The dislocated, deterritorialized discourse produced by repatriates from formerly European colonies has remained overlooked in academic scholarship. One such group is the Eurasian “Indo” community that has its roots in the former Dutch East Indies, today’s Indonesia. This article focuses on Tjalie Robinson, the intellectual leader of this community from the 1950s to the mid-1970s. The son of a Dutch father and a British-Javanese mother, Robinson became the leading voice of the diasporic Indo community in the Netherlands and later also in the United States. His engagement resulted in the foundation of the Indo magazine Tong Tong and the annual Pasar Malam Besar, what was to become the world’s biggest Eurasian festival. Robinson played an essential role in the cultural awareness and self-pride of the eventually global Indo community through his elaboration of a hybrid and transnational identity concept. By placing his focus “tussen twee werelden” (in-between two worlds) and identifying “mixties-schap” (mestizaje) as the essential characteristic of Indo identity, Robinson anticipated debates on hybridity, transnationalism, and creolism that only much later would draw attention from scholars in the field of postcolonial studies. This article highlights Robinson’s pioneering role in framing a deterritorialized hybrid alternative to nationalist essentialism in the postcolonial era.

This article entitled 'The British in Java, 1811-1816; A Javanese Account' was published in Jurrien van Goor (ed.), Trading Companies in Asia, 1600-1830 (Utrecht: HES Uitgevers, 1986), pp.127-92. It is largely based on my text edition and translation of British Library MS 12330 (Babad Bedhah ing Ngayogyakarta - The Chronicle of the Fall of Yogyakarta) which was written by a senior Yogyakarta prince (great-uncle of Prince Diponegoro), Pangeran Ario Panular (circa1760-1825), describing the period from the British attack on the Yogyakarta court on 20 June 1812 to the marriage of the fourth sultan (HB IV, reigned 1814-1822) to the daughter of the murdered Yogya prime minister, Danurejo II (1799-1811), in May 1816. This whole Javanese text was later published under the same title by Oxford University Press in 1992 and it has recently been translated into Indonesian (Bahasa) and will be published by Penerbit Buku Kompas (PBK) on 24 May 2017 in the British Embassy, Jakarta, to mark the 200th anniversary of he publication of Raffles's History of Java in May 1817. For those interested in more detail on the specifically Javanese view of the events of the British occupation of Java in 1811-1816, these last publications may prove more useful for English and Indonesian speakers.

This book analyses the processes of social and economic change in Brunei Darussalam. Drawing on recent studies undertaken by both locally based scholars and senior researchers from outside the state, the book explores the underlying strengths, characteristics, and uniqueness of Malay Islamic Monarchy in Brunei Darussalam in a historical context and examines these in an increasingly challenging regional and global environment. It considers events in Brunei's recent history and current socio-cultural transformations, which give expression to the traumatic years of decolonisation in Southeast Asia. A wide range of issues focus on foreign, non-Bruneian narratives of Brunei as against insider or domestic accounts of the sultanate, the status of minority ethnic groups in Brunei and the concept of 'Brunei society', as well as changes in the character and composition of the famous 'water village', Kampong Ayer, as the cultural heartland of Brunei Malay culture and the socio-cultural and economic effects of the resettlement of substantial segments of the population from a 'life on water' to a 'life on land'. A timely and very important study on Brunei Darussalam, the book will be of interest to anthropologists, sociologists, historians, geographers, and area studies specialists in Southeast Asian Studies and Asian Studies.

The development of Philippines' poetic terrain is a product of the nation's historical circumstances. The country, being a prey of colonial and imperial projects by Spain and the US, has transformed its own poetic landscape into an area where Filipino writers struggle, first through a "period of apprenticeship", to use the colonial language as means for expressing the Filipino consciousness, then towards the present quest of naturalization and colonization of the colonial language itself. According to Gémino Abad, in order for our Filipino poets to further cultivate its poetic terrain; we must naturalize English and colonize the language. That is to say, we must own English and make it Filipino -especially for it is the foremost task of a poet to become the "nerves and sinews of the language" based on his feeling, thinking, and looking at our historical condition.

