Asian history Books
Springer Verlag, Singapore The Contemporary Construction of the Chinese Form
Book SynopsisThis open access book is the first comprehensive and systematic study of Chinese Marxist literary criticism as an independent theoretical form. It discusses and describes the theoretical features of the Chinese form of Marxist literary criticism by refining and re-interpreting the iconic key concepts of “people,” “nation,” “politics,” “praxis,” along with the relationships between literature, technology and capital. Literary criticism and value judgment has also been discussed at length with insightful and valuable views being provided. This book is a brilliant introduction to the topic and ideal academic material for global readers to grasp the essence of Chinese Marxist literary critical thought.Table of ContentsChapter 1: Introduction.- Chapter 2: People: The Starting Point & the Destination of Literary Criticism.- Chapter 3: Nation: A New Dimension of Literary Criticism in the Context of Globalization.- Chapter 4: The Political Dimension of Literary Criticism.- Chapter 5: The Praxis Dimension of Literary Criticism.- Chapter 6: Marxist Literary Criticism in the Hi-Tech Era.- Chapter 7: Literature and Capital in a Market Economy.- Chapter 8: A Study of Value Judgment.- Chapter 9: Conclusion.
£33.24
Springer Verlag, Singapore The Territory of Japan: Its History and Legal
Book SynopsisThis Open Access book carefully examines the legal and historical bases of the territory of Japan as a modern State from the Meiji period to 2002. A new preface summarizes key developments in the situation up through 2022.Japan’s current territory is stipulated by the Potsdam Declaration (1945) and the Treaty of Peace with Japan (1951); it includes the Northern Territories, the Senkaku Islands, and Takeshima. Japan has demanded the return of the Northern Territories, comprising the islands of Etorofu, Kunashiri, Shikotan and Habomai, which are occupied by Russia. China has claimed sovereignty over the Senkaku Islands, which are validly controlled by Japan; Japan has claimed sovereignty over Takeshima, which is occupied by the Republic of Korea.This book analyzes the current status of these territorial topics, drawing on historical documents and international legal precedent, and it suggests peaceful methods to address them. In discussing territorial land, sea, and air space, this work touches upon postwar concepts defining modern international law and relevant rules on these subjects—exclusive economic zones (EEZs), continental shelves, and air defense identification zones (ADIZs)—found in international treaties, such as the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), and related domestic laws.Table of ContentsChapter 1.Development of Japan’s Territory.- Chapter 2.The Northern Territories (Kunashiri Island, Etorofu Island, Habomai Islands, and Shikotan Island).- Chapter 3.The Senkaku Islands.- Chapter 4. Takeshima.- Chapter 5. Territorial Sea and Exclusive Economic Zone.- Chapter 6. Exclusive Economic Zones between Japan and the Republic of Korea, and Japan and China.- Chapter 7.A Proposal for Stability and Coexistence in East Asia.- Chapter 8.Territorial Air Space and Air Defense Identification Zones.
£33.24
Springer Verlag, Singapore Understanding Chinas Belt and Road Initiative
Book SynopsisThis open access book provokes critical thinking regarding the most ambitious Chinese project since the founding of the People's Republic of China, The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).
£42.74
The Chinese University Press Translation and Modernization in East Asia in the
Book SynopsisThe present volume is a collection of selected papers of the international conference on Translation and Modernization in East Asia in the 19th and Early 20th Centuries, organised by the Research Centre for Translation (RCT), The Chinese University of Hong Kong in May 2013. The conference aimed at studying the role played by translation in the modernisation process of the East Asian countries. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, many people saw the West as a model for modernisation and hence modernisation in East Asia was more often than not taken as a process of learning from or even imitating the West. In this process, translation played a crucial role, when efforts were made to import Western ideas, knowledge, concepts and practices. The articles in this volume study and explain the various translation phenomena in the modernisation process of China, Korea and Japan.
£40.50
The Chinese University Press A Medical History of Hong Kong: 1842–1941
Book SynopsisThis book tells the fascinating story of the development of medical and sanitation services in Hong Kong during the first century of British rule and how changing political values and directions of the colonial administration and the socio-economic status of the Hong Kong affected the policies of development in these areas. It also recounts how the bubonic plague of 1894 changed the government’s laissez-faire attitude towards sanitation and public health and began sanitary reforms and developed public health infrastructure.
