Encouraging knowledge and enhancing the study of Asia iias.asia 8884 The Newsletter

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The Study Explaining low crime Japan 2 Contents In this edition of the Focus

From the Director 3 Imagining the university The Newsletter is a free periodical published by IIAS. in the post-COVID world As well as being a window into Online the institute, The Newsletter also links IIAS with the The Study community of Asia scholars and the worldwide public 4 What kind of history can we resources interested in Asia and Asian studies. The Newsletter bridges write of the Song dynasty? the gap between specialist Christian de Pee knowledge and public discourse, 5 Explaining low crime Japan and continues to serve as for Asia a forum for scholars to share Laura Bui research, commentary and 6-7 Sex and trade in seventeenth century opinion with colleagues in academia and beyond. Siam: Osoet Pegu and her Dutch lovers Wil O. Dijk scholars Postal address 8 Knock, knock! The great success PO Box 9500 of ideophones in Korean journalism 2300 RA Leiden Sonja Zweegers and The Netherlands Cristina Bahón-Arnaiz Alessandra Barrow 9 Creative ways to help believers: Visitors Indonesian female Islamic leaders Rapenburg 59 Leiden offer COVID-19 relief to families No one has escaped the effects of the T +31 (0) 71-527 2227 under pressure COVID-19 pandemic; we were forced [email protected] Mirjam Künkler and Eva F. Nisa indoors, sequestered to our ‘home 10-11 Indonesia in ‘3D’: development, Colophon dictatorship and democracy offices’. The online world has become The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 Jean-Luc Maurer very familiar to all of us. And so, for this Managing editor: issue of The Newsletter, and as a way Sonja Zweegers The Region to highlight our ever expanding list at Editorial assistant: Alessandra Barrow www.iias.asia/resources a Focus section 12-15 News from Southeast Asia Editors for The Focus: 16-18 News from Northeast Asia like no other, designed specifically for Sonja Zweegers the time in which we find ourselves: and Alessandra Barrow Regional editors: The Review an exploration of online resources that Su-Ann OH (ISEAS) and Ilhong Ko (Seoul National University Asia 20-25 Selected reviews from newbooks.asia may assist (or at least entertain) the Cente) 26-27 New reviews on newbooks.asia Asia scholar. The Review pages editor: 28 New titles on newbooks.asia Wai Cheung The Network pages editor: Sandra Dehue The Focus Digital issue editor: Thomas Voorter 29-43 Online resources for Asia scholars Graphic Design: Sonja Zweegers and Alessandra Barrow Paul Oram Lava Printing: The Network EPC, Belgium 44-47 Reports Submission deadlines 48-49 Humanities Across Borders Issue #89: 15 March 2021 50-51 Announcements Issue #90: 15 July 2021 52-53 IIAS Research Issue #91: 1 Dec 2021

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Free subscriptions Ute Jansen is the new Go to: iias.asia/subscribe 56 IIAS Fellowship Programme To unsubscribe, to make changes IIAS Deputy Director (e.g., new address), or to order multiple copies: [email protected] n 1 January 2021, the International Institute for Asian Studies welcomed Ute Jansen as its new Deputy Director. Rights O Responsibility for copyrights and The International Institute for facts and opinions expressed for Asian Studies (IIAS) is a global Ute Jansen has longstanding experience as in this publication rests exclusively an executive manager in several development with authors. Their interpretations Humanities and Social Sciences cooperation organisations, including Médecins do not necessarily reflect the views institute and a knowledge Sans Frontières (MSF), the Dutch organisation of the institute or its supporters. for internationalisation in education (NUFFIC) Reprints only with permission from exchange platform, based in and Oxfam Novib. Besides collaborating with the author and The Newsletter Leiden, the Netherlands, with local partners on humanitarian projects, she editor [email protected] programmes that engage Asian was involved in higher education capacity building projects, with a special focus on and other international partners. Indonesia, Bangladesh and countries in iias.asia Subsaharan Africa. IIAS takes a thematic and Her interest in Asia started 30 years ago multi-sectoral approach to with first a Master's degree in Japanese and Korean languages, and later, a position at the the study of Asia and actively Embassy of Japan in Germany. After adding involves scholars and experts a Master's programme in Humanitarian Assistance, Ute worked in numerous countries, from different disciplines and including Uganda and Burundi. She has now regions in its activities. lived in the Netherlands since 2004. Ute takes over from Willem Vogelsang, who Our current thematic research served IIAS as Deputy Director for more than 9 years. Willem plans to use his retirement to clusters are ‘Asian Heritages’, pursue his passion for researching, writing ‘Asian Cities’ and ‘Global Asia’. and curating. The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 3 From the Director

societies saw as valuable knowledge, as a mark of their ultimate superiority, exclusive of the immediate communities from which they emanated, and of the world Imagining the in all its ecological and human diversity. But as the pandemic has shown (or reminded) us, we live in an inter- connected, complex world, in which university in the human-nature relations and the different forms of knowledge drawn from them are all entangled. We now understand that the virus is a consequence of our relentless post-COVID world encroachments on the environment and its biodiversity. By getting rid of our anthropo- ethno-cultural provincialism, along with our neoliberal obsessions, we can imagine Philippe Peycam a more sober, anchored, multi-centred, horizontal and inclusive experience of Academia. One that combines collective ne of the disquieting questions the by the latter. This rift was accentuated by and providers (universities), thereby bypassing activities embedded in our local environ- pandemic has forced us to consider is, the economic crisis and the introduction of the traditional (public) role of the latter as ment (human and natural), in dialogue OWhat will universities, now partially neoliberal policies from the 1980s onward. part of the so-called new ‘platform economy’. with colleagues from other ‘ecosystems’ if not totally deserted, look like in the post- It has since encysted into a ‘them-and-us’ A direct consequence for higher education in the world, for a mutually beneficial COVID world? The massive use of online socio-political culture, and has led to the therefore may be a trend towards its effective collaborative educational and research virtual instruments means that the old model, perception amongst many that universities dematerialisation, and the gradual depletion of process. This modus operandi can make use in which universities physically concentrate are primarily instruments of social segregation. the university as a brick-and-mortar campus, of online devices, but without falling prey all their activities in one single location, as Meanwhile, the university model has remained and with it, the communities of faculty and to the Tech platforms and their deadly logic. the Western university was built after, may a luxury for most countries in the South, where students forged through inter-personal Facilitating structures like IIAS can no longer completely hold true. In fact, the the ratio student/national population has encounters and interactions. play an important role in this reinvention tendency towards an online environment remained much lower.3 In most decolonising When EdTech reaches maturity, D’Souza process. Because it operates on the basis of was already on the rise with the advent nations, a number of emblematic new predicts it will no longer operate on the collaboration, as a versatile multi-function of e-learning, MOOCs, open universities, establishments served as national development basis of a cycle of semesters spent by the platform (I here want to reclaim the word!), etc., and their increasing grip on the higher pillars. In Nehruvian India for instance, state students at a physical campus, but mostly the institute and its world counterparts can education ‘market’. interventionism in the 1950s and 1960s led to through online connections from anywhere help universities rediscover their civic role. the creation of a network of public universities in the world, driven to accrue à la carte With its capacity to forge connections of I recently revisited an article that appeared and the now renowned Indian Institute of courses provided by a few platforms. These different kinds while promoting locally- in June 2020, at the height of the first wave of Technology (IIT) system. Yet, those who benefit platforms will attract much larger numbers situated/globally-connected knowledge the pandemic, by Rohan D’Souza. The author from this public system, even if it has continued of online ‘students’ without the hard costs production streams, IIAS can help bring characterised the struggles between three to expand, remain a tiny minority of the of maintaining buildings, libraries or a vast forward the kind of approach that no university paradigms or ‘ideal types’, and what population, which is a situation that has invited number of employees, faculty included. Quite EdTech will ever achieve. they mean for the future of ‘the university’: the development of a large private higher naturally, as already the case for other service This is the effort IIAS has unleashed the original ‘Humboldtian’ model, built around education sector, not always synonymous businesses, we may see algorithm-operated through a number of coalitions of willing the idea of turning students into autonomous with high quality. platforms like Amazon or Google forge partners such as ICAS, SEANNET and HaB. ‘citizens’ by developing their own reasoning The second contradiction lies in the working alliances with a handful of prestigious Like IIAS, our Asian, African, American powers in an environment of academic neoliberal ‘corporate university’ model and university names – turned into certification and European partners recognise that freedom; the neoliberal model, based on the its economic and human unsustainability. ‘brands’ – to lead the train to comprehensive only through collaboration, without understanding that education is above all the The progressive introduction of this paradigm digital education. assumed hierarchies, and through their preparation of ‘student-clients’ to hit the labour in the wake of the ‘Washington Consensus’ During the first wave of COVID, we adherence to a set of essential principles, market; and the irrepressible rise, both as in the 1990s, led to a further expansion of witnessed the surprising readiness of some including the recognition that different continuity and rupture of the latter, of ‘EdTech’ higher education services. Predicated on flagship institutions – Cambridge, Harvard, forms of knowledges are equally worthy university platforms, where credit-based economic ‘usefulness’, the corporate model MIT, Science Po, LSE – to shut down their of engagement, that a new universal online education-certification leads to the de-emphasised the ‘gratuitous’, speculative physical activities and move everything online ‘multi-lingual’ framework can be forged. abandonment of the experience of in-person and deliberative pursuits best represented for at least one or two years. Even if these With its Humanities across Borders (HaB) learning. For D’Souza, it is the struggle between by the humanities and the social sciences policies were later amended to allow students program in particular, IIAS offers organ- these until now overlapping value-imbued – which were deemed less ‘useful’ – whilst it to partially return to classrooms, these isational and methodological perspectives paradigms that will determine the future of imposed an arsenal of managerial methods renowned establishments could obviously for a truly co-developed pedagogy; one in higher learning. In his powerful account, the aimed at evaluating, and quantifying, not resist entering the new business which universities reclaim their role as unique author warns of the possibility of an irreversible every aspect of academic work in the name fray. What they may lose in tuition fees, meeting-grounds, as was foregrounded in trend towards the disappearance of most of ‘marketability’. Built on the sacrosanct particularly from overseas students, they the program’s Manifesto preamble (written by physical universities.1 belief in competition – between individuals will eventually earn many times more in representatives of the 18-institution members With a few months’ hindsight, we can (tagged as ‘human resources’), institutions online course-based subscriptions. of the HaB consortium, just before COVID-19 see that D’Souza’s description was possibly and countries – the new model justified a The consequence of such a trend is not just got us in its clutches): excessive. The presence of university vertical ‘selection’, which was ultimately not the demise of an organisational, economic campuses and their communities of students very different from the old elitist European model. It is the ultimate atomisation of “We envision a university that reclaims will not disappear from our urban landscapes tradition. ‘Ivy League’ US and UK universities individuals, faculty and students alike, and the its rightful civic role and responsibility so easily. However, D’Souza’s description showed the way by transforming themselves unravelling of the civic educational experience as a confluence of multiple nodes of of the transformation nonetheless points from national to global educational and elite that the university, as we know it, offers. What knowledge exchange. Our goal, as to some tectonic changes that will likely markers, a trend reinforced by attributes the COVID crisis reveals indeed, is the extent educators and institutions, is to identify present themselves due to COVID-19. What of academic distinction such as prestigious to which universities should be appreciated and explore the expansive variety of remains powerful in his argumentation is University Presses, peer-reviewed journals, for their primary role, as vectors of social modes and contexts of acting in, and on, that it forces us to grapple with some of the endowed centres and Professor Chairs. development and cohesion. Unless strong the world. We propose to create border- inherent contradictions within these university Yet, as D’Souza pointed out, the decisions are taken, this existential role may crossing spaces within and outside paradigms, in a way that the path toward continuation of the neoliberal university be threatened, as was recently commented universities where academics, students, a dystopian future remains real. is founded on students’ willingness, and on in a South African academic periodical: and communities learn from, and act and I see at least two such contradictions. capacity, to take on increasingly higher “The pandemic is an inflection point. It behoves work with, each other, in an atmosphere The ‘Humboldtian’ university, a model debts to pay for their studies. This model is universities to re-imagine new teaching and of mutual respect and recognition.” inseparable from the nation-state project built on a deleterious system at a time when learning possibilities. It calls for universities imagined in the early nineteenth century an inflation of diplomas faces a reduction to re-examine the way they do research and Philippe Peycam, Director IIAS for an ‘enlightened’ category of society. Its of (good) job opportunities. The system is pursue collaborations. It calls for the sector massification after WW2, with considerable also built on a faculty and staff population to re-examine how it works. Higher education investments on the part of states, succeeded in an increasingly precarious situation, must re-define the rigid bureaucracies that Notes in bringing a ratio of above 40% of tertiary most hired on a temporary basis. characterize the system. Universities must education gross enrolment (a figure reached also pursue bold responses to enhance their 1 D’Souza, R. 2020 (June 8). ‘Zooming in the US in the end of the 1960s, in Europe in sustainability, relevance and contribution to Toward a University Platform’, RAIOT the 1980s). However positive the trend was, the country’s socio-economic advancement.”4 Magazine, India. Universities as EdTech 2 The sociologist Emmanuel Todd calls at a time of economic growth and full platforms it ‘educative stratification’, in L’Illusion employment, it led to a phenomenon of Rethinking the university, Économique (Gallimard, Paris, 1997). Todd invisible separation within society, between D’Souza foresees this economically also draws from Michael Young’s seminal those who ‘made it’ (to college) and those unbalanced model experiencing a dramatic on the basis of collaboration Rise of Meritocracy (Penguin, London, who did not.2 The American Vietnam War was turn when the classroom-campus ‘humanistic’ and situatedness 1958), who first predicted that the rise of an illustrative moment when the education gap experience finally implodes, and is replaced higher education would lead to that of a gained political visibility: whilst less educated by the new business model represented by We must ask ourselves, Is there an sentiment of inequality within society, and youth were drafted to fight in Southeast Asia, EdTech. This new paradigm, EdTech, is based alternative to the EdTech predicament? for the members of the highly educated those at university, exempt from fighting, were on the same competitive utilitarian ideology As we saw, even in its benevolent expression, strata, an inclination toward separation demonstrating on campuses against the war. as the corporate university models, yet it the old university model may have suffered from the less educated groups. 3 It was 4% in 1980’s China; it is now over When they returned home, the former found corresponds to a new level in that model: from an original hubris, a hubris reinforced 30%. themselves basically ignored, if not rejected, through the commoditisation of higher by the post-cold war victory of the West, 4 Kupe, T. & Wangenge-Ouma, G. 2020 education by using computing platforms in which it was thought that total knowledge (15 Nov) ‘Post-Covid 19: Opportunity (the ‘Big Tech’) in order to virtually aggregate could be encapsulated in universities as for Universities to have a rethink’, The Above: Leiden University Academy Building. transactions between clients (the students) repositories of all what (Western or Northern) Conversation, South-Africa. 4 Writing the Song dynasty The texts that survive from the The Study Song dynasty are particularly resistant to a transparent reading

What kind of history can we write of the Song dynasty?

Christian de Pee What kind of history can we write of the Song dynasty (960-1279 CE)? The question seems naïve and limiting. Didn’t the spread of printing during the Song preserve more texts from that period than survive from earlier dynasties, and don’t these sources allow us to write A lack of transparency almost any history we would like? The problem is that these printed texts are nearly all Texts are never transparent. One some- that remains, and that they are formal, generic, and public. They do not lend themselves times reads that an historical source provides ‘a window onto the past’ or that it ‘offers a to the kinds of narratives that historians of medieval Europe have written based on glimpse’ of a former person or custom, and unique, individual manuscripts in monastic libraries and municipal archives. many a research proposal today proposes to use a certain archival collection ‘as a lens’ for examining a chosen subject matter. Such visual metaphors are misleading, because they imply particular genre, they chose a subject, that the textual record is incomplete and that This post-structuralist approach to text the possibility of unmediated access to the images, and sentiments appropriate to that the particular incompleteness of the textual and ritual practice revealed, among other past. They elide, however briefly, that which genre. They created original effects and an record is itself an historical artifact, the product things, that the authors of the ritual manuals exists—a physical text—in favor of something individual style, not by violating conventions of historical choices. The acknowledgment had themselves a structuralist understanding that has vanished—an event in the past—and but by obeying them, demonstrating their of this incompleteness is not an obstacle to of ritual. thereby suggest that the historical value of a ability to express themselves coherently and historical knowledge; it is its precondition. Since in these texts the inscription of the text lies behind it rather than in front of it, that elegantly within the strictures of form and wedding ceremony constituted the primary the referent of the text is more substantial, and style, with subtle variations on the phrases historical act—its eventual performance more historical, than the text itself.1 If one wishes of earlier writers. Writing in classical Chinese, An intellectual history in reading or in ritual embodiment being to use a visual metaphor, one might better in other words, required the overt display of unknown—I argued that we know most about compare a text to a painting. Like painters, literary skill and literary knowledge. The mode of social life the historical practice of Song and Yuan writers deliberately choose and compose their of representation was to a large extent also I began thinking about such historio- weddings when writing itself was a ritual act scenes, compress time and foreshorten space the object of representation. graphical problems as a Ph.D. student in the (e.g., the calculation of a horoscope) and when to fit these scenes within a unifying perspective, Third, almost all surviving texts from the early 1990s. I noticed that the Song Empire the text itself was a ritual object (e.g., the and represent them in conformity with the Song were preserved for ideological reasons, described in the scholarly books and articles letters exchanged during betrothals). Critics of conventions of their period and their genre. as examples of good style and proper morals. I read looked different from the Song Empire my work have objected that these arguments A painting is not a window; neither is a text. From the trunk of a deceased man of letters, that I imagined when I read primary sources deny the existence of an historical reality The texts that survive from the Song dynasty his descendants or his friends selected the from the period. The prose style and the beyond the text, but in fact the arguments are particularly resistant to a transparent compositions they deemed worthy of him and mode of reasoning in the block quotations extend historical reality to include the text, and reading. First, almost all surviving texts from the therefore worthy of being imitated by others. and paraphrases of historical monographs demonstrate that any knowledge of the world Song are written in classical Chinese, a written (Writings by women were very rarely published often did not sound like the style of the prose behind the text depends on our understanding language that perpetuated the grammar and during the Song.) Subsequent generations made and reasoning I thought I heard in texts from of the world in front of it. This enlarges the the idiom of the fourth century BCE and that their own selections, reprinting authors whose the Song dynasty. It seemed to me that the potential evidence and the potential subject was distant from the language spoken during learning and virtue retained their reputation translations and paraphrases inflected the matter of history instead of diminishing them. the Song. To write in classical Chinese during or aroused new enthusiasm, while works that language and manner of the sources in order The analysis of letters of betrothal illustrates the Song involved not only the transformation had fallen into disfavor became first rare, then to fit them for analysis by social-scientific this most vividly. Although these letters present of vernacular action into formal writing, but also obsolete. The writings of those who supported methods. I did not think that the translations direct evidence of the practice of Song and the translation of colloquial speech into classical the controversial economic reforms of Wang were wrong or that the arguments were Yuan weddings, previous historians of weddings diction, embellished with literary allusions. One Anshi (1021-1086), for example, have nearly all inaccurate, but I felt that the translations and and marriage had omitted them from their might compare the effect to that of a medieval been lost, to the extent that much of the ideo- the arguments diminished the distinctiveness monographs, presumably because they are European text that describes a contemporary logy of the reforms must be reconstructed from of the sources and that a subtle variety of literary exercises that do not provide specific market in the high Latin of Horace or Cicero. criticism by their opponents, whose writings cultural knowledge was lost in the process. material details. Read as performances in their Second, almost all surviving texts from the later generations admired and preserved. Instead of conforming the language and own right, however, these letters can be placed Song are written in set genres and conform The linguistic anthropologist William F. Hanks reasoning of the sources to existing analytical among the written and material exchanges by to the conventions of form, style, content, has observed that, “historical texts illustrate categories, I wondered whether it might not which two families confirmed to one another and ideology that defined those genres. When discourse under minimal conditions, because of be more interesting to use the language and that they had firm possession of the learning learned men and women wished to set down the vast amount that can never be known of the reasoning of the sources to generate new and the wealth that they had advertised to their thoughts, they selected a genre that suited context, and this makes it all the more necessary analytical categories. each other through the matchmaker. the subject and the mood of those thoughts. to be explicit about how we read”.2 Historical In my dissertation I attempted this latter The performativity of the act of writing that When required by an occasion to write in a research must begin with the acknowledgment approach. Having originally intended an dominates the surviving texts from the Song anthropological analysis of wedding ritual dynasty may prohibit the kind of social history during the Song and Yuan (1272-1368) from the bottom up that historians of medieval Left: Text as practice. dynasties, I found that the wedding ceremonies and early modern Europe have written, but it The editors of the recorded in the sources did not add up to does allow a lively intellectual history of social thirteenth-century Ceremonies and Rites a coherent sequence and that they had to life, and a detailed knowledge of historical ways Illustrated (Yili tu) be understood in the first place as scripts of seeing and thinking among the literate elite. reconstructed the for the performance of the ideology of the As a Fellow at the International Institute for Asian choreographies of ancient rituals and genres in which they were written. Instead of Studies during the 2019-2020 academic year, represented these reconstructing an average wedding sequence I began writing a general history of eleventh- choreographies in maps, and subjecting that sequence to a structuralist century China based on these historiographical as in this map of a analysis, I placed wedding ceremonies within betrothal ceremony. insights. I hope to show that the history of the their generic context, showing that the Song dynasty can be made accessible and ceremonies inscribed in each genre—ritual interesting to a general reading public when manuals, writing manuals, mantic texts, it is told as intellectual history. and legal texts—instantiated the ideological notions of time, space, and body of that genre: Christian de Pee, University of Michigan; former IIAS Fellow [email protected] the symmetrical, centered, porous time and space of exegetical discourse, where the groom and the bride merge Notes with sacred Antiquity; the linear time and 1 Cf. Ricoeur, P. 1981 (edited and translated space of literary discourse, where the by John B. Thompson) Hermeneutics and written bodies of the groom and the bride the Human Sciences: Essays on Language, proceed through an anterior, metaphorical Action, and Interpretation. Cambridge time and space; the cyclical time and University Press and Éditions de la Maison space of cosmological discourse, in which des Sciences de l’Homme, p.93. calculations and diagrams chart a safe 2 Hanks, W.F. 2000. Intertexts: Writings on Language, Utterance, and Context. path for the liminal groom and bride Rowman and Littlefield, p.11. through liminal time and space; and the 3 de Pee, C. 2007. The Writing of Weddings imperial time and space of legal discourse, in Middle-Period China: Text and Ritual in which codes and verdicts carefully Practice in the Eighth through Fourteenth inscribe the groom and the bride into a Centuries. State University of New York transparent hierarchy of imperial subjects.3 Press, p.13. The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 Crime in Japan A tendency to assume that anything 5 unfamiliar must be uniquely Japanese The Study

Explaining low crime Japan

Laura Bui The introduction of Crime in Japan: A psychological perspective, my recent co-authored book, opens with the novelist Kazuo Ishiguro's observation on British depictions of the Japanese.1 His observation is actually the start of his 1985 review, in the London Review of Books, of John David Morley’s ‘Pictures from the Water Trade: An Englishman in Japan’. Ishiguro remarked that the British were compelled to depict the Japanese as “extreme and bizarre” as to assure themselves that their way of life bore no resemblance to that of the Japanese. He then went on to review Morley’s book, and although generally complimentary, he found that old, imperialist ways still persisted: simplistic explanations for Japanese ways of living and a tendency to assume that anything unfamiliar must be uniquely Japanese. “Behind this”, Ishiguro wrote, “seems to lie the sadly familiar presumption that white-European cultures comprise world culture”.

identity. Post-war, particularly during the serves as a glimpse into related idiosyncrasies height of economic prowess beginning in the that mingle with each other and might give seventies, Nihonjinron took on a favourable rise to particular crime phenomena. It is view of prevalent, inherent Japanese evidence that crime is not the consequence characteristics, attributing interdependence of a mistaken understanding of culture as a and nurturance of group relationships to container of innate, fixed qualities. Similarities current societal achievements. The late to what is already known about crime are also seventies ushered in a number of campaigns identified in the book, and situating these © Masashi Makui, Pixabay © Masashi Makui, that provided opportunities for other countries explanations in the collective knowledge base to learn from Japan in its approach to while traversing varied cultural presumptions education, management, and industry. Low are the challenges of cross-cultural research. ntroducing Crime in Japan in this way considered the country that endures the crime, in this context, was considered yet There is then the question of why bother? intended to highlight the concerns of trying most stereotyping in comparative analysis another aspect that supported Japanese If studying unfamiliarity makes one susceptible Ito understand crime and justice phenomena by Western scholars. The frequent criticism is exceptionalism. to wrong presumptions or to conclude that beyond Europe and North America as an that the cultural explanation is simplistic and it is impossible to make any interpretation, outsider, and within a collective knowledge does not provide a complete understanding then such study must be futile. But wanting to base that is predominantly informed by a white of crime in Japan. Although this is true, it is A matter of translation understand others has been a characteristic Western viewpoint. The study of crime and also true of any single explanation for crime. Whether Japan truly has low levels of commonly shared amongst us. ‘Explaining’ criminal justice, known as criminology, whether Culture is not in itself the issue, but when it crime, however, has been contested. As found low crime Japan is misleading because past or contemporary, is no exception. Often, is used to reduce a group of people to a few in other countries, the fundamental limitation explanations are never simplistic, and the same the simple reason given in criminology for why characteristics thought to be inherent, it gives of official crime data, often derived from is true for all crime phenomena everywhere. studies of other countries and populations the false impression that it is easy to explain police reports, is its capacity to capture only Yet curiosity, the want to understand, can be are needed is there are few compared to the away any phenomena because of that group’s the tip of the iceberg. Domestic violence, a potent driver for fact in all its captivating many of Western countries and populations. perceived lack of complexity, and therefore, sexual assault, and white-collar crimes complexity. Advancing understanding by including that group’s inferiority. are likely to be underreported, and their other lands and people is to expand the The cultural explanation used in this prevalence are actually thought to be high. Laura Bui is Lecturer in Criminology at the knowledge base and make it more collective, essentialist way is a familiar narrative with The use of self-reports, where information University of Manchester. Crime in Japan: and significantly, to increase the accuracy a long history of use to emphasise the is given by individuals themselves, is one way A Psychological Perspective, co-authored of that base. For precision is relative to whom irreconcilable differences of those who to counter this limitation of official data. with David Farrington, University of Cambridge, was published 2019 by Palgrave collective knowledge represents, erases, originate from ‘the Orient’. In the US, for My early research compared the level of Macmillan. The book uses psychology to and caricatures. example, those of Asian ancestry have long violence between Japanese and American male elaborate on seven common explanations Japan has been of particular interest in been considered to be an ‘invasion’ and the youths using self-reports, and unexpectedly for crime in Japan, while confronting the criminology because of its comparatively low ‘Yellow Peril’, whose perceived foreignness, found that violence was more prevalent among complexities of narratives on Japan as a low crime rate. After World War II, countries like regardless of how long they and their families the Japanese. As the result conflicted with the crime country. It received Honorary Mention Germany, England and Wales, the US, and have lived in the country, is perpetual.2 presiding understanding of low crime Japan, in the 2020 Distinguished Book Prize from Canada experienced rising crime rates, which The mass relocation and imprisonment of the paper had difficulty getting published. the Asian Criminological Society. were attributed to industrialization, and the Japanese Americans by their own government The study needed replication as it compared rates never returned to the pre-transformation during World War II comes to mind. When no two different versions of interpersonal violence: numbers. This, too, was expected of Japan, longer perceived as a threat, a similar, though “hit someone with the idea of seriously hurting Notes but higher crime did not happen. Although more positive, narrative of innate difference them” was used in the pre-existing English there was an initial surge, the crime rate is bestowed: ‘the Model Minority’. Inherent version, but the direct “hurt someone in a fight” 1 Ishiguro, K. 1985. ‘Uchi’, London Review of subsequently declined and continued to cultural traits derived from a Confucian was used in the Japanese translation. Part of Books; https://tinyurl.com/lrb-ishiguro-uchi. 2 Tchen, J.K.W. & Yeats, D. 2014. Yellow Peril! do so over the same period. In addition, its belief system are thought to be responsible the challenge of making comparisons is that An Archive of Anti-Asian Fear. Verso. economy at that time was remarkably strong. for success across an array of social and exact translations may not yield comparable 3 Le, T.K. et al. 2020. ‘Anti-Asian Xenophobia This success of a thriving economy and low economic indicators when the reality is that results. The use of a forthright understanding and Asian American COVID-19 Disparities’, crime was what attracted attention from this narrative is used to shame other racial for the Japanese translation was thought to be American Journal of Public Health scholars who wanted to know why this was minority groups. Either narrative of innate the equivalent of the meaning conveyed by the 110(9):1371-73; Tessler, H., Choi, M. & the case. A number of explanations had been difference sees outcomes, good or bad, as English version. Before, a 2009 study compared Kao, G. 2020. ‘The Anxiety of Being Asian given, ranging from the country’s supposed resulting from fixed cultural traits. The present anger among Japanese and American children. American: Hate Crimes and Negative homogeneous population to geographical pandemic has shown the tenuous nature of Usually anger is understood as an expression, Biases During the COVID-19 Pandemic’, location. But the most complicated, because this narrative: anti-Asian hate crimes in the but when a measure that captured experience American Journal of Criminal Justice 45:636-46. of the larger issues and implications that US rose tremendously in 2020 because of rather than expression was used, anger was 4 Kazufumi, M. & Befu, H. 1993. ‘Japanese surround it, is the cultural explanation. the false belief that COVID-19 is intrinsic to unpredictably higher in Japanese children Cultural Identity: An Empirical Investigation 3 anyone who is thought to look Chinese. – it seemed that they were better at self- of Nihonjinron’, Contemporary Japan The cultural explanation, when trans- regulating their anger so did not show it.5 4(1):89-102; Yamamoto, K. 2015. The Myth The cultural explanation formed into a narrative of innate difference, of “Nihonjinron”, Homogeneity of Japan, has also been used by the Japanese, but and its Influence on the Society. Centre for is simplistic to demonstrate their exceptionalism, and at Studying unfamiliarity Ethnicity and Racism Studies, University of Explaining low crime with culture is to say certain points in history, their superiority to While Crime in Japan features culture Leeds (working paper). that collectivist traits like group-orientation, other Asian ‘races’.4 Romantic and idealised as one of seven examined explanations, the 5 Bear, G. et al. 2009. ‘Shame, Guilt, inclination towards harmony, and high self- Western understandings of Japanese explanation actually filters into the others – Blaming, and Anger: Differences between Children in Japan and the US’, Motivation control are why the Japanese do not murder, crime and criminal justice have appeared what behaviours are deemed illegal and the and Emotion 33 (article number 229). assault, and steal from each other as much as alongside, and were possibly encouraged by, sort of responses towards them, not to mention 6 Karstedt, S. 2001. ‘Comparing Cultures, others in different countries. Evidence of this the discredited but enduring body of work what a justice system decides to manifest Comparing Crime: Challenges, Prospects, is limited, but commentary and speculation called Nihonjinron, comprising theories on as, are dependent on cultural values and and Problems for a Global Criminology.’ are many; so much so that Japan has been a distinctive Japanese national and cultural practices.6 The result is that each explanation Crime, Law, & Social Change, 36, 285-308. 6 Osoet Pegu, a force to Telling her story through The Study be reckoned with the VOC archives

Fig. 1 (left): Map of Ayutthaya around 1650. South of the city along the river lies the small Dutch lodge across from the district where the Portuguese and Japanese merchants were settled. The factory was enclosed by a rectangular bamboepagger (= fence) and a moat. The main building functioned as a warehouse and as living quarters for the senior Company servants. The other employees shared a number of small houses on the grounds. In: Gijsbert Heecq, Journael ofte Dagelijcxsz Aenteijkeninghe wegen de Notabelste Geschiedeniszen voorgevallen en gepasseert op de derde Voyagie van Gijsbert Heecq naer Oost-Indijen (Journal kept by Gijsbert Heecq on his third voyage to the East Indies), 1654-55. The manuscript is kept at the Dutch National Archives, The Hague in the collection Aanwinsten van de (voormalige) Eerste Afdeling (Acquisitions of, what used to be, the First Department), inventory nr. 959, access code: 1.11.01.01.

Fig. 2 (left): Jeremias van Vliet (1602-1663), Mathijs Gootjes. Image courtesy Schiedam Council Archive, Amsterdam. Sex and trade in seventeenth century Siam Osoet Pegu and her Dutch lovers After about a century of Europeans steadily trickling into Ayutthaya, Siam’s capital city at that time, representatives Wil O. Dijk of the Dutch East India Company (Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie or VOC) arrived in 1604 and planted a factory (or trading post) there four years later. With varying degrees of success and intermittent closures, the post survived until 1767, when the city was razed by the Burmese. Siam was

A tale to tell The time was the seventeenth century essentially an export market for the VOC and the mainstay Born in Ayutthaya around 1615, Osoet and the place Ayutthaya, Siam’s celebrated of its Siam trade was without doubt the export of deer hides came to the Dutch compound at an early royal capital, one of Southeast Asia’s leading age under yet unexplained circumstances.1 port cities. Its centrally located market place to Japan. Osoet Pegu, a remarkable woman of Burmese- In time she would have a succession of Dutch consisted of a long, wide, spacious lane with Mon descent, was a formidable trader and force to be lovers and have children with two of them.2 on either side an array of stalls selling a wide On 18 June 1658, she passed away after range of goods. And here, in the heart of the reckoned with in Ayutthaya. This article takes a look at the a long, lingering illness followed by a stroke city’s business centre, female traders played impact she made, based on VOC archives. that left her paralysed and unable to speak. a key role, more often than not as prominent, The Dutch persuaded the King not to have large-scale commercial participants with her cremated as was customary in Siam, the requisite capital and connections that but to allow her to be interred in the enabled them to be successful. The wide Company’s cemetery in accordance with gulf separating the Royal Court from the Christian religious practices.3 marketplaces was precisely what brought the Jan van Meerwijck Jeremias Van Vliet In the absence of crucial building likes of Osoet Pegu into their own. Aristocratic The first of Osoet’s Dutch lovers was Jan Jeremias van Vliet was Osoet’s second blocks – diaries, correspondence, memoirs, ladies would look for women, often of low van Meerwijck. In 1621, he sailed East as an lover. He sailed from Holland in 1628 and was reminiscences, autobiographical writings birth or non-Siamese identity, who could assistant in the service of the VOC. He left the posted to the VOC’s Japan factory. He left for and the like – from which to construct move linguistically and culturally across Company in 1627 to become a private trader Siam in 1633 and took over the directorship in Osoet’s life story, we can only rely on what social boundaries to act as intermediaries.5 and joined a group of Dutch free burghers 1636, a post he kept for five years. Charges of others had to say about her. And this is Osoet was of non-aristocratic descent with that was then very active in countries around dishonesty were laid against him in 1645, but precisely where the problem lies since those an undoubted mastery of the Dutch language the Bay of Bengal, Siam in particular. Jan van rather than putting him on trial, the Company others were VOC officials, westerners who and familiarity with European ways, making Meerwijck and Osoet Pegu met in Ayutthaya, repatriated him. He went home knowing full well tended to portray ‘native women’ as sensual, her the perfect mediator and cultural broker. perhaps at the Dutch compound. At 16 years he would never be allowed to return to Asia. lustful, and immoral. Sadly, Osoet’s story Over the years, Osoet had intimate relations old, Osoet moved out of the shadows and Van Vliet and Osoet probably began their is of necessity wholly based on the very with a succession of Dutchmen. Two of her entered the VOC annals as Van Meerwijck’s relationship around the time he was made sources that overwhelmingly privilege the three Dutch lovers were directors of the VOC’s wife or concubine. She bore a son shortly director, and when she was 21 years old. Their viewpoint of white Calvinist males steeped Ayutthaya office. They would have been aware before his untimely death in 1635. The exact relationship lasted many years during which in a patriarchal Christian tradition. Still, these that a relationship with a well-connected and manner of his death is not certain; he was she bore three daughters. As director, Van Vliet materials contain information not available astute businesswoman such as Osoet, was reportedly clubbed to death in Burma, but an will almost certainly have turned to Osoet when anywhere else and, as one author pointedly crucial to the smooth running of the Company’s entry in Batavia’s Daghregister [Daily Journal] her aid was required for contacts and influence remarked: “Without the VOC documents trade since she was well placed to mediate records that he was captured near Martaban at court. These links made her an invaluable there would be no tale to tell at all”.4 between the VOC and the Palace. And indeed, and hanged.6 Be that as it may, Jan van and indispensable intermediary between the And indeed, a tale there is to tell, albeit that Osoet’s contacts and influence contributed in Meerwijck came to a sorry end leaving Osoet Company and the Palace. Sources clearly without any personal records to build on, no small measure to the successful sealing of to embark on a remarkable and rewarding show that Osoet was already well established we can merely situate Osoet Pegu in her lucrative business deals beneficial to all parties new life in Ayutthaya in which the Company both at Court and in the trading community time and place. concerned, not least the VOC. and other Dutchmen would play a key role. well before she met van Vliet.7 The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 7 The Study

Fig. 3 (left): The Company’s trade flourished, mainly if the governor-general put in a request, Rycklof van Goens due to the pair’s invaluable connections with the King would allow Osoet Pegu’s children to (1619-82), Martin 18 Palin. Image courtesy the Siamese Court, particularly the friendship leave for Batavia. And so, her four half-Dutch The Rijksmuseum, and patronage bestowed upon them by one children left Siam, never to be heard of again.19 Amsterdam. of the King’s chief brokers. This triangular Osoet Pegu’s grave can likely still be found in Fig. 4 (below): relationship was instrumental in speeding the Dutch cemetery in old Ayutthaya. Osoet’s Ayutthaya in 1687. up the Company’s business, such as the story, however incomplete, will hopefully In: Anthony Reid, procurement of products and export licences.14 assure her of a much-deserved place in the Southeast Asia in In the early years of Van Muijden’s directorship history of Siam and the VOC. the Age of Commerce 1450-1680, Vol. II, the King even granted the Company a Expansion and Crisis, monopoly on the export of deerskins. This Wil O. Dijk, New Haven and London, was quite a coup for the Dutch, for it allowed former Fellow at the International Yale University Press, Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS) 1993, p. 81. them to exclude all other merchants from the Siamese hide trade; moreover, these skins [email protected] were much in demand in Japan where they made huge profits. In 1652, after Van Muijden was recalled to Batavia, the King revoked the Notes VOC’s deerskin monopoly. 1 VOC 1175, Rijckloff van Goens’ report Company records portray Jan van Muijden on the Siam office to g.g. Carel Reniers, as a shady character who was to blame for 8 January 1651, Kraan pp.63-4. his own downfall. He stood accused of fiddling 2 The information available allows us with the books and conducting an illicit private to estimate her age and that of her trade with Japan. After his records were children, give or take a year or two: audited, he was found guilty of corruption and 1615 - born in Ayutthaya to Burmese mismanagement, stripped of his directorship /Mon parents and recalled to Batavia. Van Muijden protested 1631 - aged 16, took up with Jan his innocence throughout and in the end there van Meerwijck 1632 - aged 17, bore Jan van Meerwijck’s was insufficient evidence to convict him. Still, son Johan (Jan van Meerwijck was unable to wholly clear his name, he was not murdered in Burma in 1634 or 1635) permitted to return to Siam. 1636 - aged 21, took up with Jeremias As for Osoet, a prominent VOC servant van Vliet (Rijckloff van Goens) declared quite 1638 - aged 23, gave birth to Maria, unashamedly that she had grown prosperous their eldest child and influential by cohabiting with several 1640 - Osoet, aged 25, had by now borne VOC directors and that her subsequent Van Vliet three daughters (Jeremias van wealth had allowed her to exert pressure on Vliet left Siam for good in 1641) the Siamese government and even the King.15 1646 - aged 31, took up with 25 year old Jan van Muijden (Van Muijden left Siam He did acknowledge though that in Osoet’s day in disgrace in 1650) every Company director had made convenient 1658 - Osoet Pegu dies in Ayutthaya use of her prominent position to obtain favours about 43 years old from the Siamese authorities and insisted 3 VOC 1227, ff. 446-446v, Jan van Rijck that good relations be maintained since, for and Enoch Poolvoet in Siam to Joan a variety of reasons, Osoet Pegu was more Maetsuijcker in Batavia, 13 November 1658; deserving than others.16 Heecq left us a vivid eye-witness account In retrospect, it is astonishing that Van of Siamese cremations: Gijsbert Heecq’s Goens, a high-ranking representative of Journal, 1655, p.68. 4 Dhiravat na Pombejra. 1992. Court, a trading company with as its raison d’être Company, and Campong: Essays on the acquirement of the highest possible gains, the VOC presence in Ayutthaya, p.21. could accuse as astute a businesswoman as 5 Watson Andaya, B. 2000. Other Pasts: Osoet of making a profit! Especially since the Women, Gender and History in Early high point of VOC-Siamese relations coincided Modern Southeast Asia. Honolulu: with the period in which Osoet Pegu’s influence Center for Southeast Asian Studies, p.20. over the Company’s affairs was at its peak 6 Daghregister, 14-16 March 1636, p.42. (the 1630s and 1640s). Undoubtedly this 7 ibid. note 1; see also, Dhiravat na had much to do with Osoet’s influence in Pombejra. 2000. ‘VOC Employees and royal circles, yet Van Muijden’s own positive their Relationship with Mon and Siamese Women: A case Study of Osoet Pegua’, contribution should not be underestimated. in Watson Andaya, B. (ed.) Other Pasts: To show his appreciation, the King bestowed Women, Gender and History in Early on him a high Siamese rank. But, in the end, Modern Southeast Asia. Honolulu: Center Batavia’s refusal to reinstate Jan van Muijden for Southeast Asian Studies, p.205. had a negative effect on Siamese-Dutch 8 ibid. Dhiravat na Pombejra, 2000, p.206; relations. A respected VOC servant wrote in see also VOC 1153, f. 521, Jeremias van his diary in 1655 that the VOC’s Siam trade Vliet in Melaka to Phrakhlang, 7 June 1645; had decreased considerably following the VOC 1153, ff. 518-518v, Jeremias van Vliet departure of Jan van Muijden. Osoet certainly in Melaka to Reijnier van Tzum in Siam, 11 June 1645. did the Company no harm, quite the contrary. 9 ibid. note 1 Jan Van Muijden 10 KA 773, G.G. to Jan van Muijden 15 Eventually, their three daughters September 1646; KA 1061, Jan van Muijden became the cause of endless wrangling Jan van Muijden, the third of Osoet’s Osoet’s legacy to G.G. 15 November 1646; KA 1067, G.M. between Van Vliet and the Company on the Dutch lovers, left Holland and went east in Mixed-race families were common 26 January 1649; KA 778, G.G. to Hendrick one hand and Osoet and the King of Siam 1643. A year later he arrived in Ayutthaya in Ayutthaya, though jurisdiction over the Craijers 31 July 1651; KA 1117, Jan van Rijck on the other. Disputes about children fathered as a junior merchant. A mere two years later children often led to bitter and protracted to G.G. 11 February 1658; VOC 883, ff. 701- by Dutchmen with local women were quite he was made provisional director and the disputes, particularly between the Siamese 702, Batavia to King Narai, 29 August 1659; common. Upon leaving Ayutthaya, the following year permanent director, a post kings and representatives of the VOC. Siamese KA 1123, Jan van Rijck to G.G. 11 February Dutchmen usually sought custody of their he held till 1650. A man of limited ability who law generally forbade VOC employees (and 1660; G.M. 20 January 1651, pp.449-450. See also Smith, G.V. 1977. The Dutch in offspring. At the very least, they wanted barely spoke Siamese and had no experience other foreign traders) to take their children by Seventeenth-Century Thailand. Northern them sent to Batavia for a ‘proper’ Christian in running an office, the twenty-five year local women with them on being transferred. Illinois University, pp.101-102; van Opstall, upbringing. The King, however, was adamant old Van Muijden increasingly relied on the The VOC’s own policy with regard to the M.E. 1985. ‘From Alkmaar to Ayudhya and that these children belonged to Siam and older (31 year-old) and more experienced children was unambiguous; the employees Back’, Itinerario 9(2):111-112. should remain in the country with their Osoet Pegu. They soon developed a sexual were not permitted to return to Holland until 11 KA 1066, Pieter de Goijer and Jan van mothers. and business relationship whereby Osoet their offspring were safely installed in the Muijden to G.G. 25 October 1648; VOC 874, Van Vliet petitioned the King on several effectively took over all the buying and selling Company’s orphanage in Batavia. Instructie Van Goens 21 September 1650. occasions to allow his daughters to leave of the Company’s goods.11 Unpleasant gossip Although Osoet Pegu left a sizeable albeit 12 Ibid note 1. the country. In a letter to the then VOC notwithstanding, there can be no doubt that disorganized estate, there was a moment 13 VOC 1170, ff. 824v-825, Pieter de Gooijer’s report to g.g. Cornelis van der Lijn 13 director, Van Vliet suggested that the Osoet was besotted with her handsome young when it looked like her children would not January 1649. children were probably being kept in Siam lover, and he no less with her. She spared no inherit her wealth because of the attempts 14 VOC 1175, F. 521 verso, Van Goens to G.G., because their mother refused to let them go, pains to win him the favour of the Siamese by Siamese nobles to get hold of it. Johan, 22 November 1650; ibid note 1; VOC 1197, and he begged the VOC director to rescue authorities and through her efforts he obtained Osoet’s son by Jan van Meerwijck was born Westerwolt to G.G 8 November 1653, his daughters from the clutches of ‘those generally hard to come by export licences for in Siam (Tenasserim) and was later employed f. 479 and verso; ibid Dhiravat na Pombejra, pagans’.8 But it soon became clear that so rice, hardwood and other products.12 by the VOC.17 In 1658, shortly after his 1992, pp.10-11. long as Osoet was alive it would be impossible In time, misgivings began to emerge about mother’s passing, Johan arrived in Ayutthaya. 15 ibid. note 1. to wrest her daughters from her since her his administration and negative reports The Siamese mandarins, disgruntled at having 16 Ottow, W.M. 1954. Rijckloff Volckertsz. prominent position allowed her to thwart reached Batavia, the VOC’s headquarters the son’s share of the estate slip through their van Goens, de carrière van een diplomaat, the Company at every turn.9 It is indicative in the East, alleging that Van Muijden and fingers, sought to deprive him of his mother’s 1619-1655, pp.94, 99-106. 17 Gijsbert Heecq’s Journal, 1655, pp.61, 88; of the high regard in which she was held the ‘shrewd’ Osoet jointly handled all the inheritance. However, the King proved VOC 883, ff. 701-702, G.G. and Council at Court that the King did not permit Company’s affairs and that he followed magnanimous and ordered Osoet’s property to the King of Siam, 29 August 1659. Osoet’s daughters to leave the country till her advice to the letter.13 Clearly, Osoet’s to go directly to her four children (Johan and 18 ibid. note 2. after their mother’s death and even then, influence over the Company’s Siam affairs Osoet’s three daughters), a royal intervention 19 VOC 1240, Jan van Rijck in Siam to g.g. only after further pleadings by the Dutch was never more pronounced than during crucial to safeguarding their inheritance. Joan Maetsuijcker in Batavia, 22 February Governor–General.10 Van Muijden’s stewardship from 1646 to 1650. The VOC brokers were also told in private that 1662, pp.306-7. 8 Ideophones Significance of understanding The Study ideophones when learning Korean

