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An introduction is presented for the issue, which is in honour of Professor Ian Brown, on the theme of South Asia's colonial history.

Burma's first well known welfare plan was entitled Pyidawtha or Happy Land, and it was launched in 1952. In vernacular terms, the literal meaning of Pyidawtha is 'Prosperous Royal Country'. The government's attempt to sustain tradition and culture and to instil modern aspirations in its citizens was reflected in its choice of the word Pyidawtha. The Plan failed and its implications still overshadow the development framework of Burma. This paper discusses how the country's major decisions, including whether or not to join the Commonwealth, have been influenced by language; how the term and concept of 'development' were conceived; how the Burmese translation was coined to attract public support; and how the detailed planning was presented to the masses by the government. The paper also discusses the concerns and anxieties of the democratic government led by U Nu in introducing Burma's first major development plan to a war-torn and bitterly divided country, and why it eventually failed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recruitment of the all-female Rani of Jhansi Regiment of the Indian National Army in Japanese-controlled Singapore and Malaya, with a particular focus on the period between the first female guard of honour on 12 July 1943 through to the opening of the regiment's main camp in Singapore on 22 October 1943, has to date been insufficiently studied. Starting with the conception of the Regiment in an Axis submarine by the Indian nationalist leader Subhas Chandra Bose (1897-1945), this paper examines the ideas and figures that inspired the regiment and the role of Bose and Dr Lakshmi Swaminadhan (1914-2012) in mobilizing recruits. A division of labour can be distinguished, whereby Bose's rallies and speeches awakened a desire and commitment to join the regiment, whereas Dr Lakshmi used a door-to-door approach and access to homes to convince parents and to confirm participation. By 22 October 1943, 156 women and girls from among the Indian communities in Singapore and Malaya from a wide range of ethnic, social, religious and language backgrounds had joined the regiment that was part of Bose's plan to liberate India from British domination. Among the key sources used in this paper are Dr Lakshmi's late-1960s autobiography and the 2007 autobiographical account of one of her then 16-year-old recruits, Rasammah Naomi Navarednam (b 1927). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses a case study of the H...ôi An-Da Nang corridor in Qu...ang Nam province, Vi...êt Nam, to examine some of the pressures that whale worship - a traditional cultural practice of coastal fishing communities in central and southern Vi...êt Nam - has faced since the Đ...ôi M...ói reforms of 1986. Whale temples, the physical manifestation of the veneration of the whale as an ancestor of fishers, are coming under increasing pressure as tourism development displaces coastal communities from the shores and as the younger generations turn their back on the sea as a source of livelihood. The paper seeks to draw attention to a locally important manifestation of intangible cultural heritage, the existence of which is threatened even before the country's first tentative efforts at cultural heritage conservation come into full swing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the concept of 'speaking beyond trauma' in societies undergoing post-war reconstruction and recovery after decades of colonization and violence. It examines inequalities in the production of knowledge and the re-colonization of knowledge economies dominated by well funded 'experts'. It draws contrasts with the precarious lives of underfunded local knowledge producers, especially musicians and artists, whose compositions transcend methodological nationalisms. The focus of this paper is on the tactile aspect of practising and playing music: perceived by, connected with, appealing to the sense of touch, producing the effect of solidity. The paper examines how music can weave, repair, connect, disconnect and reconnect people and affective communities of belonging in a society shattered by colonization, war and ongoing conflicts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the Indonesian occupation of Timor-Leste (1975-99), the Roman Catholic Church grew in importance to the East Timorese people. This is demonstrated by the large increase in Timorese affiliation to the Church: 25-30% of the populace were baptized Catholics in 1975 compared with over 90% in the 1990s. Various explanations have been offered for this growth, many of which identify 'extrinsic' factors such as the religious prescriptions of Indonesian law or the pressures of Islamization. While acknowledging the importance of these factors, this paper argues that certain intrinsic factors substantially influenced the identification of the Timorese experience of occupation with Catholic faith and solidarity. An understanding of these intrinsic factors can provide a more expansive understanding of Timorese culture, experience and history. Drawing on original research into the faith and experience of Timorese people during the occupation, the author explores the relationship between suffering, resistance and the Catholic faith of the Timorese in four areas: language; 'a spirituality of resistance'; martyrdom; and sanctuary and advocacy for the persecuted. The paper draws on the insights of French philosopher and literary critic, René Girard, regarding the importance of Christianity in the context of violence. Girard has argued for a particular understanding of the centrality of the victim in human culture and of how Christianity helps to reveal this centrality. Girard's perspective sheds light on how the Timorese came to terms with their experience of suffering and violence under Indonesian occupation through their identification with Jesus Christ and the Church. