EXPLORATIONS ! a graduate student journal of southeast asian studies Volume 12 Fall 2014 Type to enter text FEATURED IN THIS ISSUE: Interrelationships in South and Southeast Asian Art: Cham Female Realm, Buddhist Inscriptions and the Bud- dha Image, MYA CHAU |Pleasure of Abjection: Cheap Thai Comics as Cultural Catharsis, CHANOKPORN CHUTIKAMOLTHAM |Contesting the Master-Narratives of Thai Historiography: A Bibliographic Essay, JORDAN D. JOHNSON | Asian Seafaring Communities and the Blood-Red Seas: Maritime Violence and the Waters Surrounding the Malay Peninsula, 1825-1885, SCOTT C. ABEL| Burmese in Hawai‘i: "Voting with our Feet" and Speaking for the Silent, TANI SEBRO| Irom Sharmila’s Beyond the Web of the Material World, SUMITRA THOIDINGJAM | Lao Kamhawm’s The Dry Wind | JOSEPH RUBIN EXPLORATIONS: a graduate student journal of southeast asian studies Volume 12 | Fall 2014 ! ! ! Articles ! Contesting the Master-Narratives of Thai Historiography: A Bibliographic Essay ! Jordan Johnson 3 ! Interrelationships in South and Southeast Asian Art: Cham Female Iconography, Buddhist ! Inscriptions and the Buddha Image ! Mya Chau 12 ! Asian Seafaring Communities and the Blood-Red Seas: Maritime Violence and the Waters ! Surrounding the Malay Peninsula, 1825-1885 ! Scott C. Abel 32 ! Pleasure of Abjection: Cheap Thai Comics as Cultural Catharsis ! Chanokporn Chutikamoltham 46 ! Mainstream Theories in Southeast Asian International Relations: Discourses and Limitations ! Ta-Wei Chu 59 ! Rediscovering Champa ! Michael Leadbetter 71 ! Burmese in Hawaiʻi: "Voting with our Feet" and Speaking for the Silent ! Tani Sebro 82 ! Translations ! Djenar Maesa Ayu’s Mandi Sabun Mandi [Bath Soap] ! Jesse Conrad 101 ! Irom Sharmila’s Taibung Mipanlangi Wamgmada [Beyond the Web of the Material World] ! Sumitra Thoidingjam 105 ! Lao Kamhawm’s Lom Lǣng [The Dry Wind] ! Joseph Rubin 108 ! Explorations of Historicization and Oral Traditions: A Translation of the Dalikal Nao Magru ! William B. Noseworthy 116 ! Book Reviews ! Mary Margaret Steedly’s ! Rifle Reports: A Story of Indonesian Independence ! Steve Beers 126 ! Erik Braun’s ! The Birth of Insight: Meditation, Modern Buddhism & Burmese Monk Ledi Sayadaw ! William B. Noseworthy 127 Dear Readers, Welcome to EXPLORATIONS: a graduate student journal of southeast asian studies. This year, the editorial ! team is pleased to announce our journal theme, ! Destabilizing Centers and Peripheries: Re-examining Approaches to the Study of Southeast Asia. ! This issue of EXPLORATIONS re-examines established approaches to the study of Southeast Asia. The articles in- ! cluded in this issue all destabilize and problematize existing categories and approaches in light of contemporary re- ! search. In addition, a broad range of disciplines and areas of research are covered here, including maritime history in ! the Malay Peninsula, international relations in Southeast Asia, as well as landscape archaeology of the ancient Cham ! civilization. We hope that they will provide a starting point for readers to consider alternative ways of thinking about ! Southeast Asia, both past and present. ! We are also pleased that we are able to publish the first English-language translations of Southeast Asian literature ! and manuscripts, including the works of Khamsing Srinawk and Djenar Maesa Ayu. ! The 2014 editorial team is glad to be a part of this student-initiated platform to encourage and promote graduate ! scholarship in Southeast Asian studies, and we look forward to seeing further advancement of research in this area. ! Aloha, ! 2014 EXPLORATIONS Editorial Team ! ! ! ! EXPLORATIONS is a student publication of the Southeast Asian Editorial Team ! Studies Student Association in conjunction with the Center for South- Isabel Chew ! east Asian Studies at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa and partially Asrizal Luthfi ! funded by the Student Activity and Program Fee Board at the University Piyawit Moonkham ! of Hawai‘i. ! Andrew Peterson ! The principle mission of EXPLORATIONS is to offer a forum for Daniel Pham ! students to present disciplinary and interdisciplinary research on a ! ! broad range of issues relating principally to the region which today con- ! Design and Layout Support ! stitutes Southeast Asia. Embracing both the diversity of academic inter- ! Piyawit Moonkham ! ests and scholastic expertise, it is hoped that this forum will introduce ! students to the work of their colleagues, encourage discussion both ! ! within and across disciplines, and foster a sense of community among CSEAS Coordinator ! Paul Rausch ! those interested in Southeast Asia. ! The views expressed in EXPLORATIONS are those of the authors ! ! Faculty Advisor ! and not necessarily those of the editorial board. If you have