Interweaving Border Folklore and Cultural Identity: An Exploration of Sound Aesthetics in The Story of Southern Islet
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5195/cinej.2026.784Keywords:
soundscape, diasporic identity, folkloric sound, Third Space, Chong Keat Aun, The Story of Southern IsletAbstract
In The Story of Southern Islet (2020), the debut feature film of Malaysian Chinese director Chong Keat Aun, sound functions not merely as a regional soundscape delineating the Malaysian borderlands, but as a core cinematic narrative mechanism through which the diasporic identity of Malaysian Chinese communities is constructed and negotiated. Drawing on R. Murray Schafer’s soundscape theory, Homi K. Bhabha’s concept of the “Third Space,” and diaspora studies as its principal analytical frameworks, this article undertakes a close textual reading of three categories of sonic elements in the film: how gamelan music and Wayang kulit vocal performance activate the cultural memory of ethnic communities along the Malay-Siamese border through ritual sound; how the serunai, functioning as a soundmark, foregrounds the boundary tensions between sound and body, the sacred and the secular, within the audiovisual field of a soul-summoning ritual; and how the performance of Nanyin transforms the Chinese diasporic experience into an irreversible sonic elegy, constituting the emotional climax of identity negotiation at the film’s conclusion. This study argues that through the meticulous design of its sonic elements, The Story of Southern Islet renders the Kedah borderlands as a “Third Space” in which diverse cultures converge and questions of identity and belonging remain unresolved. Sound operates therein simultaneously as a vehicle of folkloric memory and as an agentive medium through which Chinese ethnic identity is reconstructed in situ. The study also carries methodological significance in advancing the interdisciplinary dialogue between film sound studies and diaspora cultural studies.
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