Highlighting the interconnections between Southeast Asia and the world through literature, this book calls for a different reading approach to the literatures of Southeast Asia by using translation as the main conceptual framework in the analyses and interpretation of the texts, languages, and cultures of the following countries: Cambodia, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei Darussalam, and the Philippines. Through the theme of “translational politics,” the contributors critically examine not only the linguistic properties but also the metaphoric, symbolic, and semiotic meanings, images, and representations that have been translated across societies and cultures through local and global consumption and circulation of literature, (new) media, and other cultural forms. Using translation to unlock and decode multiple, different languages, narratives, histories, and worldviews emerging from Southeast Asian geo-literary contexts, this book builds on current scholarship and offers new approaches to the contestations of race, gender, and sexuality in literature, which often involve the politically charged discourses of identity, language, and representation. At the same time, this book provides new perspectives and future directions in the study of Southeast Asian literatures. Exploring a range of literary and cultural products, including written texts, performance, and cinema, this volume will be a key resource for students and researchers interested in translation and cultural studies, comparative and world literature, and Southeast Asian studies.

This book offers a comprehensive and detailed analysis of refugee protection in Southeast Asia from an international law perspective. It examines both the legal and policy frameworks pertaining to the protection of refugees in the region as well as the countries’ response to refugee movements from the Indochinese refugee crisis in the mid-1970s to the most recent developments. It covers important aspects of refugee protection, such as access to territory, non-refoulement, the treatment of refugees, the concept of refugee as applied in the region, burden-sharing and durable solutions to the plight of refugees. The analysis focuses specifically on the main countries of asylum within the Association of Southeast Asian Nations that are not parties to the 1951 Refugee Convention, namely Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia. Using an international law perspective based on the doctrine of the ‘two elements’ (practice and opinio juris), the author argues that these states have long recognized that people fleeing persecution, armed conflict and generalized violence, namely refugees, should be protected. This in turn demonstrates that they recognize the existence and relevance of the international refugee regime despite their refusal to accede to the Refugee Convention. Offering a different perspective on the links between international refugee law and refugee protection in Southeast Asia, this book will be of interest to researchers and practitioners in the fields of international relations, international refugee law, international human rights law, migration governance and Southeast Asian Studies.

This book examines the lives of the Malay and Cham Muslims in Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam and examines how they co-exist and live in societies that are dominated by an alternative consensus and are illiberal and non-democratic in nature. Focusing on two major Muslim communities in Southeast Asia, both of whom live as minorities in societies that are not democratic and have a history of hostility and repression towards non-conforming ideas, the book explains their circumstances, the choices and life decisions they have to make, and how minorities can thrive in an unfriendly, monocultural environment. Based on original field work and research, the author analyses how people live, and how they adapt to societies which are not motivated by Western liberal ideals of multiculturalism. The book also offers a unique perspective on how Islam develops in an environment where it is seen as alien and disloyal. A useful contribution analyzing historical and post-colonial experiences of Muslim minorities and how they survive and evolve over the course of state monopoly in mainland Southeast Asia, this book will be of interest to academics working on Muslim minorities, Asian Religion and Southeast Asian Studies.

This book examines the history of political continuity and conflict in East Timor between 1974 and 2006, and the origins of an unexpected crisis in 2006 which caused an international military intervention and several more years of UN missions. Providing a fresh and empirical political history to explain the crisis, the book offers new dimensions to the understanding of East Timor, its independence struggles, political transition and politics after independence in 2002. The author revisits historical materials and brings to light new resources, making extensive use of the 2005 Report of the Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation and contemporary diplomatic, UN and news media reports, to provide a precise context and chronology for the events in 2006. The book provides an analysis within which factors such as ethnic and inter-communal violence, security sector weaknesses and conflict between the army and police, the constitution and legal system, state-building and peace-building can be located in the larger context of the 2006 crisis. Demonstrating how and why, in the space of four weeks in April and May 2006, the newly independent country of Timor-Leste plunged from ‘UN success story’ into catastrophe, this book will be of interest to academics working on Southeast Asian Politics, Southeast Asian history, Development Studies and Nation-, State- and Peace-Building and International Relations.