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the existence of Shi'ite women in Indonesia as a religious minority group. Although studies of numerous aspects of women's lives and organizations in an Indonesian context are increasing, there have been few on issues of religion and women, particularly on women from minority religious groups. It is only in the last few years that scholars have paid more attention to women's divisions of Muslim organizations, focusing mainly on Sunni Muslim women's organizations such as Aisyiyyah, Muslimat NU, Persistri and Al-Irsyad. However, information on gender and women's roles in minority religious groups is still hard to find. The paper fills this gap by working towards a better understanding of the position and the role of Shi'ite women in their Shi'ite community and within the Indonesian community in general. The subject of the study is Fathimiyyah, the women's division of Ikatan Jamaah Ahlul Bait Indonesia (IJABI, the Indonesian Council of Ahlul Bayt Associations), an Indonesian Shi'ite organization founded in 2000. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What makes a 'classic' in South East Asian studies? In addressing this question, the paper compares and contrasts the features of two books written in the late 1940s and early 1950s: Teodoro Agoncillo's The Revolt of the Masses and George Kahin's Nationalism and Revolution in Indonesia. It examines the subject position of the authors and the politico-academic contexts in which their works were written, assessed and consumed. Specifically, the paper explores the following questions. To what extent did scholarly merit define a 'classic'? What features internal to particular area studies stimulated or impeded the making of a potential classic? What sort of political and academic architectures were conducive or unreceptive to potential candidates? In what ways, and to what extent, have the 'rules of the game' changed 60 years later? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study of political parties in the parliamentary arena in Indonesia is in its infancy. This has led to various assumptions about the way parties act in the House of People's Representatives (Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat, or DPR) that are based on scanty evidence and are heavily influenced by hostile attitudes to the DPR common in the media and the NGO community. The paper argues that, contrary to assertions that central party leaders exercise strict discipline over their members in parliament, coordination between party and caucuses, or fraksi, is weak, inconsistent and ad hoc. The paper concludes that this situation is facilitated by the eschewing of public votes through the process of decision making by 'consensus', a practice that is actually a vote by fraksi leaders to the exclusion of ordinary members. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the links between Bangkok's smoking skyline and the political and economic aspirations of North Eastern Thais. The author proposes that much of what was at stake during the 2009 and 2010 political upheaval was closely tied to a constricted sense of citizenship apparent in the frustrated political and economic aspirations expressed by North East Thailand's urban poor. Through an ethnographic analysis of the experiences of residents of Khon Kaen's railway communities as they participate in a new housing project, the paper explores the obstacles that poor citizens encounter when they try to 'become right with the law' and 'unite' in the name of 'developing' themselves, their communities, their cities and their nation. In reflecting on the politics of belonging that arise during this project, the author's analysis reveals how hard these citizens work to comply with laws and to take part in national development projects, even when many of those same laws and processes frequently work against them. The author argues that, although coups and mass mobilizations form the most public faces of the current political moment, they simply reflect more pernicious, complex forms of the everyday politics facing poor citizens. Indeed, these frustrated aspirations expose the links between Bangkok's burning shopping malls and the charred provincial government buildings of the North East (Isan). The analysis suggests that the events of 2009 and 2010 were not an uprising against the state, but rather a movement demanding recognition and the opening of the political and economic order to the poor as full citizens. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent political events in Thailand have shed light on a long neglected and dangerous corner of 'Thai' history. An oceanic shift in Thai politics, only beginning to be tracked, now threatens the 'Thai race nationalist model', the foundations of which date back to the early twentieth century. Made near complete under military dictatorship after 1958, and perfected after the bloody crackdown of 1976, this model has enjoyed apparent rejuvenation since the 2006 coup, now with the monarchy at its centre. This paper focuses on the question of Lao ethnicity and the North East of Thailand, or Isan. It shows how a combination of linguistics, a pseudo-science of race and ethnicity and historical revisionism have created the appearance of an ethnically and culturally homogenized 'Thailand'. The paper argues that an ethnic history from the periphery has run parallel to the history of the Thai centre, and its broad contours become ever sharper. 