Mak Yong, a UNESCO "Masterpiece": Negotiating the Intangibles of Cultural Heritage and Politicized Islam

Abstract

Mak yong is a Malay dance drama once performed for entertainment and healing ceremonies by itinerant theater troupes that traveled throughout northern Malaysia, southern Thailand, and the Riau archipelago of Indonesia. Incorporated into national displays of Malaysian cultural heritage since the mid-1970s, mak yong was declared a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO in 2005. The UNESCO intangible cultural heritage (ICH) designation for mak yong was filed and accepted while mak yong was officially banned in its home state of Kelantan. The validity of mak yong as a symbol of Malay culture, and its ban in Kelantan for religious reasons, are frequently debated in Malaysia. Malaysian mak yong provides a case study of the divergent ways in which administrative and local communities of practice implement the ICH concept of safeguarding in a highly charged political-religious field. International UNESCO designation, ICH safeguarding, and international human rights discourses have to contend with Malay ethnic nationalism and political Islamic movements that have alternatively sought to eradicate the art through bans or remake mak yong in their own image.