The Revival of Chineseness as a Cultural Identity in Malaysia

Abstract

The revival of ethnic culture in the current globalizing world challenges the anthropologists and sociologists to study the multicultural societies. This phenomenon appears in urban areas of multicultural cities and it makes the ethnic background awareness lead to be a cultural identity remaking. With an ethnohistory approach and ethnographic fieldwork in 2014, this paper provides the cultural identity making and remaking process of Chineseness in Malaysia since 1970. Chineseness has contextualized the cultural process of cultural plurality to a complexity of the multiculturalism in Malaysian society. This research paper presents a history of social process that resulted in the Chinese culture identity revived in Malaysia after the May 13, 1969 riots, and analyzes two important factors; they are Government Policy and Transnational Linkage of Chinese, shaped and illuminated the Chinese cultural identity in Malaysia. The government policy upholds the Ketuanan Melayu (Supremacy of Malay culture with affirmative action) and the Chinese descendants or Peranakan in adapting national situation, then they sought their shared traditions and memories as well as link them to transnational of Chinese culture in Asia Pacific region. The fieldwork data of 2014 show that multicultural society in Malaysia allows the Malaysia Chinese to enact their rituals, festivals, culinary shows and cultural attractions in public spaces and social media with a revival mode in which the reconstruction of ethnic identity represented as cultural productions of multicultural society.

Differences in Painting Styles of Malaysian Chinese Artists in Different Periods

“…Even as the status of batik as an artistic medium with cultural influence and significance waned in the art world in the 1980s, Chuah Thean Teng's grandson, Chuah Seong Leng, persisted in his batik creations, and batik paintings in the Chuah family during this period have lasted for three generations. Moreover, Chinese descendants or native-born Chinese in Malaysia shape and reshape their identity by creating a Malaysian cultural identity (Matondang, 2016). The three generations of artists in the Chuah family coincidentally correspond to the first, second and third generations of the Chinese community in Malaysia, who have experienced a new socio-culture in Malaysia, which has influenced their cultural awareness and identity, as seen in their artworks.…”

Contemporary Hakka Language Maintenance in Multilingual Penang, Malaysia

“…The taste may have been altered to assimilate into Malaysia's multiracial culture and the style of preparation may have been simplified to cater to the younger generation. Despite Matondang's (2016) claim that the Chinese community in Malaysia has created a hybrid culture due to globalisation, these traditional dishes are still an important identity marker for the Hakkas.…”

Sustainability of Chinese Culture in Moslems Society

“…It noted that the ethnic identity revivals in regional and global scopes (Matondang, 2016a) bring the rites of passage to a wider context of sustainability. The ethno-regionalized the Chinese culture were manifested in the cultural sustainability.…”

“…Sustainability of migrants' cultural events needs the new explanation and theories in Social Sciences. There is now a great attention of social scientists seeking the grounded theory of the dynamic reconstructions of ethnic identity, and building a model of ethnicity through the lenses of revivals (Matondang, 2016a). Nocca (2017) argued the sustainability development included cultural heritage of each ethnic group.…”

“…Furthermore,in globalizing world the Chinese groups in Malaysia and Indonesia, in the revival of ethnic identity, created a new form of Chinese cultural identity. The revival of Chinese culture in Malaysia was not only a matter of adopting the patterns of recommended cultural practices from the National Culture Policy, but it also had been creating a new hybrid culture among Chinese communities (Matondang, 2016a). Census repoted that in 2016, the Malaysian Chinese comprised about 23.7% of 31,7 million (the total population of Malaysia, stats.gov.my).…”