Southeast Asia Collection Blog

Holt, John. Spirits of the place : Buddhism and Lao religious culture. Honolulu : University of Hawai’i Press, c2009.
Here John Holt, a well-known scholar of Sri Lankan Theravada Buddhist history and culture, enters previously uncharted territory with a study of religious culture in Laos. A newcomer to the study of Lao Buddhism (a relative newcomer, [...]

[Read more →]

Di cư và chuyển đổi lối sống. English. [Migration and change in the way of life : an anthropological introduction to the Vietnamese community in Laos] / Nguyen Duy Thieu, editor. Hanoi : Thế Giới Publishers, 2008.
This is a collection of ethnographic essays on the Vietnamese population in Laos. It is the fruit of a [...]

[Read more →]

Evans, Grant. The last century of Lao royalty : a documentary history. Chiang Mai, Thailand : Silkworm Books, 2009.
This is a very welcome addition to the existing scholarship (which is dreadfully scant) on Lao history. Here Evans attempts to “recover” memories of the Lao royal family. With the communist victory in 1975, the Lao [...]

[Read more →]

Tai lands and Thailand : community and state in Southeast Asia / edited by Andrew Walker. Honolulu : Asian Studies Association of Australia in association with University Of Hawai’i Press, c2009.
This edited volume, featuring essays by Andrew Walker, Craig J. Reynolds, and Holly High, among other notable scholars, offers a new approach to the study [...]

[Read more →]

Baird, Ian (Ian G.). People, livelihoods, and development in the Xekong River Basin, Laos / Ian G. Baird and Bruce Shoemaker. Bangkok, Thailand : White Lotus Press, c2008.
This is the first serious study (in any language) of the rapidly changing economic and cultural landscape of the Xekong river basin in Laos. The Xekong River originates [...]

[Read more →]

The Middle Mekong River Basin : studies in Tai history and culture / edited by Constance M. Wilson. DeKalb, Ill. : Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Northern Illinois University, c2009.
The essays in this collection, two of which (those written by John Hartman and Constance Wilson) were originally presented as papers at the International Convention of [...]

[Read more →]

M̄ækhōng-Sālawin : phūkhon, ph̄ưnnam, læ Suwannaphūm kh̨ōng ʻUsākhanē = Mekong-Salween : peoples, waters and the golden land of Suvarnabhumi/Southeast Asia / [bannāthikān, Chānwit Kasētsiri]. Samut Prākān : Mūnnithi Tōyōtā Prathēt Thai ; Krung Thēp : Mūnnithi Khrōngkān Tamrā Sangkhommasāt læ Manutsayasāt, 2551 [2008].
The two volumes pictured here cover a wide range of topics related to [...]

[Read more →]

Smith, R. B. (Ralph Bernard). Communist Indochina / R.B. Smith ; edited by Beryl Williams. London ; New York : Routledge, 2009.
This title, a companion volume to the late R. B. Smith’s Pre-Communist Indochina, which was introduced in a previous post, is a collection of previously published and unpublished articles and conference papers on the [...]

[Read more →]

Smith, R. B. (Ralph Bernard). Pre-communist Indochina / R.B. Smith ; edited by Beryl Williams. London ; New York : Routledge, 2009.
R. B. Smith, a highly regarded scholar of Vietnam, and former professor of the International History of East Asia at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, passed away suddenly in [...]

[Read more →]

On the borders of state power : frontiers in the greater Mekong sub-region / edited by Martin Gainsborough. London ; New York : Routledge, 2009.
This slender volume (115 p.) deftly addresses one of the most complex and relevant issues in Southeast Asian studies today—namely, the ever-changing dynamic between state power and international borders within the [...]

[Read more →]