Response to “Policing Intensity” by Andrew M. Carruthers

The Bugis, an ethnic group of muslims who speak both Malay and Burgis, lived in Sebatik. When Malaysia was incorporated outside of British rule, the Burgis were adopted into the Malay identity. This saw an increase in undocumented Bugis immigrents to Malaysia from Indonesia. As a result, non-malay, indeginous Christian groups have dwindled in number, with them claiming it stemmed from the immigration issue. It is here where we posit the question “how might they police undocumented immigrants who look and talk like local Malays and who carry identity cards marking them as Malaysian citizens?” On the island of Sebatik, which is bisected by the border of Malaysia and Indonesia, acts as a “zone of intensity,” where the “virtual threshold” is particularly visible, as the movement of people around the defined states shapes community development. While the border is recognizably arbitrary and a remnant of colonial cartography, we still see “tempestuous, topological nature of borders and boundaries that meaningfully materialize across zones of intensity.” The borders are invisible, but not unsensible, making them more virtual than fictitious. And these thresholds don’t just block flow, but they also invite certain actors to cross them, like Brugis immigrants who don’t want to go through the difficult official channels of immigration. The intensity of police and state action also contributes to the intensity of the flow of immigrants. Advocates of a harder border with a wall on Sebatik seem to be far removed and don’t value the “coordinated infrastructure” defining the border as much as the actual (and arbitrary) border line.

Yet there are observable differences between the native Malaysian Bugis and migrants. There seems to be a perceived index-kind relationship where one can short them based on attributes that has been picked up by media outlets. Indonesian Malay is spoken “thicker.” Indonesian women wear tight clothing. This “moreness” manifests itself in Burgos migrants, describing movement to and from Malaysia as a “search for moreness.”

The definition of a border as virtual stood out to me. I remember how on google earth you can literally turn off borders, showing just how arbitrary they are, however in going to a border there is likely to be some observable existence. Yet, while I understand this idea that coordinated infrastructure can help define such an arbitrary line, in reality it is very hard to mark borders and to do it accurately, so how would this virtual nature not blur into a border zone rather than a defined line? He almost brings this up when discussing the assemblyman’s map, but he doesn’t really discuss the implications of a conflicted border. I think his observation of linguistics and index-kind relations helped explain the manifestations of nationality/place of birth in action, despite having similar cultural backgrounds. However, I did find his writing very jargon heavy which isn’t the most conducive to conveying your point. I think he did a good job of generally showing how thresholds exist, but doesn’t really discuss what happens when these thresholds come in conflict with each other.

Does the virtual nature of borders extend to the movement of goods and resources?

To what degree does “moreness” manifest itself in other aspects of the Bugis? Does it extend past linguistics and ontology?

Are index-kind assumptions about nationality reasonable to use in any official sense, or even in any social sense?