An enigmatic woman beams off the textbook page, brass rings stacked around her stalk-like neck. The village behind her breathes in vivid shades of burgundy, turquoise, and chartreuse. It is an image rich in both color and culture—a glimpse into a world tourists often visit but never actually explore, a fresh alternative to the gray air of the city where the textbook was mass-produced.
Fascination with the rare takes many forms: yet we tend to separate ourselves, passively observing our fellow humans in textbooks, like specimens in a glass box. In Thailand, an entire tribe serves a life-sentence term inside a display case. As Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology at Boston University, Robert Weller remarks, the issue is our tendency to “turn culture into commodity.” To the Thai authorities, the Kayan tribal women are commodities for a slew of paying tourists – existing solely to showcase the brass rings coiled around their necks.
Thai authorities prevent Kayan women from taking up asylum overseas. The dozens of rings around their extremely long necks have turned these women into cash cows; the women are lucrative to the Thai tourist industry, the nation’s most profitable enterprise. Powder fine beaches and thick tropical air mark many travel destinations, but it is the rich cultural history of the Kayan tribe that distinguishes Thailand. Officials hope to sway tourists like palm trees toward their islands by promoting the women’s obscurity. As Wanchai Thiasiri, a Chiang tour guide told an Age Newspaper reporter in January 2008, "[it’s] the No. 1 attraction in this area. It's why tourists come here.”
Many people feel the Thai government exploits their renounced refugees by offering their rich culture as an attraction at an amusement park, rather than a living art exhibit. The Kayan women attempt to protest, despite lacking citizenship or power. In 2006, many women removed their rings after provincial authorities refused to allow emigration to other countries, such as New Zealand. The myth that ring-removal was a torturous punishment, which would snap the neck of an unfaithful woman, was thus debunked. Upon removal the women say the only ill effect is dizziness, which soon subsides. The actual elongation is painless, but permanent; accumulations of coils, starting at age two, forces the chin upward while pressing down the collarbone and ribs. Though altered, the Kayan women’s shape remains fully functioning. But the curiosity swirling around these women seems intrusive and painfully permanent.
The ringless are pointed out on tours, singling out even those who want to join popular culture. In 2008, Southeast Asia reporter Lawi Weng interviewed now-ringless 21-year-old Mu Hwit, who boldly articulated her perspective that Thai authorities “just want us to stay to preserve our culture as a tourism attraction; they don’t want us to leave and study abroad.” Mu Hwit hopes her newfound distance from her culture will provide her with more opportunity. She feels that, to those still ringed, their “culture brings no benefits, only to others.”
The elders of the Kayan tribe see it differently—in their eyes, it is taboo to ever take off the rings. The elders spread false information that suffocation is a risk with removal, in hopes of dissuading rebellious girls like Hwit. In contrast, American body modification is seen as taboo, and their removal praised. In fact, prior to piercing or tattooing any body part in America, involved parties are required to sign legal documents. Such documents confirm it is indeed the will of the participant, highlighting another difference—in America, body modification is not about cultural conformity, but about individual expression.
Kayan Tribes express themselves through group rituals, their identity based on the entire community. Anthropological studies show that originally the women wore the rings to make themselves less of a target for slavery and more appealing for marriage. While a growing number women, like Hwit, have been prompted to protest against the exploitation of their culture, others feel sustained by the ritual. These women see the rings as important—either as a visible homage to their tribe’s rich cultural beliefs or as a means of easy, though meager, income. Reports indicate that the Thai government has relocated hundreds of people to display them for monetary gain. It is unknown if the Kayans would keep coiling if they were considered a comparable culture to their homeland and not merely a commodity.
