Seeking Thai Gender History
Using historical murals as a source of evidence
What do scholars do when there is no written evidence? Use oral evidence, yes, but not if the period in question is prior to the twentieth century AD. This is the problem that faces would-be historians of women, of gender, and indeed social historians for Thailand in general. The sacking of Ayudhya by the Burmese in 1767 and the subsequent fighting virtually destroyed all the documents of that centralized state. A couple of documents and one or two remarks in dynastic histories do still exist, there are some useful comments by foreign visitors and one or two writings in stone (although the famous Ramkhamhaeng Stone, once dated from the thirteenth century, has now been reduced to the level of a nineteenth century artefact), but that is about all for sources on social history. Are we at an impasse and forced to rule out a thousand years or more of Thai social history?
By NAPAT SIRISAMBHAND & ALEC GORDON
What can we say, for example, about the gender division of labour in Thailand/Siam during the nineteenth century AD? There are two points of view (whose authors shall be nameless!) that illustrate the stalemate very well; one argues that women did all the farm work whilst the other claims that women did no work at all outside the house. Neither camp, however, offers evidence to support its views. This does not necessarily need to be the case, we reckon, because there is visual evidence. We have at our disposal the immensely rich and beautiful treasures of the murals in historic Thai temples. There are at least one hundred temples in Thailand in which one can find very old, narrative, genre murals, some of which date as far back as the seventeenth century AD. Amongst other things, these murals show ordinary people and their relations with one another.
The main themes of all temple paintings in Thailand are, of course, religion and both religious and political morality. The religious parts of the murals dictate what ought to be done; the rest deal with real life. Most paintings illustrate one of the Jataka stories dealing with the activities of Buddha during the approximately 455 lives he lived before his historical existence plus the story popular with Thai muralists, Buddha's life itself. Normally the murals have a three-part division: at the top, deities are looking on, the activity of the main story is depicted in the middle, which mainly involves Buddhadasa and princely characters and, thirdly, at the bottom is a representation of the day-to-day goings-on of ordinary people. We are largely concerned with this third part, which frequently merges with the middle part, because this is where most of the portrayals of gender relations are displayed.
Division of labour
Our first study concerned the relatively scarce genre murals of the Ayudhya style, roughly dating from AD 1350 1800.1 In these murals, we found thirty-one work activities described. When looking at them in terms of the gender-based division of labour, there were a total of eighteen tasks performed by Thai women and twenty-three by Thai men; of these, eight tasks were done by women only, and the number of tasks performed by Thai men alone were nine; and eleven tasks were shown being carried out by either gender. Given the current expectations of gender roles, there were some surprises, namely that there are several paintings of women elephant drivers. Although this probably was not an occupation held by numerous women, its depiction in the murals gives cause for much thought because, today, being a mahout is exclusively a male domain. There are indications of gender blindness on the part of many present-day observers who assume that what holds today held yesterday. There is also evidence that it is the rules applying to gender, and not sexual weakness, that preclude women from undertaking such an occupation today. Other unusual tasks shown to be performed by women include bearers, management, and pottery-making, as well as the expected ones of weaving, food vending, and cooking. Men are occasionally shown preparing food, caring for children, fishing, and soldiering.
Two mysteries
In addition to the division of labour, the images in the murals reveal unequal sexual relations, women as male property, unfair punishment, and female peer pressure. Many of the murals depicting the common people are not only extremely beautiful, like those in the upper parts, but are also very amusing indeed. Two mysteries also appeared. Given that rice cultivation must have been the principle task for most Thai families, why did we find only one rendering of it in a painting dated about 1890? The second concerns the appearance of Mae Dhorani, the Earth Goddess, in the great scene where the evil Lord Mara attempts to distract Buddha from the meditation that will lead him to Enlightenment. This scene is portrayed in almost every temple in Thailand. The armies raised by Mara are defeated, but only because Mae Dhorani wrings water out of her hair thus sweeping them away. This action by a woman saved the very foundation of a religion that, by and large as it developed in Thailand, came to hold no further important place for women.
These and other aspects are grounds for further investigation (provided funds are forthcoming) as proposed in our study of mural paintings of the Rattanakosin period from AD c.1800 to c.1920. These murals are far more numerous than those of the Ayudhya period, partly because, being from a later date, they have not had the same opportunities to fade or to be wiped out, and partly because several of these Wats are royal temples of the present dynasty and therefore cared for. This much richer collection promises to reveal much more about gender relations. Moreover, given that these murals would cover the period usually seen as being the period of transition towards capitalism in Thailand (Siam), generally regarded as having begun in the 1850s, we may even be able to uncover changes in the situations of women for which this development in Thai society is responsible.
Note
1 Sirisambhand and Gordon, Journal of the Siam Society, vol. 87, parts 1 & 2 (1999)
Napat Sirisambhand is a rural sociologist and Senior Researcher at Chulalongkorn University Social Research Institute (CUSRI). She specializes in gender and social aspects of development and has conducted field work in Thailand, Laos, Canada, and India.
E-mail: gnapat@chula.ac.th
Alec Gordon (MA; SOAS, London) has combined political economy and economic
history in research for many years in and on Indonesia and Thailand. Presently
he acts as honorary consultant at CUSRI and the Social Research Institute
of Chiang Mai University and conducts research on colonial plantations
and the history of Thai women.
E-mail: nagordon@usa.net