Customer Reviews

Burma: Frontier Photographs

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Having only had the book in my possession for an evening so far, I am struck by the range of photographs included in this much-needed collection, but also by the strangely ambivalent accompanying essays, which, admittedly I've only perused. As with many cultural and pseudo-scientific records produced under colonialism, there is much that is problematic with these photographs and more, the person and Empire responsible for their creation. In another review, Dr. Johnston feels that this book will contribute to increased tourism to the "Golden Land". This is exactly the spirit in which some of these photographs were made or reproduced in their contemporary context: to be consumed by inhabitants of the First World. Burma is not a Golden Land and has existed in the Western imagination as an idyllic repository for an "untouched and original" romantic primitivism. This book shows otherwise and in an indirect manner, points to some of the root causes for the genocidal strife encompassing Burma under the brutal State Peace and Development Council and its coetrie of merciless generals. As someone who does extensive collaborative documentary work with children here in the United States and with Karen refugee children on the Thai-Burma border, I'm disappointed by this book's tone and its indistinct or muffled point-of-view. The era of objective scholarship has passed. The images contained here have enormous bearing on both passive spectators in the West and on the ethnic minorities still struggling against cultural exploitation by eager tourists and fighting for political and religious autonomy and liberation from the dictators who inherited the crude construct of imposed nationhood from the departing British colonisers. As you read and examine this book, I urge you to so critically, to search out other information and to educate yourself and in so doing honor the visual memory of the people contained in these pages.

Having only had the book in my possession for an evening so far, I am struck by the range of photographs included in this much-needed collection, but also by the strangely ambivalent accompanying essays, which, admittedly I've only perused. As with many cultural and pseudo-scientific records produced under colonialism, there is much that is problematic with these photographs and more, the person and Empire responsible for their creation. In another review, Dr. Johnston feels that this book will contribute to increased tourism to the "Golden Land". This is exactly the spirit in which some of these photographs were made or reproduced in their contemporary context: to be consumed by inhabitants of the First World. Burma is not a Golden Land and has existed in the Western imagination as an idyllic repository for an "untouched and original" romantic primitivism. This book shows otherwise and in an indirect manner, points to some of the root causes for the genocidal strife encompassing present-day Burma under the brutal State Peace and Development Council and its merciless generals. As someone who does extensive collaborative documentary work with children here in the United States and with Karen refugee children on the Thai-Burma border, I'm disappointed by this book's tone and its indistinct or muffled point-of-view. The era of objective scholarship has passed. The images contained here have enormous bearing on both passive spectators in the West and on the ethnic minorities still struggling against cultural exploitation by eager tourists and fighting for political and religious autonomy and liberation from the dictators who inherited the crude construct of imposed nationhood from the departing British colonisers. As you read and examine this book, I urge you to do so critically, to search out other information and to educate yourself and in so doing honor the visual memory of the people contained in these pages.

Superb photos, informative text - all in all, a fascinating work and a book which will surely entice many more tourists to the Golden Land....