Asian Studies

Asian Studies Book List

Viet Nam
Tradition and Change
By Hữu Ngọc
· Edited by Lady Borton and Elizabeth F. Collins

During his 20 years as a columnist for Việt Nam News, Huu Ngoc both charmed and educated an international readership with his simple but elegant glimpses into Vietnamese culture. These selections from his column are perfectly suited to students of Vietnamese history and culture and travelers seeking an introduction to the country and its people.

Social Science Essays · Asian History · Asian Studies · Vietnam

The Red Earth
A Vietnamese Memoir of Life on a Colonial Rubber Plantation
By Binh Tu Tran
· Edited by David G. Marr
· Translation by John Spragens

Phu Rieng was one of many French rubber plantations in colonial Vietnam; Tran Tu Binh was one of 17,606 laborers brought to work there in 1927, and his memoir is a straightforward, emotionally searing account of how one Vietnamese youth became involved in revolutionary politics. The connection between this early experience and later activities of the author becomes clear as we learn that Tran Tu Binh survived imprisonment on Con Son island to help engineer the general uprising in Hanoi in 1945.

Asian History · Memoir · World and Comparative History · Vietnam · Asian Studies · Southeast Asian Studies

Cover of 'Television, Nation, and Culture in Indonesia'

Television, Nation, and Culture in Indonesia
By Philip Kitley

The culture of television in Indonesia began with its establishment in 1962 as a public broadcasting service. From that time, through the deregulation of television broadcasting in 1990 and the establishment of commercial channels, television can be understood, Philip Kitley argues, as a part of the New Order’s national culture project, designed to legitimate an idealized Indonesian national cultural identity.

History · History | Modern | 20th Century · Political Science · Media Studies · Television - History and Criticism · Asian History · Sociology · Asia · Southeastern Asia · Indonesia · Asian Studies · Southeast Asian Studies

Under the Heel of the Dragon
Islam, Racism, Crime, and the Uighur in China
By Blaine Kaltman

The Turkic Muslims known as the Uighur have long faced social and economic disadvantages in China because of their minority status.

Violence in Society · Race and Ethnicity · Social Science | Sociology of Religion · Religion | Religion, Politics & State · Islam · China · Central Asia · Xinjiang · Criminology · Asian Studies

Cover of 'Burma’s Mass Lay Meditation Movement'

Burma’s Mass Lay Meditation Movement
Buddhism and the Cultural Construction of Power
By Ingrid Jordt

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.Drawing

Social Science | Sociology of Religion · Religion | Religion, Politics & State · Buddhism · Human Rights · Southeastern Asia · Burma · Southeast Asian Studies · Asian Studies

Land for the People
The State and Agrarian Conflict in Indonesia
Edited by Anton Lucas and Carol Warren

Half of Indonesia’s massive population still lives on farms, and for these tens of millions of people the revolutionary promise of land reform remains largely unfulfilled. The Basic Agrarian Law, enacted in the wake of the Indonesian revolution, was supposed to provide access to land and equitable returns for peasant farmers. But fifty years later, the law’s objectives of social justice have not been achieved.Land

Southeast Asian History · Agricultural and Food Policy · Indonesia · Southeastern Asia · Asia · Southeast Asian Studies · Asian Studies

The Return of the Galon King
History, Law, and Rebellion in Colonial Burma
By Maitrii Aung-Thwin

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.

Southeast Asian History · Colonialism and Decolonization · Violence in Society · Burma · Asian Studies · Southeast Asian Studies

Cover of 'Resistance on the National Stage'

Resistance on the National Stage
Theater and Politics in Late New Order Indonesia
By Michael H. Bodden

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

History · Theater - History and Criticism · Southeast Asian Studies · Asian Studies

Between Frontiers
Nation and Identity in a Southeast Asian Borderland
By Noboru Ishikawa

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.

Human Geography · Demography · Anthropology · Malaysia · Southeast Asian Studies · Asian Studies

Cover of 'Sino–Malay Trade and Diplomacy from the Tenth through the Fourteenth Century'

Sino–Malay Trade and Diplomacy from the Tenth through the Fourteenth Century
By Derek Heng

China has been an important player in the international economy for two thousand years and has historically exerted enormous influence over the development and nature of political and economic affairs in the regions beyond its borders, especially its neighbors.Sino–Malay

Asian History · History · Southeast Asian Studies · Asian Studies

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

Indonesian Exports, Peasant Agriculture and the World Economy 1850–2000
Economic Structures in a Southeast Asian State
By Hiroyoshi Kano

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. This economic pattern survived several shifts and persisted even after Indonesia became independent in the mid-twentieth century.Hiroyoshi

Southeast Asian Studies · Business & Economics | Development Studies · Asian Studies · Business and Economics

Burma’s Mass Lay Meditation Movement
Buddhism and the Cultural Construction of Power
By Ingrid Jordt

Social Science | Sociology of Religion · Religion | Religion, Politics & State · Buddhism · Human Rights · Southeastern Asia · Burma · Southeast Asian Studies · Asian Studies

Under the Heel of the Dragon
Islam, Racism, Crime, and the Uighur in China
By Blaine Kaltman

The Turkic Muslims known as the Uighur have long faced social and economic disadvantages in China because of their minority status.

Southeast Asian Lives
Personal Narratives and Historical Experience
Edited by Roxana Waterson

As news accounts report almost daily, the social, political, and economic atmosphere of Southeast Asia makes it one of the most dynamic and quickly developing regions of the world. Southeast Asian Lives: Personal Narratives and Historical Experience presents extraordinary life stories of ordinary people in a rapidly changing Southeast Asia.The

Sociology · Social Science, Methodology · Southeast Asian Studies · Asian Studies

The Komedie Stamboel
Popular Theater in Colonial Indonesia, 1891–1903
By Matthew Isaac Cohen

Originating in 1891 in the port city of Surabaya, the Komedie Stamboel, or Istanbul-style theater, toured colonial Indonesia, Singapore, and Malaysia by rail and steamship. The company performed musical versions of the Arabian Nights and European fairy tales and operas such as Sleeping Beauty and Aida, as well as Indian and Persian romances, Southeast Asian chronicles, true crime stories, and political allegories.

History · World and Comparative History · Asian History · Theater - History and Criticism · Colonialism and Decolonization · Asian Studies · Literature