In this highly personal account, Chao Tzang Yawnghwe, a son of the first President of the Union of Burma, tells of his youth and involvement in the Shan resistance movement. He gives his version of Shan history and explains the complexity of Shan politics as well as discusses the personalities involved in the war. The final part of this book is a compendium of who's who in Shan history and politics.
The Shan have been fighting since 1958 for the autonomous state in Southeast Asia they were promised. Jane M. Ferguson articulates Shanland as an ongoing project of resistance, resilience, and accommodation within Thailand and Myanmar, showing how the Shan have forged a homeland and identity during great upheaval.
The Shan are the largest of the many national ethnic groups residing in the Union of Myanmar. After migrating from their early home in the Hwangho-Yangtze region of China, they settled in the eastern part of today's Myanmar, primarily in the Shan Plateau, around the first century AD. The Shan dominated the political stage for a few centuries, founding three historically important dynasties in the heartland of Myanmar at Pinya, Sagaing, and Inwa. Shan history then merges with that of Myanmar until after World War II and Myanmar's independence from the British, when the Shan initiated efforts to establish an autonomous state. Sai Aung Tun deftly traces the cultural and political history of the Shan people from their origins, to Myanmar independence, and up to the constitutional crisis of 1962. His work highlights particularly the political affairs of the Shan state from 1946 to 1962. He details the Second Pang Long Conference of 1947, which brought about the historic agreement of all the nationalities of Myanmar to work together for independence. He examines the significant role played by the Shan people in the debate on whether Myanmar should adopt a federal system of administration, and their efforts to draft a new constitution. He concludes with an account of the military coup of 1962, which effectively sabotaged the constitutional reform process, a stalemate that still persists today. Unique among Shan histories is the in-depth analysis of the Kuomintang incursion into the Shan States in the early 1950s, with its political, military, and economic consequences. Sai Aung Tun has amassed a substantial amount of primary materials in the text proper, including verbatim excerpts from conference interviews and speeches, as well as a rich collection of official documents, minutes, and reports in the appendixes. The historical critique of existing constitutional weaknesses will be of interest to those who advocate the drafting of a new constitution in Myanmar. The pleas for unity and goodwill among the ethnic groups, made by various leaders nearly half a century ago, will resonate with readers today. This comprehensive reference work will be an invaluable resource for all Shan scholars and Myanmar observers, and an excellent addition to any reference collection on Southeast Asia.
This book proposes the alternative explanation on the pattern of ethnic conflict, especially the on-going civil war in Myanmar. Previously, most scholars accepted that narcotics play the crucial role in conflict as the resource of revenues. However, this book dramatically changes what we have ever thought before. It investigated in both field and documentary research by examining the role of narcotics in the ideological formation process and ethnic identification process. Consequently, the so-called ethno-narcotic politics was found in the way that the role of narcotics was able to be used as the source of political mobilization in various ways. Furthermore, the borderland is the appropriated area where the process of anti-ethno-narcotics identification could be emerged and later used as the main identity for the ethnic groups who remain fighting against state’s power.
Just married and returning to live in her new husband's native land, a young Austrian woman arrived with her Burmese husband by passenger ship in Rangoon in 1953. They were met at dockside by hundreds of well-wishers displaying colorful banners, playing music on homemade instruments, and carrying giant bouquets of flowers. She was puzzled by this unusual welcome until her embarrassed husband explained that he was something more than a recently graduated mining engineer - he was the Prince of Hsipaw, the ruler of an autonomous state in Burma's Shan mountains. And these people were his subjects! She immersed herself in the Shan lifestyle, eagerly learning the language, the culture, and the history of the Shan hill people. The Princess of Hsipaw fell in love with this remote, exotic land and its warm and friendly people. She worked at her husband's side to bring change and modernization to their primitive country. Her efforts to improve the education and health care of the country, and her husband's commitment to improve the economic well-being of the people made them one of the most popular ruling couples in Southeast Asia. Then the violent military coup of 1962 shattered the idyllic existence of the previous ten years. Her life irrevocably changed. Inge Sargent tells a story of a life most of us can only dream about. She vividly describes the social, religious, and political events she experienced. She details the day-to-day living as a "reluctant ruler" and her role as her husband's equal - a role that perplexed the males in Hsipaw and created awe in the females. And then she describes the military events that threatened her life and that of her children. Twilight over Burma is a story of a great happiness destroyed by evil, of one woman's determination and bravery against a ruthless military regime, and of the truth behind the overthrow of one of Burma's most popular local leaders.
The culture of the Shan peoples of Burma and their rulers is extensively explored in this volume. Shan courts flourished in the late British colonial period, and in this book rare early photographs, never before published, document life in the courts and in the hill regions of Shan dominion.As in her previous book Silken Threads Lacquer Thrones P Lan Na Court Textiles, acclaimed for its groundbreaking discoveries of the culture of the Lan Na kingdom, Susan Conway focuses again on dress and the use of textiles in the Shan states, as well as on historical chronicles, to define a fascinating people of old Burma. Lavish illustrations bring to life a rich cultural tradition of mainland Southeast Asia.
