by Greg Constantine
2012

In Burma, the Rohingya have been abused, excluded and denied the most basic of human rights, including citizenship. As refugees in Bangladesh and beyond, they have been neglected, exploited and forced to exist in the darkest margins of society. Persecuted and stateless, they are the unwanted and the unwelcome. Exiled to Nowhere: Burma’s Rohingya is a photography book by American-born photographer Greg Constantine. The book exposes the stories and plight of one of the world’s most oppressed and forgotten people and also provides evidence of their sheer courage to stay alive whatever the ground beneath their feet. It is the second book from Constantine’s long-term project, Nowhere People.

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by Hazel J. Lang
Southeast Asia Program Publications, 2012

An examination of the plight of the refugees of Burma’s protracted civil war, many of whom have fled across the border into Thailand. This study looks at the changing nature of the refugee situation and the responses of the parties involved, including the United Nations, the refugees themselves, and governments in both Bangkok and Rangoon. In the process, Fear and Sanctuary addresses pertinent international questions regarding civil war, ethnic resistance against an oppressive state, displacement, and refugee protection.

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Burmese Refugees: Letters from the Thai-Burma Border
by T F Rhoden, 2011

The misrule of the Burmese military junta continues to be the main catalyst of refugees in Southeast Asia today. In this collection of letters, learn about the true stories of people who have fled from that regime. All of the accounts are written by the refugees themselves and explain how they became asylum seekers, what life is like in the camps, and what they envision for their future. These stories document persons from the 8888 generation, the 2007 Saffron Revolution, and various ethnic struggles. This book contains the narratives of thirty diverse individuals–all of them united by the simple desire to have a more representative government in their homeland.

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by Phil Thornton
Asia Books, 2006

Betrayed by the British, the Karen of Burma have been locked in a titanic, sixty-year struggle for survival against the Burmese military regime, their story ignored by the rest of the world. Journalist Phil Thornton spent five years on the Thai-Burma border, crossing illegally into the Karen State scores of times to find the families, freedom fighters, teachers, and medics resisting the regime.

Restless Souls is a tragic, sometimes amusing journey through the war zone and the underbelly of the Thai border town Mae Sot, where refugees, ‘mercenary’ adventurers, migrant workers, gem dealers, prostitutes, scavengers, rebel soldiers, corrupt officials, and drug dealers inhabit the shadows.

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by Russ Christensen
Silkworm Books, 2006

The Pa-O, one of Burma’s many ethnic minorities, engaged in a forty-year insurgency against the government of Burma which ended in a cease-fire in 1994. This is the first book on the Pa-O in English. Drawing upon historical accounts, contemporary writing, and personal interviews, the authors present the mythological and historical background of the Pa-O in Burma and Thailand. They recount the recent political history and focus on the experiences and difficulties of one village community that was forced to relocate ten times between 1978 and 1996. Interviews provide first-hadn evidence of the difficult conditions under which the Pa-O live in Burma and Thailand. Russ Christensen has spent over four years with the Pa-O in the Mae Hong Son area of northern Thailand. Sann Kyaw, and ethnic Pa-O, completed two years at the University of Mandalay before the universities were closed in 1988.

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by Tracey Lister and Andreas Pohl
Hardie Grant Books, 2013

A collection of the best and most delicious recipes from the streets of Vietnam. Stepping onto the streets of Vietnam is like entering a big, bustling kitchen—everywhere, something is being rolled, boiled, steamed, or fried; pots of hot, fragrant pho sit over coal burners and balls of peanut-studded sticky rice are steamed and wrapped in newspaper. The food is fast, fresh, fragrant, and second to none in terms of its diversity and availability. Vietnamese Street Food represents everything enticing there is to eat on the streets of Vietnam. It contains more than sixty well-loved and authentic recipes from Prawn and Rice Paper Rolls to Crab Wontons, from Classic Noodle Soup with Chicken to Salt and Pepper Squid, and Crunchy Baguettes Filled with Skewers of Lemongrass Beef. Alongside these recipes are the stories of people who run some of the most legendary street stalls, providing a glimpse into their lives and daily routines. The variety of dishes and cooking methods, be it rolled, boiled, steamed, or fried, combined with gorgeous photographs of every dishful will have you creating unpretentious, fresh, and flavorsome food for any occasion.

