Just who are ‘the Malays’? This provocative study posesthe question and considers how and why the answers have changedover time, and from one region to another. Anthony Milner developsa sustained argument about ethnicity and identity in an historical,‘Malay’ context. The Malays is a comprehensiveexamination of the origins and development of Malay identity,ethnicity, and consciousness over the past five centuries. Covers the political, economic, and cultural development of theMalays Explores the Malay presence in Brunei, Singapore, Indonesia,Thailand, Cambodia, Sri Lanka, and South Africa, as well as themodern Malay show-state of Malaysia Offers diplomatic speculation about ways Malay ethnicity willdevelop and be challenged in the future

This simulating new reading of constructions of ethnicity in Malaysia and Singapore is an important contribution to understanding the powerful linkages between ethnicity, religious reform, identity and nationalism in multi-ethnic Southeast Asia.

The Malay World (Alam Melayu), spanning the Malay Peninsula, much of Sumatra, and parts of Borneo, has long contained within it a variety of populations. Most of the Malays have been organized into the different kingdoms (kerajaan Melayu) from which they have derived their identity. But the territories of those kingdoms have also included tribal peoples - both Malay and non-Malay - who have held themselves apart from those kingdoms in varying degrees. In the last three decades, research on these tribal societies has aroused increasing interest.This book explores the ways in which the character of these societies relates to the Malay kingdoms that have held power in the region for many centuries past, as well as to the modern nation-states of the region. It brings together researchers committed to comparative analysis of the tribal groups living on either side of the Malacca Straits - in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Singapore. New theoretical and descriptive approaches are presented for the study of the social and cultural continuities and discontinuities manifested by tribal life in the region.

McAmis also gives attention to the history of their relationship with Christians - a history that is key to understanding the current state of religious and social life in places like Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines. Since Muslims and Christians together comprise ninety-four percent of the Malay population, peaceful interaction and cooperation between mosque and church are crucial to realizing the economic and political goals of the entire region.".

Contesting Malayness assembles research on the theme of how Malays have identified themselves in time and place, developed by a wide range of scholars. While the authors describe some of the historical and cultural patterns that make up the Malay world, taken as a whole their work demonstrates the impossibility of offering a definition or even a description of "Melayu" that is not rife with omissions and contradictions.

Just who are ‘the Malays’? This provocative study poses the question and considers how and why the answers have changed over time, and from one region to another. Anthony Milner develops a sustained argument about ethnicity and identity in an historical, ‘Malay’ context. The Malays is a comprehensive examination of the origins and development of Malay identity, ethnicity, and consciousness over the past five centuries. Covers the political, economic, and cultural development of the Malays Explores the Malay presence in Brunei, Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, Cambodia, Sri Lanka, and South Africa, as well as the modern Malay show-state of Malaysia Offers diplomatic speculation about ways Malay ethnicity will develop and be challenged in the future

In this original and perceptive study Donna J. Amoroso argues that the Malay elites' preeminent position after the Second World War had much to do with how British colonialism reshaped old idioms and rituals _ helping to (re)invent a tradition. In doing so she illuminates the ways that traditionalism reordered the Malay political world, the nature of the state and the political economy of leadership. In the postwar era, traditionalism began to play a new role: it became a weapon which the Malay aristocracy employed to resist British plans for a Malayan Union and to neutralise the challenge coming groups representing a more radical, democratic perspective and even hijacking their themes. Leading this conservative struggle was Dato Onn bin Jaafar, who not only successfully helped shape Malay opposition to the Malayan Union but was also instrumental in the creation of the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) that eventually came to personify an ïacceptable Malay nationalismÍ. Traditionalism and the Ascendancy of the Malay Ruling Class in Colonial Malaya is an important contribution to the history of colonial Malaya and, more generally, to the history of ideas in late colonial societies.

"The Malay population makes up Singapore's three largest ethnic groups. This book provides an analysis of the debates on religion, politics and citizenship of Malay Muslims in contemporary Singapore. Comprehensively and convincingly argued, the author examines their disadvantaged circumstances in the fields of politics, education, social mobility, and freedom of religious expression."--Publisher's description.