£44.25
The Chinese University Press A History of Cultic Images in China – The
Book SynopsisIn the past twenty years, work on the local culture of central Hunan has been one of the most exciting sources for rethinking the nature and variety of Chinese local society. At the heart of this society is a kind of statuary found nowhere else in China—sculpted images of local people, primarily religious specialists of a wide range, but also parents and ancestors who, according to Confucian orthodoxy, should be represented by tablets, not statues. While the consecration ceremonies of these statues include rites that are common to all China, they are embedded in unique local ritual traditions. Based on two decades of international collaborative research, Alain Arrault focuses on some 4,000 of these statues and studies them on the basis of consecration certificates inserted in the statues, the earliest of which date to the sixteenth century.Trade ReviewArrault’s comprehensive investigation of central Hunan religious and social practices is the first devoted entirely to the unique statuary and represents a major contribution to our understanding of local Chinese society."" - John Lagerwey, The Chinese University of Hong Kong""This is a significant contribution to the study of religion and local society in China. The main focus of this book is a large collection of small wooden statues that had originally been installed on domestic altars throughout central Hunan province. This new vantage point helps to fill out our picture of the Chinese religious landscape and at the same time challenges many scholarly assumptions about the nature of Chinese religions—and the ways they have been conceptualized and categorized—from the sixteenth century to the present day"" - James Robson, Harvard University
£48.75
The Chinese University Press Transmutations of Desire – Literature and
Book SynopsisIn the West, love occupies center stage in the modern age, whether in art, intellectual life, or the economic life. We may observe a similar development in China, on its own impetus, which has resulted in this characteristic of modernity—this feature of modern life has been securely and unambiguously established, not the least facilitated by the thriving of literature about qing, whether in traditional or modern forms.Qiancheng Li concentrates on the nuances of a similar trend manifested in the Chinese context. The emphasis is on critical readings of the texts that have shaped this trend, including important Ming? and Qing?dynasty works of drama, Buddhist texts and other religious/philosophical works, in all their subtlety and evocative power.Trade ReviewThe power of qing or strong emotion is a major theme in late imperial Chinese literature—some writers asserting that it can transcend even life itself. Qiancheng Li surveys a number of seventeenth?century philosophical, religious, and literary texts to elucidate the metaphysical aspects of emotional attachment and of sexual desire in particular. Through his broad and penetrating reading, Li demonstrates incontrovertibly how, to seventeenth?century writers, qing and religion were inextricably linked. To those writers, qing could bring enlightenment, and certainly Li’s study enlightens its readers to new levels of complexity in major literary works of that period. Transmutations of Desire sets a major new milestone in the study of traditional Chinese culture.""- Robert E. Hegel, Washington University in St. Louis;""This book brings to a significantly new level the study of qing, a key concept in intellectual discourses of the late Ming which reverberated throughout the subsequent Qing period in Chinese literature. Herein we learn how, presented with the tension between passionate attraction as a fundamental force in life and religious (especially Buddhist) emphasis on release from attachments as an ultimate spiritual goal, authors of, and commentators on, the era’s most important works of drama and long fiction developed a multi?dimensional metaphysics of qing. Thereby they transmuted desire from a hindrance to spiritual fulfillment into its necessary complement.""- Lynn A. Struve, Indiana University Bloomington;""In many areas, Professor Li’s new study mainly on dramatic works has demonstrated the kind of sophistication and rigor I wish I had been able to achieve in my Desire and Fictional Narrative in Late Imperial China exclusively on fictional works. He has convincingly argued that we could not properly understand various “transmutations” of desire without an adequate understanding of their “scriptural foundation.” His study has significantly enriched our understanding of not only several well?known classics like The Peony Pavilion and Peach Blossom Fan but also very important but little?studied works such as those by the dramatist Jiang Shiquan from the eighteenth century.""- Martin W. Huang, University of California, Irvine;""Transmutations of Desire takes on one of the most crucial tensions in late imperial Chinese literature, desire and its renunciation. Bringing into dialogue four of the most celebrated plays as well as several understudied ones, their commentary and reception history, Buddhist scripture, Western theoretical approaches to love, and ultimately the novel Honglou meng, Qiancheng Li has given us a rich and rewarding intertextual study. With its focus on drama, it is an indispensable complement to his earlier monograph Fictions of Enlightenment, which explored the interplay of religion and literature in the realm of narrative.""- Rania Huntington, University of Wisconsin–MadisonTable of Contents Acknowledgements A Note on Abbreviations and Citations Prologue Chapter 1 Transmutations of Desire Qing (Desire) and Religions Origin of Desire: Transvaluation of Value The yin and yang, and the Dao Between xing (Nature) and qing (Feeling/Desire) The Ultimate Expression of qing The Full Course of Desire: The End of qing, or Its Transmutation Chapter 2 Mudan ting: The Theater of the Mind The Meaning of qing in Tang Xianzu Immateriality and the Theater of the Mind Indestructibility of Pleasing Forms and Desire (Seqing nanhuai) Pursuing the Dream: The Aftermath and Consequence The Self?Portrait 85 Death and Resurrection Transcending qing Chapter 3 Between Union and Separation: Xixiang ji and the Tragic “Meng youchun” (Dreaming of a Spring Excursion) “Yingying zhuan” (Yingying’s Story) Xixiang ji (The Western Wing) Ming Commentary Traditions on Xixiang ji Jing Shengtan’s Recension: An Anatomy of qing The Tragic: Form and Vision The Imperfect World: Feng Menglong’s Vision of the Tragic Jin Shengtan’s Tragic Vision Chapter 4 Changsheng dian: Qing, Death, and Redemption Hong Sheng’s Purist Revision of the Yang Yuhuan Saga Qing: Between Life and Death From Life to Death Qing’s Repentance (qinghui) and the Remedy of Regrets (buhen) Ambiguities of qing Chapter 5 Taohua shan: The Inadequacy of qing and the Metaphysical Solution Revisited Qing and Exterior Values The Inadequacy of qing The Peach Blossom Fan Metaphysical Solution Revisited Concluding Remarks Chapter 6 Jiang Shiquan and Xu Xi: Justifications of qing and the Metaphysical Frame After Taohua shan: Jiang Shiquan on Tang Xianzu “Dreams” Reenacted Yu Ergu as the Ideal Reader and the Female Readership of Mudan ting Convergence of Dreams Metaphysical Solutions: Subject and Structure Xu Xi: Life, Desire, and Life?Writing— By Way of Conclusion Chapter 7 Honglou meng: Qing and Visions of the Tragic Honglou meng and the Late Ming Legacy The Imperfect World and the Cosmic Dimension of qing: Significance of the Nüwa Myth Yiyin (Lust of Mind) and chi (Folly) Du Liniang and Jia Baoyu, Fidelity and Promiscuity: Qing Independent of Its Objects Lin Daiyu and Jia Baoyu: The Sense of the Tragic Two Visions of the Tragic: The 80?Chapter and 120?Chapter Versions Tensions between qing and Its Opposite: The Metaphysics and Dialectics of kong, se, and qing Revisited Epilogue: Qing and Talents for qing Writing Bibliography Index
£40.50
The Chinese University Press How the Red Star Rose – Edgar Snow and Early
Book SynopsisUntil the present day, Mao Zedong's biography has been the subject of an international mountain of commentary in China and elsewhere. Biographies praising Mao and those slandering him are all based on the American journalist Edgar Snow's (1905–1972) account in Red Star over China for the route Mao traveled from early childhood through his youth.How the "Red Star" Rose introduces the image of Mao and the biographical information made known to the world through the publication of Red Star, and with its publication the circumstances which they fundamentally undermined. There is no reason that Mao Zedong the person himself would completely change by virtue of the publication of Red Star. However, the external image surrounding him did completely change from before.Ishikawa uses Mao Zedong as raw material to examine from whence and how ordinary historical information and images which we habitually use unconsciously come into being. He desires to help readers to reconsider the historicity of the generation of not only Mao's image but of that of "historical materials."This book also examines the situation prevailing after the collection of data and publication of Red Star which played the definitive role in generating Mao's image and will investigate the various editions of Red Star in English, Chinese, Russian, and Japanese.
