Published by Amsterdam University Press

Asian Heritages

Volumes

Book Open Access 2024

Resilience as Heritage in Asia

Michael Herzfeld, Rita Padawangi

Volume 9 in this series

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This volume analyzes forms of collective resilience through manifestations of strength-in-fragility in selected communities in Asia (Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand). Persistent resistance to communal erasure taking place through repressive policies and commercialized, multinational urban development insensitive to local communities and values often presents an uphill battle. Some of these collective efforts to survive through everyday actions, encounters, and constant struggles have successful outcomes, while others are ephemeral at best. The authors argue that persisting vernacular spaces located between resistance and co-optation are themselves a form of local cultural heritage in the rapidly urbanizing region. Recognizing these nonconformist forms of resilience as heritage acknowledges the creativity involved in challenging social and political inequalities. Supporting the cultural autonomy of local communities by acknowledging resilience as heritage contributes to social justice in the region.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.0000/9789048554997
ISBN:: 9789048554997
Subject:: Social Sciences
Subject:: Political Science
Subject:: Political Science, other
Publisher:: Amsterdam University Press

Book 2021

World Heritage and Urban Politics in Melaka, Malaysia

A Cityscape below the Winds

Pierpaolo Giosa

Volume 6 in this series

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Already celebrated as a busy entrepôt and the most glorious of the Malay kingdoms of the past, Melaka has been on the UNESCO World Heritage List (together with George Town) since 2008 on the strength of its multi-ethnic and multi-religious urban fabric. Yet, contrary to the expectations of heritage experts and aficionados, the global mission of safeguarding cultural heritages has become a tumultuous issue on the ground.
In World Heritage and Urban Politics in Melaka, Malaysia: A Cityscape below the Winds how the World Heritage 'label' has been, and continue to be used by different actors – such as international organizations, nation states, and society at large – to generate new economic revenues as well as to attract tourists and investments for large-scale real estate development projects is analyzed, revealing the complex and often contradictory stories behind heritage designations in urban milieus.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9789048550500
ISBN:: 9789048550500
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Global History
Publisher:: Amsterdam University Press

Book 2020

The Heritage Turn in China

The Reinvention, Dissemination and Consumption of Heritage

Carol Ludwig, Linda Walton, Yi-Wen Wang

Volume 5 in this series

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The Heritage Turn in China: The Reinvention, Dissemination and Consumption of Heritage focuses on heritage discourse and practice in China today as it has evolved from the ‘heritage turn’ that can be dated to the 1990s. Using a variety of disciplinary approaches to regionally and topically diverse case studies, the contributors to this edited volume show how particular versions of the past are selected, (re)invented, disseminated and consumed for contemporary purposes. These studies explore how the Chinese state utilises heritage not only for tourism, entertainment, educational and commercial purposes, but also as part of broader political strategies on both the national and international stage. Together, they argue that the Chinese state deploys modes of heritage governance to construct new modernities while strengthening collective national identity in support of both its political legitimacy and its claim to status as an international superpower. The authors also consider ways in which state management of heritage is contested by some stakeholders whose embrace of heritage has a different purpose and meaning.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9789048536818
ISBN:: 9789048536818
Subject:: Business and Economics
Subject:: Political Economics
Subject:: Political Economics, other
Publisher:: Amsterdam University Press

Book Open Access 2018

Heritage and Romantic Consumption in China

Yujie Zhu

Volume 4 in this series

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This book examines how heritage interacts with social-cultural changes and how individuals perform and negotiate their identities through daily practices that include tourism, on the one hand, and the performance of ethnicity on the other.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9789048536825
ISBN:: 9789048536825
Subject:: History
Subject:: Regional and National History
Subject:: Asia-Pacific
Publisher:: Amsterdam University Press

Book Open Access 2018

Chinese Heritage in the Making

Experiences, Negotiations and Contestations

Christina Maags, Marina Svensson

Volume 3 in this series

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This book focuses on the contested nature of heritage through the lens of individuals, local communities, religious groups, and heritage experts.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9789048534067
ISBN:: 9789048534067
Subject:: History
Subject:: Regional and National History
Subject:: Asia-Pacific
Publisher:: Amsterdam University Press

Book 2017

Eurasian Encounters

Museums, Missions, Modernities

Carolien Stolte, Yoshiyuki Kikuchi

Volume 2 in this series

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The essays in this volume explore crucial intellectual and cultural exchanges between Asia and Europe in the first half of the twentieth century.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9789048527472
ISBN:: 9789048527472
Subject:: Social Sciences
Subject:: Political Science
Subject:: Political Science, other
Publisher:: Amsterdam University Press

Book 2016

Beyond Bali

Subaltern Citizens and Post-Colonial Intimacy

Ana Dragojlovic

Volume 1 in this series

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This ethnography explores how Balinese citizens produce postcolonial intimacy-a complex interaction of claims to proximity and mutuality between themselves and the Dutch under colonialism that continues today.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9789048530038
ISBN:: 9789048530038
Subject:: Social Sciences
Subject:: Sociology
Subject:: Sociology, other
Publisher:: Amsterdam University Press

Book Open Access 2023

Designs on Pots

Ban Chiang and the Politics of Heritage in Thailand

Penny Esterik

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The prehistoric site of Ban Chiang in northeast Thailand challenges the narrative of Thai origins, while at the same time appealing to the public’s vision of Thailand as an early centre of civilization. Ban Chiang demonstrates the complexity of constructing national heritage in modern Thailand, where the Thai national narrative begins and ends with Buddhism and the monarchy.

Designs on Pots. Ban Chiang and the Politics of Heritage in Thailand contributes to the literature on cultural preservation, repatriation, fake antiquities as souvenirs, and the ethics of collecting and demonstrates how heritage tourism intersects with the antiquities market in Asia. Ban Chiang itself is important for rethinking the model of indigenous development in Southeast Asian prehistory and provides informed speculation about the borders between prehistory, proto-history, and history in the region, challenging current and past models of Indianization that shape the Thai state’s heritage narrative.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9789048554980
ISBN:: 9789048554980
Subject:: Arts
Subject:: Museums and Collections
Publisher:: Amsterdam University Press

Book 2021

Heritage and the Making of Political Legitimacy in Laos

The Past and Present of the Lao Nation

Phill Wilcox

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The Lao People’s Democratic Republic is nearly fifty years old, and one of the few surviving one-party socialist states. Nearly five decades on from its revolutionary birth, the Lao population continues to build futures in and around a political landscape that maintains socialist rhetoric on the one hand and capitalist economics on the other. Contemporary Lao politics is marked by the use of cultural heritage as a source of political legitimacy. Researched through long-term detailed ethnography in the former royal capital of Luang Prabang, itself a UNESCO-recognized World Heritage Site since 1995, this book takes a fresh look at issues of legitimacy, heritage, and national identity for different members of the Lao population. It argues that the political system has become sufficiently embedded to avoid imminent risk of collapse but suggests that it is facing new challenges primarily in the form of rising Chinese influence in Laos.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9789048550715
ISBN:: 9789048550715
Subject:: History
Subject:: Regional and National History
Subject:: Asia-Pacific
Publisher:: Amsterdam University Press