Sheltered by dhamma: Reflecting on gender, security and religion in Cambodia

Abstract

This article draws upon recently-gathered anthropological and other data from Cambodia to explore how some Cambodians move beyond the constraints of social differentiation and order to access higher realms of meaning. This enables communion, security and liberation from social patterns of misrecognition. Gender is one of the primary principles of social differentiation and in recent years the relationship between gender, security and development has attracted the interest particularly of feminist scholars. Attention is often focused upon the misogynistic aspects of gender differentiation. Proponents of this kind of discourse tend not to concern themselves with how women and men may actually transcend rather than challenge gender order or with how they may commune with one another in ways that generate security. Focusing instead on the notions that are meaningful to the members of a given society may reveal some of the shortcomings of current security, development and feminist discourse. The material presented here is analysed by adapting some of the ideas that Roy Rappaport developed in his study of the ‘cognized models’ and liturgical rituals of the Maring of New Guinea. Rappaport's model helps to reveal how, by navigating multiple and overlapping levels of meaning, Cambodians may negotiate and even invert social order in ways that can be transformative, emancipatory and healing.