£56.25
The Chinese University Press Spiritual Foundation of Chinese Culture
Book SynopsisRevisiting the foundation of Chinese spiritual life, the prestigious historian Cho?yun Hsu seeks a way to connect Chinese culture with the world.This book is an insightful and lively discussion of the spiritual life of the Chinese people. Through investigation of cultural ideals and life practices, Professor Cho?yun Hsu constructs an original portrait of Chinese cultural values. Apart from the exalted subtleties of the scholarly elite, he pays much attention to everyday people's daily practices and collective memory, seeking to clarify Chinese ideas concerning the universe, human life, and nature, from traditional times down to the present day.Professor Hsu contends the problems Western civilization is facing nowadays, including various crises of alienation and separation from nature, are ones that it lacks resources to solve. He believes Chinese humanistic culture might offer another way forward and be of benefit to the future of the world.Trade ReviewA work of passionate humanism, this book is a heartfelt call to the world to take seriously the best aspects of traditional Chinese culture in order to avoid a looming catastrophe."" —Ian Johnson, Pulitzer Prize?winning author""Professor Hsu is deservedly a legend in Chinese Studies, and this book only adds to a long and distinguished publication record by an innovative scholar who has contributed to an enormous range of disciplines. Like all of Hsu's works, this can be read with pleasure and profit, as it is studded with insights drawn from antiquity to contemporary history. Highly recommended."" —Michael Nylan, Sather Professor of History, University of California at Berkeley""Professor Hsu undertakes a sweeping review of the beliefs, values, and visions that constitute Chinese civilizations from the ancient times to the present. Historically engaged and critically provocative, it is a must?read for anyone interested in Chinese Studies."" —David Der?wei Wang, Edward C. Henderson Professor of Chinese Literature, Harvard University""This account of traditional Chinese ways of thinking and being by one of the world's most eminent Sinologists is an invaluable witness to lived Chinese cultural history and its overriding ideal of harmony. Not since Lin Yutang's My Country and My People has there been such an accessibly erudite tribute to one of the world's great civilizations."" —John Lagerwey, Research Professor of Chinese Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong""It is a masterpiece that digs deeply into the roots of problems and their underlying values in modern Chinese society in a tradition that goes as far back as to the formative stage of Chinese civilization. Reading through the lines of the book, there is a deep sense of passion and concern for the future of the humankind."" —Li Feng, Professor of Early Chinese History and Archaeology, Columbia UniversityTable of Contents Chronology of Chinese Dynasties Translator's Foreword Foreword by Ying?shih Yu Preface Acknowledgements Introduction Searching for the Spirit of Chinese Culture I. Life Aesthetics in Time and Space II. The World of Heaven and Earth, Humans and Gods III. Legends and Ghost Stories IV. A Plural, Interactive Order: The Five Elements, Chinese Medicine, and Chinese Cooking V. The Ever?Changing Universe VI. The Meaning of Life VII. The Many Gods Who Protect the People VIII. Secular Religion IX. The Human Networks that Bind Us X. The World Revealed in Novels Conclusion A New Life for Chinese Culture
£48.75
The Chinese University Press China Pluperfect: Volume 1Epistemology of Past
Book SynopsisInitially based on a comparative study of Chinese and Euro?American art theory in the 18th and 19th centuries, this book examines how both cultures looked at their own past and their outside, i.e. what was construed as not belonging to their own cultural sphere, and how they devised new ways of adapting them into evolving cultural constructs.While the 17th century was still a time when the epistemological backgrounds of both civilizations were so profoundly different that nearly no dialogue was possible, the 18th century saw the emergence in both places of profound changes that would get them close enough to create the conditions for the beginning of a conversation. First quite superficial and taking shape mostly in the decorative arts, this process of rapprochement, while remaining chaotic and unpredictable, led to wider and more profound zones of contact throughout the late 19th and 20th centuries. Through the reinterpretations of each other's cultural creations, these zones of contact grew wider as the conditions for globalization became more and more prevalent.Frank Vigneron observes and explores these changes through texts and the visual arts to reveal how these two civilizations, while keeping their own characteristics, managed to develop fruitful dialogues and create deeply intertwined cultures. As an example, the final chapter looks at contemporary Chinese calligraphy as an art that, even though it has no equivalent in Euro?America, successfully integrated cross?cultural theoretical elements, thus exemplifying how past and outside can combine into new artistic constructs.Table of Contents 1 Floating Epistemes Episteme in the Works of Michel Foucault "Passeurs": The Jesuits in China "Passeurs": Chinoiseries Conditions of Passage Change of Episteme in China 2 Changing Epistemes Literati Tradition in Painting Dualism in Chinese Portrait Painting Misreading by the Jesuit Portrait Painters Misreading as Opening The Idea of Period Style as Life Cycle 3 Changing Views of History Art Classifications before the Republic Originality and Copying A Brief History of Chinese Art History Teleological Process Modern and Postmodern 4 Past and Present of Chinese Calligraphy From Antiquarianism to Chaos Script Brush Opening?Closing Performativity Conclusion: Multi?epistemic World