The Ifugaos seem to be the only people in the world who have developed peacemaking ideology in a typically aggressive genre of oral literature. The rich literature on epic traditions worldwide portrays a highly male-centered genre of song glorifying heroic values and warlike acts. Ifugao male epics represents aggressive ideology, which it shares with all the corresponding genres from India to Iceland. But what is specific of the Ifugao epic lore is that it contains two trends. The /hudhud/, female epic tradition of the Ifugaos, is a unique specimen of peacemaking, even pacifist ideology in epic form. This ideology has developed in the peak of headhunting period, i.e. it is genuine, not imposed by the influence of other cultures as, for instance, the motives of regret that appeared in Kalinga Ullalim under the influence of Christianization and American "order".

The appropriation of place and language is a key strategy by which post-colonial writers represent the identity of the individual. These two tasks go hand-in-hand because, in order to establish one’s bond with the land and re-write it from one’s perspective, language must also be stripped of its British connotations and adapted to the individual’s consciousness. Because of Singapore’s unique experience of post-colonialism and nation-building, various other presences besides the British coloniser also influence the way that language and place are conceived. These include the homelands of China and India and the government of Singapore, among others. Examining the works of poets from three different periods of the nation's history, I discuss how each practices appropriation through different means and to different ends as they respond to their specific historical circumstances. The three poets I will focus on are Wang Gungwu (pre-independence), Edwin Thumboo (early independence) and Alfian Sa’at (late independence). Each articulates an identity that is a hybrid of its various influences and unique to its moment of utterance.

This wide-ranging book re-evaluates in detail the early history and historiography of Brunei Darussalam, the origins of the sultanate, its gene-alogical foundations and the structure and administration of Brunei society. Contributors draw on the seminal work of Donald E. Brown whose major monograph on the sultanate was published in 1970 and marked the beginnings of advanced sociological, anthropological and historical research on Brunei. Among the key issues addressed are status systems, titles and social stratification, Chinese sources for the study of Brunei, Malay oral and written histories and traditions, the symbolism, meanings and origins of coronation rituals, previously unknown sources for the study of Brunei history and the processes of incorporation of minority populations into the sultanate. Contributions by leading scholars of Brunei, Borneo and the wider Indonesian-Malay world, both from within Brunei Darussalam and beyond, address some central preoccupations which Brown raised and which have been the subject of continued debate in Austronesian and Southeast Asian studies. A novel contribution to the study of the history of Brunei Darussalam, this book will be of interest to scholars of Southeast Asian history, Asian history, Colonial and Imperial history and anthropology. Victor T. King is Professor of Borneo Studies at the Institute of Asian Studies , Universiti Brunei Darussalam, and Emeritus Professor of South East Asian Studies, University of Leeds, UK. He is the co-author of The Modern Anthropology of SouthEast Asia (Routledge 2006) and co-editor of the Rou-tledge series Modern Anthropology of SouthEast Asia.

2000 KITLV Uitgeverij Leiden Déwa Rutji De Maleise versie is uitgegeven en vertaald door Poerbatjaraka (1940:35-7, 52-4), de Oud-Javaanse prozaversie door Prijohoetomo (1934:27-139) en het Oud-Javaanse gedicht afkomstig uit Java door Poerbatjaraka (1940:11-28). Het corpus van Wrekudara-Déwa Rutji-verhalen wordt nader besproken in Arps, te verschijnen.

Bali has been regarded as a 'paradise island', 'island of thousand temples' and many other images to support the growth of tourism industry. In fact, the industry has been developed massively  after a mass massacre of the leftists and radical populists associated with PKI (Communist Party of Indonesia) taking place in 1965-1966 led by General Soeharto. The images have been a strategy for romanticizing Balinese culture while simultaneously forgetting the traumatic tragedy of 1965.  Although the history has been distorted by the regime and most Balinese are reluctant to talk about tragedy, a few Balinese youth has established a community called Taman 65 (1965 Park) as a learning circle to study and challenge the state history. This book is a collection of their thoughts on history, Balinese social dynamics, and contemporary issues in Bali that arguably cannot be separated from the 1965 event.

Southeast Asia was the location of violent conflict and social upheaval during the Cold War, from the 1950s until the late 1980s. The literary evidence suggests that the imprint of the Cold War on Southeast Asian thinking, Cold War 'structures of feeling', long survived the fall of Berlin Wall in 1989. In this chapter, however, I discuss major novels, short stories, a poem and two plays written in Southeast Asia during the global Cold War era (1950-90) in order to understand the ways in which these texts comment upon the Cold War and its impact on the region.

