Miss Malaysia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Miss Malaysia represents Malaysia in two of the major international pageants.
Miss Universe is a beauty pageant run by the New York-based partnership between NBC and Donald Trump
Miss World is a beauty pageant created in the United Kingdom by Eric Morley in 1951 and since 2000, Morley's wife, Julia Morley, co-chairs the pageant.
The winners of the national pageants are selected at different competitions as each is owned by a different organization. Usually, the Miss Malaysia Universe pageant is held earlier to coincide with the Miss Universe pageant and the Miss Malaysia World pageant later on in the year. The winner of these contests holds the title of Miss Malaysia Universe or Miss Malaysia World for a one year term.
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[edit] Former titleholders
Former titleholders of Miss Malaysia Universe includes Elaine Daly, Andrea Fonseka, Dato' Anna Lin and the only Malaysian semi-finalist in the Miss Universe pageant Josephine Lena Wong in 1970. She is the mother of Miss Malaysia Universe 2004, Andrea Fonseka.
The current title holder of Miss Malaysia Universe 2008/2009 is Levy Li Su Lin, a 21 years old, Honours Degree student of University Tunku Abdul Rahman, a rising TV personality and a fashion entrepreneur.
In comparison, by far, many Miss Malaysia World title holders have gone on to find success in other fields of the entertainment industry. These include Michelle Yeoh, Erra Fazira, Lina Teoh, Arianna Teoh, Jaclyn Lee, Tan Su Wei, Gloria Ting, Emmeline Ng, Deborah Priya Henry and the current holder Soo Wincci
In 2008, a 23 years old law & MBA graduate, Soo Wincci was crowned Miss World Malaysia 2008. She is now active in acting, modeling and will be coming out with her own singing album. She is the 1st Miss Malaysia who will be coming out with a Chinese album. Besides that, she also wrote songs for the children and charity houses.
[edit] Miss Malaysia/Universe Titleholders
[edit] Miss Malaysia/World titleholders
[edit] Fatwa ruling
In Malaysia, female Muslims were denied participation in beauty pageants following the issue of a fatwa in 1995 by the Mufti of Selangor.[1] The issue came to a nasty twist in July-September 1997 when three Malay participants joined the Miss Malaysian petite contest, only to be arrested by the authorities. In the ensuing public outcry and debate that followed, the effectiveness of the fatwa was shown given the influence of the Selangor's Mufti over the nation's sharia law.[2] The fatwa resonated with the ideology that Muslim women should cover up private parts of their body, or Aurat of which the beauty pageants' practices ran contrary to–even though such religious enactments are not restricted to male pageants.
Nevertheless, a public outcry ensued, as members of the public questioned the way the religious authorities handled the matter as well as the abrupt ruling which came about–Muslim women in the past had participated in beauty pageants without much protest amongst the religious authorities.[3] This invoked the concerns of Mahathir's who had raised objections to the way the religious authorities had implemented and enforced the law–and questions including distinctions on religious laws and personal freedom were raised.[4] Nevertheless, the fatwa ruling has since been very effective; Muslim women have since then been deterred from joining any beauty pageants for fear of arrest by the religious authorities by the fatwa enactment.[5] Malaysian beauty pageants, in compliance with the law, similarly denied Muslim individuals from participating.[6]
[edit] References
- ^ Arskal Salim, Azyumardi Azra (2003). Shari'a and Politics in Modern Indonesia. Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. p. 178. ISBN 9812301879.
- ^ Ariel Heryanto, Sumit Kumar Mandal (2003). Challenging Authoritarianism in Southeast Asia: Comparing Indonesia and Malaysia. Routledge. p. 143. ISBN 0415309417.
- ^ Norani Othman. "Islam and the State in Malaysia: A Problem of Democratization and Pluralism". Institut Kajian Malaysia dan Antarabangsa, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia. http://www.asef.org/go/subsite/ccd/documents/othman.pdf.
- ^ Zainah Anwar (September 16, 1997). "Modern, and Moderate, Islam". Newsweek. http://www-cgi.cnn.com/ASIANOW/asiaweek/97/0919/nat6.html.
- ^ "Family sees yet another beauty queen; Muslim hopeful pulls out". Daily Express, Sabah. July 18, 2006. http://www.dailyexpress.com.my/news.cfm?NewsID=43231.
- ^ "Better prizes offered in Miss Sabah pageant". The Star. March 13, 2007. http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2007/3/13/southneast/16972208&sec=southneast.