£40.50
The Chinese University Press China Pluperfect: Volume 2Practices of Past and
Book SynopsisThis book contains analysis of different domains of contemporary art in China seen through the lens of the epistemological changes described in China Pluperfect I: Epistemology of Past and Outside in Chinese Art. It first looks at the concept of "ink art," describing how it meant different things to different people in the former colony and how these different meanings came to determine certain institutional choices made at the beginning of the 21st century. The following chapters are dedicated to issues related to the urban and rural contexts for art creation in Mainland China and Hong Kong. One chapter observes the ups and downs of the representations of cities in the history of the People's Republic of China and how they have defined a certain idea of culture. Another looks at how Chinese cities have been exceptional centers of art creations over the last thirty to forty years through the example of Shenzhen where a vibrant art scene, albeit closely connected to Hong Kong which has become a major art hub in the last two decades, has developed. The following is dedicated to the changing fortunes of art making in the countryside, observing how institutions in the Mainland and in Hong Kong have supported these practices very differently.Frank Vigneron finally considers how the different speeds of globalization, slow in the past and fast today, have determined some of the issues of past and outside in the present, particularly in the context of socially engaged art in both the Mainland and Hong Kong.Table of Contents 1 Hong Kong Ink: A History of Past and Outside Bamboo Curtain and Mass Media Ink Society in Hong Kong Hong Kong Ink Art Museum Marginalization of Hong Kong Art 2 "When Is a Landscape Like a Body?" The Mollywood Series Mundane Mind and "Paintings of Beauties" Gender Positioning in Literati Culture Hong Kong Mundanity and Patriarchy in Mainland China 3 From Rural to Urban and Back Again Peace Reigns over the River in Hong Kong River of Wisdom in Shanghai and Hong Kong Anti?urban Bias of the Maoist Period Pro?urban Bias of the 1990s and Beyond 4 New Urban Frontier "One Country, Two Systems," and One Border The City over the Border: Shenzhen Three Plasticians in Shenzhen Art Market and Institutional Critique 5 New Rural Frontier Peasant Paintings during the Maoist Period "Beautiful Countryside" "Reviving the Country through Culture" Socially?Engaged Art Practices in the Hong Kong Countryside 6 Multi?cultural World Past and Outside Mobility as Privilege Mobility as Necessity
£45.00
NUS Press New Perspectives on the Japanese Occupation in
Book SynopsisInformation on the Japanese Occupation of Malaya and Singapore is sparse, and Japanese-language materials are particularly difficult to find because the Japanese military systematically destroyed war-related documents when the war ended. The contributors to this volume participated in a Forum that spent four years locating surviving materials relating to the Occupation of Malaya. The group had three objectives: to collect primary sources, to interview Japanese military and civilian officials who took part in the military administration and people in Malaysia and Singapore who experienced the period, and to publish the results of the studies.Based on interviews with Japanese, Malaysians and Singaporeans who lived through the war years and materials gathered from archives and libraries in Britain, Malaysia, Singapore, USA, Australia, and India, the Forum has produced a number of Japanese-language publications. This book makes available some of their research findings in English. Topics covered include the Watanabe Military Administration, Japanese research activities in Malaya, Japan's Economic Policies, Malayan Communist Party Leaders and the Anti-Japanese Resistance, the Massacre of Chinese in Singapore, Railway Transportation during the Japanese Occupation Period, The Singapore Internment Camp for Allied Civilian Women, and the Japanese Surrender. This volume is a revised version of ""Akashi Yoji, ed., Nippon Senryoka no Eiryo Maraya/Shingaporu"" (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten Publishers Co., 2001).
£999.99
NUS Press Anti-Chinese Violence in Indonesia 1996-1999
Book SynopsisIndonesians of Chinese descent constitute only two to three per cent of the country's population but dominate the private business sector. Serious acts of violence against this ethnic minority occurred during Indonesia's colonial past, and after a period relatively free of such incidents became increasingly frequent during the final years of Suharto's New Order. In this first book-length study of anti-Chinese hostility during the collapse of Suharto's regime, Jemma Purdey presents a close analysis of the main incidents of violence during the transitional period between 1996 and 1999, and the unprecedented process of national reflection that ensued. The mass violence that accompanied the fall of the regime in May 1998 affected not only ethnic Chinese but also indigenous or pribumi Indonesians. The author places anti-Chinese riots within this broader context, considering causes and agency as well as the way violence has been represented. While ethnicity and prejudice are central to the explanation put forward, she concludes that politics, economics and religion offer additional keys to understanding why such outbreaks occurred.
