Trais Pearson
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781501740152
- eISBN:
- 9781501740176
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501740152.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
By the 1890s, Siam (Thailand) was the last holdout against European imperialism in Southeast Asia. But the kingdom's exceptional status came with a substantial caveat: Bangkok, its bustling capital, ...
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By the 1890s, Siam (Thailand) was the last holdout against European imperialism in Southeast Asia. But the kingdom's exceptional status came with a substantial caveat: Bangkok, its bustling capital, was a port city that was subject to many of the same legal and fiscal constraints as other colonial treaty ports. This book offers new insight into turn-of-the-century Thai history by disinterring the forgotten stories of those who died “unnatural deaths” during this period and the work of the Siamese state to assert their rights in a pluralistic legal arena. The book documents the piecemeal introduction of new forms of legal and medical concern for the dead. It reveals that the investigation of unnatural death demanded testimony from diverse strata of society: from the unlettered masses to the king himself. These cases raised questions about how to handle the dead—were they spirits to be placated or legal subjects whose deaths demanded compensation?—as well as questions about jurisdiction, rights, and liability. Exhuming the history of imperial politics, transnational commerce, technology, and expertise, the book demonstrates how the state's response to global flows transformed the nature of legal subjectivity and politics in lasting ways. A compelling exploration of the troubling lives of the dead in a cosmopolitan treaty port, the book is a notable contribution to the growing corpus of studies in science, law, and society in the non-Western world.Less
By the 1890s, Siam (Thailand) was the last holdout against European imperialism in Southeast Asia. But the kingdom's exceptional status came with a substantial caveat: Bangkok, its bustling capital, was a port city that was subject to many of the same legal and fiscal constraints as other colonial treaty ports. This book offers new insight into turn-of-the-century Thai history by disinterring the forgotten stories of those who died “unnatural deaths” during this period and the work of the Siamese state to assert their rights in a pluralistic legal arena. The book documents the piecemeal introduction of new forms of legal and medical concern for the dead. It reveals that the investigation of unnatural death demanded testimony from diverse strata of society: from the unlettered masses to the king himself. These cases raised questions about how to handle the dead—were they spirits to be placated or legal subjects whose deaths demanded compensation?—as well as questions about jurisdiction, rights, and liability. Exhuming the history of imperial politics, transnational commerce, technology, and expertise, the book demonstrates how the state's response to global flows transformed the nature of legal subjectivity and politics in lasting ways. A compelling exploration of the troubling lives of the dead in a cosmopolitan treaty port, the book is a notable contribution to the growing corpus of studies in science, law, and society in the non-Western world.
A. J. Stockwell
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198205654
- eISBN:
- 9780191676734
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198205654.003.0017
- Subject:
- History, World Modern History, British and Irish Modern History
British expansion in South-East Asia was shaped by the well-being of India, opportunities in China, and international, particularly Anglo-French, rivalry. From the late eighteenth century, British ...
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British expansion in South-East Asia was shaped by the well-being of India, opportunities in China, and international, particularly Anglo-French, rivalry. From the late eighteenth century, British commerce in South-East Asia became enmeshed with British commerce in India; from the late nineteenth century, the development of agriculture and mining tied South-East Asian economies more closely to industrial and finance capitalism in Britain. The advances into ‘Further India’ during 1786–c.1830 are shown. It specifically addresses maritime South-East Asia and Britain in mainland South-East Asia. In addition, the free trade imperialism and turbulent frontiers in Malaya and Borneo, Burma, and Siam during c.1830–c.1870 are reported. It then considers imperialism and colonialism during c.1870–1914. As the British pursued their interests and extended their power in South-East Asia, the demarcation between those areas falling within Britain's formal Empire and those remaining outside it became indistinct.Less
British expansion in South-East Asia was shaped by the well-being of India, opportunities in China, and international, particularly Anglo-French, rivalry. From the late eighteenth century, British commerce in South-East Asia became enmeshed with British commerce in India; from the late nineteenth century, the development of agriculture and mining tied South-East Asian economies more closely to industrial and finance capitalism in Britain. The advances into ‘Further India’ during 1786–c.1830 are shown. It specifically addresses maritime South-East Asia and Britain in mainland South-East Asia. In addition, the free trade imperialism and turbulent frontiers in Malaya and Borneo, Burma, and Siam during c.1830–c.1870 are reported. It then considers imperialism and colonialism during c.1870–1914. As the British pursued their interests and extended their power in South-East Asia, the demarcation between those areas falling within Britain's formal Empire and those remaining outside it became indistinct.
Tamara Loos
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- May 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781501704635
- eISBN:
- 9781501706172
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501704635.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
Prince Prisdang Chumsai (1852–1935) served as Siam's first diplomat to Europe during the most dramatic moment of Siam's political history, when its independence was threatened by European ...
