Exotic Burma

“For some reason, Western audiences just aren't as concerned or preoccupied with these sort of faraway conflicts taking place in Southeast Asia. And you know, maybe they're exoticized a bit.”

In our recent episode contrasting the crises in Ukraine and Myanmar, this is one reflection shared by Hunter Marston, a PhD candidate in International Relations at Australian National University and who has worked previously at the Center for East Asia Policy Studies, The India Project at the Brookings Institution, the Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS) Southeast Asia program, and the U.S. Embassy in Myanmar.

Responding to a question as to why the ongoing military coup never garnered the same level of attention that was seen only hours after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Hunter acknowledges the sad truth that, for whatever reason, it has been exceedingly difficult to bring outside observers into the reality and struggles behind the Burmese cause for independence.

Underlying his comment is the long history of the country being exoticized in a variety of fields, from Burma Studies academics looking for the final frontier, to tourists fancying themselves 21st century Orientialists, to meditators holding up a fantasy narrative to fit within their own spiritual conception, to journalists hoping to find their big scoop, to corporates trying to capture the world's last emerging market. What do all these diverse backgrounds have in common? For them, Burma remains a kind of imagination within which they can embed their own adventures and ambitions, and so when the country truly finds itself in difficult times, the reality of the people and suffering tend to become less... "real."

We hope that interviews like these can not only provide an accurate overview of what the country is going through, but also express the shared humanity between our guests and those listeners tuning in from a place of safety.