£23.36
NUS Press Paths Not Taken: Political Pluralism in Post-war
Book SynopsisSingapore's era of pluralism between the 1950s and 1970s was a time of extraordinary cultural, intellectual and political dynamism. Students, labour unions, ambitious political contenders, and representatives of the various ethnic communities all stepped forward to offer alternate visions of Singapore's future from across the entire political spectrum. They generated a ferment of ideologies, priorities, perspectives and social visions such as mainstream 'official' Singapore politics had never known before and has not seen since.Post WWII Singapore history generally follows a central theme of progress to establish the PAP political, economic and social model. Alternatives receive cursory treatment as problems, false starts, or difficulties to be overcome. This book reveals a more complex situation that involved a much larger cast of significant players, and gives due weight to the middle years of the twentieth century as a period that offered real alternatives, rather than a chaotic age before the dawn.The book will remind older Singaporeans of pages from their past, and will provide a younger generation with a novel perspective at their country's past struggles. For outside observers, it offers a fascinating glimpse of a side of Singapore that has received relatively little attention.
£18.00
NUS Press The Sulu Zone, 1768-1898: The Dynamics of
Book SynopsisFirst published in 1981, ""The Sulu Zone"" has become a classic in the field of Southeast Asian History. The book deals with a fascinating geographical, cultural and historical ""border zone"" centred on the Sulu and Celebes Seas between 1768 and 1898, and its complex interactions with China and the West. The author examines the social and cultural forces generated within the Sulu Sultanate by the China trade, namely the advent of organized, long distance maritime slave raiding and the assimilation of captives on a hitherto unprecedented scale into a traditional Malayo-Muslim social system.How entangled commodities, trajectories of tastes, and patterns of consumption and desire that span continents linked to slavery and slave raiding, the manipulation of diverse ethnic groups, the meaning and constitution of ""culture,"" and state formation? James Warren responds to this question by reconstructing the social, economic, and political relationships of diverse peoples in a multi-ethnic zone of which the Sulu Sultanate was the centre, and by problematizing important categories like ""piracy"", ""slavery"", ""culture"", ""ethnicity"", and the ""state"". His work analyzes the dynamics of the last autonomous Malayo-Muslim maritime state over a long historical period and describes its stunning response to the world capitalist economy and the rapid ""forward movement"" of colonialism and modernity.It also shows how the changing world of global cultural flows and economic interactions caused by cross-cultural trade and European dominance affected men and women who were forest dwellers, highlanders, and slaves, people who worked in everyday jobs as fishers, raiders, divers or traders. Often neglected by historians, the response of these members of society are a crucial part of the history of Southeast Asia.
£23.36
NUS Press Javanese Performances on an Indonesian Stage:
Book SynopsisDuring the dramatic economic and social transformation of late twentieth-century Indonesia, theatre performances in Central Java featured a familiar cast of rulers, nobles, clown servants and ordinary people. However, these presentations were not a repetition of age-old cultural 'traditions'. Instead, by stretching the framework of Javanese theatrical convention, theatre troupes challenged dominant cultural and political values. As political pressures intensified in the final months of the New Order regime, their witty, critical performances drew enthusiastic, oppositionist crowds.The dismantling of repressive state control after the fall of Suharto in 1998 diminished interest in political critiques from the stage, and growing economic weakness caused patronage and sponsorship to dry up. By 2003-04, however, a revival was underway as performers engaged with the politics of regional autonomy and democratisation, and actors responded to the devastating Yogyakarta earthquake of 2006 by staging shows in the worst-affected areas to help sustain community spirit and pride in local culture.Barbara Hatley's account of more than thirty years of theatre activities and social change shows how performers and audiences have adapted, resisted, incorporated and survived. As Indonesian society evolves, Javanese performances continue to engage with ever-changing social contexts, expressing the dynamic resilience and sense of identity of those who stage and watch them.
£23.36
NUS Press Thai South and Malay North: Ethnic Interactions
Book SynopsisThe portion of the Malay Peninsula where the Thai Buddhist civilization of Thailand gives way to the Malay Muslim civilization of Malaysia is characterized by multiple forms of pluralism. An appreciation of the long history and varied forms of that pluralism opens up fresh and important perspectives on the violent crisis currently affecting southern Thailand.""Thai South and Malay North"" brings together research by academic specialists working on this border zone who examine a broad range of issues relating to the turmoil afflicting the region. Drawing on a broad historical perspective, the authors explore religious observances and national identity, the relationship between electoral democracy and separatist violence, and interactions between northern Malaysia and southern Thailand.Intellectually rigorous and theoretically sophisticated, ""Thai South and Malay North"" is the most comprehensive work to date on a part of Southeast Asia whose historical, linguistic, and political complexity has long defied scholarly synthesis - essential reading for anyone seeking to understand southern Thailand's complex past and troubled present.