Knock, knock! The great success of ideophones in Korean journalism

Cristina Bahón-Arnaiz

Korean is an extremely phono-symbolic language, whereby the sounds themselves carry meaning. One of the biggest challenges when learning Korean is to understand and fully utilize this subtle character of the language, yet most non-native speakers will acknowledge the absolute importance of mastering this skill. For example, becoming Scope and language register proficient in the use of what are known as ideophones is vital for effective communication An onomatopoeia imitates a sound perceived by the human auditory system since a breadth of meanings and emotions are condensed into one word or phrase. (crash, quack, shush, etc.), whilst an ideophone Ideophones, although found in most languages, are particularly abundant in Korean; is a sound-symbolic word that produces a sensory description, i.e., the sound of the word and unlike in most languages, in Korean, ideophones are even commonly used in denotes an idea (squidgy, zigzag, flutter, etc.). more formal contexts, such as Newspaper headlines. By evoking sensations, impressions, states, or emotions, ideophones build an emotional intermediary between the speaker and the listener. In contrast, ideophones can be easily (분단위 엎치락뒤치락…트럼프, 남부 선벨트 translated as crowded, yet it is more sensorial There is an extensive repertoire of ideophones found in South Korean newspapers, in both 대부분 뒤집었다); (fig.2) literally translated than that. Hwik (휙), as most ideophones, across the globe, including in East Asia, the headlines and throughout the article itself. as: “Up and down minute by minute … Trump is polysemic (it can have multiple meanings especially Korea and Japan, in Southeast Asia, This is not a matter of journalistic quality. flips most of the Southern Sun Belt”. The depending on the context). Normally it particularly in Vietnam and Cambodia, and Korea’s main newspapers – Kukmin Ilbo, ideophone eopchirakdwichirak (엎치락뒤치락) symbolizes the sudden and strong sound also in Central Africa. Despite the presence Segye Ilbo, Maeil Gyeongje, JoongAng Ilbo has two contrasting, yet parallel meanings. of an object flapping in the wind. However, of ideophones in many languages, including or Chosun Ilbo, among others – publish daily It describes a person who tosses and turns here it equates that sound with the one made English, there are important differences articles in which ideophones play a relevant in bed, unable to sleep, and it also depicts when energetically removing a face mask. regarding the scope and the language register role, especially when they are used in the a dingdong, a race, a close game or a fight Maeil Gyeongje is one of the main they are associated with. For example, countries headline. The examples provided here are at close quarters. It expresses a continuous economic newspapers in South Korea. with a modest or marginal usage of these words only a few of the wide uses of these sound- change of positions: up and down. At the Recently, it published the article “Peolpeol often associate ideophones with conversational, symbolic terms in Korean journalism, more beginning of counting the votes for the kkeulleun Busan jipgap, seokdalsae 10eok immature and vulgar scopes, or relate them specifically, in newspaper headlines. US presidential elections, it was difficult ‘ssuk’” (펄펄 끓는 부산 집값, 석달새 10억 ' to low registers of the language. However, Kukmin Ilbo recently published the article to predict the winner, since the results 쑥 '), or: “Boiling Busan house prices, 1 billion Korean ideophones are applied in formal “Baekbeon jjilleodo, 90do gayeolhaedo changed every single minute. The one ‘rise’ in three months”. Two ideophones have and informal registers, in both speaking and ‘meoljjeong’… I jugil nomui korona” (백번 word, eopchirakdwichirak (엎치락뒤치락), been used in this short headline. Peolpeol writing language. They are found in manhwa 찔러도, 90도 가열해도 ‘멀쩡’…이 죽일 놈의 perfectly denotes both the flip-flopping (펄펄) describes something boiling or burning [webtoons], novels, social media, newspapers, 코로나). (fig.1) This headline literally means: and the struggle. with intensity; ssuk (쑥) expresses something informal speech and formal speech, being “Even if you stab it a hundred times or heat Chosun Ilbo issued the article “Baideun being boosted abruptly. Ideophones convey possibly only absent from official documents. it up to 90 degrees, it’s still ‘fine’ … this damn seungnihamyeon dakgogi-gematsal tteunda? clear images as they create emotionally Coronavirus”. Not only is the ideophone Harim-Hanseong juga ‘deulsseok’” (바이든 charged sensations and impressions. meoljjeong (멀쩡) used, it is also emphasized 승리하면 닭고기·게맛살 뜬다? 하림·한성 In addition, ideophones’ simple yet expressive Ideophones in Korean with quotation marks. This polysemic word 주가 '들썩'); literally: “If Biden wins will the and rhythmical features have the added refers to something that remains intact, price of chicken and crab rise? Harim and ability of capturing the readers’ attention newspapers unscathed, sane or sober. Furthermore, Hansung stock prices ‘soar’”. The ideophone and to motivate them to keep reading. It is extremely rare to find ideophones it evokes in the receiver a particular feeling deulsseok (들썩) describes an object stuck to Despite the marginal use of ideophones in European newspapers. Even though of strength, lucidity, power or robustness, something else, and thereby easily lifted, yet in formal contexts in European languages, headlines can be observed to feature which seems unstoppable or invincible. Thus, also evokes a feeling of flutter and excitement. especially in comparison with Asian or African short words, with a minimal inclusion of this ideophone conveys the sense that the It is astounding how one single word, formed languages, these illustrative words are widely verbs, articles, word play, noun string and Coronavirus remains unscathed and seems by two syllables, can comprise a wide variety used in all registers of the language in Korean, alliteration, the information in newspapers invincible. Ideophones have an extraordinary of implications, sensations and impressions. including in the official arena of newspapers. must be clearly organized, the language descriptive power that allows receivers to Again, the ideophone is enclosed by quotation Ideophones are commonly used in Korean mostly formal and cultivated, sentences develop a deep emotional understanding marks to attract the reader’s attention and journalism to draw attention to headlines simple and coherent, not to mention the of the message the headline is conveying. emphasize its meaning. and connect with the reader emotionally. importance of a good journalistic style The main objective of newspaper headlines There are some cases where two This highlights the significant role of these with a rich variety of vocabulary and is to attract and have an impact on the readers. ideo-phones are used in one headline. words in Korean, and the necessity to a rigorous narrative structure. They must be short and simple, yet attractive For example, Segye Ilbo issued the article properly introduce ideophones when and impressive. Ideophones are equipped with “Gwangwangjineun bukjeok, maseukeuneun teaching Korean as a foreign language. all these features: they are short yet splendidly ‘hwik’… jiyeokgamnyeom jaehwaksan uryeo” Fig. 1 (top): Kukmin Ilbo “Baekbeon jjilleodo, 90do descriptive, and impressive in their ability to ( gayeolhaedo “meoljjeong”… I jugil nomui korona” 관광지는 북적, 마스크는 '휙'… 지역감염 Cristina Bahón-Arnaiz http://news.kmib.co.kr/article/view.asp?arcid=00 evoke emotional reactions and impressions. 재확산 우려), translated as “The tourist spots is a visiting Korean language professor 15028945&code=61151611&sid1=eco&cp=nv2 JoongAng Ilbo published an article on are crowded, the masks are ‘off’… Regional at the Autonomous University of Madrid. Fig. 2 (above right): JoonAng Ilbo “Bundanwi the recent US elections with the headline, infection proliferation is being worried about”. eopchirakdwichirak Tteureompeu, nambu Her PhD thesis was related to the linguistic seonbelteu daebubun dwijibeotda” “Bundanwi eopchirakdwichirak Tteureompeu, Bukjeok (북적) describes the sound of people and literary aspects of Korean ideophones https://news.joins.com/article/23911611 nambu seonbelteu daebubun dwijibeotda” moving and noisily talking. It is normally [email protected] The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 Ulama perempuan Female islamic leaders helping the 9 most vulnerable during the pandemic The Study

Creative ways to help believers Indonesian female Islamic leaders offer COVID-19 relief to families under pressure

Mirjam Künkler and Eva F. Nisa Female Islamic leaders in Indonesia have been devising new and creative ways to help believers cope with the COVID-19 pandemic and the Above: Promotional flyer for a Ngaji Virtual event s global infection levels continue to rise organised by Fatayat (total deaths approximated 2.4 million myriad crises arising from it. The authors, Mirjam Aby February this year), societies have Künkler and Eva Nisa, interviewed some of noted: “ulama perempuan have proven been hard hit by mounting economic, political the agents of change in their communities. and social costs. In Indonesia, while President these leaders about their various initiatives that During the pandemic, they have shown their Jokowi and his government were criticised address the gendered dimension of the social initiatives to synergise with various parties for their slow initial response to the crisis, to serve their communities: young and old, many have applauded the more efficient and economic consequences of the pandemic. women and men”.8 As the Indonesian saying responses by local leaders, who quickly goes, ‘Berakit-rakit ke hulu, berenang-renang imposed distancing measures and encouraged ke tepian. Bersakit-sakit dahulu, bersenang- mask-wearing. Unfortunately, the economic children occur in the household. Problems costs, women leaders in Islamic boarding senang kemudian’. Directly translated as hardship, faced by many Indonesians even in dealing with domestic violence during the schools have initiated local seed-sharing ‘Raft upstream, swim to the shore. Pain will before the crisis, has limited people’s capacity pandemic have stemmed from human mobility programmes. As many men are currently come first, joy will come later’, we can take to confine themselves to the home, minimise restrictions, which have impeded victims from forced into isolation in their workplace, this to mean that hard work will eventually human contact, and purchase recommended reporting their cases and have kept service thereby separated from their families, these be rewarded by rescue and salvation. In the medical supplies. providers from handling cases effectively. In organisations encourage them to cook, and pandemic, women religious leaders have been Civil society actors have stepped in to response, Fatayat, the young women’s wing of to do so with vegetables and herbs that they able to demonstrate that it is not only male complement public sector programmes, and Nahdlatul Ulama, launched a telephone hotline can easily grow on a small patch of land. ulama who can provide the raft. have offered life-saving services in areas where for complaints and consultation on domestic Home-grown greens, which can be cultivated the state has been largely absent. The country’s violence. According to Fatayat’s chairwomen even in urban settings, are emphasised for Mirjam Künkleris research professor multi-million member Islamic organisations have Anggia Ermarini, the organisation mobilises their potency in alleviating the effects of at the Swedish Collegium for Advanced also put in their share, hoping to cushion some resources from its central, provincial and depression and psychiatric disorders. Study. Her focus is on Islamic law, Islamic of the economic fallout. Such efforts mirror district levels, in order to address the crisis.6 Some organisations, such as the Alliance political thought and female religious authority in Iran and Indonesia. Among similar engagements by Islamic organisations of Theologically Educated Women (PERUATI), her publications are Democracy and Islam elsewhere in the Muslim world, aiming to deliver organise fundraisers to financially help those in Indonesia (Columbia University Press, the kind of relief and support not provided by Spiritual, mental, and most in need, while others, such as Libu 2013) and A Secular Age beyond the the public sector. Perempuan Palu [Learning Circle for Women] West (Cambridge University Press, 2018). physical resilience focus on people stranded far from home due [email protected] Digital media has become a key to the pandemic and who are often living Addressing the gendered communication tool between religious leaders in temporary shelters. At the Islamic State Eva F. Nisa is a senior lecturer in and constituents in Indonesia. What scholars University Jakarta, an organisation led by anthropology at the Australian National impact of COVID-19 and local activists call ‘digital religion’ has women religious leaders has raised funds University and an Australian Research Indonesia has stood out for the overwhelming become more visible and accessible, and for students who can no longer rely on their Council DECRA Fellow. Prior to this, she was a lecturer in religious studies (Islamic response of ulama perempuan [female Islamic Muslim female activists have embraced the families for financial support. studies) at Victoria University of Wellington, authorities] and women’s religious organisations new technology. Fatayat organises virtual On the epidemiological level, women activists New Zealand. Her research focuses on in addressing the gendered dimension of the Islamic study gatherings, called Ngaji Virtual, have urged the authorities to include gender- Islam and Muslim societies, gender and pandemic. Female Islamic leaders have seized for its constituents, during which topics are sensitive medical data at all administrative youth, religion and media (social media), the opportunity to step in and offer their presented through the lens of Islamic gender levels, from the national down to the village. and Islamic cultural economy. services to the broader public by issuing fatwas justice, for example, ‘Building Immunity Women from many of the aforementioned [email protected] against domestic violence,1 giving lectures on through the Improvement of Spiritual Quality organisations serve as representatives on the how to preserve and strengthen mental health, within a Family’. In the same vein, Rahima, an national COVID-19 task force. In that role, and offering practical support to alleviate organisation that trains ulama perempuan, they have consistently stressed the ways in Notes financial hardship. produces YouTube videos of its female preachers which women are particularly burdened by the 1 The phenomenon of women issuing UN Women has collected data from addressing issues faced by Muslim women and COVID-19 crisis, and how policies must respond fatwas is extremely rare in the Muslim various countries that documents the extent educating the larger public during lockdown. accordingly. In most cases, women have been world and a relatively recent development to which violence against women and girls Other organisations are using digital the key link between civil society organisations in Indonesia that we have written about has intensified during the pandemic. In media to emphasise mental health issues and families, collecting data on health previously in: Künkler, M. & Nisa, E.F. 2018. addition, in April-May 2020, Indonesia’s during the crisis. Muslimat actively advocates (including infection levels and treatments) and ‘Re-Establishing Juristic Expertise. National Commission on Violence against handling COVID-19 through a combination of other problems faced by families, disseminating A historic congress of female Islamic Women (KOMNAS) conducted a survey to map scientific and spiritual approaches. Moreover, scientific information, and communicating scholars’, The Newsletter #79, p.7; the impact of the pandemic on household it highlights the importance of salawāt and economic opportunities. https://tinyurl.com/NL79-Kunkler-Nisa · 2 Bayhaqi, A. 2020. ‘Survei Indikator: dynamics in 34 provinces.2 The results reveal dhikr [prayer and meditation] during lockdown, Kinerga Pemerintah Pusat di Bawah that women aged 31-40 years, especially those which aligns well with the rising popularity in Conclusion Daerah dalam Menangani COVID-19’, from lower classes, are particularly vulnerable. Indonesia of Muslim groups campaigning to Merdeka, 20 August; http://tiny.cc/ The survey also found that only 10% of the revive inward-looking spiritual approaches Women and girls have been particularly BayhaqiSurveiIndikator respondents who indicated that they had and practices.7 Muslimat published videos of vulnerable during the COVID-19 pandemic. 3 The survey had 2285 respondents. It needs to be noted that this survey experienced domestic violence had contacted s· alawāt lī khamsatun and t·ibbil qulūb, recited Rising levels of domestic violence have the relevant service providers.3 by its chairwoman Khofifah Indar Parawansa. accompanied increasing economic hardship was conducted online and thus excluded people without internet access. Even in Ulama perempuan, such as those from The s· alawāt aims to boost people’s confidence in households, worsened by women’s financial Alimat, the Congress of Indonesian Women in facing the pandemic by heeding medical dependence and unemployment. Ulama normal times fewer than 40% of women Ulama, and young ulama of the women’s protocols and maintaining spirituality through perempuan and Muslim women’s organisations experiencing violence seek help. See http://tiny.cc/UNWomenFandF. subdivisions of the nation’s biggest Islamic the recitation of prayers. Khofifah received have been on the frontline supporting women 4 Interview with Ala’i Nadjib, lecturer at organisations, Muhammadiyah and an award from the Ministry of Religious Affairs through various initiatives: reaching out State Islamic University Syarif Hidayatullah Nahdlatul Ulama, have organised webinars in recognition of the impact made by her online to provide spiritual guidance, creating Jakarta and board member of Nahdlatul and workshops on how to contain the rise of s· alawāt campaign. scientific information programmes, supplying Ulama’s Institute for Research and Human gender-based violence and reduce violence The organisations also focus on face masks and hand sanitiser, and generating Resource Development, 1 October 2020. against children.4 Alimatul Qibtiyah, a KOMNAS disseminating sound information and more sustainable aid through empowerment 5 http://tiny.cc/webinarAlimatul commissioner and member of the fatwa-issuing countering false claims about the disease. programmes rooted in religious practices. 6 Interview with Anggia Ermarini, general board of Muhammadiyah, commented on In remote areas, jamu [herbal medicine] sellers Spiritual, mental and physical resilience chairwoman of the central board of the precarious situation in which “sometimes have been mobilised to publicise information comprises the foundation of these women’s Fatayat Nahdlatul Ulama, 1 October 2020. 7 Howell, J.D. 2014. ‘Revitalised Sufism a house is not a safe place for both wives on maintaining hygiene, and to distribute hand initiatives, while ‘digital religion’ enables the 5 and the New Piety Movements in Islamic and daughters”. Khofifah Indar Parawansa, sanitisers and herbs, particularly to groups for execution of such activities. Southeast Asia’, in B.S. Turner & O. Salemink governor of East Java and chairwoman of whom commercial medicine is too costly. Some In the face of myriad of crises, women’s (eds) Routledge Handbook of Religions in Muslimat, reinforced this statement during have established online portals to circulate Islamic organisations and the ulama Asia. Routledge, pp.276-292. a webinar in which she confirmed that close traditional recipes and to reduce reliance on perempuan of Indonesia practice what they 8 Interview with Pera Sopariyanti and Andi to 59% of violence against women and instant ingredients. To address rising food preach. As Pera Sopariyanti, head of Rahima, Faizah, 1 October 2020. 10 Indonesia's political Which political regime has been The Study system(s) more efficient in terms of economic and social development?

Left: Jokowi confronts the COVID-19 virus spreading over the Indonesian flag. Source: Hapelinium on Shutterstock.com, all rights reserved.

Below: Cover of Indonésie: l'envol mouvementé du Garuda by Jean-Luc Maurer.

Indonesia in ‘3D’: development, dictatorship and democracy

Jean-Luc Maurer On 17 August 2020, while the COVID-19 pandemic was raging, Indonesia celebrated less joyfully than planned the 75th anniversary of its independence. With more than 270 million people, it is the fourth most populated country in the world. It is also at the crossroads Ambitious objective of the Indo-Pacific region where it occupies a uniquely strategic position. On the political In the introduction, some methodological front, it is the third largest democracy on earth and one of the few in the Muslim world clarifications are followed by a short presentation of Indonesia’s favourable to which it belongs, also counting the highest number of believers. At the economic level, situation at the beginning of 2020. After well endowed with natural resources, it is one of the major emerging countries, with a rather a first chapter to set the geographical and the pre-colonial scene, followed by a second good development record since the early 1970s, a member of the G20, and will possibly be on the heavy heritage of 350 years of Dutch the fourth or fifth biggest economy in the world by 2045, at which time it will be celebrating colonial domination, it focuses on the post independence period with a different chapter its centenary. In spite of all that, Indonesia remains certainly the most unknown and ignored devoted to each of the five major phases among major nations. This article is a summary of a French-language book whose title one can distinguish since 1950: the troubled 1 Sukarno years of political instability and can translate as “Indonesia: Garuda’s turbulent take-off”. It aims to fill part of a knowledge economic decline (1950-1966); the New Order gap about this country, particularly marked in the French literature. Its main objective authoritarian era of economic development and political repression under Suharto’s is to retrace the history of the archipelago’s economic, social and political development. dictatorship (1966-1998); the chaotic but decisive transition to democracy known as Reformasi (1998-2004); the decade of However, the book also has a second, Sukarno: polarisation ill-adapted to traditional Indonesian political economic stability and democratic stagnation wider and more ambitious objective: to allow culture, proved to be a major obstacle. during which Soesilo Bambang Yudhoyono the reader, through what is considered as and recession Moreover, the difficulty to forge national was president (2004-2014); and the six years the emblematic case of Indonesia, to better After independence, proclaimed in 1945, unity and the various regional rebellions that have elapsed since Joko Widodo was understand the dynamics of development, and the four following years of a devastating during the 1950’s in different parts of the elected in 2014 and re-elected in 2019 to the this global process of change resulting in national liberation war against the colonial archipelago monopolised all the energy and presidency, where clear signs of democratic a nation’s economic, social, political and power, Indonesia went through two very derailed this developmental process. In the regression have started to accumulate amidst cultural transformation. The emblematic different political experiences under the end, parliamentary democracy resulted a positive economic situation until early 2020. nature of the case study is not only linked presidency of Sukarno from 1950 to 1966: in a serious development failure. The book ends with an epilogue showing to the fact that Indonesia started from a very the first was rather democratic and the Thereafter, in 1959 Sukarno imposed his how this favourable situation has turned to low level of development and has reached second clearly more authoritarian. Neither system of Guided Democracy, a presidential a deep economic and social crisis due to the a certain degree of success in this domain, of these two experiences put the country on regime that was increasingly authoritarian irruption of the COVID-19 pandemic, which but also to the complex and ambiguous the path of sustained economic and social and incompetent, giving priority to foreign was managed inefficiently, as well as the relation that this process has entertained development. Until 1959, in spite of the huge policy objectives of national sovereignty consequences it had on the acceleration of with dictatorship and democracy, the two difficulties met from the start – resulting claims and struggle against neo-colonialism democratic regression. However, it is preceded political regimes between which the country from the burden of colonial heritage, the and imperialism, but neglecting economic by a conclusion drawing the lessons from has wavered since independence. As a matter iniquitous conditions for decolonisation fundamentals. The economy became a the Indonesian development process and of fact, this analysis of the relation in ‘3D’ imposed by the Dutch and the very poor state victim of economic nationalism, nonsensical stressing the possible links one can establish between development, dictatorship and of the economy – the country seemed able to planning and inept strategic choices guided by with the phases of dictatorship or democracy democracy constitutes the connecting thread engage in a promising developmental process. ideology and ignorance and reflecting the lack the country has known, including a brief of the book, with the ambition to clarify the However, the political instability inherent in of concern by the president for such issues. comparison with the four other co-founding following haunting question: which of the two the commendable but probably premature This policy drove the country towards economic ASEAN members, Thailand, Malaysia, political regimes has been more efficient in attempt to establish a regime of western- recession and resulted in a serious deterioration Singapore and the Philippines. terms of economic and social development? inspired parliamentarian liberal democracy, of living conditions for the population. To sum The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 11 The Study

up, the first fifteen years of independence A demand for democratic new actors coming from civil society and having announced at the start of his second ended up in a severe developmental fiasco. freeing talents that were dormant until that mandate that development would be his first In 1965, economic growth was close to zero, reform time? Sometimes, a crisis can be beneficial priority and that he was aiming for a yearly inflation was over 600%, around 70% of the This is precisely what happened in 1998. to put back on track a country that was growth rate of 7-8% by 2024, Jokowi has population lived in poverty and hunger was The Asian Financial Crisis (AFC), which started close to derailing. In any case, here too the instilled the pernicious idea that a deepening common, with a rice deficit of 1 million tons. in Thailand in mid-1997 and reached Indonesia successor of the unlikely trio inherited in of democracy constituted an obstacle to The degradation of the economic and social at the end of the year, served as a catalyst 2004 a largely improved situation that made reaching his development goals. situation was accompanied by the rise of for this movement of revolt and opened the era it possible to see the future with optimism. This presidential position is worrying. political antagonism between the Indonesian of reforms, leading to a rapid and genuine During the decade (2004 to 2014) when Some ministers are even defending the idea Communist Party, who supported Sukarno’s democratisation of the country. The collapse president Soesilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) that democracy and its major conquests – policy, and the majority of the army’s of the economy, dragged into a 13% was in place, one first saw a deepening direct elections, including for the presidency, US-trained higher officers, allied to Islamic contraction in 1998, bringing the bankruptcy process of democratisation take place, respect for the rule of law, as well as individual conservative circles, who were opposed to of thousands of enterprises and the explosion before registering the disturbing beginning and collective human rights, and above all the it. This growing polarisation blew up at the of social problems, with millions of people of democratic stagnation during the second struggle against corruption – are impediments end of September 1965 when Indonesia was losing their jobs and a poverty rate jumping half of his appointment. It had no real impact to development and security. Indeed, the precipitated into a terrible episode of violence to over 20%, resulted in a deep political crisis. on economic growth, maintained at a yearly government gives a disproportionate priority that resulted in the slaughter of at least half It is when the ‘miracle’ turned into a ‘debacle’. pace of 5-6% and accompanied by a return to the preservation of internal security and a million people, one of the worst and still The New Order’s only political legitimacy lay to poverty decline, but also by a significant to the respect for national sovereignty on unexplained and unpunished mass killings in its capacity to continue ensuring economic increase of income inequality. the international front. This has naturally of the second half of the 20th Century. and social development. This being gone, If one examines in more detail the evolution resulted in the return of the army in politics, it collapsed in the face of social unrest and of the situation during this decade, what are the growing influence of conservative Islamic the demands of the population for freedom the main lessons to be drawn with regard to political parties or organisations, and the Spectacular progress. and democracy. General Suharto resigned the ‘3D’ relation at the heart of our concern? rise of religious radicalism and intolerance, pitifully in May 1998. Starting from the It appears first that democratisation was leading to an increasing degree of illiberalism. At what cost? experience of Indonesia (and other Asian favourable to the economic and social It corresponds to a certain weariness of the After this awful holocaust, in March countries like Thailand and South Korea at development, allowing a return to stability, population in front of the unfulfilled promises 1966 Indonesia fell for 32 years under the the same moment), one can conclude that a respectable growth rate and a substantial of democracy and the resurgence of a domination of a harsh authoritarian regime economic and social development gives birth improvement of living standards for the true nostalgia for the ‘good old days’ when established by General Suharto and baptised to democracy more easily when it turns into majority of the population. But being inscribed everything was clearer, easier and better. New Order. Starting as a pure military a crisis, when the process of global change in a more general context of globalisation Yet, one talks about Suharto’s dictatorial New dictatorship, it used and abused coercive that was operating is suddenly interrupted. and accelerated liberalisation, the same Order whose exactions seem to have been measures during these three decades. But It is more difficult to draw clear conclusions democratisation process has also entailed the forgotten by a population that is mostly too it also initiated an undisputable process on the relation in ‘3D’ for the troubled rise of social inequalities and the widening young to have suffered through it. of economic and social development that period of democratic transition between of the gap between a minority of privileged Indonesia had been waiting for since 1998 and 2004. In fact, it comes down to people becoming infinitely richer, and the independence. Even if one must consider two questions: how can a transition between majority of a population remaining just Closing the loop statistics with a critical eye, the main dictatorship and democracy take place and slightly less poor. development indicators show that economic what are the conditions for economic and on democracy growth remained high under the New Order, social development in a time of crisis? One comes therefore to a paradoxical varying between 5 and 10% a year, and To answer the first question, let us say Liberalism, conservatism, reversal of history where, after it has been the was accompanied by spectacular progress that these six years of Reformasi were fruit of a rapid and successful economic and on the social front. Thus, between 1966 and certainly the most difficult and dangerous for and populism social development conducted by a dictatorial 1996, GDP per capita was multiplied by the young Indonesian democracy. In reality, Moreover, democratisation, and the regime that tried hard to avoid its advent, more than twenty (from around 50 US$ to Indonesia almost blew up due to violent liberalisation of the society it has allowed democracy comes to be considered, after a more than 1000), life expectancy gained regional and religious conflicts. The process of with the reinforcement of people’s political mere twenty years of existence, as an obstacle almost 15 years (from 50 to 65) and absolute democratisation could have been interrupted and civil rights, has also triggered the rise to the acceleration of the developmental poverty was quartered (from some 60% at any moment, bringing the country back of a growing hostility among the more process. In such a simplistic vision, too much to 15%). Education and health indicators to authoritarianism. However, thanks to conservative sections of the population, for democracy would kill development! Then, substantially improved too. It is certainly the actions of the three political figures the most part linked to Islamic circles. They the question remains to know whether the exaggerated and inappropriate to depict successively appointed to the presidency – are opposed to this change and cultivate Indonesian democracy will continue to weaken this as a shining developmental success when B.J. Habibie (1998-99), Abdurhaman Wahid the nostalgia of authoritarianism, a period and eventually fade away, in the name of a one considers the cost of this experience in (1999-2001) and Megawati Sukarnoputri of time when law and order was the rule and faster development. Can one imagine that the terms of violence, contempt for the rule of (2001-2004) – arduous progress has been when things were clearer, even if it often quest for a higher level of development results law and deprivation of political and individual achieved towards democracy. However, degenerated in serious excesses. In fact, in the end of democracy and the return to rights, without mentioning the assault on the simple fact that Indonesia had three as it has appeared since then even more authoritarianism and possibly to dictatorship? the environment. But it is difficult to contest presidents in just six years, while it had obviously, a rapid democratisation process The loop would be sadly closed. Depending the fact that this authoritarian regime only had two in more of the type that has on the turn events will take until the end of succeeded in pulling Indonesia out of its than half a century characterised Indonesia Jokowi’s second mandate, it is unfortunately chronic underdevelopment. It even lifted of independence, … democracy comes during the time of quite possible. it into the group of HPAEs (High Performing gives an idea of the Reformasi generates The COVID-19 pandemic, which started to Asian Economies), participating in the difficulties that to be considered … its own natural poison. infect Indonesia in mid-March 2020, and had so-called ‘East Asian Miracle’ praised by were faced. Indeed, This political process of already passed the 30,000 deaths mark in the famous World Bank report of 1993. these very different as an obstacle to the change is threatened early February 2021 has naturally turned the Thus, the political authoritarianism of the characters, who came to acceleration of the by the resurgence situation totally upside down, like everywhere New Order regime seems to have been relatively power unexpectedly and of intolerance and else on earth. The economy has collapsed favourable to Indonesia’s economic and social exercised it for a short developmental process. populism as well as here too. Instead of the 6-7% growth rate development. It is consistent with the classical time, contributed to this by the emergence of hoped for by the president, the country will modernisation theory, some of its most radical laborious consolidation repressive ‘illiberal’ register a contraction of around 2% in 2020, advocates having even supported the idea that of democracy. All the institutional reforms practices. It becomes truly serious when the first since 1998 at the time of the AFC. the army can constitute a key accelerator in they signed (political and press freedom, several political leaders belonging to this Unemployment, poverty and inequality are a developmental process. However, quantitative rights of association, decentralisation laws, trend support the idea that democracy on the rise again. The ambitious development figures do not say much about the quality independence of East-Timor, reduction of would constitute an obstacle to economic objectives Jokowi had set have been of this process and even less about the real army role, adoption of direct elections at all and social development. In their view, the postponed or even abandoned, to make place life of Indonesian citizens, deprived of the levels, etc.) made it possible for the country pace of development could be much quicker, for a huge rescue financial plan at the cost elementary but fundamental freedom they to progress in the right direction. One can and its results better, under an authoritarian of a deepening budget deficit. On the health could have enjoyed under a democratic regime. even say that the most difficult part was regime, as it was during the New Order. front, the government has been inefficient in The elections organised every five years achieved under their leadership and that Thus, by the end of SBY’s second term, managing the crisis and Indonesia shows by and skilfully manipulated to obtain a large their successor inherited a situation that Indonesia was confronted with the dilemma far the worst performance among all ASEAN victory for the governmental party cannot be was as favourable as possible. of development being torn between the countries. At the same time, the coercive considered as a true democratic expression necessity to reinforce democracy and the measures taken to try to control the spread of trust. On the other hand, one can also temptation of a return to authoritarianism. of the virus have given a central role to the observe that different forms of popular protest Recovery with inequalities The phenomenon of democratic army and police, reinforcing the illiberal against the regime gained force over time. As for the second question, it is obvious stagnation, which started under SBY, has trend that was already at work. It is therefore They culminated at the end of the New Order, that reform frenzy, political instability, been confirmed since the arrival to the most probable that the pandemic will further when it became unable to ‘deliver’ economic the threat of national disintegration and presidency in 2014 of the unexpected Joko weaken democracy. The only hope is that and social progress. But it is the initial success the beginning of a deadly wave of Islamic Widodo (Jokowi) and his re-election in 2019. Indonesia will manage to survive as a flawed of this developmental process that finally terrorism during this period, did not facilitate The young Indonesian democracy has even democracy, but a democracy nevertheless, made it possible for these dissenting voices the return to favourable conditions for started to show signs of regression in some in a region increasingly dominated by to express themselves, grow in importance economic and social development. However, domains, like the respect for the rule of law or authoritarian regimes. and make change possible. To a certain considering the true cataclysm that the AFC the struggle against corruption. What some extent, the New Order was a victim of its had been for Indonesia in 1997-98, one can scholars consider to be an ‘illiberal drift’ did Jean-Luc Maurer, own success. It was the improvement of the imagine that things could have turned much not have any notable effect on economic Honorary Professor in Development living standards of the population (nutrition, worse. It was miraculous that six years later growth. It has remained resolutely fixed Studies, The Graduate Institute Geneva clothing, housing, transport, education, the country could retrieve a respectable 5% at the usual yearly 5% rate, in spite of the [email protected] health, communication, information, etc.), economic growth and a whole set of social reforms undertaken by the president to boost alongside the spectacular decline of absolute indicators rapidly catching up with pre-crisis development, among other things through poverty, that allowed the emergence of a levels. Maybe it is due to the fact that this the improvement of infrastructure. In addition, middle class longing for more freedom, as well critical period facilitated a better mobilisation poverty has continued to decrease and as a student movement and a working class of efforts and stimulation of imagination, inequality has ceased to increase, even Notes ready to take risks and fight for a better life. allowing the emergence of a multitude of showing signs of a slight decline. However, 1 https://books.openedition.org/iheid/7876 12 News from Southeast Asia Regional Editor The Region Commodities, credit and luxury Su-Ann OH consumer goods

https://www.iseas.edu.sg

Commodities, credit and luxury consumer goods Insights into the structures that shape economic life in Southeast Asia

Su-Ann OH Looking at Milo Dinosaur (a quintessentially Singaporean drink), the Musang King durian (the most sought after variety from Malaysia), moneylending in Vietnam and the demand for luxury goods in Southeast Asia, researchers in the Regional Economic Studies Programme here at ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute lay bare the structures that shape economic life in the region. Through an examination of global chains, historical legacies, political economy, social relations and changing tastes brought about by the pandemic, they provide us with fascinating insights into the workings of commodity and credit markets in the region.

Su-Ann OH, Visiting Fellow at ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute, Managing Editor of SOJOURN, and Regional Editor for The Newsletter , [email protected]

COVID-19 and the lost immunity of the luxury goods industry

Above: Luxury fashion brand Louis Vuitton selling exercise equipment, pictured here with couturier Karl Lagerfeld. Pritish Bhattacharya

he market for luxury goods has enjoyed New strategies net profits were down by 34 per cent. Likewise, have unreservedly backed textbook notions phenomenal growth over the past few Since the beginning of the millennium, rival conglomerate Kering SA, owner of Gucci of fuelling ‘conspicuous consumption’ and Tdecades. In 2019, the global value of the luxury goods market has relied, almost and Yves Saint Laurent, witnessed a 17.5 per generating ‘snob value’ to help their consumers the sector was estimated to be around a exclusively, on two consumer clusters for cent decline in revenue, and a 34.4 drop in distinguish themselves from the crowd. staggering US$1.47 trillion. A carefully crafted generating overall growth. While middle class recurring operating income. Although pricing So entrenched is the prestige preservation illusion of hedonism, robust manufacturing Asian tourists remain the primary revenue strategies – including setting price mark-ups philosophy that large-scale commoditisation processes and seamlessly integrated supply source, young local adults or ‘Millennials’ form sometimes as high as 20 times the cost of has never even been considered a viable chains have allowed the industry to create the much smaller backup target. However, with production for a host of products – have option. However, the lasting impact of the and satiate people’s perpetual appetite for COVID-induced travel restrictions affecting the allowed most industry stalwarts to remain afloat current pandemic is making them take the high-end products and experiences with former group and rising youth unemployment during the pandemic, a handful of high-end first steps towards setting aside the allure of great aplomb. Even during periods of grave impacting the latter, demand has flatlined boutique brands are starting to shutter down. exclusivity and embracing coping mechanisms economic uncertainty, flagship luxury brands and the industry has been caught completely Among the American casualties of the crisis are rooted in mainstream economic principles. have emerged virtually unscathed. For off guard. Annual sales of LVMH, the parent retail giants Brook Brothers, Neiman Marcus First, a number of companies are offering instance, in the aftermath of the catastrophic company of prestigious companies such as and Lord & Taylor – all three companies filed existing and new customers a greater range Global Financial Crisis of 2008-09, the sector Louis Vuitton, Dior, TAG Heuer and Bulgari, for bankruptcy last year. Closer to home, of products and prices that would – at least contracted by a mere 9 per cent, before loyal plummeted 17 per cent year-on-year, while Singapore’s Robinsons & Co., too, was unable somewhat – justify heavy spending in this consumers promptly elevated the retail giants to bear the brunt of the coronavirus fallout, challenging period. Second, centre stage back to their original dominant positions announcing its closure after 160 years in the brands are actively trying to develop a sense by the following year. The events of 2020, city-state. Other players that have come to of congruity between consumer perception however, have managed to expose a chink in terms with the peculiar nature of the ongoing and their own values. And third, the ever-so- the industry’s armour. The COVID-19 pandemic crisis – the ease with which the virus spreads, neglected digital engagement channels are and the resultant economic downturn have the psyche of cautious consumers and the finally being put to good use. dealt a major blow to the generally indomitable complexity of vaccinating billions of people luxury segment. According to analysts at Bain – and that anticipate a long recovery process & Co., the global sales of personal luxury goods have finally started to abandon their change- Greater variety declined by 23 per cent in 2020, and are not averse mode of operations. Most luxury fashion houses have been expected to return to 2019 figures until late Economic homeostasis has been a wary of diversification due to fears of ‘brand 2022 or 2023. Such projections do not bode signature trait of most luxury fashion houses. dilution’. But keeping such concerns at bay and well for Southeast Asia’s luxury market, which A self-sustaining ecosystem developed by unapologetically extending product and price had started to show signs of slowing down nurturing a steady stream of loyal patrons ranges is now imperative for such firms. Given even before the current outbreak, thanks to the has helped them attain unparalleled growth in that recessions invariably heighten consumers’ spill-over effects of the US-China trade war. Above: Burberry face mask. the past. In order to do so, established brands price sensitivity, catering to financially fettered The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 News from Southeast Asia Regional Editor 13 Commodities, credit and luxury Su-Ann OH The Region consumer goods

shoppers should be seen by the industry not as a deviation from its ethos of maintaining inaccessibility but as an opportunity to inculcate loyalty into a new group of consumers. This should be supplemented with detailed A thorny dispute over land and profits. analyses of market trends. Preliminary studies have shown that, in Southeast Asia, younger Durian plantations in Raub, Malaysia consumers have been affected less severely by the COVID-19 crisis than their middle-aged counterparts. Not allocating adequate resources Cassey Lee to serve their needs just because they have traditionally accounted for a smaller proportion of the revenue stream would therefore be a misstep. Instead, by offering a greater variety of goods tailored to their preferences by utilising the underlying notion of ‘aspirational utility’, the industry stands a good chance of creating a new, permanent consumer base in the future. Developing practical and durable goods – as exemplified by some brands that have forayed into production of reusable face masks (Burberry), exercise equipment (Louis Vuitton) and electronic gadgets (Mont Blanc) – is a brilliant move towards diversification.

