Good and evil, heaven and hell, beauty and beast, angel and demon, virgin and whore – the oppositional thinking dominating gender debates in Thailand today can be traced back to the country’s literary and artistic traditions. This paper looks at how Thai folktales portray the good woman and the bad woman by examining their traits and their relations with the men in their life. Conversely, it also examines how the depiction of female characters contributes to the way Thai women view themselves and their relations with men.

1. The Virgin and the Whore:
Looking at the Good and the Bad Woman in Thai folktales
Please contact xingledout[at]gmail.com if you’d like to use any
information from this paper.

2. CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................... 1
DEFINITION OF “GOOD” AND “BAD” ............................................................................................ 2
DISSECTING THE FOLKTALES........................................................................................................ 4
RESEARCH QUESTIONS ........................................................................................................................ 5
RESEARCH DATA AND METHODOLOGY ............................................................................................... 5
DATA ANALYSIS .................................................................................................................................... 7
Physical traits .................................................................................................................................. 7
General behaviour and special abilities .......................................................................................... 9
Gender relations .............................................................................................................................. 9
Story endings .................................................................................................................................. 10
CASE STUDIES ..................................................................................................................................... 11
From “good” to “bad” .................................................................................................................. 11
From “bad” to “good” .................................................................................................................. 12
The feminist prototype.................................................................................................................... 13
The ideal woman with a modern mind ........................................................................................... 14
IMPLICATIONS FOR THAI WOMEN TODAY ............................................................................. 15
ATTITUDE TO BEAUTY ....................................................................................................................... 16
MODES OF PROPER CONDUCT ............................................................................................................ 18
CONCLUSION ...................................................................................................................................... 21
REFERENCES ...................................................................................................................................... 22
APPENDIX 1: DATA ANALYSIS....................................... ERROR! BOOKMARK NOT DEFINED.
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3. Introduction
Good and evil, heaven and hell, beauty and beast, angel and demon, virgin and
whore – the oppositional thinking dominating gender debates in Thailand today can
be traced back to the country’s literary and artistic traditions. Thai dance-dramas,
narrative poetry, puppet shows, folklore and other literary expressions emphasise all
these oppositions, especially the opposition between women as beautiful temptresses
and women as dutiful wives and mothers.
The Virgin – or the ideal woman – is not difficult to find in Thailand. You can
see her on glossy tourist posters, invariably beautifully and neatly dressed while
smiling charmingly at you posed in a gentle wai. Likewise the Whore – synonymous
with the bad woman – is just as easy to spot. She is almost always sexily dressed and
smiling seductively at you from the streets of Patpong and Pattaya. This division of
women into “good” and “bad” is deeply embedded in the Thai consciousness and has
been reinforced by the law and other ideological institutions such as religion,
education, literature and language.
This paper looks at how Thai folktales portray the good woman and the bad
woman by examining their traits and their relations with the men in their life. This
paper also argues that the good/bad status of a woman is not necessarily static. In
Khun Chang and Khun Phaen, Wanthong fell from being a woman with a lot of merit
to one who was executed for fickleness in love. On the other hand, Laveng in Phra
Aphaimanee started out as a devious murderess and ended up as a nun. I will also pay
special attention to Kaew Naamaa in A Horse-faced Woman because she is atypical of
the female leads in Thai folktales. Finally, the paper examines how the depiction of
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4. female characters contributes to the way Thai women view themselves and their
relations with men.
Definition of “good” and “bad”
In the literature on the conduct of women, the three texts that crop up
repeatedly are the Traiphummikatha, the Three Seals Law and Sunthorn Phu’s
Suphasit Son Ying (Words of Wisdom for Women).
The Traiphummikatha, which was composed by King Thammaracha Lithai
around AD 1345 during the Sukhothai era, outlined the principles according to which
all existence was structured and offered concrete illustrations of the abstract idea of
Dhamma. There are four references to women in the Buddhist cosmological text – the
“female Peta” (miserable spirits), the women of the Utarakuru continent, the Perfect
Woman of the Righteous Sovereign, and Queen Asandhimitta, consort of King Asoka
the Great. The Perfect Woman is described as being “glowingly beautiful” and
“endowed with all the good qualities pleasing to everyone on earth”. She is also
admired for her submissiveness to the Righteous Sovereign:
When the Great Cakravarti King comes to see her, she never waits
for him to approach her but moves forward to greet him. Seated on
a golden pillow before him, she will fan him and pleasingly
massage his feet and his hands. She never lies on the royal bed
before the Emperor does, nor does she ever leave it after him.