'Thailand', as a nationalist construct, now faces competing 'ethnic' narratives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the resilience of local Cambodian kinship and village communities in the aftermath of devastating violence. These communities are explored as cross-cutting sets of exchange relationships between local community residents, community members and their urban relatives, lay people and Buddhist monks, and the living and the dead -- in the context of the annual phchum ben ceremony, or 'festival of the dead'. The phchum ben ceremony is an act of 'social resilience' in the spirit of this special issue; the ritual is an act of mourning, a demonstrative activity expressing grief, and a process to restore the disrupted social relations between the living and the deceased ancestors, especially those who died during war and the reign of the Khmer Rouge in the state known formally as Democratic Kampuchea (1975-79). The ritual focuses on community cohesion, as most rituals do, and social networks are enacted, recreated and displayed; by participating, people declare their membership of various social groups. The paper emphasizes that, in the contemporary economic and social context, the ritual is also about enacting and proclaiming social hierarchy, highlighting the gap between wealthy and powerful (now often urban) family members and their poor and dependent rural cousins. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the recovery in Thailand after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. The country worst affected by the tsunami was Indonesia, while in Thailand about 8,000 people were assumed dead. In all the countries affected more females were killed than males. Disasters test the strength of a society's structures and relationships, and this paper focuses on the interplay between gender, vulnerability and social resilience. It provides an overview of social resilience as a concept and theory and discusses vulnerability and resilience in disaster situations. The paper is based on findings from a long period of anthropological fieldwork, which included interviews with survivors and relatives and with Buddhist monks and nuns. Buddhist temples, monks and nuns played important roles after the tsunami and became a refuge for survivors, and this paper explores religion as a resilience factor. Religious explanations and daily and other religious practices were of major significance in the recovery process, and Thai people have shown themselves to be both vulnerable and resilient. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the years, Hanoi historians have presented different views of the role of communist organizers in the events of 1930–31. Thanks to the opening of the Comintern archives, we can now see that in 1929–30 there was a strong shift in international communism towards revolutionary violence in all parts of the world. This paper discusses the ideological precedents and influences reaching Vietnam from Russia and the Comintern, as well as from the Chinese revolutionary movement. These include the slogans and political analysis of colonial countries that the Comintern and its agents were popularizing in Moscow, Paris and China. They also include the experience of peasant revolt in southern China, in particular what became known as the Hai-lufeng Soviets in Guangdong province in 1927–28, as well as Chinese left-wing politics of 1928–30, when Li Lisan was a dominant force. The author explores the idea that violent anarchism, with roots in the theories of early Russian revolutionaries, may have been a link between these disparate influences. An examination of the attitudes expressed by different Vietnamese communist leaders towards the revolutionary violence of 1930–31 forms an important part of this paper. To what extent were they in tune with the Comintern? Did they find other sources of inspiration closer to home? Were they simply riding a wave of peasant anger? In conclusion, the author discusses conceptions of what the Revolutionary High Tide represented in terms of political change in Vietnam. Was it the coming of age of the proletariat; an expression of peasant grievances that got out of control; or a first step on the path to independence? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the regional network of the Indonesian chapter of Hizbut Tahrir (HT), a transnational Islamic group aiming to revive the Islamic Caliphate. Focusing on the chapter of HT in Indonesia, the paper highlights how Hizbut Tahrir Indonesia (HTI) supports the activities of other HT chapters in the region and beyond. The key argument of the paper is that an understanding of HTI's transnational activism brings new insights to the current understanding of HT as a transnational movement. The author seeks to show the linkages between HTI and other HT chapters around the world and to analyse the implications of HTI's transnational activism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Tablighi Jama'at ranks as one of the biggest missionary movements in the contemporary Muslim world and it has spread its network of itinerant members right across Asia. This paper looks at the spread of the Tablighi Jama'at in and across South East Asia in particular, tracing its early arrival in the 1950s to the present. The author identifies it as one of the many currents of globalization that has brought the region closer together in a borderless world that is now being integrated by the forces of capital. Interestingly, the Tabligh is one example of an alternative form of globalization that is faith-driven, and yet spreads across national political boundaries with relative ease. Understanding the Tablighi Jama'at, plus what motivates its members to opt for an alternative understanding and praxis of normative Islam in an age of mass