Uneven Orientalisms:Burmese Women and the Feminist Imagination

Abstract

Victorian and Edwardian Anglo-American feminists had long deployed ‘orientalist’ imagery to convey the depths of the oppression of women by men and the negative impact that this might have upon society. There has therefore been a historiographical consensus that the British and Americans imagined that they were globally pre-eminent in terms of gender equity. Yet within this broadly ‘orientalist’ discourse, there was a curious exception made on behalf of Burmese women. As one feminist writer noted in 1892, ‘The independence of Burmese women is remarkable. They manage their own affairs, hold stalls in the bazaar, with which no one interferes, marry when they choose, and divorce their husbands as soon as they please... They flirt, dance, and laugh with as many admirers as they choose, and last of all, they smoke.’ This article explores the historical reach and significance of this belief in the exceptional freedoms enjoyed by Burmese women amongst both feminists and non-feminists in nineteenth and twentieth century Anglophone texts. It investigates the various explanations used to account for Burmese gender equality, and asks how these views of Burma came to be established in popular culture and scholarly debate. The article charts the ways in which the imagining of Burmese men and women contributed to the fashioning of Anglo-American gendered identities. It also examines the participation of Burmese women themselves in this discourse, and the ways in which the imagining and assessment of Burmese gender norms changed over time.