Southeast Asian Studies Book List ·

Resistance on the National Stage

Theater and Politics in Late New Order Indonesia

Resistance on the National Stage analyzes the ways in which, between 1985 and 1998, modern theater prac­titioners in Indonesia contributed to a rising movement of social protest against the long-governing New Order regime of President Suharto.…

The Return of the Galon King

History, Law, and Rebellion in Colonial Burma

In late 1930, on a secluded mountain overlooking the rural paddy fields of British Burma, a peasant leader named Saya San crowned himself King and inaugurated a series of uprisings that would later erupt into one of the largest anti-colonial rebellions in Southeast Asian history.…

Being “Dutch” in the Indies

A History of Creolisation and Empire, 1500–1920

Being “Dutch” in the Indies portrays Dutch colonial territories in Asia not as mere societies under foreign occupation but rather as a “Creole empire.” In telling the story of the Creole empire, the authors draw on government archives, newspapers, and literary works as well as genealogical studies that follow the fortunes of individual families over several generations.…

Between Frontiers

Nation and Identity in a Southeast Asian Borderland

A staple of postwar academic writing, “nationalism” is a contentious and often unanalyzed abstraction. It is generally treated as something “imagined,” “fashioned,” and “disseminated,” as an idea located in the mind, in printed matter, on maps, in symbols such as flags and anthems, and in collective memory.…

Beyond the Archipelago

Selected Poems

A collections of 70 poems from one of Malaya’s leading poets, that depict longing, loneliness, modernization, and insights in Malaysian culture.

BitterSweet

The Memoir of a Chinese Indonesian Family in the Twentieth Century

Millions of Chinese have left the mainland over the last two centuries in search of new beginnings. The majority went to Southeast Asia, and the single largest destination was the colony of the Dutch East Indies, now known as Indonesia.…

Burma’s Mass Lay Meditation Movement

Buddhism and the Cultural Construction of Power

Burma's Mass Lay Meditation Movement: Buddhism and the Cultural Construction of Power describes a transformation in Buddhist practice in contemporary Burma. This revitalization movement has had real consequences for how the oppressive military junta, in power since the early 1960s, governs the country.…

Change and Continuity in Minangkabau

Local, Regional, and Historical Perspectives on West Sumatra

Social scientists have long recognized many apparent contradictions in the Minangkabau. The world’s largest matrilineal people, they are also strongly Islamic and, as a society, remarkably modern and outward looking.…

Communism, Religion, and Revolt in Banten in the Early Twentieth Century

Twice in this century popular revolts against colonial rule have occured in the Banten district of West Java. These revolts, conducted largely under an Islamic leadership, also proclaimed themselves Communist.…

A Comprehensive Indonesian-English Dictionary

This major new dictionary is the most modern and inclusive Indonesian-English dictionary available. The product of more than twenty years of research and documentation of the Indonesian language and culture, A Comprehensive Indonesian-English Dictionary is designed to be as user-friendly as possible.…

A Comprehensive Indonesian–English Dictionary

Second Edition

This second edition of A Comprehensive Indonesian-English Dictionary brings the highly successful first edition up to date with hundreds of new entries in business, law, and finance, as well as specialized terminology in the fields of technology, engineering, mining, and construction.…

Dictionary of Indonesian Islam

Drawing from an extensive list of writings about Indonesian Islam that have appeared over the past fifteen years, Federspiel defines approximately 1,800 terms, phrases, historical figures, religious books, and place names that relate to Islam and gives their Arabic sources.…

Eight Prison Camps

A Dutch Family in Japanese Java

Eldest daughter of eight children, the author grew up in Surakarta, Java, in what is now Indonesia. In the months following the bombing of Pearl Harbor, however, Dutch nationals were rounded up by Japanese soldiers and put in internment camps.…

Financing Local Government in Indonesia

Considering the size and importance of Indonesia, remarkably little has been published in the West about the society and government of that country. With over 160 million people, it is the fifth most populous country in the world.…

From Jail to Jail

From Jail to Jail is the political autobiography of a central though enigmatic figure of the Indonesian Revolution. Variously labeled a communist, Trotskyite, and nationalist, Tan Malaka managed, during the several decades of his political activity, to run afoul of nearly every political group and faction involved in the Indonesian struggle for independence.…

From Kampung to City

A Social History of Kucing Malaysia, 1820-1970

One of the major processes in modern Southeast Asian history has been the development of ethnically heterogeneous towns and cities. Kucing, an intermediate-sized urban center in Sarawak, Malaysia, is today an institutionally complex, predominantly Chinese city of 100,000 led by modern political leaders.…

History of the Malay Kingdom of Patani

This translation of Ibrahim Syukri’s Sejarah Kerajaan Melayu Patani (SKMP) makes available a little known but important manuscript published privately ca. 1950 and printed in jawi (Malay written in a modified Arabic script).…

The Indigenization of Pali Meters in Thai Poetry

During the Ayutthaya period in Thailand (1350-1767), a group of meters based upon specific types and arrangements of syllables became a significant part of the Thai literary corpus. Known as chan in Thai literature, these meters, and the stanzas created from them, were adapted and transformed so that they corresponded in structure to other Thai verse forms.…

Indonesian Exports, Peasant Agriculture and the World Economy 1850–2000

Economic Structures in a Southeast Asian State

The Indonesian economy, like the Indonesian nation state, took shape as part of the colonial transformation of the archipelago by the Dutch in the mid-nineteenth century. The agricultural sector of the economy provided food and labor to the export sector, which was firmly incorporated into the world economy through international trade.…

Jan Compagnie in the Straits of Malacca, 1641–1795

In 1500 Malay Malacca was the queen city of the Malay Archipelago, one of the great trade centers of the world. Its rulers, said to be descendents of the ancient line of Srivijaya, dominated the lands east and west of the straits.…

Japanese Empire in the Tropics

Selected Documents and Reports of the Japanese Period in Sarawak, Northwest Borneo, 1941–1945

Although the Japanese interregnum was brief, its dramatic commencement and equally dramatic conclusion represented a watershed in the history of the young state of Sarawak. In recent years, there has been a groundswell of interest in the war years, culminating in an attempt at reassessment of the Japanese occupation in Southeast Asia by Western and Japanese scholars as well as by those from Southeast Asia.…

The Japanese Experience in Indonesia

Selected Memoirs of 1942-1945

Although the wartime Japanese military administration of Indonesia was critical to the making of modern Indonesia, it remains shrouded in mystery, in part because of the systematic destruction of records following the Japanese surrender.…