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Asia Pacific Journal of Sport and Social Science

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Obituary
Alan Bairner Published online: 15 Mar 2013.

To cite this article: Alan Bairner (2012): Obituary, Asia Pacific Journal of Sport and Social Science, 1:2-3, 166-168 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/21640599.2013.778671

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Asia Pacic Journal of Sport and Social Science, 2012 Vol. 1, Nos. 2 3, 166168, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/21640599.2013.778671

Obituary
Alan Bairner*

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Pattana Kittiarsa It was with great sadness that I received the news from Tomo Ishioka that Pattana Kittiarsa had passed away. It is always a matter of sorrow when a fellow scholar and, in this instance, a potential contributor to ones journal, dies. I was very much looking forward to being able to publish Pattanas article, Of Men and Monks: Boxing Buddhism Nexus in the Production of National Manhood in Contemporary Thailand. As the abstract that appears below demonstrates, Pattana would undoubtedly have added greatly to our understanding of masculinity in his native Thailand with this study. However, as is so often the case, it is only when someone dies that we begin to appreciate the true magnitude of what has been lost. This is made abundantly clear in the obituary written for The Nation by Nantiya Tangwisutijit and Subhatra Bhumiprabhas, which is reproduced in full here. Pattana Kittiarsa was that increasingly rare creature in the academic world an earnest researcher who was primarily motivated not by yearnings for personal advancement, but rather by a deep desire to improve the lives of those whom he studied. He leaves behind a wife and two children, as well as countless admirers in the elds of anthropology and Southeast Asian studies. On behalf of the associate editors and editorial board members of the Asia Pacic Journal of Sport and Social Science, I offer my sincere condolences to his wife and family. The following originally appeared in The Nation on 11 January 2013 (http://www.nati onmultimedia.com/opinion/Mourning-a-son-of-the-soil-30197647.html) and is reproduced with permission from Achara Deboonme, editor of The Nation: Mourning a son of the soil Nantiya Tangwisutijit, Subhatra Bhumiprabhas Not long ago, Isaan was simply seen as a supply of workers facilitating Bangkoks sprawl. But when these workers started going home, sharing ideas, music and culture, the result cemented the northeastern region into the Thai fabric far more than the buildings and roads the regions people helped to construct decades earlier. No one did more to articulate the evolution and importance of this trend than anthropologist Pattana Kittiarsa, who at just 45 died of cancer yesterday in a Singapore hospital. Once he left his Nong Khai home for the University of Washington, he devoted his life to documenting how increasingly inuential Isaan has become to Thai economics, politics and culture. His studies and writings include Thai Migrants in Singapore: State, Intimacy and Desire (2008); Muai Thai Cinemas and the Burdens of Thai Men (2007); The Ghost of

*Email: A.E.S.Bairner@lboro.ac.uk
q 2012 Taylor & Francis

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Transnational Labour Migration: Death and Other Tragedies of Thai Workers in Singapore (2005); and Rice Festivals in Northeast Thailand. Pattana was born in the northeastern province of Nong Khai. He began his anthropological career as a student at Khon Kaen University. After completing his PhD at the University of Washington in 1999, he returned to his Isaan homeland to teach at Suranaree University in Nakhon Ratchasima province. He had been an associate professor in Southeast Asian Studies at the National University of Singapore since 2004. Apart from working in his classroom in Singapore, the anthropologist also worked tirelessly to help improve the rights of Thai labourers until his last breath. His studies and his advocacy helped lift the welfare and social status of thousands of Thai migrant workers in Singapore, most of whom are from Isaan. Pattanas mentor, Professor Charles Keyes, who was among the rst generation of Western anthropologists focusing on the Isaan culture, wrote of Pattana: I feel greatly honoured to have had Pattana as my luksit [student], but I also see myself as his luksit as well, since I have learned as much from him as I know he has learned from me. I also have come to feel a deep sense of kinship with him that goes well beyond our academic relationship. His death is a great personal loss, but I take some solace in knowing his karmic legacy will continue for a long time to come. Colleague and friend Pinkaew Laungaramsri, an anthropologist at Chiang Mai University, wrote in a farewell message: Pattanas lifelong aspiration was to be able to take part in the world of anthropology outside his home. I once asked him why? He unhesitatingly responded, the Western community of anthropology is so lively and energetic, I wish I could contribute to such a vibrant and challenging academic atmosphere. For a native anthropologist of northeastern Thailand, this kind of dream means an intense self-discipline, hard work and constant struggle in the highly competitive world of academia, where qualications are judged by the mastery of theoretical knowledge, language and novelty of thought. This is undoubtedly a tiring journey. But for Pattana, it was always a rite of passage, a difcult path one had to learn to become intellectually mature. And through such academic life struggles, a multitude of anthropological work and knowledge was produced. From religious cults, transmigration, to popular culture and politics, his engaged ethnography has opened up the voices of the unheard others, telling the stories of marginal subjects whose existence is often neglected by society. The productive life he lived has now ended. But the journey and legacy of his hard work will remain an inspiration to us all. Pattana left his wife Rungnapa and their two children. His funeral rites will be held for three nights starting at 7.30pm at Wat Ananda Metyaram in Singapore, and the cremation will take place on Sunday (January 13). While his family, friends and colleagues mourn his untimely death, Thai society is once again reminded how, like so many sons and daughters of Isaan, Pattana contributed to the ongoing evolution of Thai society in very meaningful and profound ways. The following is the abstract of the paper by Pattana Kitiarsa that was meant to appear in this issue Of men and monks: boxing-Buddhism nexus and the production of national manhood in contemporary Thailand Pattana Kitiarsa, Department of Southeast Asian Studies, National University of Singapore In Thailand, boxers and Buddhist monks share many common characteristics. Most of them started their respective careers as poor, young boys from the countryside. Emerging

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from humble family backgrounds, they are attracted to two different extreme routes of masculine ideals: one is deemed physically violent and deeply involved with masculine contests and worldly activities, while the other offers an ideal path to renounce the world and engage in a model of religious asceticism. How can Thai boxing (Muai Thai) and Theravada Buddhism coexist and be widely practiced without signicant tension in contemporary Thailand? How and why can Thailand possibly be home to the two, seemingly extremely contrasting, cultural modes of masculine expressions? In this paper, I will argue that boxing and Buddhism are taken by the Thais as a hegemonic cultural nexus, in which they form a basis of everyday gendered ideological practices and social institutions. In and through the boxing Buddhism nexus, a certain style and sensitivity of Thai national manhood is produced and sustained. Discussions will be drawn from my data gathering through ethnographic eldwork in Northeastern Thailand and other related secondary sources.

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