In this chapter, the flow of news is examined through a comparison of stories that are used by the editors in their newspapers and news agencies. This evidence is drawn from the ASEAN coverage provided by five news agencies and five newspapers during what may be considered three average news days in March 1983, on which no extraordinary event dominated the news. This evidence is supplemented by a second comparison of the ASEAN coverage provided by the same five newspapers during what may be considered three extraordinary news days for the region in June 1983, on which the annual ASEAN ministerial meetings took place in Bangkok. These comparisons do not represent a content analysis of the papers concerned. They were intended merely to show what sources and categories of news are used by the editors in their coverage of the region, what sort of pattern exists in the flow of news within the region and what kinds of stories seem to have regional appeal. These questions are considered in relation to the expressed perceptions of the ASEAN news professionals, which were elicited in personal interviews. An examination of the content of these stories, while potentially useful and unquestionably interesting, was outside the scope ot this study.

Respondents to this study were quite critical of the way ASEAN news is presented to the world, particularly by the international agencies. Many of them argued that the western agencies do not present a balanced view of ASEAN countries, but run a preponderance of critical, negative stories, using western biases. The majority felt that while in five categories the coverage was more or less adequate, in seven other categories it was rather inadequate. In spite of this criticism, the ASEAN news professionals indicated in interviews that they use international news agencies as their first and foremost sources of news for covering ASEAN. Now, a comparison of the categories of stories offered by two of the smaller international news agencies during two average news days yields some supporting evidence for these perceptions.

The sequence in Appendix A is an eight-pantun series sung by Rahim Jantan and Fatimah Adan. It was probably issued some time between 1976 and early 1982 as it is not listed in Low's thesis (1976). The tape labels the poems as “Dondang Sayang” without further identification.

The first poem in the Rahim-Fatimah sequence (see Figure 2) begins with a plain-language pantun using the subject of advice (nasihat) about love (kasih), and this is followed by another love pantun-which appeals to fate (nasib). Fate can itself be a high-level subject, but here appealing to fate is used as an argumentative technique. This avoids answering the first pantun's suggestion that the passions of the heart are detrimental by tacitly admitting to the harm of love and asserting that this misfortune has long been fated. The maintenance of the high-level theme labels these poems as a love (kasih) sequence while the changing middle-level metaphor places it within the potpourri (rampaian) style where a selection of subjects most often sung separately are presented together.

The singers then shift to deep-meaning poems. Additional complexity is introduced through the metaphor of business (niaga) while maintaining the subject of love, but the strategy of appealing to fate changes to one of lowering oneself (rendah diri). “While you may be prospering”, Rahim says, “I am wretched”. This poem is an old one, but would otherwise score points from the inclusion of a Malay proverb in its first couplet. References to folklore or history are also valued. The fourth poem changes the middle-level subject from business to a subject sometimes listed as a kind of niaga but more often discussed as the subject of silk and sackcloth (sutera dan belacu). The poem continues with the theme of love and the mode of humbling oneself: “My love is not equal to yours”, Fatimah replies. Maintenance of thematic continuity is a constant problem in the rampaian style as the high-level tajuk tends to be lost in the quest for novelty.

Politically and economically the ASEAN organization has so far succeeded in keeping one foot in the Third World and the other foot in the developed western world. Over the first 15 years of the association's existence, it has remained faithful to the developing world, sometimes even acting as spokesman for the newly emerging nations in such gatherings as the United Nations General Assembly and the non-aligned movement. At the same time, it has moved closer to the industrialized world, through economic relations as well as a series of unique dialogue relationships with the European Community, Japan, the United States, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. This continuing relationship with both the most powerful western industrialized countries and the developing world testifies to the region's desire to bridge the gap between those two worlds. Without forgetting their own colonial past or losing sight of their aspirations for developing strong, new and prosperous nations, ASEAN countries have also espoused some of the basic assumptions and ideology of the non-communist industrialized world. They are staunch believers in free enterprise and are equally staunch opponents of communism with the professed hope of turning their region into a Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality.