Pro-social behaviour The literature on behavioural economics is replete with studies that highlight the idea of possessions being an expression of their owner’s extended self. With the ‘new normal’ forcing most individuals to stay indoors and unintentionally making them reflect on ‘what really matters’, materialism is bound to take a hit. It is therefore important for the luxury sector to depart from its typical ‘wants over needs’ narrative and, instead, communicate to the buyers what it stands for. A host of new studies have shown that, in addition to the combination of willingness Above: Durian night market, Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. Image John Tewell on Flickr, Creative Commons license. and ability to pay, luxury consumers now assign a lot of weightage to their preferred brands’ manufacturing processes, treatment rickly, creamy and pungent, durian to sell their Grade A Musang King to the joint to overcome such non-tariff barriers. If the of employees, commitment to saving the (Durio zibethinus) is regarded by many ventures at a fixed price of RM30 (US$7.40) state government does not have the expertise environment, charitable endeavours, inter Pin Southeast Asia to be the king of per kg for two years starting from 2021. nor the human resources to provide direct alia. As shoppers begin to trickle out of their fruits. In fact, durian’s commercial value Not surprisingly, the ultimatum and proposal technical assistance to farmers on matters homes after months of isolation to satiate has risen in recent years, especially since were met with stiff resistance by the durian relating to MyGAP, it could encourage private their ‘pent up demand’ for luxury escapism, it became popular in China. In 2019 alone, farmers who felt that the state had colluded provision of such services. the industry must make greater effort to China imported some US$1.7 billion worth of with a private company to unfairly extract One potential complication is the involve- convince them of, say, the craftsmanship durians. Although Thailand dominates supply their hard-earned profits. The state and ment of the Pahang Royal Family as a share- of the artists it employs, its resolve to create in this market, the Malaysian government the private company have not previously holder in the private company RPD. The a truly inclusive work environment and the aspires to increase the country’s market invested any time and resources in the Sultan of Pahang is the de facto head of the genuineness of its pro-social behaviour. share to well beyond the current ten per cent. farmers’ ventures and yet, by way of fiat, state government. Some legal scholars and In the early days of the COVID crisis, many Two factors are likely to increase Malaysia’s intend to extract rent from them. The case practitioners have argued that state lands big-name fashion companies had turned durian exports to China in the future. First, has since gone to the courts with the farmers ‘belong’ to the Sultan as a sovereign entity. their production lines, usually meant for Malaysia secured the rights to export frozen seeking a judicial review on two matters – This is debatable because changes in state handbags and apparel, to manufacture whole durians to China in August 2018. the state government’s order to vacate their land legislations require the approval of the personal protective equipment and hand Second, there is increasing demand for lands and its decision to award the lease and state legislative body, implying that the sanitisers – a gesture that will undoubtedly Malaysia’s premium durian, especially for a the right to use to the joint venture company. ‘state’ is in fact distinct from the sovereign add to their scintillating brand value. variety known as ‘Musang King’. A temporary reprieve was obtained by the entity – just as the Federal legislative body farmers when the court ordered the state (Parliament) is separate from the executive Though the Covid-19 pandemic has authorities to cease all enforcement and body and the king. Norms may, however, Digital engagement adversely affected the demand for durians eviction measures against the durian farmers differ from actual practice as the Sultan ‘Experiential satisfaction’ has been the in China in 2020, the long-term constraint until the judicial review would be decided commands the utmost respect from state essence of the luxury sector. Consequently, is likely to come from the supply-side rather in December 2020. bureaucrats and politicians. enhancing the operations of brick and mortar than the demand side. Not only is there a At first glance, the case appears On 23 December 2020, the High Court in stores has been the principal focus of most long gestation period for durian trees (more straightforward from a legal perspective. Kuantan dismissed the farmers' applications high-end brands. For years, digital marketing than five years), the Musang King variety The implementation of land registration for judicial review on the basis that they and sales channels were implicitly labelled only thrives in specific geographical areas in under British rule had abolished the practice are trespassers and hence have no legal as weak instruments – to the extent that Malaysia. One of these areas is the district of ‘adverse possession’, which was recognised standing. This court decision is likely to be most brands did not even list the prices of of Raub, located in the state of Pahang. As under customary law. In adverse possession, construed by the general public to be unfair. their offerings on the official websites; the durian industry booms, durian plantation an occupant of ‘waste land’ [tanah mati] Legal constraints aside, it might be worth in order to obtain this key piece of information, lands in Raub have become the loci of has the right to cultivate the land provided to consider economic efficiency. What consumers were expected to call the nearest contestations among various parties. This is a proportion of the produce is remitted to arrangement would allow the durian industry outlet. Things are much different now. because many of the one thousand affected the rightful owner (the state). Thus, under in Raub to flourish whilst ensuring that the The pandemic has forced the industry to farmers have been cultivating durian on land the current legal system, the affected durian state government receives its fair share of elevate e-commerce sales to the same that is state-owned. farmers have illegally occupied state-owned revenues (lease payments, quit rents and stature as outlet purchases. Luxury firms are The most recent struggle over land for lands and have no legal recourse whatsoever. tax revenues)? To do this, the courts should finally adopting digital engagement to not durian cultivation in Raub can be traced This would put the farmer at a disadvantage stay the ‘grabbing hands’ of the state and just showcase goods and services and relay back to March 2020, when the Pahang when bargaining for a more favourable allow the ‘invisible hand’ of the market to do their desirability, but also receive immediate state government’s agency for agriculture lease term. what it does best in commerce. This would customer feedback. A growing number of development, Perbadanan Kemajuan Under the Federal Constitution, land- require the court to recognise the right of firms in the region have been livestreaming Pertanian Negeri Pahang (PKPP) signed related matters are dealt with under the farmers to be fairly compensated (for fashion events, offering virtual consultations agreements with a private company, the state jurisdiction. It would perhaps be less past investments, should they choose to and adopting digital prototyping to unveil Royal Pahang Durian Group (RPD), to form controversial if the entire 30+30 year lease is exit farming) or to a fair revenue-sharing novel products. As social distancing measures joint ventures to develop a durian processing given to PKPP because the land does in fact contract (should they choose to continue are here to stay for at least the next several centre and to legalise durian farming on belong to the state. PKPP can then provide farming). Such a contract should be months, further digital amplification can encroached state lands. a sub-lease to each durian farmer. Why negotiated without the threat of eviction. certainly help cushion the impact of the crisis. On 24 June 2020, the Pahang should another private company (RDP) be To conclude, the boom in Malaysia’s While these measures alone cannot government awarded a 30+30 year lease a beneficiary of the lease? As a state-owned durian exports has brought about a conflict restore the luxury industry’s immunity and the right to use over 5,357 acres of land agency, PKPP should have sufficient resources between major players and institutions in overnight, they can help mitigate some of in Raub to the joint ventures. A month later, to develop the industry including financing the country – farmers, state and the royalty. the challenges brought upon by the current the affected durian farmers in Raub were the proposed durian processing plant. As A fair solution to this conflict can only be crisis and prepare a new, sustainable modus given the ultimatum of accepting a sub- part of a sub-lease agreement with farmers, obtained through negotiations without operandi for a post-COVID scenario. lease of 10+10 years with the joint venture the PKPP could also assist them in obtaining threat of eviction. company or risk being evicted for illegal the Malaysian Good Agricultural Practices Pritish Bhattacharya is a Research land occupation. The proposed sub-lease (MyGAP) certification, which is required by Cassey Lee is a Senior Fellow in the Officer in the Regional Economic Studies contract requires each farmer to pay a levy China for durian imports. After all, it is the role Regional Economic Studies Programme Programme at the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak of RM6,000 (US$1,473) per acre and of the government to assist the private sector at the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute. Institute. 14 News from Southeast Asia Regional Editor The Region Commodities, credit and luxury Su-Ann OH consumer goods

market economy and the country’s insertion month. But first, I go to their place to see into the globalised economy would set off how they live. If I see that they really cannot The gendered structure of an irreversible process of cultural dilution pay and are going through a hard time, and cause the proliferation of crime and I sympathise and don’t force them to pay”. moneylending in Vietnam greed. Giang hồ lenders also embody certain ideals of masculinity, in particular men’s ‘hot As flexible as neighbourhood money- temper’ that can easily turn into aggressive lenders’ practices are, they must also Nicolas Lainez and violent behaviour (and intimate partner recoup their money to sustain their business. violence) when they consume alcohol. When they run out of patience, they harass Although conforming to these gender roles and insult late repayers. This is how Phường, marginalises male moneylenders as deviant a neighbourhood moneylender, pressures oneylending is a vital source of is ‘if I lend money, I can always get it back’. and puts them at risk of repression and late borrowers: “I can say ‘fuck you or your credit for unbanked and under- Their methods include charging penalties stigmatisation, it allows them to generate mother, is it you or me now?’, or I could use Mbanked borrowers in Vietnam. and compound interest, insults and beatings, enough fear and respect among borrowers more aggressive words like ‘fuck your mother, Despite its relevance, this credit sector is making a fuss at borrowers’ homes, harassing to sustain their lending operation. fuck your father’. I only swear at the borrowers poorly understood and shrouded in negative their relatives, disclosing the debt to a themselves. I never insult their mother, father stereotypes about loan shark practices. It is spouse, posting their pictures and personal and ancestors”. As opposed to giang hồ thought to be a masculine world, a universe information in their neighbourhood, and Sympathetic familiarity gangs, neighbourhood moneylenders rarely of violent and cruel men belonging to giang splashing paint and fermented shrimp sauce On the contrary, women operate as hit ‘stubborn’ borrowers or ‘make a fuss’ hồ [outlaw] gangs that prey on the poor and at their front door. These bullying campaigns small-scale ‘neighbourhood moneylenders’. at their home and workplace. Inflicting use strong-arm recovery methods. However, have devastating effects on late repayers. They work individually, use savings to physical violence on associates, friends moneylending is also a feminine domain, As described in his interview with me in Ho launch small lending ventures, and offer and family members would damage their a world of adaptable and humane women Chi Minh City, Quyền, 40, the head of a flexible borrowing conditions to handpicked reputation in the neighbourhood and therefore who support their community by providing giang hồ gang of five ‘little brothers’ involved clients. They use their extensive experience their capacity to recruit new clients. In fact, loans. The tension between ‘cruelty’ [sự hung in pawnshops and moneylending, instilling and connections to lend money in their the relationship between moneylenders like ác] and ‘sentiment’ [tình cảm], two terms fear among borrowers is key to sustaining social networks. A prerequisite to lending Nở and Phường and their clients is framed expressed by male and female moneylenders his operation: is familiarity with and trust in their within the terms of reference chị-em or ‘old respectively, reveals the gendered structure borrowers, typically a neighbour, a friend, sister-young sister/brother’. This referential of moneylending in Vietnam. Not only do men “To be honest, at first, I need something to an acquaintance or a business partner. system lends itself to the narrative of money- and women run different types of lending make them scared of me and make them According to Quyên, a small-scale lending as a mark of ‘good sentiments’ operations, but they do so while deploying realise if they don’t pay me or they flee, neighbourhood moneylender from Ho Chi [tình cảm], a term frequently used in family essentialist constructions of gender for moral they won’t be able to work. I will come and Minh City, “I only lend small amounts of and close interactions. The obligation to and economic purposes. This deployment make a fuss at their house and look for money, like 2-3 million đồng (USD86-129), pay back is bound not only by the terms is both normative and strategic, as it them everywhere. If they are still stubborn, to people I trust. I lend it to people who are of credit but also by the seniority and the simultaneously reinforces gender ideologies they know that I won’t hesitate to hit them. very close to me or whose situation I am familial relations denoted by the pair of and sustains business practices. We have to work hard and sacrifice our sympathetic to, mainly people having a kinship pronouns. blood and tears to make that money, small business. Even if I am known as an easy In brief, neighbourhood moneylenders so we don’t give it away to people easily. moneylender, I only lend money to people conform to the socially and politically- Gangsters and fear tactics I also need power. Not that I want to deal I know and trust”. To issue a loan, female derived image of the petty trader who keeps Male moneylenders operate in gangs, with borrowers using violence, but I want to moneylenders need to know the borrower’s a low profile and works diligently to support which people commonly refer to as giang use my power to make them scared of me, work and house address, but refrain from her family, as female moneylenders often hồ [outlaw], xã hội đen (lit.: ‘black society’; so they pay me in due course. They must asking for an ID or a household certificate claimed. Unlike giang hồ lenders, they are meaning gangster, or mafia) and tụi Hải know that repaying is their responsibility. as collateral. Once they gain experience and sensitive to people’s living situation and too Phòng (lit.: ‘gang from Hải Phòng’, a coastal If they don’t pay me, it’s like if they steal contacts in the moneylending trade, build weak physically to use violence. This gender city in Northern Vietnam popularly considered from me. They must be afraid of me even their reputation and increase their capital, essentialism allows them to appear as moral a hotbed of criminality). These gangs cultivate if I do nothing to them. I just need them to they expand their operation to more distant subjects who lend money for a good cause a reputation of being reckless, belligerent understand they must pay me back”. circles in their social networks. Most argue in a burgeoning market economy where and cold-hearted and, in some cases, display that they ‘lend money for affectionate certain types of capitalist activity may raise tattoos, fancy vehicles, flashy jewellery, Giang hồ lenders’ use of extreme violence reasons’ [cho mượn tình cảm], meaning at suspicion. Embracing this gender role limits and stacks of cash on social media. Some to recover loans stirs up public indignation slightly lower rates and with more flexibility the scope of their operation and confines it of these gangs use pawnshops and rental and concern and a strong call for political toward defaulters than giang hồ gangs. to highly localised social spheres, but it also and wholesale businesses as fronts for their action, to which the government has Nở, a neighbourhood lender, who lends protects them from criticism and repression. operations. They lend money to a range of responded with persecution and has used money to sex workers, explained that: Overall, men and women occupy borrowers whom they recruit through social as a justification for liberalising consumer different positions and embrace different networks and aggressive marketing. For lending. However, these male lenders embrace “I am familiar with the girls and understand gender roles in the moneylending market in small unsecured loans, they do not require the stereotype of the ruthless and ‘evil’ usurer their situation, so I can’t grab their money Vietnam. Taking this into account will enrich collateral, trust, or a prior connection with who crushes the poor with high-interest rates like giang hồ gangs do. When they don’t our understanding of how credit markets the borrower. Some ask for a photocopy and strong-arm recovery methods. They also have enough money, I go easy on them work in general and in Vietnam. of the ID or household certificate, and only embody the xã hội đen image, the greedy and let them slide for that month. If they occasionally keep the original document. gangster popularised in the campaigns aren’t able to pay me double next month, Nicolas Lainez is a Visiting Fellow in the In line with a reputation for ruthlessness, against ‘social evils’ in the 1990s, a time when I let them pay one month and wait until they Regional Economic Studies Programme they use brutal recovery tactics. Their motto it was believed by the government that the have enough money to pay for the missing at the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute.

Above: Vietnamese currency. Image Peter Garnhum on Flickr, Creative Commons license. The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 News from Southeast Asia Regional Editor 15 Commodities, credit and luxury Su-Ann OH The Region consumer goods

Milo Dinosaur: the life and times of a Southeast Asian national beverage

Geoffrey K. Pakiam

ong before COVID-19’s spread, Southeast Asia was already struck Lby the strange ailment known as food heritage fever. Tensions have erupted among citizens in Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore over national claims on dishes like chilli crab, rendang, and chendol over the past decade. Accusations of cultural appropriation have been fuelled by concerns that globally connected urban centres like Singapore are more adept than their neighbours at commodifying food heritage for soft power and tourist dollars.

Less discussed but equally important is the relationship between consumer brands and Southeast Asia’s food heritage. It is now commonplace to see ‘home-cooked’ ‘Asian’ foods being marketed under established brand names overseas, whether in the form of pre-made spice mixes or restaurant chain offerings steeped in nostalgia. But what about Asian food cultures based on established Western mass consumer brands? How does Western mass manufactured food become Asian national heritage? We can explore these questions in the Southeast Asian context through the curious case of Milo Dinosaur – a concoction whose identity rests on a brand belonging to Nestlé, the world’s largest food company. Milo Dinosaur is a chilled beverage commonly found in casual eateries across Singapore and Malaysia. Vendors blend Swiss multinational Nestlé’s chocolate-malt Milo powder with sugar, water, milk and ice, before adding more Milo powder on top. Some recipes even include rainbow sprinkles (fig.1). Milo Dinosaur’s name appears to have originated in Singapore-based Indian- Muslim eateries during the mid-1990s. Eateries claiming credit include A&A Muslim Restaurant, Al-Ameen Eating House, and Al-Azhar Eating Restaurant, all popular with youth and young adults. Many of these open- air outlets were already serving sweetened Above: A Milo Dinosaur. Image taken from The Prata Shop website: http://www.enaqprata.com.sg/milo-dinosaur. milk-based beverages like teh tarik, ice Milo and bandung, as staples. Labelling a turbo- charged version of ice Milo as Milo Dinosaur attractive mouthfeel when consumed ‘raw’. in Singapore and Malaysian households. and beyond, public concerns about rising may have been a way to riff on Singapore’s Even in the hands of children, Milo was a Since the late 1950s, Nestlé’s Malayan levels of diabetes and obesity have helped cinema culture, which during the 1990s was relatively easy beverage to prepare. One advertisements have occasionally urged stigmatize Milo and other sugary drinks. It is saturated with the exploits of giant reptiles interviewee remembers having enjoyed cold consumers to sprinkle Milo powder over perhaps for these reasons that Milo Dinosaur’s in Jurassic Park and its sequels. Milo with extra powder on top while growing bread. Nestlé even advertised a recipe for main clientele have been Asian youth, who A second origin story looks towards Malaysia. up in Singapore during the 1980s. As a child ‘Milo Milk Shake’ in 1940 bearing similarities sometimes still produce the enzyme needed Singaporeans themselves remember a similarly he was introduced to the concoction when to today’s Milo Dinosaur. to digest lactose in large amounts, and are cloying drink called Milo Shake being served visiting his neighbours who happened to Many Southeast Asians appear sanguine probably less restrained in their consumption at Malaysian roadside stalls by the mid-1990s. be Australian immigrants. His parents also that their taste preferences have been of sweetened beverages than grownups. Today, many in Malaysia continue to insist that allowed him to make his own Milo at home, remade by a Swiss multinational over several Rather than dwell on its unhealthy physical Milo Dinosaur is a Malaysian creation. resulting in occasional happy accidents generations. In both Singapore and Malaysia, effects, fans of Milo Dinosaur can take A third line of enquiry focuses on Nestlé’s when the powder was unable to fully Milo Dinosaur has been embraced as a comfort from its more palliative qualities. shifting global presence since the colonial era. dissolve in refrigerated milk.1 socially unifying food item. The beverage’s Eating and drinking remain unrivalled ways The essential ingredient in Milo Dinosaur/Milo Part of Milo Dinosaur’s initial allure most high-profile episode in Singapore to date to socialize, celebrate, reminisce, and escape Shake – Milo powder – was developed by Nestlé thus stemmed from past culinary practice, came when Joseph Schooling, Singapore’s the drudgery of everyday life, not least chemist Thomas Mayne in Australia during the recalling previous generations of children first-ever Olympic gold medallist, drank his during these coronavirus-laden times. early 1930s. Milo was initially manufactured in who furtively gobbled Milo straight from the childhood beverage at his favourite hawker Australia and marketed in British Malaya as a tin like candy, or sprinkled it on bread as a stall during his victory parade in 2016. Geoffrey K. Pakiam is a Fellow in the fortified tonic food for aspirational households sugar substitute. Whether at home or outside Before Schooling’s performance, musicians Regional Economic Studies Programme and professionals. Following independence, in each other’s company, later generations in Singapore were already enrolling the at the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute. Nestlé began manufacturing Milo in both found in Milo Dinosaur an ideal concoction beverage in songs channelling coffee shop Initial research for this article was Malaysia and Singapore, persuading for recreation. As one Singapore vendor cultures and nationalism. A Kuala Lumpur- conducted for ‘Culinary Biographies: consumers on both sides of the causeway to observed, “[the Milo powder] falls all over based rock band went even further, naming Charting Singapore’s History picture Milo as their respective national drink. the ice and they can lick it, roll it over their itself Milo Dinosaur. Through Cooking and Consumption’, Present-day Malaysia is believed to have the tongues and enjoy its texture”.2 We are Milo Dinosaur’s popularity can ultimately a collaborative project supported by the world’s highest per capita consumption of Milo, essentially witnessing the emergence of be traced back to Milo itself. Promoted Heritage Research Grant of the National with Singapore running a close second. In this a super-sized mocktail, occupying the in Malaya since the 1930s as a hygienic, Heritage Board, Singapore. The author telling, Milo Dinosaur was ultimately a child of grey space between childhood and the nourishing, yet relatively affordable beverage, would like to thank Toffa Abdul Wahed Singapore and Malaysia’s joint colonial legacy adult world. Milo insinuated itself into breakfast and and Gayathrii Nathan for their research and openness to Swiss capital. Spontaneous play nonetheless night-time routines for time-scarce families. assistance. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations A fourth narrative enhances Milo co-exists with Nestlé’s guiding hand, Cups of chilled Milo from roving Milo Vans expressed in this material are those of Dinosaur’s regional popularity from below. though it is difficult to gauge the extent remain a fond childhood memory for many. the author and do not necessarily reflect Commercial eateries may have gifted of the multinational’s influence from With each successive generation, Milo- the views of the National Heritage Board. Milo Dinosaur its catchy title, but families public records alone. Nonetheless, in 2009, drinking increasingly brought people together in Singapore, Malaysia and Australia were Nestlé Singapore’s managing director through space and time. preparing versions of the drink at home openly stated that Milo Dinosaur’s earlier Milo’s image, however, is increasingly Notes in all but name beforehand, sometimes development in Singapore coffee shops marred by biological and health concerns. 1 Interview with Kung Chien Wen, unintentionally. Part of Milo’s historic was partly due to input from a Nestlé sales Roughly one-eighth of Milo consists of lactose, 29 August 2019. charm lies in the powder’s unusually team. Nestlé has in fact long promoted limiting its consumption by lactose-intolerant 2 Dawn Lim. ‘Reviving Milo and the Beatles’. coarse and crunchy grain, giving it an alternative Milo consumption practices individuals. In Singapore, Malaysia, Australia The Straits Times, 1 May 2006. 16 News from Northeast Asia Regional Editors The Region Cultural encounters through Ilhong Ko translation in Northeast Asia

Cultural encounters through translation in Northeast Asia

Ilhong Ko Translation is not merely a form of intercultural communication, it is a cultural encounter between two different worlds. The process of translation opens up an arena in which conceptual boundaries are expanded, meanings are contested, and power conflicts emerge. In this issue of News from Northeast The Seoul National University Asia Center Asia we examine how the act of translation can also shed light on the nature (SNUAC) is a research and international of the relationship between the countries in which the original and translated exchange institute based in Seoul, South Korea. The SNUAC’s most distinctive texts were produced. feature is its cooperative approach in fostering research projects and international exchange program through he way in which translation can lead also be accompanied by active attempts to of a Korean dissident presented by Kyung close interactions between regional and to bilateral exchange is illustrated by reconfigure power relations and bring about Hee University’s Moon-seok Jang in ‘Across thematic research programs about Asia TKyusik Jeong of Wonkwang University change to the status quo; this is demonstrated the Korea Strait and the Yellow Sea. Kim Ji Ha and the world. To pursue its mission in ‘Asian workers’ solidarity and cultural by Kyushu University’s Tanaka Mika in in the 1970s’. to become a hub of Asian Studies, SNUAC exchange’. Translation can also act to provide ‘Aspects of Japanese publication translations research teams are divided by different a common ground for engagement, as in Sinmunkwan’s magazines’. However, Ilhong Ko, HK Research Professor, regions and themes. Research centers and Nihei Michiaki, Professor Emeritus of Tohoku translation may also contribute, perhaps Seoul National University Asia Center; programs are closely integrated, providing University, reminds us in ‘The translation unintentionally, to the reproduction of long- Regional Editor of News from Northeast a solid foundation for deeper analysis and cultural exchange of the Japanese standing prejudices, as can be seen in the Asia [email protected] of Asian society. classic Genjimonogatari’. Translation may case of the Japanese translation of the works

Korean. Among those, The Formation of Chinese New Workers and The Future of Asian workers’ solidarity Chinese New Workers, for which the author of this piece served as the main translator, and cultural exchange calls for the establishment of subjectivity in the New Workers as both individuals and groups through the analysis of the social Kyusik Jeong structure that those workers are situated in, as well as their ‘life stories’. Moreover, We Are Justified (the Korean translation published in 2020) presents a detailed examination of the s Hong Kong’s Anti-Extradition Law lives, work, and struggles of Chinese female Amendment Bill Movement in 2019 workers. The fact that this book was published Agained the world’s attention, reports as part of the ‘Joint Publication Project that the citizens of Hong Kong had sung Commemorating the Fiftieth Anniversary of ‘March for the Beloved’, South Korea’s Chun Tae-il’s Death’, which was planned by representative grassroots activist song, the Chun Tae-il Foundation and eleven Korean led some to ponder upon the influence publishing companies for the continuation of Korea’s democracy movement on these of Chun Tae-il’s spirit in the present age, demonstrations. Yet cultural exchange and is significant indeed. practice should not be regarded as one-way In this sense, translation does not stop phenomena; they are lifestyles constructed at the transferring of print from one country and modified according to their needs by to another, but rather is a kind of cultural various organizations and activists over a long struggle that calls for the exchange of time of solidarity and cross-reference.1 Indeed, thoughts and experiences as a mediator ‘March for the Beloved’, recognized since of conversations and encounters. Thus the the 1980s as a key cultural text symbolizing encounter of Chun Tae-il and Chinese New Korea’s democracy movement, had Workers through translation becomes a sign already become Asia’s ‘The Internationale’, that promotes the solidarity and cultural transcending time and space to be sung exchange of Asian workers, transcending throughout Asia, in China, Hong Kong, industry types, regions, genders, generations, Taiwan, Cambodia, and Malaysia. and borders. This would be the true meaning of what Lü Tu said to this author during her In China, the socialist state that has visit to Korea in 2015: “Your paying attention Above: The New Workers of China: Culture and Destiny, turned into ‘the world’s factory’, the active written by Lü Tu and published by Legal Publishing to the realities and future of Chinese New movements of the New Workers group are House in 2015, presents an analysis of the social structure Workers is paying attention to the fate of said to have referenced the culture and that the ‘New Workers’ of China face, as well as a vivid the world’s workers, and that is the reason account of their life stories. It was translated into Korean experience of South Korea’s labor activism. as The Future of Chinese New Workers (left) and published why I am interested in the life and death A prime example of this can be found in in 2018 by Nareum Books. Images provided by the author of Chun Tae-il”. the Beijing Migrant Workers’ Home located who participated in the volume’s Korean translation. The encounter of Chun Tae-il and the in Picun, a village outside Beijing where a Chinese New Workers continues strong high concentration of workers reside. This into the present day. In 2020, Sun Heng organization, which began in 2002, aims to song among Chinese labor activism Lü Tu, an expert in developmental sociology and Lü Tu came together to compose the build a commune that seeks “the construction organizations and activists. who studied at Wageningen University in the song ‘Brilliant Spark: In commemoration of of New Workers group culture, various Another legacy of Korean political and Netherlands, was once a university professor Chun Tae-il’, a video of which2 was screened educational activities, and the possibilities labor activism that spread throughout Asia in China, and now lives with workers at the during the closing ceremony of East Asia of community economy and solidarity”. is the Biography of Chun Tae-il (written by Beijing Migrant Workers’ Home carrying out People Theater Festival, held in 2020 in Korea Members have been developing an alternative Cho Youngrae in 1983). Recording the life research, education and community activities, to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary cultural movement based on the realistic lives and struggle of Chun Tae-il, an icon and confesses that she felt an indescribable range of Chun Tae-il’s death. and needs of workers, under the following martyr of the Korean labor movement who of emotions after reading the biography. recognition: “Without our culture, our history self-immolated in 1970 for the improvement As she says, in the lives and struggles of Kyusik Jeong, HK Research Professor, is lost, and without our history, our future is of the poor working conditions, crying Chinese New Workers, it is possible to observe Korean-Chinese Relations Institute, lost”. This organization is headed by Sun Heng, “Workers are not machines” and “Abide that the ‘Spirit of Chun Tae-il’ lives on, beyond Wonkwang University [email protected] also the leader of the New Workers Art Troupe, by the Labor Standards Act”, this book was borders and language barriers, in the hearts who first heard ‘March for the Beloved’ in translated into English in 2003 as A Single of people who respect the value of life. 2005 and was so impressed that he adapted Spark. It has since come to be read in China, It should be noted that the experience Notes it into ‘Song of Praise for Workers (劳动者赞歌)’, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Indonesia, and Mongolia. and culture of Korean labor activism has 1 See, for example, Raymond Williams’ which addresses the lives and struggles of It became a must-read text for Chinese labor not stopped at merely being accepted in assertion that culture is “a whole Chinese workers. The song gained popularity organizations and activists following the China but, through the Chinese New Workers, way of life”, in: Williams, R. 1958. during the ‘New Workers Culture and Arts publication in 2012 of the Chinese translation has evolved and become disseminated within Work and Society, Chatto & Windus. Festival’ celebrating the new year in 2012 by Liu Jianzhou, A Single Spark: Biography Korea. All three books of Lü Tu on the Chinese 2 https://tinyurl.com/BrilliantSpark- and subsequently became the most popular of Chun Tae-il [星星之火: 全泰壹评传]. New Workers have been translated into ChunTai-Il The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 News from Northeast Asia Regional Editor 17 Cultural encounters through Ilhong Ko The Region translation in Northeast Asia

The translation and cultural exchange of the Japanese classic Genjimonogatari

Nihei Michiaki

ranslation entails the transmission of a text not only into a different language Tbut also into a different cultural and historical context. As such, no such thing as a ‘perfect translation’ is possible. Furthermore, when the text to be translated is a piece of foreign literature written in an archaic rather than modern language, it would be needless to say how its trans- lation would be difficult and limited. It could be said that Genjimonogatari [The Tale of Genji], a fifty-four volume work written one thousand years ago by the Japanese female author Murasakishikibu, has joined the pantheon of ‘world literature’ not only due to the masterful nature of the work itself but also because so many people from different countries and regions have dedicated themselves to the difficult task of translating this classic. The following overview of the major translations of Genjimonogatari published in Northeast Asia including China, Taiwan, and Korea, well illustrates the significance of ‘translation’ as a form of cultural exchange.

The Chinese and Korean translations of Genjimonogatari had initially been based on modern Japanese translations, rather than the original 11th century text. Genjimonogatari was written using the language and rhetoric of the Heian period and therefore the interpretation of many passages remains a contested issue among Above: Scenes from the Tale of Japanese scholars. As such, it is not surprising Genji painted by Tosa Mitsuyoshi, that the earliest translations, which had taken of the Tosa school in Osaka. place before the scholarship of Japanese Dating from the second half of the 16th century (Azuchi-Momoyama classics had been well established in China period). and Korea, had relied on modern Japanese translations published in Japan. Left: A 13th century fragment of Genjimonogatari. From collection In China, the translation of the first of Nihei Michiaki. volume of Genjimonogatari, ‘Kiritsubo’, was published in a magazine as early as 1957, Right and below: A selection of by Qian Daosun who, during his adolescence covers of the translated books. in Japan, had been educated in Japanese classic literature. Some say that this translation was based on the original text, but it seems more likely that annotations featured in the modern translations of the text had been referenced. The Chinese artist and cartoonist Feng Zikai, who had studied briefly in Japan, began to translate all volumes of Genjimonogatari over five and a half years, starting in 1961. His translation was published in three volumes between 1980-1983, after the Cultural Revolution and his subsequent death. This first full Chinese translation of Genjimonogatari was based on the modern translations of Yosano Akiko and Tanizaki Junichiro, as well as other Japanese researchers, but remains greatly influential since it is easy to read and continues to be published by several companies. Most of the Chinese publications of Genjimonogatari in China have directly utilized Feng’s translation. In Taiwan, an outstanding Chinese translation of Genjimonogatari based on the original text was undertaken by Lin of the original text. Lin’s translation was Unfortunately, such knowledge and six volumes have been published by Wenyue, a scholar of Chinese-Japanese highly regarded, even in China, and came understanding was lacking in the earliest SNU Press to present. The complete comparative literature and Chinese to be published in simplified Chinese. Due to Korean translations of the original text, Korean translation of Genjimonogatari literature. The translation was first serially this achievement, Lin Wenyue was awarded carried out by Yoo Jeong in 1973 and Jeon by a researcher of the work will hopefully published in a magazine from 1973 to 1978; the Japan Research Achievement Award Yongshin in 1999. Fortunately, the 21st be accomplished in the near future. the full translation first published in five in 2013 as the only Asian awardee. century has witnessed the publication of It would be wrong, however, to expect volumes and then the revised edition in two The Chinese and Taiwanese translators Korean translations based on the original the above mentioned ‘outstanding trans- volumes. Lin Wenyue’s education until early were aided by the fact that Genjimonogatari text that have been written by researchers lations’ to be ‘perfect translations’. adulthood had taken place in Shanghai’s had been influenced by Chinese literature of Genjimonogatari. In 2008, a high-quality A ‘perfect translation’ simply cannot exist. Japanese concession, and she later engaged and historical texts; translating into Korean, abridged translation of all volumes of As an act of transferring a text into another in research at Kyoto University. Lin was however, was inevitably more difficult. In Genjimonogatari was published by Kim language based in a different culture and knowledgeable of the numerous annotations addition to a general understanding of Jongduck, the leading researcher in South with a different history can inevitably only of the original text, the modern translations of Genjimonogatari, an understanding of the Korea on this classic. Lee Misuk, who exist as a fusion of cultures. In its original Yosano Akiko and Tanizaki Junichiro, and the background, institutions, and history that has published a research monograph on form, ‘translation’ is above all cultural English translations of Europe and America. gave rise to the work, as well as an in-depth Genjimonogatari in Japan, also began to exchange. However, her translation of the original text knowledge of the language and culture translate the work in 2014. Her translation is was based on her own interpretations and the of the Heian period are required for based on an interpretation of the original text Nihei Michiaki, Professor Emeritus, style is in keeping with the refined atmosphere Korean translators. and various commentaries and two of Tohoku University [email protected] 18 News from Northeast Asia Regional Editor The Region Cultural encounters through Ilhong Ko translation in Northeast Asia

The paraphrasing of expressions to align with Korean culture or the presentation Aspects of Japanese publication of Korea as the ‘subject’ through the replacement of terms can also be observed translations in Sinmunkwan’s magazines in the children’s magazines published by Sinmunkwan in the period between the final publication of Sonyeon and the first issue Tanaka Mika of Cheongchun, such as Bulgun Jeogori (붉은저고리), Aideulboi (아이들보이) and Saebyeol (새별). For instance, 太郎さん (Taro-san) from the original text is translated as ‘friend’ and 大名 (daimyo) as yangban. Sinmunkwan’s magazines for children are inmunkwan (新文館) was a publishing also notable for the fact that they were printed company established in Seoul in 1908 mostly in Hangul, the likely reason for this Sby Choe Nam-seon (1890-1957), one being the preservation of the Korean language of the key intellectuals of modern Korea. at the time of Japanese colonial occupation. It gained prominence as the publishing Purely Korean expressions were used as much house of Sonyeon (少年) (November 1908 as possible, with great effort being made to – May 1911), considered to be Korea’s avoid the use of Chinese characters. Examples first modern magazine, and Cheongchun of this include the way in which naruneun (靑春) (October 1914 – September 1918), teul (나르는 틀), an expression meaning a comprehensive cultural magazine that ‘a flying machine’ that uses only Hangul was popular in the 1910s. Featured in these characters, was used instead of bihaenggi two Korean magazines were numerous Fig 1: (飛行機), the more generally used term to translations of Japanese publications. Images from Chugaku Sekai (中學世界) Issue 13-1 translate ‘airplane’, but which is comprised of (published in January 1910) (left) and Cheongchun An analysis of these translations sheds (靑春) Issue 1 (published in October 1914) (right). Chinese characters. Another such case is the light on the nature of Sinmunkwan’s In this case (and other similar cases), the article itself use of jeollo ganeun soore (절로가는수레), relationship at the time with the Japanese was not translated but the illustrations or layouts meaning ‘wagon that goes on its own’ instead of Japanese texts regarding world topics or events publishing sector. were referenced. Images of the original articles of jadongcha (自動車) for ‘automobile’. scanned by the author. Indeed, Choe Nam-seon urges the readers In Sonyeon, many of the Korean of Aideulboi to “make sure to write in Korean” translations of western works were based for correspondence. The creation of Korean upon the Japanese translations of the expressions in the process of translation went original texts. Key characteristics of the Another characteristic feature of the In the case of Cheongchun, a magazine hand in hand with his attempts to preserve Korean translations featured in Sonyeon are translations in Sonyeon is the revision of the in which pieces on ‘global knowledge’ a pure version of the Korean language that did the addition of explanatory comments and text so that ‘boys’ – the magazine’s readership featured prominently, the material for many not depend on Chinese characters. the tailoring of expressions for the Korean (sonyeon means ‘boy’ in Korean) – are of the pieces was obtained by translating As the above example of Choe Nam-seon’s audience. For example, Choe Nam-seon addressed directly and the expectations numerous Japanese publications, such as translation of various Japanese publications added explanations about historical figures for these ‘boys’ are clearly expressed. Taiyo (太陽) and Chugaku Sekai (中學世界), and the publication of these translations in the (such as the Macedonian King Alexander, One example would be the addition of the published by Hakubunkan (博文館), magazines produced by his publication house, the philosopher Francis Bacon), as well as following sentence at the end of the article or Gakusei (學生), published by Fuzanbo Sinmunkwan, illustrates, ‘translation’ was on western concepts such as ‘materialism’ ‘The Youth of Edison, the King of Electricity’ (冨山房). An analysis of the translations not merely the act of transferring a text from and ‘the Reverend’. In addition, he para- [電氣王애듸손의少年時節] to express an that appear in these magazines reveals that one language to another, but also involved phrased ‘exemplary man’ into yangban expectation for these ‘boys’: “We wish to know attempts were made to situate Korea within active attempts to enlighten the people (a term referring to the traditional ruling class what kinds of trees and eggs of invention are the global context substituting ‘Korea’ for or to preserve culture. or gentry of Korea during the Joseon Dynasty) being fostered and hatched in the future in ‘Japan’. For example, ‘Ueno Zoo in Tokyo’ was so that the translation may be understood Korea” [新大韓에는 어떠한 発明의 나무가 replaced by ‘Changdeokgung Zoo’, ‘Tokyo’ by Tanaka Mika, Ph.D. Candidate, Kyushu within the Korean cultural context. 자라가고 알이 깨여가는가를 알고자하오]. ‘Gyeongseong’ and ‘Kyoto’ by ‘Pyeongyang’. University [email protected]

