Fact, Fiction, Fun, and George Orwell: Conflicting Narratives in Burma
These words from the recent podcast discussion with Rose Metro stayed in my mind long after the interview. As she separates fact from fiction and then goes into examining the implications of this distinction in her study of recent Burmese history, it is fascinating to hear more about the intentions she brought to her recent book Have Fun In Burma, and how she was able to use this medium to express greater nuance and critical reflection than her usual work in academia.
“It’s interesting to try to strive for believability, rather than to strive for accuracy.”
“I've done a lot of academic writing about Burma, and it has its purpose. I think it's valuable, but it also is just very limited. It gets tiresome to defend an argument, and at some point, you're just like, ‘Do I even really believe this anymore?’ Like, why do we have to argue for a specific interpretation or a specific perspective?
And so I really wanted to just be able to, instead of saying, this is what's wrong, or what's right, just these are some things that people say. It’s interesting to try to strive for believability, rather than to strive for accuracy. Someone really said to me that thing [which appears in the book] about 99% of Muslims being bad! I know that it's something that someone said, and obviously, you wouldn't put that in an academic paper because it's ridiculous.
But not understanding that people really say these things, is missing a big piece of why things are happening, and the way they're happening. So, I wanted to get away from the attachment to views that comes with academic writing, and [the] defending [of] a position, and then having people attack your position and trying to prove it wrong. That can feel kind of conflictual, or aggressive. You can't disagree with a novel. You can think it's a poorly written novel, which people could certainly say.
I think one criticism I've gotten, especially from people who don't know much about Burma is [that] this [is] kind of didactic. I'm not the most subtle. George Orwell also wasn't an awesome novelist, people say, not to compare myself to George Orwell in terms of the import of my work, but you don't have to be an amazing wordsmith to convey different perspectives that people have on people.
And to make the reader feel something. That contrast between academic writing tries to make the reader think something, and non-academic writing would be like trying to make the reader feel something, and not a specific thing, necessarily, just [to] make them feel what they feel in reaction to these different perspectives.”