The 'Soul' of the Tai re-examined

The Khwan Concept and Tham Khwan Ceremony of the Tai-Speaking Peoples

Barend Jan Terwiel, Benjamin Baumann

• Publisher: Galda Verlag
• Year: 2023
• Print ISBN:
  9783962032975
• eBook ISBN:
  9783962032982
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

Khwan is certainly one of the most enigmatic concepts one encounters in the study of the Tai-speaking world. Variously rendered as 'soul', 'vital principle' or 'life essence', the concept eludes unambiguous translations as Western ontologies and the languages that reproduce them simply lack an analogous signifier. While a lot has been written on khwan, it seems that little progress was made in understanding their place in Tai conceptualizations of personhood and sociality. One reason for this may be that authors addressing khwan in their scholarship are frequently referring to the same seminal publications while ignoring others. This fostered a quasi-canonical understanding of what khwan are that is rarely critically scrutinized. With this edited volume we seek not only to honor Barend Jan (Baas) Terwiel, but also to problematize this conventional understanding of what khwan are. In the field of Tai Studies, Baas' name stands out as a beacon of knowledge and understanding, illuminating the rich tapestry of Thailand's history, culture, and society. Through meticulous scholarship and a profound love for the subject, Baas has left an indelible mark on the field, enriching our understanding of Thailand in ways that go beyond the surface. Join us on a journey through texts Baas has written over 50 years in order to explore what khwan are and how Tai-speakers all over the Tai-speaking world interact with them in order to strengthen their well-being and maintain personhood. Our goal with this volume is to make Baas scholarship on khwan more easily available and thus to celebrate his remarkable contributions to the world of Tai Studies. Therefore, we have edited, commented, and streamlined his original and sometimes hard to find texts and ordered them in a way that allows readers to better understand khwan as well as their similarities and differences all over the Tai-speaking world.ABOUT THE SERIESDevelopments in the field of area studies - goaded by the analytical deconstruction of world regions as such - have deeply affected the knowledge production on societies and cultures located in these politicized compartmentalization of the globe.With this series, the editors and authors wish to contribute to a reformulation of area studies that emphasizes the continuing epistemic value of contextualized knowledge production that is firmly rooted in concrete places.Starting with the notion of Southeast Asia, books published in this series will contribute to a more nuanced understanding of regionality based on a multidisciplinary approach.The series represents an oulet for young scholars intending to publish their degree theses and dissertations; and for established scholars who are looking for a place to republish out-of-print books, edited volumes or themed collections of their own papers and articles.We also invite scholarly collectives to publish collaborative works or edited volumes on topics that usually will not attract the attention of big presses due to their transdisciplinary orientation or the niche character of their topic.Our overall motivation is to maintain Southeast Asian studies as a critical and self-reflexive academic field.EDITORIAL BOARDDr. Benjamin Baumann, Chief EditorPD Dr. Daniel BultmannProf. Caroline S. HauProf. Vincent HoubenProf. Peter A. JacksonProf. Guido SprengerProf. Barend Jan TerwielDr. Xue Li