interest in ! participating in the production of EXPLORATIONS or have ques- Barbara Watson Andaya ! tions, comments, or submissions, please contact the editors at: ex- ! [email protected], or EXPLORATIONS c/o CSEAS, University of ! Hawai‘i at Mānoa, Moore Hall 416, 1890 East- West Road, Honolulu, ! Hawai‘i 96822. ! ! ! ! Cover Picture: ! Mekong River in Luang Prabang, Laos © 2014 Piyawit Moonkham ! Please visit us on the web at: ! http://www.cseashawaii.org/students/explorations/ ! ! ! Jordan D. Johnson ! Contesting the Master-Narratives of Thai Historiography: A Bibliographic Essay JORDAN D. JOHNSON Arizona State University ! Accounts of modern Thai history have traditionally often been influenced by two highly influential nor- mative viewpoints, which are that the Thai monarchy (especially since the mid-nineteenth century) has been singularly responsible for guiding the course of Thailand’s successful transformation into a modern nation-state, and that Thai Buddhism is something that can be wholly separated from socio-political life and any departure from this model represents a novel corruption. This essay serves as a critical examina- tion of these two pervasive narratives within Thai historiography, with a particular emphasis on exploring the underlying discursive trends that led to the rise of these two dominant paradigms. Furthermore, the following discussion highlights attempts by a more recent generation of scholars to offer a critical re-as- sessment of these “master-narratives,” thereby challenging the conclusions to which they lead. ! It is sometimes said within the field of philosophy of raphy. The first is the notion that the operative agent science that all data is theory-laden. If this is true – in the formation of the modern Thai nation was the and there is a powerful argument to be made that it is – benevolent, Herculean, and enlightened leadership of then the implication of this axiom for historiography is Thai kings. The second is the idea of normative Thai that there is probably no way of presenting historical Buddhism being a religious tradition unsullied by con- information that is in all ways neutral and free from the tact with the mundane world of politics. With respect influence of certain dominant discursive pressures. to these two themes, it will be shown that although This is certainly true in the case of histories of Thai- powerful forces exist within both of these areas that land. In the “Prologue” to his book, Seditious Histo- encourage specific kinds of histories to be written and ries: Contesting Thai and Southeast Asian Pasts, for certain interpretative angles to be employed, important example, Craig Reynolds asserts that, “in the Thai work is being done to challenge the validity of some of public square there is no such thing as disinterested the traditional master-narratives of Thai history and history.”1 Within Thai historiography certain themes open up new avenues of interpretive hermeneutics or “master-narratives” have traditionally served as or- from which there is much to be gained. ganizing principles that dictate the manner in which information is presented in order to either implicitly or The Centrality of the Monarchy in the explicitly advance certain agendas. In this essay, sever- Emergence of the Modern Thai al relatively recent monographs concerning Thai histo- Nation ry, religion, society, and politics will be examined with an eye towards looking at how themes prominent with- One of the most obvious factors that sets the nation in Thai studies are being re-assessed by scholars who of Thailand apart from all other nations in Southeast have an interest in looking beyond history as it is sup- Asia is the fact that it was never formally colonized by a posed to have been, and finding new interpretive lenses European power, and thus the process of moderniza- with which to illuminate new and understudied aspects tion in Thailand was not driven by a series of colonial of the historical record. In particular, this discussion viceroys ruling on behalf of a foreign government. will focus on two “ideal forms” within Thai historiog- Rather, the process was driven by forces from within. Volume 12, Fall 2014 "3 Contesting the Master-Narratives of Thai Historiography Within traditional Thai histories, although a number of “throw the baby out with the bath water.” Quite sim- different factors are presented as converging to allow ply, any history of the development of modern Thailand the modernization process to take place, it is very that fails to include an account of the critical role that clearly the Thai monarchy that is given primary credit the monarchy played – or fails to note the remarkable for masterminding a plan for the “native” moderniza- achievements and influence of Mongkut and