Across the Korea Strait and the The Chinese magazine World Literature also introduced a translation of Kim Ji Ha’s Yellow Sea. Kim Ji Ha in the 1970s works in June 1979, in this case in association with the novel El Señor Presidente by Miguel Ángel Asturias, a Guatemalan writer. Both Kim Moon-seok Jang Ji Ha and Asturias’ works shared the themes of dictatorship and resistance, allowing the reader to read the two together in order to grasp the universality and specificity of im Ji Ha was a poet who resisted Park When Kim Ji Ha was sentenced to death in dictatorship in underdeveloped countries from Chung Hee’s regime of developmental 1974, Japanese and Korean-Japanese literati a new perspective. This Chinese publication Kdictatorship in 1970s Korea. In 1970, he staged a hunger strike, and approximately a of Kim Ji Ha’s works illustrates the fact that published a poem that criticized the military thousand Japanese citizens protested in front reading East Asian literature alongside dictatorship, and the Korean government of the Korean Embassy in Japan. Jean-Paul Central American literature can open up the imprisoned him under the outrageous claim Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Howard Zinn, possibility of imagining world literature in that he had violated the Anticommunist Law. Edwin Reischauer and others participated in a new way. Yet, it should be noted that the After being released, Kim Ji Ha published the International Committee to Support Kim Chinese translation utilized not only Kim another poem that sang of democracy, and Ji Ha, following the suggestion of Oda Makoto Ji Ha’s original Korean works but also the soon returned to prison. His life in the 1970s and Tsurumi Shunsuke. In June of 1975, Kim Ji versions that had been published in Japan. was a cycle of imprisonment, release, escape, Ha was awarded the Lotus Prize for Literature This shows how Japanese, the language and arrest, and he was not able to publish from the Afro-Asian Writers’ Association as of the former colonial empire, continued to his work in Korea until 1982. a writer of a ‘free-world’ country; this was play the role as a mediator in the process also due to the help of the Japanese literati. of East Asian communication, even in the Among the people who reached out to As a result of the solidarity and attention of Cold War era. him in solidarity during his imprisonment Japanese citizens, the complete collection of Kim Ji Ha in the 1970s remained immobile were Japanese citizens. In the 1970s, around Kim Ji Ha’s works was published in Korean and in South Korea due to imprisonment and twenty collections of the works of Kim Ji Ha, Japanese in 1975 and 1976, respectively. Given dictatorship oppression. However, translated a resistance poet of Korea, Japan’s former that the publication of Kim Ji Ha’s works had into Japanese and Chinese, his works were colony, were published by the people of Japan, been prohibited in Korea, their publication in able to travel. The crossings of borders the former colonial empire. Twenty is the Japan as a result of the solidarity of Japanese demonstrated by Kim Ji Ha’s works leaves number of official publications produced in the citizens became a huge international incident. us to ponder upon the task of solidarity 1970s in Japan; this number skyrockets when Some unexpected problems arose, however, of East Asian citizens and the conditions pamphlets, newsletters, and pirate publications in the process. As Kim Ji Ha – the ‘resistance for such solidarity; it also opens the door are included. The publication of Kim Ji Ha’s poet’ of the former colony – was being helped to imagining world literature in a new way works in 1970s Japan was a movement of by the citizens of the former colonial empire, and the possibilities of this endeavor. solidarity between Korea and Japan led by Japan, for over ten years, a ‘relationship of aid’ Japanese citizens as a campaign to support became fossilized. While the stereotypes of Korea Moon-seok Jang, Assistant Professor, Kim Ji Ha. Japanese citizens, religious as an underdeveloped country of dictatorship, Department of Korean Language and figures, literary figures, and Koreans in Japan and Japan as a country helping the oppressed Literature, Kyung Hee University participated in this movement. The Japanese resistance poet, came to be reproduced, Kim [email protected] citizens observed the process of Kim Ji Ha’s Ji Ha’s literary themes of criticizing colonialism trials in real time while editing and publishing were no longer given due attention. Despite the Above: Collected Works of Kim Ji Ha (Vol. 1), the various manifestos that he drafted, along fact that so many of Kim Ji Ha’s works had been published in Japan in 1976. The cover illustration with the records of his trials. As the oppression published in Japan, it was only the sentiment is the work of the Japanese artist Tomiyama Taeko. of Kim Ji Ha intensified in Korea, the power that ‘Kim Ji Ha must be helped’ which flourished. Image of the original cover scanned by the author. Below: Japanese citizens demonstrating in front of the of solidary shown by Japanese citizens also The self-reflexive question ‘Why should I read Korean Embassy in Tokyo in July of 1974. Image from strengthened. Kim Ji Ha now?’ was omitted. Sanzenri Feb. 1975, scanned by the author. The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 19 The Adspace

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Stretching community, bridging distance Migration and belonging in Mustang and New York

Reviewed title The Ends of Kinship: Connecting Benjamin Linder Himalayan Lives between Nepal and New York

Sienna R. Craig. 2020. n recent decades, ethnographies of transnationalism and globalization Seattle: University of Washington Press Ihave become prominent across the social ISBN 9780295747699 sciences. Within anthropology, this turn helped redress the longstanding hyper- localism of ethnographic research, one that tended to treat categories like ‘culture’ and ‘place’ as static and bounded. The Ends of Kinship builds on this turn, yet in a way Pushing genres that beautifully retains the nuance and texture reminiscent of an earlier generation and conventions of ethnographic writing. The book charts the There are at least two possible books changing lives of people in (and from) Mustang, contained within The Ends of Kinship. a remote district in northern Nepal with close There might have been, for instance, one ties to Tibet. Sienna Craig began traveling to book about contemporary Mustang and Mustang over 25 years ago. Since then, the another book about a South Asian diaspora region has undergone dramatic demographic, in New York City. Alternatively, there might ecological, economic, and political shifts. have been one book of literary fiction and Increased migration – to other sites in Nepal, another book of academic ethnography. but also to sites abroad – is both a driver Undoubtedly, its author has the knowledge, and consequence of such transformations. background, and ability to have pulled it off. Aspirational out-migration has yielded rapid However, in foregoing such arbitrary divisions, depopulation in Mustang, while also driving Craig has produced something more hybrid, many to settle in New York City. In the wake exciting, and true-to-life. As she has made of such dispersal, new tensions emerge, clear, understanding the two main field but so do new modes of connection. sites requires understanding them together. They are interlaced through circuits of labor One of the book’s triumphs is its insistence and exchange, of kinship and sociality. on considering these far-flung sites to- To consider them independently would miss gether, its recognition that understanding something crucial about both. Likewise, contemporary Mustang requires attention placing literary short stories alongside to the multi-scalar circulations within ethnographic nonfiction joins a growing which it is embedded. In short, the book body of work challenging academic writing understands that these circulations constitute conventions. There is a beautiful literary a singular process, and that the process is quality to all of Craig’s nonfiction chapters, deeply conflicted. Such migrations promise and a keen ethnographic depth to her opportunity and threaten ‘traditional’ lives. creative short stories. In other words, They strain cultural connections and offer but both genres speak to and strengthen new tools for their reinvigoration. The Ends each other throughout. of Kinship takes up these issues with enviable The Ends of Kinship does not delve deeply prose and remarkable depth. It explores how into contemporary theoretical arguments, people from Mustang, whether in Nepal or and Craig offers only passing glances at New York, “care for one another, steward extant literatures. She jettisons traditional a homeland across time and space, remake in-text citations throughout, though she households elsewhere, and confront distinct does include a glossary, Essay on Sources forms of happiness and suffering through this and Methods, and full bibliography at the process” (p.10). The central question of the end of the book. On the one hand, some book is how a new reality, characterized by readers may feel disappointed by this. It distance, reshapes a community’s sense of would have been welcome to see the rich belonging, obligation, and cultural continuity. ethnographic content situated more deeply Craig offers two key concepts to illuminate within ongoing scholarly debates. On the these dynamics: the titular ‘ends of kinship’ other hand, the book’s approach has at and the ‘khora of migration’. The first concept Top: Tsarang palace from monastery © Sienna Craig. least two critical benefits. First, Craig’s twin highlights the ambivalence faced by people Above: New York street scene. Photo by Emily Xie on Unsplash. conceptual pillars (i.e., the ends of kinship from Mustang as they navigate new cultural and the khora of migration) emerge from waters, trying to maintain community and livelihood and subsistence (Part III), marriage “I cry. Not because I knew this woman. the research context itself, meaning that kinship ties throughout the radical dispersal and gender (Part IV), ecology and place (Part V), Not because I understand the subtleties of her discussion is less beholden to the terms of the last 20–30 years. The phrase itself is and finally death and loss (Part VI). Each of this funerary rite or the complexities of this of a Western intellectual cannon. Second, highly redolent. The term ‘ends’, in particular, these sections includes one fictional short story grandmother’s story. But because the dirges the lack of in-text citations and theoretical resonates with diverse shades of meaning: the and one ethnographic chapter. Those familiar offered up as part of the ritual process for one tangents lets the words breathe and objectives of kinship, the demise of kinship, the with Craig’s career will know that she has person resonate with the loss of a way of life— reverberate. They are less encumbered completion of kinship, the locations of kinship, published widely beyond academic formats. if not the life force of the village itself.” (p.210) by rigid frameworks, less burdened by the boundary points between which kinship In addition to her scholarship, she has also As people (especially younger people) overladen concepts. This allows the writing spans. The second concept derives from two written a children’s book, poetry, the text for increasingly move away, Mustang is faced with to resonate more freely. separate words in Tibetan: (1) kora, the social a book of artistic photography, and more. new threats to its persistence and cohesion. This book will hold the attention of and spiritual practice of walking clockwise In The Ends of Kinship, the line between the As a result, the pages about death take on anyone interested in Nepal, migration, around a sacred space; and (2) khorwa, the creative short stories and the ethnography broader significance: the biological death or diasporic experiences. It is complex cyclical nature of existence, commonly known is always clear, but the nuance, texture, of people, but also the possible death of yet accessible, making it suitable for by the Sanskrit term samsara. By fusing these and quality of Craig’s prose shines in both traditional lifeways. Yet, refreshingly, the book undergraduates as well. Indeed, Craig two concepts, the ‘khora of migration’ braids genres. The book is neither a staid academic studiously avoids fatalism. Throughout, readers has set up a website1 that includes, among together the mundane and metaphysical, ethnography nor a self-indulgent literary foray. are given examples of cultural maintenance, other resources, a series of reflective writing the quotidian and the grand. As applied to Craig’s writing is empathetic and poignant, of new forms of belonging taking shape in and prompts tailor-made for classroom use. migration specifically, it “illustrates patterns bringing to life the community and characters through diasporic circulations. Craig writes The Ends of Kinship offers an admirable of mobility, processes of world-making, she describes, whether they are actual friends of community projects, fundraisers, cultural account of life in and beyond contemporary and the dialectical relationship between or fictional inventions. events, digital chat groups, religious rituals, Mustang, of the stretch and strain induced loss and wonder around which diasporic We are told of new tensions and strains language classes, and remittances. All of these by migration, and of the ties that continue experiences turn” (p.8). arising from accelerating out-migration: foster a sense of community across time and to bind a community together. children who cannot speak the same language space, and all of them highlight the labors as family members, new norms surrounding of love through which people from Mustang Benjamin Linder, International Institute Writing Himalayan lifeworlds marriage and childbirth, a loss of connection retain (and transform) their community and for Asian Studies, The Netherlands The book’s structure echoes the cyclical to ancestral landscapes, the difficulties of its traditions. There are spaces of hope and existence it describes. Its 6 sections masterfully making a living in New York, and the different optimism woven throughout the book, perhaps guide readers through different stages of life difficulties of making one in Mustang. In Part inseparable from the spaces of loss and Notes in Mustang and beyond: pregnancy and birth VI, focused on death, Craig writes of witnessing mourning. Indeed, these are the twin-faced 1 https://sites.dartmouth.edu/endsofkinship, (Part I), childrearing and education (Part II), a village funeral procession: effects of a singular process. accessed 4 March 2021. The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 newbooks.asia Asian Studies. Newest Titles. 21 Latest Reviews. The Review

into the past provoking curiosity to research this history further. Haafner glorifies the multi-cultural and multi-religious co-existence in the East by highlighting the stimulating Life under the palms interactions and meetups he had with divergent ethnic, cultural, and racial groups. Although his father was a medical doctor, Anushka Kahandagamage Reviewed title migrating to the Netherlands from Germany Life Under the Palms: The Sublime World posed the Haafner family with challenging financial conditions. The situation led Haafner of the Anti-colonialist Jacob Haafner and his father to join and work on a Dutch East India Company ship, which sailed to the his book is the biography of Jacob Paul van der Velde. 2020. Translated by Liesbeth Bennink East. Haafner's father dies on the journey, Haafner, a Dutch traveler of German Singapore: NUS Press and Haafner becomes an orphan. Due to these Torigin. He spent more than 20 years in ISBN 9789813250826 conditions, he ends up in a lowly position in the South Africa, India, Sri Lanka, and Mauritius. world of colonial masters. The author unearths According to the author, unlike the memoirs the different layers of colonial subjects and of many travelers, entrepreneurs, colonial the colonial masters through the life story of officers, Haafner captured the cruelty and Haafner, going beyond the simple categories oppression of colonialism in his writings. a medical doctor. However, he does not sail different jobs. The third chapter, ‘Where can of the colonizer and the colonial subject. Haafner’s narratives shows the cruel side of solely as the doctor's son but as a ship’s boy our Soul Shelter’, is dedicated to his expedition Haafner glorifies the mixed cultural milieu in the the slave trade, the maltreatment of slaves on the vessel. The second chapter is assigned to Ceylon with his young wife and life in colonies over highly hierarchical Dutch society. as animals and the abandonment of colonial to explain the troubled life he had in India. This Ceylon. The penultimate chapter is about He is able to see and depict the oppressive subjects to death by famine. chapter consists of his return to India, and the closing chapter nature of colonization because he is from his interactions with concerns his final sorrowful years in Europe. a lower layer of the colonial endeavor. The book consists of five chapters, including different colonial This title introduces the 19th century What makes the character of this book an introduction. The Introduction maps the rulers who traveled Dutch traveler, Haafner, and his writings to special is that it exposes the reader to a expeditions of Haafner and his writings. Further, to the East, and the world. The book opens a window onto lesser known colonial writer with a markedly the author locates himself in the study and reveals details the 19th century colonial world by including different perspective. In addition, the book within the world of Haafner by elucidating how about famine in excerpts and examples of Haafner's original introduces new sources that can provide he became attracted to Haafner's writings. India, Haffner's writings and his sketches. The book provides the historian with a more nuanced and a The author of the book, Paul van der Velde, is struggles to make an approachable point of view on the available subtle analysis that goes beyond imposing a historian and an expert on the Dutch in Asia. money and survive sources to a learner interested in studying the the present socio-economic and political The book is translated from Dutch to English in these difficult colonial past. Further, the author's expertise structures on the past. by Liesbeth Bennink. times by doing and in-depth research in the field ensure The first chapter is marked as ‘A Wandering an authentic account of Haafner's writings. This is the English translation of Existence’, which includes Haafner's first Haafner practiced drawing from a young age the Sinhala review published on the Patitha website, 4 November 2020. expedition to the East and his experiences and Jacob Haafner in and his sketches can be seen in his written 1805 by Dr. Thomas adventures. As an adolescent, Haafner secures Kohl. Image in Public accounts. By including these drawings in the Anushka Kahandagamage, the opportunity to sail to East with his father, domain on Wikimedia. book, the author subtly draws the reader South Asian University, India

the Macanese and what role does food Foodways of Macao play in their identity? Food is an important cultural marker for most groups of people. To be considered a true Macanese, as the Robert Antony Reviewed title author points out, one must have some The Making of Macau’s Cuisine: Portuguese ancestry. Like their cuisine, the Macanese people are an eclectic mixture From Family Table to World Stage of different and evolving ethnic groups. aving lived in Macao for over 15 At first the Macanese were the offspring of years, I thought I knew quite well what Annabel Jackson. 2020. the original male Portuguese settlers and HMacanese food was all about. That Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press females from their colonies in Mozambique, is, until I read Annabel Jackson’s new book, ISBN 9789888528349 Goa, and Southeast Asia. Later, in the 20th The Making of Macau’s Cuisine. Trained in century, the so-called Neo-Macanese are anthropology and a recognized food critic, the progeny of Portuguese or Macanese the author carefully examines the history, fathers and Chinese mothers. Thus, in terms nature, and roles that food has played in of foodways, family recipes included a large Macao and in other Portuguese settlements mixture of different culinary tastes and in Asia. The inclusion of the other Portuguese In recognition of its unique cuisine in 2017 This raises the question of authenticity. techniques yet were nonetheless considered creolized foodways of Goa and Malacca Macao became a UNESCO Creative City What is Macanese cuisine? What locals Macanese. As food styles changed over time provides not only useful comparisons but of Gastronomy and its cuisine has since and tourists nowadays eat at home and in so too did perceptions of one’s identity. are also important for understanding the entered the world stage. restaurants is a far cry from what the people Interestingly, today there are more people close interconnections and similarities living in Macao ate several centuries ago. who identify themselves as Macanese who between these cuisines. People and their tastes have continually live outside Macao than inside the city itself. Fusion cuisine changed over the centuries and so have There is a large Macanese diaspora spread Although not well known outside eastern As Jackson explains, because Macanese ingredients, flavors, and cooking styles. across the globe. As a critical part of her Asia and often misconstrued, Macanese food food had its origins in the fusion of many As the author rightly explains, the nature research, Jackson conducted a large number is one of the world’s earliest fusion cuisines. diverse cuisines and has continued to evolve of Macanese food is adaptation. of interviews and surveys of Macanese living When the Portuguese founded Macao over the centuries, it is impossible to pinpoint Cuisines are always evolving. From its in Hong Kong, Europe, North America, and nearly 500 years ago, it was a relatively what exactly constitutes Macanese food. Even origins in the Portuguese colonies, Macao’s Australia. Because many diasporic Macanese barren stretch of sand dunes and low hills, within the Macanese community at large, early foodways followed the spice trade from people have a sense of rootlessness, memories with only one or two fishing villages and an there is little consensus as to what comprises Africa to India to Southeast Asia to Macao of home foods and recipes have become A-Ma Temple. In building the city the early Macanese cuisine. For purists, in fact, it has and Japan. Take the iconic Macanese dish, important identifiers of their common culture settlers, who were all males, needed to import become a lost art, yet for most ordinary African Chicken, which likely was invented and values. In creating an identity, in fact, nearly everything from outside, including tourists, who want to enjoy a different cuisine, only in the 1940s, believed to have been the sharing of recipes and the production food and women from other Portuguese it is simply the food prepared in restaurants created by chef America Angelo at the former of cookbooks have become crucial. As the colonies in Africa and Asia. So right from the in Macao. Indeed, today in most restaurants Pousada de Macao. In its earliest forms, it author explains, today Macanese food has start, Macao’s foodways borrowed from and in Macao, whether categorized as Portuguese was blackened and spicy with a marinade of moved away from being everyday food to adapted to the foods, spices, and cooking or Cantonese, they all include dishes on butter, garlic, and chilies, but today in most something more symbolic and ceremonial. styles of a large variety of peoples. their menus purporting to be Macanese. versions it is baked in a tomato and peppery How one remembers the aromas and tastes of peanut sauce. It is a typical creolized dish certain foods is as important as the actual foods that combines flavors from Mozambique, themselves. At the same time, with the diaspora Goa, and Malacca, and each of these places Macanese cuisine has diffused around the world also have their own versions of the same in trendy ethnic restaurants. For most Macanese dish with different names. Today Macanese both at home and abroad, food is decisively cuisine has progressed from its traditional embedded in their notions of identity. Portuguese foundations to a creolized mixture In conclusion, this is a concise and of Portuguese and Asian cooking, to what is fascinating book on a little-known and often more recently heavily influenced by Chinese misunderstood fusion cuisine that should be cuisines. For Macao fusion food represents of interest to anyone wanting to learn about something new and distinct. Macao and the dissemination of food culture Above: Portuguese Custard Tarts © Macau in general. There is indeed more to Macao Photo Agency on than merely casinos and gambling. Unsplash. Left: Galinha à Macanese food and identity africana, African chicken © mulaohu on flickr Another topic discussed throughout the Robert Antony, under a CC license. book concerns questions of identity. Who are Shandong University, China 22 newbooks.asia Asian Studies. Newest Titles. The Review Latest Reviews.

The growth in online trading in the second half of the 21st Century’s first decade was synchronous with the Japanese government’s goal to implement an economic Invisibility by design transition away from traditional saving to investing. Japanese housewives, seen as non-threatening, trusted messengers, would Sally Tyler Reviewed title become poster children for this seismic Invisibility by Design: Women and experiment in social engineering. The extent to which the women interviewed sought Labor in Japan’s Digital Economy to minimize their efforts, by claiming that hile reading Invisibility by Design they only spent as much as 15 minutes a for review, I was struck by two news Gabriella Lukács. 2020. day to make USD 3,000 per month but later Witems: 1) Forbes Magazine provoked Durham, NC: Duke University Press admitting that they initially spent months controversy by downgrading its estimate of ISBN 9781478006480 of 20-hour days in front of the computer to Kylie Jenner’s net worth to a scant USD 900 attain trading proficiency, serves to illustrate million, rather than the USD 1 billion previously Lukács’ argument about how the digital reported when the magazine named her the economy renders women’s labor invisible world’s youngest self-made billionaire, and 2) by promoting the myth of its ease. Lisa Su became the first woman to top the S&P As a policy professional, my primary 500 list of highest-paid CEO’s. Some of the examples Lukács uses to in order to stay true to their artistic vision. lens is admittedly in the applied context illustrate her thesis that platform owners tap Some of them continued to work in other jobs and my most salient critique of the book Whatever the valuation of Jenner’s women’s unpaid labor and make it invisible part-time, even after achieving critical acclaim. is that it fails to examine any policy cosmetics line, launched while she was still a do not serve it well. The work is weighed down Ultimately, their stories are ambiguous and prescriptions that could remedy the teen, it owes much of its stratospheric success by overreliance on disciplinarian jargon that could be used either as an illustration of the inequities Lukács attempts to describe. to relentless social media promotion. And does little to advance her case. She repeatedly inherent limitations of the digital economy Was there no discussion with subjects Su, CEO of Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), asserts that the digital economy offers or to show that creative labor may embody about the extent to which wage parity, achieved her compensation milestone at the instances of feminized affective labor, yet goals beyond the financial. affordable child care and equal opportunity helm of a corporation which manufacturers occasionally undermines her own argument Similarly, the chapters on net idols for advancement within traditional semiconductors for use in the digital gaming by allowing that most contemporary work (digital content creators who sought branding employment would have rendered the industry. Clearly, neither occurrence would represents both affective and intellectual opportunity via personal websites), bloggers digital economy less attractive to them? have happened if not for the digital economy. labor and even allows that some aspects and cell phone novelists fail to disaggregate Likewise, a rigorous examination of whether Author Gabriella Lukács would likely of the digital economy reflect forms of between motivation such as personal the digital economy merely provides a characterize both these examples as outliers reproductive labor. Jargon aside, the type of satisfaction, social connectivity, and desire fallback when traditional opportunities that do not typify opportunities for women labor exemplified within the digital economy for income. In societies where the views of stagnate or if a newer generation of workers within the digital economy. She uses her is less relevant than the question of whether young women are rarely sought or seriously truly prioritizes the flexibility and degree fieldwork exploring the experiences of it is labor in the most general sense, as in did examined, digital platforms can provide a of autonomy it represents over job security young women in Japan who became digital the women who undertook the activity have voice and ready-made audience to offer and compensation would have been useful. photographers, net idols, bloggers, online an expectation of earning a living through it? validation. Absent expanded employment and If the latter were indicated, then an traders and, cell-phone novelists to underscore The fields that Lukács examines demonstrate economic opportunity for women in Japan, exploration of subjects’ reaction to the the fallacy of the digital economy as a more a mixed bag in support. the desire for ‘meaningful work’ illustrated by concept of minimum basic income might democratic, egalitarian, and inclusive mode The chapter on onna no ko shashin, personal fulfillment, often eluded to by Lukács’s be warranted. of production. sometimes translated as girly photography, subjects, and the premium placed on work Invisibility by Design offers many lively The growth of Japan’s digital economy which begins the book, offers a fascinating based on compensation and opportunity for examples of the gendered impact of new in the 1990s through the first decade of the glimpse into the groundbreaking early advancement will likely remain muddled. work opportunities in Japan, but ultimately 21st Century paralleled its labor market digital work of Hiromix, Ninagawa Mika, and The chapter on online trading offers the raises more questions than it answers. deregulation and accompanying cultural shift Nagashima Yurie. Operating before ubiquitous best fit with Lukács’s broader thesis, in that As digital platforms including Task Rabbit in which rigidly-defined, lifetime employment selfie culture took root, these young women the women who commenced the labor had and Fiver grow exponentially, underscoring opportunities were no longer the norm. At the frequently turned their cameras on the details clear objectives to make money and were a dramatic global shift toward the gig same time, the role of women in Japanese of their everyday lives in a vision that was both swayed by promotion of the digital realm’s economy, research leading to policies society was rapidly evolving with greater artistic and political, declaring in effect that capacity as a conduit to wealth through supporting worker equity becomes even expectation of their labor market participation, their lives were worth memorializing. While part-time, irregular or amateur work not more critical if the digital economy is to without social policies to support it, such as paid some of the women Lukács interviewed stated afforded by the traditional Japanese have any chance to fulfill its promise as family leave and affordable childcare. As such, a desire to become famous through their employment system. It is also the only the egalitarian and inclusive sphere some the development of the digital economy provides photography, none explicitly expressed the chapter in which she illustrates in detail envision for it. a flashpoint ripe for analysis in the context of goal of using the medium to become wealthy. the extent to which platform owners derived cultural anthropology, labor, and gender, all In fact, she offers salient examples of instances profits from workers’ labor, an assertion Sally Tyler, independent policy analyst, of which Lukács does with varying success. in which they rejected commercial opportunity she makes throughout the book. United States

and allows us to think about independence and choice. Care is defined neoliberal politics of creative (self-) as large as self-care (not to be identified employment, poetics of pleasure with selfishness), for one’s well-being, and the possibilities of unfolding agency and aspirations towards success Caring in times a life of one’s own – despite all and recognition, be it among working class challenges – in urban habitats. or upper middle class. The author considers Being single gestures towards intergenerational relations of single women, of precarity concepts of respectability, auto- how single women in the media reflect their nomy and precarity at a particular media-based representation – between moment and place in time. glamourization and stigmatization, Reviewed title How does a single lifestyle inequality and empowerment. He also Christiane Brosius Caring in Times of correspond with the highly considers the role of the city as a laboratory demanding conditions of creative and catalyst but also a highly competitive Precarity: A Study of work in globalizing urban environs? and lonely space. The eight chapters and Single Women doing And how does the single woman epilogue of Caring in Times of Precarity fit into an Asian realm, particularly under are a fascinating read even for non-China Creative Work in Shanghai a paradoxical presence of Maoist notions specialists. Chow takes the reader to the of femininity, Confucian values and various empirical grounds he has defined in Chow Yiu Fai. 2019. globalized and consumer-based repertoires the individual chapters. The sensibility for New York: Palgrave Macmillan of neo-liberal qualities of womanhood. small details, for vernacular utterances, and ISBN 9783319768977 With his book on single women in the the ability to relate this to larger questions, creative industries of Shanghai, Chow Yiu marks the book as engaged and engaging. Fai enriches and expands the slender field But the book is also a remarkable read for of ‘single studies’ and challenges views of its critical recalibration of certain Western- s ‘being single’ or ‘going solo’ (Kinneret phenomena of global urbanization and social precarity that often dominate the debate by based theories on womanhood, feminism Lahad, A Table for One: A Critical transformation, and even less so in the context proposing an ethics of care. The Associate and precarity that – as a consequence – IReading of Singlehood, Gender and Time, of the so-called Global South, and with respect Professor at the Department of Humanities does not fall into the trap of Asianisms Manchester University Press, 2017) still to women. If there is, then much attention is and Creative Writing of Hong Kong Baptist and rejection of theories from the ‘West’ a taboo to be subsumed under singlism? paid to how this ‘abnormal’ lifestyle can be University considers the perspective of (e.g., Foucault, Mouffe). This book is One would be surprised given that in overcome, still pathologizing the single woman journalists, musicians, artists, designers, certainly a good choice for scholars everyday worlds across the globe, the as ‘left-over’ or ‘off the shelf’, ‘too demanding’ and others. Altogether 25 interlocutors and students in critical area studies, ‘type’ of the single – be it man or woman and ‘selfish’, to be normalized into marriage from various age, social and economic Asia/Chinese Studies, Gender and Urban – has become a fairly common sight and or at least a heteronormative relationship. backgrounds were interviewed in Shanghai Studies, as well as Transcultural and narrative in the past two decades or so. But like Georg Simmel’s figure of the stranger, between 2015-17. Chow asks as well as Globalisation Studies. And yet, surprisingly, there is yet not much or Benjamin’s Flaneur, the single (woman) ethnographically delineates how they research published about what could be is a fascinating – and urban – phenomenon experience precarity as stigmatization, Christiane Brosius, Heidelberg Centre considered as one of the most interesting that emerges almost hundred years later, stress and anxiety, but also nurture liberty, for Transcultural Studies, Germany The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 newbooks.asia Asian Studies. Newest Titles. 23 Latest Reviews. The Review

Rats and sewers in ‘modern’ Reviewed title and ‘civilized’ French Hanoi The Great Hanoi Rat Hunt: Empire, Disease, and Modernity in French Colonial Vietnam

Michael G. Vann and Liz Clarke Hans Schenk Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press ISBN 9780190602697

Structure and composition in a minor part of Vann’s dissertation, but first death was on Rue Paul Bert … in the heart seeking a comfortable urban life and hence The book consists of five parts. The first became subsequently an episode in Hanoi on of the white quarter!”, followed by a graphic threaten urban elites striving for modernity one, by the historian Michael Vann and the its own, and now even in the form of cartoons. of a near heart-attack of one of them and a and civilization is then a bit overdone, to artist Liz Clarke, is a so-called graphic history: The final section leads the reader to what the laughing Vietnamese ‘boy’ (p.83). Modernity say the least. Has it been designed for the a historical treatise in a visual form consisting book is actually supposed to be; as Margaret has created a potential health-crisis, comment purpose of a visually thrilling story, full of of cartoons with supporting texts. It centres Bodemer writes in her review on the back-cover: Vann and Clarke and the colonial administration rats – as said hanging on cliffs – and turning on the presentation of the bubonic plague “a practical text for world history courses”. This flung into action, demonstrating: “France’s pages? The book, hence shows the danger epidemic in French colonial Hanoi in 1902-03, final part ends then in style, with ‘Discussion civilizing mission in action!” (p.87). of offering a catchy episode in visuals and and the French attempts – ‘darkly humorous’ Questions’ and ‘Essay Topics’, and reads like A first strategy to fight rats was to ask allow – paraphrasing Marshall McLuhan – attempts as the jacket promises – to fight some sort of examination of the content of the the French physician Alexandre Yersin to the medium to become the message. If one urban rats. This part of 122 pages forms preceding pages. come to Hanoi. A few years before he had ignores, however, the visual drama, and looks almost half the book and is its hard core. co-developed3 a serum against the fleabites at the overall attempt to present in various The following four parts form to a large extent carried by rats, and in 1902 he advocated ways the French colonial adventure in Hanoi, supporting arguments to present history in Visuals and words successfully the mass killing of rats. The the book may make students curious and a visual form. The second part consists of The book is not a history of colonial Hanoi. authorities offered a bounty for every dead read more. a large number of primary and secondary It deals however in some detail with the contexts rat, and later on for every rat-tail when the documents that pertain to different episodes leading to the French endeavour to colonize pile of rats waiting to be incinerated became of the French endeavour to govern the Indo-China and to transform the Vietnamese too high,4 but found subsequently profitable Postscript Vietnamese and fight the plague. Many of citadel and market settlement into “a little rat-farms around Hanoi. This is presented by The Vietnamese were quick in removing these documents have been translated from Paris in the East … in which the French could the authors as Vann explaining on a black- the symbols of French colonial rule after their the French. Vann wrote subsequently in feel comfortable”, as the context rectangles in board to his students: “the French bounty independence. Statues of French heroes were the third part a useful essay of the various the cartoons tell (p.12).1 Vann and Clarke show and the Vietnamese reaction illustrate the torn down, their street names, etc., replaced needed contexts in order to understand why in several pages the villas of the French, their economic principle of a ‘perverse incentive’” by Vietnamese ones; at least more than a the French came at all, what they did in impressive public buildings and infrastructural (p.95). Subsequently, however, when the hundred. One street name still has French Indo-China, and why things went wrong now works, built during the 1880s and 1890s, to arrive plague epidemic in Hanoi had faded away roots. The Institute of Epidemiology ‘Louis and then. This part finalizes with remarks on at this comfortable feeling. These construction in the same year, Yersin’s serum proved to Pasteur’ can be found on nr. 1 Pho Yersin the character of the bubonic plague epidemic activities served as well to demonstrate the be a preventatively effective anti-toxin (the street named after the medical doctor (a pandemic one rather). It originated in ‘civilizing mission’ that the French undertook protecting those who had been in contact who put the authorities on the right track the 1850s in South China and reached the in Hanoi. Vann and Clarke use this concept with a plague victim. to fight the plague). The Vietnamese have Southeast Chinese coast and South Asia by of the civilizing mission as a common thread not forgotten his contribution to ‘modernity’ the end of the 19th century and struck Hanoi throughout the texts and pictures of the cartoon amidst all the folie de grandeur. in 1902. The French became notably nervous chapter. It reached its peak with the desire Modernity and rats as the rats that carried the fleas whose bites among the French to have a system of sewers in The stage for the thriller has been set Hans Schenk, Independent researcher, would transmit plague germs, settled (also) the French quarter like the Parisians had been and visualized: modernization and French The Netherlands in the recently built sewers meant to keep given, and which was an ultimate symbol of civilizing colonial power versus fleas, rats, and the French quarter dry and clean. urban modernity and the mission to civilize. the plague. The hero has been announced But, then come the rats in Vann’s and as well: Yersin, though he was reluctantly Notes Of the two short final parts, one is devoted Clarke’s graphic story! A bit sneaky first, a and distrustfully received in Hanoi with his 1 I use the word rectangle to make a to the history of the book. Vann gives an bit down-under at a lower graphic, but more message of fleas and an anti-serum. Yet, what distinction between these background texts account of its origins and its later collaboration and more and on many pages cliff-hanging actually happened to the French in Hanoi was and balloons, which show spoken words: in with Clarke, on the process of making this in what is presented as an evolving historical less dramatic after all. Three Europeans died a red balloon-frame those from Vietnamese book. By accident, the rats came to the fore, thriller. Indeed, in 1902 they were detected in in the whole of Indo-China during the years words and in a blue one those from the as Vann writes about his archival research on the new sewers of the city, and they were “most 1898 and 1908 during which the plague struck French. 2 It is tempting to compare the happy rats in the French colonial history in the French city plentiful in the French quarter” (p.81). Text and intermittently various parts of the colony. Vann the sewers with the flâneurs along the Paris of Aix-en-Provence: “When flipping through graphics suggest subsequently rats strolling in and Clarke do not give figures for Hanoi but boulevards and subsequently those among the decades-old card catalogue for material Hanoi’s fine sewers, where “the pipes offered admit that it affected primarily the Vietnamese the boulevards and cafes of the colonial on municipal regulations, I came across a card rats a new ecological niche, free of predators and Chinese quarters, which were by the way district of Hanoi, which appear frequently for a dossier on ‘Destruction of Hazardous and full of food” (p.77).2 Matters became worse not provided with sewers that the rats found in the book of Vann and Clarke. Even a Animals’. Thinking that it would be amusing, when in 1902 a first case of bubonic plague was so convenient. And, let me look at Bombay reminder of Yves Montand’s famous song: I ordered the file. When it came, I was stunned detected – not in the quarters inhabited by the where the fierce plague-epidemic of 1896 and ‘j’aime flâner sur les grands boulevards’, to discover the contents. There were dozens of native Vietnamese population, as the French subsequent years killed thousands of Indians etc., is hard to avoid. dates, signed, and stamped forms informing supposed. A French citizen – representing the every week, even though sewers were also a 3 A competing claim for the identification the colonial administration of the capture growing legion of French men and women far cry in those parts of the city that were most of an effective serum against plague was developed by the Japanese physician and killing of thousands of rats” (p.237). Vann settling in Hanoi, strolling along its boulevards affected. Indeed, the epidemic in Bombay has Kitasato Shibasaburo. decided subsequently to give attention to this and sitting on the sidewalk cafes with glasses of often been related to exactly the opposite: the 4 The administrative processing of all these ‘micro-history’ as he called it, within the macro wine – says to another (per balloon): “well, what absence of an adequate drainage system. rats and tails triggered actually Vann to perspectives of the French colonial history. do you expect, the native quarter is filthy”, but The whole contradiction that Vann explore this episode in the French colonial The rat killings were originally written down receives the reply: “au contraire my friend, the and Clarke create so beautifully by rats history (see above). 24 newbooks.asia Asian Studies. Newest Titles. The Review Latest Reviews.

Shane J. Barter (Soka University of America) has a continued interest in experiential education, been an inseparable part of China since … the thirteenth century’ (p. 284). For some, combining interactive teaching with student field experience. He has mentored several of his this tone will be refreshing. For others, students in reviews for newbooks.asia; some of the rich results can be read here. however, it may be seen as pro-government. Our major substantive concern relates to how the authors frame the study of China. On several occasions, the authors emphasize China’s distinctiveness. The authors suggest that the ‘“rhythm” of Chinese politics is completely different from that of most other political systems’ (p. 396). One potential China’s political system danger here is that an excessive sense of Chinese exceptionalism may be used to sidestep accountability to international Jaroslav Zapletal and Shane J. Barter norms. Throughout the book, the authors suggest that Western models are unsuitable for understanding China. We are told that Reviewed title policy making procedures in China are or political scientists, China is as China’s Political System ‘markedly different from those in democratic important as it is elusive. It has developed constitutional states’ (p. 300), and that into one of the world’s leading economies, Eastern European Communist systems F Sebastian Heilmann (ed.) 2017. with officials guiding market forces and state ‘do not help to understand developments enterprises through long-term planning. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield in the PRC’ (p. 298). For one, it is unclear if Politically, China remains a single-party ISBN 9781442277359 Western experiences are not useful – for any authoritarian state with few signs of particular case, we can expect varying levels democratization, although it is also relatively of applicability. It is also unclear which models decentralized, responsive, and adaptable. might work better. Heilmann labels China Chinese politics are ever-changing, with as a ‘learning authoritarian system’ (p. 42); our understanding limited by opaque party provides rich details, at many points aided discussion of the implications that Xi’s if China learns from international experiences, hierarchies. In light of these and other by clear tables. Of course, a few topics consolidation of power may have for the but not from the West, it would be useful challenges, we applaud Sebastian Heilmann are not discussed in detail—for instance, sustainability of China’s political system, to explain from which countries China is and his colleagues at the Mercator Institute the book opts not to look at international as it may be less able to adapt to changing learning. Western cases should not represent for China Studies in Berlin for their new book, relations or political history. However, circumstances. our only comparative lenses, as we can also China’s Political System. The authors provide given the enormity of the topic, there are approach Chinese politics in regional context. a comprehensive, authoritative account remarkably few stones left unturned. The authors do so to some extent in terms of of the contemporary political landscape Readers will appreciate how the authors Potential critiques political economy, framing China as an Asian of the Middle Kingdom. parse the formal and informal worlds of Despite our enthusiasm, we would like developmental state. At several points, the Chinese politics. Here, personal connections to raise some potential critiques. For one, authors note that it seems impossible to have and party influence often determine political in the book’s encyclopedic approach, it a single-party authoritarian state ruling over An authoritative account outcomes. The book also discusses several sometimes reads like a reference volume. an educated society and globalized economy. China’s Political System is notable for sensitive topics in a diplomatic manner, There is limited engagement with major This is only a puzzle if we focus on Western its overall clarity, with clear writing and including social unrest, environmental concepts or academic debates surrounding countries, whereas Asia provides several organization, and key terms provided in both degradation, and corruption. Throughout China, as the emphasis is more in painting rich examples. Singapore, which is hardly Chinese and English. Given that the book the book, the authors discuss several a thorough, somewhat descriptive portrait. mentioned in this lengthy study, could serve is a product of several authors, its tone is interesting themes, including relations Another potential critique is that, in an effort as a useful comparison. In future editions, remarkably consistent. The book is organized between the central and subnational to provide a neutral, diplomatic account the book might wrestle less with how China’s in terms of different areas of political science: governments, regional inequality, and of Chinese politics, the authors may have politics are novel in Western terms, and instead political institutions, political leadership, shifts between ‘normal’ and ‘crisis’ modes acquiesced too much. Regarding the acknowledge its similarities with its Asian peers. political economy, state–society relations, of political leadership. Another key theme pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong, Such quibbles should not detract too policy making, and political development. is the growing power of President Xi Jinping. the authors observe ‘a lack of journalistic much from what is an authoritative overview Each chapter contains several specific Unlike his predecessors, whose leadership distance’ by the West (p. 97), noting that of politics in China. Due to its thorough subsections, ranging from food safety and involved consultation and delegation, Xi has many Hong Kong residents felt the protestors’ account of the many aspects of Chinese disaster management (in terms of policy) demonstrated a more centralized, personalist criticisms of Beijing to be excessive. Regarding politics, Heilmann and his colleagues to autonomous regions and public finance approach. In Chapter Seven, Heilmann and Tibet, the authors note that China justifies effectively moderate the discourse on the (in terms of institutions). Each discussion his colleagues present a thought-provoking its claim ‘due to the fact that the region has topic, dismissing many misconceptions. China’s Political System promises to stand as a key text for various audiences, including advanced undergraduates, graduate students, policymakers, and even professors who hope to refresh or enrich their knowledge of the People’s Republic.

