{{Short description|Burmese jurist and politician}} {{expand Burmese|မေအောင်၊ ဦး (စွယ်စုံပညာရှင်)|date=October 2018}} {{Infobox officeholder | honorific_prefix = | name = May Oung | native_name = {{nobold|{{lang|my|မေအောင်}}}} | native_name_lang = my | honorific_suffix = | image = | office = Minister of Home Affairs of British Burma | term_start = 1924<ref>{{cite book |last1=Kyaw |first1=Aye |title=The Voice of Young Burma |date=2018|publisher=Cornell University Press|isbn=9781501719349|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VFpdDwAAQBAJ&q=May+Oung+minister&pg=PA64 |language=en}}</ref> | term_end = 5 June 1926 | minister = | predecessor = | successor = | office2 = Minister of High Court of British Burma | term_start2 = 1922 | term_end2 = 1924 | birth_date = {{birth date|1880|1|6|df=y}} | birth_place = Sittwe | death_date = {{death date and age|1926|6|5|1880|1|6|df=y}} | death_place = Maymyo, Burma, British India | party = | alma_mater = University of Cambridge | parents = Tha Do Phyu (father)<br/> Hnaung Dway (mother) | spouse = Thein Mya | occupation = Legal scholar, Judge, Politician | relations = | children = Tha Doe Oung<br/>Tun Hla Oung<br/>Mya Sein }} '''May Oung''' ({{langx|my|မေအောင်}}, also spelt '''May Aung'''; 6 January 1880 - 5 June 1926) was a Burmese legal scholar, judge and politician who served as Minister of Home Affairs during the colonial era. He was known for his expertise in Burmese Buddhist law and one of the founders of the Young Men's Buddhist Association Burma. Scholars view him as a symbol of the early rise of Burmese nationalism.<ref name=":0">{{Citation |title=5. Burmese Buddhist Exceptionalism |date=2024-12-31 |work=InterAsian Intimacies across Race, Religion, and Colonialism |pages=104–124 |url=https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9781501777158-009/html |access-date=2025-05-11 |publisher=Cornell University Press |doi=10.1515/9781501777158-009 |isbn=978-1-5017-7715-8|url-access=subscription }}</ref> May Oung was the first law professor at Yangon University.
==Early life and education== May Oung was born on 6 January 1880 in Sittwe to parents Tha Do Phyu and Hnaung Dway, the second eldest of three sons. The family was of Arakanese descent.<ref name=":0" /> His parents died when May Oung was a child, so he was raised by his mother's brother, Hla Aung and his wife, Mya May, who sent him to India for his formative education. He studied law at the University of Cambridge from 1904 and 1907, and pursued an LLM at Cambridge in 1922.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tyiFCwAAQBAJ&q=%22may+oung%22&pg=PT80|title=British Burma in the New Century, 1895–1918|last=Keck|first=Stephen L.|date=2015-10-06|publisher=Springer|isbn=9781137364333|language=en}}</ref>
==Career== He was one of only two Burmese judges appointed to the High Court when it was established by the British administration in 1922.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_H4WBAAAQBAJ&q=%22may+oung%22&pg=PA17|title=A Twentieth Century Burmese Matriarch|last=Oung|first=Kin Thida|date=2007|publisher=Lulu.com|isbn=9780557102297|language=en}}</ref>
From 1924 to 1926, he served as the home member on the Legislative Council, one of the highest positions available to Burmese under British rule.<ref name=":0" /> He was also a founding member and president of the Young Men's Buddhist Association and a strong advocate for Buddhist revivalism, believing that Burmese identity was deeply tied to Buddhism and that national unity could be restored through a return to Buddhist teachings.<ref name=":0" />
== Personal life == May Oung was married to Thein Mya, and had several children, including Mya Sein.<ref name=":0" />
==References== {{reflist}}
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Category:1880 births Category:1926 deaths Category:Academic staff of the University of Yangon Category:Judges from British Burma Category:Alumni of the University of Cambridge Category:Rakhine people Category:People from Sittwe