Hybrid Production of Anisong Manuscripts in Luang Prabang

In a modern world dominated by book printing and digital technologies, the old cultural practice of producing manuscripts, both as containers of texts and as artefacts, has not disappeared in Laos, Thailand and adjacent Tai-speaking areas, but has rather been transformed by these new technologies. This article explores this process of transformation by examining a corpus of two dozen “hybrid manuscripts” of a particular literary genre called anisong (homiletic texts used in Buddhist rituals and ceremonies) as a case study. All these manuscripts are from Luang Prabang, the old Lao royal capital and major centre of Buddhist learning where the traditional manuscript culture has survived until present. Hybridity in manuscript production is reflected in changes of writing support (from palm-leaf to various kinds of paper), visual organisation, and the mixing of handwriting, typewriting and print in one and the same object.