Comments

You’re right Grasshopper, the Bush administration is rather surreal.

Thank you for your very informative thesis .

Although not entirely relevant : I have an interesting angle to the etymology of the Burmese term Shan and the confusion that exists in the modern Thai ( Siamese ) identity .

The assumption that one can use evidence from the Burmese language to link Shan and Siam is heavily flawed .

Siam ( based at the Chao Phraya basin ) was an assimilated product of Tai suzereinty over an existing Mon-Khmer ( plus malay ) population . The original population had already been recognised as Siem ( presumed to mean dark ) by the Angkor empire even prior to the traditional founding of the southern Tai polities of Sukhotai and Ayutthaya . ( Siam come sfrom a Khmer term ) The Burmese have never confused the Siamese with the more northern Tai or Lao . The Burmese term Shan extends to northern Lao , Lan Na and parts of Yunnan and NE India but not to the the polities further south which have been refered to since mandala overlap in the 1500s as Yodaya ( and never as Shan or even as Siam ) . This would presumably have been attributed to the observed phenotypical as well as language differences between the Tai and the Siamese : the central Thai dialect is very much a heavily Khmer influenced Tai dialect with many loanwords from Khmer and a tendency not only to use Rs but also to roll them .

The Tai migrated in a southerly direction and this is illustrated by the lesser influence of Tai culture by Khmer , Mon or Burmese the closer one gets to the epicentre of the original Tai culture which is in southern China . There is also a phenotypical change as ones goes north . ( the Bangkok anomaly is created by the Chinese presence ) . It seems unlikely given this assumed migratory path that either the Khmer or the Siamese themselves would have adopted a Burmese term and similarly it would be unlikely that the Burmese would adopt a Khmer word to refer to the Tai in their immediate vicinity. Indeed it is often postulated that Shan , Siam and Assam all have the same route meaning when infact these are names given to Tai by non-Tais in very separate areas . Therefore the similarities are probably coincidental .

The word “Shan” in Burmese is indeed written as S( with Y diacritic )- an and not R( with H diacritic ) an as one would expect conventially to create the Sh sound ( nevertheless both spellings create the same sound ) . Additionally when a diacritic is used to alter the primary sound it is always very merged into the one sound rather than creating 2 syllables ( therefore the Burmese rendering of Siam would be written as 2 words and not one : ie S-y -A-n and not Sy-an ) . More likely the term Shan comes from the Chinese term mountain . The lowland Burmese still and have always perceived the Shans as the original highlanders . ( the Kachin / Jingpo came much later )

I have also been exposed to ( as someone interest in Tai-Burmese history ) a recent wave of Tai nationalism in Laos , the Shan states and Sipsongpanna ( particularly from their diaspora abroad ) . Some of this nationalism lauds Thailand as THE successful Tai state and includes a desire to be part of this success but there is also a recognition that the similarities in culture and even language are greater between the peoples of Lan Na , Laos the Shan states of Burma and the Tai of Yunnan than with the Thais in and around the original Siam .

I have not come across Tais of any group using any term sounding like Shan or Siam to refer to themselves . The fashionable argument explains that the term Tai does not mean “free” as advertised by Thailand but simply refers to smaller groups of people from a particular locale : the correct original name of the Tai speaking collective is fashionably speculated as being Ai-Lao , from the mountain range Ai-Lao Shan .

There is also a small but growing dissent in Lan Na and Issan fueled by Lao nationalism against the perceived oppression of older Tai/Lao/ Lan Na identity by the heavily the Khmer influenced culture of central Thailand ( Siam ) . Ironically the Khmer also feel that not enough credit is given to them by the Thais regarding cultural interchange and influences .

It seems to met as if Bangkok continues to have an identity crisis . It appears that the modern elite ( mainly made up of SinoThais ) since the formation of the Chakri dynasty have been largely successful at : the promotion of a Tai identity which is Thai-centric and not Taicentric ; the suppression of Khmer heritage and identity ; the utilisation of Burma as the bogeyman . It is interesting that there is renewed interest in the Tai heritage but no interest in researching their Khmer heritage . I do feel that trying to link the etymology of Siam and Shan is far fetched and comes across as a symptom of a desperate to be fully included as Tai .

Perversely although Thailand is the most well known “Tai” nation it is the furthest from the Tai culture and identity as one could get .

( I am Burmese of Chinese-Shan descent )

Grasshopper,

Haven’t you been paying any attention?!? You’re not a terrorist unless Bush says you are, and Bush isn’t going to declare “Rocky” a terrorist.

The Chinese amongst themselves are not necessarily united, of course. Upcountry, I recently talked politics with Chinese who run the provincial chamber of commerce and the industry assembly. After joking about Banharn and identifying his “sae” they agreed that Thaksin was no good. But they did not refer to him as a fellow Chinese. Maybe, they are just so used to be amongst Chinese-Thais most of the time.

When they build roads like this, travel times drop from days to hours.

At least that was the case when, after several failed attempts and abandoned equipment by the side of the road, they finally completed the Maesai to Kengtung Road. I wonder what the Taunggyi to Kengtung road is like nowadays. That was quite a bottleneck.

Where are all those PAD people who were complaining about TRT’s lack of transparency and the failure/inability of parliament to scrutinise the TRT’s actions and conflicts of interest? They were right to denounce Thaksin and TRT on these things, but why are they suddenly struck dumb? Has Surachai Wungaoew said anything on this? Or did he just vote with the rest of the puppets?

The Irrawaddy article is perversely funny; Steve Law, Lo Hsin Han’s son, and Asia World are building a road that will just happen to run through one of the main heroin/methamphetamine producing areas in the world down to a major port facility? Is the highway going to go past Traders Hotel in Rangoon?

On a more mundane level, getting a highway through the Shan Plateau has got to be one tough engineering project.

I wonder how Stallone defines “action” and “revolutionary” as to the viewer it looks pretty much the same. And neither case is believable.
In the politically very incorrect corner of the mind though, it is a (illicit) pleasure to imagine one guy smashing the Tatmadaw.

Boy those were fun to read and look at. Where did Gnarly Kitty go, anyway? And do ministers really divulge all their intimate personal sex histories during news conferences? The cost of living thing was great too. (There are nice places for 7,000 near subway stations but the waiting lists are humungous at least a couple of months ago) The Sonthi and Surayud pair in the cartoons is hilarious and the Nak Kaan Muang jumping like frogs through a hoop! The knife through the law book and the professor in a big sweat is classic too. Who says there isn’t press freedom.