Rescuing History from Srivijaya Paper (Part 1)
At long last, the first part of a 2-part article on “Srivijaya” has just been published. In this article, I argue that information in Chinese sources (about “Sanfoqi” 三佛齊) that…
Srivijaya 3.0 (04): Revisiting the Arabic Sources for Southeast Asian History
I have recently come up with a new picture of premodern Southeast Asian history by revisiting Chinese, Siamese, and Cambodian sources.In particular, I have come to conclude that there was…
Foreign Knowledge Production about Vietnam and Nhậu: A Theorization
For the past 20+ years, I’ve watched Vietnam change dramatically. Now as I visit the country after a three-year absence because of the COVID pandemic, I can see that yet…
The 13th Engaging With Vietnam Conference is Coming
For the past month, we have been in Vietnam preparing for the 13th Engaging With Vietnam conference (23-31 October 2022).Like our previous EWV conferences in Vietnam, this one will be…
Srivijaya 3.0 (03): Angkor as an International Entrepôt
As I stated in the previous post (The “One Country - One King” Problem in Premodern Southeast Asian History), when historians have looked at the records of tribute missions to…
Srivijaya 3.0 (02): The “One Country – One King” Problem in Premodern Southeast Asian History
There is a major problem that plagues the scholarship on premodern Southeast Asian history, and I call it the “one king - one country” problem.When European scholars during the colonial…