Dec 15, 2010

The Cham Muslims of Indo-China

Human Rights Watch - Indifference to Duty

December 14, 2010

Indifference to Duty

Impunity for Crimes Committed in Nepal

Map of Nepal

Summary

Methodology

I. Impunity for Past Human Rights Abuses

Truth and Reconciliation and Disappearances Commissions

Role of the International Community and the National Human Rights Commission

II. Impunity for Recent Human Rights Abuses

Amrita Sunar, Devisara Sunar, and Chandrakala Sunar

Dharmendra Barai

Ram Hari Shrestha

III. Recommendations

To the Government of Nepal

To the Nepal Police Authorities and the Attorney General’s Office

To the Judiciary

To the National Human Rights Commission

To the International Community, especially Australia, China, the European Union, India, Japan, and the US

To the United Nations

Acknowledgements

Appendix: Updates on 62 Cases of Grave Human Rights Violations from Waiting for Justice

Human Rights Watch - Rights on the Line

December 11, 2010

Rights on the Line

Human Rights Watch Work on Abuses against Migrants in 2010

Summary

Key Recommendations

I. Exploitation of Migrant Workers

Indonesia and Malaysia

Kazakhstan

Lebanon

Thailand

II. Abuse and Detention at Borders

Egypt and Israel

Italy and Libya

Hungary, Slovakia, and Ukraine

Greece and the European Union

Spain

III. Inadequate Health Care for Migrants in Detention

Malawi

Zambia

IV. Discriminatory Treatment of Migrants

France

Italy

South Africa

United States

V. Migration and Trafficking

Côte d’Ivoire

Kuwait and Saudi Arabia

Senegal and Guinea-Bissau

Acknowledgments

Human Rights Watch Reports on Migrants in 2010

Other Human Rights Watch Materials on Migrants in 2010

Dec 14, 2010

The Political Challenge of Yemen’s Southern Movement

Dec 13, 2010

Bertil Lintner - Thai Turmoil Was No Class War

Thai Turmoil Was No

Free E-Books: The Open Library (from The Internet Archive) Launches a Much Improved Online E-Book Reader

Image via Wikipedia

December 9, 2010 20:12

The Open Library (an Internet Archive initiative) has just launched a new version of their online ebook reader (aka BookReader) featuring a new user interface and other tools. It's terrific.

BookReader allows users read/search more than two million digitized books (and other items) available from The Open Library and Internet Archive.

When searching the Internet Archive eBook and eText Collection, look for the link to read the item online in the left column. Users will also notice that books and other items can also be downloaded in a number of formats.

Using Open Library to search, find, and access books, either click the "read icon" on a search results page (online ebook reader will open) or click the cover thumbnail. Users will be taken to a page with several options (read online, download, send to Kindle, etc.).

Once BookReader is open, here are a few of the things you can do:

1. Clicking the "i" (top of reader) provides a list of formats you can download the item in; send to Kindle (very cool), link to provide feedback, and more.

2. Clicking the three circles icon (next to the "i") allows you to get the code to directly link to the book and/or embed (that's right, embed the book*) on a web page or blog.

The embedded BookReader – now includes "expando" button to view the book in a new browser window.

3. Clicking the speaker icon, will provide text-to-speech allowing you to listen to the book. The Open Archive calls it "Read Aloud."

4. On the bottom of BookReader you'll find the navigation bar. Sliding the finger icon will take you directly to a specific page, facing pages, or multiple pages (depending on the view you select).

5. The remaining icons allow users select how pages are viewed (one page, facing pages, multiple pages); increase/decrease type size; and move back and forth throughout the book.

What's listed above is only the beginning. This blog post from the Open Library has information on more features the the ebook reader provides including:

+ Automatically Generated Tables of Contents for Most Books.
Look for the chapter markers appear in the new navigation bar

+ Improved Full-Text Search of Each Item
Wow! Search results are shown on the navigation bar and include a snippet of text near the matched search term. The search box is located on the top-right side of the reader.

