Autonomy and identity in the Wa Hills of Myanmar

Source: Morris Wu/Dashetou/YouTube

It’s not a propaganda video, but carries a strong sense of indigenous pride. This pride is often hard to separate from what analysts might regard as ethnonationalist agendas—an identity-based political cause often linked to political autonomy or even secessionism. But through its production and messaging, wayizhi offers us an insight into the complex facets of identity in an insurgent, “non-state” borderworld.

Autonomy from the state

The Wa are a Mon-Khmer people who have inhabited the highlands of the present-day China-Myanmar border for centuries. Infamous for their practices of headcutting and raiding, the Wa hills were avoided by lowland-dwelling peoples for the longest part of history. Largely untouched by colonial rule, armies entered their mountain realms in the 1950s, and they joined forces with the Communist Party of Burma (CPB) to maintain their autonomy.

In 1989, they revolted against the CPB leadership, which comprised mainly Burmese officers who were sending the Wa foot soldiers to perish in human wave attacks against the Myanmar military.

Today they run their autonomous region, holding a 30 year-long ceasefire with the Myanmar military. The UWSA half-heartedly joins the recent nationwide peace process under Aung San Suu Kyi, and often stays away from talks. They occupy a place in between—not in open armed conflict, yet suspicious, hostile, and unable to come to an agreement with a government they do not trust.

My research examines UWSA political manoeuvring; the mismatches between the way they seek to express their autonomy and the expectations the community of sovereign nation-states have of “non-state” rebel actors. Autonomy is often accused of secessionism and rebellion.

By looking at their diplomatic and governing practices, I study the manner in which the autonomy of Wa Region is constituted and enacted. Autonomy is not about running away, keeping others out, but rather, about managing flows and engagements through its region.

Wa autonomy is maintained partly due to the protection afforded by mountainous terrain, partly due to the strength of its military. Sitting on the border with China’s Yunnan Province, Wa Region’s autonomy also has much to do with tacit Chinese political and economic support, the permissiveness cross-border flows of people and things. Wa Region has become far closer socially and politically to China than to Myanmar. Indeed, as wayizhi shows, many Wa speak Chinese and the audience for the music video is mostly Chinese speakers.

Ambivalence: Masculinity and marginality

Wayizhi starts off locating itself in the tropical forests China-Myanmar border. It calls on the Wa communities in China, referencing the Wa areas of Ximeng and Cangyuan alongside Wa Region—Dashetou describing them as part of his homeland. He casts a wider cross-border net for the Wa imagined community, held together with an ethic of Wa grit and determination.

The verses are in Chinese, the chorus—“this is my homeland”—in Wa. He showcases elements of Wa culture even as the camera moves through the roofs of the village—children sitting on thatched platforms, women harvesting rice, women playing wind instruments and dancing. He calls on images of remoteness, indigeneity, to highlight Wa pride—the totemic skulls of water buffalo, the scenic backdrop of a famous pagoda landmark in Wa Region. In a later interview he discusses the importance of having pride in one’s culture.

Mobilizing classic hip-hop tradition, Dashetou draws on blackness (another of his songs is “They say I’m black”)—under the sun our black skin shines”—and rags-to-riches narratives. The overt and aggressive masculinity (posture, gestures, and dress) draws reference from the Wa army. This Wa militancy fits well into the reputations and imagery of toughness, providing constant visual references to the UWSA, his military slacks, its emblems on his cap and T-shirt.

Primarily, Dasehtou is defiant in the face of prejudice—of tropes of marginality and backwardness that minorities in both China and Myanmar often face: “you say I’m a frog in the well, to me you are but a toad.” Cultural symbols referenced throughout the lyrics—traditional Wa dress, rice wine, rice gruel, and a reputation for energy and warmth—elicits pride in local viewers.

Striking in wayizhi is also the use of camera drones to view the Wa hills and villages from above, and his video editing techniques to tint the landscape with a romantic and rustic feel, manufacturing a sense of “indigeneity”.

And what of its audiences and reach? They haven’t gone far it seems. Chinese audiences might see Dashetou as a mild curiosity, while Burmese audiences cannot understand any of the lyrics.

The platforms on which these videos are circulated, into China through WeChat and Youku, and into Myanmar through YouTube and Facebook, channel Dashetou’s messages in different directions. They are mediums for expressions of identity and autonomy, the reimagining of place, but also hold the potential to integrate or divide.

Life under insurgency

Wayizhi is a beautiful and ambivalent text about life under insurgent control and rule in Myanmar—life in between the threat of and actual outbreaks of fighting. The UWSA is so well-armed that fighting with the Myanmar government is unlikely to break out, yet the constant threat of skirmish and distant prospect of reconciliation mean that conflict remains unending. It demonstrates a way of framing autonomous identity that isn’t all about conflict and ethnic hatred, yet retains a keen awareness of the prejudice minorities face, both on the Myanmar and Chinese sides of the border.

Wayizhi calls on a local, indigenous cultural pride, and struggles to keep this pride separate from the forces of ethnonationalism that comprise the more militant or political sides of the UWSA. In this sense, references from hip-hop and rap culture provides an alternative channel to the militarized languages of warfare and threat.

Elsewhere across the country, visual media is utilised to document human rights abuses, push calls for environmental protection of cultural homelands, but also as recruitment tools for armed groups fighting the Myanmar government.

The failure of Facebook to regulate misinformation in Myanmar, particularly during the Rohingya crisis of 2017, shows the catastrophic dangers of visual images.

Wayizhi highlights the ambivalences of identity, how manufacturing a pride in indigenous autonomy often draws upon sentiments that have potentially darker sides. How can autonomy express itself in these conflict settings, without being deemed threats to idealized forms of national sovereignty? Identity-building and collective pride carries risks at all scales, far more in a militarized setting.

These ambivalences around identity aren’t just problems for insurgent groups and projects of autonomy, they are complexities for ordinary people as well—Dashetou is but one of many borderland inhabitants navigating these struggles of allegiance, dignity, and justice.