While the tweet above is a little over the top, the Malaysian Prime Minister certainly missed the mark in terms of political correctness by the use of the word ‘keling’ in the course of his address at the Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (UPSI). Anwar quickly aplogized to the Tamils of the nations whose offence is understandable, given that they have been assailed, in recent years, by the use of this term as a racist slur. In mitigation, however, he claimed that the sense in which he used the word is correct in the context of his literary reference. I for one, understand his assumption of intellectual privilege, his belief that he was rising above the slur to the respectful connotations evidenced by the etymology of the term. There is however no doubt that the Malay language displays both benign and derisory senses of the term and it is very revealing of the status of Indians in our nation, that our Malay Prime Ministers seem consistantly unable to keep this terminology out of their public utterances.
See: A Keling Lexicon A – J
See Also: Pantun Keling Kedah!
Tag: racism
Jewish Voice for Peace
According to Al Jazeera, hundreds of Jewish activists occupied the Statue of Liberty on 7th Nov 2023, to demand a ceasefire in Israel’s bombardment of Gaza. They unfurled banners including one that proclaimed NEVER AGAIN FOR ANYONE, while wearing black T-shirts bearing the slogans Jews Demand Ceasefire Now and Not in our Name. Anyone, regardless of which side of this conflict they belong, who conflates Jews with Zionists and antizionists with antisemites is, at best, deeply mistaken.
Image composited from: https://www.aljazeera.com/gallery/2023/11/7/jewish-new-yorkers-occupy-statue-of-liberty-to-demand-gaza-ceasefire
Israel Invokes the Holocaust
Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Gilad Erdan, donned the despicable yellow star that Jews were forced to wear by the Nazis to mark them out as such in Aryan society. After saying “From now on my team and I will wear Yellow Stars”. He stood up to put on his star, sat down again, and said, “We will wear this star until you condemn the atrocities of Hamas and demand the immediate release of our hostages.” The original yellow star had the word ‘Jude’ emblazoned across its center, while the ambassador and his delegation donned stars that said, ‘Never Again’. The Irony of this political theatre at the UN is that the Holocaust had already been invoked in the mediain a comparison with the contemporary Israeli persecution of Palestinians. Palestinian American celebrity Mohamed Hadid made a much maligned repost of a meme on X which itemised the 6 congruities between Israel and the Nazis . Hadid was accused of antisemitism and eventually removed his post. I have restated the correlations presented in the meme below –
1. an ideology/nationality based on racial supremacy,
2. the forced transfer of populations,
3. containment within ghettos and concentration camps,
4. the use of language to dehumanize,
5. collective punishment and
6. genocide by industrial means.
Image: https://staging-beta.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/world/2023/10/31/israel-envoy-wears-yellow-star-at-un/
https://www.firstpost.com/world/staying-silent-in-face-of-evil-israel-envoy-to-un-vows-to-wear-yellow-star-until-un-condemns-hamas-atrocities-13323472.html
Forms of Government 5
5. Meritocracy: A form of government based on fair competition and excellence. Of course, while claims are made for this form of governance, it can not exist without equality of opportunity. This is a reflexive relationship. The more opportunity a community or class has, the more capacity for merit its members might accrue. Less opportunity for the group will make it harder for individuals to achieve thge so called ‘meritorious’ results. Unmitigated meritocracy might bring what I call synchronic justice, but it might be unjust in terms of the history of opportunity. This historical dimension can be addressed by affirmative action, which might enable what I term diachronic justice. Malaysia’s NEP is a case in point. The problem, however, is that it is very difficult to ascertain when diachronic justice has been done and the goal must be reset to synchronic justice .
Updated 22.11.2023
Nahvin Muthusamy used his speech as a Royal Education Award winner at the Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka’s (UTeM) 19th convocation ceremony, to call for an end to racial quotas and a turn towards Meritocracy in Malaysian higher education. Is it time to pivot from diachronic justice to synchronic justice? Are the Malays ready to compete without a handicap? If, as the infamous exchange between another young Indian student and the Prime Minister of Malaysia at the Kolej Matrikulasi Pulau Pinang confirms, the answer to these questions is a resounding -NO!; are we at least ready to modify our ethnocentric quota system, to better ameliorate the devastating narrowing of opportunity it brings to the least fortunate non-Malays?
The Jewel has the Crown!
The lion and the unicorn
Were fighting for the crown
The lion beat the unicorn
All around the town.
Some gave them white bread,
And some gave them brown;
Never mind the plum cake
The Jewel’s got the Crown!
