IT is the Malay-Muslim tradition to seek forgiveness on Hari Raya. It signifies a reset and a new start to the year.

But we are now caught in a vicious cycle of seemingly never-ending attempts by certain quarters to stir up division over race and religion.

While I will often dismiss the shouting as amplification brought about by the omnipresent digital media, it is also important to reflect on and take stock of recent events, ironically emerging during Ramadan, and consider how Malaysia has survived as a diverse nation since its inception.

Economist Hafiz Noor Shams’ excellent book, “The End of the Nineteen-Nineties”, noted an aspect of Malaysian-Malay society that is often overlooked by others: collective amnesia.

If our annual Hari Raya tradition of asking for forgiveness is meant to be a reset, this form of forgetting is intrinsic to the modern Malay identity. The fact that most Malay names do not have surnames expounds this form of collective forgetting as it is often hard for one to trace one’s lineage except though oral histories and stories passed down from one generation to the next.

Yes, forgetting is a blessing but modern Malay names (“modern” here means post-independence) makes the mistake of reverence for the patronymic (the “bin” or “binti” in names). 

Most Malays, wherever you may be born in Malaysia, exist in some form of identity crisis, especially in the age of globalisation, because of this modern cultural norm.

Globalisation is perceived as a threat to the sovereignty of the conservative Malay world, but one should ask: who is a Malay?

History is written by the victors and if you have read Malaysian (or Malayan) history leading up to independence and the formation of the country, various propositions of what it means to be “Malay” were promoted.

In fact, prior to the “threat” of the Malayan Union, Malay “unity” was hard to come by but the idea of the Malayan Union resulted in the modern Malay identity along with the now-normalised notion of who is a Malay.

A Malay, according to article 160 of the Federal Constitution, is someone who professes faith in Islam, speaks the Malay language, and practises Malay traditions.

One could argue for days over what makes a Malay but since I am one, constitutionally speaking, I have grounds to discuss this and to also resist or accept the top-down definition as I choose.

The collective amnesia of Malays fascinating because I face this directly in my family. As someone who married a non-Malay (who had to convert to Islam to be in union with me), I have often asked the question: will my children be defined as a “cross-collaboration” between two or more ethnic groups in their birth certificate?

When my son was born, I got the answer when I registered his birth: no.

My children will just be plainly “Malay” and “Muslim” in their birth certificates because of their father.

I had registered my son without the “bin” in his name but when the lady behind the counter, who was non-Malay, asked me to doublecheck my child’s name on the birth certificate, I saw that it had “bin” in it.

So I asked: “Why is there a ‘bin’ in his name? I did not put that in the form.” She answered, matter-of-factly, “Oh, because if it is not included, he could be considered an orphan.”

What a reason. I was left speechless. I didn’t have a comeback so the name remained as it was set out.

As a university lecturer, I am well aware that some Malay-Muslim students do not have a bin or binti in their names. I assume that this was wholly at the discretion of the officer in charge of the birth registration.

Now, this leads back to forgetting. How will someone in a situation similar to mine make sure that their children do not catch this collective amnesia?

Well, one may embed a surname or common name in the children’s names but this could be overlooked by the next generation.

So, back to our Hari Raya greetings: yes, let us forgive and forget our mistakes and whatever misdemeanours in the past 12 months and reset ourselves, but let us not forget who we are as citizens, and above all, as humans. – April 12, 2024.

* Azmyl Yunor is a touring underground recording artiste, and an academic in media and cultural studies. He has published articles on pop culture, subcultures and Malaysian cultural politics. He adheres to the three-chords-and-the-truth school of songwriting, and Woody Guthrie’s maxim “All you can write is what you see”. He is @azmyl on Twitter.