Likewise, the debate over news in the ASEAN region mirrors this political situation, as news professionals are caught between the powerful currents of news flowing from the industrialized world and the demands for balanced flow from the developing world. This study attempted to assess how the political issues raised by the MacBride Commission report concerning the relationship of the press and governments, concerning the conflict between the free flow and the balanced flow of news and concerning the conflict between western news values and developmental news values, apply to this region. The study also attempted to test the contention raised in the MacBride report that government control provides improved news coverage or results in a more balanced flow of news and to test the report's assertion that regional co-operation in news circulation results in improved news coverage.

Introduction>/b>

It is widely accepted among scholars in Southeast Asian studies that Central Thailand from the sixth to the eleventh century A.D. was dominated by a single state known as Dvaravati with its capital city at Nakhon Pathom (Quaritch Wales, 1965 and Diskul, 1972: 4,5). Most of its population were Mons who embraced Buddhism as their principal religion. With the rise of Angkor from the tenth century, Dvaravati gradually declined and in the end was replaced by Lop Buri or Lavo, which was established by Khmer overlordship in Cambodia.

This reconstruction of Dvaravati history is based mainly on accounts of a state called To-lo-po-ti, mentioned in Chinese notes. This name can be restored as Dvaravti, which appears on an old coin of the seventh century and in the Ayuthya chronicle, where the name of the city is mentioned in full “… krung thep dvaravati sri ayuthya…”. Moreover, the existence of this early state is supported by the presence of religious monuments and art objects heavily influenced by the Post Gupta and Pala arts of India from the sixth to the ninth century. The similarity in art style in the archaeological evidence has led to what is known as the Dvaravati style. It is found all over the Chao Phraya Valley, and indicates a shared pattern of culture among cities, towns, and villages which were integrated into a state.

This paper argues that when one looks at Dvaravati from the perspective of the development and distribution of ancient settlements in the Chao Phraya Valley, the cultural similarity reflected in art style becomes obscure and does not clearly explain political organization and continuity of the state in this region. Instead, there are some differences that indicate that more than one political centre and state existed in Central Thailand.

Development and disribution of ancient settlements in the Chao Phraya Valley

The Chao Phraya Valley is the deltaic region formed by deposition of sediment from various river systems. From existing archaeological evidence, it is the oldest area of Central Thailand where sedentary human settlements developed and later became state and nation. Its geography and environment played an important role in providing a firm basis for such a development. In the first place, the entire area encompasses a large fertile lowland suitable for rice cultivation that can feed large numbers of people.

In May 1984, about forty historians, epigraphers, archaeologists, linguists and anthropologists convened at the Australian National University for four days to talk about early Southeast Asia. It was a refreshingly cosmopolitan encounter, at least four languages being spoken across the conference table, another six cropping up in the conference papers.

The outcome might have been a Southeast Asian tower of babel, with each specialist talking past the others. Fortunately, most participants came to Canberra eager not only to present the fruits of their most recent research, but also to evaluate the state of the field in general, and to engage in interdisciplinary and cross-regional discourse. To encourage such exchanges, conference organizers insisted that authors remain silent while their papers were introduced and reviewed by participants who were not specialists in the particular subject matter. Thus, a Javanist reviewed a paper on early Vietnam, a Malay specialist reviewed a paper on Arakan. Of course, authors took part in subsequent discussion and were permitted the final word. On the first morning some participants regarded the method with a certain trepidation, but by lunchtime it was clear we had an intellectually stimulating atmosphere in which the research materials themselves were being subordinated to the issues raised and the problems demanding further investigation. Towards the end of proceedings a number of scholars commented on how they had gained a better conceptual context for their own highly specific work.

