ARI Working Paper Series

This paper argues against a tendency to see Southeast Asian Studies as a recent, shallow and essentially foreign construct.   It surveys an older pattern of writing about the region as a whole by a variety of different names, such as ‘Ultra-Gangetic India’ or ‘the Indian Archipelago and Adjacent Countries’. Many of those who did write about the region in this vein took their stance in one of the maritime hubs around the Straits of Malacca, which for centuries served as distribution nodes for the region.  Despite the divisive role of colonialism in many respects, scholarly institutions were built from the beginning of the twentieth century which sought regional answers to questions in archeology, geography and ethnology.

Many anti-colonial nationalists also dreamed dreams about regional unity.  Finally, with the establishment of universities and research institutes in Singapore  and Malaysia after World War II,  the institutional life of Southeast Asian Studies in Southeast Asia was gradually built on a solid basis of books,  libraries, journals, and courses.

Full text is not available, this working paper is withdrawn, as it has now been published as the larger part of Anthony Reid and Maria Serena I. Diokno, ‘Completing the Circle: Southeast Asian Studies in Southeast Asia’, in Southeast Asian Studies: Pacific Perspectives, ed. Anthony Reid (Tempe: Arizona State University Program for Southeast Asian Studies, 2003), pp. 93-107.