+ Touch gesture support – swipe to flip pages in two-page mode, pinch to zoom on iOS.

+ Improved support for tablet devices like the iPad.

Hopefully, support for iPhone and other mobile platforms are in the works.

As you've read, BookReader is full powered but it's also very easy to use (and learn).

Finally, BookReader and the more than 2 million items you can use it to access are free.

Its been a great year for the Open Library with its relaunch and the addition many new features. With this launch, the OL is ending the year on an excellent note. We can't wait to see what's in store in 2011.

Kudos to Brewster, Peter, George, Michael, and the rest of the IA/OL team.

Dec 12, 2010

Global Issues - Iraq - WikiLeaks - More Damaging Revelations for the US

by Anup Shah

This Page Created Sunday, December 12, 2010
This page: http://www.globalissues.org/article/790/iraq-wikileaks.
To print all information e.g. expanded side notes, shows alternative links, use the print version:
http://www.globalissues.org/print/article/790

When WikiLeaks released leaked US diplomatic cables in November 2010, it caused an emormous uproar in US circles. Yet, numerous issues were uncovered that would at least cause embarrassment to the US. One of those issues was Iraq and it seemed that despite revelations years before about torture, civilian killings etc, this has all continued.

This web page has the following sub-sections:
Cables reveal that US action in Iraq continues to be questionable
WikiLeaks under fire
More information

Cables reveal that US action in Iraq continues to be questionable

Media organizations, Journeyman Pictures and The Bureau of Investigative Journalism had advanced access to the released cables and produced a documentary for the UK’s Channel 4 Dispatches series, looking at some of the leaked information and what it revealed about Iraq.

Here is a short clip from their documentary:

Iraq’s Secret War Files - 48min Documentary, October 26, 2010 (Clip is 5 minutes. See also the transcript for full documentary)

It showed how the US has killed many innocent civilians, continued torture (even after public revelations about them), and so much more. On their introductory page to the following video clip of their documentary, they give a small example of what these cables reveal:

George Bush said, “In the new Iraq there will be no more torture chambers, the tyrant will soon be gone, the day of your liberation is near”. But the files show that rather than being the driving force for occupation, Al Qaeda flourished under the alienation bred by coalition troops. A handful of references to Al Qaeda in 2003 rises to 8000 in 2008. Troops manning checkpoints or riding convoy shoot at anything that moves: killing a doctor taking a pregnant woman to hospital, and the parents of a fourteen year old girl who was heard to cry: “Why did they shoot us? We were just going home!”. And though the army said they weren't recording the death toll, 69 000 out of the 109 000 deaths recorded in these pages, were civilians.

— Iraq’s Secret War Files; The story the US military didn’t want you to hear … ever, Journeyman Pictures, October 22, 2010

Back to top

WikiLeaks under fire

WikiLeaks is an organization that publishes submissions of documents that are normally not public, usually from anonymous sources as news leaks. Started in 2006 it has won awards from organizations such as Amnesty International and the Economist for exposing issues around the world (not just the US, as has been the case more recently).

In 2010 it started releasing documents that made the US look quite bad, especially in Iraq. Towards the end of 2010, it started to release the first of 250,000 confidential US diplomatic cables that have been leaked and since then has found itself under immense media criticism in the US, some even calling for it to be officially classed as a terrorist organization.

This caused an enormous uproar in the US, and debates about WikiLeaks itself rages on, (whether it is indeed performing a democratic function of providing information citizens should know, even filling the gaps of the mainstream media that fails to do this, whether it has gone too far, etc).

The organization has found itself in the spotlight on numerous fronts, for example, some Internet hosting companies severing ties, their web site facing denial of service attempts, various service providers being pressured to or cutting ties with the organization (e.g. payment providers), and so on. Their founder Julian Assange has also found himself facing charges of rape, which many find suspicious as a flagrant attempt to silence someone who is seen as a thorn in the side of the US establishment. Each of these issues themselves are their own pages, but are not covered here at this time.