Before she does anything, she will inform her husband first and
when given permission, she will then proceed. Never has she ever
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5. disobeyed her husband. Whatever she does or say, it is intended to
please her husband (National Identity Board 1992:28).
Next came the Three Seals Law, which was codified in 1805 during the reign
of King Rama I and represented the height of women’s subordination. It considered
women as property and gave fathers and husbands the right to sell or give them away.
The law legalised polygamous marriage and allowed husbands to mete out corporal
punishment on their wives, to the point of killing them if they were caught in the act
of adultery (Suwadee 1999:8). According to this law, a good woman should not let
more than one man gain access to her body. As a result “good” Thai women remain,
broadly speaking, those who perform their roles as dutiful daughters and faithful
wives and whose concern with sexuality focuses on their aspirations of motherhood
and their fulfilment of their husband’s desires; while the “bad” are those whose sexual
contact outside the institution of marriage are automatically equated with prostitution
(Sukanya 1988:118).
The last text, Suphasit Son Ying, was written around 1837 – 1840 by renowned
poet Sunthorn Phu during the reign of King Rama III and was used for decades as a
school text for Thai students. His advice to women covers many aspects of female
manners, from tending to one’s husband to “correct” modes of eating, speaking and
walking as illustrated by the following stanza:
Do not allow your breasts to swing or raise your shawl as you go.
Do not run your hands through your hair while you walk.
Do not talk nonsense.
And do not linger outside once your business is done.
(Cheuacheun and Non 1971:8)
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6. His work upholds the clear distinctions between the “good” and the “bad” woman”. A
“good” woman should be chaste:
A beautiful young virgin can
Be compared to a precious stone.
Should the precious stone break, its worth would fall;
Should the maiden be defiled, her value would decrease.
(Suwadee 1999:17)
On the other hand, “bad” behaviour is exemplified in the following stanza:
Do not associate with women of ill repute
Who dress in unfortunate ways
Wandering aimlessly in the late afternoon
With their seductive and tricky airs
(Prakaaitham 1996:172)
It is worthy to note that the authors of these texts were all men, revealing men’s
concerns about female roles and behaviour to the extent that they had to set up the
criteria of “proper” conduct in various versions. Moreover it reflected men’s
conviction that they had the right to define women’s roles and behaviour. According
to these texts, a “good” woman is imbued with grace, beauty and self-control, and
waits upon her husband. And a “bad” woman is just one who perhaps does not do or
even goes against what is prescribed to her.
Dissecting the folktales
Classical Thai literature services the Buddhist dhamma and is didactic in form.
Representations of women in literature and theatre exemplify obedient sacrifice: do
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7. good, maintain morality, uphold truth. This didactic literature defines expectations for
women in Thai society – the expectation that women should remain virgins until
marriage, serve their husbands faithfully, keep house, and work longer and harder
than their husbands. Yet the sexual double standard was elaborately emphasised in
literature. Women were taught to accept polygamy because it signified their
husbands’ superior status. In contrast, married women were forbidden from
committing adultery or even paying attention to other men.
Research questions
1. With a clearer picture of how “good” and “bad” conduct has been defined
historically, I want to know how Thai folktales disseminate this code of behaviour.
What are the physical traits of the women in the stories? Do they have special abilities?
2. Given the didactic nature of the folktales, I want to examine how the “good” and
“bad” women end up. Does doing good always lead to reaping good or vice versa?
3. Because a lot of the expected proper conduct for a woman centres on her relations
with men, I want to study how the women in the folktales – both good and bad –
conduct themselves towards men. On the other hand, I also want to look at how men,
in turn, conduct themselves towards the women.
Research data and methodology
I decided to rely on cultural artefacts, i.e. folktales, to study the lives of
women in the past. Cultural artefacts have two distinctive properties. First they
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8. possess a naturalistic, “found” quality because they are not created for the purpose of
study. Second, they are non-interactive, i.e., they do not require asking questions of
respondents or observing people’s behaviour (Reinharz 1992:147).
