Ethnography in Contemporary Thai Cinematic Practices: A Case Study

Abstract

Expanding on the nexus of art and ethnography in contemporary Thailand, I take a case study approach in this paper to apprehend the film Din Rai Dan (Soil Without Land) through an ethnographic framework. Completed in 2019 by Nontawat Numbenchapol, Din Rai Dan was shot at the Shan State Army camp, at the border between Thailand and Myanmar. Straddling compelling visual aesthetics and thorough, on-site research, I regard ethnography in Din Rai Dan as the enabling factor in enacting artistic and interventive agency on the relation of the object-subject of inquiry, that is, the Shan State Army community. To do so, this study approaches Din Rai Dan from the perspectives of filmmaker and film subject, as well as filmmaker and film viewer. Together, these two viewpoints mutually reinforce the film’s ethnographic framework at the time of its making and deliverance to the public.

Also known as Soil Without Land, the film’s original Thai title ดินไร้แดน Din Rai Dan hints to the dearth of identity to a place that is the land on which we tread but do not belong. The word ดิน (din) is commonly combined with other words to denote earth, ground, or country. Used alone, din refers to the soil that plants need to grow and thrive, or the loam that sustains nature. Din is fundamental; it is what our planet is made of. ไร้ (rai) indicates something that is missing or lacking. แดน (dan) implies land or estate. Together, ไร้ แดน rai dan means borderless; while ดิน แดน din dan refers to manmade territory. Conjoined with the interlocutory rai, the title ดินไร้แดน Din Rai Dan literally means “no land,” evoking the absence, or lack, of the essence of society. Din Rai Dan is a figure of speech, a concept, that relays the condition of inclusion or exclusion to a nation or state—any state but in this case the Shan State.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The author wishes to thank Prof. Ashley Thompson and Prof. Patrick Flores for their comments and guidance. She extends her gratitude to the Burma Study Group UK for their support of the early drafts of this article. Most importantly, the author expresses her deep indebtedness to the artist and filmmaker Nontawat Numbenchapol for illuminating conversations and exchange of ideas on Din Rai Dan.

Notes

1 As stipulated in the 1947 Panglong Agreement, the Shan State had the constitutional right to secede from Burma, but the military coup prevented it.

2 For the definition of the diasporic community as dispersed from the original ‘center’ but that maintains the ‘memory’ of homeland, which is held as the eventual place of ‘return’, see James Clifford, ‘Diasporas’, Cultural Anthropology vol 9, no 3, 1994, p 304, in relation to William Safran (1991). I examine this by way of addressing the film’s reception by the Shan migrant community in Thailand.

3 After the last Saopha (king in Shan) died in custody of the military junta in 1962, his family fled into exile. His wife Mahadevi of Yawnghwe Sao Nang Hearn Kham and son Chao Tzang Yawnghwe founded one of the first SSA groups in 1964. Notably, the largest divisions are SSA-South and SSA-North.

4 For an overview of the ongoing Burma/Myanmar ethnic conflicts at the borderlands, see Martin Smith (1999). See also David Brenner (2019).

5 For details of the screening, see https://www.soas.ac.uk/cseas/events/22nov2019-film-screening-soil-without-land.html

6 Thailand has never been formally colonised, unlike neighbouring countries in the region. However, it has also struggled and still struggles to assert its own identity in the face of the country’s ongoing political instability, constitutional monarchy and strict military rule. For more information about the recent student-led protests, see BBC (2020)

7 Taylor makes her argument in response to James Clifford and Hal Foster. See also James Clifford (1988), and Foster (1966, 302).

8 Of particular relevance is Isaac Marrero-Guillamón (2018).

9 In terms of the ways the ethnographic method can be deployed critically, Crawford proposes to look at Trinh T. Minh-ha’s works as an example of unconventional methods.

10 On the topic of ethics, aesthetics and ethnography, see also Matthew Rampley (2005).

11 Nontawat Numbenchapol, interview with the author, January–August 2020

12 For an overview, see BBC (2014).

13 There have been other films portraying the Shan State, for instance, The Opium Trail (1996) and The Opium Warlords (1974) by pioneer Adrian Cowell, and Bertil Lintner’s several documentaries, chiefly Who is the Drug King of the Golden Triangle (1994). It is remarkable to see in the latter very similar scenes recorded in the army camp to what Numbenchapol shot in 2019, 15 years later. Recently, BBC published a series of short clips on the Shan State by journalist Simon Reeve. On the other hand, Twilight Over Burma (2015) by Sabine Derflinger (2015) offers a romanticized interpretation of the life of the last Saopha. Viewed in this context, it emerges clearly that the ethnographic approach taken by Numbenchapol is very distinctive.