This is a momentous turn of events for the UK. It is a bit like Obama’s arrival on the political scene of the USA. On the one hand, all people of colour should be happy and the Conservatives should be commended for looking beyond race, on the other, it is premature to congratulate the UK as the population has not voted for Sunak. Will race come into play in an election, when it happens? I believe it will, as it did around Obama’s election … but unlike the US electorate, the UK polity may be not be ready for black leadership. If, in fact, the UK is ready, that would of course, be a good thing …. but then again, what about Sunak in himself – is he worthy of ones vote beyond the virtue of his skin. He is a millionaire in his own right, billionaire by marriage, and an exemplary neo-liberal globalist. Those who are on the left of the political spectrum certainly cannot really endorse him … but then the Labour party no longer represents the British working people either ….. Regardless of its historical moment, the salient quality of this turn of events is irony – if India was once the Jewel in the Crown of the great British Empire, an Indian has now become the ‘head’ of a much diminished British Isles … indeed, now, the Jewel has the Crown!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lion_and_the_Unicorn
https://www.knowswhy.com/why-india-was-called-the-jewel-in-the-crown/
The Boss is Back 10
With Annaatthe about to be released, a Malaysian politician claims a likeness to the SUPERSTAR! According to Baling MP Abdul Azeez bin Abdul Rahim his Indian constituents call him Padayappa, after Rajnikanth’s character who champions the cause of the poor and downtrodden in the film of the same name. He also took great pride in saying “I speak in fluent Tamil, which shows I not only accept the language but also keep it in high regard.” Sorry lah but I always thought the honorable member of parliament was a Tamil … you know what I mean … in ancestry, like he learnt it at home from Ammamma or more likely Appappa (judging from his proud colour, maybe even from his Appa?)! Anyhow, the point is that this analogy was thrown up in his self-defense after being angrily accused, perhaps unfairly, of insulting the Tamil language by the even more colorful Jelutong MP Sanisvara Nethaji Rayer s/o Rajaji Rayer … and it was all over an elephant! Here is the video!
What can I say … nampaknya –
Baling sama Jelutong berlawan
gajah pulak di tengah-tengah!
Image: https://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/nation/2021/10/27/they-call-me-padayappa-in-baling-says-azeez/
K is for Kisona 4
Beautiful family selfie of rising national badminton star Kisona Selvaduray gives us so much pride as Malaysian Indians.
Numbering continued from the previous post.
“BAM kutip india (keling) dlm estate mana lah jd pemain utama Malaysia”
6. I ended the last post by noting the semantics (etymology and idiomatic usage), syntax (parenthetical punctuation marks) and the pragmatics of its context (the explanation in the apology) of the utterance leaves open the possibility that no racial slur was intended in the use of the word ‘keling.’ There is however more to this utterance that needs to be analyzed. While the focus of attention has been on the K word, there is another word that in my view is more insidiously troublesome, the E word – ‘estate’.
7. Malaysian Indians are of diverse backgrounds, in terms of regions of the subcontinent from which they hail, economic conditions and social status with which they arrived. Many Indians were brought from Tamil Nadu to a then British Malaya as indentured laborers within the colonial economy. As Dr. I Lourdeasamy writes, “The Indian migrants in estates lived under slave-like conditions. The European planters and their staff exploited them economically and socially. Wages were low, working hours long (10-12 hours a day), housing was crowded, sanitation and health facilities were almost non-existent, and their women were molested”. He quotes historian, S Arasaratnam, who writes that the newly recruited ‘estate’ workers were “cleansed with pesticides and docked around their necks with the name of their estates and shipped under the most deplorable conditions”. These Indian Malaysians who contributed their sweat and blood to the very infrastructure that became this nation were then abandoned as the nation achieved independence. Ocer half a century after independence, a sizable number of their descendants remain in the abject condition of stateless in Malaysia.
8. Using the word ‘estate’ as adjective for the noun ‘Indian’ is a denotation of all of this and within the Malaysian milieu, it has connotations of abjection and depravation. Estate Indian can certainly be used in a neutral manner, for instance, in a census, but there is no doubt that it also connotes a lowly status. While I object to this meaning, I have the word used in this both within the Indian community and within the Malaysian community at large. I remember a classmate in primary school who was teased and shunned the non-Indian students for his smell (he used coconut oil in his hair). He was picked on and even physically abused regularly by one of out teachers. Of note is that this teacher happened to also be an Indian. So even without any racial connotation, which it obviously carries as well, the word ‘estate’ carries all the pejorative connotations of a socio-economic slur.