"A New Sun Rises Over the Old Land" by Suon Sorin: A Novel of Sihanouk's Cambodia
Translated and with an introduction by Roger Nelson (NUS Press, 2019)
First published in Khmer in 1961

"A New Sun Rises Over the Old Land" traces the story of Sam, a young man who leaves the countryside for the capital after the death of his parents. In Phnom Penh, he suffers countless hardships and injustices as a cyclo driver. Sam’s humanity is denied him at every turn in the city’s capitalist society, leading to devastation for him and his wife, Soy.

As Cambodia develops and Sam’s fortunes change, he realises that while life as a farmer is far from easy, it has the potential to bring fulfilment and happiness.

First published in 1961, eight years after Cambodia gained independence from French colonial rule, Suon Sorin’s novel is an iconic work of modern Khmer literature. A singularly illuminating historical document of the new nation, the novel offers a fresh view into a period of profound transformation in Cambodia.

This is one of the first English translations of a modern Khmer novel, and is accompanied by an extended introduction which situates Suon Sorin’s work in its historical and artistic context.

"Many survivors of Norodom Sihanouk’s time in power in Cambodia (1955–1970) refer to the era as a golden age – as it certainly was when it’s compared with what came next. A New Sun Rises Over the Old Land has been deftly translated and introduced by Roger Nelson. Reading this passionate, absorbing novel, it’s poignant to re-enter a period that was filled for many Cambodians with optimism, autonomy and self-respect."
-- David Chandler, Emeritus Professor, Monash University

"Of value to researchers and diasporic Khmers alike, this is tragedy as Khmer tragedy comes, entangled in class violence, national pride, and hope."
-- Prumsodun Ok, author, dancer and choreographer

Suon Sorin was born in Battambang, Cambodia in 1930. "A New Sun Rises Over the Old Land" is his only known work of fiction, and was the best-selling novel of the 1960s. It remains widely read in Cambodia today.

168pp / 229 x 152mm, 2 images
Paperback
ISBN: 978-981-3250-77-2

https://nuspress.nus.edu.sg/products/a-new-sun-rises-over-the-old-land-a-novel-of-sihanouk-s-cambodia

This wide-ranging book re-evaluates in detail the early history and historiography of Brunei Darussalam, the origins of the sultanate, its gene-alogical foundations and the structure and administration of Brunei society. Contributors draw on the seminal work of Donald E. Brown whose major monograph on the sultanate was published in 1970 and marked the beginnings of advanced sociological, anthropological and historical research on Brunei. Among the key issues addressed are status systems, titles and social stratification, Chinese sources for the study of Brunei, Malay oral and written histories and traditions, the symbolism, meanings and origins of coronation rituals, previously unknown sources for the study of Brunei history and the processes of incorporation of minority populations into the sultanate. Contributions by leading scholars of Brunei, Borneo and the wider Indonesian-Malay world, both from within Brunei Darussalam and beyond, address some central preoccupations which Brow...

This paper operates on the notion of the unintentional grotesque and aims to explore elements of the grotesque in Lee Kok Liang‟s “Just a Girl” (1968) and Lisa Ho King Li‟s “The Tiger and the Moth” (1991). A grotesque reading of the two works was done
based on several reasons: the misfit characters, the grotesque elements present in the stories and ultimately, the grotesque manipulation of power towards the Other in society. This article aims to analyse elements of grotesque in the two stories via its
thematisation of notions of alterity and manipulation of power. I also argue that the grotesque elements serve as a critique of the social malaise portrayed in the stories. Lisa Ho‟s misfit is the effeminate Endi, an illegitimate child of mixed parentage with
mottephobia whose status as the other leads to a grotesque death. The misfit in Lee's work is portrayed via the nameless blind girl facing a bleak future as a result of her blindness and her father's abuse of paternal authority. While both protagonists are polar opposites, they both face grotesque consequences because of who they are. By relating to this, this paper argues that the grotesque elements expose readers to the unexpected,
dark side of society.