Jaroslav Zapletal and Shane J. Barter, Soka University of America

or students of Comparative Politics, Japan stands out as a fascinating Fcase. It is one of Asia’s few liberal democracies, although one with little turnover in government. Japanese politics have been known for overlapping business ties, powerful internal party factions, limited women’s participation, and recently, a rightward turn. At the core of this distinctive political landscape has been the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), whose . Creative Commons license. . Creative dominance and ability to recapture power have been extraordinary. Kōji Nakakita’s The Liberal Democratic Party of Japan: The Realities of ‘Power’ provides readers with an authoritative guide to the LDP’s inner workings and evolution. Nakakita is a renowned expert of Japanese Courtesy on Flickr Grooble politics, authoring many books and articles. Already a highly popular book in Japan, the Reviewed title English translation was provided by Stephen The Liberal Democratic Johnson, who is to be commended for such a readable translation of a complex book. Party of Japan: The Liberal Democratic Party of Japan Explaining political The Realities of ‘Power’ features six chapters. Chapter One dives directly into the decline of factional politics Kōji Nakakita, translated in Japan, a product of electoral and finance dominance in Japan by Stephen Johnson. 2020. reforms. Chapter Two looks within the LDP, examining internal party elections and the London: Routledge ISBN 9780429053931 distribution of offices. In Chapter Three, Nakakita focuses on policymaking, which is Shunji Fueki and Shane J. Barter increasingly dominated by the executive due The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 newbooks.asia Asian Studies. Newest Titles. 25 Latest Reviews. The Review

the Vietnamese government working to restore Vietnamese traditions. Tran makes a case for greater complexity, challenging the basic trope and locating patriarchy early in Vietnamese Familial properties history. As Vietnam continues to develop and tensions with China continue to mount, there is a need to question state claims of traditional Ha Chau Ngo and Shane J. Barter Reviewed title equality, as if patriarchy lacks roots in Vietnam. Familial Properties: Gender, State, and Possible critiques n introductory courses on Southeast Asia, Society in Early Modern Familial Properties features impressive many researchers focus on the relative research, clear writing, and speaks to a range Istrength of women as a definitive regional Vietnam, 1463–1778 of important debates. Although Tran succeeds trait compared to neighboring South Asia in showing that official laws often played out and East Asia. The focus often lies on Vietnam Nhung Tuyet Tran. 2018. differently in practice, she could be clearer as a regional crossroads, with a Chinese Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press regarding the limitations of historical records. Confucian order transposed upon a Southeast ISBN 9780824874827 For the most part, state power correlates Asian peasantry. Nhung Tuyet Tran’s Familial with records. Even if we move beyond official Properties: Gender, State, and Society in Early records to village steles, it is likely that we are Modern Vietnam, 1463-1778 sheds new light still overlooking the rural majority. The book on gender in Southeast Asia. Utilizing a wide essentially tackles the hardest cases, showing range of primary sources, Tran provides an benefit lower-class women, who were sometimes laws that influenced Vietnamese society, but that even in historical records and areas of state ambitious historical-political anthropological expected to fulfill sexual roles for more powerful also resistance to these laws, which often strength, women maintained autonomy and account of gender systems in precolonial men. All told, Tran manages to document gender failed to shape local communities. One source resisted official norms. It should be remembered, Vietnam, citing official laws alongside sites systems across Vietnamese history while paying of disruption was various civil wars, which though, that where history was not recorded, of resistance in a highly readable study. attention to the diverse experiences of women, necessitated women playing public role. women likely had even greater autonomy. successfully painting a general picture while Another was changing markets, with the A related point is that, by focusing on the state, not essentializing. ‘Age of Commerce’ creating new areas of we have little sense of how gender norms were Vietnam’s gender system This nuance is made possible by impressive, female power and wealth. Women were also enforced societally. Cases of adultery and Chapter One lays out what Tran refers to meticulous research. Tran bases her discussion afforded more autonomy where the state perceived sexual indiscretions were more likely as the gender system of historical Vietnam, a on a wide range of sources, including laws, was weakest, namely in rural areas and in the to have been punished immediately by non- state-articulated vision of proper womanhood textbooks, early colonial accounts, folk stories, south, and among poorer classes. Tran shows state actors, with judicial records providing only from childhood through death (and beyond). village steles and records, and more, many of Southeast Asian agency within a Confucian an echo of social enforcement. Tran provides Subsequent chapters focus on adolescence, which are primary sources written in Vietnamese structure, with the Lê state possessing several accounts of judicial decisions that marriage, sexual relations, property, death, demotic script. Tran differentiates between significant, but not total power. skirted official rules, cases framed in terms of and the afterlife, charting the life course of prescriptive sources (the laws, textbooks, In terms of other topics, Chapter Three persuasive women and judicial interpretation. womanhood. Tran interprets Vietnam’s gender dictionaries, and guides that lay out what the discusses legal discourses related to rape, They may also be explained by state weakness, system in economic terms, with Vietnamese state thinks should be) and descriptive sources sex work, chastity, and homosexuality. In both, with courts providing post-hoc rationalizations society as a market and its participants as (the legal cases, folk poetry, short stories, class status mediated crimes and punishments. for their inability to act. Even today, many state economic actors. The Vietnamese state has missionary letters, and other observations of Homosexuality is notable by its absence in efforts to enforce gender laws are mediated promoted its gender system in its quest for what was). Particularly impressive is Tran’s use Vietnamese law, with greater attention paid to by strong societal norms, with states forces stability, as stable families and the continuation of village steles, slabs erected in honor of various whether same-sex relations violate class lines or loathe to admit their weaknesses. State forces of elite agnatic lines were intended to produce patrons. These steles show that Vietnamese not. Punishments were dealt in cases where poor such as courts possess incentives to make it a stable social hierarchy as well as a secure women were able to amass resources and servants penetrated more powerful partners – appear that social enforcement reflects their tax base. This gender system placed significant maintain influence within a Confucian legal where sexual orders overturned socio-economic will, clouding our understanding of how the pressures on women as responsible actors, system and veneration in the afterlife. orders, thus inviting social instability. reach of state rules. making them the key figures in Vietnamese The book’s final chapter examines the culture and nationalism. contemporary relevance of historical gender One of the book’s great strengths is that Other themes systems in Vietnam. Tran notes that French Conclusions Tran lays out official gender systems, but By examining the application of neo- colonizers framed Vietnamese women as All told, Familiar Properties is an impressive always remembers that lived realities often Confucian laws under the Lê Dynasty and oppressed by Chinese laws to help legitimize achievement, navigating official and lived varied significantly from state visions. Such how they affected gender systems in Vietnam, colonial power. At independence, Vietnamese gender systems over several centuries of a feat is difficult in contemporary studies, Familial Properties informs debates surrounding leaders promoted similar tropes, noting that Vietnamese history. Tran manages to paint a but is especially impressive in historical work. Southeast Asian versus East Asian influence, Chinese and French forces oppressed women, broad picture while not losing sight of variation Each chapter notes different experiences over state capacity, urban/rural societies, northern unlike traditional Vietnamese culture. With one over time, status, and place. It is essential time, by ethnicity and geography (with the versus southern Vietnamese societies, tradition of the great promises of communism was also reading for those interested in women’s history, Cham-influenced South featuring distinctive versus modernity, and Vietnamese nationalism. to uplift women. Today, Vietnamese leaders Southeast Asian history, gender in Vietnam, gender systems), and class. Class is especially If the question is whether gender in Vietnam mix communist and nationalist rhetoric about and Vietnamese national identity. A rare study important, as elite women were expected to was more Southeast Asian, featuring relative women’s equality, often aimed at denigrating that is both meticulous and readable, Tran is conform to stricter rules for the sake of social autonomy for women, or more Confucian, China for political gain. The story told is that to be commended. stability, whereas poor women were afforded subordinating women in a patriarchal order, ancient traditions of Vietnamese matriarchy more flexibility in areas such as remarriage and then the answer is that it was both. Vietnam saw were transformed into ‘a totalizing, oppressive, Ha Chau Ngo and Shane J. Barter, the workforce. However, this did not always both the successful application of Confucian misogynist Confucian society’ (p. 186), with Soka University of America

to the decline of factions and the rise of party reform. Changing Japan’s electoral system they differ by ideology and leadership styles. religion, with historical LDP ties to Shinto leadership. Chapter Four focuses on national in 1994 from the multi-member Single Non- Nakakita emphasizes how Koizumi promoted and other interests transforming in response electoral battles, including rural support Transferable Vote towards a mixed plurality- neoliberal reforms and courted floating voters to the LDP’s partnership with Komeito. networks, turnout rates, the LDP-Komeito proportional electoral system has caused with a media-friendly, populist message, while There are few available critiques of this alliance, and party recruitment. Chapter Five myriad transformations in Japanese politics Abe returned to earlier LDP practices and is masterful study. The book could do with examines partner organizations, providing and within the LDP. Electoral reform largely more conservative. In an effort to reconnect an introduction or background chapter, a window into the shifting patterns of the succeeding in its core aims of weakening to rural voters alienated by Koizumi’s reforms, bringing those less familiar with Japanese LDP’s business and professional networks. factions and pork politics, also transformed the Abe has captained the LDP’s rightward shift, politics up to speed instead of jumping Finally, Chapter Six examines subnational policy process, party membership, leadership including policies refusing to allow married directly into factions. Readers may want politics, including elections and the personal styles, business ties, and more. This study is couples to keep separate surnames, rejecting more details on subnational electoral organizations bolstering local candidates. a testament to the importance of electoral non-citizen voting rights, and rewriting competition, especially varied local party One of the book’s most impressive systems for shaping political behavior. the constitution to allow for military and alliances, and perhaps more on LDP foreign features is its data. Nakakita mixes Electoral and finance reforms helped bring emergency powers. One could see this rising policy. Finally, the book has few references quantitative electoral and spending data about the decline of factional politics, paving conservativism as an unexpected consequence to scholarly theories or comparative cases. with personal interviews, internal party the way for a more top-down, executive-run of electoral reform, as combatting factionalism There are a few spots where glances beyond documents, and media reports, bringing LDP. However, Nakakita emphasizes that the and pork politics has led Abe’s LDP to find new Japan might heighten its analysis, although together multiple sources to illustrate and LDP’s power is relative rather than absolute, ways to connect to voters and maintain power. this is probably not the author’s goal in a explain LDP power. The book is replete with with victories resulting from low voter turnout, Not only does this book provide expert book aimed at a Japanese audience. instructive figures and tables that illustrate, support from various associations, a weak analysis of the inner party workings, it All told, The Liberal Democratic Party of among other things, politician backgrounds, opposition, and the alliance with Komeito. contributes towards an understanding of state– Japan: The Realities of ‘Power’ provides a factional affiliations and strength, industry In fact, the LDP’s support base is shrinking. society relations, although here the emphasis is commanding account of how the LDP has support for LDP candidates, and more. The LDP has adapted to maintain power, on business, professional, interest, and religious managed to maintain power in and over Specific individuals identified in the book, but it is hardly unassailable. As the author interactions with the party rather than the state. Japan. This will undoubtedly be required such as prefectural party bosses and senior concludes, ‘there is potential for the current It is fascinating to see how various factions reading for students of Japanese politics, LDP officials, provide detailed descriptions political conditions that allow an ‘all powerful’ connect with non-state interests, from Koizumi but will also be of interest to a broader of the ‘realities’ of the LDP. LDP to suffer a sudden reversal’ (p. 205). challenging postal lobbies, to policy groups audience in Comparative Politics. This is This book represents a deep dive into Another key theme is differentiating connected to dentists, firefighters, kindergarten a simply excellent study that will teach a Japan’s ruling party but will also be of between the LDP’s dominant recent figures, teachers, truckers, and chambers of commerce. wide readership about one of Asia’s most interest to those studying party politics, Junichiro Koizumi and Shinzo Abe. Although Overlapping state/society distinctions also important, fascinating parties. campaign finance, dominant party systems, the former mentored the latter, they share a exist subnationally, with politicians depending and state–society relations. One core theme factional background, are third generation on personal support organizations and kinship Shunji Fueki and Shane J. Barter, is the far-reaching effects of electoral politicians, and have dominated the LDP, networks. We also see changing roles for Soka University of America 26 newbooks.asia Asian Studies. Newest Titles. The Review Latest Reviews.

New reviews on

newbooks.asia is the go-to Asian studies book review newbooks.asia website, administered by IIAS. The site lists the newest titles in the field of Asian studies and makes them available Now available to read online for review. Find a selection of new titles on page 28. All reviews are posted online, whilst a lucky few also make it into The Newsletter. Browse a selection of the latest reviews below.

‘Roos Gerritsen’s Intimate Visualities ‘A compelling work that inaugurates and the Politics of Fandom in India offers architectural scholarship’s engagement incomparable insight into the politics with Sri Lanka’s civil war and its impact of Kollywood, the aspirations of its stars on civilian populations’ and fans’ – Preeti Chopra – Michiel Baas Anoma Pieris. 2019. Sovereignty, Space and Civil War in Sri Lanka: Roos Gerritsen. (2019). Porous Nation Intimate Visualities and the Politics of Fandom in India Abingdon and New York: Routledge Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press ISBN 9780815371618 ISBN 9789462985230 https://newbooks.asia/review/porous-nation https://newbooks.asia/review/fandom-india

‘Green has brought together and ‘[T]he editors have been successful carefully examined an amazing array in compiling a compelling cluster of cases of visual sources from late pre-colonial on some of the most pressing concerns Burma’ for Asian urbanisation in the 21st century’ – Tilman Frasch – Anubhav Pradhan

Alexandra Green. 2018. Gregory Bracken, Paul Rabé, R. Parthasarathy, Buddhist Visual Cultures, Rhetoric, and Narrative Neha Sami, and Bing Zhang (eds). 2020. in Late Burmese Wall Paintings Future Challenges of Cities in Asia Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press ISBN 9789888390885 ISBN 9789463728812 https://newbooks.asia/review/buddhist-visual-cultures https://newbooks.asia/review/future-challenges-cities-asia

‘Unlike other anthologies related to Japanese ‘The book brings together stories about Cinema, this book avoids an excessive focus disparate language groups and peoples on the very well-known … to concentrate in a new way of thinking about belonging instead on transversal and transdisciplinary in Sri Lanka’ approaches on national identity, cultural – Farzana Haniffa – Yves Laberge industries and globalisation’ Ronit Ricci. 2019. Banishment and Belonging: Exile and Diaspora Daisuke Miyao (ed.) 2019. in Sarandib, Lanka and Ceylon The Oxford Handbook of Japanese Cinema Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Oxford: Oxford University Press ISBN 9781727242 ISBN: 978 0199731664 https://newbooks.asia/review/banishment-belonging https://newbooks.asia/review/japanese-cinema

‘An ethnographic look at how ‘Nuanced yet detailed exposition of the Filipino call center agents work around political dynamics in one of the most hotly a job’s possibilities produced by its contested maritime regions in the world’ contradictions and complexities’ – Benjamin Tze Ern Ho – Lorna Q. Israel Daniel C. O’Neill. 2018. Dividing ASEAN and Conquering the South China Sea: Jan M. Padios. 2018. China's Financial Power Projection A Nation on the Line: Call Centers as Postcolonial Predicaments in the Philippines Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press ISBN 9789888455966 London and Durham, NC: Duke University Press https://newbooks.asia/review/china-financial-muscle ISBN 9780822370598 https://newbooks.asia/review/nation-line The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 newbooks.asia Asian Studies. Newest Titles. 27 Latest Reviews. The Review

‘Offers fresh methods and approaches ‘A panoramic coverage of North Korean to study Indian politics’ politics from its founding to the present, – Mithilesh Kumar Jha this is a fascinating and sobering book

James Manor. 2017. about the way forward in dealing with Politics and State–Society Relations in India North Korea by a leading European expert London: Hurst on the subject’ – Zhiqun Zhu ISBN 9781849047180 https://newbooks.asia/review/state-society-india Glyn Ford. 2018. Talking to North Korea: Ending the Nuclear Standoff London: Pluto Press ISBN 9780745337852 https://newbooks.asia/review/talking-north-korea

‘In this book, [Glassman] has made a ‘Combining approaches in history, major contribution to the understanding ethnomusicology and film studies, of the nature of East and Southeast [Johan] performs a fine job in presenting an Asian industrial transformation’ – John Walsh academic text that is novel, informational, – Husni Abu Bakar Jim Glassman. 2018. and intellectually engaging’ Drums of War, Drums of Development: The Formation Adil Johan. 2018. of a Pacific Ruling Class and Industrial Transformation Cosmopolitan Intimacies: Malay Film Music in East and Southeast Asia, 1945-80 of the Independence Era Leiden and Boston: Brill NUS Press: Singapore ISBN 9789004315792 ISBN 9789814722636 https://newbooks.asia/review/drums-war-development https://newbooks.asia/review/cosmopolitan-intimacies

‘Mark Ravina’s book is an important work ‘A must read also for those concerned which sets the stage for studies of the Meiji with producing historically-informed Restoration in an era of global history’ analyses of its foreign policy’ – Ian Rapley – Silvia Tieri

Mark Ravina. 2018. Michele L. Louro. 2018. To Stand with the Nations of the World: Comrades Against Imperialism: Nehru, India, Japan’s Meiji Restoration in World History and Interwar Internationalism Oxford: Oxford University Press Cambridge: Cambridge University Press ISBN 9780195327717 ISBN 9781108419307 https://newbooks.asia/review/asian-revolution-global-age https://newbooks.asia/review/comrades-against-imperialism

‘This well-conceived journey along studio ‘Fact in Fiction is a welcome addition photography in China and Japan presents to work on urban life in early an attentive analysis of forms of self- 20th-century China’ representation and formation of modern – Jeff Kyong-McClain

identities, shedding light on the incorporation Kristin Stapleton. 2016. of photography into local visual practices Fact in Fiction: 1920s China and Ba Jin’s Family and artistic traditions’ – Marco Musillo Stanford: Stanford University Press ISBN 9781503601062 Luke Gartlan and Roberta Wue (eds). 2017 https://newbooks.asia/review/fact-in-fiction Portraiture and Early Studio Photography in China and Japan Abingdon and New York: Routledge ISBN 9781472484383 https://newbooks.asia/review/portraiture-photography-china-japan

‘Classic cases and a focus on art-themes ‘Multidirectional pathways of remittances make for a mixed bag of ‘consumption’ illuminate the human connections and research’ intentions that were so central to the lives – Anthony Rausch of Chinese migrants’

Katarzyna J. Cwiertka and Ewa Machotka (eds). 2018. – Tracy C. Barrett Consuming Life in Post-Bubble Japan: A Transdisciplinary Michael Williams. 2018. Perspective Returning Home with Glory: Chinese Villagers Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press around the Pacific, 1849-1949 ISBN 97894629806311 https://newbooks.asia/review/consuming-life-japan Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press ISBN 9789888390533 https://newbooks.asia/review/realities-belonging 28 newbooks.asia Asian Studies. Newest Titles. The Review Latest Reviews.

Visit newbooks.asia to browse the newest titles in the field of Asian studies. If you would like to review any of the available titles, of which you Asian Studies. Newest Titles. Latest Reviews. will find a selection below, please submit a review request through the website or send an email to our editor at [email protected] newbooks.asia

Slave in a Palanquin: Colonial Servitude and Resistance in Sri Lanka

Nira Wickramasinghe. 2020.

Columbia University Press ISBN 97780231197632 https://newbooks.asia/publication/slave-palanquin

In Camps: Vietnamese Refugees, Asylum Seekers, and Repatriates

Jana K. Lipman. 2020.

University of California Press ISBN 9780520343665 https://www.newbooks.asia/publication/in-camps

Encyclopedia of Embroidery from Central Asia, the Iranian Asian Revitalization: Plateau and the Indian Adaptive Reuse in Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Singapore Subcontinent Katie Cummer and Gillian Vogelsang-Eastwood and Willem Vogelsang. 2021. Lynne D. DiStefano (eds). 2021.

Bloomsbury Academic Hong Kong University Press ISBN 9781350017245 ISBN 9789888528561 https://www.newbooks.asia/publication/encyclopedia-embroidery https://newbooks.asia/publication/asian-revitalization

Jin Siyan. 2020. Rosalie Stolz. 2021 Ramacandra Cintaman Dhere. Maria Rashid. 2020. Luke White. 2020. Translated by Isabelle Lee Living Kinship, Fearing Spirits: 2020. Translated by Jayant Dying to Serve: Militarism, Legacies of the Drunken Subjective Writing in Sociality among the Khmu Bhalchandra Bapat Affect, and the Politics of Master: Politics of the Body Contemporary Chinese of Northern Laos The Lajjagauri and Anandanayaki: Sacrifice in the Pakistan Army in Hong Kong Kung Fu Literature NIAS Press A New Light on the Nature and Stanford University Press Comedy Films Chinese University of ISBN 9788776942984 Worship of the Adi-Mata, the ISBN 9781503611986 University of Hawai'i Press Hong Kong Press https://www.newbooks.asia/ Primordial Mother https://newbooks.asia/publication/ ISBN 9780824881573 ISBN 9789629967871 publication/living-kinship-fearing- Monash University Publishing dying-serve https://newbooks.asia/publication/ https://www.newbooks.asia/ spirits ISBN 9781925835243 legacies-drunken-master publication/subjective-writing https://www.newbooks.asia/ Gotelind Müller and Meredith L. Weiss and publication/lajjagauri-anandanayak Nikolay Samoylov (eds). 2020. Alexander Lee. 2020. Glenn Wyatt. 2020. Faisal S. Hazis (eds). 2020. Chinese Perceptions of Russia From Hierarchy to Ethnicity: The Phenomenology of Towards a New Malaysia?: Jie Li. 2020. and the West: Changes, The Politics of Caste in Traffic Experiencing Mobility The 2018 Election and Its Utopian Ruins: A Memorial Continuities, and Contingencies Twentieth-Century India in Ho Chi Minh City Aftermath Museum of the Mao Era during the Twentieth Century Cambridge University Press Routledge NUS Press Duke University Press CrossAsia eBooks ISBN 9781108779678 ISBN 9780429266287 ISBN 9789813251137 ISBN 9781478011231 ISBN 9783946742791 https://newbooks.asia/publication/ https://newbooks.asia/publication/ https://www.newbooks.asia/ https://www.newbooks.asia/ https://www.newbooks.asia/publication/ hierarchy-ethnicity-india traffic-experiencing-mobility publication/towards-new-malaysia publication/utopian-ruins chinese-perceptions-russia-west The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 29 The Focus

Online resources for Asia scholars

Sonja Zweegers and Alessandra Barrow

During the past year not one of us has escaped the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic; we were forced indoors, sequestered to our ‘home offices’ in order to work. Those of you used to being out in the field, roaming the earth, looking for the next research adventure, have now had to make do with Zoom meetings and Facebook groups and archival browsing. Those of us more accustomed to working out of a university building, chatting to colleagues during coffee breaks, and suffering our daily commutes, well, we too have now learned all about online meeting etiquette, and probably failing quite splendidly. The online world has become all too familiar to each and every one of us. And so, for this issue of The Newsletter, not a Focus section as you know it. Something a little bit different, designed specifically for the time in which we find ourselves: an exploration of online resources that may assist (or at least entertain) the Asia scholar.

o accomplish this, I reached out Throughout the collection we have added in mind, if you know of any online resources to IIAS alumni and fellows, and tidbits from the websites mentioned to that you would like to see added to this list, Tother friends made during the past provide some enjoyable reading in addition which we will be continuing to curate on our 10 years as Editor of this publication. to the more practical information. website, then please contact me with your Their (your) input led to the compilation of Finally, the pages of this Focus (and other ideas. You can find the ever-expanding list useful spaces with regard to Asia presented sections in this issue) were assembled with at www.iias.asia/resources. Key used throughout on the following pages. Whilst this list is far the outstanding help of Alessandra Barrow, this section: from comprehensive, and some regions are IIAS intern for the past few months. Alessandra Sonja Zweegers, CA Central Asia more widely represented than others, we is currently completing the Research Master Editor of The Newsletter [email protected] SA South Asia intend it to be a valuable start to a collection in Asian Studies at Leiden University. I am that we will continue to build upon on the IIAS extremely grateful to have received her SEA Southeast Asia Alessandra Barrow, website; hopefully with your help. The list is assistance for this issue, especially at EA East Asia Research MA Asian Studies student gathered by resource type, but we have tried, a time when we all might be feeling rather at Leiden University, and intern for MENA Middle East where possible and if relevant, to indicate disconnected. Let that be a reminder to The Newsletter. https://linkedin.com/in/ and North Africa to which region the resource most relates. reach out and work together! And with that alessandra-barrow-675297172 30 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources The Focus for Asia Scholars

Digital collections, databases and archives

Appraising Risk SA SEA Archnet CA SA SEA MENA scholarly activities. Artstor images come with Base Ulysse SEA high-quality metadata from the collection This is a historical database of climatic This website is a resource focused on catalogers, curators, institutions, and This is an online digital archive of crisis in the Indian Ocean World. On this site, the Built environment of Muslim societies. artists themselves. the National Overseas Archives in Aix-en- you can access articles, relevant maps, and Including architecture, urbanism, environ- Much of the site will require a subscription, Provence. It contains over 45,000 individual visualizations. The Appraising Risk Partnership mental and landscape design, visual culture, but check to see if your institute/library can photographs, albums, postcards, posters, is an international collaboration of scholars and conservation issues. It has a range of grant you access. In addition, Artstor’s ever- drawings and maps documenting aspects and researchers dedicated to exploring the collections and books, city records, maps, growing Public Collections offer approximately of the French colonial empire. critical role of climactic crisis in the past architecture plans and the like. 1.3 million freely accessible images, videos, and future of the Indian Ocean World. The documents, and audio files from library special http://anom.archivesnationales.culture. partnership seeks to create a comprehensive http://archnet.org collections, faculty research, and institutional gouv.fr/ulysse spatial and temporal database of human- history materials, as well as hundreds of environment interaction and interdependence thousands of open access images from partner during periods of climactic change. museums. Anyone may view and download Arsip Nasional Republik these collections; no subscription or login Bichitra: Online Tagore https://www.appraisingrisk.com Indonesia SEA required. Variorum SA This website offers access to thousands https://www.artstor.org This resource contains nearly all of of unresearched documents about the history Tagore’s writings in Bengali and English, Archive of India Music SA of the Nusantara and its connections to the from manuscript to print. The website can world at large during the seventeenth and be navigated in English, Bengali and Hindi, This site is a repository of gramophone eighteenth centuries. This website also gives Asia Art Archive EA SA SEA and the search engine allows you to locate recordings of India set up in collaboration access to some older book publications of any word or phrase used in his works. with the Manipal University’s MCPH (Manipal the former ‘Landsarchief’, beginning with the Based in Hong Kong, Asia Art Archive Centre for Philosophy and Humanities). If you published Daily Journals of Batavia Castle is a catalyst for new ideas that enrich our http://bichitra.jdvu.ac.in/index.php wish to listen to the clips you may need to (1624-1682). understanding of the world through the contact the archive directly. collection, creation, and sharing of know- https://sejarah-nusantara.anri.go.id ledge around recent art in Asia. This website http://archiveofindianmusic.org hosts online modern Asian art and archives. Biodiversity Heritage Library It includes a range of articles and opinion pieces relating to modern art in East Asia, Not Asia-specific, this site is the largest ARTstor Southeast Asia and South Asia. open access digital library for biodiversity The Archive of the Institute literature and archives including books on for Taiwan History The Artstor Digital Library features a wide https://aaa.org.hk/en plant taxonomy and natural history texts. range of multidisciplinary content from some Most of the collection is public domain (ITH, Academia Sinica) EA of the world’s top museums, artists, libraries, content but the BHL works with rights holders scholars, and photo archives, including rare to obtain permission to make in-copyright This website was launched in 2008. It stores collections not accessible anywhere else. Atlas of Mutual Heritage SEA materials openly available under Creative personal papers and collections, family and New contributions are added regularly. Commons licenses. The library has texts folk papers and institutional archives that The Artstor Digital Library provides This website hosts an incredible database from 1450s to 2000s. have been collected by the Archives of ITH straightforward access to curated images from and atlas of information, maps, drawings, for more than 20 years. The website can be reliable sources that have been rights-cleared prints and paintings of locations significant https://about.biodiversitylibrary.org accessed in Chinese and English. for use in education and research. You are to the Dutch VOC (East Indies Company) and free to use them in classroom instruction and WIC (Dutch West India Company). https://archives.ith.sinica.edu.tw handouts, presentations, student assignments, and other non-commercial educational and https://www.atlasofmutualheritage.nl

The Database of Religious History: Pre-Buddhist cults

Entry by Anna Sehnalova

cross the large geographical space of the Tibetan Plateau and the AHimalayas, cultures and societies of Asia Art Archive: speakers of Tibetic and Qiangic languages share certain religious notions and similar ‘Art’ and ‘craft’ in Sri Lanka ritual practices which do not derive from Buddhism or Yungdrung Bön (g.Yung drung Bon) but rather relate to local natural environments and social structures. Annemari de Silva addresses the marketing them as ‘designer’? Perhaps it is Being very variable and difficult to gendered and postcolonial valuations the woman from a family of businesspeople subsume under one term, these localised of ‘art’ and ‘craft’ in Sri Lanka. heading one of the biggest handloom religious cults have been called ‘popular’ retailers in the country? (Bell 1931), ‘nameless’ (Stein 1972), ‘folk’ he word ‘entrepreneur’ can mean Handicrafts, or artisanal crafts, replete (Tucci 1980), often also ‘shamanism’ or such radically different things in with cultural significations and political uses, ‘bön’ (bon), and in specific cases ‘pagan’ Ta developing country. Who, for are not surprisingly a fairly nebulous public (Ramble 2008) and ‘mundane’ (Huber instance, is the woman entrepreneur policy concern: in some countries, handicrafts 2020). They are concerned with mundane in handicrafts in Sri Lanka? Is she the policy falls under the domain of creative aims of well-being and prosperity, fecundity woman in the north coast, widowed by industries, while in others it remains under and progeniture, health, protection and the tsunami with children to care for, the small industries or enterprise. Perhaps the warfare, and general worldly success; not beneficiary of a programme to encourage only tacit assumption is that it’s not quite mass with soteriology. They most likely represent entrepreneurialism as a poverty alleviation production, nor is it automatically counted indigenous, pre-Buddhist cults of Tibet and strategy? Or is she the woman at the as ‘fine art’. Read full article and more at: the Himalayas. Find full entry at: local fair, selling bags she designed and made herself but can sell at a premium by https://tinyurl.com/AAA-HK-DeSilva https://religiondatabase.org/browse/983 The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources 31 for Asia Scholars The Focus

The East Asia Image Collection From the Richard Mammana Archive: Postcard ‘Calvary Charge’, published by the Tokyo Daily News Company, 1904-1907.

The ‘Historical Photographs of China’ Project ‘The Bund, Shanghai, ca 1929’, from the Teesside Archives collection, © 2011 British Steel Archive Project

East Asian Scroll Paintings Section of ‘Bathing Horses’, Zhao Mengfu, late 13th century

British Empire and Digital Batavia SEA The East Asia Image Indiancine.ma SA Commonwealth Collection Collection EA Maintained by the National Archives of An annotated online archive of Indian film. SA SEA EA CA Indonesia, this website includes collections An open-access archive of digitised It is intended to serve as a shared resource of advertisements, film footage, newspaper photographs, negatives, postcards, rare books for film scholars and enthusiasts in India This unique resource includes objects, clippings, paintings, and maps about Batavia and slides, hosted at Lafayette College. and beyond. artworks, photographs, films, papers and (Jakarta), the chief port of the Netherlands’ sound archives. These were donated by British Asian trading empire. https://dss.lafayette.edu/collections/east- https://indiancine.ma people who lived and worked in many parts asia-image-collection of the former empire and Commonwealth and https://bataviadigital.perpusnas.go.id/ reflect their occupations and interests. tentang The International Dunhuang https://becc.bristol.gov.uk East Asian Scroll Paintings Project: The Silk Road Online (University of Chicago) EA Digital Himalaya SA EA This website is devoted to digitizing East Chinese Text Project EA The Digital Himalaya project was Asian scroll paintings. In collaboration with IDP is a ground-breaking international designed as a strategy for archiving and a number of museums including the Tokyo collaboration to make information and images This website is an open-access digital making available ethnographic materials national museum and the Beijing Palace of all manuscripts, paintings, textiles and library of pre-modern Chinese texts. With from the Himalayan region. The site hosts Museum, here you can search for specific artefacts from Dunhuang and archaeological over thirty thousand titles and more than five a large collection of maps, rare books and paintings, artists, theme, period or museum. sites of the Eastern Silk Road freely available billion characters, the Chinese Text Project manuscripts, music and film related to on the Internet and to encourage their is also the largest database of pre-modern the region. https://scrolls.uchicago.edu use through educational and research Chinese texts in existence. programmes. http://www.digitalhimalaya.com https://ctext.org http://idp.bl.uk Filipinas Heritage Library (SEA)

Digital South Asia Library SA As a one-stop digital research centre on Cologne Digital Sanskrit the Philippines, its mission is to spark and The Internet Archive Dictionaries SA This website is based on a two-year pilot stoke interest in the visual, aural, and printed project funded by the Association of Research story of the Filipino. The website hosts a large A database of sources not covered by This website hosts lexicographic material Libraries' Global Resources Program that collection of sources focused on the formative copyright. The Internet Archive is building for Indologists including dictionaries and provides digital materials for reference and period of Philippine nationhood (1930-1950s). a digital library of Internet sites and other encyclopaedias. research on South Asia to scholars. It contains cultural artifacts in digital form. Like a paper a useful collection of resource links and other https://www.filipinaslibrary.org.ph library, it provides free access to researchers, https://sanskrit-lexicon.uni-koeln.de websites to access for those with an interest in historians, scholars, the print disabled, and modern South Asian history. the general public. Its mission is to provide ‘Universal Access to All Knowledge’. Anyone https://dsal.uchicago.edu Hathi Trust Digital Library with a free account can access nearly 500 The Database of Religious billion web pages, 28 million books and other History EA SA SEA CA MENA The Hathi trust is a not-for-profit texts, 14 million audio recordings, 6 million collaborative of academic and research videos, 3.5 million images and over half a This is an excellent resource for anyone The Documentary Film libraries, based in the USA which began in million software programmes. studying the history of religion. The website Programme SA SEA 2008. So far, they have preserved 17+ million hosts a large database where you can search digitized items. The library is focused on https://archive.org by region, for specific religions or researchers. This project covers the colonial official film books, journals and long-form texts and It also includes an interactive map, breakdown in Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaya, Malaysia includes a substantial collection of US-Asia of beliefs and practises and sources. and India. The majority of the documents were and Asia related texts. written by government officials and deal with KITLV Digital Resources SEA https://religiondatabase.org the use of the official film in the South and https://www.hathitrust.org South-East Asia region over the period from The Royal Institute of Southeast Asian 1945 to the 1970s. These documents reveal and Caribbean Studies (KITLV) has entrusted the process of colonial withdrawal from the the care of its world-famous collections to Delpher SEA region, the project of nation building and The ‘Historical Photographs Leiden University Library, which makes it an the role played by the official film in that. As of China’ Project EA invaluable repository. The resources include, This is a Dutch-language site that has such, they offer insight into the region at the among others, the Digital Media Library, the digitised millions of texts from scientific, end of empire and during the first phase of The project locates, digitises, and publishes Chinese Indonesian Heritage Center project, library and private collections. The sources independence. online photographs of China held, largely, in and the Aceh Books collection. are books, newspapers, journals, magazines, private hands outside the country. The aim is radio bulletins. Most relevant for this list https://digital.lib.hkbu.edu.hk/ to help make this virtual photographic archive https://www.kitlv.nl/resources is that the site also has a large selection documentary-film/search.php of modern China publicly available, under a of sources from the Netherlands Indies. Creative Commons licence.

https://www.delpher.nl https://www.hpcbristol.net 32 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources The Focus for Asia Scholars

Rare Books Society of India: A Zebra

A Zebra, by Mansur, opaque water- colour and gold on paper, Mughal, 1621. Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

he zebra in this painting was presented to the Mughal emperor Jahangir T(r. 1605-1627) by Mir Ja'far who had acquired it from some Turks who had travelled to India from Africa. Jahangir wrote on the painting (in Persian, the court language) that it was: “A mule which the Turks in the company of Mir Ja'far had brought from Abyssinia in the year 1030 [1620-21], completed by Nader al-Asri The Public Domain Review: [Wonder of the Age], Ustad Mansur". When Jahangir had carefully examined Japanese Firemen’s Coats it, and ensured that it was not, as some thought, a horse on which someone had painted stripes, he decided to send it to Shah Abbas of Iran, with whom he often uring the Edo period in Japan Although experiments with wooden pumps and thoroughly soaked in water before the exchanged rare or exotic presents. (1615-1868), crowded living conditions were made, limited water supply rendered this firefighters entered the scene of the blaze. The painting is part of a group known as Dand wooden buildings gave rise to more modern firefighting method impractical. No doubt the men wore them this way round the Minto Album, now divided between the frequent fires – so frequent in fact it was Each firefighter in a given brigade was to protect the dyed images from damage, V&A and the Chester Beatty Library, Dublin, said that “fires and quarrels were the outfitted with a special reversible coat but they were probably also concerned with all of which were done for Jahangir or his flowers of Edo”. The socially segregated (hikeshi banten), plain but for the name of protecting themselves, as they went about son, Shah Jahan (r. 1628-1658). brigades formed to combat these fires the brigade on one side and decorated with their dangerous work, through direct contact were made up of either samurais (buke richly symbolic imagery on the other. Made with the heroes and creatures represented https://tinyurl.com/RBSI-Zebra hikeshi) or commoners (machi hikeshi), but of several layers of quilted cotton fabric, on the insides of these beautiful garments. whatever their class, their methods were using a process called the sashiko technique, the same: they would destroy the buildings and resist-dyed using the tsutsugaki method, https://tinyurl.com/TPDR-JapaneseFirecoats surrounding the fire in an effort to contain it. these coats would be worn plain-side out

The Loewentheil Photography a host of services for the scholarly community. The Panjab Digital Library SA institutions and professional organisations. The of China Collection EA It is designed to enable people to learn and database allows users to easily locate abstracts, prepare from best practices from all over the This digital archive holds sources relating full journal articles, and research materials. This is the largest collection of early world and to facilitate researchers to perform to the Punjab area and Sikhs, including photography of China in the world. These inter-linked exploration from multiple sources. manuscripts, books, magazines, newspapers, https://ejournals.ph include a large collection of historical photographs and pamphlets. Some of the photographs taken Beijing and Shanghai https://ndl.iitkgp.ac.in resources are limited to specific organisations taken from the 1850s through the 1930s, and registered users, registration is free. to access some of the collection you need PressReader.com to contact the organization directly. http://www.panjabdigilib.org New Silk Road (NSR) at IIAS Not Asia specific, but with a subscription https://loewentheilcollection.com EA CA SA to this all-you-can-read service you will gain access to thousands of newspapers and Based at IIAS in Leiden, the New Silk The 1947 Partition Archive SA magazines from more than 120 countries. Road project is dedicated to promoting PressReader’s proprietary technology makes it Malay Concordance Project evidence research and education on What began as an idea in 2008 to possible to process thousands of newspapers SEA national and international efforts to improve acknowledge and popularize the people's every single day, extracting text and images the infrastructure and connectivity among history of Partition has been accomplished and making articles instantly translatable, This website is a project that aims to the countries of Asia and Europe. It brings through the founding and building of ‘The searchable, and easy to read on mobile help scholars share resources for the study together over 750 teachers and researchers 1947 Partition Archive’, which has preserved devices. Many libraries across the globe have of classical Malay literature. It has a large from a wide range of disciplines and nearly 9,500 memories of Partition witnesses. a subscription to this site, granting library collection of pre-modern Malay written text working in over 80 countries. Membership Through the sharing of thousands of witness members access through their connection. and articles. is open to all. accounts millions of times over the last The site hosts eight different e-libraries, decade, the 'people's history' of Partition https://www.pressreader.com/catalog http://mcp.anu.edu.au/Q/mcp.html educational resources, with articles and has been established and is now a growing news related to China’s BRI, Youtube lectures and active area of research as well as new and podcasts. documentation efforts. The Public Domain Review The Museum of Material https://newsilkroads.info https://www.1947partitionarchive.org Memory SA Not Asia specific, but this informative and highly entertaining site includes nearly This is a digital repository that preserves 1000 annotated collections of images, books, a wide range of material culture, in the form The Open Heritage People’s Archive of Rural India and film from the public domain. You can of heirlooms, collectibles and antiques, from 3D Project CA SA EA SA also browse the current articles on themes the Indian subcontinent. The repository builds including art, film, music, philosophy, religion on posts from contributors from all over the As 3D data capture becomes an PARI is a living journal and an archive, and and legends, and science, among others. world, who share stories of the objects in increasingly common method for the they are currently creating a database of If you prefer print to digital, head to the site’s their collection. By tracing histories of objects documentation of cultural heritage there published stories, reports, videos and audio ‘shop’ and order one of the ‘Selected Essays’ and family histories, the site aims to explore has emerged a growing need to assist recordings. In addition, PARI hosts video, photo, printed volumes, public domain ‘fine art narratives of tradition, culture and society of with the distribution and open access audio and text archives on rural India. PARI’s prints’, or curated postcard packs. the subcontinent. of this growing library of 3D data while content comes under the Creative Commons maintaining scientific rigor, respecting and the site is free to access. PARI is also open https://publicdomainreview.org http://www.museumofmaterialmemory.com cultural and ethical sensitivities, enhancing to new contributors to write and record. discoverability, and addressing data longevity and archival standards. In response https://ruralindiaonline.org/en to these areas of need, the Open Heritage Rare Books Society of India SA National Digital Library 3D project was developed to make primary of India SA 3D cultural heritage data open and This site is a virtual space for rare book accessible and remove the barriers for Philippine E-Journals SEA collectors and history buffs to read, discuss, The NDLI is a virtual repository of learning content producers to publish their data. rediscover and download lost books, paintings, resources which is not just a repository This is an online collection of academic photographs and other objects. Importantly, with search/browse facilities but provides https://openheritage3d.org publications from various higher education it aims to highlight the understanding that The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources 33 for Asia Scholars The Focus

there is always more than one truth in history! SEAlang projects SEA a vehicle for targeted research, and one which Wilson Center Digital Archive Sourcing from digital libraries such as The has been intelligently structured to ensure SEA EA Internet Archive, Google Books, Wikipedia This website hosts Southeast Asian efficient content discovery. The site is hosted and the online collections of various museums language reference materials. The by Routledge/Taylor&Francis, and you will The Digital Archive, overseen by the around the world, RBSI has curated these rare organization is focused on non-roman script need a subscription to access the content. Wilson Center's History and Public Policy books and images, and presented them in a languages, though more recently they have Program, contains once-secret documents context that gives them relevance and shows expanded their collection to include many https://www.southasiaarchive.com from governments all across the globe, each piece as a part of a grander whole. All languages of insular Southeast Asia, including uncovering new sources and providing fresh material posted on this site is sourced from the Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Philippines. insights into the history of international public domain and Rare Book Society of India The website contains a number of bilingual relations and diplomacy. The collection explicitly states that it does not hold copyrights and monolingual dictionaries, and tools for South Asia Open Archives contains newly declassified historical on any of this material. searching and displaying complex scripts. on JStor SA materials from archives around the world— much of it in translation and including https://www.rarebooksocietyofindia.org http://www.sealang.net This is a free open-access resource for diplomatic cables, high level correspondence, research and teaching on South Asia in meeting minutes and more. The website has English and other regional languages. SAOA's a particular focus on Southeast Asia, East collection contains a number of books, Asia, the Korean war, and the history of Reconnecting Asia The SOAS Digital Collections journals, newspapers, census data, magazines, Nuclear proliferation. EA SA SEA CA EA SA SEA CA and documents, with particular focus on social and economic history, literature, women and https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org Reconnecting Asia maps new linkages— SOAS digital collections include archives gender, and caste and social structure. roads, railways, and other infrastructure—that and manuscripts, photographs, maps, books are reshaping economic and geopolitical and journals, newspapers, oral histories, films https://www.jstor.org/site/south-asia- realities across the continent. Through data and audio. Nearly all are available freely, open-archives World Digital Library curation and objective analysis, the project twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, aims to fill Asia’s infrastructure-information all year round. While some of this content is The World Digital Library (WDL) was gap, squaring lofty ambitions with facts on protected by copyright, all of it can be used launched by the U.S. Library of Congress the ground. The project site offers analyses, with attribution under Creative Commons TANAP Databases SEA and UNESCO, with contributions from maps and databases – and also provides licence CC BY-NC. You can browse according libraries, archives, museums, educational masterclasses in the topics. to discipline or geographic region, and among The archives of the VOC (Dutch East Indies institutions, and international organizations the archives and special collections. There is Company). The website is in Dutch and around the world. Its intent is to preserve https://reconnectingasia.csis.org also a large section of language resources English and contains an exhaustive list of and share some of the world’s most important (e.g., Swahili, Rawang, Telugu, Urdu, Pali, digitised VOC documents and descriptions. cultural objects, increasing access to cultural Buriat, Batak, etc.) treasures and significant historical documents http://databases.tanap.net/ead to enable discovery, scholarship, and use. Researching Colonial History https://digital.soas.ac.uk The materials collected by the WDL make of the Malay World like it possible to discover, study, and enjoy cultural treasures and significant historical a Millennial SEA Things That Talk documents including books, manuscripts, South Asia Archive SA maps, newspapers, journals, prints and This is a fabulous new resource and guide This platform explores the humanities photographs, sound recordings, and films. from the Cultural Centre of the University of The South Asia Archive provides an through the life of objects. This site is funded by Material on specific topics can be found Malaya. The focus of this resource guide is on extensive resource for students and scholars Leiden University and explores the context and by using the site’s search and filter features. digital resources that tell us something about across the humanities and social sciences. stories of objects old and new. They are open For example, you can search by region, the Malay Archipelago, stretching back to Focusing on South Asia, the Archive contains to new curators so if you have an object you topic and/or time period. the 17th century. The guide also offers tips both serial and non-serial materials, including would like to discuss you can contact them! and ideas on how to find materials online, reports, rare books, and journal runs from https://www.wdl.org an introduction to historical thinking, as well noteworthy, rare publications. The South https://thingsthattalk.net as a guide to various communities, projects Asia Archive is a specialist digital platform and initiatives related to the colonial history providing global electronic access to culturally of the Malay World. and historically significant literary material produced from within, and about, the South https://tinyurl.com/likeamillennial Asian region. It is not merely a repository, but

