Karen Cultures

Don Dance

Karen Wrist-Tying Ceremony

Water Festival

Celebrations

Refugees from Burma are community-centered cultures, so celebrating various festivals throughout the year is very important. Celebrations typically involve dancing, speeches, music, food, sports tournaments and more. Community members dress in traditional clothing to show respect and pride for their culture. Learn more about these community events below.

Karen Community Events

Karen Revolution Day is held on January 31 and commemorates the beginning of the Karen uprising on January 31, 1949. In Burma, the event features a military parade along with dancing and speeches.
Karen National Day is held on February 11 and commemorates the demonstration on February 11, 1948 when Karen people demanded their own homeland. This event also involves a military parade when celebrated in Burma.
Don Dance The don dance is a series of dances performed by groups of dancers and accompanied by traditional Karen instruments. Don means to be in agreement. The person who leads the dance is called the don koh. Don dancing originated with the Pwo Karen, who developed it as a way to reinforce community values. However, the don dance has changed in significant ways since then. Under military dictatorship it was used to glorify Burmese socialism and then for the musical expression of the village or regional pride. Now, the don dance is known as a musical expression for national pride—or Karen nationalism. It is performed at many celebrations.
The annual Karen Wrist-Tying Ceremony is held in August (some celebrate at weddings too). It is rooted in the Animist belief to call back the spirits and bring good fortune. Monks and elders sit with a basket of 7 items in front of them: cold water, white threads, rice balls, triangular-shaped lumps of sticky rice in the packages, boiled bananas, paw woung flower branches, and sugarcane. They place each of these items in the participant’s hand and then tie a string around the wrist with yellow or white string. The meaning of the wrist tying is so the person is connected to one’s spirit and therefore can live free from fear.
Buddhist New Year/Water Festival is celebrated in mid-April. During the ceremony, participants show respect to elders by sprinkling water on them and make offerings to spirits. Additionally, women and girls wear a yellow flower in their hair and perform a special dance. In Burma and Thailand, people fill the streets and spray each other with water for several days.
Karen New Year is celebrated on the First Day of Pyathoe on the Lunar calendar, which is generally the end of December or beginning of January. It marks the end of the harvest of one rice crop and the beginning of the next rice crop. Karen New Year is the largest celebration in the Karen community and is celebrated nationally throughout Burma.

Karen Traditional weaving

Traditional clothing incorporates rich hues of red or blue woven into shirts and dresses. Weaving is an important folk art in Karen culture. Back in refugee camps, women often weaved in order to make money to buy food and school supplies for their children. They made woven scarves, shirts and bags. Weaving is an art the Karen value and teach to their children and the generations after

Education

Education is highly valued and respected in the Karen culture. In Burma and Thailand, there is a high-regard and respect towards teachers. During adolescence, some children must stay at home to take care of their younger siblings to allow their parents to work in the field. Sometimes teenagers worked in the fields with their parents. School can get disrupted when armies invade villages and the people must flee for safety.
The average age for Karen or refugees from Burma to enter school is 5-8 years old. They normally finish between 16-20 years old. There are no ceremonies to mark birthdays or rites of passage into adulthood. Generally, three languages are taught in Karen schools, Karen, English, and Burmese. The academic year begins the first week of June and ends in March.
Traditionally, Karen families teach their children the virtues of sincerity, simplicity, brotherhood, honesty, and humility. Most Karen children love music and sports. There is a desire to learn English, but students are deprived of school supplies and experienced educators. Although Karen schools began by missionaries, the Karen schooling system was not as influenced by Christian education. Because qualified teachers could only be found in Christian society, schools were led by Christian teachers but supported by Karen villagers, most of which were non-Christians. The Karen appreciate the kindness of missionaries, but their desire to learn was not intended to convert Karen society to Christianity, but to eliminate illiteracy and to provide an educational opportunity for their children.
After General Ne Win seized power in 1962, he nationalized all missionary and private schools in Burma and abolished their curriculum’s. He began the foundation for a socialist education system. As a result, Karen schools disappeared in Burma. However, the Karen have never given up their rights to an education. Since 1978, many refugees (more than 15,000 on the Thai-Burmese border) have started teaching their own children and as a way to pave the path towards opportunities in higher education.

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