The Nu regime (1948-1962), threatened with intervention by both the PRC and the
United States, and its supporters successfully reimagined the Cold War in ways that
masked its concerns and sought to weaken the more direct threat of military
intervention by the PRC. While the superpowers were able to configure conventional
maps in ways that yielded propagandic value, Burma’s Cold War terrain was more
difficult to render cartographically in ways that would aid the Burmese government.
The Nu regime thus turned to the project of creating, through a play, an “imagined”
Cold War landscape. This imagined landscape made it possible to hide from the
Burmese the PRC threat and isolate the government’s domestic enemies from the
global Cold War context. This Burmese version of the Cold War was so successful in
doing so that it would continue to inform the military’s policies after the latter took
power in 1962.

Numerous are the patrilineal mythic narratives that institutionalize unidimensional representations of women, portraying female bodies either as repositories of submission and passivity or as cesspools of chaos and corruption. Through insidious reproduction, such myths cast a discursive spell that dispossesses women of their subjectivity and agency. To break this curse and regain their voice, feminist authors have undertaken the task of rewriting old myths in ways that speak to current local problématiques. Intan Paramaditha's collection of stories, Apple and Knife (2018), is exemplary of this mission: in her speculative quill, fairy tales become reports of female body policing, vampires are symbolic of non-normative roles and a menstruation-eating monster is a counter-metaphor to misogynist scatological taboos. With a framework informed by feminist and postmodernist studies, this article explores the stylistic modes of corporeal writing in revisionist mythmaking. How are female bodies recast in revised myths in the interest of subverting standards of femininity? How does speculative fiction serve as an effective instrument in celebrating bodies symptomatically silenced in "original" texts? By fostering a dialogue between corporeal writing and revisionist speculative fiction, this paper examines how the female body may be reimagined outside what is deemed singular, natural, or authentic, both in terms of genre and gender.

Probabilmente perché in Italia mancano scuole a livello universitario idonee a stimolare – come avviene per l'India, il Tibet, la Cina, il Giappone, per non citare che i paesi che più richiamano l'attenzione dei nostri orientalisti – l'interesse e lo studio della Birmania, delle sue genti, della sua civiltà, è già arduo attendersi di reperire, anche nelle migliori biblioteche, un minimo di opere fondamentali per iniziare una ricerca seria nel campo della birmanologia. Per ovviare a questa carenza, altrimenti inspiegabile, ho pensato di far cosa utile pubblicando la bibliografia che segue per offrirla al lettore interessato a questi studi, perché in poco tempo possa avere a disposizione un panorama bibliografico ch'io ho potuto ottenere soltanto a prezzo di non pochi anni di ricerche, soprattutto all'estero, spesso per la cortesia di autorevoli amici che mi hanno inviato a prestito opere della loro biblioteca o fornito utili indicazioni per poterle consultare.
Mi sembra, oltre a ciò, che in lavori simili non esista un corredo bibliografico così ricco e, credo, anzi, che molte opere qui citate siano state talvolta del tutto trascurate, forse perché ritenute superate dal tempo, mentre a parer mio, sono da ritenersi basilari per uno studio documentato.
Perciò mi auguro che il seguente “contributo ad una bibliografia generale sulla Birmania” sia accolto come il coronamento di tutto il lavoro, addirittura la base di esso.

Renzo Carmignani,  1971 “Birmania storia arte civiltà”: 303

Taiwan-based Mahua (Chinese-Malaysian) writer Ng Kim Chew (Huang Jinshu, 1967– ) has questioned Mahua literature’s filiation to mainland Chinese literature through parodic depictions of look-alikes and resemblances involving the canonical May Fourth writer Yu Dafu and his sojourn in colonial Malaya. What critics view as Ng’s self-invention through negativity can be used to explore his strategic alliance with another mainland Chinese genealogy, that of the late-Qing philologist-rebel Zhang Taiyan and the “father” of modern Chinese literature, Lu Xun. Ng provocatively claims that the late-Qing and postwar (or Cold War) Mahua intellectual and literary contexts are structurally resonant. His filiation with these two historically unrelated contexts in his essays, as well as his short fiction, over two decades is what I call his imaginative materialism of Chinese writing (wen). Using Ng’s recently published master’s thesis on Zhang Taiyan (2012), I focus on how Zhang’s role in the longer history of Chinese reflection on writing and semiotics shapes Ng’s fictional works on Malayan communism and his critique of Mahua literary history. Besides Zhang’s proposal for literary reform, I examine Ng’s allegorical reading of Zhang’s skepticism about oracle bone inscription, and what the “unearthing” of this ancient form of writing around the fall of empire means for Mahua people’s history and experience of the Asian Cold War. Ng refashions cultural essentialist Zhang’s Old Text Confucianism and “National Studies” toward new ends. Paradoxically, it is Ng’s deep engagement with the legibility of the classical Chinese past and the recurring theme of revolution and writing that defines his aesthetic modernity.