However, in the context of Iraq, it revealed more about what has been going on, and confirms more many of our general cynicism about politicians; they say one thing, but another thing is often done.

Back to top
More information

This web site is not going to be able to cover the WikiLeaks saga (as I don’t have the time and resources that the mainstream media has, and there is a LOT of mainstream coverage about this anyway), though from time to time, this site will highlight some of the issues that the leaked information reveals.

For further information:
News on Iraq from Inter Press Service, whose stories are carried on this web site
From the Guardian (one of the few news outlets around the world to whom the US diplomatic cables were released)
Iraq War Logs, looks at “391,832 previously secret US military field reports and details the unvarnished and often unknown realities of the war in Iraq”
The US Embassy Cables, coverage of WikiLeaks and the US diplomatic cables that were leaked (including a searchable database of cables)
WikiLeaks more general coverage about the organization

Pew Research Center - Future of the Internet

Future of Internet - Pew Internet Research

Tewari and Alvarez - Asian American Psychology: Current Perspectives

Asian American Psychology

Dec 11, 2010

Pew Research Center - Mapping the Global Muslim Population

Muslim Population

Internet Politics - Surveillance and Intimidation in Singapore

US Intelligence Planned to Destroy Wikileaks

Us Intel Wikileaks

Oct 20, 2010

New Postings for October 20,2010

Image via Wikipedia

Christian and Muslim playing chess (BM)

Oct 18, 2010

II - Review: A new textbook invites readers to consider a broad concept of ‘Indonesia’

Andy Fuller

The Indonesia Reader, edited by Tineke Hellwig and Eric Tagliacozzo, aims to ‘help those who are interested in this unique country’ to understand it better. Using narratives of history, culture and politics to approach Indonesia, The Reader provides a stimulating, challenging and provocative portrait presented through texts chosen on either because they pull apart the concept of ‘Indonesia’ or because they strengthen it.

The book presents texts chronologically, from fifth century writings in Sanskrit on stone pillars found in Kutei in eastern Borneo, through the Dutch colonial period, the Japanese occupation, revolution and independence, ending in the early years of this century. These readings are divided neatly into 10 chapters, each of which has an overview and summaries of the context in which each selected reading was written.

The editors maintain a fine balance between primary source, academic analysis and overview. Their introductions to each section, which are clear and nuanced, will be particularly useful to readers unfamiliar with the original texts.

The complexity of their approach is demonstrated in the way they have edited the texts, skilfully contrasting ideologies and perspectives. For example, in Chapter 8, eyewitness accounts of the killings of 1965-66 are juxtaposed against an account by Suharto in which he describes his humble beginnings and vouches for his ethical principles which have been derived from his simple background – the first of these an excerpt from The Indonesian Killings 1965-1966: Studies from Java and Bali, edited by Robert Cribb, and the second, Suharto’s ‘My Thoughts, Words, Deeds’.

Texts by authors from marginalised or peripheral communities also provide alternative perspectives to dominant narratives of ‘Indonesia’. These include texts such as ‘I am a Papua’ by Julius Pour, ‘Our Struggle against Indonesian Aggression’, by the Republica Democratica de Timor Leste and Dédé Oetomo’s essay, ‘Gays and Lesbians in Indonesia’. In addition, throughout the Reader there is a strong presence of literary writings. We see, for example, texts from authors as varied as Multatuli, Mas Marco Kartodikromo, Sutan Takdir Alisjahbana, Soewarsih Djojopoespito, Pramoedya Ananta Toer, Nh. Dini and Seno Gumira Ajidarma. The exclusion of authors writing in low Malay and of ethnic-Chinese origin as well as those authors writing from the peripheries of the modern nation state of Indonesia is, however, an opportunity missed.

