Multi - Laterality and the changing global mapping of southeast Asian studies: a view from Japan

Abstract

The global mapping of Southeast Asian Studies is currently under reformulation. In an article written in 1992, Ben Anderson used the term "the ecology of scholarship" to look back on the paths taken by Southeast Asian studies in the U.S. between the 1950s and the 90s. Each of our different (yet not at all unrelated) academic traditions have evolved with respective historical positioning towards "Southeast Asia". What he calls the "ecology of scholarship" is the total effect of the language of scholarship, epistemological tendencies in the scholarly practices as well as the institutional set-up that constitute the difference. Ecology is an apt term especially as it reflects the dynamic changes in accordance with changes in the political and cultural "environment". We therefore stand in different positions in varied moments in our respective academic traditions. Yet just as some of our difficulties and tendencies are shared, so should we be able to find points of convergence and exchange once we are more aware of where each of us stands. Change in the global mapping of scholarship is concomitant with changes in the region itself. What we see today is not a convergence towards global standardization of Southeast Asian studies, but towards exchange of ideas in a consortium of different traditions and perspectives.