This paper traces Hindu-Sanskrit influences in precolonial Philippine literature; examines intangible elements such as superstitions and filial piety in ancient literary forms; and discusses their influences on regional literatures particularly in the literary traditions of Muslim Philippines. CABRERA, Jaime-Seminar in Philippine Literature 1

Panay Bukidnon are a group of people who practice swidden agriculture in upland communities across all four provinces on Panay Island, Philippines. Epic chanting, known collectively as sugidanon, is one marker of ethnolinguistic distinction that separates them from lowland populations due in part to use of an “archaic Kinaray-a” or binukidnon lexicon and the perception that chanting is a timeless ethnic tradition. Since the 1960s, several Filipino anthropologists have demonstrated a keen interest in the narratives, collecting and publishing them for academic and public consumption. Additionally, chants are currently taught to Panay Bukidnon children in an ethnopedagogy program known variously as the Balay Turun-an, School of Living Tradition (SLT), or GAMABA Training Center. My discussion of sugidanon will primarily refer to the ongoing University of the Philippines publication series chanted by members of the Caballero family, comprised of fourteen volumes total, presented in archaic and contemporary Kinaray-a, Tagalog, and English.

This paper argues that sugidanon chants act as invented tradition by asserting continuities with the precolonial past and also preserving in memory maritime lifeways and socioeconomic practices no longer extant among Panay Bukidnon people living in the uplands of Panay. The frame of invented tradition allows for analysis of sugidanon narratives as being situated in and informed by specific temporal, geographic, and cultural contexts rather than viewing them as timeless, obsolete, or exotic. To illustrate the applicability of invented tradition literature to the SLT program as my primary case study, I will first discuss other examples of invented tradition such as ethnic dress, language, and dance with a special focus on Southeast Asia. Furthermore, I suggest that sugidanon and the SLT program specifically are exemplars of one indigenous response to modernity that is contingent on Panay Bukidnon relationships with other non-indigenous Filipinos and the world at large.

The Abhiraja/Dhajaraja story, the most important origin myth legitimizing Burmese kingship, is widely viewed as a central Burmese (Burman) tradition. Based on evidence from available pre-eighteenth century historical texts, many previously unexamined by scholars, this article finds that the Abhiraja/Dhajaraja origin myth developed in western Burma over three centuries before its appearance in central Burma in a 1781 court treatise. This analysis demonstrates that during a significant period of cultural borrowing, from the 1780s until the 1820s, central Burmese (Burman) literati inserted western Burmese (Arakanese) myths and historical traditions into an evolving central Burmese historical perspective with which most scholars are more familiar.

The genocide which occurred in Cambodia in the aftermath of the Vietnam War cannot be easily dismissed or ignored. The ongoing (though not progressive) Khmer Rouge tribunal and the active campaigning of war remembrance by diasporic Cambodian writers and artists have demanded a re-assessment of the Khmer Rouge period of Cambodia from 1975-1979. In addition, the intentional publication of testimonies and historical fiction on anniversaries that mark the genocide in Cambodia also ensure that the nation’s tragic past continues to remain in the public’s consciousness. Moreover, the emphasis on the concept of responsibility and truth-telling by many Cambodian scholars clearly indicates a privileging of an uncontested accuracy over artistic and creative representations in testimonies concerned with war and genocide. This tension between immediate truth telling and artistic retelling is thus the main concern in this paper.  For, as the discussion will show, Vaddey Ratner’s In the Shadow of the Banyan (2012) posits that the aesthetics of the written testimony need not be sacrificed for accurate truth-telling, but that the use of a Khmer Buddhist aesthetics enables her readers and her to actively resist a fetishized memory of the genocide, and seek reconciliation with their traumatic experiences.