It provides varying readings on what Indonesia is and, usefully, presents many alternatives to the nationalistic interpretations of the unified nation of Indonesia

Each reader of The Indonesia Reader will easily find points of argument with the texts selected and perhaps also with the manner in which certain periods of Indonesia’s history are summarised. For me, one significant incident in Indonesia’s recent history that is omitted is the state-sponsored killings of suspected criminals (known as the ‘petrus’, or ‘mysterious shootings’), which took place during the early to mid-1980s. This phenomenon could have been introduced through the writings of scholars such as James Siegel and Ariel Heryanto and perhaps complemented by some of the literary texts that deal with this state violence. In my view, this would have provided a fascinating portrait of the New Order government as well as a vital intersection of history, politics and culture. Surprisingly, also, The Reader includes little on Islam: there are no texts from Nurcholish Madjid, Abdurrahman Wahid, Ahmad Wahib or contemporary and controversial thinkers such as Ulil Abshar Abdalla or Luthfie Assyaukanie. Given the power of Islam’s influence in Indonesia, it is distinctly underrepresented in the collection, reflected only through texts authored by the current president, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, and convicted bomber Imam Sumadera.

But in the scheme of things these complaints are mere quibbles. The Indonesia Reader is a vital text. It is not only accessible for a generalist audience, but may also provide some more seasoned professionals with new perspectives through the many alternatives to the nationalistic interpretations of Indonesia that it presents.

Tineke Hellwig and Eric Tagliacozzo (eds), The Indonesia Reader: History, Culture, Politics. Durham: Duke University Press, 2009.

Andy Fuller (acfuller@utas.edu.au) is a PhD candidate at the University of Tasmania.

Inside Indonesia 102: Oct-Dec 2010

II - Review: Barbara Hatley’s new book documents a career-long study of, and passion for performance in Central Java

Emma Baulch

Javanese Performances on an Indonesian Stage: Contesting Culture, Embracing Change, is Barbara Hatley’s first book about the performing arts in Indonesia, a topic that piqued her interest while undergoing a masters program at Yale University in the late 1960s. In this sense, it is a landmark study, for Hatley has since become very well known in Indonesianist circles, especially among those with an interest in matters of culture, popular and elite. Until recently, her writings on Indonesian performing arts have only been available in the form of journal articles and book chapters.

Javanese Performances must have felt like a massive undertaking for Hatley. It documents her entire career so far, beginning with the research for her doctorate she undertook in 1977-8 on ketoprak, a performance genre hailing from Yogyakarta’s lower class kampung communities, and ending with scenes in which both ketoprak and modern Indonesian theatre (teater) feature in healing efforts following the 2006 earthquake in Yogyakarta.

The book is set entirely in Yogyakarta, although Hatley occasionally draws in developments in the neighbouring court city, Solo. Her focus is on two forms of performance. Ketoprak features a repertoire of plays (lakon) based on Javanese tales of kingship and governance, heavily improvised, interspersed with comic interludes known as clown scenes, also improvised. Teater emerged in the early twentieth century, drawing on Western theatrical traditions, including strict adherence to scripts.

During the period of Hatley’s research, the worlds of teater and ketoprak draw closer to each other. In the 1970s, WS Rendra’s Bengkel Teater established in one of Yogya’s kampungs, some distance from those areas of the city associated with Western-oriented middle class intellectual and artistic activity. Conversely, the New Order state made attempts to ‘modernise’ ketoprak by bringing it into line with certain Western traditions, such as adherence to a script, often one authored by the state. Teater only began to attract large audiences when it drew on ketoprak’s comic elements. In the 1990s, ketoprak plesedan, pioneered by a new generation of ketoprak practitioners who subversively played with the form, brought ketoprak to teater’s standard constituents: young university students and professionals. Hatley describes these and other examples of the inter-mixing of teater-ketoprak in glorious detail.