Reconnecting Asia: Belt, Road, and Beyond

World Digital Library: The CSIS Belt and Road Executive Course Ethnographical Turkestan he Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a $1 trillion flagship foreign policy effort of Chinese leader Xi Jinping, Tcould reshape global networks of trade, transport, and political ties within and between countries for decades to come. But since its announcement, the BRI his photograph is from the has remained shrouded in confusion and controversy, ethnographical part of Turkestan and it now faces major challenges, including the Covid-19 TAlbum, a comprehensive visual survey pandemic. Drawing insights from leading experts and the of Central Asia undertaken after imperial Reconnecting Asia Project, the most extensive effort to Russia assumed control of the region in the map and analyze these developments to date, CSIS has 1860s. Commissioned by General Konstantin developed a Master’s-level introduction to China’s BRI. Petrovich von Kaufman (1818–82), the first This private, virtual course explains what the BRI is, what governor-general of Russian Turkestan, it is not, and how it is impacting commercial and strategic the album is in four parts spanning six realities on the ground. Check back for Fall 2021 course volumes: ‘Archaeological Part’ (two volumes); dates, coming soon! ‘Ethnographic Part’ (two volumes); ‘Trades Part’ (one volume); and ‘Historical https://tinyurl.com/CSIS-BRBcourse Part’ (one volume). The principal compiler was Russian Orientalist Aleksandr L. Kun, who was assisted by Nikolai V. Bogaevskii. The album contains some 1,200 photographs, along with architectural plans, watercolor drawings, and maps. The ‘Ethnographic Part’ includes 491 individual photographs on 163 plates. The photographs show individuals representing the different peoples of the region (Plates 1–33); daily life and rituals (Plates 34–91); and views of villages and cities, street vendors, and commercial activities (Plates 92–163). Above: ‘Syr Darya Oblast. City of Dzhizak and the Types https://tinyurl.com/WDL-SyrDaryaOblast of People Seen at the Market. Water Carrier’. Found by searching on ‘place’: Uzbekistan. 34 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources The Focus for Asia Scholars

OXUS Society for Central Asian Affairs CA The Oxus Society for Central Asian Institutes and organisations Affairs is a DC-based non-profit organization dedicated to fostering academic exchange between Central Asia and the rest of the world. Oxus provides a platform for early career researchers, practitioners and established academics by publishing research on the politics, economics, cultures, history The Ancient India & Iran Trust the pilot project that was based at the more than one million printed volumes and and societies of Central Asia. Oxus compiles SA CA MENA Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies to expand the an equivalent number of audio-visual items, original datasets and develops analytical work of digitally documenting historical and including many posters. Users can browse tools to help advance understanding This organisation, in Cambridge (UK), archaeological sites across the broader region the institute’s thousands of datasets, which of the latest developments in the region. occupies a unique position as an independent of maritime Southern Asia, including new field include millions of records on demographics, Oxus organizes workshops focused on charity concerned with the study of early survey work in Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Brunei, inequality, prices, wages, national accounts, research ethics, methods, data analysis South Asia, Iran and Central Asia, promoting and Vietnam http://maritimeasiaheritage. labour relations, etc. IISH is one of the world’s and publishing for researchers working on both scholarly research and popular interest cseas.kyoto-u.ac.jp. See the article by Michael main data hubs on socioeconomic history. Central Asia. Subscribe to their Newsletter in the area. Its primary focus is prehistory, Feener et al. on page 46 of this issue to read to stay updated. archaeology, art history, linguistics and more about this survey. https://iisg.amsterdam/en ancient languages, but this often extends https://oxussociety.org to more modern topics and other disciplines. https://en.kyoto.cseas.kyoto-u.ac.jp It has a library of over 50,000 items and organises a range of activities including ISEAS - Yusof Ishak Institute conferences, public lectures and visiting SEA Policy Forum SEA SA EA fellowships. The Centre for Asian and Transcultural Studies (CATS) ISEAS - Yusof Ishak Institute is a research This is the website of the Asia and the https://www.indiran.org centre in Singapore, offering multiple projects, Pacific Policy Society based at the Australia in Heidelberg SA SEA EA publications, and online resources: such as National University. The Asia and the Pacific their commentaries at https://fulcrum.sg; Policy Society is a community of scholars, CATS is an Asia centre of a different or their analyses of current affairs, or more policymakers, researchers, students and the The Asia Research Institute kind. It is committed to studying Asia in a in-depth analyses of contemporary policy-engaged public. The Website hosts (ARI) SA EA SEA global context and through interdisciplinary geopolitical and socio-economic forces in episodes of 4 podcast series and publishes dialogue. In CATS, four institutes from the region - all to be found at: articles on topics such as national security, ARI, at the National University of Heidelberg University, whose regional focus arts and culture and the belt and road Singapore, engages the humanities and is Asia, are joined together. Scholars at CATS https://www.iseas.edu.sg/category/ initiative. social sciences broadly defined and are specialized in a variety of disciplines articles-commentaries especially interdisciplinary frontiers such as Anthropology, Geography, History, https://www.iseas.edu.sg https://www.policyforum.net between and beyond disciplines. As a Cultural Studies, Art History, Literary university-level institute, ARI brings together Studies, Musicology, Religious Studies, scholars from different departments, Politics, Sociology, among others. The centre schools and faculties across campus for maintains research projects, a media centre, The Kern Institute SA The Textile Research Centre seminars, conferences and collaborative a ‘digital humanities unit’, various BA and research projects. The institute hosts MA degree programmes, and has recently This organization supports and promotes Based in Leiden, the Netherlands, the basic visiting researchers, organises events inaugurated their Newsletter: CATSarena. the study of South Asia, in particular India and aim of the TRC is to give the study of textiles, and maintains an academic blog called Tibet. It organises lectures and excursions, clothing and accessories their proper place in ARIscope. Its publishing department https://www.cats.uni-heidelberg.de/ provides subsidies for study trips, supports the field of the humanities and social sciences. produces working papers, manuscripts, media/catsarena.html the expansion and public use of its library The TRC does so by providing courses and a number of journals and a Newsletter. collections, and brings out a Newsletter and lectures, carrying out research and by the other publications. presentation of textiles and dress from all over https://ari.nus.edu.sg the world. The two main focal paints of the Clingendael Institute for https://www.instituutkern.nl TRC are (a) dress and identity: what people International Relations wear in order to say who they are and (b) pre-industrial textile technology. The TRC British Institute of Persian SA EA SEA CA has a large textile-based archive, much of Studies MENA SA Clingendael experts conduct policy- LeidenAsiaCentre EA which is now available online via their website. oriented analysis and research on strategic The British Institute of Persian Studies international issues. They offer policy The aim of the LeidenAsiaCentre is to https://www.trc-leiden.nl (BIPS) is the UK’s foremost learned society recommendations through our publications, generate academic knowledge on modern dedicated to promoting and supporting events and presence in the media. East Asia that can find societal applications scholarship and research excellence on all Clingendael Academy is one of the largest in the Netherlands. The LeidenAsiaCentre aspects of Iran and the wider Persianate international diplomatic training centres actively aims to expand its expertise and Tracing Patterns Foundation world, and to increasing public under- around the world. Every day, international to use this in collaboration with a growing SEA standing and knowledge of this region. professionals experience their unique training number of diverse societal partners, in The Persianate world includes territories philosophy. The institute organises numerous particular the business sector, the social Tracing Patterns Foundation (TPF) is a historically associated with Persian events and publishes prolifically, including midfield, the media, governments and community of international scholars and textile and Iranian culture and language: Iran, ‘The Clingendael Spectator’, the think tank’s academic and non-academic knowledge makers (weavers, dyers, craftspeople, textile Afghanistan, Central Asia, Transcaucasia, magazine, which is freely accessible for centres. Visit the site to find out more designers) who contribute towards building Iraq, the Persian Gulf littoral, and South all with an interest in current developments about their projects and publications. a body of research on both traditional and Asia. BIPS supports humanities and social concerning world politics. contemporary textiles around the world. TPF sciences research into this region. https://leidenasiacentre.nl/en is a collaboration of like-minded people who BIPS supports UK-based post-doctoral https://www.clingendael.org are passionate about textiles, production researchers and UK-based students to carry processes, weaving and dying techniques, out humanities and social science research symbols, patterns, cultural meanings, art, and into Iran and the Persianate world through history. TPF also provides an institutional home the award of research and travel grants. Institute for South Asia Studies for researchers seeking to conduct original field BIPS usually invites grant applications three UC Berkeley SA research. The foundation maintains a blog, times a year – in January, April and October. a mentorship program, a number of museum This site includes a large selection of online projects and also organises events. https://www.bips.ac.uk resources, produced by the institute and recommended by the institute, dedicated to https://tracingpatterns.org South Asia. Including a wide range of lecture Mercator Institute for China videos, podcasts, blog articles and interviews Studies (MERICS) (Berlin) EA Center for Southeast Asian with well-known South Asianists. Studies at Kyoto University MERICS has established itself as the https://southasia.berkeley.edu go-to European think tank on China. With (CSEAS) SEA about 20 full-time research staff from different disciplines, MERICS is currently the CSEAS offers a wide range of largest European research institute focusing resources, education and events, with International Institute solely on contemporary China studies. Based a focus on Southeast Asia. Find for of Social History in Berlin, MERICS plays an active role in TU Delft Spatial Planning example, their tremendous Newsletter here: informing European public debates on China https://newsletter.cseas.kyoto-u.ac.jp. The IISH is a distinctive institute, serving and in providing senior decision-makers Though not Asia specific, the website of the The Kyoto Review of Southeast Asia: science and society on a global scale. across Europe with in-depth China-related Spatial Planning & Strategy department at the https://kyotoreview.org; and the CSEAS At an international level, its research staff insights critical to their portfolios. Visit the Delft University of Technology presents their Online Movie Project: https://onlinemovie. generates and offers reliable information site to explore their policy briefs, briefings, international research, book updates, blog cseas.kyoto-u.ac.jp/en/index.html. and insights about the (long-term) origins, analyses, opinion pieces, etc. posts and links to events. Also hosted at CSEAS is The Maritime Asia effects and consequences of social inequality. Heritage Survey (MAHS), which builds upon The institute holds nearly 5000 archives, https://merics.org/en http://www.spatialplanningtudelft.org The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources 35 for Asia Scholars The Focus

Leiden University Libraries The Miguel de Cervantes Digital Collections SA SEA EA Virtual Library This website is the digitised and digital This site can be accessed in Spanish. Library collections born collections of Leiden University Libraries. It is a digital archive and library and includes A number of the collections are Asia specific, a history portal where you can find documents such as the ‘Balinese narrative drawings’, on Spanish colonialism. In addition, the site ‘Southeast Asian pop music’, ‘Colonial incorporates the archives of many Spanish sources’, ‘Japanese agriculture in the early libraries and museums. This site is connected 19th century’ and the ‘Kong Koan papers’. with the Spanish State Archives, accessible in both Spanish and English, which can be Bibliothèque nationale Endangered Archives https://digitalcollections.universiteitleiden.nl accessed here http://pares.culturaydeporte. de France Programme SA SEA gob.es/pares/en/inicio.html The national library of France. This This project of the British Library gives http://www.cervantesvirtual.com site gives access to a number of digitised grants to organisations to catalogue, collections and archives. The website is preserve, and digitize archives in danger accessible in both French and English, from across the world. Thanks to this scheme, although the English is poorly translated in over eight million images and 25 thousand Monash Collections Online places. The site also published a number of soundtracks have been digitized till date. SEA articles and free access to manuscripts. Collections span South Asia, Southeast Asia, and beyond. Monash University Library’s Special https://tinyurl.com/Gallica-BNF-EN Collections are an integral part of the Library, https://eap.bl.uk/search/site spanning multiple genres and mediums. Library of Congress The largest of the Special Collections held Chinese Rare Book Digital at the Matheson Library are the Rare Books, Bodleian Library Music and Multimedia, and Asian collections. Collection EA SA SEA EA Laures Kirishitan Bunko The Slavic, Asian, Yiddish language and Database EA Jewish studies collections are also among This library has almost a million images This is the website of the Chinese Rare the largest in Australasia. The collections of rare books, manuscripts, and other The materials contained in the Book Digital Collection which draws from include purchases, gifts, and donations, treasures from the Bodleian Libraries and database are collected and managed by 5,300 titles of Chinese rare books housed and are part of ongoing activities to promote Oxford college libraries. Specific South & Kirishitan Bunko Library of Sophia University. at the Asian Division of the Library of the University’s research outputs. We are Southeast Asia, and East Asia collections The focus of the collection is Japanese Congress. The collection brings together selectively digitising these collections to better are presented alongside a number of other missionary items. printed books, manuscripts, Buddhist sutras enable access to these unique and valuable regional collections. and local gazetteers among other items. research materials. Monash Collections https://digital-archives.sophia.ac.jp These materials encompass a wide array of Online is the new home for the discovery, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk disciplines and subjects in classics, history, access, and engagement with these digitised geography, philosophy, and literature. collections. Most items are available to download and reuse, unless otherwise stated. https://www.loc.gov/collections/chinese- rare-books https://repository.monash.edu

Endangered Archives Programme: Digitising Cirebon manuscripts

irebon was one of the important help to reconstruct how Islam spread Islamic Sultanates in Java, together in West Java in the period of the 15th Cwith Demak and Banten, and had century to the first half of the 20th century. been a centre for Islamic learning and the According to the latest survey, Cirebon dissemination of Islamic teachings in West manuscripts are mostly damaged because Java. Cirebon was also considered to be of inappropriate treatment and natural one of the cultural centres in the Indonesian causes. Others were neglected due to a archipelago, which can be seen in its lack of knowledge about the storage and manuscripts. handling of manuscripts. Read full text at: These Cirebon manuscripts will contribute towards the understanding of Islamic https://eap.bl.uk/project/EAP211 intellectual and cultural heritages, and will

Monash Collections Online: Japanese Fairy Tales

ffectively ending their self-isolation among the Japanese, however, the series from the western world in 1853, became hugely popular in the West. The EJapan inevitably became the object influx of 'Yatoi' or foreigners employed by the of fascination for much of the English- Japanese government, saw Hasegawa develop speaking world. Innovative publisher and key relationships with Western intellectuals, book importer, Hasegawa Takejiro, took academics, and entrepreneurs. advantage of this interest, producing the Read full description and find all items attractive and collectable, Japanese Fairy in this collection at: Tale Series (1885 - 1925). Initially, these ‘fukuro toji’, or, bound-pocket books were https://repository.monash.edu/collections/ produced for improving English literacy show/108 36 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources The Focus for Asia Scholars

Qatar Digital Library: The use of ‘Islamic’ seals

‘Performing Authority: the ‘Islamic’ Seals of British Colonial Officers’, by Daniel A. Lowe

ultural appropriation was as much a part of empire as military force. CThe use of ‘Islamic’ seals by British colonial officials is one example of this. In his record of nineteenth century Egyptian society, Edward William Lane wrote that ‘[a]lmost every person who can afford it has a seal-ring, even though he be a servant’. The function of seals as symbols of textual authority and ownership National Library of Singapore BiblioAsia: is deeply rooted in the Islamic world, especially in Arabic and Persian-speaking ‘Let there be light’ societies. Historically, seals were used for authorising various documents, including letters and legal contracts, and for marking Below: Detail of a letter the ownership of books and manuscripts. from the Regency Council Read full entry at: (majlis al-wisāyah), Published on BiblioAsia: ‘Let There Be joined by gas-lit lamps in the second half of dated 30 January 1938, Light’, by Timothy Pwee, 1 January 2021. the 19th century. Even then, street lighting was bearing the seals of https://tinyurl.com/QDL-Lowe limited to major areas in town. Streetlamps Shaikh ‘Abdullah bin ‘Isa Al Khalifah (top), Shaikh imothy Pwee enlightens us about the running on electricity were introduced in the Salman bin Hamad Al history of street lighting in Singapore, early 20th century but there were not very Khalifah (middle) and starting with the first flickering oil many of these back then. It was only after Charles Dalrymple T Belgrave (bottom). lamps that were lit in 1824. World War II that the authorities came up with IOR/R/15/2/181, f. 39r. There is something special about plans to ensure that all of Singapore’s streets Singapore at night. The glittering skyline would be lit at night. Read full article at: of the Central Business District and Marina Bay is now an iconic image, while the https://tinyurl.com/BiblioAsia-Pwee annual festive light-ups of Orchard Road, Chinatown, Geylang Serai and Serangoon Road never fail to draw a crowd intent on Above: Lighted torches taking selfies and wefies. illuminating the evening sky as coolies transport Singapore did not always sparkle after coal to refuel a ship, c. dark though. The first streetlights relied 1876. This illustration first on feeble, flickering oil lamps, which were appeared in The Graphic on 4 November 1876. Courtesy of the National Museum of Singapore, National Heritage Board.

National Diet Library (NDL) National Library of Singapore Japan EA BiblioAsia EA SEA This library can be accessed in This site hosts the newsletter of the Japanese or English and is predominantly National Library of Singapore’s archive. text based but includes over 600 audio- BiblioAsia features articles on the history, visual recordings. The archive also publishes culture and heritage of Singapore within Österreichische Smithsonian Libraries the National Diet Library monthly bulletin the larger Asian context, and has a strong Nationalbibliothek each month, which provides comprehensive focus on the collections and services of the The network of 21 specialized research information about the NDL’s collection of National Library. The National Library of The Austrian National Archives can libraries that make up the Smithsonian books and its services: digitised versions Singapore also maintains a few YouTube be accessed in German and English. The Libraries provide the Institution’s museums of rare books, periodicals, dissertations, channels featuring a collection of lectures collection is being digitised in conjunction and research centers with resources and gazettes, political materials, music and talks across a wide range of topics with Google and includes titles from the services that are as diverse and deep as manuscripts, maps, and many more. including history, art, and current events. early 16th century up to the second half the collections, exhibits, and scholarship of the 19th century. From this site you can they support. They truly span the range of https://dl.ndl.go.jp https://biblioasia.nlb.gov.sg also access physical books and journals scientific and cultural pursuits of humanity https://www.youtube.com/NationalLibrarySG that can be picked up from the associated from aerospace, anthropology, and art Austrian libraries. history to business history and botany, cultural history, design, philately, zoology, https://tinyurl.com/ONB-ANA and much, much more. These websites OAPEN - Online library include a vast collection of public domain and publication platform books and images. The digital collections include over 35,000 digitised books and OAPEN promotes and supports the transition Qatar Digital Library manuscripts as well as digitised photo to open access for academic books by providing MENA CA SA collections, ephemera, and seed catalogs. open infrastructure services to stakeholders Many of the physical collections have not in scholarly communication. They work This website is an archive featuring the yet been digitised, but you can browse the with publishers to build a quality-controlled cultural and historical records of the Gulf physical inventories of those collections collection of open access books and provide and wider region. It is hosted in partnership on the website. services for publishers, libraries, and research with the British Library. The sources are freely funders in the areas of hosting, deposit, available online for the first time. The archives https://library.si.edu quality assurance, dissemination, and digital include maps, manuscripts, sound recordings, preservation. Browse by ‘subject’, ‘publisher’, photographs and much more, complete with ‘language’, or ‘collection’ – for example: ‘Asian contextualised explanatory notes and links, history’, which has about 250 titles included. in both English and Arabic.

https://oapen.org https://www.qdl.qa/en The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources 37 for Asia Scholars The Focus

Museum digital collections

The British Museum Metropolitan Museum of Art consecutive Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (New York) (1644-1911) dynasties. The magnificent The British Museum’s website has a large architectural complex, also known as array of online resources, images of over Since 2017, the Met has made all images the Forbidden City, and the vast holdings two million records and artifacts. The site of public-domain works in its collection of paintings, calligraphy, ceramics, and also includes a large collection of articles and available under Creative Commons Zero antiquities of the imperial collections make explanation of artifacts (Collection Stories), (CC0), so around 406,000 images of it one of the most prestigious museums in with around 600,000 thousand records artworks are freely available for use. China and the world. Fun item on website: linked to Asia. download beautiful high-resolution images https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection for free to use as desktop ‘wallpaper’ https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection or to print out.

https://en.dpm.org.cn National Palace Museum Chester Beatty Museum (Taipei) EA More than a museum with outstanding Digital archives from the National Palace The Rijksmuseum collections, including those from Asia, Museum in Taipei. From 2015 the National Chester Beatty is also a research library for Palace Museum has made all images on the The National museum of the Netherlands, scholars from all over the world. Collections site free to download (CC BY 4.0). You can featuring not only the Dutch masters, but and exhibitions are displayed online, search by dynasty or category. Head to the a comprehensive and representative overview alongside a range of educational resources. tab ‘Open Data’ on the site. of Dutch art and history from the Middle Ages onwards, and of major aspects of European https://chesterbeatty.ie https://theme.npm.edu.tw and Asian art. The museum’s website is a playground for art lovers and for those Above: One of the two impressive temple wanting to learn and discover. guardians of the Asian Pavilion in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en (Kansas City) EA SEA SA The Nelson-Atkins Museum has various collections of images available online, some Shanghai Museum of which in the public domain. This includes (Shanghai) EA large East Asia, and South & Southeast Asia collections. With a focus on collecting, researching, Cleveland Museum of Art displaying and education of pre-modern EA SA SEA CA https://art.nelson-atkins.org/collections Chinese arts, the Museum has built up a collection of nearly 1,020,000 items. The Cleveland museum website contains Its multimedia section includes stunning a collection of their artifacts and records that videos introducing you to their exhibitions have been digitised including a number that The Palace Museum and collections. are linked to Asia. The museum particularly has (Beijing) EA a large collection of textile and art artifacts. https://www.shanghaimuseum.net/mu/ Established in 1925, the Palace Museum frontend/pg/en/collection/index https://www.clevelandart.org is located in the imperial palace of the

Above: Painting of a Travelling Monk, Sourced from The British Museum digital collection story ‘Exploring the Silk Roads’. Found at the Library Cave, Mogao Caves, Dunhuang, Gansu province, China, about 851-900. © The Trustees of the British Museum. Creative Commons license.

Above: Downloadable wallpaper image from The Palace Museum Beijing. 38 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources The Focus for Asia Scholars

Networking News sites

Asian Art Newspaper Eurasianet CA CA SA SEA EA MENA This is an independent news organization Academia This website focuses on what is new in that covers news from and about the South the world of Asian and Islamic art, including Caucasus and Central Asia, providing on- A networking website for academics, it can be used exhibitions, events, and auctions. It is free to the-ground reporting and critical perspectives to access and promote academic papers. Academia’s subscribe to their newsletter. The Newspaper on the most important developments in the goal is to ensure that every paper, ever written, is is available in both digital and print formats, region. Published in both English and Russian, on the internet, available for free. It aims to build the for a small price. Eurasianet strives to provide information fastest and most relevant paper distribution system useful to policymakers, scholars, and in the world. Today its algorithms make about https://asianartnewspaper.com interested citizens both in and outside 20 million paper recommendations a day. of Eurasia.

https://www.academia.edu https://eurasianet.org

CrossAsia-Repository JStor Daily CA SA SEA EA Occasionally Asia related, this interesting CrossAsia-Repository is the full-text server of online publication contextualizes current CrossAsia.org, the Specialised Information Service events with scholarship by drawing on for Asian Studies, and provides an opportunity for JSTOR’s digital library academic journals, publishing, indexing and long-term preservation of monographs, and other materials. The service documents on Asian Studies. CrossAsia-Repository also offers a number of newsletters. is a service of the University Library of Heidelberg, which within the scope of its special subject collection https://daily.jstor.org on Asian Studies offers members of the academic community worldwide the opportunity to publish their monographs, articles, lectures etc. in electronic format on the Internet at no charge.

http://crossasia-repository.ub.uni-heidelberg.de BBC Asia CA SA SEA EA

The British Broadcasting Company is a New Mandala SEA H-Net Asia long-established news broadcaster which is CA SA SEA EA principally funded through the licence fee New Mandala is an academic blog that paid by households in the UK. BBC Asia is the provides analysis and new perspectives on the Part of H-Net Humanities and Social sciences platform for the BBC’s news articles relating societies and politics of Southeast Asia. New online. The primary purpose of H-ASIA is to enable to Asia. The BBC also publishes their articles Mandala is hosted by the Australian National historians and other Asia scholars to easily in most Asian languages, for example, BBC University’s (ANU) Coral Bell School of Asia communicate current research and teaching interests; Telugu. The BBC operates a number of radio Pacific Affairs and is open to submissions to discuss new articles, books, papers, approaches, stations including BBC Asian Network, which is from the academically orientated. methods and tools of analysis; to test new ideas focused on British-South Asian lifestyles. and share comments and tips on teaching. The site https://www.newmandala.org contains numerous articles, reviews, and an online https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world/asia database of resources on the Asian regions that can https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/ be found on the second link given here. live:bbc_asian_network North Korea News EA https://networks.h-net.org/h-asia https://networks.h-net.org/node/22055/links Every day, NK News gets you behind The Caravan SA the headlines with analysis from some of the world’s leading experts on North Korea, The Caravan is India’s first long-form insight from both North Korean and defector ResearchGate narrative journalism magazine. It was voices, and opinions from academics, former relaunched in 2010 as a journal of politics and residents and leading international observers. A professional networking site for scientists culture dedicated to meticulous reporting The site intends to bring authoritative news, and researchers. Share your publications, access and the art of narrative. The stories are opinion & analysis, research tools, data and millions more, and publish your data. Connect and based on months of reporting and research, subject specialists together in one convenient collaborate with colleagues, peers, co-authors, and and are crafted into dramatic narratives place. NK News also hosts a weekly podcast. specialists. Get stats and find out who's been reading that employ pace, colour, character and Much of the site is freely accessible, but and citing your work. Ask questions, get answers, literary style. They bring the excitement and a subscription will give access to many and solve research problems. Find the right job using readability of great fiction to stories with real more services. the research-focused job board. Share updates characters, real plots and real consequences. about your current project, and keep up with The magazine works with some of the finest https://www.nknews.org the latest research. reporters and writers in South Asia, and beyond, to tackle complex subjects at a depth https://www.researchgate.net which transcends that of the daily news. Articles are published in both English and Prachatai SEA Hindi; many can be accessed freely, but full access requires a subscription. Prachatai is an independent, non-profit, Vietnam Studies Group SEA daily web newspaper established to provide https://caravanmagazine.in reliable and relevant news and information The VSG website gives you access to a large to the Thai public, particularly with regard collection of Vietnam studies related resources to human rights and Thai civil society. It has (books, journals, scholar directory, library collections, separate news sites in both English and Thai. online guides, digital collections, and teaching Coconuts SEA EA materials). Significantly there is also a networking https://prachatai.com/english discussion board, which functions through an email Coconuts is an alternative online publisher list. The discussions are public, but you will have of news, culture and lifestyle commentary to join the group to participate. from Asia's cities. They also have a Youtube channel called Coconuts TV, which focuses on Radii EA https://sites.google.com/a/uw.edu/vietnamstudiesgroup the “weird and wondrous untold stories of Asia”. RADII (rā’dē-ī’) is an independent platform of artists, writers and creators dedicated https://coconuts.co to sharing vibrant stories from the rarely The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources 39 for Asia Scholars The Focus

explored sides of new China. Founded in 2017, RADII creates multimedia content, events and interactive workshops that shine a light on the topics that connect the world’s young global thinkers together. This website publishes New mandala: Duterte’s opinion pieces, commentary, podcasts and video content on Chinese current affairs, Tight Grip over Local society, art, and technology. Politicians: Can It Endure? https://radiichina.com

Radio Free Asia SEA EA Weena Gera and Paul Hutchcroft, which had been eagerly supported by local New Mandala, 19 Feb 2021. government coalitions. In addition, the Radio Free Asia’s mission is to provide president backpedaled in delivering a financial accurate and timely news and information to he major trend in central-local relations windfall to local governments as promised in Asian countries whose governments prohibit in the Philippines under the regime of a landmark 2019 Supreme Court ruling on the access to a free press. RFA is a private, non- TPresident Rodrigo Duterte has been the primary national revenue sharing program. profit corporation, funded through an annual capacity of the presidential palace to exert a This decision, known as the Mandanas ruling, grant from the United States Agency for very tight grip over local politicians—arguably is the only major win for local politicians since Global Media. the tightest since the martial-law dictatorship Duterte came to power. Yet its implementation of Ferdinand Marcos (1972-1986). This trend has been conveniently pushed out to the very https://www.rfa.org/english has emerged even as Duterte has done end of his term in 2022. strikingly little to advance the reforms that If Duterte has failed to deliver, why do so many local politicians have been keen to many local politicians remain beholden to champion. He abandoned the federalism him? Read more at New Mandala: agenda which he had touted in the lead-up to his presidential campaign in 2016, and https://tinyurl.com/NewMandala-Duterte

Rice media SEA EA Prachatai: Protest at Government Article, 21 Feb 2021. This website publishes alternative House calls for justice for indigenous embers of the Bang Kloi indigenous commentary and opinion pieces on culture, Karen community and the activist current affairs, food, travel and video content Karen community MSave Bang Kloi Coalition have in contemporary Asia. Or in their own words: gathered at the Chamai Maruchet “Asia, Unfiltered. Rice is Asia’s alternative Bridge for the past three days to demand voice. From sex workers to politicians, protection for members of the Bang Kloi contemporary art to street food, we bring Community who returned to their ancestral fresh perspectives and bold commentary on home. everyday life in Asia”. In early January 2021, 60-70 people from the Bang Kloi community travelled https://www.ricemedia.co back to the former location of the Chai Phaen Din village, the community’s ancestral home in the Kaeng Krachan forest. The community was forcibly Southeast Asia Globe SEA evacuated from Chai Phaen Din in 1996, and for a second time in 2011, when park This website publishes daily in-depth officials burned down their houses and rice feature articles on power, money, culture, storage barns. art and the environment. Southeast Asia At the time, the authorities promised Globe is a space for some of the region’s best the community that each family would be writers and photographers to take readers allocated 7 rai of land in Pong Luek-Bang behind the headlines and into the stories that Kloi village, where they were relocated. shape people’s lives. The site is dedicated to However, they were not allocated the producing engaging stories that combine promised amount of land, and the world-class journalism with captivating land they were given is not suitable for art design. The Globe has a number of agriculture. The Covid-19 pandemic has newsletters you can subscribe to, and a also made their situation worse, as many selection of articles that are free to access, community members who leave the village but the site funds itself through subscribers. to work lost their income, leading to the decision to travel to Chai Phaen Din to live https://southeastasiaglobe.com according to their traditional ways. Read Rice Media: Lessons from full article at:

a circus performer about https://prachatai.com/english/node/9077 SupChina EA living with uncertainty “We help the west read China between the lines”. SupChina is a New York-based news platform, that informs and connects a global audience regarding the business, technology, politics, culture, and society of China. Article by Rice Media contributor SupChina publishes in a variety of mediums, Priyashini Segar organises large-scale events, and even hosts an extensive network of China-focused s a circus performer, 24-year-old podcasts. Jonathan comes face to face with risk on Aa daily basis. In striving to perfect stunts https://supchina.com like fire spinning and aerial performances, he has realized two things about life: one can never block out uncertainty, and it actually is possible to even appreciate life’s ambiguity. These days, Jonathan adopts what he calls a “philosophical” view of life. To him, challenges and risks exist to show him that the path to growth is through accepting that nothing in life can be set in stone. It was the attitude he adopted as 2020 drew to a close, and as he enters a new year where unpredictability will continue to define many of his experiences. Read full article at Rice Media:

https://tinyurl.com/ricemedia-circus 40 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources The Focus for Asia Scholars

Open access blogs and journals

Allegra Laboratory British Library Cafe Dissensus SA Chopsticks Alley SEA Asia and Africa Studies Blog “Anthropology for Radical Optimism”. With a focus on Indian media, This website focuses on the Vietnamese Allegra Laboratory is a platform for a CA SA SEA EA MENA Cafe Dissensus (based in New York) is an and Southeast Asian diasporas in the USA. large number of anthropologists and other alternative magazine dealing in art, culture, The site hosts articles, podcast episodes academics to enliven the ‘dead space’ This blog site is written mostly by literature, and politics. The magazine also and videos on contemporary culture, between standard academic publication curators in Asia and African Studies runs a blog, Cafe Dissensus Everyday. society, politics. and fast-moving public debates. Allegra seeks (one of the ‘subjects’ at the British Library), “A very specific urge behind this magazine to provide its contributors with the chance to but also includes contributions from guest is to challenge the contemporary parochial https://www.chopsticksalley.com showcase their best critical thinking, replete contributors. The blog focuses on the attitude in Indian media. We want honest with the originality of their own perspectives, collections in ‘Asian and African Studies’ debate and discussion that should not be on issues affecting the world today. As such, that have their origins in the collections colored by any fear or favor. We are not Allegra welcomes contributions in different of the British Museum and in the Library of a magazine for news reporting. We want Competing Regional formats that speak to pressing socio-political the East India Company and its successor, to devote ourselves to analyzing issues Integrations in Southeast Asia issues, broadly informed by the beauty the India Office. Altogether more than that need to be discussed and debated.” of ethnography and the critical potential 65,000 manuscripts and over 900,000 (CRISEA) SEA of anthropology. printed books cover over 500 languages https://cafedissensus.com or language groups, ranging from Chinese, CRISEA is an interdisciplinary research https://allegralaboratory.net spoken by one-third of the world’s population, project funded by the European Union’s to languages of New Guinea spoken by The Calvert Journal CA Horizon 2020 Framework Programme that only a few hundred people. Additionally, studies multiple forces affecting regional the Visual Arts collection is made up of about This journal was launched by the Calvert 22 integration in Southeast Asia and the Asian Development Review 250,000 photographs, 12,000 drawings by Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation which challenges they present to the peoples of CA SA SEA EA Indian artists, 16,000 drawings by European focuses on contemporary art and culture of the Southeast Asia and its regional institutional artists and a sizeable collection of paintings, New East (incorporating Central Asia, Eastern framework, ASEAN. The five main topics of The Asian Development Review (ADR) is the sculpture, furniture and ephemera. Europe, the Balkans and Russia). Today, the interest are the environment, the economy, journal of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) Journal is the world’s leading publication for the state, identity, and the region. Three and the Asian Development Bank Institute https://blogs.bl.uk/asian-and-african/ culture, innovation, photography and travel transversal themes – migration, gender and (ADBI), published by MIT Press. It publishes index.html in the New East. In its daily features, news, security – are examined within each Work research on development issues relevant to the photography and travel reports, The Calvert Package. Visit the site for an array of policy countries of the Asia and Pacific region. ADR is Journal stands apart for its wealth of original briefs, articles, working papers, and most Open Access. All content is freely available in research, striking photography, and clarity of interestingly: web documentaries. electronic format to readers across the globe. insight on a region that, despite its richness, often goes under-reported. http://crisea.eu https://www.mitpressjournals.org/loi/adev https://www.calvertjournal.com

Right: The Burning Kelin (Zhasau)/The Burning Daughter-in-law [Dowry] by Assel Kenzhetaeyva ‘By reimagining the national dress, one artist Below: ‘Washing-hands Guanyin’ designed by Hong Kong artist Tik Ka from East. shows what it really Image from the article ‘Why Was Thousand-hand Guanyin Late for the Meeting? means to be a woman Implications of Religious Humour During COVID19’, by Dean WANG, posted on in modern Kazakhstan’. CoronAsur, 18 June 2020. Read article at: https://ari.nus.edu.sg/20331-19

The Calvert Journal: Assel Kenzhetaeyva

Post by Yuliya Khaimovich, The Calvert national Kazakh jewellery, skirts with ethnic Journal, 25 January 2021. prints from around the region, delicate straps, and lace tights. Each garment acts as a ssel Kenzhetaeyva began her career as symbol: despite having integrated certain a fashion designer. Then, she became Western norms into their lives, Kazakh women Aa mother, and began dedicating her still carry the load of ancient traditions. practice to womanhood in all its complexity Kenzhetaeyva’s works speak to the strength and diversity. “Art has always been around and difficulties faced by women who take on me,” says Kenzhetaeyva, whose lineage many diverse responsibilities, dictated both includes opera singers, actors, and writers. by her traditional role as a mother but also “So, it was only natural that I pursued an by the modern ideal to be successful and artistic profession.” But after giving birth good-looking. Or, to quote the phrase that to her first child in 2013, the new stage in accompanied one of her paintings at the life inspired her to pursue painting. “It was UN Exhibition #Artivism for Gender Equality, a period of emotional growth. I wasn’t a “A woman rocks the cradle with one hand and little girl anymore,” she says. Now working rules the world with the other”. Read from her home in Almaty, Kenzhetaeyva’s the full article at: paintings depict women in costumes which combine elements of traditional Central https://tinyurl.com/Calvert-Khaimovich Asian dress with modern clothing, including The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources 41 for Asia Scholars The Focus

ow does the concept 퀴어 (queer) operate as a part of everyday life, Hwhen mainstream conception is QueerAsia: What is based upon the controversial Seoul pride? How are my experiences of using this word ‘Queer’ in Korean? academically in universities entangled Made in China: Doing time, with, and distance itself from this popular reception? So, it’s story time: I’d like tell you making money in Angola three brief tales to sketch my experience as a queer student activist. In their differences, ‘퀴어’가 한국말로 뭐에요? (What I explore the radical potential of the term is ‘Queer’ in Korean?): Reflections on ‘queer’ in South Korean context. Across these Navigating as Queer-identifying Student three stories of mine, one question never Activist, by Jessie Yoon. Part of the ‘Queer’ stopped haunting me. “What is 퀴어?” Read ‘Doing Time, Making Money at a criticised by suspicious observers as a form Asia 2020: Rethinking Radical Now Blog the full article at: Chinese State Firm in Angola’, by Cheryl of ‘new imperialism’, while Chinese and Series - Our blog series in lieu of cancelled Mei-Ting Schmitz. ‘Made in China’, volume Angolan state actors praised it as a pragmatic conference activities in 2020 https://tinyurl.com/QueerAsia-Yoon 5, issue 3 (Sept-Dec 2020). and mutually advantageous partnership. As an ethnographer, I was less interested n late 2013, I arrived in Luanda, the capital in casting moral judgement about ‘China of Angola, for a year of research on in Africa’ than in understanding how Ithe recent boom of Chinese investment China–Africa relations were experienced and labour migration in the region. An through everyday life. At one of our first acquaintance introduced me to Li Jun meetings, I relayed this vague anthropological (pseudonym), a 27-year-old manager at goal to manager Li. I wondered whether I a Chinese state-owned construction firm might conduct participant observation at that I will call ‘The Angola Company’. His his company’s base, which consisted of company, like many others, had come to dormitories and offices built on the corner of Angola in the early 2000s under the auspices a construction site. His response surprised me. of the massive National Reconstruction ‘I understand. You want to know not only how Program established at the end of the Chinese people work here, but also how they 27-year-long Angolan civil war. The Angolan live. But,’ he cautioned, ‘you should know one Government contracted Chinese companies thing: Chinese people do not live in Angola; to build infrastructure, paying for the projects we only work.’ Read full article at: with loans from Chinese financial institutions backed by Angolan oil. The arrangement was https://tinyurl.com/madeinchina-Schmitz

