Islam, Masculinity and the Crisis of Conversion in Lee Kok Liang's ‘Ibrahim Something’

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Notes

1. Malaysia's former Prime Minister, Dr Mohammad Mahathir for example, is of Indian-Muslim heritage.

2. In her 1978 sociological study on Chinese Muslims, Judith Nagata arrived at a somewhat similar observation as well. She writes: ‘Although in specific instances it is recognized that the latter [that is, Indonesians, Indians and Arabs] are by origin of different bangsa (“race”), this is often submerged by the common religious affiliation, and the effective ethnic boundary adopted for most purposes is a religious rather than a “racial” one. Yet in the case of the Chinese, it seems that bangsa is always salient, and that this constitutes the operational and sole ethnic boundary marker, despite the common faith’ (Nagata 110).

3. All references to ‘Ibrahim Something’ are from Death is a Ceremony and Other Stories (93–106).

4. Another similarity with Flowers in the Sky is the sequencing of the story over two days (in Flowers, it is three), signalled by time of day.

5. I want to emphasise that this story reflects the dilemma of a single Chinese person with regard to conversion to Islam. As such, my interest is in what the story, through theoretical investigation, tells us; this is not an attempt to pathologise such converts, much less criticise the choice of being Muslim and/or the Islamic faith.

6. Although Ibrahim's wife's ethnicity is never mentioned, that she is Malay can be inferred from the narrative.

7. Although Lee sets his story during the Japanese Occupation, that his story is written in the 1990s would certainly inscribe contemporary political and social realities onto it as well. As such, this story can be read as a veiled criticism of the constitutionally defined notion of Malayness that immediately segregates the race and places Muslim converts, especially the Chinese, in precarious situations.

8. The third being husband–wife. But from a hierarchical point of view, it is clear that Chinese kinship, at least that which Freedman posits, clearly privileges patriliny and men. For a useful criticism of Freedman's model and suggestions of alternatives, see Charles Stafford where he discusses kinship patterns based on yang and laiwang models which, although existing subordinately alongside patrilineal kinship, are nevertheless significant as well. Yet, having noted Freedman's conceptual shortcoming and Stafford's more inclusive models, I have to agree with Ulf Mellström's point that Freedman's model remains crucial as ‘these three relationships hold as formative and important in the […] successive order of the joint family, though not necessarily when it comes to stem or elementary families. In the latter two forms, the mother–son relationship is generally an emotional strong bond, although it does not carry the same weight in family ideology’ (Mellström 74).

9. Despite Ma's observation of a more positive trend amongst Chinese-Muslims, her conclusion remains somewhat ambivalent: ‘armed with wider Islamic knowledge, [Chinese-Muslims] find it easier now to resist re-assimilation into the non-Muslim Chinese community they once belonged to. At the same time, the increased awareness of Chinese culture and language make it easier for them to avoid total assimilation into the Malay culture and community to which they now partly belong’ (Ma, ‘Shifting Identities’ 107). Resistance towards assimilation and partial belonging seem, to me, merely a reification of this community's already abject status, and I do not see how ‘wider knowledge’ will help the situation.