Thread by @meemalee

A MYANMAR HISTORY THREAD:

I saw this great piece, and I wanted to add some context about just how much the cause of Myanmar women has been set back after 60 years of brutal and misogynistic oppression by the Burmese military.

aljazeera.com/features/2021/…

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Before military dictatorship in 1962, women had much more power, especially in commerce.

This extract from “Debating Democratization in Myanmar” (ed. Nick Cheesman) talks of businesses that were owned by Myanmar women.

Naga Daw Oo was my great-aunt.

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

This extract is from my book Mandalay.

My grandmother’s first business The Burmese Paper Mart was requisitioned by the Myanmar military.

My grandmother never forgave them.

And she was just one of many women who they did this to.

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

My grandmother had even been a senior member of Upper Burma’s Chamber of Commerce and so she was part of the welcome party for Premier Zhou Enlai when he visited Myanmar in 1960.

That’s her shaking hands with him.

Her status was stripped after Ne Win.

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

One of my grandma’s other sisters was famous dissident and writer Ludu Daw Amar en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludu_Daw_…

They were two of the leaders of Myanmar’s Second University Students' Strike of 1936.

Note that out of the 11 leaders, *eight* of them were women.

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Here is archive footage of Burmese barrister Daw Myat Thein giving a talk about women in Burma in 1957.

Obviously, notions of equality in the 1950s were very different from now, but we did keep our maiden names and property and we had the right to vote.

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Talking of the right to vote, suffrage was granted to women in Myanmar in 1922.

This was only 4 years after women in the UK en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s…

Again, please note I’m discussing the status of Myanmar’s women *before* military dictatorship.

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Of course, suffrage is not the same as equality.

So this is Miss May Oung attending the Round Table Conference on Burma in London in November 1931.

While there, she argued for universal suffrage and equal rights, regardless of gender, race or religion.

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Ironically, it was the British government that didn’t want Miss May Oung to attend.

A threatened boycott by the whole Burmese delegation, plus a mass rally by Burmese women in Rangoon, and this telegram convinced them otherwise.

britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/untoldlives/20…

#WhatsHappeninglnMyanmar

Just for fun, let’s go even further back into Myanmar’s history of women.

Let’s look at this piece from 2007:

‘No Soft Touch’ by Kyaw Zwa Moe for @IrrawaddyNews

irrawaddy.com/from-the-archi…

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Read about the ancient Queens of Burma 👑

Queen Pwa Saw / Saw Hla Wun (reigned 1256-1287)

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pwa_Saw

Queen Shin Sawbu (reigned 1425-1471)

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shin_Sawbu

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Also read about this (terrifying) female dynasty 👑

Queen Nanmadaw Me Nu (1819-1837)

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanmadaw_…

Queen Hsinbyumashin (1853-1878) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hsinbyuma…

And the last queen of Burma - Queen Supalayat (1878-1885) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supayalat

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Queen Supalayat deserves a thread to herself, but for now, do listen to this podcast episode about her from @herstoryseapod when you have a moment

open.spotify.com/episode/3oXXsa…

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar #supalayat

This might be my favourite bit of Myanmar women’s history:

Major John James Snodgrass talking about brave Shan women in 1825 who literally rode into battle on horseback! 🏇

(‘Narrative of the Burmese War’ p243 et seq)

burmalibrary.org/docs4/Narrativ…

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

(This is honestly some of the funniest stuff I have ever seen.

I’m 1/4 Shan and married to an Englishman 🤣)

In 1919, the 1st women’s group in Myanmar, Konmari Athin, was formed as part of an anti-colonial, nationalist movement.

Other women’s groups followed.

(Extracts from ‘The Authority of Influence: Women and Power in Burmese History’ by Jessica Harriden)

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

In 1911, Dr Saw Sa was the first woman in Myanmar to get a medical licence to practise as a doctor and a surgeon.

She was multi-talented, as you’ll see later in my thread.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saw_Sa

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

https://twitter.com/isabelzawtun/status/1031667776975335425

Btw, women doctors abound in Myanmar.