CoronAsur SA SEA EA Life as Art Asia SEA platform for queer activists, artists, and Servants’ Pasts SA This is a blog about art and artists academics is done in an entirely voluntary This is a research blog hosted by the based in Bali & Indonesia. capacity. They strive to build a global platform The blog focuses on the history of Religion and Globalisation Cluster at the from which to challenge dominant ideas, forms, domestic servants and service in South Asia. Asia Research Institute, National University https://lifeasartasia.art and representations of gender and sexuality. The project ‘Domestic Servants in Colonial of Singapore. Grounded in Asia, with The platform also has a YouTube channel. South Asia’ (DOS), which ran from 2015-2018, a global and comparative outlook, Religion is an attempt at two levels: one, to write the and COVID-19 curate reflections, analysis, https://queerasia.com history of the servant-subaltern, which is opinions, commentary pieces, photographic Made in China EA almost marginal in South Asian accounts, essays and multimedia contributions and second, through the history of servants written by scholars and practitioners at the The Made in China initiative rests on two rewrite the social, cultural and labour histories interface of the COVID-19 pandemic, religious pillars: the conviction that today more than Roadwork Asia CA EA of South Asia. The project’s temporal scope communities and their ritual practices. ever it is necessary to bridge the gap between is from the mid-eighteenth to mid-twentieth the scholarly community and the general Research project conducting ethnographic century. https://ari.nus.edu.sg/coronasur-home public, and the related belief that open fieldwork along roads that have been access is necessary to ethically reappropriate designated as key links at the Sino-Inner Asian https://servantspasts.wordpress.com academic research from commercial interface of the China-initiated Silk Road publishers who restrict the free circulation Economic Belt. The site tracks the project’s The Hatha Yoga Project SA of ideas. Starting as a monthly newsletter research, events, publications, social media in Italian aiming to spread awareness of the and even an online exhibition. The team The South Asia Multidisciplinary South Asia focused, hosted by SOAS, this complexities and nuances underpinning has also been maintaining a personal blog Academic Journal (SAMAJ) SA research project addresses the history of socioeconomic change in contemporary (Viral Infrastructure) during the pandemic Yoga. The site contains access to a number Chinese society, Made in China progressed with their thoughts and feelings: This website is a double-blind peer- of publications, a page devoted to resources into a quarterly journal with a specific focus “As anthropologists of infrastructure, we reviewed, open access, journal devoted to on the topic and a blog. on Chinese labour and civil society in English turn our gaze to infra-structures and objects research in the social sciences and humanities language. From that point on, the project in the time of COVID-19. To empty park benches, on South Asia. http://hyp.soas.ac.uk quickly developed in previously unforeseen closed borders and refrigerators exploding directions, including not only the journal, but with their contents. To letterboxes, face masks, https://journals.openedition.org/samaj also book series, summer schools, and other bottles of disinfectant, but also tractors, events. The Made in China journal that you aeroplanes, television screens, balconies, Himalaya: The Journal of see today is published in partnership with camper vans and credit cards. Confined to the Association for Nepal ANU Press and is freely accessible online. our home offices in countries under lockdown, we write, in a freestyle manner, about these and Himalayan Studies SA EA https://madeinchinajournal.com silent participants in our lives. And we marvel at how far humans can be called Homo HIMALAYA is a biannual, open access, infrastructuralis”. peer-reviewed journal published by the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies. Modern Yoga Research SA https://roadworkasia.com On this website you can access the journal and its archive of articles. This website is focused on modern yoga and is a great resource for finding established https://himalayajournal.org and current research into modern yoga and, Sarai, Centre for the Study more generally, about some of the most of Developing Societies SA informative research on earlier forms of yoga. The website hosts a podcast, and provides Over the last two decades, the Sarai History of Science in access to a number of articles on the topic. programme at CSDS has arguably been South Asia Journal SA South Asia’s most prominent and productive South Asian American Digital http://www.modernyogaresearch.org platform for research and reflection on Archive SA The History of Science in South Asia the transformation of urban space and Journal, hosted by the University of Alberta, contemporary realities, especially with regard This archive is specifically focused on publishes the latest international research to cities, data and information, law, and the history of South Asian Americans and in the history of science in South Asia. QueerAsia SEA SA EA media infrastructures. The website includes includes 4,154 items ranging from journals, The journal provides open access to research on urbanity, media, and law and photographs to periodicals. The site allows all its content via the website. ‘Queer’ Asia is a collective of early career gives access to a number of their publications you to search by topic, time, languages researchers, doctoral researchers, and and essays. and states. https://journals.library.ualberta.ca/hssa/ activists, currently housed at SOAS, University index.php/hssa/index of London. Their work to create a global https://sarai.net https://www.saada.org 42 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources The Focus for Asia Scholars

Podcasts

The Asian Review of Books The China in Africa debates from the iconic Jaipur Literature New Books Network Podcast CA SA SEA EA MENA Podcast by SupChina EA Festival, setting off conversations even when CA SA SEA EA MENA away from the Pink City. Their website hosts The Asian Review of Books has an archive This podcast is “A weekly discussion a number of South Asia related podcast This is a podcast network for books, of more than two thousand book reviews. about China’s engagement across Africa episodes and they have a YouTube channel which you can search according to a number The ARB also features long-format essays by hosted by journalist Eric Olander in Hanoi where you can watch past events and talks. of topics and/or regions, such as South Asia, leading Asian writers and thinkers, excerpts and Asia-Africa scholar Cobus van Staden Southeast Asia, East Asia, Korea, Central Asia, from newly-published books and reviews of in Johannesburg”. If you are interested https://jlflitfest.org Indian Ocean World, Chinese, Asian-USA, etc. arts and culture. It provides an unparalleled in learning more about China’s investment https://www.youtube.com/user/JprLitFest There is also a section called Asian Review forum for discussion of key contemporary in Africa and about the newest develop- of Books. The podcasts are available on their issues by Asians for Asia and a vehicle of ments in China-Africa relations. It provides website but also on Spotify, Stitcher, and intellectual depth and breadth where leading interesting perspectives on China’s Apple podcasts. The network also accepts thinkers can write on the books, arts and presence in Africa. pitches if you have a book to discuss. ideas of the day. The site also hosts a weekly podcast featuring interviews with authors. https://supchina.com/series/the- https://newbooksnetwork.com china-in-africa-podcast https://asianreviewofbooks.com/content/ category/podcast Jaipur Literature Festival SA Majlis Podcast CA The Belt and Road Podcast The Jaipur Literature Festival is a flagship CA SA SEA EA event of Teamwork Arts, which produces This podcast is hosted by Radio Free over 25 highly performing arts, visual arts Europe/Radio Liberty Central Asia Report. This is a highly informative podcast by and literary festivals across more than It hosts renowned speakers and experts Erik Myxter-iino and Juliet Lu. The podcast 40 cities globally. Every year, the Festival of the region who discuss the most pressing gives insight into various BRI projects from brings together a diverse mix of the world’s topics of Central Asia. an ‘on the ground’ perspective, providing greatest writers, thinkers, humanitarians, plenty of ethnographic details. politicians, business leaders, sports people https://www.rferl.org/majlis-talking- and entertainers on one stage to champion asia-podcast https://www.buzzsprout.com/196316 the freedom to express and engage in thoughtful debate and dialogue. Described as the ‘greatest literary show on Earth’, the Jaipur Literature Festival is a sumptuous feast of ideas. The Jaipur Bytes podcast delivers thought-provoking ideas and meaningful

The China in Africa Podcast: ‘China and the geopolitics of COVID-19 vaccines in Africa’

Published 15 February 2021 jabs available in the coming months. Similarly, a new air bridge between the OVID-19 vaccines are finally two regions, to facilitate the transportation starting to make their way to and distribution of vaccines throughout Cthe world’s poorest countries Africa, is now operational. as production of Chinese, Russian, Nwachukwu Egbunike, the sub-Saharan and Indian jabs ramps up. But it’s the community manager for the independent large-scale distribution of Chinese journalism website Global Voices, says the vaccines that’s causing a lot of people West isn’t in a good position to complain around the world, particularly in about China’s ‘vaccine diplomacy’ given the U.S. and European countries, to how little it’s doing to help the situation. become increasingly worried about Nwachukwu joins Eric and Cobus to the geopolitical ramifications. discuss a two-part series he wrote on the In Africa, the Chinese have exported geopolitical ramifications of COVID-19 vaccines to half a dozen countries and vaccine distribution for China, Africa, The Asian Review of Books Podcast: are in talks with dozens more to make and Western countries. Three Asian Divas

ARB podcast with David Chaffetz, them to break free of the gender roles that author of “Three Asian Divas: Women, Art pervaded their societies. In "Three Asian and Culture In Shiraz, Delhi and Yangzhou” Divas: Women, Art and Culture in Shiraz, Delhi and Yangzhou", David Chaffetz briefly he ‘diva’ is a common trope when we explores how these 'Asian divas' could talk about culture. We normally think be seen as some of the first recognizably Tof the diva as a Western construction: 'modern women'. Read more and listen the opera singer, the Broadway actress, to this podcast at: the movie star. A woman of outstanding talent, whose personality and ability are https://tinyurl.com/ARB-Chaffetz both larger-than-life. But the truth is that throughout history, Above: Gauhar Jân (1873-1930) was an Indian singer and dancer from Kolkata. She was one many cultures have featured spaces for of the first performers to record music on 78 rpm strong female artists, whose talent allows records in India. The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 www.iias.asia/resources Online Resources 43 for Asia Scholars The Focus

Social media and listservs

Asian Feminist French Colonial History International Institute Sinologists EA CA SA SEA EA MENA Society SEA for Asian Studies The Sinologists Facebook group is A curated collection of the latest A private Facebook group, which CA SA SEA EA a professional, scholarly community, publications and news on sexuality offers a discussion space for French and membership is open to all scholars and gender in Asia. colonial history. Keep up-to-date on the latest editions and professionals working in Chinese of the Newsletter, the latest publications, studies. https://www.facebook.com/ https://www.facebook.com/ online events, calls for papers and news TheAsianFeminist groups/1627205484163791 from IIAS! On the IIAS Youtube channel https://www.facebook.com/groups/ you can find recordings of webinars and sinologists/about conferences as well as updates about ICAS (International Conference for Asia Scholars).

https://www.facebook.com/asianstudies https://twitter.com/AsianStudies https://www.youtube.com/AsianStudies

Chinese Storytellers EA South Asian Studies Group SA

China-USA journalists and writers keeping Indian Ocean Studies A large private group, useful for you up to date on the latest news stories. listserv SA finding online lectures and latest books on SA, particularly from researchers https://twitter.com/CNStorytellers This list is primarily aimed at those based in SA. involved in Indian Ocean Studies in the humanities and the social sciences. https://www.facebook.com/groups/ This does not exclude researchers from Raphael Rashid EA southasianstudies other disciplines, however, and all with an interest in the Indian Ocean are Korean and English Language welcome to join. Subscribe here: journalist with a focus on Korean news.

https://tinyurl.com/IOSlistservSubscribe https://twitter.com/koryodynasty

Webinars and MOOCS

Berkeley 2020 Conference IIAS Webinars Mouse and Manuscript SASNET SA on Post-Imperial Oceanics SA CA SA SEA EA CA MENA Swedish South Asian Studies Network Catch up on lectures from this 2-day The International Institute for Asian This website hosts lessons in codicology at Lund University - with a newsletter, virtual conference. The conference focused Studies hosts a series of Webinars and and palaeography based on manuscripts podcasts and webinars. on the fragmented, layered and linked other events. from the Middle East, Islamic Africa and oceanic imperial processes, to think with Asia. Lessons are based on manuscripts held https://www.sasnet.lu.se the creative tensions between sociocultural https://www.iias.asia/events predominantly by Leiden university. The https://www.youtube.com/ processes across oceanic surfaces, and https://www.youtube.com/AsianStudies project is the initiative of Dorrit van Dalen and SASNETLundUniversity the mysteries of the submarine. Peter Webb, but includes other contributors https://soundcloud.com/sasnetlund with backgrounds in manuscript traditions. https://southasia.berkeley.edu/pio-videos https://mouse.digitalscholarship.nl/lessons

Chester Beatty Museum SA SEA Politics East Asia EA Talks, audio tours, webinars, workshops Whether you are an academic, student, and activities. policy-maker, journalist, or East Asia enthusiast, this website and blog aims to help https://www.youtube.com/ you get your bearings in the complex and ChesterBeattyDublin often challenging field of East Asian politics. This site includes useful introductions to King’s India Institute methods of online research orientated to East Seminar Series SA Asia, aimed at undergraduate students, but also includes articles on issues relating to The India Institute, King’s College London, digital East Asia, curated by Leiden university runs regular seminars on topics relating to lecturer Florian Schneider. India and its global impact, including guest TU Delft SA SEA EA speakers, book launches, and film screenings. http://www.politicseastasia.com Seminars will be held fortnightly on Thursdays An array of online courses, including from 12:00-13.30, online until further notice. Asia-related subjects.

https://www.kcl.ac.uk/events/series/ https://online-learning.tudelft.nl/courses kings-india-institute-seminar-series 44 Digital repositories Preserving culturally significant objects The Network for present and future generations.

Preserving manuscripts for future generations Below: Mrs Wiwin Indiarti, S.S. M.Hum. with Mbah Haliyah in Banyuwangi at the The digital repository of endangered and affected tip of East Java, Indonesia; returning one of his manuscripts after digitisation. manuscripts in Southeast Asia (DREAMSEA) Photograph DREAMSEA.

Dick van der Meij and Jan van der Putten

In Southeast Asia a large number of handwritten manuscripts abound that contain a wide array of, mostly, religious subjects and that are written in a large variety of languages and scripts. A substantial number of these Digitisation, metadata University of Hamburg in Germany, PPIM, manuscripts have been preserved in public collections and the Hill Museum and Manuscript Library and preservation (HMML), which is based in Minnesota, USA. The inside and outside Southeast Asia, but a surprisingly The DREAMSEA programme was set programme is funded by a generous grant from large amount of these culturally significant objects are up against the background of the ongoing the Arcadia Foundation in the United Kingdom. degradation of cultural diversity and has The fact that Southeast Asian manuscripts in private hands or stored in semi-public collections of the aim to ensure that the contents of the were written using a large variety of scripts institutions, such as palaces, temples and other places manuscripts are preserved for present and and languages makes the execution of the future generations. We have embarked on an programme quite challenging. One of the of religious study and worship in the region. Deliberate or ambitious course comprising the digitisation of most complex issues is the metadata, which unintended neglect, climate, natural disasters and more, as many endangered manuscripts as possible. needs to be accurate and correct. To execute It will involve storing these surrogate images on this in a satisfactory manner, we call in the put an increasing number of manuscripts in jeopardy. servers and converting them to other formats help of experts who are informed and/or The DREAMSEA programme was set up to ensure that the in the future. We will then upload these images part of the manuscript traditions themselves to an open-access database, providing reliable to write down and check the information contents of the manuscripts are preserved for present metadata about the manuscripts to assist users about the physical characteristics of the and future generations. of the database to form an impression of the manuscript and the text(s) contained in them. physical manuscripts and supply information In Indonesia, DREAMSEA works together for their research. Although not included as with members of the Indonesian Association one of our main aims, we also develop efforts for Nusantara Manuscripts (MANASSA, to preserve the physical manuscripts by Masyarakat Pernaskahan Nusantara); they Lost forever means that they are often the victim of advising their owners about better ways to live all over the country and use their networks In the largest country in Southeast Asia, simple unintended neglect. The humid store and handle them. DREAMSEA has its of manuscript owners and enthusiasts to help Indonesia, the number of manuscripts in tropical weather conditions we encounter in regional office at the premises of the Center us detect and negotiate access to endangered private collections alone is staggering. They large parts of the region are detrimental for for the Study of Islam and Society (PPIM) of the collections in private hands. In mainland may be found from Aceh on the tip of Sumatra the preservation of manuscripts, especially Syarif Hidayatulah State Islamic University in Southeast Asia, this kind of network does all the way east to Papua, and from the when they are written on paper. Insects and Jakarta. The programme is executed through not exist, and DREAMSEA relies on help from Minahassa in the north to the royal palaces other pests, too, have that effect as these a cooperation between the Centre for the academics and other groups of manuscript of Central Java. In mainland Southeast Asia animals feed on the organic materials. Study of Manuscripts Cultures (CSMC) at the experts. DREAMSEA also cooperates with manuscript lovers and guardians of temples Natural and social disasters further add have established repositories to store their to the circumstances that make handwritten highly valued and often venerated heirlooms. manuscripts in Southeast Asia highly There is a network of Buddhist convents endangered, and put their physical built around Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, existence in jeopardy. Vietnam and Cambodia, that include small The manuscripts frequently remain the pavilions where the sacred texts are kept. only witnesses of a substantial number of texts The manuscript cultures in the region, with the that are still unedited and therefore unknown practice of copying texts by hand, continued in any other form. This means that when the most pertinently in the religious culture, manuscripts disappear or are destroyed, their whereas the more secular parts of social life contents are lost forever, not only for scholars Right: A so-called 'buk' were informed with texts that were much less but also for the general interested public. in Indramayu on Java's involved in rituals and could be multiplied and The loss of these texts means that part of the north coast. In this region, old manuscripts are not preserved in other ways. We encounter similar diversity in the cultural and religious outlook destroyed but put in a trends in insular Southeast Asia where small of the peoples in the region will disappear bag. The bag is used Islamic educational centres frequently have with them. Within the religious and cultural during ceremonies, but their repositories. At the same time, Balinese traditions there is a tendency for small groups, is never opened, so no temples, Chinese shrines and Christian with their own exegetic practices, to be one knows its contents. institutions will have retained some of their regarded as deviant by the majorities who DREAMSEA was allowed to have one 'buk' opened cultural heritage of handwritten documents. are informed by the transnational mainstream to digitise its contents, Many of these manuscripts are not religious practices that are considered to be as far as possible. preserved in a professional way, which in agreement with ‘modern times’. Photograph DREAMSEA. The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 45 The Network

Below: DREAMSEA staff digitising a paper manuscript in Surau Simaung, West Sumatra, Indonesia, on 9 September 2019. Photograph DREAMSEA.

Above: Returning In its attempts to preserve this cultural manuscripts to the Vat heritage and diversity throughout Southeast Pak Chaek village temple Asia, DREAMSEA endeavours to find as many monastery, by the abbot, manuscripts from as many different back- novices and lay people from the Pak Chaek grounds as possible. This is easier said than village community and done. Not infrequently, people are ignorant the DREAMSEA team of about their content and value, or they are Luang Prabang, Laos, embarrassed or secretive about their existence on 9 January 2020. out of fear of ridicule, or even physical threat Photograph by Bounsou because others believe the manuscripts contain Saytham. deviant texts. In each case, we will need to assess whether the manuscripts brought to our attention are indeed endangered. It transpires that most manuscripts brought to us are threatened simply because of the tropical climate and the fact that they are in the hands of people who do not know how to preserve them professionally. The fact alone that they are in private hands is another reason for their endangeredness. Once the collector dies or decides to get rid of his collection, the manuscripts are either lost or end up in private collections that may not be accessible. This fact presented yet another dilemma for us. We had to consider whether to digitise entire collections or only certain parts of them. We solved this issue in a rather practical and straightforward way. Choosing the National Library of Indonesia staff to and how they were used and transmitted, provisional titles may be inaccurate, and other only selected manuscripts would mean that assist manuscript owners with improved a special photographer cum videographer is mishaps can also occur. Therefore, we invite our present-day interests would decide not preservation methods for their collections. part of the team. The information gathered is researchers and other interested parties who to include what others in the future might In a nutshell, the DREAMSEA proactive used to form a picture of the present manuscript find mistakes in the online repository to report deem to be of crucial importance. Therefore, procedure is as follows. DREAMSEA or situation, which is used to design a strategy to such inaccuracies, so that we can improve we decided to digitise entire collections. MANASSA staff members approach manuscript help owners better preserve their manuscripts. the catalogue. So far manuscripts have The digitised manuscripts stay with their owners, or they contact DREAMSEA or At various stages during the process, the been digitised from Luang Prabang in Laos, owners. As a token of appreciation of their MANASSA themselves. After this initial step, metadata and manuscript images are checked Lamphun in Thailand and in many places in willingness to have their collections digitised manuscript owners or MANASSA members for quality. The metadata is translated into Indonesia in Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi and Bali. and for the very fact that they built these may submit a proposal to the DREAMSEA English and, along with the images, is sent At present, more than 150.000 images have collections, they receive a framed certificate office in Jakarta for the digitisation of their to HMML in Minnesota to be uploaded to been processed, of which more than 27.000 with a picture of one of the manuscripts. manuscripts. The proposal is assessed and, the DREAMSEA cloud. This quality control is are now available in the DREAMSEA Cloud. They also receive a hard disk with the digital if approved, a mission is sent to the owner to complex and very time consuming because images of their manuscripts, and sometimes photograph the manuscripts. A team usually of the large number of languages and scripts we present them with cupboards or boxes to consists of 5 persons: one photographer, that need to be deciphered and, of course, Cultural heritage store the collection in a dust-free environment. one assistant photographer, an academic due to the enormous diversity of manuscript expert, and assistant academic expert and contents. We regularly encounter incomplete and diversity an assistant. Where necessary, manuscripts manuscripts, often with missing pages at the Texts in Southeast Asian manuscripts Stay informed are cleaned before being photographed. start, which makes it very difficult to quickly have lost much of their initial practical Building on a community of stakeholders The cleaning of the manuscripts needs to be identify texts contained in the manuscripts. value and relevance for everyday life, and and a network of informants is crucial to done very carefully so as not to damage them Particularly in the case of the quite common much information can be gathered from finding the smaller collections of manuscripts even more. They are written on a large variety Multiple-Text Manuscripts (MTMs), i.e., books and, of course, from the internet; and to showing how much fun studying these of materials ranging from different types of manuscripts containing a variety of (fragments yet, as mentioned above, a substantial manuscripts may be. DREAMSEA uses social paper, palm-leaf, bamboo and tree bark. These of) texts, the identification of the items can be number of texts have never been edited media to inform the public what is being done writing supports come in all kinds of sizes, from a very time-consuming effort. Frequently, the nor have they appeared in book form, and and to attract attention for the study and use extremely small to large scrolls of many meters texts in the manuscripts are without title, therefore may reveal hidden treasures that of handwritten manuscripts. You can connect long. To ensure that the team records crucial and the DREAMSEA staff has to provide one, add to the knowledge we have of the past. with us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, information about the manuscript themselves, so that researchers at least get an idea of what The manuscripts that act as containers of the whilst more about current and future activities the place where they are kept, their owners, type of text it is. As a matter of course, these texts can tell us much about how texts went can also be found on the DREAMSEA website. from one place to the other and reveal the intercultural, interreligious and interhuman Dick van der Meij, DREAMSEA's contacts throughout the region in the (recent) Academic Advisor and Liaison Officer past, and sometimes even in the present since [email protected] some manuscript cultures are continued. Jan van der Putten, Professor We should not forget that the majority of Austronesistik, Universität Hamburg, the manuscripts in the region were made Primary Investigator (PI) DREAMSEA recently and many, if not most of them, are [email protected] no older than 100 to 150 years. This means that until recently, the contents of these manuscripts were disseminated in manuscript DREAMSEA form only. This adds to their value as no Website: https://dreamsea.co other sources are available to tell us what Blog: http://blog.dreamsea.co Left: Dramatic storing people thought and how they expressed their Repository: https://www.hmmlcloud.org/ conditions in Indonesia thoughts in words. Manuscripts also feature dreamsea/manuscripts.php raise the question prominently in the discovery and revived Instagram: @dreamsea_mss if digitising is feasible appraisal of nations’ cultural heritage, but (#saveourmanuscripts) at all. Collection of perhaps particularly of specific individual Twitter: @dreamsea_mss La Ode Zaenu, Bau-Bau, small communities. They are often used as (#saveourmanuscripts) Southeast Sulawesi, heirlooms of a community’s highly cultured Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ Indonesia. 25 August dreamseaproject past, that is almost forgotten but is worthy 2018. Photograph YouTube: DREAMSEA Manuscripts DREAMSEA. of being preserved and restored. 46 Digital archives Documenting critically endangered cultural The Network heritage across maritime Southern Asia

significant populations of Hindus, Muslims and Christians. Brunei presents a concentrated case study of a rich local heritage formed out of centuries of interaction between Chinese, Malay Muslim, and indigenous populations, The Maritime Asia while Vietnam provides the survey with Below: The MAHS field coverage of a remarkable heritage of Cham team documenting coral- Hinduism alongside rich histories of localized stone grave markers at an old Muslim cemetery expressions of Buddhism, Confucianism, and on HA. Mulhadhoo in the Christianity. Indonesia has historically been Heritage Survey Maldives. one of the world’s most dynamic locales of cultural interaction, situated as it is at the crux of maritime trade between the two great R. Michael Feener, monsoon systems of Southern Asia. While Patrick Daly and today it is the world’s most populous Muslim Noboru Ishikawa nation, its diverse heritage also reflects historical experiences of and interactions between Hinduism, Buddhism, Chinese traditions, Christianity, and a great number of indigenous cultures. These countries provide an incredible wealth of material that has the potential to serve as a particularly rich resource for comparative study to deepen our understanding of the complex heritage of maritime Southern Asia in broader contexts. In each of these countries, the MAHS works with our local partners to hire, equip, and train national survey teams to conduct full-time heritage survey and documentation. We will create, preserve and make open- access records of diverse and historically significant forms of material culture produced over centuries of commercial and cultural interactions across this region. Our in-country field teams deploy digital technologies including GPS/RTK (Real-Time Kinetic) mapping, digital photography, documentary video, oral history interviews, IIIF (International Image Interoperability Framework) standard manuscript digitizations, CAD architectural plans and elevations, as well as aerial and terrestrial LiDAR to produce rich, multimedia The Maritime Asia Heritage Survey (MAHS) is a new documentation of sites in our survey area. five-year project supported by the Arcadia Fund to The MAHS combines this field documentation carried out by members identify and document vulnerable heritage resources of the project teams in each country and across maritime Southern Asia within an open-access rapidly eroding, and coastal urban areas are collaborative work with a range of existing literally sinking as groundwater is depleted. initiatives across the region to integrate and permanently preserved digital archive. The It is estimated that climate change will increase existing data sets into a new framework within MAHS Project is a partnership between the Center for sea-levels by between 1 and 3 meters by the a robust, user friendly, and stably preserved end of this century, potentially inundating tens online archive. This will make a wealth of new Southeast Asian Studies (CSEAS) at Kyoto University, of thousands of square km, displacing millions material from multiple countries across the the Earth Observatory of Singapore (EOS) at Nanyang of people, and further eroding the region’s region available in open access, to facilitate endangered cultural heritage. the comparative study of the connected Technological University, and national-level institutions To make matters worse, heritage sites histories of these maritime Asian societies, in each of the countries where we work. in many parts of Asia are under immense as well as for use in heritage management pressure from rapid and largely unplanned programs and by local communities. The development and urbanization. Historic full project data set will also be permanently neighborhoods have been razed or archived in the digital repositories of Kyoto fundamentally altered to accommodate University and the Bodleian Library’s Oxford he seasonal monsoon cycles of intangible, and natural heritage. However, urbanization, while a wide slate of intangible Research Archive. Large point-cloud files for maritime Southern Asia have facilitated this work tends to favor sites that are boldly cultural heritage and traditional practices LiDAR scans and photogrammetry will also be Tthe circulation of people, materials, monumental, play important roles within are jeopardized by the rush to modernize. made available through Creative Commons and ideas across a vast seascape over national tourist economies, and/or fit within Finally, the rise of political, ethnic, and licensing through https://openheritage3d.org. the past two millennia. The history of the contemporary national (or nationalistic) religious extremism has led to the desecration The MAHS digital archive can be accessed at: region has been shaped by historically narratives. This can be seen, for example, of heritage that belongs to a number of http://maritimeasiaheritage.cseas.kyoto-u. inter-connected societies stretching from in the attention to large sites such as Angkor cultural communities that comprise minorities ac.jp. the deserts of the Middle East and Indian Wat in Cambodia, Borobudur in Indonesia within the borders of modern nation-states. sub-continent, to the jungles of island and Hue City in Vietnam. Less attention has If the cultural heritage sites of these regions Southeast Asia and port cities along the been allocated to document and preserve are not documented soon, they may be lost Participate Chinese coast. Complex maritime circulations heritage sites of more modest scale that reflect forever, along with the incalculable knowledge We are always open to considering of commerce and cultures created dynamics the diverse experiences of local communities about the histories they embody. new collaborations to enhance the digital in which trans-regional cultural and religious across this interconnected region. documentation of heritage across the traditions merged with unique local forms The history of maritime interactions across region both within and beyond the specific of expression, producing diverse forms of much of Southern Asia is a history of sojourners Documenting vulnerable countries where fieldwork is currently material culture. The history of the region and migrants that often complicates religious underway. Interested organizations are has also been shaped by complex and often or ethno-nationalist heritage narratives heritage resources welcome to contact us at: MAHS@cseas. volatile environmental conditions, in which and is thus often neglected or downplayed The Maritime Asia Heritage Survey (MAHS) kyoto-u.ac.jp. natural hazards have long posed significant within the region. The heritage sites that is a new five-year project supported by the challenges for peoples and polities across reflect this are, moreover, difficult to preserve, Arcadia Fund to identify and document R. Michael Feener, Kyoto University the region. Today, these same environmental manage, and study because of the inherent vulnerable heritage resources across maritime Center for Southeast Asian Studies/ pressures, coupled with the accelerating geographic decentralization across the Southern Asia within an open-access and Associate Member, Oxford University impacts of global climate change, pose borders of modern nation-states. Any effort to permanently preserved digital archive. The Faculty of History, Principal Investigator and Project Leader potentially insurmountable challenges to the preserve this maritime heritage thus requires MAHS Project is a partnership between the survival of the rich cultural heritage situated a multi-national scope and a range of local Center for Southeast Asian Studies (CSEAS) Patrick Daly, Earth Observatory along Southern Asia’s coasts, deltas, and partnerships to engage with the material at Kyoto University, the Earth Observatory of of Singapore, Co-Investigator archipelagoes. The Maritime Asia Heritage legacy of the trans-regional cultural dynamics Singapore (EOS) at Nanyang Technological Noboru Ishikawa, Kyoto University Survey is a new multi-national effort, produced by a constant stream of maritime University, and national-level institutions Center for Southeast Asian Studies, supported by the Arcadia Fund (a charitable interactions over the history of the region. in Indonesia, Brunei, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Co-Investigator fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin), By definition, maritime sites are generally and the Maldives. to document critically endangered cultural located in low-lying coastal areas and We are focusing on these five countries heritage in this region. on deltas that are highly vulnerable to a because together they present a rich inter- combination of natural hazards, subsidence, linked history of complex cultural circulations Notes and climate change. Major tsunami, cyclones, that are reflected in heritage sites vulnerable floods, and earthquakes have devastated to a combination of environmental and human 1 Patrick Daly et al. 2019. ‘Archaeological Trans-regional cultural Evidence that a late 14th-century Tsunami communities across maritime Asia. This has threats. The Maldives is a former Buddhist dynamics Devastated the Coast of Northern Sumatra also resulted in extensive damage to cultural society that has over the past millennium and Redirected History’, Proceedings of Governments and donors have heritage – as we have extensively documented become thoroughly Islamicized. Sri Lanka is the National Academy of Sciences of the invested significant resources to preserve in parts of Indonesia hit by the 2004 Indian predominantly Buddhist but still a remarkably United States of America 116.22; and document aspects of Asia’s tangible, Ocean Tsunami.1 Major river deltas in Asia are diverse society including historically https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1902241116 The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 IIAS Double Degree Challenges of 47 in Critical Heritage Studies studying abroad The Network

The Double Degree in Critical Heritage Studies A most rewarding challenge

Edwin Pietersma In March 2018, I graduated with an MA in Asian Studies from Leiden University, opting for the IIAS Double Degree in Critical Heritage Studies. Edwin Pietersma in the 'Sweat Room' of the Through this programme, I also graduated with an MA from the Department Leiden University Academy Building, where after graduation he was allowed to sign his name on of Anthropology at National Taiwan University in January 2020. the wall, in accordance with university tradition.

y studies in Leiden and then at National successful stay. Therefore, from August 2018 apparent in the second semester with the of the received kindness. Here, I want to Taiwan University (NTU) are experiences to February 2019, I enrolled in a Mandarin arrival of two other students from Leiden, express my gratitude to IIAS, particularly Mthat I will remember for the rest of my language centrum affiliated with NTU (the was the class structure and setting. Being Dr Elena Paskaleva, Dr Willem Vogelsang, life. I became interested in Asian Studies during Chinese Language Division). I was extremely accustomed to the education system of the Dr Philippe Peycam, and all the professors my first year as a bachelor’s student of History fortunate to be granted the Huayu Mandarin Netherlands, I was unaware of how privileged and staff at the National Taiwan University, at the University of Groningen. I soon got fed Enrichment-scholarship from the Taiwanese I was. At home, classes last no longer than two including Dr Kai-Shi Lin, Dr Cheng-Heng up with the Eurocentric approach to history, Ministry of Education. These six months of 15 hours with a limited number of assignments Chang, Dr David Cohen, and Hui-Xuan. where everything eventually ended up with hours of class and 25 hours of self-study each and readings, carefully mapped out in historians feeling the need to include Europe as week were a fantastic start to this adventure, as a set number of hours translated to ECTS. Edwin Pietersma the main protagonist, and I decided to change it allowed me to settle into the country smoothly. In Taiwan’s case, which is American-based, [email protected] my direction and do a minor in ‘Non-Western Even though I had acquainted myself with the credits are calculated based on the number History’. It led to a fascination for Japanese Chinese characters before my relocation, of hours spent in class each week. This means history, in particular Meiji history and Japanese I knew it would be near impossible to master the that a three-credit course is three hours colonialism. After this, as I had developed a language this soon. Assuming that this would per week of class, excluding assignments more profound interest in the country, I decided not be a problem, I continued my application and readings. Often, there is a syllabus with to go to Japan and learn the language. and was accepted into NTU in November 2018. minimal information. This situation allows The Double It led to a year abroad at Osaka University, Before, and after, my acceptance into the room for the teacher’s creativity and freedom where I reached the N2 level in Japanese programme, I often met with the Faculty’s and for more dynamics in the classroom. Degree in Critical (B2/C1 according to the CEFR), and was able director, Dr Lin Kai-Shi. With extreme kindness However, this system also leads to notable to conduct research in Japanese that would and concern, his door was always open differences in the work-load of the various Heritage Studies form the basis of my two theses; and later led for anyone needing guidance and advice. courses with a similar number of credits. to a new adventure, which was Taiwan. However, these discussions soon revealed For one class, I only had to show up every a misunderstanding about the language week while having no readings and a final I was the second person following this requirements: while the first candidates of the writing assignment of two pages. For another, ver the past few years, IIAS track of the IIAS Double Degree programme Double Degree programme could still circumvent I had to read a book of over 400 pages before has been intensively engaged in Critical Heritage Studies at National Taiwan the (official) language requirements, this class, write a reflection before and after class, Owith the Leiden University Institute University. Learning from my predecessor, would no longer be possible for future students. join an extra two-hour reading group, and for Area Studies (LIAS) and targeted Asian I had understood that proficiency in Mandarin He advised me that I should just try. Language write an end-of-term paper. Both classes were partners in the development of a special was recommended but not necessary. Instead, indeed became my biggest struggle, as most awarded the same number of credits. Therefore, master’s (and PhD) track in the field of a show of commitment would suffice. Given of my classes were in Mandarin. it was hard to plan and at the end of the ‘Critical Heritage Studies’. The uniqueness my experience with Japanese, I knew learning A stark difference between Leiden semester I felt like I had been on a rollercoaster. of this initiative is that the MA in Leiden Mandarin would not be easy yet crucial for a University and NTU, which became more There were also other miscommunications, will be combined with a parallel set of such as about the necessary credits to fulfil. courses at a number of Asian universities, An added challenge was that Taiwanese allowing for the students to obtain a students usually spend three years on this double degree at the end of their training. programme. I was trying to do it in one year, in a language I did not yet fully master. To date, the Asian partners involved Several factors led to the completion of are National Taiwan University in Taiwan the degree. First of all, it would not have been and Yonsei University in South Korea, possible without the kindness and flexibility of and contacts with other possible Asian the professors. I was fortunate to have already partner institutes have been established. received such kindness from IIAS and again At Leiden University, students can opt in Taiwan. Secondly, the vibrancy and beauty for a specialisation in Critical Heritage of the country also helped a lot. For example, Studies of Asia and Europe within the in Taipei and on Green Island, I visited heritage MA Asian Studies track ‘History, Arts and sites of the martial-law period. Traveling Culture’. Inspired and supported by the around the country allowed me to reconsider IIAS Asian Heritages research cluster, the many of my previous assumptions on topics curriculum allows students to explore the I had already researched for years, something contested character of all representations I had not imagined possible. Another bonus of culture, the plurality of notions of was the food markets, one found just across heritage in Asian and European contexts, campus, allowing me to have a small moment and the way distinct and conflicting values of indulgence every day. Thirdly, I was equally of indigenous, local communities and blessed with my partner living in Thailand and official state discourses are negotiated. our plans to meet every month, either in the Upon successful completion of the countries we lived or somewhere in between. whole programme, the students will obtain This allowed me to intensify my experience three diplomas in total: the Leiden University with different perspectives across Asia and MA diploma, the partner university MA appreciate how much I learned from classes diploma (two-year programme, of which and living in Taipei. the Leiden MA qualifies as one year) and After completing the degree, I moved to a separate certificate for the Double MA Thailand as my immediate future plans were Degree in Critical Heritage Studies of Asia unsure. However, due to the pandemic I had to and Europe, issued by IIAS. return to the Netherlands by the end of March. In the meantime, I have been applying for jobs The ‘Double Degree in Critical and academic opportunities. I have not yet Heritage Studies’ programme is been able to return to Thailand, Taiwan, or supervised by Dr Elena Paskaleva Japan. Currently, I am working for the Dutch (IIAS/LIAS), coordinator of the Asian Heritages cluster at IIAS. Health Agency in tackling the coronavirus by helping people get tested for the virus. I often Contact: Elena Paskaleva look back on the Double Degree programme [email protected] with pride and happiness. In the future, I hope to find a job or PhD position to which More information: I can apply myself with the same amount https://www.iias.asia/programmes/ of excitement and determination as for the critical-heritage-studies Above: Visiting Kaohsiung, Taiwan, with family. Double Degree. And to pay forward some 48 Humanities across Borders Advancing academic freedom The Network Program and humanist pedagogies

Below: The University of Ghana. In October 2020, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation extended a new grant to the IIAS Humanities across Borders: Asia and Africa in the World program (HaB) and its 18 partners in Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas, to support the program’s consolidation and institutionalisation. https://humanitiesacrossborders.org https://www.iias.asia/programmes/hab

Advancing humanist pedagogies

Principles of academic freedom at The University of Ghana

Kojo Opoku Aidoo The IIAS Humanities across Borders program (HaB) arrived at The University of Ghana in 2017. The University of Ghana (established in 1948) has always been quintessentially encyclopaedic with a tradition of bounded disciplines.1 It has consistently placed a very high premium on rigorous, performance-oriented, test-dominated pedagogical approaches. Such approaches have tended to dismiss, even refute, the humanistic pedagogical approach. Even though more recently there have also been indications of a movement towards community engagement, and possible rectification of the colonial pedagogy mind-set, the university’s initial response to HaB was nevertheless ambiguous; simultaneously welcoming and hesitant.