In all, I looked at 15 stories found in Fascinating Folktales of Thailand which
were retold and translated in English by Thanapol Chadchaidee (2004). These stories
are chosen because the female characters in them played substantial roles instead of
just being wallflowers. I am aware that there are different versions of the same
folktale that might highlight different angles of a person’s character. I am also aware
of the limitation of gathering data from translated folktales as opposed to reading the
folktale in its original language. Hence I decided to look at stories from only one
source because that would ensure a consistency in the writing and description.
However, I will refer to other versions of the folktale when it comes to analysing the
data.
From the 15 tales, I picked out 23 female characters whose roles were
significant enough for analysis. While dividing the women into “good” and “bad”
categories, I promptly hit a snag. Initially, I placed Wanthong among the “good”
women but I later changed her status to “bad” because that was how she was
perceived by the public. Finally I divided them into 14 good women and nine bad
women. I decided against using quantitative content analysis because of the above-
mentioned limitations of using translated stories. So using its qualitative counterpart, I
studied each woman based on the following categories: physical traits, special
abilities, general behaviour, results of goodness/badness, conduct towards men, men’s
conduct towards her and her final ending. The tabulated results can be found in
Appendix 1.
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9. Data analysis
Physical traits
The good woman is more likely to be beautiful than a bad woman. Out of the
14 good women, nine were specified to be beautiful, compared to four out of nine bad
women. Yet it is important to note that just because it was not specifically mentioned
in the book that a woman was beautiful meant that she was ugly. For example, Queen
Chantrathewee, in this version of the tale, was not described as beautiful, yet one
would find it unbelievable if a queen in those days were anything less than beautiful.
Thai ideas about beauty can be traced back to the Traiphummikatha, which
describes the gorgeous women of Utarakuru in great detail:
Their skin is as perfectly beautiful as burnished gold, and this
pleases all the men. Their toes and fingers are quite round and very
beautiful; their nails are magnificently red as if they are painted
with lacdye. Their cheeks are creamy-white and are as smooth as if
they were carefully powdered, their face are clear without any
blemishes and look like the moon when it is full. The pupils in
their eyes are as black as those of a three-day-old fawn, and the
white parts are as white as a newly polished conch; their lips are as
red as Momordica, a ripe “white melon” gourd. The strands of
their hair are so fine and soft that it takes eight of their hairs to
make one the thickness of ours. Their long hair is as black as the
wings of a carpenter bee; and when it reaches the lower parts of
their shoulders, the tips of each hair curl upward themselves.
Whether they sit, stand or walk it looks as if they are smiling all
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10. the time. Their figure and complexion is as beautiful as that of a
16-year-old maiden. They never become old, and all of them
remain as youthful as that all their lives.
(National Identity Board 1992:27)
Yet beauty could be a double-edged sword. Of the four bad women who were
portrayed as attractive, it was their beauty that led to their downfall. Think Wanthong,
Mora in Chanthakorop, and Kaki in Kaki – men fought over them because of their
loveliness and ended up causing much heartache to the women. And Laveng was seen
as a “bad” woman because she slyly used her good looks to seduce men in order to
take revenge for her dead father and brother.
Another interesting point to note is the mention of body smell. Three of the
good women were said to have a sweet or fragrant smell. In fact, in the folktales, it is
sometimes the smell that differentiates between a giant and a woman. In Phra
Suwannahong, although the female giant disguised herself as Princess Ketsuriyong,
Prince Suwannahong still detected the strange body smell from her. Again this idea of
a sweet-scented body probably has its roots in the Perfect Woman of the
Traiphummikatha:
Her body has a divine scent like that from sandal wood and aloes
ground and mixed with the four kinds of fragrant essence.
Whenever she speaks or laughs, her breath is scented, like blooming
lotuses of the Nilupala and Cankalani kinds.
