BETWEEN MALAY AND NATIONAL CULTURE

Posted by: Rabenjamina Francis

Melanesian Austronesian / Malayo-Polynesian Solidarity

…Some extracts from the publication of an Emeritus Professor on Malay culture, which subsequently became Malayo-Polynesian and definitively AUSTRONESIAN

…The opening of the historic and cultural panorama of this Malay-Polynesian world happened simultaneously with the growth of Malay (Nusantara) nationalists at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the

20th centuries. It had a deep impact on these founding nationalists: such glorious panorama seemed to offer an antidote for the sufferings they endured as a people who were colonized, and thus despised. And the first step undertaken by these young nationalists was to move out of their limited world and identify themselves with the wider world of their great-great grandfathers. When nationalism was at its height in Indonesia, a young man, Nazief, wrote as his dissertation “The fall of Malay Marine Kingdom in Madagascar”. When Filipino nationalism was fermenting, the leader of Filipino Youth Association, Wenceslao Vinzons, named his daughter “Ranavalona” after a female Malay warrior in Madagaskar…

...What became obvious was that this obsession with the Malay world rose amongst its elites. Awareness of the Malay among the Filipinos became dominant at the end of 19th century, especially through its eminent hero, Jose Rizal, who was jokingly referred to as “The Pride of The Malay Race” or “The Great Malayan”. Rizal himself was a prime example of a classical Malay for he was not completed and wholly Filipino since he was part Chinese, yet his sentiments and his extraordinary loyalty was for the race and country of his origin: the Philippines...

…Wanceslao Q Vinzons, enamored with the Malay world…He was a great admirer of Rizal… and his historical speech “Malaysian Irredenta” disclosed his dream about the unification of the whole Malay-Polynesian races. We should compare this with Muhammad Yamin’s equally historic making speech to the Congress of Indonesian Youths…Vinzons, like Yamin was a pursuer of dreams. From his campus days he started his plans to establish a PAN MALAYAN UNION…or in official Malay name “Perhimpunan Orang Melayu”…which involved selecting students already in Manila but who originated not only from the Philippines but also from Southern Siam, Peninsula Malaya, Indonesia and Polynesia…According to the notes of Ranavalona Grate, they always had “secret rituals”…where Malay was the ceremonial language…

…It is interesting that in 1972 UNESCO launched quite a huge Malay Culture Project; an international conference to plan for this Malay Culture was held in Kuala Lumpur in January…The project was sponsored by five nations: Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. The five Nations covered by the project was referred to as “The Five (sponsoring) Countries of Malay Region…in addition, it referred to the cultures of Southeast Asia, Madagascar and Oceania as a broader context for the project.

…The voyages of Malay Races which spanned both oceans in the East and West during the pre-historical age continued to impress researchers for this was a case of oceanic migration, unlike that of the Indo-Europeans which was though land…

…Although Madagascar is separated from the main islands of Southeast Asia, it is obvious that in the pre-colonial age, their relationships were never severed.

…This culture of “NUSANTARA ERA” which encompassed the regions south of the Indian Ocean from Madagascar to the islands of Indonesia could still defend both their similarities and uniqueness…

…This Malay world is a universe full of variety be it of religion, culture, arts tradition, but beneath this teeming variety, there is a unity which manifests itself and ties everything together…

…I am given the chance to experience the realization of a DREAM held by Malay Nationalists in the 60’s.

Tan Sri Professor Emeritus Dato’Pendita Dr ISMAIL bin HUSSEIN (30 January 1932 – 20 October 2014)

Formerly Professor of Malay Studies at the University of Malay (1976-1980)

Was a Malaysian academic and literary activist. He is also the former Chairman of the Association of National Writers ‘Associations (GAPENA) from 1971 to 2013.

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3 June 2024 > 26 Zulkaedah 1445H: 11.15 p.m