Fortunately this spirit did not dissipate when scholars returned home, and has been captured in the revised papers published in this volume. Readers not familiar with the early history of the region will discover that Southeast Asia was a lively place in the ninth to fourteenth centuries, with extensive trade, bitter wars, kingdoms rising and falling, ethnic groups on the move, impressive monuments being constructed, and profound religious issues being debated. Readers vaguely aware of such grand Southeast Asian kingdoms as Angkor, Pagan, Majapahit, Champa or Dai Viet will see them take on colour and character. On the other hand, readers already well versed in the available literature will find that a number of contributors to this book are uncomfortable with established labels, asking whether they oversimplify reality, or obscure important developments elsewhere in the region.

To push deeper and wider in early Southeast Asian history demands discussion of specific texts, authors, artefacts and concepts.

A Brief Theoretical Discussion

Social transformation entails changes in social relations which include changes in the relations between men and women, and their gender roles and experiences at various levels and in different spheres of a society. Depending on the forms of organization and relations within that society as well as the nature of the social transformation, social changes bear specific impact and consequences on gender relations and the position of women. Across societies and cultures, such changes bear striking similarities in some aspects and vast differences in others. But whatever these may be, it has been consistently shown that in most cases, women's position and status in societies undergoing social changes become or continue to be subordinate to those of men.

Our understanding of the position and subordination of women can benefit from the many studies of social changes taking place in various parts of the world which are undergoing profound social transformation. These studies have been mainly carried out within the framework of either modernization or capital accumulation. They offer valuable empirical and analytical insights into social changes in general and those related to gender relations and women's position in particular.

The modernization approach perceives changes as occurring in a unilinear movement along a scale from simple traditionalism to complex, specialized structures. In the case of women, it is argued that their static nature, passivity or resistance to change accounts for their backwardness and confinement in the traditional sectors. Other obstacles within the modern development planning processes, such as the male biases of planning officials, further reinforce the women's exclusion from modernization's benefits (Rogers 1980).

Perceiving social changes in the context of capitalist accumulation offers an analytically different understanding of the phenomena. It rejects the notion that all societies move along similar stages of development and instead, allows for historical and social specificities in the dynamic interplay of social relations and forces internal and external to a society. Gender relations and women's position are set within such a context of social change.

While there are various sources of ASEAN news in the region, there is one source that stands out and requires special examination: the news exchange run by the government-owned news agencies which was started in response to the perceived inadequacy of the coverage that was available from the other sources. In a way, the exchange is a child of the international debate about the flow of news: it is ASEAN's demonstrated contribution to a New World Information Order. As such, it is facing the fundamental dilemma of a news service that is at the same time trying to serve two apparently incompatible “masters”: the governments, whose financial support keeps the four national news agencies operating, and the newspapers, whose decisions to use or ignore the ASEAN exchange copy is crucial to the eventual success or failure of the exchange. This chapter examines some aspects of that dilemma, by considering the background, objectives and operation of the news exchange as well as ASEAN perceptions about its contribution to the development of ASEAN and its future prospects.

The exchange began in 1975 as an arrangement between Antara and Bernama. Since Indonesia and Malaysia share a common racial stock in the majority of their populations, officials of both news agencies felt that they could offer stories of common interest to readers in the two countries. Furthermore, since the confrontation between them had been over for nine years, and the two countries had been partners in ASEAN for eight years, the news agency officials felt that it would be appropriate to start some kind of bilateral co-operation. Although the exchange was only between the two agencies, the two governments gave their blessings and encouraged it as a useful manifestation of ASEAN co-operation.

But there were also ideological reasons for the commencement of the exchange. The officials resented the foreign domination of the news flow between their two countries. They felt that some of this news was irrelevant from their point of view, often distorted, often emphasizing what might be of interest only to the developed countries.

A cardinal principle of historical investigation, in particular when a hitherto unknown or unstudied part of the world comes under scholarly scrutiny, should be to study first of all the primary contemporary sources before attempting a synthesis from secondary material written retrospectively or by observers from a different polity or culture. If the sources are of a distinct cultural type, it is also necessary to subject them to an analytical critique rather than simply assume that they are statements of fact after the manner of European archival records.