(National Identity Board 1992:29)
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11. General behaviour and special abilities
The good woman in the folktale is generally kind-hearted, gentle, obedient to
authority (be it husbands or parents), dutiful and faithful. Only three of the characters
had special abilities – Sroisuda in Singhakraiphob and Kaew in A Horse-faced
Woman are intelligent while Manora in Prince Suthorn can fly because she is a
ginaree which is half-bird and half-human. The good woman also seldom uses magic
although others, such as hermits or giants, who come to their rescue might give them
or help them with magic. On the other hand, the bad woman is typically either a
jealous and wicked person or a temptress who is not faithful in love. Four of the nine
bad women are well-versed in magic, characteristically using spells to get the men
infatuated with them. This seems to indicate that while a good woman would depend
on her virtue, merit or goodness to win over supernatural assistance, a bad woman
actively turns to magic to manipulate the people around her.
Gender relations
In the case of both the good and the bad women, the men were the originators
or initiators of action. They were the ones who actively pursued the women,
instructed them, flirted with them, abandoned them or even killed them. They were
also the ones to make decisions. Good women tend to hold a more passive role than
their bad sisters. Their conduct towards men was often in response to what the men
have initiated. For example, Chalawan in Krai Thong was the one who started flirting
with Tapaothong and she responded by falling in love with him.
In their conduct towards men, the good women usually take a subservient
stance to either their father or husband. Even if they were treated badly, they
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12. continued to plod on faithfully, as in the case of Kanitha in A Golden Goby. If they
originate an action, it tends to be confined to an action of speech or an expression of
her emotions, especially unhappiness over the men’s philandering ways. Yet, if the
good woman is hard-pressed enough, she can shake off the shackles that men have put
on her and rise up to the occasion, such as Suwanmalee in Phra Aphaimanee who was
brave enough to lead the army in defence of the city because her husband was too
besotted with Laveng to do so.
As for the bad women, while they are also on the receiving end of men’s
actions, there are more examples where they are more proactive than the good women
in their dealing with the men. The bad women could be roughly divided into two
groups. One group is made up of women like Wanthong, Kaki and Mora whose fates
are out of their hands while the second group consists women like Ay (Golden Goby),
Tasmalee (A Horse-faced Woman), Suwanchampa (Sang Thong) and Laveng who
know what they want – revenge or a man’s love – and resort to various means to
achieve their ends. While the men seemed like powerful agents of action for the
women in the former group, they in turn looked like easily-swayed puppets in the
hands of the latter group.
Story endings
As with all good didactic tales used to teach moral right and wrong, those who
do good will have good endings while those who do evil will come to a bad end. This
is borne out strongly in the lives of the female characters in the folktales.
Out of the 14 good women, 11 had happy endings where they “lived happily
ever after” usually with the prince of their dreams. Expectedly, the bad women came
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13. to a sad end, with extreme examples of one being turned in a gibbon and another
reborn in hell. Although most of the bad women faced the death penalty, they were
generally pardoned either by the prince or their victim. This is, of course, another
teaching point to inculcate in children the value of mercy and forgiveness of one’s
enemies.
Case studies
From “good” to “bad”
Wanthong, or Pimpilalai as she was formerly known, was born into a wealthy
family and brought up as a proper young lady. She was also known as the local beauty
in Suphan Buri at that time. Her “goodness” is evident from her sponsorship of the
recital of a chapter from the Maha Chat. Besides, the chapter that she sponsored was
about Queen Matsi who was a prime example of the ideal self-sacrificial woman.
Wanthong then married Khun Phaen but instead of a happily-ever-after ending, she
was soon caught in a tug-of-war between Khun Chang and Khun Phaen, and was
abducted alternately by both. Meanwhile, Wanthong begins to sense the erosion of her
goodness:
Already at my age, I have two husbands.
Very bad, very wicked, from head to toe,
Very shameful and very sad.
Even after death, my name will be notorious.
(Suwadee 1999:17)
When the scandal was brought before the king and Wanthong could not decide on
either of them because she now sees their true nature, the king condemned as her
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14. being worse than a prostitute because even such a “bad” woman has one man at a time
while Wanthong wanted both husbands at the same time. She was then executed and
her name became a synonym for a woman with sexual greed and uncertainty in Thai
society. Contrast this with how Khun Phaen had four wives and was admired for his
gallantry and how the king, while blaming Wanthong, remarked that her son should
have at least 10 wives because of his nobleman status (Suwadee 1999:17). Although
Wanthong did not initiate sexual relations with more than one man, society still
ignored the full sequences of events and emphasised only the end result – she allowed
more than one man to have access to her body – and condemned her for such
undesirable behaviour.