The civic role of the interference from the university or the state”.3 assertions that lay clear the presence is the freedom to search for truth and to publish This guarantees that both faculty and students of Africa and Africans in the production of and disseminate what one holds to be true. University can engage in intellectual debates without an enlightening and liberating knowledge”.6 This in itself is intrinsically linked to the notion The University of Ghana, the premier and fear of bowdlerisation or retribution, thus For this to happen, the historical processes of the rule of law and fundamental rights, largest university in Ghana, was founded establishing faculty members’ right to remain that have framed the African academy and most notably, free expression and free speech by and for the British colonial regime in the true to their pedagogical philosophy and intellectuals, the issue of autonomy and in general. It is important to point out that immediate post-WWII era. It was built on intellectual commitments. democracy have to be at the fore and centre questions have often been raised about the role a model of scholarship developed in the Two significant problems emerged, of the discourses on scholarly freedoms in that coercive authoritarian governments may United Kingdom. The university’s self-stated however. First, the university has over the Africa. To better comprehend the nature of play on universities campuses, presumably key objective and functional role is to years been insulating itself from the wider the research environment in Africa and to believed to be strongholds of academic conduct research and to pursue new truths society, thereby excluding local voices, reflect on the social and material context of freedom outside their reach. Today, in parts and scientific methods, so as to advance and in so doing, has been maintaining and research as an intellectual activity, CODESRIA of Africa, the ‘rule of law’ has become a code social progress. To do this, a comprehensive encouraging a coloniality of education. co-organised a major conference on academic word for allowing governments to supplant system of scholarly freedom is embedded The university is clearly embedded in a freedom and research in Africa in Kampala in ‘scholarly freedoms’. And this is accomplished in the university’s statutes. The university’s contradiction, between the lofty ideal of 1990.7 Claude Ake, touching on the material by resorting to colonial laws that remain in the Academic Freedom Guideline states that “… advancing social progress and the apparent base of academic freedom, maintained that statute books of many post-colonial states. The University of Ghana by the nature of its exclusion of locally-generated knowledge and the democratic aspirations of the nationalist I would like to share a personal experience core business should provide an environment voices, which are equally legitimate. This lop- movement were betrayed when most post- of how due process of law stifles academic that fosters the free pursuit of knowledge and sidedness amounts to what Nyamnjoh refers colonial African leaders decided to inherit the freedom in contemporary Africa. On 17 May artistic creations through teaching, learning, to as “… unequal encounters and dogmatic colonial system rather than transform them 2012, I was due to present a seminar paper research and dissemination of knowledge propensities in the production and circulation democratically. And, in the course of dealing at the Institute of African Studies (University and artistic performances. The assurance of of meaning and value, which has received with the alienation and resentment that of Ghana) on ‘How incomplete capitalism academic freedom is critical in pursuance of far less emancipatory scholarly attention this produced, they became authoritarian, encourages capital accumulation via this goal”. Further, “…academic staff have the beyond proliferating spurious rhetoric and repressive and coercive. predatory trajectories: the case of the freedom to pursue their research and artistic prescriptive lip service".4 The second problem Woyome scandal’. This was a preliminary creations, subject to the universal principles is that the university, based on the rational sketch, a contribution towards the view and methods of scientific enquiry, without scientific method, appears to be acting Academic freedom and the that underdeveloped capitalism engenders against its and our own best interests. Humans a primitive accumulation of capital via act irrationally, as observed by behavioural coloniality of education predatory, corrupt trajectories. The Woyome “In a world structured economics, for example. Rational science Academic freedom is basically embedded scandal in Ghana, described in the media by global coloniality, ignores such long-established fact. in the right to education. First, it means that as financial malfeasance, involved a In this regard, Ndlovu-Gatsheni admonishes both faculty and students can engage in leading financier of the then ruling National there is no African the African academy, and calls for “a radical intellectual debate without fear. Second, it Democratic Congress, who in connivance with future without epistemic turning over of a new leaf, predicated on establishes a faculty’s right to remain true to politicians and state technocrats managed decolonial turn and epistemic freedom”.5 their pedagogical viewpoint and intellectual to secure and pay judgment debts running freedom” Diagne appeals to African academics “to go commitments. It is a preservation of the critical into millions of Ghana Cedis. A day before beyond the simple denunciation of epistemic norm of intellectual integrity of the educational my presentation, a group of lecturers and Ndlovu-Gathseni 2 coloniality or the demand for epistemic system. Thus, not only are debate and dissent administrators at the university called for its freedom to produce affirmative, positive critical to the pursuit of knowledge, but so also cancellation on the grounds that since the The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 49 The Network

matter was before a court of law, we could Second was to call on the principles of be cited for contempt of court. The seminar academic freedom on which the university was called off.8 was originally established: the freedom to Clearly, the rule that was cited to me as pursue and disseminate knowledge and law was one used by the British courts to stifle to determine the worthy object of the the Irish during the height of the British-Irish humanistic knowledge. war. Imported without thinking, and applied The Humanities across Borders quite rabidly and opportunistically by the program represents an intellectually and courts and by a coterie that stepped into the methodologically disruptive and radical shoes of the British when they left, this rule departure from the pedagogical practices was clearly unconstitutional vis-a-vis the that I am familiar with. In the course freedom of speech and academic freedom of developing a humanistic pedagogy, provisions of Ghana’s 1992 Constitution and I encountered griot-like figures (migrants the University of Ghana Act. It is unfortunate in Ghana, Togo, and Benin) during field that we are still colonised in almost stints, who build their knowledge through everything. their analyses of how the world is. They are The rule of law is being used to stifle regarded for their reflective philosophical scholarly freedoms in contemporary Africa. knowledge, as ‘walking libraries’ with In the past, coercive authoritarian HaB at The University of Ghana up-to-date knowledge and histories of their governments employed violence to silence communities. With wide-ranging historical debate and dissent. That was easier to knowledge, they demonstrate unlimited identify, classify and contest. The new trend possibilities for the formal educational seems to conceal the attack on academic establishment. They tell their stories from freedom and free speech under the cloak of Project: ‘Mobilities of influence of the states. Two things memory extemporaneously, elaborating democracy and due process of law. This new Grassroot Pan-Africanism. stand out, namely place-making and on actions and events. These experiences development is slight and subtle and difficult Memory, migration and meaning-making. The project explores the challenge the conventional pedagogical to perceive or understand. Nevertheless, existing body of knowledge on memory paradigms and call for alternative it constitutes a veritable abuse of academic communities’ (itself contestable and manipulatable), frameworks. The formal classroom setting freedom. For now, we can only take refuge in migration and new ways of pan Africanism. with its structural limitations and trappings Bertrand Russell’s admonition, in praising Karl defining feature of post-colonial https://tinyurl.com/HaB-MGPA of scripted literacy curriculum can benefit Popper’s ‘The Open Society and its Enemies’ West Africa is increasing cross-border immeasurably from such wise, knowledge- to be “vigorous and profound (in our) defence migration, making the region a Methodology workshop able griot-like figures. 9 A The HaB Methodology Workshop, of democracy”. It is on the basis of such quintessential ‘social laboratory’ through In a very practical way, this short article dynamic and reflective democracy that we will which to interrogate and heighten our ‘Mobilities of Grassroots Pan- reflects my divided self, but also a growing Africanism: Integrating Community- construct a humanistic system of education comprehension of memory, migrations Generated Knowledge into a Pan- synthetisation that I seem to be experiencing: in which the academy and communities, and pan-Africanist ideals. The Ghana African Curriculum’ took place on me as a traditional educator and me as hand-in-hand, would co-create knowledge project relates to memory, migration, 12-13 June 2018 in the western regional a humanistic pedagogue in the setting of that liberates. How then can Africans begin to communities, and new ways of Pan- twin-city, Sekondi-Takoradi, Ghana. a typical encyclopaedic university. Tensions, ponder, theorise, interpret the world and write Africanism in connection with the historical, https://tinyurl.com/HaB-Mworkshop opportunities and restrictions exist between from where they are located, unencumbered comparative and contemporary issues these two selves. To confess, my pedagogical by Eurocentrism certainly, but beyond that, such as the Nigerian, Malian, Burkinabe Radio interview practice, until I became part of the Humanities by inimical colonial laws that remain in the and Senegalese diasporas in Ghana, Kojo Opoku Aidoo discussed the across Borders program, failed to meet the statute books? This remains the biggest and mobility in West Africa in general. HaB Project on 26 October 2017 on stringent standards set by Paulo Freire,11 Radio Univers’ ‘Interrogating Africa’ challenge yet to academic freedom. The migrations have tended to challenge or the key objectives of HaB, which include on air show at University of Ghana. the nation-state and also xenophobia. https://tinyurl.com/HaB-AidooRadio ‘to go beyond classroom and textbook-based And, in some instances, they have even pedagogies and to deploy embodied teaching Advancing humanist led to the construction of parallel political Project update and learning practices’; ‘to seek non-textual, economies different from those under the https://tinyurl.com/HaB-MGPAupdate lived sources of knowledge and their modes pedagogies of transmission’; and ‘to work with local Structured along the lines of Cambridge communities and civil society actors to jointly and Oxford universities and established by formulate research agendas’. Thankfully, ordinance in 1948, the University of Ghana Photos taken during the workshop: a clear prognosis is that as HaB enters its has been a quintessential encyclopaedic one Above, Dr Amponsah interacting with participants. second phase, we at The University of Ghana with a tradition of ‘bounded disciplines’. Seen Left, Mr Aryee sharing his lived experience. will be able to consolidate, institutionalise, largely as an ‘ivory tower’, the university, Below: Dr Kawlra and Dr Aidoo at the and build upon the achievements made so far. since its inception, has placed a very Kokrobitey Institute. high premium on rigorous, performance- Kojo Opoku Aidoo, Head of the History and oriented, test-dominated pedagogical Politics Section of the Institute of African approaches. Such approaches have tended Studies, The University of Ghana, and a to peripheralise, if not entirely negate, the Research Fellow at the same institute. He is also the Principle Investigator of the humanistic pedagogical approach. HaB project ‘Mobilities of Grassroot Pan- Nonetheless, two specific developments Africanism’. http://ias.ug.edu.gh/content/ profoundly altered university-community dr-kojo-opoku-aidoo relations. The first event was the establishment in 1963 of the Institute of African Studies as an autonomous body within the University to “engage in the regeneration of Africa Notes and her peoples through knowledge production, dissemination, application and 1 https://www.ug.edu.gh/about/university- preservation”. Allman noted that Ghana’s history founding president, Kwame Nkrumah, sought 2 Ndlovu-Gatsheni is referring to the to transform both scholarly and public epistemological turn in the movement understandings of African history and culture to decolonise education. locally and globally through the Institute 3 ‘The University of Ghana Guidelines of African Studies and the Encyclopaedia for the Assurance of Academic Africana.10 During the launch of the institute, Freedom, Creativity and Innovation’, accessible from http://tiny.cc/ Nkrumah declared: “When we were planning GhanaUniAcademicFreedom this University, I knew that a many-sided 4 Nyanmnjoh’s review of: Ndlovu-Gatsheni, Institute of African Studies which should S.J. 2018. Epistemic Freedom in Africa: fertilize the University, and through the Deprovincialization and Decolonization. University, the Nation, was a vital part of Routledge. it”. It was W.E.B. Du Bois who conceived the 5 ibid., Ndlovu-Gatsheni. Encyclopaedia Africana idea, as a scientific thereby enriching the theory and praxis of encyclopaedic academy. The university’s 6 Bachir Diagne’s review of: ibid., and comprehensive work on Africa and humanistic knowledge production. Despite the initial response to HaB was ambiguous; Ndlovu-Gatsheni. peoples of African descent that “would refute proclivities towards coloniality of pedagogy, simultaneously welcoming and hesitant. 7 ‘The Kampala Declaration on Intellectual the Enlightenment notion of blacks as devoid the University of Ghana seems to have made For the University of Ghana, HaB was Freedom and Social Responsibility’, 29 November 1990, Kampala, Uganda; of civilization and the hallmarks of humanity”. efforts at decolonising education, even if intellectually potentially disruptive of its elitist https://www.codesria.org/spip. The second development was the progress remains meagre. The establishment history and standing, or even ‘revolutionary’. php?article350 establishment of the radio programme of a radio station is an indication of a The biggest challenge was to get the 8 https://humanitiesacrossborders.org/ ‘Interrogating Africa’, broadcast weekly on movement towards community engagement, university to buy into this new, pioneering, blog/due-process-law-and-academic- ‘Radio Univers’ since 2013, in which Institute and possible rectification of the colonial humanistic pedagogical model. Whilst the freedom-personal-narrative of African Studies faculty share their research pedagogy mind-set. Vice-Chancellor of the university, the Director 9 Popper, K. 2011. The Open Society and findings, and important developmental and of the Institute of African Studies, and the Its Enemies. Routledge. educational messages, with not only the Association of African Universities were 10 Allman, J. 2013. ‘Kwame Nkrumah, African university community, but also members of generally receptive to the new programme, Studies, and the Politics of Knowledge The Humanities across Production in the Black Star of Africa’, the neighbouring communities. ‘Interrogating most faculty members remained incredulous, Borders program The International Journal of African Africa’ is an interactive radio show that if not in total opposition. Two solutions Historical Studies 46(2):181-203, Boston allows callers to contribute to discussions. In 2017, the Humanities across Borders: presented themselves. First was the slow University African Studies Center. An emergent system of co-creation of know- Africa and Asia program (HaB) arrived at process of explanations required to highlight 11 Freire, P. 1993. Pedagogy of the ledge is, as a result, being institutionalised, The University of Ghana, a colonially created the efficacy of the humanistic pedagogy. Oppressed. New York: Continuum Book. 50 The Network Announcements

Asian studies titles at AUP Amsterdam University Press (AUP) has a well-established list in Asian Studies, renowned for its solid source-based publications in the history, religion, politics, migration, and culture of the peoples and states of Asia. The Asian Studies programme is strengthened by a number of book series, focusing on a special topic or an area of study. https://www.aup.nl/en/academic/discipline/asian-studies

Wang Bing's Filmmaking of Decoding the Sino-North Korean the China Dream: Narratives, Borderlands Witnesses and Marginal Spaces Adam Cathcart, Christopher Green and Steven Elena Pollacchi. 2021. Denney. 2021. Series: Critical Asian Cinemas Series: Asian Borderlands ISBN 9789463721837 ISBN: 9789462987562

his volume offers an organic discussion this investigation goes beyond the divide ince the 1990s, the Chinese-North Korean Adam Cathcart is a lecturer in Chinese of Wang Bing's filmmaking across between Western and non-Western film border region has undergone a gradual history at the University of Leeds TChina's marginal spaces and against traditions. Stransformation into a site of intensified the backdrop of the state-sanctioned ‘China cooperation, competition, and intrigue. Drawing Christopher Green is a lecturer in Dream’. Wang's work has contemporary Elena Pollacchi is Lecturer in Chinese on existing studies and new data, Decoding Korean Studies at Leiden University in the Netherlands. China as its focus and testifies to the country's Studies at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice the Sino-North Korean Borderlands brings contradictions, not dissimilar to those of (Italy) and in Sweden (Stockholm University much of this literature into concert by pulling and Gothenburg University). Steven Denney is a postdoctoral research contemporary societies dealing with issues together a wide range of insight on the region's fellow at the Munk School of Global Affairs of inequality, labour, and migration. economics, security, social cohesion, and https://www.aup.nl/en/ and Public Policy, University of Toronto. Without being an activist, Wang Bing book/9789463721837/wang-bing-s- information flows. Drawing from multilingual gives voice to the subaltern. His internationally filmmaking-of-the-china-dream sources and transnational scholarship, this https://www.aup.nl/en/ awarded documentaries are recognized as volume is enhanced by the extensive fieldwork book/9789462987562/decoding-the- world masterpieces. His unique aesthetics undertaken by the editors and contributors in sino-north-korean-borderlands bears references to film masters, therefore their quests to decode the borderland.

Asian Alleyways: An Urban Narrating Democracy in Vernacular in Times of Myanmar: The Struggle Globalization Between Activists, Democratic Marie Gibert-Flutre and Heide Imai (eds). 2020. Leaders and Aid Workers Series: Asian Cities ISBN 9789463729604 Tamas Wells, 2021 Series: Global Asia ISBN: 9789463726153

sian Alleyways: An Urban Vernacular students, and all those interested in the his book analyses what Myanmar's networks of local activists and democratic in Times of Globalization critically modern transformation of Asian cities struggle for democracy has signified leaders, and international aid workers. Aexplores ‘Global Asia’ and the and their urban cultures. Tto Burmese activists and democratic metropolization process, specifically from its leaders, and to their international allies. Tamas Wells is a Research Fellow alleyways, which are understood as ordinary Marie Gibert-Flutre is Assistant Professor In doing so, it explores how understanding in the School of Social and Political neighbourhood landscapes providing the of Geography in the Department of East contested meanings of democracy helps Sciences at the University of Melbourne. setting for everyday urban life and place- Asia Studies (LCAO) at the University of Paris. make sense of the country's tortuous path https://www.aup.nl/en/ based identities being shaped by varied since Aung San Suu Kyi's National League Heide Imai is Associate Professor at book/9789463726153/narrating- everyday practices, collective experiences and for Democracy won historic elections in Senshu University, Faculty of Intercultural democracy-in-myanmar forces. Beyond the mainstream, standardising Communication, Tokyo, Japan. 2015. Using Burmese and English language vision of the metropolization process, Asian sources, Narrating Democracy in Myanmar Alleyways offers a nuanced overview of urban https://www.aup.nl/en/ reveals how the country's ongoing struggles production in Asia at a time of great changes, book/9789463729604/asian-alleyways for democracy exist not only in opposition and will be welcomed by an array of scholars, to Burmese military elites, but also within

Rural-Urban Migration and Development Zones in Asian Agro-Technological Change Borderlands in Post-Reform China Mona Chettri, Michael Eilenberg (eds). 2020. Series: Asian Borderlands Lena Kaufmann. 2021. ISBN: 9789463726238 Series: New Mobilities in Asia ISBN 9789463729734

ow do rural Chinese households deal both migration and farming. It innovatively evelopment Zones in Asian Borderlands namely, as sites of capital accumulation, with the conflicting pressures of conceives rural households as part of a maps the nexus between global capital territorialisation and socio-spatial changes. Hmigrating into cities to work as well as larger farming community of practice that Dflows, national economic policies, staying at home to preserve their fields? This spans both staying and migrating household infrastructural connectivity, migration, and Mona Chettri is a Next Generation Network is particularly challenging for rice farmers, members and their material world. aspirations for modernity in the borderlands Scholar at the Australia-India Institute, because paddy fields have to be cultivated of South and South-East Asia. In doing so, University of Western Australia. continuously to retain their soil quality and Lena Kaufmann is a postdoctoral researcher it demonstrates how these are transforming Michael Eilenberg is an Associate Professor of value. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork and at the Department of History and an associate borderlands from remote, peripheral Anthropology at Aarhus University, Denmark. written sources, Rural-Urban Migration and lecturer at the Department of Social Anthro- backyards to front-yards of economic pology and Cultural Studies, both at the Agro-Technological Change in Post-Reform development and state-building. Development University of Zurich. https://www.aup.nl/en/book/9789463726238/ China describes farming households' strategic zones encapsulate the networks, institutions, development-zones-in-asian-borderlands solutions to this predicament. It shows how, https://www.aup.nl/en/book/9789463729734/ politics and processes specific to enclave in light of rural-urban migration and agro- rural-urban-migration-and-agro-technological- development, and offer a new analytical technological change, they manage to sustain change-in-post-reform-china framework for thinking about borderlands; The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 51 Announcements The Network

The Newsletter issues online

e are excited to inform you that have been able to scan all of the earlier you can now find all issues of The issues. The resulting PDFs are fully searchable, WNewsletter on our website, open and have recently been added to our website’s access of course, going back to the very first section for The Newsletter. This was a vital one published in 1993. step in our ambition to make all of our issues available to as many readers as possible. Over the past 28 years, the paper version The online versions of issues 73 and of The Newsletter has been through a number onwards are currently the most complete: of redesigns and has enjoyed various ‘looks’, each item on the content page leads you to but so too has its online sibling. The current an ‘article page’ where a full printable version issues are produced entirely digitally, and are of the text can be found, alongside a link to simply sent to the printers by email, only to the paper version PDF. miraculously appear in print a few days later. Issues 27-72 provide you with a content But it was not always that easy. The first 26 page where you can open individual PDF pages issues, produced between 1993 and 2001, correlating to each article. Full text printable were done the ‘old-fashioned’ way. The paper pages have not yet been created, but this will version was put together at the printers, and a likely be our next step in the process! digital copy never existed. We hope you will enjoy browsing through Now, thanks to the invaluable support our previous issues, as well as catching up provided by our colleagues at Leiden with our most recent. All of which can be University Libraries ‘Special Collections’, we found on www.iias.asia/the-newsletter. Above: Selection of previous newsletters available to view online.

i) a global consortium with its commitment to public humanist values in education; Continuation of ii) a foundational curricular platform in IIAS webinar series ‘Humanities Across Borders’ co-created and Humanities Across co-taught across the consortium’s geographies; and iii) an interactive digital platform and Borders (HAB) pedagogical resource repository, made widely accessible through partner libraries. IAS organises webinars on a variety of We will subsequently contact you with In this way we hope to build a collaborative Asia-related topics, held by IIAS fellows further information on how to participate. model of locally rooted, globally conscious, Iand other speakers. All webinars (and Our previous webinars can be viewed higher education that, until now, has been updates to the schedule) are announced on our YouTube channel www.youtube.com/ he International Institute for Asian an aspirational ideal for many universities on our website at www.iias.asia/events. asianstudies. Studies (IIAS) is pleased to announce attempting to achieve educational justice The following speakers have been con- Tthat it has been awarded a third grant goals. In the coming years, we will disseminate You are most welcome to join (free of firmed for the coming period, and we will be from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in the programme’s situated learning approach charge) by registering online in advance. adding new lectures to the list as time goes on. New York to support the consolidation and extensively, via the consortium’s website, institutionalisation of its flagship collaborative publications, conferences, and other education program ‘Humanities Across Borders’ pedagogical events, and hope to encourage 22 March 2021 21 April 2021 (HAB). From building a trans-regional network other institutions to join our endeavour. Book talk Speaker: Norah Gharala of partners, to testing out-of-classroom and On behalf of IIAS and its partners, I wish Fluid Jurisdictions: (title to be confirmed) community embedded experiential pedagogies to express our sincere gratitude to The Andrew Colonial Law and in HaB 1.0, in this next phase, HAB and its W. Mellon Foundation for its vision and support Arabs in Southeast 18 partners in Asia, Africa, Europe and the to HAB and its efforts in re-enchanting public Asia 29 April 2021 Americas, will mobilise institutions into a new humanist values among academe today. Book talk pattern of South-South-North collaboration Speaker: Islands in a in higher education. Philippe Peycam, IIAS Director Nurfadzilah Yahaya Cosmopolitan Sea: (author) A History of the The three institutional innovations Follow the program activities here: Comoros envisioned for HAB 2.0 are: https://humanitiesacrossborders.org 24 March 2021 Speaker: Book talk Iain Walker Contemporary (author) oin the first symposium entirely Practices of dedicated to ‘textual heritage’, and Citizenship in Asia Textual Heritage Jexplore the many facets of this new and the West: 19 May 2021 analytical concept! Care of the Self Speaker: Hedwig Waters (title to be confirmed) Online Symposium How have literature, historical chronicles, Speaker: 22-24 March 2021 musical notations, inscriptions, manuscripts, Gregory Bracken Registration and further books and scrolls shaped our cultural (author) 26 May 2021 information: heritage, and how will they change in the Book talk www.unive.it/textualheritage 21st century? How do the processes of Reimagining Indian reading, writing, copying, translating and 7 April 2021 Ocean Worlds performing texts inform and transform notions Transculturality, Sensoriality and Politics of authenticity, authorship, ownership, as of the Decorative Arts of Kerala, India Speakers: well as the relationship between tangible and Speaker: Deepthi Murali Smriti Srinivas, intangible heritage? Bettina Ng'weno, A dozen specialists from different Neelima Jeychandran disciplines and areas – many early career (authors) scholars – will discuss fresh approaches to textual sources, engaging with the latest developments in the field of heritage. On each of the first two days, keynotes by Prof. Wiebke Denecke (MIT) and Prof. David C. Harvey (Aarhus University), will kick off the debate. On the final day, a lively roundtable will bring the program to a close. Attendance is free, but registration is kindly required.

Organisation Department of Asian and North African Studies, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice In collaboration with Waseda University Top Global University program.

Registration For registration and further information, check out the dedicated website www.unive.it/textualheritage 52 The Network Research

IIAS Research, Urban Knowledge Network Asia (UKNA) he Urban Knowledge Network Asia Symposium (UKNA) is an inclusive network that 'Neighborhood Transformation in East Networks, Tbrings together concerned scholars Asian Cities: Is 'Gentrification' the Right and practitioners engaged in collaborative Frame of Reference?', 30 August-1 Sept 2021, research and events on cities in Asia. It seeks Chiba, Japan. to influence policy by contributing insights and Initiatives that put people at the centre of urban https://ukna.asia/events/neighborhood- governance and development strategies. transformation-east-asian-cities- The UKNA Secretariat is at IIAS, but the gentrification-right-frame-reference network comprises universities and planning IIAS research and other initiatives institutions across China, India, Southeast www.ukna.asia are carried out within a number Asia and Europe. Its current flagship project Coordinator: Paul Rabé is the Southeast Asia Neighbourhoods [email protected] of thematic, partially overlapping Network (SEANNET). Clusters: Asian Cities; Asian Heritages research clusters in phase with contemporary Asian currents and

built around the notion of social EANNET is about research, teaching agency. In addition, IIAS remains and dissemination of knowledge open to other potentially significant Son Asia through the prism of the Southeast Asia neighbourhood. Supported by a grant topics. More information: from the Henry Luce Foundation, NY Neighborhoods www.iias.asia (2017-2020), case studies were caried out in six selected cities in Southeast Asia Network (SEANNET) (Mandalay, Chiang Mai, Bangkok, Ho Chi Minh City, Manila, Surabaya). SEANNET seeks to engage the humanistic social sciences in a dialogue with urban stake- field-research, in-situ roundtables, workshops, IIAS research clusters holders as co-contributors of alternative conferences, publications and new forms of knowledge about cities. This is done pedagogy developed in collaboration with through a combination of participatory local institutions of learning. Our second Asian Cities ambition is to help shape and empower This cluster deals with cities and urban a community of early-career scholars and cultures with their issues of flows and fluxes, practitioners working on and from Southeast ideas and goods, and cosmopolitism and Asia. The SEANNET research teams comprise connectivity at their core, framing the existence international and local scholars, students of vibrant ‘civil societies’ and political micro- from local universities, and civil society cultures. Through an international knowledge representatives, all working together with network, IIAS aims to create a platform for the neighbourhood residents. scholars and urban practitioners focusing on Asian cities ‘in context’ and beyond traditional www.ukna.asia/seannet western norms of knowledge. Coordinators: Paul Rabé [email protected] and Rita Padawangi Singapore Asian Heritages University of Social Sciences This cluster focuses on the uses of culture and [email protected] cultural heritage practices in Asia. In particular, Cluster: Asian Cities it addresses a variety of definitions associated with cultural heritage and their implications for social agency. The cluster engages with a broad range of related concepts and issues, including the contested assertions of ‘tangible’ and ‘intangible’, concepts such as ‘authenticity’, ‘national heritage’ and ‘shared heritage’, and, The Forum on Health, Environment in general, with issues pertaining to the political economy of heritage. and Development (FORHEAD)

Global Asia Asia has a long history of transnational The Forum on Health, Environment and linkages with other parts of the world, thereby Development (FORHEAD) is an interdisciplinary shaping the global order, as much as the world Inetwork that brings together natural, medical at large continues to shape Asia. The Global and social scientists to explore the implications Asia Cluster addresses contemporary issues of environmental and social change for public related to Asia’s projection into the world as well health in China and beyond. as trans-national interactions within the Asian region itself. In addition IIAS aims to help develop www.iias.asia/programmes/forhead a more evenly balanced field of Asian Studies Coordinator: Jennifer Holdaway by collaborating in trans-regional capacity [email protected] building initiatives and by working on new types Cluster: Global Asia of methodological approaches that encourage synergies and interactions between disciplines, regions and practices.

nitiated by IIAS, this programme involves Leiden University in the Netherlands, two IInstitutes at National Taiwan University in Taiwan and one at Yonsei University in South Double Degree in Korea. Discussions with other possible partners in Asia are ongoing. The programme offers Critical Heritage Studies selected students the opportunity to follow a full year study at one of the partner institutes of Asia and Europe with full credits and a double degree. The curriculum at Leiden University benefits from the contributions of Prof Michael Herzfeld (Harvard) as a guest teacher and the Senior Advisor to the Critical Heritage Studies Initiative of IIAS.

www.iias.asia/programmes/critical- heritage-studies Coordinator: Elena Paskaleva [email protected] Cluster: Asian Heritages The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 53 Research The Network

Asian Borderlands Research Network (ABRN)

Leiden Centre for Indian Ocean Studies Humanities he Leiden Centre for Indian Ocean Across Borders Studies brings together people and his network focuses particularly on the border regions Tmethods to study the ‘Indian Ocean between South Asia, Central/East and Southeast Asia. World’, aiming to co-organize conferences, TThe concerns are varied, ranging from migratory move- workshops and academic exchanges with IAS is pleased to announce another grant cycle from the ments, transformations in cultural, linguistic and religious institutions from the region. Together with Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to establish ‘Humanities practices, to ethnic mobilisation and conflict, marginalisation, IIAS, the Centre facilitates an inclusive and IAcross Borders’ (HAB) as an institutional intervention in and environmental concerns. ABRN organises a conference global platform bringing together scholars higher education. In the first phase of HAB (2017-2020), we in one of these border regions every two years in co-operation and institutions working on connections concentrated our efforts on building a network of partners and with a local partner. and comparisons across the axis of human experimenting with out-of-classroom, experiential pedagogies. The 7th ABRN conference, 'Borderland Futures: Technologies, interaction with an interest in scholarship In this next phase, we aim to mobilise existing, stand-alone Zones, Co-existences', has been postponed until June 2022. that cuts across borders of places, periods educational institutions, structures, and processes into new and disciplines. configurations of South-South and South-North collaboration. www.asianborderlands.net In the next five years, we plan to organise our partners into Coordinator: Erik de Maaker www.iias.asia/programmes/leiden- a membership-based consortium, expand the programme’s [email protected] centre-indian-ocean-studies outreach, and formalise and apply HAB’s in situ or place-based Cluster: Global Asia Cluster: Global Asia methodologies to real-world societal and ecological concerns in a trans-regional setting. By disseminating HAB’s locally situated yet globally connected approach to teaching and learning -through the consortium’s website, publications, conferences, and pedagogical events - we hope to encourage other institutions in the global South and North to join our efforts. Energy Programme The New Silk Road. Follow the stories on the Humanities Across Borders Blog Asia (EPA) China's Belt and Road humanitiesacrossborders.org/blog Initiative in Context www.iias.asia/hab Clusters: Global Asia; Asian Heritages he new joint research programme between IIAS-EPA and the Institute of World Politics and Economy of the TChinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing is entitled The Political Economy of the Belt & Road Initiative and its he International Institute for Asian Reflections. It aims to investigate the policy, policy tools, Studies has recently started a new and impacts of China’s Belt and Road Initiative. By focusing Tproject of interdisciplinary research Africa-Asia, on China's involvement with governments, local institutions, aimed at the study of the Belt and Road and local stakeholders, it aims to examine the subsequent Initiative of the Chinese government, with A New Axis of responses to China’s activities from the local to the global- special attention given to the impact of the geopolitical level in the following countries: Kazakhstan, ‘New Silk Road’ on countries, regions and Knowledge Turkmenistan, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Ethiopia, peoples outside of China. Hungary, the West Balkans, and Russia. www.iias.asia/programmes/newsilkroad www.iias.asia/programmes/energy-programme-asia Cluster: Global Asia frica-Asia, A New Axis of Knowledge’ is an inclusive Coordinator: M. Amineh transnational platform that convenes scholars, artists, [email protected], [email protected] ‘A intellectuals, and educators from Africa, Asia, Europe, Cluster: Global Asia and beyond to study, discuss, and share knowledge on the intricate connections and entanglements between the African and Asian world regions. Our aim is to contribute to the long-term establishment of an autonomous, intellectual and academic community of individuals and institutions between two of the world’s most vibrant International continents. We aspire to facilitate the development of research and educational infrastructures in African and Convention of Asia Asian universities, capable of delivering foundational knowledge in the two regions about one another’s cultures Scholars (ICAS) and societies. This exchange, we believe, is a prerequisite for a sustainable and balanced socio-economic progress of the two continents. It is also an opportunity to move beyond the Western-originated fields of Asian and African area studies—something that would benefit ith its biennial conferences, Singapore, Shanghai, Kuala Lumpur, Daejon, Asian, African and Western scholars alike. International Convention of Asia Honolulu, Macao, Adelaide, Chiang Mai and WScholars (ICAS) is the largest Leiden). If the situation allows, then ICAS 12 www.africasia.org global forum for academics and civil society will take place as planned on 24-27 August Cluster: Global Asia exchange on Asia. Founded in 1997 at the 2021 in Kyoto, Japan. However, we may initiative of IIAS, ICAS serves as a platform need to consider virtual alternatives to an for scholars, social and cultural leaders, and in-person conference. Please do keep an eye institutions focusing on issues critical to Asia, on the website for updates, or sign up to our and, by implication, the rest of the world. mailinglist to stay informed. The ICAS biennial conferences are organised in cooperation with local universities, cities www.icas.asia and institutions and attended by scholars https://icas.asia/forms/mailinglist and other experts, institutions and publishers [email protected] from 60 countries. ICAS also organises the biennial ‘ICAS Book Prize’ (IBP), which awards the most prestigious prizes in the field of Asian Studies for books in Chinese, English, French, German, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish; and for PhD Theses in English. Eleven conventions have been held since 1997 (Leiden, Berlin, 54 Exhibition: Tangential A virtual exhibition The Portrait Stress 2020 for remote times

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EXHIBITION Tangential Stress 2020 DATE 14 May 2020 - ongoing LOCATION Museum of Nepali Art (MoNA), Kathmandu, Nepal FURTHER INFORMATION https://360mona.com

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n early 2020, the Museum of Nepali Art The Museum of Nepali Art modern artists working in more contemporary Its curator commissioned 19 works by Nepali (MoNA) was preparing for its grand opening, (MoNA) styles. Nepali artwork often hangs in private artists, each addressing pandemic conditions Ijust as coronavirus grew increasingly collections abroad or in foreign museums, in Nepal. These were swiftly arranged into ominous worldwide. The museum’s permanent The Museum of Nepali Art (MoNA) finally such as The Rubin in New York City. Meanwhile, a digital exhibition entitled ‘Tangential Stress’. collection of contemporary and traditional opened its doors after eight months of art that remains in Nepal often fails to reach The virtual interface simulates a walk through Nepali art would have to wait until October delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic and a wider audience. The Museum of Nepali Art the manicured grounds of the Kathmandu 2020 to welcome the public. In the interim, its consequent lockdowns. The new museum seeks to redress this, keeping Nepali art in the Guest House, punctuated by icons represent- MoNA’s curator commissioned 19 Nepali is housed on the grounds of the Kathmandu country and offering a committed space where ing pieces of art. It launched in May 2020, artists to produce works dealing with the Guest House (KGH), one of the most iconic the public can experience it. making it among the earliest exhibits focused socioeconomic, ecological, psychological, hotels in Nepal. The MoNA – curated by Rajan The MoNA originally scheduled its grand on the virus’ impacts, and the first virtual and emotional impacts of the global Sakya, CEO of the KGH Group of Hotels – aims opening for February-March 2020, precisely showcase of its kind in Nepal. pandemic. ‘Tangential Stress’ is the result; to create a platform for Nepali artists working the months when the scale of COVID-19 a free, fully virtual exhibition showcasing in a variety of media and styles. It dedicates was clearly becoming a threat. The World artwork depicting the multiple ways a space for the public appreciation and Health Organization declared the outbreak ‘Tangential Stress’ COVID-19 has transformed life in Nepal dissemination of Nepal’s artistic heritage. The a veritable pandemic on March 11, and Nepal and around the world over the past year. country has a long, rich history of creative imposed a nationwide lockdown on March in Pandemic Times production: Hindu devotional art, Thangka 24. The MoNA’s permanent collection of The art of ‘Tangential Stress’ is diverse, and Paubhā paintings, world-renowned art (religious and secular, traditional and though all of it hinges on the epidemiological, statuary, meticulous woodwork, and more. contemporary) would have to wait. The psycho-emotional, and socioeconomic Such traditions continue today, alongside museum, however, quickly shifted gears. effects of COVID-19. Several of the pieces The Newsletter No. 88 Spring 2021 55 The Portrait

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take a more expansive view of such effects, wearing a facemask, surrounded by signs Another theme addressed in ‘Tangential Shakti evokes this feeling by superimposing depicting the resurgence of nature as humans of nature’s reassertion. Stress’ is the toll of psychological and social a globe upon a traditional Nepali door, a white stayed home, and/or highlighting human The now-ubiquitous shape of the SARS- isolation. Batsa Gopal Vaidya’s Lockdown and facemask stretched across them both. perseverance in the face of a biological CoV-2 particle, with its signature ‘crown’ of Ranju Yadav’s Pregnancy During Pandemic All these themes – destruction and threat. Sagar Manandhar’s Creativity Never spike proteins, appears in many of the works each portray a singular figure – a masked solidarity, isolation and hope – stand out in Dies – composed of abstract flashes of color on display. Sunita Rana’s (Hope) has boy and a pregnant woman, respectively SC Suman’s Hope Amidst Despair. The sharp आशा surrounding the fluid shapes of the world’s an upbeat, vibrant color scheme in which – to evoke the peculiar combination of fear composition foregrounds eight scenes of continents – is a testament to the persistence a human figure emerges from, or perhaps and loneliness characteristic of the COVID isolation. It looks as if the artist is capturing of creativity and nature during these trying is submerged within, a flood of bubbles and era. Gopal Kalapremi Shrestha’s series snapshot views through a series of windows, times. Koshal Hamal’s Art in Lockdown depicts virions. Pradip Kumar Bajracharya’s So Small of two-tone, puzzle-like images reflects a each one padlocked shut. Silhouettes – a line of multicolored flowers winding in sharp Yet So Big!!! depicts ethereal bodies sprawled pronounced disorientation through optical likely representing those lost to COVID – turns up a bright green canvas, with the and tangled beneath enormous renderings trickery, a chaos that reverberates with float through the marginal spaces between blossoms representing the experiences and of coronavirus particles. The virions loom the psychological upheavals wrought by the frames, across a jumbled landscape memories that comprise a life. Asha Dangol’s menacingly above the faceless bodies. lockdowns. Kiran Manandhar’s The Eternal of buildings and temples, world landmarks New Avatar evokes the Newari Paubā style, The virus, normally invisible, is thus made Debate yields a similar effect through its and staircases. The ‘outside’ is menacing, depicting a deity with five heads: the artist to feel commensurate with its outsized poignant portrayal of internal struggles and the ‘inside’ is stifling. An unassuming golden and his wife, but also a pig, buffalo, and cow. impacts. Such impacts include economic the conflicting facets of one’s self. Among the key hangs in the upper-right corner of the Behind the figure, viral particles float above and geopolitical disparities shaping unequal most effective paintings in this vein is Bidhata painting, hinting at the possibility of opening a bright blue Earth, hinting at and hoping pandemic outcomes, themes taken up KC’s Ekkais Din – 21 Days. The mixed-media the padlocks that enforce our confinement, for a different ecological future. Similar strongly in Binod Pradhan’s Same Planet, self-portrait represents the artist in quarantine as if the solution to COVID were simple themes emerge in Prithvi Shrestha’s A Game, Different Effects and Bhai Raj Maharjan’s after returning to Nepal from a residency in and just beyond reach. an inventive self-portrait of the artist, Powerlessness. Vienna. Hers was a literal, spatial isolation Considering how swiftly ‘Tangential as well as a psychological, emotional one. Stress’ came together, it is admirable how Her piece pays deliberate homage to Gustav well the commissioned works speak to Klimt’s The Kiss, yet with a clear difference: one another. As a whole, they express the Fig. 1: Powerlessness, by Bhai Raj Maharjan whereas Klimt’s famous painting shows two intersecting feelings that have come to bodies entwined in embrace, KC’s self-portrait characterise life during a global health Fig. 2: Mahakala - depicts only herself, looking somber. She is crisis. Beyond the art’s aesthetic merits, Destruction with cause, by Rajani Sinkhwal. encircled by a ring of airplanes pointing in all the virtual nature of the exhibition amplifies directions, which surround a grid of scratchy the show’s themes: it is the pandemic itself Fig. 3: Your life before designs and Nepali numerals, as if marking that inhibits in-person appreciation of mine, by Pramila Bajracharya. time on a prison wall. pandemic paintings. To take a remote, virtual tour constantly reminds viewers Fig. 4: Hope Amidst of the new reality addressed in the art. Despair, by SC Suman. Destruction and hope In that sense, ‘Tangential Stress’ is ideally Fig. 5: Ekkais Din – 21 The exhibition is shot through with suited to the present moment. Days, by Bidhata KC. a central tension between destruction Beyond this exhibition, the museum and hope. Rajani Sinkhwal’s Mahakala: also launched a second virtual show Fig. 6: The variable gem, by Erina Tamrakar. Destruction with Cause shows the deity entitled ‘Inception: A Collection of Nepali of destruction in detail; an apt symbol for a Masterpieces’ (https://www.360mona.com/ virus wreaking indiscriminate havoc across inception), which highlights more traditional the world. In the face of such devastation, styles from Nepal. For those in Kathmandu, signs of hope, or at least consolation, can the MoNA is now open for public admission. also be found: Pramila Bajracharya’s tribute to a healthcare worker in Your Life Before Benjamin Linder, currently a Fellow at Mine, Manish Lal Shrestha’s ringing bell IIAS, is an anthropologist focusing on exploding with color in Sound of Silence, socio-spatial transformations in urban Erina Tamrakar’s masked figures tenderly Nepal. He previously worked with MoNA curator Rajan Sakya and others at the posed in The Variable Gem. There is a certain Kathmandu Guest House to produce the solidarity during lockdown conditions, coffee-table book Thamel Through Time: 6 a recognition that humans are alone, but Commemorating 50 Years of Kathmandu together. Govinda Lal Singh Dangol’s Daibya Guest House and Thamel 1968-2018. 56 The Network IIAS Fellowship

IIAS Fellowship Programme In the spotlight The International Institute for Asian Studies annually hosts a large number of visiting researchers (research fellows) who come to Leiden to work on their own individual research project. In addition, IIAS also facilitates the teaching and research by various professorial fellows as part of agreements with Dutch universities, foreign ministries and funding organisations. Meet our fellows at www.iias.asia/fellows

began my fellowship in February and feel a few years ago. Because the mentions were he was a young boy ... in Mozambique where very fortunate to be here. The flexibility brief, my process of understanding this term they are from”. The two traveled “to China Iof IIAS has been generous, as has my digital has necessitated engagement with archives by boat” and then on to Mexico around 1588 reception from scholars in the Netherlands. and libraries beyond Mexico. Part of the first (Mexican National Archive, I.V. 1356 exp. 12). I am working on a book manuscript about chapter of my book explores early modern Such a rare friendship must have meant a the forced movements of people from European descriptions of the Indian Ocean great deal to both men as they were trafficked Southeastern Africa to Mexico in the sixteenth World and Southeast Asia. These texts halfway around the world. A handful of and seventeenth centuries, using a central collectively contributed meaning to the labels these remarkable stories persist in fragments story as a focal point. So far, I have found applied to enslaved people. Gold mining, throughout the archives of the former Iberian Leiden an ideal place for reflection and maritime knowledge, loyalty, rebelliousness, empires. My first task while in Leiden is am grateful for the opportunity to research and military prowess were some of the analyzing these fragments in order to draw Norah and write. I have online access to relevant practices and traits associated with the out as much meaning from them as possible. materials through the Leiden University term ‘mozambique’ in Iberian worlds. People of East African origin or descent in Gharala Libraries: maps of Southeast Asia; travel Beyond analyzing how Portuguese and Mexico had little opportunity to describe accounts; and cutting-edge volumes like Spanish vocabularies incorporated Indian their homelands in the historical record. Being a Slave: Histories and Legacies of Ocean Africa, my project explores how My research must reckon with those gaps European Slavery in the Indian Ocean (edited Africans and Afrodescendants deployed labels. in our historical knowledge and contextualize by Alicia Schrikker and Nira Wickramasinghe Men sometimes made oblique references to the clues East Africans left to their experiences From Mozambique of Leiden University, 2020). Southeastern Africa by claiming relationships of an interconnected world. to Mexico: forced with each other within Spanish colonial Brief references to enslaved people institutions. In Mexico City, Juan Bartolo told Norah Gharala, journeys in the early from ‘Mozambique in the Indies of Portugal’ in a priest that he had maintained a friendship University of Houston, Texas, USA modern Iberian world Mexican archives caught my attention with another enslaved man “from the time

IIAS Fellowship possibilities and requirements

Apply for an IIAS fellowship

The International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS) in Leiden, the Netherlands, invites outstanding researchers to apply for an IIAS fellowship to work on a relevant piece of research in the social sciences and humanities.

Combine your IIAS fellowship with two extra months of research in Paris

When applying for an IIAS Fellowship, you have the option of simultaneously submitting an application for an additional two months of research at the Collège d’études mondiales of the Fondation Maison des sciences de l’homme (CEM-FMSH), in Paris, France, immediately after your stay in Leiden. The next application deadline is 1 October 2021.

Apply for a Gonda fellowship

For promising young Indologists at the post-doctorate level it is possible to apply for funding with the J. Gonda Foundation of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) to spend three to six months doing research at IIAS. The next deadline is tentatively set for 1 September 2021. Please check the website for the latest information.

Information and application forms: www.iias.asia/fellowships