As she explains in her introduction, Hatley is at pains to illustrate that the images that consistently crop up in Javanese performing arts are fluid; their meanings are not fixed. There is a ‘shared store of images’, Hatley argues, but their frequent emergence in performance does not evince a shared meaning. More often, they serve as devices to contest the status quo, or at least allow for a multiplicity of interpretations. Her book reveals this shared store of images as the bare bones of locality; a frame for the blood and guts of social and political context. Sometimes, the bodies of ketoprak and teater appear controlled by the dominant forces of her story: social hierarchy linked to the culture of the Yogyakarta court, the New Order state with its strong military, a deregulated economy and the celebration of ethnic identity made possible by the post-New Order state. But more often, performances mediate these forces by presenting them in ways that afford people the opportunity to mull them over and consider their meanings.

A history of ketoprak

One of Hatley’s first tasks in the book is to chronicle the history of ketoprak. This is no mean feat, considering the reluctance of her research participants to discuss with her the development of the form during the 1950s and 1960s. During those decades, many ketoprak troupes were aligned with the Indonesian Communist Party. By the 1970s, a number of actors were tainted by this association, or had been killed for the same reason. This political legacy is not forgotten, even though military sponsors attempted to erase class consciousness by refashioning ketoprak’s address. But among viewers and actors in the 1970s, the notion that ketoprak was the property of the little people, the wong cilik, rather than of a more general floating mass as asserted by the New Order state, endured. Military sponsorship in the 1970s did constrain ketoprak. Certain lakon pertaining to class matters were rarely performed during this period. But the military was not able to exert total control over the form, as becomes clear in the second chapter of the book.

Hatley presents ketoprak as a highly syncretic form, with improvisation at its heart. For the most part, actors ‘dutifully incorporated propaganda messages… and listened silently to lectures on aspects of theatrical production they had been practising routinely for decades’. But ketoprak hits the very limits of its syncretism when it comes to accommodating all that the New Order state required of it. There is only so much modernising that practitioners can bear. In a 1978 seminar for actors, the Department of Education and Culture suggested a reworking of the Roro Mendut role so that a soldier, Wiroguno, appeared as virtuous and fit, rather than as a mean old man. But in the time set aside for participants’ comments, several actors spoke out against the suggested reworking. They described it as an unacceptable reshaping of the lakon, and as potentially disruptive of cultural continuity.

Politics in performance

Politics is of great interest to Hatley. She has an acute political sensibility and her analysis is sophisticated. The first three chapters of the book are dedicated to discussion of the politics of ketoprak in the 1970s. In the fourth chapter, Hatley turns to her second example, teater. This chapter treads an epic journey beginning with the establishment of Bengkel Teater in Yogya in the early 1970s, and ending with the performance of a play, Lautan Jilbab (A Sea of Veils), by the Muslim intellectual, Emha Ainun Nadjib, in 1988.

The picture Hatley paints of teater’s beginnings in Yogyakarta in the early New Order period is striking for its contrast with her depiction of ketoprak at this time. From Hatley’s descriptions, I get a sense of ketoprak troupes coping as best they can with military sponsorship and attendant modernisation of their form. But teater proponents such as Rendra experienced this early New Order period as a time of liberation from party politics, a time of free expression. Indeed, one of Hatley’s central points here is that teater was independent of military control, and therefore not as constrained as ketoprak in its story tellings. Political control over teater seems to have been exerted, rather, through periodic bannings, such as of Rendra’s public performances in 1978.

One of Hatley’s central points is that teater was independent of military control under the New Order, and therefore not as constrained as ketoprak in its story tellings

In the latter part of the Javanese Performances, the figure of Bondan Nusantara emerges strongly as representative of a number of children of politically disgraced ketoprak stars who began to play important roles in modernisation and commercialisation of the form in the 1990s. Nusantara’s mother, a star actress with the Communist Party-aligned Krido Mardi troupe, was imprisoned in 1965. Nusantara was among a number of children of ketoprak stars politically tainted in this way, who had spent their early youth with travelling ketoprak groups, then returned to Yogyakarta and became aligned with one of the large, military -sponsored groups.