From “bad” to “good”
Young and beautiful, Laveng ruled Lanka City after her father and brother
died at the hands of Phra Aphaimanee. She wanted revenge. Using a magic spell, she
got various kings infatuated with her portrait and these kings in turn declared war on
Phaluek City. She even got Phra Aphaimanee besotted with her twice, masterminded
mass infatuation of his brother and sons and planned to burn her enemy by fire. All in
all, she was a nasty piece of work. But Laveng turned over a new leaf when she heard
a sermon by a hermit. She held a big peace party and invited her former enemies to
help themselves to her precious stones. She was even generous enough to give away a
diamond from her ancestors. She never went back to her evil ways and tried to stop
her son from declaring war on his father. The story ended with her becoming a nun to
follow Phra Aphaimanee, who had become a hermit, to take care of him.
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15. It is interesting to observe that Laveng’s turning point came about because of
religion. It suggests that a woman needs religion to convert her from her evil ways
and put her on the correct path. Jataka tales often portray women as, by nature, lower
beings who were tied to the material, illusory world and did not have enough merit to
resist temptation, so they need religion to keep them on the straight and narrow path.
Her transformation into a “good” woman was further cemented by her decision to
become a nun. Yet she wanted to become a nun, not because she wanted to be more
devout but because she wanted to take care of Phra Aphaimanee, which then brings us
full circle to what it means to be a good woman – to put the man’s needs before your
own and to take care of him.
The feminist prototype
The story of Kaew Naamaa is a fascinating study because she is atypical of a
“good” woman. She is not pretty, in fact she is horse-faced. But she is very intelligent
and is not afraid to insist on her rights and to get what she wants. Looking at the table
in Appendix 1, one can see that Kaew could match the men’s actions towards her
almost one for one, which is rare among the good women who tend to take a passive
role and respond. From the time that she got hold of Prince Pinthong’s kite, Kaew was
very much in control. Not only did she set all the conditions for meeting the prince,
marrying him and fighting the giants, but she also made sure her terms were met and
would not budge from them. In an era where good wives were exhorted to put up with
their husbands’ infidelity because it is a sign of their prosperity, Kaew dared to get
back at her prince.
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16. I have always wondered why Kaew did not immediately show her new,
improved self to the prince after the hermit helped her to remove her horse face.
Surely she must have known that that would be a sure way of winning her shallow
husband’s heart. Yet she chose to remain ugly and put up with the plotting of her
father-in-law and husband. My conjecture is that Kaew, having grown up with a
strange appearance, is only too aware that beauty is skin-deep and she wants Prince
Pinthong to love her for who she is and not what she looks like.
The ideal woman with a modern mind
Kanthathewee, or Rojana in other versions of Sang Thong, is an intriguing
combination of an “ideal” woman in traditional Thai literature and her independent-
minded modern counterpart. She was the most beautiful of her six sisters, with looks
rivalling that of celestial ladies. She is portrayed as a dutiful daughter who complies
with her parents’ wishes to choose a husband, and later on as a loyal and faithful wife.
In fact when she realised that her husband might be killed if he could not get the
animals for her father, she lamented:
Oh, what shall befall you, my beloved husband?
Should they take your life, I would follow you,
And let them take mine too.
No longer do I want to live, and face the world.
Never shall I let another man touch me,
And be my husband.
(National Identity Board 1992:159)
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17. Despite her submission and obedience to her parents – qualities found in
“good” women –Kanthathewee was also a strong and resolute individual. This is
evident from how she stuck to her decision to marry Sangthong although that meant
incurring her parents’ wrath and being exiled to live a simple life.
Implications for Thai women today
Thai folktales do give a glimpse into the life and status of women in the
bygone days although it is believed that what women in literature had to suffer was
but a pale reflection of the onus they had to bear in real life (National Identity Board
1992:53). Yet Thai folktales also have important implications for today’s women
because literature is one of the most effective mans of communicating standards,
values and ideologies. And what people read or listen to as a child would shape their
values of what it means to be a “good” or “bad” woman as well as their perspectives
on how to relate and behave towards men. Sexist indoctrination begins with picture
books designed for pre-school children, before they can read and write.
