"The Good Women" and the Buddhist Five Precepts and Five Virtues : A Case Study on Thai TV Soap Opera Jam Loey Rak

• Main Authors: Ming-Lun Lin, 林明倫
• Other Authors: Mei-Hsien Lee
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2010
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/06107727946024154995

碩士 === 國立暨南國際大學 === 東南亞研究所 === 98 === After World War II, Thailand, a country that hadn’t been colonized, was trying to modernize itself by means of capitalism and industrialization like other countries in post-colonial Southeast Asia. Through planning and establishment for policy and system, “gender equality” was proverbially discussed in public, thus encouraging women to be more educated, to receive professional vocational training and to engage themselves into job markets. In other words, in the country’s process of industrialization, unlike traditional agricultural societies, Thai society was in the process of generating its “modern women”. This study examines the case on the Thai TV soap opera Jam Loey Rak, which has been well received by the audience with high ratings for quite some time. Through textual analysis, the soap opera attempts to communicate and characterize cultural boundaries of “The Good Women”of Thailand. It shows that the Thai society, as a Buddhist country, has expectations on gender roles and relations, having a very high consistency with conditions of “ ‘The Good Women’ and the Buddhist Five Precepts and Five Virtues”(which was) instructed by Buddha for Yu-ye on Theravada Buddhism Scripture《玉耶經》. In the play, we repeatedly see that the opera plots women who yield to the “Five Precepts and Five Virtues” as “Good Women”; once women violate these “Five Precepts and Five Virtues”, the audience tends to view these scenarios with dismay. Values and trends expressed by the drama are consistent with past studies. A late industrialist country like Thailand, with good intention for “advancement of women” and “equality of gender relations” through national policy and system, was perhaps seen as “a myth of civilization and modernization” to the country. That is to say, the way it regarded ‘to seek “gender equality or modernity” as an index of civilization and modernization’ neglected the deep-rooted fact of “local traditional gender culture” as well as the power of “Patriarchal”. We clearly understand that the developmental direction of the government of Thailand is attempting to force the country to lean towards gender equality. In this case, the patriarchal values presented from Jam Loey Rak can be detrimental against development of gender equality.