Education in the Margins: Learning Burmese to Learn Buddhism in Contemporary Myanmar and Beyond

Theravāda Buddhist religious literacy is often dependent on knowledge of the scriptural language Pāli. Yet, advanced knowledge and literacy in a vernacular language such as Burmese can be instrumental in the learning of Buddhism, not least because Pāli cannot be ‘studied in a vacuum’. This article therefore examines how learning the Burmese language is used as a foundation for the understanding of Pāli and Buddhism, and leads the author to advocate a combination of anthropological and textual approaches when studying this specific intersection of vernacular and classical language practices. Without the observation, participation, and questioning of teachers, students and their methods and practices, the full context of marginalia – to name one important example – would remain unclear.