Table of contents

• About the Series
• Editor’s PrefaceThe Former Monk’s Magic
• Preliminary
• Figures
• Texts
• Maps
• Introduction
• The Concept “Khwan”
• Three Excerpts from Monks and Magic
• What the “real”Phraya1 Anumanthought about Khwan
• Khwan Etiquettein Everyday Village Life
• Death-related Khwan Ceremonies—Or Delving into the Sources
• A Congress leadingto a Surprise Visitto Assam
• The Second Journey to Assam and the Write-up in Hamburg
• Tai Khwanin TranslocalComparison
• Assamese-TaiFuneral Customs
• A Phakey Calling the Khwan Text
• Rice and Khwan
• Khwans and the Lunar Calendar
• Conclusions
• Appendix 1: The Three Pages of Phraya Anuman’s Book, Translated in Chapter 3
• Appendix 2: The Phakey haek khwan text
• References
• figure 1 Being admitted to the Mahanikaya section of the Thai Sangha
• figure 2 My monk’s passport, in the year 1968
• figure 3 The author, holding the banana leaf wrapping of the bai sī gets his wrists bound
• figure 4 The khwan is strengthened with items of food from the bai sī, here coconut milk
• figure 5 The title page of Phraya Anuman’s book
• figure 6 Excerpt from Terwiel Fieldwork Diary No. 3, 1969
• figure 7 Source: Sulak Sivaraksa, Samphāt Sathienkoset [Interviewing Sathien Koset], Cremation volume for the last rites of Phraya Anuman Rajadhon on 14 December 1979, Bangkok: Thai Wattanaphanit, B.E. 2512 [1969].
• figure 8 The Permit to visit Assam (With Jinavangsa’s assistance, a permit to visit the restricted areas of Sibsagar and Dibrugarh Provinces was obtained.)
• figure 9 Poway Mukh, December 1978: Jinavangsa, his father and the author
• figure 10 Clipping from the Assam Tribune, January 30, 1979]
• figure 11 Article from the Canberra Times, Friday, December 14, 1979, p. 2.
• figure 12 The Borgohain and Terwiel families in 1980
• figure 13 Khuk or Jakai
• figure 14 The Tai and Vitality Elements
• figure 15 The Khamyang tān khwan
• figure 16 Sketch of a wa cā ku (left) and tān khwan (right)
• figure 17 Three tān khwans
• figure 18 The kong mu at Powai Mukh
• figure 19 Book of Calling the Khon, Title page
• figure 20 The giant rice and the taphian fish at Na Sai. (photographic credit: e.h.s. simmonds).
• figure 21 Two types of receptacles with a small food offering for Mother Rice.
• figure 22 The harvest on the way to the threshing ground in the kwien
• figure 23 Tham khwan khāw (ทำขวัญข้าว) or placating the khwan of Mother Rice
• figure 24 Detail of a Phakey Ominous calendar list
• figure 25 A yan mahā amnāt
• figure 26 Two pages from a Shan magical guide book.
• figure 27 Riak khwan for a pickup truck in rural Buriram during a wedding ritual (Benjamin Baumann, 2019)
• text 1 Strengthening the khwan of a new-born baby (Excerpt from Monks and Magic 1975)
• text 2 The elaborate tham khwan nāk (Excerpt from Monks and Magic 1975)
• text 3 Tham khwan sao aek (Excerpt from Monks and Magic 1975)
• text 4 Tai Funeral Customs: Towards a Reconstruction of Archaic-Tai Ceremonies (Article, first published in Anthropos, 1979)
• text 5 The Tai-Speakers and Their Belief in Khwans (Article, first published in The South East Asian Review, 1978)
• text 6 Therapeutic Rituals (The Major part of Chapter 3 of The Tai of Assam, Vol I)
• text 7 Khwan Ceremonies in Wider Context (Chapter 4 of The Tai of Assam, Vol. I)
• text 8 Rituals Concerning Death Amongst the Assamese Tai (Chapter 6 from The Tai of Assam, Vol. I)
• text 9 The hong khwan preparation (Segment lifted from Chapter 3 of The Tai of Assam, Vol. I)
• text 10 The Phakey haek khwan document in translation (Unpublished document)
• text 11 Rice Legends in Mainland Southeast Asia (Article first published in Contributions to Southeast Asian Ethnography, 1994)
• text 12 The Khwan and the Ominous Calendar (from SCA-UK Newsletter, 2015)
• map 1 The distribution of Tai languages in three groups
• map 2 Distribution of the Main Tai Speaking Groups in Mainland Southeast Asia
• map 3 Distribution of the Story “Why Rice has Small Grains”
• map 4 Distribution of the Story “How Rice was Lost — and Found Again”