1 Capitalism and cultural relativity
The Thai pop industry, capitalism and Western cultural values
In 1997 one of Thailand's more popular soap operas was Saam Num Saam Mum (‘three boys, three points of view’), televised weekly on Sunday night to a large Thai audience. In one particular episode, aired on 7 September 1997, there was a scene where one of the main female characters, Nat, cooked a Thai meal for her husband and her husband's two younger brothers. During this cooking sequence a government announcement flashed across the bottom of the screen: Thai people should help Thai people: eat Thai food, buy Thai goods, holiday in Thailand and be thrifty’.1 The onset of the Asian financial crisis, starting with the fall of the ...
Get Refashioning Pop Music in Asia now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.
