MULTIPLE IDENTITIES AMONG THE MALACCA PORTUGUESE
This anthropological study examines the complex construction of identity within the Portuguese Eurasian community of Malacca. Utilizing the local Creole expression *natibu!—ng’ka kristang* ("Malay!—not Portuguese") as a primary point of departure, Brian Juan O’Neill explores how this Catholic minori...
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| Published in: | Review of Culture |
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| Format: | Articles |
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Instituto Cultural de Macau
October 2002
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| Online Access: | https://www.icm.gov.mo/rc/viewer/pdfViewerParts/40004/2695 |
| Summary: | This anthropological study examines the complex construction of identity within the Portuguese Eurasian community of Malacca. Utilizing the local Creole expression *natibu!—ng’ka kristang* ("Malay!—not Portuguese") as a primary point of departure, Brian Juan O’Neill explores how this Catholic minority maintains a distinct social boundary against the surrounding Malay and Islamic culture. The author identifies three distinct levels of "multiple identities" that define the community. First, a strategy of extreme social differentiation is employed to distance the group from the "Other." Second, the community maintains an idealized, "rosy-coloured" identification with a remote Portuguese heritage—a process characterized by the "invention of tradition" through imported folk music and dance, alongside a pervasive "social amnesia" regarding actual genealogies and historical links since the end of Portuguese rule in 1641. Finally, O’Neill addresses the paradox of Creole identity, wherein the community’s European (paternal) cultural fonts are systematically honored while its Malay (maternal) elements are denigrated. By analyzing these layers of identification, the article highlights the tensions between emotive proximity to a distant Europe and sentimental distance from a physically proximate Malaysia, offering a nuanced look at the persistence of Lusitanian identity markers across centuries of shifting colonial and post-colonial contexts. |
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| ISSN: | 1682-1106 |