consumerism and global capital, is one of the aims of this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most media coverage of the 'Abu Sayyaf, an allegedly militant Islamist group or organization in the Philippines, derives ultimately from official sources, but the information provided by such sources has never been subject to scrutiny. To redress the oversight, this paper critically examines official and media accounts of the 'Abu Sayyaf. Beginning with a survey of media reports from June 2007 to January 2009, it highlights the contradictions uncovered in the sample before accounting for such inconsistencies and other peculiarities in terms of Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky's propaganda model. Applying the model to the performance of the media in the southwestern Philippines, the paper then looks at the factors that render journalists in the region highly dependent on official sources for data, and hence vulnerable to state disinformation, before exploring the framework of presuppositions that influence popular representations of the 'Abu Sayyaf and the troubles in the zone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines how ethnic Shan singers use the Burmese language to redefine their own ethnic identity, in the process helping to construct Shans' place in the Burmese national imaginary. The paper focuses on the songs of two Shan artists, Sai Htee Saing and Sai Sai Mao. These two singers have been singing in Burmese for three decades. Both have gained nationwide popularity and are now among the most famous singers in Burma's music industry. The paper consists of two parts. The first one discusses the dynamics of self-representation, examining how Shan artists select and adapt dominant discourses about them to their own task of crafting themselves. The second part investigates the audience reception of these two singers, exploring how particular groups of audience members bring their own ethnicity into interpreting a media text. Through participant observation, interviews with audiences and with the singers themselves, the author seeks to illuminate how such self-fashioning and listening practices reveal complex relations between ethnicity and the popular construction of identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although diverse and extensive, scholarship on ethnic riots in South East Asia has given inordinate attention to the genesis, evolution and eventual suppression of such episodes of violence, while many of the available studies have been local in scope and have centred mainly on incidents in modern-day Indonesia and the Philippines. This paper takes as its point of departure some lacunae in the literature on ethnic riots in South East Asia. It seeks to initiate a shift from the study of the causes, processes and conditions that led to the outbreak of ethnic riots to a critical analysis of regional and global responses by both colonial and anticolonial actors in the aftermath. By focusing on the case of the deadly ethnic riots - commonly known as the Maria Hertogh riots - which broke out in Singapore in December 1950, and by drawing connections between local events and wider developments overseas, the paper demonstrates how the study of collective violence in South East Asia and elsewhere can be further enhanced through an analysis of the various strategies that were enacted by colonial states and by the forms of resistance and collaboration of the colonized and other non-state agencies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 1970s, Filipino cinema has presented internationally distinguished narratives on same-sex sexuality. Contemporary films from the Philippines dealing with issues of sexuality demonstrate an increasing interest in Filipino men who identify themselves as gay. Looking closely at two such films, Ang Lalake sa Parola (Man in the Lighthouse, dir Joselito Altarejo, 2007) and Bathhouse (dir Crisaldo Pablo, 2005), this paper examines how Filipino men engage with (or disengage from) the global gay construct. Drawing on ethnographic research, queer theory and post-colonial discourse, this article analyses how these filmic texts reflect the changing diversities of incumbent homosexual and global gay subjectivities. Using notions of cultural imperialism and protest as a conceptual backdrop, the paper considers the relevance of dichotomies - global/local or metropolitan/rural - in understanding appropriations of the gay identity by characters tied to globalized spaces. Its contention is that these texts illustrate how same-sex screen identities are recontextualized, visually and digitically, through self-peripheralization of the body and of the self. The author argues that the reshaping and redistribution of homosexual identities is synonymous with a reconstituted (national) resistance to non-Filipino global gay identities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent processes of decentralization have dramatically changed local political configurations and access to resources throughout Indonesia. In particular, the resource-rich regions at the margins of the state have, in the name of regional autonomy, experienced new spaces for manoeuvre in their claims for a larger share of forest resources. By stressing the unfolding relationship between local ethnic elites and the state, and their different strategies in negotiating and claiming authority over forests within Indonesia's changing forest regimes, the paper examines how local-level politics has taken on its special configuration in the remote border region of West Kalimantan, Indonesia. The author demonstrates this by focusing on the ongoing struggle over forest resources and by tracking the fate of a political movement for a new district in this resource-rich region. The