Anthropological Study of Dynamics of Ethnicity of the Shan in Myanmar

本研究项目试图对生活在缅甸的掸族进行人类学分析。缅族在政治和文化上影响掸族的过程被称为掸族的缅甸化（缅甸化）。今天，我们可以看到缅甸化的几个不同阶段。与此同时，掸族也经历了一种本民族的“掸化”，这种“掸化”可能提高了掸族的自我意识，建构了掸族的知识。因此，“山化”并非指前现代时期对山族邻居的同化，而是指在缅化的政治文化压力下，对自身文化的保存与振兴、集体认同的形成等多种文化动态现象。“山化”的话语涉及到掸族的双向建构：对内是通过一些共同的获取、维持和扩展民族性知识的模式；对外通过政治谈判，努力与缅族共存。作者于1997年至2003年在掸邦和克钦邦断断续续地进行了本研究项目的实地调研。今天，居住在克钦邦的大多数掸族人已经忘记了掸语，他们使用缅语作为自己的母语。缅化和山化似乎就像一枚硬币的两面一样密切相关。从某种意义上说，掸族被迫主要通过保护他们的文学传统来保护他们的“真实”文化，否则只能在书面记录中看到。这可以被称为文化的结晶，因为这样的过程往往是回顾性的，并创造传统。掸邦的掸族，特别是掸邦北部的掸族承担了大部分责任。

This research project is an attempt to present an anthropological analysis of the Shan people living in Burma (Myanmar). The process whereby the Bamar have politically and culturally influenced the Shan will be referred to as the Burmanization (Myanmarization) of the Shan. Today we can see several different stages of Burmanization. In parallel with this phenomenon, the Shan must have experienced a kind of "Shanization" of their own people that may have raised their own self-consciousness and constructed their own knowledge. So "Shanization" does not signify the assimilation of their hill neighbors in the pre-modern period but various phenomena of cultural dynamics such as the preservation and revitalization of their own culture and the formation of a collective identity under the political and cultural pressure of Burmanization The discourse of "Shanization" relates with two-way construction of Shan ethnicity : internally by some common modes of acquiring, maintaining, and extending knowledge of ethnicity ; externally by political negotiation in an effort to coexist with the Bamar. The author's field research concerning this research project was conducted intermittently from 1997 to 2003 in Shan State and Kachin State. Today most of the Shan people residing in Kachin State have forgotten the Shan language, and they use the Bamar language as their native tongue.Burmanization and Shanization seem to be closely related to each other like the two sides of a coin. In a sense the Shan have been forced to preserve their "authentic" culture mainly through preservation of their literary tradition, otherwise it will be seen only in written records. This may be called a crystallization of culture, for such a process tends to be done retrospectively and invent traditions. The Shan in Shan State, especially Northern Shan State where have shouldered most of the responsibility.