The history of early Cambodia was pieced together in a directly contrary manner. In his “Tchen-la et Panduranga”, Pierre Dupont wrote that ‘the history of this ancient period (Funan, Chen-la, pre-Angkor) rests on two independent traditions’, which were first the Chinese historical texts based ultimately on contacts between China and Cambodia several centuries before the date of the extant Chinese writings, and second the local dynastic traditions of the Angkor period which made some connections between Angkor kings and pre-Angkor rulers.[1]

There is a third tradition which, if Dupont did not ignore it entirely, he definitely relegated to inferior status, as had his predecessors. That is the corpus of pre-Angkor Cambodian inscriptions of the sixth to eighth centuries. Textbook ‘Funan’, ‘Chen-la’, and their dynasties have been for the most part studied from Dupont's first two traditions; and even if the inadequacy of that procedure is now recognized, scholars have not entirely freed themselves from it.[2] It is not enough to recognize that the Chinese categories ‘Funan’ and ‘Chen-la’ may be misleading, or even meaningless. Absolute primacy must be given to contemporary records; and ‘contemporary’ does not mean treatment of the entire pre-Angkor plus Angkor epoch, nor even the Angkor period alone, as a synchronic whole. It was not a static society; ‘state’, ‘kingship’, administration and land organisation varied over the centuries; and in the first analysis seventh-century inscriptions, for example, must be used for the history of the seventh century, etc.

In what follows I wish to demonstrate some of the neglected contemporary evidence for the development of the upper levels of the state apparatus in early Cambodia.

The following pantun sequence is taken from Low Kim Chuan, “Dondang Sayang in Melaka” (B.A. Hons. thesis, Monash University, 1976), pp. 61–64.

Singers: Chik Mohammad Amin and Baba Chia Kim Teck. Performed for RTM, Malacca, 1974. 12 minutes, 3.7 seconds. Tempo = 80 (Low gives the tempo as 160). Based on Low's transcription and translation.

Sources for corrections: Low, first pantun from recordings accompanying thesis; Gwee Peng Kwee, William Tan, Malim Osman; Betty Molesworth Allen, Common Malaysian Fruits (Kuala Lumpur: Longman, 1975); Atlas Kebangsaan Malaysia [AKM] (Kuala Lumpur: Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, 1977); H.F. Chin and H.S. Yong, Malaysian Fruits in Colour (Kuala Lumpur: Tropical Press, 1980); A.G. Glenister, The Birds of the Malay Peninsula, Singapore & Penang (Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1971); Horridge, The Prahu: Traditional Sailing Boat of Indonesia (Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1981); Kamus Dewan [KD] (Kuala Lumpur: Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, 1970); Mohd. Rakawi bin Yusuf, Melati Sarawak, 2nd. ed. (Kuala Lumpur: Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, 1980); Scholiast on Low's thesis [Sc.]; Bertram E. Smythies, The Birds of Borneo (Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd, 1960); and Wilkinson and Winstedt [WW], Pantun Melayu (Singapore: Malaya Publishing House, 1961 [1914]).

Poem 1

Chik Mohammad Amin:

A. Sayang Cik (ng)Ali anak Cik Gaud,

B. Hutang yang banyak tidak terbayar,

C. Sayang Cik (ng)Ali anak Cik Gaud;

D. Gelombang besar di tengah laut, ah lah dendang

E. Perahu kechil berlayar bolehkah berlayar?

(Interjection by Baba Chia Kim Teck) Boleh.

F. Gelombang besar di tengah laut, ah lah kawan

G. Perahu kechil berlayar boleh berlayar?

Poor Ali, Daud's son,

For great debts, paying's impossible,

Poor Ali, Daud's son;

Great breakers in mid-sea,

With a small boat is sailing possible?

(Interjection by Baba Chia Kim Teck) It's possible.

Great breakers in mid-sea,

With a small boat is sailing possible?

