GENDER ADJUDICATED: TRANSLATING MODERN LEGAL SUBJECTS IN SIAM (THAILAND)

This study explores the operation of power in Siamese society and law along lines of gender, class, language and ethnicity. It focuses on the period between the 1850s and 1930s, when Siamese jurisprudence experienced fundamental structural and ideological transformations. Through an examination of court cases and laws, this work reveals the gender, class, and ethnolinguistic implications of “modern” legal reforms for individuals in Siam. By so doing, the dissertation fundamentally reinterprets how power operated in Siam.; In its exploration of how the domestic social hierarchy shifted when colonial pressure compelled Siam's leaders to “modernize” Siam's legal system, the dissertation traces the subtle transformations in meaning as legal concepts were translated from one cultural-linguistic context to another. It examines the politics of translating enlightenment legal concepts from English to Thai during the period of high imperialism in Southeast Asia. Because Siam was not directly colonized, its indigenous royal elites retained linguistic control over the Thai translations of legal codes. Their control over legal translations allowed elites in Siam both to resist imperialism and to maintain their dominant position in the domestic social hierarchy by regulating access to the rights and obligations of the newly conceived legal subject. Before long, however, this legal subject became a location of resistance for subordinate members of society who claimed status as legal subjects in order to contest existing power relations.; Chapters one and two establish the scholarly, social and legal framework of this study. Chapters three and four demonstrate how the allegedly gender-neutral topics of the public and liberty had ramifications for individuals based on their gender, class, and ethnolinguistic background. By focusing on rape law, chapter five considers the notion of consent, questioning the ability to transculturate an individualistic conception of consent in Siam. Chapter six explores the idea of family to reveal intimate connections among family, sexuality, nationalism, and colonialism. Throughout each chapter is woven an analysis of gender, translation, jurisprudence, and colonialism. By connecting these concepts, the dissertation demonstrates the significance of integrating a gender analysis alongside that of class and ethnicity in explorations of modernity in colonial Southeast Asia.