£23.36
NUS Press Penang and Its Region: The Story of an Asian
Book SynopsisFrom its beginnings in the late eighteenth century, the vibrant colonial port of Penang attracted a diverse range of people and encouraged pioneering commercial enterprises. A place of inter-ethnic collaboration and inter-cultural borrowings, the island came to be known as the 'Pearl of the Orient' and for many travellers was the first port of call in Southeast Asia. In the nineteenth century, Singapore displaced Penang in long distance trade, but the island remained a major focus of regional trade. For this reason, the story of Penang's relations with the Malay Peninsula and neighbouring territories reveals a great deal about conditions in Southeast Asia. This collection discusses the personal networks that linked prominent individuals in Penang with neighbouring areas, and considers the position of the island within the Southeast Asian region. The authors write about a wide range of topics, including local entrepreneurs, mutual help associations, cross border trading, political networks, and aspects of how the cosmopolitan population of the island negotiated the transition from British colony to Malaysian state.
£999.99
NUS Press A History of Modern Singapore, 1819-2005
Book SynopsisWhen C.M. Turnbull's ""A History of Singapore, 1819-1975"" appeared in 1977, it quickly achieved recognition as the definitive history of Singapore. A second edition published in 1989 brought the story up to the 1988 election. In this fully revised edition, which takes into account recent scholarship, including the work of social and cultural historians, the author added a chapter on Goh Chok Tong's premiership (1990-2004) and the transition to a government headed by Lee Hsien Loong. The book now ends in 2005, when the Republic of Singapore celebrated its 40th anniversary as an independent nation. Major changes occurred in the 1990s at the generation of leaders that oversaw the transition from a colony to independence stepped aside in favour of a younger generation of leaders. Their task was to shape a course that sustained the economic growth and social stability achieved by their predecessors, and they would be tested toward the end of the decade when Southeast Asia experienced a severe financial crisis. While most modern studies have focused on contemporary or very recent times and Singapore's successful transition from the developing to the developed world, younger historians are increasingly interested in other aspects of their past, and ""A History of Modern Singapore, 1819-2005"" seeks to provide a general framework, giving due weight to the origins, early development and each of the various periods of Singapore's history.
£40.46
NUS Press Asian Port Cities, 1600-1800: Local and Foreign
Book SynopsisAsian port cities in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were the site of intensive cultural contact involving a broad spectrum of participants from across the world. These interactions raised questions of communication for those who conducted business in the port cities, and issues of regulation and control for those who governed them. By drawing comparisons among the Asian port cities where European East India Companies maintained trading centers, this volume goes beyond national histories to examine cultural interactions on a regional basis. The authors build on the rich literature relating to cross-cultural interactions between the Dutch and the Japanese in Nagasaki by developing comparisons among Asian port cities that look at buildings, verbal communication, mercantile transactions, dispute settlement, family issues, as well as clothing, shelter, and social relations associated with food, they provide an alternative interpretation of historical events.
£23.36
NUS Press Journal, Memorials and Letters of Cornelis
Book SynopsisAdmiral Cornelis Matelieff de Jonge, a Director in the Rotterdam chamber of the Dutch East Indies Company (VOC) for three decades during the early 17th century, set sail from the Dutch Republic in 1605. He launched an attack on Portuguese Melaka in 1606 and signed landmark treaties with the rulers of Johor (1606) and Ternate (1607). After his return to the Netherlands in the autumn of 1608 he wrote a series of epistolary reports and memoranda that were carefully studied by leading policy makers in the Republic, among them the renowned jurist Hugo Grotius, and Johan van Oldenbarnevelt.These materials contributed to the formulation of early VOC policy for the Southeast Asian region in the period 1605?20, and they yield candid insights into key issues of trade, security and the diplomacy of regional polities and their relations with Spain and Portugal. Here translated into English for the first time, and presented with 70 illustrations and maps from the period, this collection of treaties, reports and excerpts from Matelieff's travelogue will be of great interest to students of Southeast Asian and early colonial history and of the history of international law.
£44.96
NUS Press Ghosts of the Past in Southern Thailand: Essays
Book SynopsisAt the heart of the ongoing armed conflict in southern Thailand is a fundamental agreement about the history of relations between the Patani Malays and the Thai kingdom. While the Thai royalist-nationalist version of history regards Patani as part of that kingdom ""since time immemorial,"" Patani Malay nationalists look back to a golden age when the Sultanate of Patani was an independent, prosperous trading state and a renowned center for Islamic education and scholarship in Southeast Asia - a time before it was defeated, broken up, and brought under the control of the Thai state.While still influential, in recent years these diametrically opposed views of the past have begun to make way for more nuanced and varied interpretations. Patani scholars, intellectuals and students now explore their history more freely and confidently than in the past, while the once-rigid Thai nationalist narrative is open to more pluralistic interpretations. There is growing interaction and dialogue between historians writing in Thai, Malay and English, and engagement with sources and scholarship in other languages, including Chinese and Arabic. In this volume, 13 scholars who have worked on this sensitive region evaluate the current state of current historical writing about the Patani Malays of southern Thailand.The essays in this book demonstrate that an understanding of the conflict must take into account the historical dimensions of relations between Patani and the Thai kingdom, and the ongoing influence of these perceptions on Thai state officials, the militants, and the local population.
