For my final cultural artifact post, I thought that I would touch upon something that has been heavily covered in the Western media over the past several weeks: the sexist advice from the Malaysian Ministry of Women, Family and Community Development's Department of Women Development instructing Malaysian women how to act in the household during quarantine. Rather than repeat what articles have already reported, I want to use my Malay language skills to analyze four of the pictures released from the Malaysian government conveying this information.
The first three photos all say, "the happiness of the household is built together, how to avoid a quarrel between the husband and wife at home." Though this mentions both the husband (sumai) and wife (isteri), all of these points of 'advice' are directed toward the woman in particular as her civic duty of sorts. Taking this into consideration, I will now move to translate and discuss each photo individually.
This infographic depicts a man and woman hanging and folding clothes on a laundry line. In the text box next to this image, it says, "If you see your spouse doing something that conflicts with your wishes, avoid [stern] words - use 'humorous' words like 'this is how I dress' instead (imitate Doraemon's tone and be followed by a good laugh!)." This is an attempt to tone down domestic disputes, but does not address the underlying issue of the fighting itself, instead attempting to mitigate the situation through the use of puerile language modeled after Doraemon - the Japanese manga cartoon character. Again, while it makes believe that it is addressing both the man and woman, it is actually in an advertisement targeted for women by the Ministry of Women and the Family itself, thus placing the onus on them to laugh it off or the like.
This infographic shows a verbal dispute between a man and a woman. It says, "If something (especially spoken/verbal) is offensive to you, wait about 1-20 seconds before responding (within 20 seconds, the brain will be more rational and calm to act)." This is essentially instructing readers (particularly women) to be silent and builds off of the notion of 'irrationality' often to women. The onus is once again on the woman to stifle her side in order to subdue the conflict or tension, instead of appealing to both to resolve it in another way.
This infographic showcases a man sitting idle on the couch and a woman speaking to him with calm and even restrained body language, with the chat bubble showing a picture of that same man doing housework. The text beside the image states, "If you see that your spouse doesn't help with your work at home, avoid being sarcastic. Ask for help, and tell them - sometimes our partners need to be 'informed' of their tasks before they know what to do." While this does acknowledge that it is not on the woman of the house to do all of the work at home, it excuses the man's lack of helping out as a bout of forgetfulness rather than something more culturally normalized.
The last picture is perhaps the most direct of all of the above messages in its intentionality, stating outright several sexist messages. At the top, it says, "Tips for working from home: Appearance. Avoid wearing home clothes. Dress up as usual, groomed and dressed neatly." This is an instruction for women to avoid wearing "home clothes" that might be comfortable but not as "presentable," also showing that women should continue to wear makeup and look and dress neatly while at home. The fact that there is no parallel for men suggests that either this dressing well is for the men at home, or that it does not matter as much if men fail to follow suit.
It is highly likely that all of the aforementioned "tips" are reflective of cultural expectations and norms, given that it was the Malaysian government's own cultural ministry that put them out there. Some of the above messages tried to imply rather than state outright a woman's "proper" place in the home, while others (particularly the last one) was not trying to mask any of its intentions or tips. The Malaysian government has been criticized beyond this because of its rather slow response time and contagion prevention strategy, which were in large part a product of the political problems political problems outlined in my last cultural artifact post. I hope this has added upon my last two posts on the Malaysian government and society and the ways in which societal, cultural, and political values, norms, etc. are reflected by the actions of the government. There are many positive and intriguing facets of Malaysian society that I have explored in my cultural posts this and last semester, and then there are some more difficult and negative ones that also must be considered critically. Finally, I hope that through these posts I was able to shed light on some of this complexity and show just some of the many things that I have learned about Malaysian culture while learning Malay.
Sources:
https://roguerocket.com/2020/04/01/malaysia-women-nag-lockdown/
Replies
Wow, I'm very impressed by your growing language skills this semester as I remember you were just starting with Malay in the fall. Secondly, you did a great job analyzing these infographics. Infographics by government agencies continue to be current and historical markers of information sharing and national initiatives and thus the cultures that are being studied. This is one tool that anthropologists use to study cultures. Great work!
Hi Bryan,
Thank you for sharing this! Just by looking at the graphic, I won't be able to imaging that the Malaysian government is giving out such kind of sexist advice targeting women. So thank you for analyzing and translating these. It's crazy how these posters are put out by the Malaysian Ministry of Women, Family and Community Development. And it's sad that these posters are reflecting such kind of cultural norms.
Hi Bryan!
As a woman, reading your post stirred up a lot of thoughts. I had no previous knowledge of any of this and am honestly pretty shocked that these Malaysian departments have published this content. The home should be a very safe and personal place and I think it's kind of crazy these departments are instructing mostly women on how to behave inside their own homes. I was especially offended by the poster that encourages women to be silent after a verbal dispute. The last poster was equally surprising. After being at home for almost a month I have only worn "home clothes" and definitely have not been dressing up to sit around my house as the last poster instructs. Well I do think dressing up is nice, these departments really should not be telling women to do that, especially since they do not instruct the men to do the same. Thank you for sharing this post and helping me learn a bit about Malaysian culture!
I also want to comment on how impressive it is for you to be able to translate these posters. Great work! I can see you've really put a lot of effort into the SDLC program which is really admirable. This was a really educational post. Thank you for sharing, Bryan!
On the part about women dressing up while working from home during the pandemic, I am not familiar with Malay customs. However, in Baku, a place with which I am familiar, there is a very hard cultural line between inside and outside. Every day the mother of my host family would go out dressed up to work, then come home and put on one of the two sets of pink pajamas she had. The quarantine situation would be cause for some confusion in a society such as this and people might want help learning what is expected of them in this confused time.