9. To return to the offending statement, “BAM kutip india (keling) dlm estate mana lah jd pemain utama Malaysia,” it is the use of ‘estate’ as an adjective, rather than the ‘Keling’ noun that in pragmatic analysis reveals the strong likelihood of racist intent and meaning. Indeed, ‘Keling’ might be the obvious racial slur but I take more offence from the use of the word ‘estate’ in a derisory manner in the context of this statement about a Malaysian Indian.
10. I would like to suggest that Malaysian Indians take on all of this name calling in their stride (sticks and stones …), as I am sure our champion Kisona will have to do if she wants to keep her eye on the prize, so to speak! Other peoples stupidity and careless racism really is no skin off our black noses! What is more pertinent here, than a shock horror reaction – that the K word is racist, is that all Malaysians, especially Indians, take note of the implications of use of the E word. I am not saying we should not use ‘estate’ because it is derogatory. That would be too brittle or ‘woke’ in the North American sense, to be useful to Malaysians. What I would like to come out from this nasty little BAM episode is a reflection on the contributions of estate Indians to Malaysia, and on the plight of their descendants today. On an intra-communal note, whether or not one is an estate Indian, Malaysian Indians as a whole can be proud to be associated with the word ‘estate’ and even the word ‘keling.’ We should orient the understanding of these words towards the more noble and affirmative connotations that are latent within them.
11. In concluding this post, I would like to qualify my earlier acknowledgement of the rich metaphoric and respectable etymological aspects of the word ‘keling’ by noting that what is most significant about a word when sent as a message (when it is uttered) is its contemporary meaning for the contemporary receiver. The sender should temper their use of problematic words with the reception of their message in mind.
12. K is for Kisona!
Image https://www.nst.com.my/sports/badminton/2017/10/292171/after-years-missing-out-deepavali-joy-last-shuttler-kisona
https://says.com/my/news/bersatu-leader-resigns-after-racist-remark-against-malaysian-shuttler
https://www.differencebetween.com/difference-between-semantics-and-vs-pragmatics/
https://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/opinion/2021/07/20/the-indian-problem-what-are-its-roots/?cf_chl_jschl_tk=pmd_nj6UJhssa3by0H4oHCAX8c5ijM71HvTviDykWPdJEOw-1633719811-0-gqNtZGzNAqWjcnBszQoR
https://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/highlight/2021/10/08/kisona-in-tears-when-asked-about-racist-comment/?cf_chl_jschl_tk=pmd_r_V6tEZ49TeaYEZ4bC0vXP06DBV7lh20xIvZqdFDOaE-1633742346-0-gqNtZGzNApCjcnBszQsl
K is for Kisona 3
In this post I will begin to unpack the meaning, possible meanings rather, of Bersatu Pasir Puteh division vice chairman Borhanuddin Che Rahim statement on social media, made with reference to Kisona Selvaduray, in the context of her recent defeat in the Sudirman Cup semi-final match in Finland. “BAM kutip india (keling) dlm mana lah jd pemain utama Malaysia” or “Which estate did BAM (The Badminton Association of Malaysia) fund this indian (keling) and make her Malaysia’s main player”.
As I noted in the previous post, my instinctive response is the same as that of most Malaysians. Surely, this statement is a racial slur. Still, given the immediate apology and resignation of the perpetrator, I now have some doubts as to the meaning of his text and as to his intention as well. To satisfy myself and to do justice to the accused, I will attempt interrogate the statement in terms of its semiotics in order to determine if indeed the statement is racist and if so, what exactly constitutes its racism. If it is not racist, I will ask if it is, nevertheless, a slur of some sort, and again how it achieves its harm. In doing this, I will unpack the syntax, semantics, and pragmatics of this utterance –
“BAM kutip india (keling) dlm estate mana lah jd pemain utama Malaysia”
- I will begin with some definitions. ‘Syntax’, is way in which the words are put together to form the offending phrase, ‘Semantics’ involves the meaning of words used independent of the context and ‘pragmatics’ is the meaning of the statement in relation to the context of its utterance. Pragmatics helps us approach the meaning as intended or implied by the speaker.