£23.36
NUS Press The Japanese Occupation of Malaya and Singapore,
Book SynopsisJapanese forces invaded Malaya on 8 December 1941 and British forces surrendered in Singapore 70 days later. Japan would rule the territory for the next 3½ years. Early efforts to maintain pre-war standards of comfort gave way to a grim struggle for survival as the vibrant economy ground to a halt and residents struggled to deal with unemployment, shortages of consumer goods, sharp price rises, a thriving black market and widespread corruption. People were hungry, dressed in rags, and falling victim to treatable diseases for which medicines were unavailable, and there was little reason to hope for better in the future.Using surviving administrative papers, oral materials, intelligence reports and post-war accounts by Japanese officers, this book presents a picture of life in occupied Malaya and Singapore. It shows the impact of war and occupation on a non-belligerent population, and creates a new understanding of the changes and the continuities that underlay the post-war economy and society. The book was first published in 1998 and is now re-issued in new edition that incorporates information from newly translated Japanese documents and other recent discoveries.Trade ReviewThe best book on World War II Malaya, it is indispensable for understanding the consequences of Japan's wartime occupation." - Gregg Huff, Pembroke College, University of Oxford
£28.01
NUS Press Squatters into Citizens: The 1961 Bukit Ho Swee
Book SynopsisThe crowded, bustling, 'squatter' kampongs so familiar across Southeast Asia have long since disappeared from Singapore, leaving few visible traces of their historical influence on the life in the city-state. In one such settlement, located in an area known as Bukit Ho Swee, a great fire in 1961 destroyed the kampong and left 16,000 people homeless, creating a national emergency that led to the first big public housing project of the new Housing and Development Board (HDB). HDB flats now house more than four-fifths of the Singapore population, making the aftermath of the Bukit Ho Swee fire a seminal event in modern Singapore.Loh Kah Seng grew up in one-room rental flats in the HDB estate built after the fire. Drawing on oral history interviews, official records and media reports, he describes daily life in squatter communities and how people coped with the hazard posed by fires. His examination of the catastrophic events of 25 May 1961 and the steps taken by the new government of the People's Action Party in response to the disaster show the immediate consequences of the fire and how relocation to public housing changed the people's lives. Through a narrative that is both vivid and subtle, the book explores the nature of memory and probes beneath the hard surfaces of modern Singapore to understand the everyday life of the people who live in the city.Shortlisted for the European Association for Southeast Asian Studies (EuroSEAS) Humanities Book Prize 2015.
£23.76
NUS Press Studying Singapore's Past: C.M. Turnball and the
Book SynopsisC.M. (Mary) Turnbull's contributions to historical writing on Singapore extended from her 1962 thesis, published in 1972 as The Straits Settlements, 1826-67: Indian presidency to crown colony, to her magisterial history of Singapore, first published in 1977 and reissued in 2009 in an updated edition as A History of Modern Singapore, 1816-2006. Her approach to history involved detailed work with documents and published materials, with a particular focus on political and economic history. One contributor to the present volume described the book as an ""exercise in endowing a modern 'nation-state' with a coherent past that should explain the present."" As styles in history evolved, younger scholars including some of her former students and colleagues began exploring new approaches to historical research that drew on non-English-language source material and asked fresh questions of the sources. Mary enjoyed controversy and expected debate, and had a deep interest in these accounts, which were in many ways a natural progression from her own publications even when they raised questions about her interpretations and conclusions. Studying Singapore's Past had its origins in a conference organised to discuss her work. The volume includes ten contributions, some from long-established scholars of Singapore's history, others from a new generation of researchers. Their work offers an evaluation of established understandings of Singapore's history, and gives an indication of new directions that researchers are exploring. In publishing the book, the editor not only pays tribute to a distinguished historian but also makes a contribution to the historiography of Singapore and to ongoing debates about Singapore's past.
£23.36
NUS Press Interactions with a Violent Past: Reading of
Book SynopsisThe Second and Third Indochina Wars are the subject of important ongoing scholarship, but there has been little research on the lasting impact of wartime violence on local societies and populations, in Vietnam as well as in Laos and Cambodia. Today’s Lao, Vietnamese and Cambodian landscapes bear the imprint of competing violent ideologies and their perilous material manifestations. From battlefields and massively bombed terrain to reeducation camps and resettled villages, the past lingers on in the physical environment. The nine essays in this volume discuss post-conflict landscapes as contested spaces imbued with memory-work conveying differing interpretations of the recent past, expressed through material (even, monumental) objects, ritual performances, and oral narratives (or silences).While Cambodian, Lao and Vietnamese landscapes are filled with tenacious traces of a violent past, creating an unsolicited and malevolent sense of place among their inhabitants, they can in turn be transformed by actions of resilient and resourceful local communities.
£23.76
NUS Press Trade and Society: The Amoy Network on the China
Book SynopsisThe book examines the social and economic changes in south Fukien (Fujian) on the southeast coast of China during late imperial times. Faced with land shortages and overpopulation, the rural population of south Fukien turned to the sea in search of fresh opportunities to secure a livelihood. With the tacit support of local officials and the scholar gentry, the merchants played the pivotal role in long-distance trade, and the commercial networks they established spanned the entire China coast, making the port city of Amoy (Xiamen) a major centre for maritime trade.In the work, the author discusses four interrelated spheres of activity, namely, the traditional rural sector, the port cities, the coastal trade and the overseas trade links. He argues that the creative use of clan organizations was key to the growth of the Amoy network along the coast as well as overseas.
£26.06
NUS Press Islam and Politics in Indonesia: The Masyumi Party between Democracy and Integralism
Book SynopsisThe Masyumi Party, which was active in Indonesia from 1945 to 1960, constitutes the boldest attempt to date at reconciling Islam and democracy. Masyumi proposed a vision of society and government which was not bound by a literalist application of Islamic doctrine but rather inspired by the values of Islam. It set out moderate policies which were both favourable to the West and tolerant towards other religious communities in Indonesia.Although the party made significant strides towards the elaboration of a Muslim democracy, its achievements were nonetheless precarious: it was eventually outlawed in 1960 for having resisted Sukarno's slide towards authoritarianism, and the refusal of Suharto's regime to reinstate the party left its leaders disenchanted and marginalised. Many of those leaders subsequently turned to a form of Islam known as integralism, a radical doctrine which contributed to the advent of Muslim neo-fundamentalism in Indonesia.This book examines the Masjumi Party from its roots in early twentieth-century Muslim reformism to its contemporary legacy, and offers a perspective on political Islam which provides an alternative to the more widely-studied model of Middle-Eastern Islam. The party's experience teaches us much about the fine line separating a moderate form of Islam open to democracy and a certain degree of secularisation from the sort of religious intransigence which can threaten a country's denominational coexistence.
