日　時：2015年9月25日（金） 15：00- 18：00

会　場：京都大学東南アジア研究所稲盛財団記念館２階201号室（東南亭）/ Tonan-tei (Room 201), Inamori Foundation Memorial Building, Kyoto University

プログラム：
15:00 – 17:30
Human, Animal, and Thing: Paradox of Security along the Thai-Burmese Borderland
Decha Tangseefa (Thammasat University; Visiting Scholar at the Center for Southeast Asian Studies of Kyoto University.)

17:30-18:00
Buddhist Holy Man Khruba Bunchum and Transnational Community of Faith at the Thailand-Burma Borders
Amporn Jirattikorn (Chiang Mai University; Visiting Scholar at the Center for Southeast Asian Studies of Kyoto University.)

要旨：
(1) Human, Animal, and Thing: Paradox of Security along the Thai-Burmese Borderland
Decha Tangseefa

The Thai-Burmese borderland has been a spectacular “contact zone” of people, culture, capital, and disease throughout its history. All these transnational forces have entwined like brush strokes coloring this space in-between. At present, it has become one of the most exciting borderlands in Asia, albeit with a lot to be concerned. Until Burma/Myanmar’s historic election on November 7, 2010, memories regarding the borderland had predominantly been scripted with ethnic strife, war, and/or dictatorship. However, forced migration to Thailand due to war and dictatorship is, for the most part, not the norm of the day. Aspiration for economic prosperity greatly relying on cheap migrant workers – legal or not – has been the dominant social beat of the borderland’s lifeworlds. Amidst these changing politico-cultural landscapes, this talk will explore key kaleidoscopic transnational forces that have become brush strokes of wispy lines, rough edges, or dark colors portraying this canvas filled with humans, animals, and things. The talk will be based on a few research projects since 2008 that have been aimed to both study and intervene.

For the “human,” this talk will discuss the interrelatedness of ethnicity, religion, and alterity, by juxtaposing lives inside and outside a so-called “refugee camp,” framed here as a space of exception. For the “animal,” it will touch upon the emergence of a particular strain (artemisinin-resistant Plasmodium falciparum) of malaria – which has been of the highest concern within the global community of malaria experts – as well as ways in which a social scientist can engage. As for the “thing,” the talk will focus on a thing in space, i.e., the Mae Sot special economic zone (SEZ). With the advents of this SEZ as well as the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC), however, the borderland’s social fabric is tremendously transforming at the rate and extent never witnessed before. The talk will end with some notes on what could be termed as a paradox of security by locating these transnational forces next to the raison d’être of the nation-state amidst the AEC aspiration and ask: How will the lives of marginal peoples along the borderland be amongst the brush works of Thailand, Burma/Myanmar, and ASEAN?

Decha Tangseefa‘s research and teaching interests are political theory, critical international studies, and cultural studies, especially relating to migration and border. He has contributed to major anthologies and journals in Thai and English. Apart from teaching political science at Thammasat University, he has also been working with the civil society along the Thai-Burmese borderland. From 2008 to 2011, he was also teaching in a college in a refugee camp.

(2) Buddhist Holy Man Khruba Bunchum and Transnational Community of Faith at the Thailand-Burma Borders
Amporn Jirattikorn

Khruba Bunchum, a contemporary Thai monk with a significant Burmese ethnic minority following, rose to fame after being forced to leave Myanmar for his allegedly involvement in ethnic politics. Upon returning to Thailand and having spent an entire three years of meditation in an isolated cave, he has gained a number of new followers among the wealthy and middle class Thais as well as Myanmar military elites. Recently Khruba Bunchum has been reportedly invited by President Thein Sein to return back to Myanmar and even given a Burmese identification card, allowing him to travel in and out of the country freely. What is his attraction amongst non-Buddhist minority groups, and how does the changing Burmese state view this movement? This paper analyzes the diverse, transnational community of faith that transformed the practice of worshipping holy men, arguing for a new approach in studying cross-border religious movements that draws upon religious, political and media sources to create a system of meaning.

Millenarianism led by holy men in Thailand and Myanmar from the seventeenth through the twentieth centuries has been understood primarily within the context of a single well-defined ethnic community, neglecting the dynamics of cross-boundary movements. The emergence of a new holy man in the Myanmar-Thailand border today presents a case of changing religious environment, to which the old millenarian analysis is no longer applicable.

Amporn Jirattikorn is a lecturer at the Faculty of Social Sciences, Chiang Mai University. Amporn’s research interests are in the areas of media flows and mobility of people across national boundaries. Amporn’s recent publication has centered on the construction of migrant identities through media consumption, ethnic media production in Burma, and religious movements across Thailand-Burma borders.