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by Pauline and Luke Nguyen
Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2008

In my family, food is our language. Food enables us to communicate the things we find so hard to say.” -Pauline Nguyen
Overflowing with sumptuous but simply prepared dishes that have been passed down through generations of the Nguyen family, Secrets of the Red Lantern is part Vietnamese cookbook and part family memoir.

More than 275 traditional Vietnamese recipes are presented alongside a visual narrative of food and family photographs that follows the family’s escape from war-torn Vietnam to the successful founding of the Red Lantern restaurant.

At the heart of each recipe is the power of food to elevate and transform. From a recipe of cari de that sparks a memory to the distinctly bitter melon soup that says, “I’m sorry,” Secrets of the Red Lantern shares the rich culinary heritage of the Nguyen family and their personal story of reconciliation and success.

Recipes like Bun Rieu (Crab and Tomato Soup with Vermicelli Noodles), Goi Du Du (Green Papaya Salad with Prawns and Pork), and Che Khoai Mon (Black Sticky Rice with Taro), unlock the family’s secrets and see the family persevere through homesickness, heartache, and the upheavals of change to finally experience growth and celebration. The result is a beautiful journey through Vietnamese history, culture, and tradition.

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by Tom Vandenberghe and Luc Thuys
Lannoo Publishers, 2012

Most people go to Hanoi to enjoy the food. And in Hanoi, street food is not merely a quaint or exotic culinary excursion – it is at the heart of the culinary tradition and helps to define the culture and rhythm of the city. However, while dining on the street may sound tempting and adventurous to visitors, it can also be intimidating. The aim of this book is to demystify Hanoi’s glorious street food culture. Hanoi Street Food does not only provide you with the places to eat but also with recipes for Vietnamese delicacies such as the Phô but also with other noodle dishes that stand out, but which are not as easily found as the Bun Cha or the Bun Rieu. Each section describes a range of dishes within a particular category. Following each description, the authors guide you to some of their favorite spots where you can try these snacks.

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by Luke Nguyen
Lyons Press, 2011

Luke Nguyen, chef and coauthor of the internationally bestselling book Secrets of the Red Lantern, returns home to discover the best of regional Vietnamese cooking. In My Vietnam he takes a personal and culinary tour to learn more about one of the richest, most diverse cuisines in the world.

Starting in the north of Vietnam and ending in the south, Luke visits his family and friends, is invited into the homes of local Vietnamese families, and meets food experts and local cooks. Accompanying his stories are more than 100 regional and family recipes—from Tamarind Broth with Beef and Water Spinach to Wok-tossed Crab in Sate Sauce—and vibrant, stunning photographs. Together these capture the beauty of Vietnam and her people’s deep connection to food.

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by Luke Nguyen
Murdoch Books Pty Limited, 2011

“Indochine” sees Red Lantern’s Luke Nguyen revisit his beloved Vietnam and seek out the food and cultural remnants of this former French colonial empire. On his regular visits to Vietnam today, Luke is often struck by the appearance of people wearing berets, speaking French and the aromas of coffee and butter emanating from cafes and patisseries. The recipes and accompanying stories showcase the French influence upon Vietnamese history and cuisine. Against a backdrop of grand colonial hotels, bars, restaurants and terraces, to private estates dressed in antiques and textiles of the period, Luke talks to chefs, bakers and family members to extract the very essence of French-Vietnamese cuisine. From coffee and croissants at breakfast to high tea and supper, Luke unravels the origins of Vietnamese dishes such as pho, which began life as a ‘pot au feu’, and experiments with new versions of traditional Vietnamese food. “Indochine” appeals to lovers of French, Vietnamese food and travel alike. This title is from the author of best-selling cookbooks “Secrets of the Red Lantern” and “The Songs of Sapa”. It features vibrant food photography shot entirely in Vietnam and more than 100 regional recipes showcasing Vietnam’s French culinary roots.