£31.46
NUS Press Sites, Bodies and Stories: Imagining Indonesian
Book SynopsisSites, Bodies and Stories examines the intimate links between history and heritage as they have developed in postcolonial Indonesia. Sites discussed in the book include Borobudur in Central Java, a village in Flores built around megalithic formations, and ancestral houses in Alor. Bodies refers to legacies of physical anthropology, exhibition practices and Hollywood movies. The Stories are accounts of the Mambesak movement in Papua, the inclusion of wayang puppetry in UNESCO's List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, and subaltern history as written by the people of Blambangan in their search for national heroes. Throughout the book, citizenship entitlement figures as a leitmotif in heritage initiatives.Contemporary heritage formation in Indonesia is intrinsically linked to a canon of Indonesian art and culture developed during Dutch colonial rule, institutionalized within Indonesia's heritage infrastructure and in the Netherlands, and echoed in museums and exhibitions throughout the world. The authors in this volume acknowledge colonial legacies but argue against a colonial determinism, considering instead how contemporary heritage initiatives can lead to new interpretations of the past.
£26.31
NUS Press Chinese Epigraphy in Singapore, 1819-1911
Book SynopsisThe history of Singapore’s Chinese community is carved in stone and wood: in the epigraphic record of 62 Chinese temples, native-place associations, clan and guild halls, from 1819 to 1911. These materials include temple plaques, couplets, stone inscriptions, stone and bronze censers, and other inscribed objects found in these institutions. They provide first-hand historical information on the aspirations and contributions of the early generation of Chinese settlers in Singapore. Early inscriptions reveal the centrality of these institutions to Chinese life in Singapore, while later inscriptions show the many ways that these institutions have evolved over the years. Many have become deeply engaged in social welfare projects, while others have also become centers of transnational networks. These materials, available in Chinese and in English translation, open a window into the world of Chinese communities in Singapore. These cultural artifacts can also be appreciated for their exceptional artistic value. They are a central part of the heritage of Singapore.
£141.10
NUS Press Three Centuries of Conflict in East Timor
Book SynopsisWhy does violence recur in some places, over long periods of time? Douglas Kammen explores this pattern in Three Centuries of Conflict in East Timor, studying that island's tragic past, focusing on the small district of Maubara. Once a small but powerful kingdom embedded in long-distance networks of trade, over the course of three centuries the people of Maubara experienced benevolent but precarious Dutch suzerainty, Portuguese colonialism punctuated by multiple uprisings and destructive campaigns of pacification, Japanese military rule, and years of brutal Indonesian occupation. In 1999 Maubara was the site of particularly severe violence before and after the UN-sponsored referendum that finally led to the restoration of East Timor's independence. The questions posed in Three Centuries of Conflict in East Timor about recurring violence and local narratives apply to many other places besides East Timor-from the Caucasus to central Africa, and from the Balkans to China-wherever mass violence keeps recurring.
£21.56
HarperCollins Publishers Inc Krakatoa The Day the World Exploded August 27
Book Synopsis
£18.99
Forgotten Books The Book of Ser Marco Polo Vol. 1 of 2 The Venetian Concerning the Kingdoms and Marvels of the East Classic Reprint
£33.74
Forgotten Books Les Derniers Barbares Chine Tibet Mongolie Classic Reprint
£26.12
Forgotten Books An Australian in China Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma Classic Reprint
£26.49
Hardpress Publishing Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bombay 1
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Hardpress Publishing Peking and the Pekingese During the First Year of the British Embassy at Peking 1
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Hardpress Publishing An Easy Introduction to the History and Geography of Bengal for the Junior Classes in Schools 1
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Hardpress Publishing The Voyage of Franois Pyrard of Laval to the East Indies the Maldives the Moluccas and Brazil 1
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Hardpress Publishing Bhotan and the Story of the Dooar War Including Sketches of a Three Months Residence in the Himalayas and Narrative of a Visit to Bhotan in May 1865 1
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Hardpress Publishing An Historical Account of the Settlement and Possession of Bombay by the English East India Company and of the War With the Mahratta Nation 1
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Hardpress Publishing Yedo and Peking a Narrative of a Journey to the Capitals of Japan and China 1
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Hardpress Publishing Linsurrection En Chine Depuis Son Origine Jusqu La Prise De Nankin 1
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Hardpress Publishing China and the Chinese Their Religion Character Customs and Manufacturers the Evils Arising from the Opium Trade With a Glance at Our Religious Commercial Intercourse With the Country 1
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Hardpress Publishing The History of Ceylon from the Earliest Period to the Present Time With an Appendix Containing an Account of Its Present Condition 1
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Hardpress Publishing A Journey Through the Chinese Empire 1
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Hardpress Publishing India Through the Stereoscope a Journey Through Hindustan 1
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Hardpress Publishing The Imperial and Asiatic Quarterly Review and Oriental and Colonial Record 1
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