Disciplining Native Masculinities: Colonial Violence in Malaya, ‘Land of the Pirate and the Amok’

Abstract

In the Malay archipelago, European encounters with ‘amok’, a behavioural pattern of indiscriminate, homicidal ‘tendencies’ purportedly observed among Malay-Muslim men, led to colonial discourses which posited that ‘native’ men were culturally ‘foredoomed’ to frenzied acts of violence. This chapter argues that such colonial attempts to understand ‘amok’ were founded upon an occidental analytical framework which affirmed the ‘primitive character’ of indigenous Malays. Such an interpretation offered colonial officials a moral high-ground based upon European mores, within which ‘amok’ could be used to justify colonial discourses on the civilising mission. By analysing examples and colonial interpretations of such indigenous acts of violence, this chapter explores how colonial authority instrumentalised ‘amok’ in order to assert control over indigenous societies—both on a physical and psychological level.