Deeply concerned by the serious problem of the influence exerted by
children’s books and textbooks on the development of sexist attitudes and behaviour
in young people, Unesco embarked on a series of national studies on the portrayal of
men and of women in textbooks and children’s literature in 1981. And the prevalence
of sexist stereotypes has been confirmed by all the studies carried out under this
project, in countries throughout the world (Michel 1986:20). Sociologist Andrée
Michel argues that sexist stereotypes, themselves a product of the inequality between
the sexes, in turn become the source of further discrimination between the sexes. The
younger the child, the less well equipped he or she is to resist the powerful stereotypes
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18. that incline him or her to see the opposite sex as having conventional attributes,
qualities or failings. Thus, young children are led to attribute mythical qualities to
boys and to look down on girls (1986:23).
In Thai folktales, the portrayal of the female sex is confined to specific
qualities and roles, for example motherhood. So little girls are socialised into the idea
that when they grow up, the most obvious route for them is to marry and have
children. Not that this is in itself a bad thing, but girls then get used to the thought that
other social (professional and political) roles are closed to them. Yet we have to
remember that folklore is not the only tool of socialisation for a child. There are other
socialising agents, such as school, parents, and TV.
Attitude to beauty
The appreciation of grace and elegance, and the evaluation of beauty are
deeply entrenched in Thai culture. The Thai tends to be aware of physical bearing,
beauty, and ugliness, as well as the use of the body as a communicative device
(Phillips 1965:45). As has been shown earlier, there are certain defined standards of
beauty, most of which are laid out in the Traiphummikatha. And these standards of
beauty are inscribed in the mind of a woman as she grows up. If she falls short of
these ideals, it might affect her self-esteem and she might take steps to rectify her
looks, such as going for cosmetic surgery. Although Hollywood movies and imported
Western TV shows have been blamed for fostering a “foreign” ideal of beauty, such
as fair-skinned blondes, in Thailand, it is interesting to note that the ideal of fair skin
is found in the ancient Traiphummikatha, which describes the women of Utarakuru:
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19. “Their cheeks are creamy-white and are as smooth as if they were carefully
powdered.”
It is commonly thought that beauty is amoral but this is not the case in
Thailand where beauty is linked to morality through canonical and popular Buddhism
and court literature. Beauty is described in the Buddhist canon as one of the five
powers of women and reflect the effects of merit collected from past lives (Van
Esterik 2000:155). Given the importance of beauty to a Thai woman because of its
religious link, it follows then that the construction of a woman’s appearance is just as
important. Sunthorn Phu offers more advice in his Suphasit Son Ying:
Ensure your attire befits your person
That it may complement your looks.
When powdering your face and your body,
Consider complexion and be not extreme.
Whoever sees you must surely approve –
Say you are clever and arrayed like a swan.
For though you by young and beautiful,
Ignorance of grooming is beauty wasted.
(Van Esterik 2000:157)
The augmenting of a woman’s natural beauty was even alluded to in a political debate
on why “Thai” should be spelt with an “h”. A reason given was that “Thai with an H
is like a sophisticated girl with her hair set, her lips touched with lipstick and her brow
arched with eyebrow pencil while Tai without the H is like a girl who is naturally
attractive but without any added beautification” (Thamsook, 1977).
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20. Hence, the importance of dressing up is evident from the endless stalls of
make-up and jewellery in shopping malls or along the streets. Particularly in the
streets of Bangkok, one would be hard-pressed to see a woman who is not neatly
dressed and attractively made-up.
Other than facial beauty, it is also vital that the Thai woman smells nice.
Afterall, in Thai folktales, the ideal woman emanates fragrance. Anthropologist Penny
van Esterik argues that “the smell of bodies is important to self-identity, both the
absence of offensive smells and the application of soothing and healing perfumes.”
(2000:210) Apparently, those working in Bangkok massage parlours devote eight per
cent of their expenditures to purchasing cosmetics, including perfumes (Wathinee and
Guest 1994:77, 292).
Modes of proper conduct
In Thai folktales, the “good” women are generally gentle, submissive and
dutiful wives. They work hard for their husbands, put up with their philandering ways
and sometimes even sacrificing their lives for them as in the story of Phra Law.