Boat motives appearing in various Southeast Asian cultural contexts were first described in detail when the subject attracted the attention of scholars in the 1930's. On the one hand, Steinraann analysed the motive in terms of the “cult ship”: starting from the description of the Lampung ship-cloths, he compared their motives with those appearing in shamanistic death rituals among the Dayaks and with the famous Bronze Age canoes of the Đông-son drums. On the other hand, Vroklage concentrated on Eastern Indonesia; except for the occasional comparison of the “death-ship” motive with the Greeks' crossing of the river Styx, for a brief outline analysis of the relationship of boat motives with the then popular “megalithic culture”, or for the repeated mention of the ancient migratory voyage as the origin of the social patterns under discussion, his various articles are basically descriptive.[1]

Scattered references to the subject appeared occasionally after the War, but it is only during this last decade that the two previous trends have clearly been revived. Art historians, particularly specialists of textiles, have devoted a fair amount of work to the Lampung ship-cloths and to their role in this Sumatran society.[2] The Eastern Indonesian “field of studies” has similarly been the object of renewed interest from a large number of well-trained anthropologists who have used sophisticated analytical tools to study boat symbolism and its meaning within the global social systems they dealt with.[3]

However, to this point, little has been don-e to integrate in a broader geographical and chronological framework the multiple references to boat symbolism in Insular Southeast Asia. This paper will be an attempt at that, but it will concentrate on one single level of the symbolic discourse, which is that, as we shall see, of the boat as a metaphor for the ordered social group (leaving aside, among others, the higher encompassing macrocosmic order). The relationship of symbolic statements about boats and overseas sailing with exchange systems, the founding of political systems and the legitimisation of political power I will also leave aside in this paper.

The retrieval from various categories of historical and anthropological sources of statements pertaining to this specific level of symbolism will shed some light on the development of political systems of the whole of Insular Southeast Asia. I will try to answer the questions posed with, as far as possible, an historian's feeling.

Performance at the residence of Mr Gwee Peng Kwee of Singapore, 19 October 1982.

Music by the Orkes Aslirama under the direction of Malim Osman. Tempo = 60.

Transcription assistance by William Tan and Gwee Peng Kwee.

HARIMAU

Poem 1

Lee Yok Poh:

A. Korek telaga di tengah padang,

B. Ambil air siramkan kapas,

C. Korek telaga di tengah padang;

D. Jaga-jaga kambing di ladang, ah lah ramai

E. Rimau yang garang lepas sudah terlcpas;

F. Jaga-jaga kambing di padang, ah lah ramai

G. Rimau yang garang lepas lah sudah dilepas,

Dig a well in mid-field,

Take water to sprinkle the cotton,

Dig a well in mid-field;

Keep watch on the goat in the field,

A fierce tiger is now loose;

Keep watch on the goat in the field,

A fierce tiger has been let loose.

NOTE

(B4) Gwee: kempas.

Poem 2

Mohamad Yusuf:

A. Pokok limau di tengah lalang,

B. Kerengga hitam duduk menumpang,

C. Pokok limau di tengah lalang;

D. Jangan harimau nak tunjukkan belang, dendang sayang

E. Nanti ku tunggu senapang dengan senapang;

F. Jangan harimau nak tunjukkan belang, dendang sayang

G. Nanti ku tunggu senapang dengan senapang;

A lemon tree in the middle of the grass,

Dark red ants make it their seat,

A lemon tree in the middle of the grass;

Tiger, don't go and show your stripes,

For I'll be waiting with my gun;

Tiger, don't go and show your stripes,

For I'll be waiting with my gun.

NOTE

(F) Filler by another singer.

Poem 3

William Tan:

A. Petiklah limau di pagi hari,

B. Isikan mari di dalam dulang,

C. Petiklah limau di pagi hari;

D. Rimau dah tua dah tak ada gigi, ah lah dondang sayang

E. Apalah takut lah takut rimau yang garang?

F. Harimau dah tua dah tak ada gigi, ah lah dondang sayang

G. Apalah takut lah takut rimau yang garang?