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by Catherine Diamond
University of Hawai’i Press, 2012

Asian theatre is usually studied from the perspective of the major traditions of China, Japan, India, and Indonesia. Now, in this wide-ranging look at the contemporary theatre scene in Southeast Asia, Catherine Diamond shows that performance in some of the lesser known theatre traditions offers a vivid and fascinating picture of the rapidly changing societies in the region. Diamond examines how traditional, modern, and contemporary dramatic works, with their interconnected styles, stories, and ideas, are being presented for local audiences. She not only places performances in their historical and cultural contexts but also connects them to the social, political, linguistic, and religious movements of the last two decades.

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by Maung Khe Sein
Orchid Press, 2006

This is an exploration of the life of Po Sein, the “father of Burmese theatre”, consummate performer, innovator, romantic and lover. His story is also the history of the development of Burmese performing arts during the 20th century.

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by Michael Bodden
Ohio University Press, 2008

Resistance on the National Stage analyzes the ways in which, between 1985 and 1998, modern theater practitioners in Indonesia contributed to a rising movement of social protest against the long-governing New Order regime of President Suharto. It examines the work of an array of theater groups and networks from Jakarta, Bandung, and Yogyakarta that pioneered new forms of theater-making and new themes that were often presented more directly and critically than previous groups had dared to do.

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by Laura Noszlopy and Matthew Isaac Cohen
Cambridge Scholars Publishing , 2010

Mutual borrowing, fluid transactions and transformations of performances and performers have a long and enduring history in Southeast Asia, but this trend has been heightened and made more vivid in the contemporary period. The omnipresence of global communications has provoked and inspired yet more novel experiments and collaborations between cosmopolitan artists and globally-oriented performers. This volume offers vital insights into recent developments in Southeast Asian performance. It demonstrates the ways in which contemporary artists and performers are increasingly working betwixt the traditional boundaries of the nation and discourses of identity. The essays collected here are testament to ongoing conversations and relations among scholars, practitioners and scholar-practitioners in Southeast Asia and around the world.

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by Matthew Isaac Cohen
Ohio University Press, 2006

Originating in 1891 in the port city of Surabaya, the Komedie Stamboel, or Istanbul-style theater, toured colonial Indonesia, Singapore, and Malaysia by rail and steamship. The company performed musical versions of the Arabian Nights, European fairy tales and operas such as Sleeping Beauty and Aida, as well as Indian and Persian romances, Southeast Asian chronicles, true crime stories, and political allegories. The actors were primarily Eurasians, the original backers were Chinese, and audiences were made up of all races and classes. The Komedie Stamboel explores how this new hybrid theater pointed toward possibilities for the transformation of self in a colonial society and sparked debates on moral behavior and mixed-race politics. While audiences marveled at spectacles involving white-skinned actors, there were also racial frictions between actors and financiers, sexual scandals, fights among actors and patrons, bankruptcies, imprisonments, and a murder. Matthew Isaac Cohen’s evocative social history situates the Komedie Stamboel in the culture of empire and in late nineteenth-century itinerant entertainment. He shows how the theater was used as a symbol of cross-ethnic integration in postcolonial Indonesia and as an emblem of Eurasian cultural accomplishment by Indische Nederlanders. A pioneering study of nineteenth-century Southeast Asian popular culture, The Komedie Stamboel gives a new picture of the region’s arts and culture and explores the interplay of currents in global culture, theatrical innovation, and movement in colonial Indonesia.