Sunthorn Phu wrote a poem, which all female students had to memorise, to teach the
women the ways in which they should serve their husbands:
1. Do not go outside the house after sunset.
2. Light up the house.
3. Clean the bed and the pillow, do not let any dust remain on the
bed.
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21. 4. Before going to bed, women must salute their husbands by
putting both hands together to the forehead and bending forward
with the hands until they rest upon the floor (The traditional wai)
5. If the husband is tired or stiff, the woman is to massage him with
her hands.
6. Wake up before the husband.
7. Prepare water for washing his face
8. Prepare food and water in clean containers
9. Sit by his side when he is eating, for it would be convenient if he
needed something
10. After he finished his meal, the woman may eat the leftovers.
(Phasuk 1979:23)
Although the “modern” middle class Thai woman now pays scant attention to these
verses, it has already inculcated in them a sense of what is “good” and what is “bad”.
Even if she does not adhere to all 10 points, she knows that this is considered the
“ideal”. In fact, I was quite surprised by the response of one of my Thai female
friends whom I thought would dismiss the entire poem. She is single, teaches English
for a living, 25 years old and is thoroughly modern in all sense of the word. She said:
“Of course I won’t eat his leftovers or do the traditional wai but I’d want to do
everything else, such as waking up before my husband and preparing meals for him.”
Social scientist Geert Hofstede’s study on national cultures may shed some
light on this. His findings are based on five independent dimensions – power distance
index, individualism, masculinity, uncertainty avoidance index and long-term
orientation. According to Hofstede’s ranking, Thailand is high on the uncertainty
19

22. avoidance index which indicates the society’s low level of tolerance for uncertainty.
In an effort to minimise or reduce this level of uncertainty, strict rules, laws, policies
and regulations are adopted and implemented. Thailand also has the lowest
masculinity ranking among Asian countries, indicating that the society is less
assertive and competitive. This situation also reinforces more traditional male and
female roles within the population. Hofstede’s findings perhaps then implies why
Thai women are not averse to the rules of behaviour that they have grown up with,
rules that govern how they eat, walk and relate to men. It seems too that women in
Thailand are more likely to take on the roles of wife and mother as depicted in the
Thai folktales.
Besides, the pictures that accompany the folktales usually portray good wives
in the process of making intricate handicrafts, such as weaving or basket-making. And
interestingly, in modern days, certain rehabilitation programmes for rescued female
sex workers, such as that piloted by Khunying Kanittha Wichiancharoen in Don
Muang, have concentrated on teaching women new skills such as weaving and basket-
making. In terms of Thai cultural tradition, this can be read as an attempt to convert
the “bad” woman into the “good” (Harrison 2001:156). Apart from portraying women
in the roles of mother and wives, Thai folktales do seem to prescribe how women
should relate to men. As mentioned earlier, the men were expected to be the
originators or initiators or action while “good” women just respond accordingly.
So it seems that while good women abide by the prescribed code of behaviour
– that of allowing the husband to take the lead, to allow themselves to be treated like
their husband’s appendage – the bad women are not afraid to break the conventional
codes to get what they want. Conversely, the interesting question to ask is: if a woman
20

23. is a go-getter and uses all means, even unsavoury ones, to achieve her ends, does that
then make her a “bad” woman?
Conclusion
It is difficult to ascertain the extent to which Thai folktales influence women’s
perception of beauty, “goodness” and gender relations. This paper draws parallels
between what is depicted in the stories and society’s expectations of women.
Literature acts as a mirror to society, yet propagates its stereotypes at the same time.
In Thailand, there has been a long-standing cultural division of women into
“good” and “bad” – the Virgin and the Whore. Local media depicts the “modern”
Thai woman as youthful, outgoing, gregarious, fun-loving and often rather “girlishly”
cute, yet avoids any suggestion of her sexual agency or availability. Underlying this
construction of “modern” Thai womanhood is a much older tradition of the feminine,
with its emphasis on grace, beauty, neatness and good manners – an image built up
partly by Thai folktales.
21

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25. Thanapol Chadchaidee (2004) Fascinating Folktales of Thailand. Bangkok: D.K.
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26. Appendix 1
Data Analysis
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27. Appendix 1
Data Analysis
25

28. Appendix 1
Data Analysis
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29. Appendix 1
Data Analysis
27