14 For Numbenchapol’s thoughts on his agreement with the SSA to record life at the camp and its legacy, see also ‘ดินไร้แดน: กลุ่มชนที่ไร้บัตรผ่านในการไ ต่ระดับทางสังคม’, The Momentum, 27 August 2019, https://themomentum.co/soil-without-land-napat/

15 Natcha Tantiwitayapitak, conversation with Nontawat Numbenchapol on Inspiration, Access and People, in In Process of Time—Soil Without Land, Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre, Bangkok, 2020.

16 See David MacDougall (2006), with particular relevance to the physical experience of the film seen from different “eyes” in a way that dilutes the filmmaker’s sole perspective. In relation to the evocative quality of the images, see Crawford, “Film as Discourse.” Here, Crawford proposes to examine the ethnographic film from representation to evocation by analyzing the ways the ethnographic method can be deployed critically.

17 MacDougall comments on the creative component undertaken by the filmmaker in transcribing the subtitles from the source language to the target language, while maintaining conceptual specificity.

18 Here, Enwezor engages in the activist role of film documentary that is confined to the observation of the present.

19 The “eye of god” concept is recurrent in MacDougall’s analysis of ethnographic films. See also Barbash et al. (1996).

20 This is a good example of how the filmmaker’s selection of certain terms in the subtitles contributes to “recontextualize” their meanings. See also Zhang Jinghong (2012).

21 Anderson’s concept of nation building based on language, hierarchy (spiritual or otherwise) and temporality finds an interesting expression in this sequence where the group discusses the establishing of and belonging to a community, immanent to the human being.

22 MacDougall explores some of the differences between documentary and ethnographic praxis, especially where density of details may contribute to the characteristics of the subject. For his considerations on the corporeality of the camera’s body that intersects with the body of the director and subjects, and that contributes to the viewers’ physical experience of the film, see also MacDougall (2006).

23 Here, an interesting point is made on the eye of the filmmaker as differing from Foucault’s clinical gaze, suggesting it is not necessarily an ‘evil’ as it may provide access to blind spots and intuitive knowledge.

24 Tantiwitayapitak, conversation with Nontawat Numbenchapol.

25 Din Rai Dan, 00:32.

26 To note, “…performative ethnography differs from performance ethnography in that is meant to reflect the fact that ethnography itself…is a cultural performance.” See Eric Haanstad (2014, 99).

27 In our conversations, Numbenchapol reveals that the camp commander was displeased with the sequence of the shackled fugitive, which Numbenchapol retained anyway. As a result, Numbenchapol’s access to the camp is now more restricted and limited.

28 Ingawanij has conducted pioneering research on itinerant cinema in Thailand that, while specifically in relation to animism, has foregrounded key considerations on the relational and ethnographic elements in Thai filmmaking and audience engagement.

29 Here, he discusses the aesthetic nature of relational works, and their art value that lies in the interpersonal relationships that they engage.

30 Rirkrit Tiravanija’s work Pad Thai (1990) is one chief example of relational aesthetics. See Sandra Cate (2012).

31 For a comprehensive overview of film agency with respect to the audience, see MacDougall (2019), The Looking Machine.

32 For more comments about the film, see https://www.facebook.com/soilwithoutlandmovie

33 A comprehensive range of literature on digital content in anthropological studies and how this enacts, for instance, activism or other communal activities is available. See Postill and Pink (2012); see also Daniel Miller (2018).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Loredana Pazzini-Paracciani

Loredana Pazzini-Paracciani is an independent scholar and curator of Southeast Asian contemporary art. Her research and curatorial practice revolve around critical sociopolitical issues in Southeast Asia, advocating a counter-hegemonic and non-Western-centric discourse. Her articles have appeared in several academic journals such as Photographies, Frames Cinema Journal, Convocarte: Revista de Ciências da Arte, and M.A.tter Unbound, among others. Together with Patrick D. Flores, she co-edited the anthology Interlaced Journeys: Diaspora and the Contemporary in Southeast Asian Art, published in 2020 by Osage Art Foundation, Hong Kong. Notable museum exhibitions she has curated include Homecoming/Eventually (2021) at UP Vargas Museum, Manila, Philippines; Diaspora: Exit, Exile, Exodus of Southeast Asia (2019) at MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum, Thailand; and Architectural Landscapes: SEA in the Forefront for InToAsia: Time Based Art Festival (2015) at Queens Museum, New York. Loredana is one of the appointed curators for the Bangkok Art Biennale 2022. E-mail: [email protected]