- The obvious trigger word here is ‘keling’ and while it is clearly used in a derogatory manner as exemplified and evidenced by the infamous ‘Keling Babi” video, the word is deeply complex both in its etymology and in its current usage. It is in fact a mainstay of Malay idiomatic expression (Please see my exhaustive Keling Lexicon). In semantic terms, to define ‘keling’ as having a racist denotation, or even a necessary connotation of racism, would mean denying the benign etymology of the word. At the very least it would mean that the contemporary negative connotations (which one can in fact see even in the older idiomatic expressions of the lexicon), have displaced other more neutral denotations of Indian origins and Indianness.
- Further, in this question of usage, there is a clear geographical diversity in the understanding the word. I have come to understand anecdotally, that the word is used freely by Malays in Kelantan, under the impression that it is not a slur and that Indians do not take it as one. I am yet to gain any insight about the Kelate Indian communities position in this matter but I consider my Malay informers astute, sensitive and reliable. If indeed this is the position in Kelantan, the explanation given by Borhanuddin Che Rahim stands corroborated. He states in his apology, “Saya tidak berniat menghina kaum India dengan panggilan tersebut, ia sebaliknya bahasa percakapan di Kelantan yang merujuk kepada orang India”.
- There is also syntactical indication that the use of the term might not be as a slur. It is used, not instead of ‘India’ but, as an ancillary to ‘india,’ and it is set within brackets, as if to indicate that it is an adjective modifying the noun. If the word ‘india’ is being explained by the more Kelate appellation of ‘keling’, or if ‘india’ is being qualified – indicating which type of ‘india,’ ‘keling’ or perhaps ‘mamak’, then there arises the possibility that no racial slur arises in the use of the word, at least not from the perspective of intention.
To be continued in the following post …
https://www.badmintoncentral.com/forums/index.php?threads/s-kisona.183894/
https://www.differencebetween.com/difference-between-semantics-and-vs-pragmatics/
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2urrs8
https://www.utusan.com.my/terkini/2021/10/saya-minta-maaf-tidak-ada-niat-hina-kaum-india/
K is for Kisona 2
The young Malaysian Indian badminton player Kisona Selvaduray, became the victim of an alleged racial slur after her recent defeat in the Sudirman Cup semi-final match in Finland. According to Says Bersatu Pasir Puteh division vice chairman Borhanuddin Che Rahim has apologized and resigned for having made this slur. It is even suggested in Free Malaysia Today that the police will investigate this matter under Section 504 of the Penal Code for the intentional insult with intent to provoke a breach of peace and Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1988.
As presented in the screen garb on Free Malaysia Today, the Bersatu politician wrote, “BAM kutip india (keling) dlm estate mana lah jd pemain utama Malaysia” or “Which estate did BAM (The Badminton Association of Malaysia) found this indian (keling) and made her Malaysia’s main player”. While I am angered by this statement and its careless, privileged, racial attitude (ketuanan), I nevertheless introduce this post with the equivocation “alleged.” I do so in spite of the apology, out of a genuine concern about casting aspersions of racist intent in a statement without a careful investigation of its syntax, semantics and, particularly, the pragmatics of the utterance. Indeed, as explored in my previous images and writings, the connotation of the term ‘Keling’ varies across history, geography and context. in the following blog posts, I will attempt to unpack and asses Borhanuddin Che Rahim statement which is more complex in semiotic terms than it initially appears to be. For now, please see the following –
When is a Racial Slur not a Racial Slur?
A Keling Lexicon A – J
A Keling Lexicon K – P
A Keling Lexicon Q – Z
Satu Kesinambungan
Image: https://www.hmetro.com.my/arena/2019/12/527214/hargai-kebangkitan-mereka-aamar
https://www.msn.com/en-my/news/national/cops-to-haul-up-ex-bersatu-man-over-racial-slur-against-kisona/ar-AAP76ST
https://says.com/my/news/bersatu-leader-resigns-after-racist-remark-against-malaysian-shuttler
https://www.differencebetween.com/difference-between-semantics-and-vs-pragmatics/
K is for Kisona
Please lah Ker! … No need to forgive so quickly … learn the F___ ing lesson first !
“Let us together cultivate unity and friendship with the aim of Keluarga Malaysia. Reject prejudice and misconceptions or racial resentment. To err is human, to forgive, divine.”
Image https://varnam.my/news/2021/43785/s-kisona-clinches-the-spanish-international-title-last-saturday/
https://www.msn.com/en-my/news/other/citing-e2-80-98keluarga-malaysia-e2-80-99-deputy-minister-wants-bersatu-man-forgiven-for-insulting-shuttler-s-kisona/ar-AAP6O8J
The Koboi Project 
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