This book analyzes why Indians have been made invisible in Vietnamese society and historiography. It argues that their invisibilization originates in the formulaic metaphor Vietnamese nation-makers have used to portray Indians in their quest for national sovereignty and socialism. The book presents a complex view on colonial legacies in Vietnam which suggests that Vietnamese nation-makers associate Indians with colonialism and capitalism, ultimately viewed as "non-socialist" and "non-hegemonic" state structures. Furthermore, the book demonstrates how Vietnamese nation-makers achieve the overriding socialist and independent goal of historically differing Indians from Vietnamese nationalisms whilst simultaneously making them invisible. In addition to primary Vietnamese texts which demonstrate the performativity of language and the Vietnamese traditional belief in writing as a sharp weapon for national and class struggles, the author utilizes interviews with Indians and Vietnamese authorities in charge of managing the Indian population. Bringing to the surface the ways through which Vietnamese intellectuals have invisibilized the Indians for the sake of the visibility of national hegemony and prosperity, this book will be of interest to scholars of Southeast Asian Studies and South Asian Studies, Vietnam Studies, including nation-building, literature, and language.

Chairullah investigates how the political, social, and economic interests of national and local elites were negotiated in the formulation and early stages of Special Autonomy in Papua Province, Indonesia. The Papuan case lends support to the current conception of elite theory, which considers the influence of actors and dynamics beyond power elites in the decision-making process. The failure of the policy implementation as a conflict reduction strategy in the Papuan case can be attributed to the dynamics of elite configurations during the negotiation and early implementation stages. Chairullah presents two significant new findings for research on Papuan Special Autonomy. Firstly, that secret negotiations were held between Papuan and national elites during Abdurrahman Wahid’s presidency, and these were crucial in reducing separatist sentiment in Papua. Secondly, that the United States, through Freeport McMoRan, strongly influenced the Special Autonomy negotiation process. The actions of national elites in Jakarta led to widespread disappointment about the policy at all levels in Papua and the subsequent escalation of separatist sentiment based on Papuan ethnic identity. An important book for scholars of Indonesian politics and society, and especially those with a particular interest in the Papuan conflict.

Considering the Mekong region as an aggregation of various commons, the contributors to this volume investigate the various commons across the boundaries of the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. The book incorporates the specialized fields of political science, area studies, public policy, international relations, international development, geography, economics, business administration, public health, engineering, agricultural economics, tropical agriculture, and biotechnology. The contributions to the book cover various issues including innovation and technology, transport and logistics, public health and literacy, traditional medicine, infectious diseases, advanced agricultural technologies, irrigation, water resources, labor migration, human trafficking, and counterfeiting. They examine various commons and goods related to these issues, and discuss practices, policies, decision-making processes and governance strategies for imagining a future Mekong Community that will avoid the tragedy, and explore the comedy of the commons/anti-commons. A valuable resource for scholars of the Mekong region, and more broadly for academics working on the interdisciplinary study of transboundary governance issues.

The Routledge Handbook of Contemporary Brunei presents an overview of significant themes, issues, and challenges pertinent to Brunei Darussalam in the twenty-first century. Multidisciplinary in coverage, the contributions cover topics relating to philology, history, religion, language and literature, geography, international relations, economics, politics and sociocultural traditions. The Handbook is structured in eight parts: Foundations History Faith and Ethnicity Literature Language and Education Economics Material Culture Empowerment Chapters focus on the recent past and contemporary developments in this unique country which has remained a Malay Muslim sultanate, sustaining its religious and traditional heritage encapsulated in the national philosophy, Melayu Islam Beraja (MIB, Malay Islamic Monarchy). The MIB philosophy represents the sultanate’s three pillars of social, cultural, political and economic sustainability, and the contributors discuss this concept in relation to the notion of ‘Malay’ or ‘Malaydom’, the official religion of the nation-state, Islam and monarchy as the essential system of government. This Handbook is an invaluable reference work for students of Asian and Southeast Asian Studies and researchers interested in what is demographically the smallest country within the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

This book comprises a collection of essays that address a significant gap in the study of Malaysian Literature in English by exploring selected local and diasporic writings produced in the new postcolonial millennium, including works by established, emerging, and new writers. The literary developments in this new millennium have been substantial and are reflected in the production of new voices, viewpoints, themes, trends, styles, and forms. By articulating these changing postcolonial perspectives and conditions, the chapters in this volume can inform and enrich the study of nation, society, and culture in a globalized and hyperreal age. Tapping into the difference, diversity, and hybridity of 21st-century historicized and glocalized multicultural Malaysia, the millennium writings explore the changing identities and relations and their social, cultural, and political dimensions through the intersections of race, gender, sexuality, and class. By examining new, different, or changing ideas, forms, themes, and representations, this book considers the vital ways the millennium voices and viewpoints can potentially help us critically rethink and resituate postcolonial studies on Malaysia as they spotlight challenges and new directions in the field. The book will be of interest to researchers, academics, and scholars in the field of Malaysian writing in English, Southeast Asian literature, Asian literature, diaspora, and literary studies. The chapters in the book were originally published as a special issue in the Journal of Postcolonial Writing.