paper further examines how current local elite strategies and networks can be related back to the period of border militarization in the 1960s and, once again, how these seem to challenge the exclusivity of the Indonesian--Malaysian border. The main argument is that central authority in the borderland has never been absolute, but waxes and wanes, and thus that state rules and laws are always up for local interpretation and negotiation, although the degree of such negotiation changes depending on the strength of the central state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Philippine government, military and media regularly represent the Abu Sayyaf as being the main perpetrators of atrocities in the southern Philippines. This paper challenges such representations through an outline of the phenomenon of kidnapping in the region. Opening with a vignette of the phenomenon drawn from primary sources, the paper then considers in greater detail its objective conditions, the identities of its perpetrators and sponsors, and their interdependencies. The available evidence strongly indicates that kidnappings in the zone are instigated mainly by key power brokers, who engage or collaborate with local armed groups for the purpose. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic nationalism is often associated with the mercantilist view. Being nationalist is viewed as non-conventional, particularly in the age of globalization in which cross-border trade and investment are perceived to bring benefits to all participants. The paper questions this notion of economic nationalism. The author argues that in today's context, policy changes that appear to be 'nationalist' may not be totally inconsistent with policies advocated by liberals. This description of economic nationalism is applicable to Singapore and Thailand. By means of a case study (involving the Shin Corporation of Thailand and Temasek Holdings Limited of Singapore), the paper shows that the governments did not hesitate to arouse local support to maximize their respective national interests while at the same time remaining active in regional and global initiatives. The decisions of the Thais and Singaporeans reflect the trend towards an increasing discomfort with globalization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper emphasizes the deeply embedded economic interests of Islamic charities: the accumulation of land and property, commercial and financial activities, rather than their role in providing social welfare, educational opportunities, and facilities for individuals to perform the Hajj. These entrepreneurial priorities are global, since the waqf (Islamic endowment) is linked to the homeland of the founders in the Hadhramaut and to Saudi Arabia. The paper appraises the application and success of Islamic finance in the commercial exploitation of these assets. The focus then shifts to the role of shari'a law in determining and shaping the issuance of bonds and derivatives. Throughout the paper, attention is given to the nature of an 'ethical capitalism' that emerges, and a brief comparison is drawn with the Chinese or Confucianist Tong (lineage). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper traces the religio-political role of ulama in Malaysia. Its key argument is that historically the ulama in Malaysia have maintained a symbiotic relationship with various political authorities. From early Islamic history to the Japanese occupation, ulama have usually worked with any power willing to secure their authority and influence. The paper also shows that even when the ulama oppose the government – exemplified by the opposition of Parti Islam Se-Malaysia ulama to the UMNO-led Malaysian government – this opposition tends to stem from differences in politics rather than religious ideologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the processes and outcomes of Indonesia's first ever direct local elections through an analysis of the 2006 mayoral election in Batam. The paper highlights and seeks to explain a paradox in contemporary Indonesia's local politics: that is, the weakening of political parties' influence in local political change at a time when political parties maintain a monopoly over the nomination of candidates for local government heads. The analysis shows that, instead of parties, party machines and party platforms, wealthy and politically influential local elites have come to dominate electoral competition for local government heads. The paper provides an understanding of how direct local elections have affected the political dynamics of Batam, which was an integral part of Soeharto's patronage system that upheld the New Order regime until 1998. Furthermore, the author suggests that analysing local political change can improve our understanding of Indonesia's political development more broadly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the mid-nineteenth century, as part of Thailand's modernization programme, Thai elites embarked on the conscious construction of a Thai national identity, which included the promulgation of three central elements: chāt [nation], sādsnā [religion] and Phra Mahāgasat [monarchy]. Essentially, these elements came to mean Central Thai ethnicity and the Buddhist religion. This paper seeks to assess the effects of Thai nationalism on ethnic relations in Thailand with an evaluation of the ethnic composition of income inequality. It specifically tests a structuralist model of social exclusion using a variety of quantitative empirical tests that rely on survey and census data in order to uncover the dynamics of Thai nationalism's effect on ethnic economic inequality. The paper ends with suggestions for a new approach to Thai nationalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]