Bondan Nusantara pioneered a form called ketoprak plesedan, which stressed ketoprak’s comic proclivities and brought the form to new audiences, particularly middle class youth. Hatley forms her discussion of performance in Yogya in the early-1990s around this phenomenon, and its antecedent, known as ketoprak kolossal. Through her descriptions of these new uses of ketoprak, a new political context emerges: one in which the New Order regime now espouses political openness and is more open to foreign investors. A hive of private sponsors emerge, malls begin to populate the Yogyakarta cityscape and the tourism industry grows. Amateur, neighbourhood troupes give way to professional collaborations with teater practitioners, and neighbourhood performances give way to colossal ones. Hatley remains optimistic about these developments. She is hesitant to interpret them as instances of the dispossession of the ‘little people’, as do some critical teater practitioners. Perhaps it is their tastes that have changed, she surmises, noting with curiosity the irony of the close involvement of the children of Communist Party-aligned actors in ketoprak’s later commercialisation: ‘[T]hese figures, Bondan, Nano and Marwoto, intimately connected through family background and personal experience with ketoprak’s populist-socialist past and underclass identity, now took leading roles in its artistic and social transformation. They engaged confidently with the worlds of bureaucracy, big business, journalism and popular media.’

A backstage view

Hatley moves with ease from national and regional-level politics to the micro worlds behind the scenes of performance. In this respect, the task of teasing out the broader social and political meanings of Javanese performances, a task she has devoted her career to, suits her very well. Somehow, by inviting the reader to become intimate with the various troupes and their oeuvres, Hatley introduces us to the political goings-on at a national level. Her ability to bring Javanese performances onto an Indonesian stage is enviable. Much of her book discusses serious matters of the failures and successes of governance but, like ketoprak, Hatley allows herself many comic interludes. The book is utterly devoid of pomposity; Hatley adopts a voice that is not only modest, but lugu, a quality denoting critical simplicity she attributes to the clowns of ketoprak. She invites us to have a laugh with her about the research process.

One of the great highlights of this book is Hatley’s scene descriptions. They sparkle with enthusiasm and convey her great respect and fondness for the people she writes about. They are also telling of her very visceral experience of this aspect of her research. Consider this gem:

The compere… calls on stage a girl in a black singlet top, pants, boots and cap, who turns out to be the boldest performer of all. Bent almost double, she thrusts her vigorously gyrating bottom towards one section of the crowd, and another, and in the faces of the seated musicians, then turns around and does the same action frontwards, to heated shouts from the audience. The head of security for the event, Pak Keamanan, appears. He first instructs the dancers to move, clearing the seated area, then takes the mike and serenades [one of the other performers] as she gyrates. As the girl with the wild bottom movements joins in and they dance together, the atmosphere seems to reach fever pitch. It seems at any minute that the crowd might rush onto the stage. But suddenly, at about 12.15 am, an announcement states that the event is over. The stage lights go out and the big crowd immediately disperses into the night.

Although visceral, much of Hatley’s writing about her experiences as a viewer seems written from the perspective of a lone spectator. The main focus of Hatley’s book is indeed backstage; she often cites the perspectives and thoughts of actors and directors. Her analysis of ketoprak does include some allusions to the different ways female and male audience members respond to certain scenes. But she often uses words such as ‘conjecture’ and ‘arguably’ in interpreting audience responses to performances. In some places, a greater inkling of audience responses would have been useful and interesting. For example, in chapter three, Hatley discusses an East Javanese ketoprak troupe’s reworking of the Arya Penangsang lakon which recounts the struggles for political control following the fall of Demak. The standard interpretation presents a just, refined Central Javanese homeland and coarse, peripheral enemy kingdom. But the East Javanese troupe, Siswo Budoyo, subverted this standard to present a regionalist interpretation. Hatley presents this reworking as an example of ketoprak’s fluidity and in this sense her argument is convincing. But one wonders how audiences in Yogyakarta, Central Java, where the subversive interpretation was performed, responded to such an instance of East Javanese regionalism.

