Southeast Asia: Dynamic and Fascinating Beyond Media Stereotypes - Essay Sample

Introduction

Southeast Asia is one of the most complex, dynamic, and fascinating areas in the world. Still, many people categorize it into China, Japan, and Korea, unaware that it consists of eleven diverse countries. Different sources of information different information about southeast Asia, with the media citing it as an incubation zone for militant Muslims. The truth of the matter is that there more positivity than the extreme and the problematic stereotype spread by the media. Southeast Asian social structure is a major theme in the study by anthropologists. The South Asian was described to be loosely structured due to the dominance of dyadic relationships, but according to recent studies, this is not true. Patrilineage, Matrilineages, existed in Southeast Asia with age, and gender is the key feature of kinship interaction in their social-structural relationship.

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Patrilineages are common and important in many countries of Southeast Asia, and this is where the kinship descended through the male lineage. A small domestic household consisting of the father, mother, and children owned property and the family. Patrilineage functioned differently in terms of political and economic conditions (Adams & Gillogly, 2011, p. 62). In Vietnam patrilineage are formally similar to those of Chinese considering the Chinese colonized Vietnam. The Confucian ideas of order through ancestral worship and hierarchies in age and gender are both similar in Vietnam and China. The council of elders in the patrilineage of the village was also the same. Vietnamese patrilineage is different as women assumed roles of leadership in the village. Patrilineage in Vietnam and China determined those to hold the leadership positions. Leadership was not hereditary since one had to win through a demonstration of political power and attracting mass followers. People from the highlands in the South East Asia mainland consider themselves as patrilineages. Their ideologies, however, in considerations of the political and economic condition appeared to be more of cognatic than patrilineal. Patrilineal was also predominant in the urban and aristocracy of Thailand. The Lisu in Northern Thailand is an example of where patrilineage power was more evident (Adams & Gillogly, 2011, p. 88). Marriage is a key factor in Patrilineage, and the Lisu were farmers depending on opium and rice.

Household labor being a limiting factor, young boys were encouraged to marry early to recruit labor. Household organized productive labor. Without wealth to pay for the bride price, there would be no marriage, and also, the labor would be unproductive. Young women needed men who would bring them to patrilineage through marriage since these women would have the land farm. In southeast Asian, families and households existed in Patrilineage to build kinship (Adams & Gillogly, 2011, p. 61). This strengthened the family ties and continued generation. Through marriage, there was the continuation of the family lineage with the father as the head of the family and men having the change to rise to the leadership position. Women, on the other hand, gave birth and assumed household chores like farming.

Matrilineages existed in Southern Asia with Minangkabau in Indonesia and Masuolo in the northern being examples of communities where the mother was the line of lineage. One belongs to the group of one's mother, according to the Muslim Minangkabau (Adams, & Gillogly, 2011, p. 62). Land and wealth were passed through the female line with the girl children inheriting everything in their families. Migration has changed this trend with matrilineage eroding but traditionally, sons remained in their mother's household even after marrying. The husbands were considered to be guests in their wives' home and assumed the adult role in their sisters' households. Merantau is a right of passage that was practiced by the Minangkabau. The males are removed from the community for a long time to seek experience, work, and work away from their homes. Men were expected to return after some time and use their skills to help their households. The majority of men never resided at home as they went to serve as monks or trading (Adams & Gillogly, 2011, p. 63). In Northern Thailand, there was also another form of patrilineality where the inheritance of land was from mother to daughter. The husbands assumed the role of the management of land. The women also were given roles of punishing the young for social transgressions and negotiating the household's welfare with the matrilineal ancestors.

Age and gender and gender is also a key feature in the social structural relationship in Southeast Asia. Differences in agenda and gender are well outlined in the structure of their languages. Most languages in Southeast Asia have their pronouns for the third person not marked by gender or age, unlike in English (Adams, & Gillogly, 2011, p. 62). When speaking, it is hard to know if the subject of the topic is a male or a female. In mainland Thailand, a word to signify the age of the parent's siblings are initiated for the children to be able to address them; this was adopted from the Chinese culture. Age and gender also signified the difference in roles, stages in life and leadership. In the communities that adopted patrilineage, the males assumed the leadership roles. The father was the head of the family and cared for the entire family. All the wealth and land belonged to the father and could be inherited by his sons. Village elders and community leaders were also men; an example of these communities was the Chinese and Thailand's. Women, on the other hand, assumed household chores where they took care of the children and did farming (Adams & Gillogly, 2011, p. 75).. Trade was explicitly for men. In matrilineage communities like Singapore, women were the leaders of the family with the man assuming the responsibility of taking care of the land. Age determined major roles and rituals that one could pass. In the majority of the communities, there was a specific age were a boy and a girl would get married. Age was considered as one assumed leadership position since, for one to be a community leader, one must be of a specific age.

Southeast Asia comprises of eleven countries which in history have had a different social structural relationship that defined family, household, and livelihood. Family is the smallest unit of a social organization, and marriage was common in all the communities for the continued growth of the community. Many communities in Southeast Asia have adopted patrilineages and matrilineages. Age and gender are the key features structuring social relationships through kinship interaction. Despite many negative stereotypes regarding the Southeast Asian countries, traditionally, their social structure was not loosely structured as suggested by some anthropologists. They all assumed a stable social structure with either the father or mother as the head a well laid out family lineage to strengthened their livelihood.

References

Adams, K. M., & Gillogly, K. A. (Eds.). (2011). Everyday Life in Southeast Asia. Indiana University Press. Retrieved from https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=tbTwAAAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PP2&dq=everyday+life+in+southeast+asia+by+katheleen+m.+adams&ots=2DJ8tJW9LR&sig=9bj76rsoWaFNLtCqasRI6qPEy5M