In my family alone, my mum, two of my first cousins, three of my aunts, and one of my great-aunts are/were doctors who qualified from Burmese medical schools.

I’m the black sheep 😅

This is *despite* the massive misogyny of the junta which once raised the exam entry requirements for women for Mandalay Medical School because they had outnumbered men the previous year.

This meant another of my first cousins missed getting in by just two marks 🤬

In 1932, Daw Hnin Mya was elected as Myanmar’s first woman Senator, after the right to stand for election was granted to women in 1929.

In 1937, Dr Saw Sa, our first woman surgeon, was also elected as Myanmar’s first legislator!

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hnin_Mya

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Finally, in 1952, Claribel Ba Maung Chain become Myanmar’s first woman Minister, when she was appointed by the Burmese government as Head of the Ministry for Karen Affairs.

irrawaddy.com/specials/on-th…

bios.myanmar-institut.org/2018/10/03/cla…

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

So, although the women’s movement in Myanmar was *far* from perfect, it was on the right track, until it was derailed by dictatorship and it entered what Kyaw Zwa Moe referred to as a “feminine ‘dark age’”.

But hints of this could be seen before then.

#WhatsHappeninglnMyanmar

Despite these advances, our greatest women still saw men as head of the household, thanks to dated views of Buddhism and animism (i.e. religion).

The Myanmar military and fake monks then spent 60 years reinforcing this bullsh!t.

etheses.bham.ac.uk/id/eprint/2981…

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

For example, talking of hpone (ဘုန်း - power or glory), it irritates me that the misogynistic junta succeeded in subverting what was already a very stupid and sexist superstition using religious propaganda and somehow made it even worse.

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Many will have seen the incredible htamein campaign.

Some men (dickheads) worry that they will lose their hpone if they walk under or come into women’s sarongs (htamein), so people used them as barricades to stop the military frontiermyanmar.net/en/with-htamei…

#WhatsHappeninglnMyanmar

The dictatorship pummelled nonsense into people that the reason that men lose their hpone if this happens is because women are inferior or unclean.

Au contraire, mes amis.

Ironically, this Myanmar Times article hits the jackpot mmtimes.com/opinion/17047-…

#WhatsHappeninglnMyanmar

The original (still stupid) superstition was that women are terrifying sexual beings/temptresses that can ruin men’s holiness.

I can’t tell you how angry I was when I reached puberty and was told I could no longer climb pagodas in case I toppled them with the power of my vagina.

The idea was just as unbelievably sexist, but at least it put Myanmar women in some kind of position of power.

We were all Delilah and our fannies rendered men as useless as if we’d shorn their hair.

And like that piece said, could even stop elephants.

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

It’s also important to note that htamein have traditionally been good luck for men too!

When pierced ears were common for men in #Myanmar, those going to war would roll up a small piece of their mother’s htamein and wear it as a stud to give them strength and courage.

Carrying on this tradition, during the 8888 Uprising in 1988, male protestors even wore strips of their mothers’ htameins as bandanas and of their partners’ htameins as wristbands.

This photo is poor quality, but you can just about see.

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Let’s not forget the times that the Myanmar military have worn htamein because yadaya / their astrologers told them that a woman would rule Burma 🤪

content.time.com/time/world/art…

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Also, hopefully you now have some idea of just how much the junta loathed The Lady, i.e. Aung San Suu Kyi, purely because she *was* a woman - at one point, even banning people from saying her name or displaying her picture.

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar

Anyway, in summary:

The Women of Myanmar f*cking ruled, until a bunch of women-hating, insecure, superstitious army tyrants decided to beat them down for nearly 60 years.

More reading courtesy of @SeinenuL

irrawaddy.com/opinion/guest-…

#WhatsHappeningInMyanmar #MyanmarWomenRule

Okay, let’s end on a high note!

Myanmar women have *always* been as strong as (if not stronger than) our men - and even after so many decades of oppression, *still* we rise!

And I promise you, we are going to take back what’s ours with interest! ✊🏽❤️

#WhatsHappeninglnMyanmar