south of the country, around 90 minutes by plane from the former pilot project in the mountainous north. For a long time the Padaung complied with the given rules without any ifs or buts and played “natives”, especially since they were still faring better in material terms than the 140,000 or so Burmese who were accommodated in UN refugee camps. There was no lack of envy: some camp residents, but also Thais, regard the Padaung as work-shy parasites who only live from being gazed at. Criticism elsewhere was raised relatively late: in 2008, employees of the UN refugee agency UNHCR in Thailand publicly criticized the Schaudörfer as “human zoos”. New Zealand and other states had offered the Padaung asylum, but the Thai government waved them off: They refused to allow them to leave - with reference to equal treatment for all refugees.
Protests
The disappointment took off. Many women complained that they were being held like prisoners because they were not given passports and were not even allowed to leave the show villages because “free contacts” with tourists could reduce the income of the show villages. They criticized their unclear legal status and the travel ban, which they suspected more economic than political reasons, and denounced the poor payment behavior of the managers. Some women took off their necklaces in protest and ended up in the UN camp despite the offer of asylum because they were no longer an attraction. However, business people in northern Thailand feared the boycott would get out of hand with economic consequences for the entire region, whereupon the restrictive exit policy was relaxed.
Collections
United Festivals Weltarchiv, Vienna
literature
- Vitold de Golish: Unexplored India . Braun, 1955
Web links
Individual references, comments
- ↑ a b c Ernst Stürmer: Long-necked attraction . In the magazine: Alle Welt , July-August 1995 (Vienna), page 41 ff.
- ↑ Section How Should I Refer to the People . In: Huay Pu Keng FAQ
- ↑ a b c d e f g Sir George Scott: Among the Hill Tribes of Burma - An Ethnological Thicket . In: National Geographic Magazine , March 1922, pp. 293 ff.
- ^ Section Background and Tradition of the Neck Coil . In: Huay Pu Keng Background & Culture
- ^ Jean-Marc Rastorfer: On the Development of Kayah and Kayan National Identity . Southeast Asian Publishing House, Bangkok, 1994.
- ↑ RD Renard: Kariang: History of Karen T'ai Relations from the Beginnings to 1923. University of Hawaii, 1979, page 37 f. and 46 f.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k Werner Raffetseder : The legacy of the Padaung . Image and sound documents from Ban Nai Soi, Thailand, April 2000. United Festivals Weltarchiv, Vienna.
- ↑ James W. Hamilton: Ban Hong - Social Structure and Economy of a Pwo Karen Village in Northern Thailand . (Diss.) Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1965, 133.
- ↑ a b Melford E. Spiro: Burmese Supernaturalism . Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1967.
- ↑ Khon Eden Phan: The Narratives, Beliefs and Customs of the Kayan People . Kayan Literacy and Culture Committee, Mae Hong Son, 2004.
- ↑ a b c d Pascal Khoo Thwe: From the Land of Green Ghosts - A Burmese Odyssey . HarperCollins Publishers, London, 2003. ISBN 978-0-00-711682-9
- ^ Vitold de Golish: Expédition chez les Femmes-Cauchemar. In: Match. Paris 1957.
- ^ A b John M. Keshishian: Anatomy of a Burmese Beauty Secret . In: National Geographic Magazine , June 1979, pp. 798 ff.
- ↑ a b c d Thilo Thielke: Uprising in the human zoo . In: DER SPIEGEL 41/2008 , see SPIEGEL ONLINE , Oct. 6, 2008.
- ^ Edith T. Mirante: Hostages to Tourism . In: Cultural Survival 1990
- ↑ The three most famous show villages in Mae Hong Son province are named (Ban) Nai Soi, (Ban) Huay Seau Tao and Huay Pu Keng .
- ↑ Michael Steinmetz: What are "mountain peoples" ? In: THE FARANG online newspaper
- ↑ Connie Levett: Burma's Young Long-Neck Women Struggle to Break Out Of Thailand's 'Human Zoo.' In: The Age . January 13, 2008.