Malaysian literature in English has just attained its sixtieth anniversary since its modest inception in the late 1940s, initiated by a small group of college and university students in Singapore. Singapore was the academic hub of British Malaya and the only university of the colony was located there, therefore it was natural that a movement in English writing should have started from there. Nonetheless, given the current cultural and political rivalries between Singapore and Malaysia, it is rather ironic that a Malaysian tradition of writing started in a territory that now sees Malaysia as the 'other' .

This interview was conducted via electronic mail in July 20071 when I decided to include Huzir Sulaiman's play, Atomic Jaya, in my undergraduate course on Malaysian and Singaporean Literature. Since little was available on this young playwright, I thought an interview would help to elicit some information that would shed light on his imagination, creative process, and the published works; and it might also trigger more discussion on the playwright, especially in the academic and critical circles.

This collection of essays brings together work by some of the most internationally acclaimed critics of Malaysian literature in English from different parts of the world, including Australia, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore and the US. It investigates the works of major writers of the tradition in the genres of drama, fiction and poetry, from its beginnings to the present, focusing mainly on thematic and stylistic trends. The book pays particular attention to issues such as gender, ethnicity, nationalism, multiculturalism, diaspora, hybridity and transnationalism, which are central to the creativity and imagination of these writers. The chapters collectively address the challenges and achievements of writers in the English language in a country where English, first introduced by the colonisers, has experienced a mixed fate of ups and downs in the post-independence period, due to the changing, and sometimes strikingly different, policies adopted by the government. The book will be of interest to readers and researchers of Malaysian literature, Southeast Asian studies and postcolonial literatures.

This book brings together fourteen articles by prominent critics of Malaysian Anglophone literature from five different countries: Australia, Italy, Malaysia, Singapore, and the US. It investigates the thematic and stylistic trends in the literary products of selected writers of the tradition in the genres of drama, fiction, and poetry, from its beginnings to the present, focusing mainly on the postcolonial themes of ethnicity, gender, diaspora, and nationalism, which are central to the creativity and imagination of these writers. The book explores the works of not just the established writers of the tradition but also those who have received little critical attention to date but who are equally gifted, such as Adibah Amin, Edward Dorall, Rehaman Rashid, and Huzir Suleiman. The chapters collectively address the challenges and achievements of writers in the English language in a country where English is widely used in daily life and yet marginalised in the creative domain to elevate the status of writings in the national language, i.e., Bahasa Malaysia. The book will demonstrate that in spite of such recurrent neglect of the medium, Malaysia has produced a number of outstanding writers in the language, who are comparable in creativity and craftsmanship to writers of other Anglophone traditions. The book will be of interest to readers and researchers of Malaysian literature, postcolonial literatures, minority literatures, gender studies, and Southeast Asian studies.

Richard Wright's The Color Curtain: A Report on the Bandung Conference has long been a fundamental book in Bandung historiography. As a crucial companion volume to The Color Curtain, Roberts and Foulcher's Indonesian Notebook: A Sourcebook on Richard Wright and The Bandung Conference showcases the previously unknown side of Wright's Bandung narrative, as told from the perspectives of the vibrant group of Indonesian intellectuals and writers who hosted him in Indonesia in 1955. Showcasing Wright’s previously unknown interactions with Indonesian modernists and his previously unknown lecturing activities in Indonesia, this book has major implications for any reading of postcolonial history and culture after the Asian-African Conference of 1955.

In the 1970s, U Nu engaged in numerous activities in a context other than that of the Cold War. His removal from office, his imprisonment and exile, and his efforts to gather antigovernment forces under his banner all occurred as part of a struggle against military rule and were treated with ambivalence by the major Cold War powers, the United States, the Soviet Union, and the People’s Republic of China. From that perspective, the dangers Burma faced during the Cold War faded from view and old allies in the 1950s, such as Ne Win, were now long-entrenched enemies. In this chapter, I seek to understand the ways in which the Nu government reacted to the Cold War in the 1950s, independently of the post-1962 Cold War context, under the shadow of the eventual military takeover.