KUALA LUMPUR: Arts and culture have a crucial role in contributing towards global peace, said National Academy of Arts, Culture and Heritage’s (ASWARA) board of directors member, Datuk Muhammad Nasir Hamzah.
He said arts and culture were part of people’s daily lives and as such could be agents of peace, reconciliation and unity. Promoting peace through arts and culture is much easier.
“We need arts to communicate, dine, do business, care for people, love. Almost all needs arts and culture. We don’t have to be French to understand the French culture, we don’t have to be Italian to understand Italian arts and culture and we don’t have to be Egyptian to understand Egyptian civilisation which dates back thousands of years BC.
“Archaeologists are unearthing arts, culture and heritage of people thousands of years earlier. From their paintings, artefacts of arts and culture,” he said in his talk titled ‘The Role of Arts and Culture in Contributing to Peace in the Asia-Pacific Rim” at the International Leadership Conference 2021 held virtually recently.
The event was organised by the Universal Peace Federation.
Muhammad Nasir who is also deputy chairman of Karangkraf Media Group said arts and culture also have no boundaries.
Citing Malaysia as an example, he said many Malaysians can watch and enjoy Hindi, English or Korean films without even understanding a word of it.
“Now, people who don’t speak a word of Korean are obsessed with Korean dramas. They watch for hours, days, weeks, months and years without speaking or understanding a word of Korean,” he said.
He added that besides the all popular English-speaking movies, the Hindi and Korean ones have captured the world by storm, while the Chinese films had captured the movie markets through action movies like those of Bruce Lee’s and Jackie Chan’s.
He said in multi-ethnic, multi-religious and multi-cultural Malaysia, arts and culture also play a vital role in uniting the people.
“We have celebrated cultural festivals together as one nation. Through this effort our country is recognised as one with many cultures and we have sold our country as Malaysia truly Asia,” he said.
He added that role of arts and culture as agents of peace, reconciliation and unity had also become a subject of interest to researchers. -BERNAMA
