A History of Manners and Civility in Thailand

An innovative new social history of Thailand told through the lens of changing ideals of manners, civility and behaviour.

Patrick Jory (Author)

9781108811774, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 15 December 2022

279 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.5 cm, 0.409 kg

'This is an utterly intriguing book which seeks to open up a whole new area of Thai traditional custom for study … this fascinating book … is cleverly argued and well worth the effort.' Barney Smith, Asian Affairs

Manners have long been a central concern of Thai society. Kings, aristocrats, prime ministers, monks, army generals, politicians, poets, novelists, journalists and teachers have produced a large corpus of literature that sets out models of appropriate behaviour. These include such things as how to stand, walk, sit, pay homage, prostrate oneself in the presence of high-status people, sleep, eat, manage bodily functions, dress, pay respect to superiors, deal with inferiors, socialize, and play. These modes of conduct have been taught or enforced by families, monasteries, court society, and, in the twentieth century, the state, through the education system, the bureaucracy, and the mass media. In this innovative new social history, based on Thai manners and etiquette manuals dating from the early nineteenth century to the late twentieth century, Patrick Jory presents the first ever history of manners in Thailand and challenges the idea of Western influence as the determinant of change in ideals of conduct.

Introduction. Manners and the Thai habitus
1. Buddhist ethics of conduct and self control
2. Manners and the monarchy: prostration and civilization
3. The making of the gentleperson
4. Manners in a time of revolution
5. From courtiers to ladies
6. Royalist reaction: Thai manners as submission
7. The passing of the gentleperson
8. Manners in Thailand's civilizing process.

Subject Areas: Sociology: customs & traditions [JHBT], Social & cultural history [HBTB], Asian history [HBJF]