The colonisation of Southeast Asia was a long and often violent process where numerous military campaigns were waged by the colonial powers across the region. The notion of racial difference was crucial in many of these wars, as native Southeast Asian societies were often framed in negative terms as 'savage' and 'backward' communities that needed to be subdued and 'civilised'. This collection of critical essays focuses on the colonial construction of race and looks at how the colonial wars in 19th century Southeast Asia were rationalised via recourse to theories of racial difference, making race a factor in the wars of Empire. Looking at the colonial wars in Java, Borneo, Indochina, Philippines and other parts of Southeast Asia, the essays examine the manner in which the idea of racial difference was weaponised by the colonising powers and how forms of local resistance often worked through such colonial structures of identity politics.

The treatment of cultural colonial objects is one of the most debated questions of our time. Calls for a new international cultural order go back to decolonization. However, for decades, the issue has been treated as a matter of comity or been reduced to a Shakespearean dilemma: to return or not to return. Confronting Colonial Objects seeks to go beyond these classic dichotomies and argues that contemporary practices are at a tipping point. The book shows that cultural takings were material to the colonial project throughout different periods and went far beyond looting. It presents micro histories and object biographies to trace recurring justifications and contestations of takings and returns while outlining the complicity of anthropology, racial science, and professional networks that enabled colonial collecting. The book demonstrates the dual role of law and cultural heritage regulation in facilitating colonial injustices and mobilizing resistance thereto. Drawing on the interplay between justice, ethics, and human rights, Stahn develops principles of relational cultural justice. He challenges the argument that takings were acceptable according to the standards of the time and outlines how future engagement requires a re-invention of knowledge systems and relations towards objects, including new forms of consent, provenance research, and partnership, and a re-thinking of the role of museums themselves. Following the life story and transformation of cultural objects, this book provides a fresh perspective on international law and colonial history that appeals to audiences across a variety of disciplines. This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read on the Oxford Academic platform and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.

Losing Hearts and Minds explores the loss of British power and prestige in colonial Singapore and Malaya from the First World War to the Malayan Emergency. During this period, British leaders relied on a growing number of Asian, European and Eurasian allies and servicepeople, including servants, police, soldiers, and medical professionals, to maintain their empire. At the same time, British institutions and leaders continued to use racial and gender violence to wage war. As a result, those colonial subjects closest to British power frequently experienced the limits of belonging and the broken promises of imperial inclusion, hastening the end of British rule in Southeast Asia. From the World Wars to the Cold War, European, Indigenous, Chinese, Malay, and Indian civilians resisted or collaborated with British and Commonwealth soldiers, rebellious Indian troops, invading Japanese combatants, and communists. Historian Kate Imy tells the story of how Singapore and Malaya became sites of some of the most impactful military and anti-colonial conflicts of the twentieth century, where British military leaders repeatedly tried—but largely failed—to win the "hearts and minds" of colonial subjects.

Stamford Raffles, James Brooke, John Crawfurd and Anna Leonowens were some of those who came from Europe or the United States to Southeast Asia in the nineteenth century — and then wrote about what they saw. Their writings deserve to be read now for what they truly were: Not objective accounts of a Southeast Asia frozen in imperial time but rather as culturally myopic and perspectivist works that betray the subject-positions of the authors themselves. Reading them would allow us to write the history of the East-West encounter through critical lenses that demonstrate the workings of power-knowledge in the elaborate war-economy of racialised colonial-capitalism. Many of the tropes used by these colonial-era scholars and travellers, such as the indolence or savagery of the native population, are still very much in use today — which means we still live in the long shadow of the 19th century. (Matahari Books)

Noor offers a close account of the construction of Southeast Asia in the nineteenth century by the forces of capitalism and imperialism.