This review has so far favoured Hatley’s discussion of ketoprak, and this is a poor reflection of the actual contents of her book, a great deal of which is devoted to teater. But ketoprak is clearly Hatley’s heartland, her darling. This is understandable, since ketoprak, not teater, was the subject of her doctoral research. As she outlines in her acknowledgments, subsequent research had to be fitted in around a full time teaching job. This explains why ketoprak is lovingly given the book’s first three chapters, where we learn of it slowly. By contrast, a vast stretch of developments in teater are squeezed into her first chapter discussing this form. At this point, chapter four, I began to wish that she had taken us through teater a little more quietly, and been more sparing of her examples.

A third criticism I have of Hatley’s book regards an absence of theory. As mentioned, Hatley masters her context. She writes brilliant scene descriptions and skilfully draws national political developments into local performances. But from time to time, we need to be drawn out of the context, given a chance to digest the enormous political changes that take place in the course of her book, and reminded of the theoretical implications of Hatley’s views about the intertwining of politics and performance. At the commencement of the book, she mentions that she became inspired to study ketoprak after reading James Peacock’s book, Rites of Modernisation, about performances of East Javanese ludruk. But her discussions of performances in Yogyakarta do not engage Peacock’s book at all. Victor Turner, whose theories Hatley’s book would in some regards appear to confirm, is cited, but only in an endnote. Hatley’s concluding chapter is an epilogue, and only provides more context. In her introduction, Hatley does explain how her analysis differs from that of Clifford Geertz, but this reviewer would have welcomed more discussion of how her research compares with some of these other writings on performance. Such engagements would help situate her fabulous descriptions in some broader questions concerning the relationship between ‘performance’ and ‘culture’.

That said, Hatley’s great ability to bring the reader right to the heart of her context should be treasured. This book, I feel, reminds us of the virtues of area studies, something of an endangered discipline, and which demands long stints of immersion in the field site and intimate knowledge of local languages. It is difficult to imagine how Hatley could have mastered Javanese, which she describes as at once ‘respectful and warmly egalitarian’, without spending so much time backstage at ketoprak shows. It is also difficult to imagine how, without her mastery of Javanese, Hatley could have gathered the material needed to support her upbeat image of Javanese people as both avidly political and culturally progressive, as intimated in the subtitle of her book: contesting culture, embracing change. This is an unusual image, but Hatley presents it convincingly, and with great fondness. Due to Hatley’s rare insights, Javanese Performances ought to endure as a classic example of Western scholarship on Java.

Barbara Hatley, Javanese Performances on an Indonesian Stage: Contesting Culture, Embracing Change, Singapore, NUS Press, 2008.

Emma Baulch (ebaulch@gmail.com) is a post doctoral fellow at the ANU, where she is researching the Indonesian pop music industry. She lives in Bali.

Southeast Asia Digital Library Resources Organized by Country

Image by Puff's Daddy via Flickr Digital library materials, general information about, and Internet links organized by country.
We are continually updating material. Please check back frequently.

Brunei	Cambodia	East Timor	Indonesia	Laos	Malaysia
Myanmar/Burma	Philippines	Singapore	Thailand	Vietnam	Southeast Asia

Brunei

About Brunei
Selected Internet links

Cambodia

About Cambodia | Photographs
Selected Internet links
Projects:

The May Ebihara Collection: Ethnographic Research in Rural Community, 1959-1995

Then and Now: Historical Photographs of Cambodia

East Timor

About East Timor | Photographs |Videos
Selected Internet links
Projects:

The Living Memory Project (Photographs | Video)

Indonesia

About Indonesia |Videos
Selected Internet links
Projects:

Video Archive — Television Program, Indonesia

Laos

About Laos
Selected Internet links

Malaysia

About Malaysia | Books
Selected Internet links
Projects:

Berita Database

Early Imprints from Southeast Asia

Myanmar/Burma

About Myanmar/Burma | Books | Manuscripts | Photographs | Videos
Selected Internet links
Projects:

Early Imprints from Southeast Asia

Mandalay Marionettes Theater Puppet Show (Video)