Foreword by Janet Yellen Weijian Shan's Out of the Gobi is a powerful memoir and commentary that will be one of the most important books on China of our time, one with the potential to re-shape how Americans view China, and how the Chinese view life in America. Shan, a former hard laborer who is now one of Asia's best-known financiers, is thoughtful, observant, eloquent, and brutally honest, making him well-positioned to tell the story of a life that is a microcosm of modern China, and of how, improbably, that life became intertwined with America. Out of the Gobi draws a vivid picture of the raw human energy and the will to succeed against all odds. Shan only finished elementary school when Mao Zedong's Cultural Revolution tore his country apart. He was a witness to the brutality and absurdity of Mao’s policies during one of the most tumultuous eras in China’s history. Exiled to the Gobi Desert at age 15 and denied schooling for 10 years, he endured untold hardships without ever giving up his dream for an education. Shan’s improbable journey, from the Gobi to the “People’s Republic of Berkeley” and far beyond, is a uniquely American success story – told with a splash of humor, deep insight and rich and engaging detail. This powerful and personal perspective on China and America will inform Americans' view of China, humanizing the country, while providing a rare view of America from the prism of a keen foreign observer who lived the American dream. Says former Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen: “Shan’s life provides a demonstration of what is possible when China and the United States come together, even by happenstance. It is not only Shan’s personal history that makes this book so interesting but also how the stories of China and America merge in just one moment in time to create an inspired individual so unique and driven, and so representative of the true sprits of both countries.”
"The book explores the possible origins of the Shan alphabet, citing the wide-ranging opinions of many scholars, and then delves into a careful analysis of the successive stages of the Shan script, from the earliest forms of Lik Hto Ngouk, through Lik Tou Moan and Hkun scripts, noting the problems and idiosyncrasies of each. In addition, it examines the spelling and handling of Pali words within religious writings in each of these scripts and in the Yuan script. Excerpts from early manuscripts are presented as evidence." "This volume will prove to be an indispensable linguistic reference on the developments in form and usage of the various Shan scripts."--BOOK JACKET.
Here are factual accounts of the sad, short lives of more than 365 Hollywood celebrities. Many, unable to accept the loss of fame and fortune killed themselves. Some were murdered because of their fame. Far too many died as a result of careless use of drugs and alcohol, and a few were killed in bizarre accidents. An addendum credits the movie stars that served in World War Two. A second relates several humorous examples of celebrities that have obviously allowed fame and fortune to warp their thinking and thus influence their actions in strange ways.
The importance of the Eastern markets to European commerce has long been recognised, and since the famous Portuguese navigator Vasco da Gama rounded the Cape of Good Hope at the close of the fifteenth century, and the Portuguese occupied Malacca and established factories or trade depots in Burmah at Martaban and Syriam, the trade of Western China and Indo-China has been a prize which has attracted the commercial aspirations of every maritime mercantile community in Europe. In 1613, the Portuguese were ousted from Burmah, and six years later, the English and Dutch established factories in that country. Some years afterwards the Dutch were expelled, and in the middle of the next century the French became our rivals for a short time. In 1756 the chief of their factory was executed, and their factory was destroyed, never to be resuscitated. The first Englishman whose name is recorded in history as travelling in Siam and the Shan States is Thomas Samuel, who happened to be at Zimmé when that place was recaptured by the Burmese in 1615. In Purchas’s ‘Pilgrims’ it is related that he had proceeded from Siam to Zimmé “to discover the trade of that country.” From that time to 1687, when the English were turned out of Siam for killing some of the natives in a scuffle, many English merchants resided there. Whilst the coast of Burmah was under native dominion, our traders had to content themselves with travelling along the great rivers; and it was not until 1829, three years after we had annexed the Burmese provinces of Tenasserim and Arakan, that steps were taken by us to establish overland trade with Northern Siam, the Shan States, and China. In that year Lord William Bentinck, the Governor-General of India, ordered a mission to proceed, under Dr Richardson, from Maulmain to the Siamese Shan States, to ensure friendly relations and trade in that direction; and in 1837, Lord Auckland, then Governor-General, despatched Captain (late General) MacLeod, viâ Zimmé and Kiang Hung to China, with the view of opening up trade with that country. Notwithstanding the favourable reports of these and subsequent missions, and the frequent petitions of our mercantile community asking for the connection of Burmah with China by railway, no action has been taken by the Indian Government in the sixty years that have elapsed since Dr Richardson’s mission, for improving the overland routes leading from Burmah to the great undeveloped markets which immediately border our possessions on the east. Burmah might as well have remained for these sixty years in native hands, for all the good that its acquisition has been to the furtherance of our trade with the neighbouring regions. When I retired from Government service at the end of 1879, the French were again in the field. They had annexed the south-eastern corner of Indo-China, had seized Cambodia from the Siamese, were determined to wrest Tonquin from China, which they have since succeeded in doing, and had openly avowed their intention to eject British trade from Eastern Indo-China, and to do all they possibly could to attract the trade of South-western, Southern, and Central China to French ports in Tonquin, where prohibitive duties could be, and have since been, placed upon British goods. It was under these circumstances that Mr Colquhoun and I took up the question, placed the necessity of connecting India with Burmah, Siam, and China before the public, and with the aid of the mercantile community determined to carry out a series of exploration-surveys to prove whether or not Burmah could be connected with these countries by railway at a reasonable expense, and to select the best route, financially and commercially, for the undertaking. The present volume deals with my exploration-surveys in Siam and the Shan States.
