It is widely accepted that language plays a vital role in the formation of nation as well as the sense of unity among its people (Anderson 2006; Gellner 1983). In a multilinguistic society such as Myanmar’s, language use has significant political implications at all levels of society. With over 135 officially designated ethnic groups, language is often seen as a marker to identify and differentiate one's individual identity. In Myanmar, Burmese has been the dominant language of power and instruction since the country's independence in 1948 in ways which have marginalised other ethnic nationality groups. Successive governments sought unification through the Burmanisation of ethnic nationality areas, including through the standardisation of the Burmese language in schools and bans on publications in non-Burmese languages (Callahan 2003).

Much scholarly attention has been paid to the relationship between national identity, ethnicity and language. Language is not only a cultural resource which crafts a shared sense of unity amongst a group of people, but also has an instrumental function embedded in the process of nationbuilding. Benedict Anderson famously demonstrates the principal role that print capitalism has played in the formation of nations (Anderson 2006, 36). He argues that the mass distribution of information vis a vis the popular press helped to lay the foundation for a national consciousness in many parts of the world: “an imagined community among a specific assemble of fellow-readers” (ibid., 62).

In recent years, increasing attention has been paid to the development of the idea of nation in Burmese or the conceptual role of religion and nation in the formation of identity in Myanmar (eg. Candier 2019; Turner 2014). While there has been significant work written on Myanmar's multiple ethnic nationality movements, less attention has been paid to the semantics of how a sense of national consciousness emerged among non-Burmese or non-Buddhists. This chapter adds to this literature by providing a historical perspective on how the concept of nation came to be expressed in colonial Burma amongst the ethnic Sgaw Karen.