Philippines

About Philippines | Books | Photographs
Selected Internet links
Projects:

Historical Archives and Photographs: Cebuano Studies Center, Phillipines (Books | Photographs)

Singapore

About Singapore
Selected Internet links

Thailand

About Thailand | Books | Manuscripts | Photographs
Selected Internet links
Projects:

Thai Indexing and Delivery of Full-Text Articles

Palm-Leaf Manuscripts of Thailand (Images)

Early Imprints from Southeast Asia

Vietnam

About Vietnam | Books | Manuscripts |Photographs
Selected Internet links
Projects:

The Hán-Nôm Special Collection Digitization Project

Early Imprints from Southeast Asia

Southeast Asia Selected Internet links

Oct 5, 2010

### - Indicates a full-text study or document.
## - Indicates a stand-alone website homepage.
# - Indicates includes featured video, audio, or photos.
No marking - Indicates stand-alone posting.
Any Scribd articles may require a quick one-time free registration.
A Facebook article requires a free signup if you are not a member.
!!! Published in a separate posting on this blog earlier today.
B - Burmese fonts and/or voice

___________________

Southeast Asia

Burma postings are covered daily in my Burma Monitor blog at http://burmamonitor.blogspot.com/

I have created extensive link directories to Southeast Asia sources on my second research blog,
Starting Points, here at http://starting-points.blogspot.com/

# Kwa Geok Choo 1920-2010 (videos)
http://www.channelnewsasia.com./kwageokchoo/videoarchives.htm

East Timor to suspend two top ministers
http://easttimorlegal.blogspot.com/2010/10/east-timor-to-suspend-two-top-ministers.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EastTimorLawJusticeBulletin+%28East+Timor+Law+%26+Justice+Bulletin%29

Inside Indonesia - Current Edition - Oct - Dec 2010 - Learning to Belong
http://www.insideindonesia.org/edition-102/102-current-edition-27091361

The Muslim World

South Sudan referendum, by the numbers
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Africa/Africa-Monitor/2010/1005/South-Sudan-referendum-by-the-numbers

Turkish Government and PKK Warming Up to Peaceful Solution
http://www.voanews.com/english/news/middle-east/Turkish-Government-and-PKK-Warming-up-to-Peaceful-Solution-104358054.html

France Arrests 12 in Antiterrorism Raids
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/06/world/europe/06france.html

American Studies

Obama's Wars (Amazon)
http://www.amazon.com/Obamas-Wars-Bob-Woodward/dp/1439172498/ref=pd_zg_rss_ts_b_books_2

Behind Closed Doors
http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2010/10/11/101011taco_talk_coll

GOP Well Positioned Among Likely Midterm Voters
http://www.gallup.com/poll/143363/GOP-Positioned-Among-Likely-Midterm-Voters.aspx?utm_source=alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=syndication&utm_content=morelink&utm_term=USA

Global Issues

As the World Burns
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/10/11/101011fa_fact_lizza

Toxic Sludge Floods Several Hungarian Towns
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/06/world/europe/06hungary.html

Traffic Picks Up in World’s Education Race
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/04/business/global/04iht-educLede04.html

Minority Groups

Uncle Sam’s shameful treatment of today's American Indians
http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Walter-Rodgers/2010/1004/Uncle-Sam-s-shameful-treatment-of-today-s-American-Indians

Poll: Latino voters less energized
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1010/43154.html

Internet Studies

What's ahead for bookseller Barnes & Noble?
http://www.csmonitor.com/Business/The-Reformed-Broker/2010/1005/What-s-ahead-for-bookseller-Barnes-Noble

With Less than 50% Market Share, IE Is Now Losing the Browser Wars
http://mashable.com/2010/10/05/ie-50-percent-market-share/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Mashable+%28Mashable%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

Sep 28, 2010

Core Topics Links - September 28, 2010

Image by Bird Eye via Flickr

Muslims in Mumbai protest against terrorism (BM)

Sep 26, 2010

Core Topics Links - September 26, 2010