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by Andrew Walker
University of Wisconsin Press, 2012

When a populist movement elected Thaksin Shinawatra as prime minister of Thailand in 2001, many of the country’s urban elite dismissed the outcome as just another symptom of rural corruption, a traditional patronage system dominated by local strongmen pressuring their neighbors through political bullying and vote-buying. In Thailand’s Political Peasants, however, Andrew Walker argues that the emergence of an entirely new socioeconomic dynamic has dramatically changed the relations of Thai peasants with the state, making them a political force to be reckoned with. Whereas their ancestors focused on subsistence, this generation of middle-income peasants seeks productive relationships with sources of state power, produces cash crops, and derives additional income through non-agricultural work. In the increasingly decentralized, disaggregated country, rural villagers and farmers have themselves become entrepreneurs and agents of the state at the local level, while the state has changed from an extractor of taxes to a supplier of subsidies and a patron of development projects.

Thailand’s Political Peasants provides an original, provocative analysis that encourages an ethnographic rethinking of rural politics in rapidly developing countries. Drawing on six years of fieldwork in Ban Tiam, a rural village in northern Thailand, Walker shows how analyses of peasant politics that focus primarily on rebellion, resistance, and evasion are becoming less useful for understanding emergent forms of political society.

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by Daniel Lynch
Stanford University Press, 2006

This book argues that democratization is inherently international: states democratize through a process of socialization to a liberal-rational global culture. This can clearly be seen in Taiwan and Thailand, where the elites and attentive public now accept democracy as universally valid. But in China, the ruling communist party resists democratization, in part because its leaders believe it would lead to China’s “permanent decentering” in world history. As China’s power increases, the party could begin restructuring global culture by inspiring actors in other Asian countries to uphold or restore authoritarian rule.

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by Tim Forsyth, Andrew Walker
University of Washington Press, 2008

Challenges scholars, policymakers, and resource managers to reexamine long-held assumptions about “environmental degradation.” Through a case study of northern Thailand the authors ask how, why, and with whose influence environmental situations are defined. Their conclusion that misleading and simplistic explanations fail to address the real causes of environmental problems, and unnecessarily restrict the livelihoods of local people, will be a valuable contribution to broader international academic and policy discussions. Tim Forsyth is a reader at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Andrew Walker is a research fellow in the Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, the Australian National University.

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by Federico Ferrara
Equinox Publishing , 2011

“Thailand Unhinged: The Death of Thai-Style Democracy” delivers an excoriating critique of Thai politics and society over the tumultuous years that followed the ouster of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. Thailand’s ongoing political crisis is explained through the prism of the country’s painful post-absolutist history – a history marred by the systematic sabotage of any meaningful democratic development, the routine hijacking of democratic institutions, and the continued suffocation of the Thai people’s democratic aspirations orchestrated by an unelected ruling class in an increasingly desperate attempt to hold on to its power. This new edition, uncensored, expanded, and revised, argues that the tragic events of 2010 mark the end of “Thai-Style Democracy” – a five-decades-old system of government that, notwithstanding the appropriation of some of the trappings of democracy, has largely preserved the right of “good” men of high birth, status, and wealth to run the country. The essays are written in a pointed, combative style, making “Thailand Unhinged” a highly unconventional mix of academic scholarship, literary journalism, and radical pamphleteering.

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by B. J. Terwiel
River Books Press , 2011

First appearing in 2005 and quickly selling out, this fully revised edition of ‘Thailand’s Political History’ continues in the same style as the first but with its scope dramatically widened. Starting earlier than the old edition, ‘Thailand’s Political History’ discusses the development and evolution of the Siamese state from the early Sukhothai period through the fall of Ayutthaya to the rise of the Chakri dynasty in the late eighteenth century and its consolidation of power in the nineteenth. Moving into the twentieth century it traces the emergence of the Thai nation state, the large-scale investments in infrastructure and the commitment to economic expansion that have occurred since the 1950s onwards. A new final chapter brings the reader up-to-date and addresses Thailand’s current political situation spanning the rise and fall of Thaksin Shinawatra to the devisive and at times violent polarisation of Thai society. It traces the emergence of the red and yellow shirts, the takeover of Suvarnabhumi airport by the PAD and the occupation of the Rachaprasong intersection by the UDD and their eventual violent dispersal by the Thai military. Often at variance with dominant interpretations of nationalistic history, this absorbing account throws fresh and illumininating light on the political events in the past 700 years.

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