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Prince Prisdang Chumsai (1852–1935) served as Siam's first diplomat to Europe during the most dramatic moment of Siam's political history, when its independence was threatened by European imperialism. Despite serving with patriotic zeal, he suffered irreparable social and political ruin based on rumors about fiscal corruption, sexual immorality, and political treason. This book pursues the truth behind these rumors, which chased Prisdang out of Siam. This book recounts the personal and political adventures of an unwitting provocateur who caused a commotion in every country he inhabited. Prisdang spent his first five years in exile from Siam living in disguise as a commoner and employee of the British Empire in colonial Southeast Asia. He then resurfaced in the 1890s in British Ceylon, where he was ordained as a Buddhist monk and became a widely-respected abbot. Foreigners from around the world were drawn to this prince who had discarded wealth and royal status to lead the life of an ascetic. His fluency in English, royal blood, acute intellect, and charisma earned him importance in international diplomatic and Buddhist circles. Prisdang's life journey reminds us of the complexities of the colonial encounter and the recalibrations it caused in local political cultures. His drama offers more than a story about Siamese politics: it also casts in high relief the subjective experience of global imperialism. Telling this history from the vantage point of a remarkable individual grounds and animates the historical abstractions of imperialism, Buddhist universalism, and the transformation of Siam into a modern state.Less
Prince Prisdang Chumsai (1852–1935) served as Siam's first diplomat to Europe during the most dramatic moment of Siam's political history, when its independence was threatened by European imperialism. Despite serving with patriotic zeal, he suffered irreparable social and political ruin based on rumors about fiscal corruption, sexual immorality, and political treason. This book pursues the truth behind these rumors, which chased Prisdang out of Siam. This book recounts the personal and political adventures of an unwitting provocateur who caused a commotion in every country he inhabited. Prisdang spent his first five years in exile from Siam living in disguise as a commoner and employee of the British Empire in colonial Southeast Asia. He then resurfaced in the 1890s in British Ceylon, where he was ordained as a Buddhist monk and became a widely-respected abbot. Foreigners from around the world were drawn to this prince who had discarded wealth and royal status to lead the life of an ascetic. His fluency in English, royal blood, acute intellect, and charisma earned him importance in international diplomatic and Buddhist circles. Prisdang's life journey reminds us of the complexities of the colonial encounter and the recalibrations it caused in local political cultures. His drama offers more than a story about Siamese politics: it also casts in high relief the subjective experience of global imperialism. Telling this history from the vantage point of a remarkable individual grounds and animates the historical abstractions of imperialism, Buddhist universalism, and the transformation of Siam into a modern state.
Francis R. Bradley
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824851613
- eISBN:
- 9780824868093
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824851613.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
Following a defeat by Siam in 1786, the Patani community experienced a period of displacement that resulted in many resettling elsewhere in the Malay world and Mecca. This marked the denouement for ...
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Following a defeat by Siam in 1786, the Patani community experienced a period of displacement that resulted in many resettling elsewhere in the Malay world and Mecca. This marked the denouement for the old order of orangkaya in the region and the rise of a new moral order. Led by Daud bin Abd Allah al-Fatani, the ulama employed a knowledge network to spread handwritten texts bearing new ideas on the place of Islam in the community. Throughout the nineteenth century, the ulama established a zone of pondok schools across what is now southern Thailand and northern Malaysia where they set in motion an Islamic textual turn. Islamic leaders came to harness the symbolic power imbued in their texts and teachings to transform the relationship between the populace, Islam, and established authority. Thus when the Anglo-Siamese Treaty of 1909 ultimately established the border between the modern states of Malaysia and Thailand, it cut directly through an organic cultural zone that had emerged over the previous century.Less
Following a defeat by Siam in 1786, the Patani community experienced a period of displacement that resulted in many resettling elsewhere in the Malay world and Mecca. This marked the denouement for the old order of orangkaya in the region and the rise of a new moral order. Led by Daud bin Abd Allah al-Fatani, the ulama employed a knowledge network to spread handwritten texts bearing new ideas on the place of Islam in the community. Throughout the nineteenth century, the ulama established a zone of pondok schools across what is now southern Thailand and northern Malaysia where they set in motion an Islamic textual turn. Islamic leaders came to harness the symbolic power imbued in their texts and teachings to transform the relationship between the populace, Islam, and established authority. Thus when the Anglo-Siamese Treaty of 1909 ultimately established the border between the modern states of Malaysia and Thailand, it cut directly through an organic cultural zone that had emerged over the previous century.
Rachel V. Harrison and Peter A. Jackson
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9789622091214
- eISBN:
- 9789882207493
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789622091214.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This book brings studies of modern Thai history and culture into dialogue with debates in comparative intellectual history, Asian cultural studies, and postcolonial studies. It takes Thai Studies in ...
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This book brings studies of modern Thai history and culture into dialogue with debates in comparative intellectual history, Asian cultural studies, and postcolonial studies. It takes Thai Studies in new directions through case studies of the cultural hybridity and ambivalences that have emerged from the manifold interactions between Siam/Thailand and the West from 1850 to the present day. The central aims of the book are to critique notions of Thai “uniqueness” or “exceptionalism” and locate Thai Studies in a broader, comparative perspective by arguing that modern Siam/Thailand needs to be understood as a semicolonial society. In contrast to conservative nationalist and royalist accounts of Thai history and culture, which resist comparing the country to its once-colonized Asian neighbours, this book's contributors highlight the value of postcolonial analysis in understanding the complexly ambiguous, interstitial, liminal, and hybrid character of Thai/Western cultural interrelationships. At the same time, by pointing to the distinctive position of semicolonial societies in the Western-dominated world order, the chapters in the book make significant contributions to developing the critical theoretical perspectives of international cultural studies. The contributors demonstrate how the disciplines of history, anthropology, political science, film and cultural studies all enhance these contestations in intersecting ways, and across different historical moments. Each of the chapters raises manifold themes and questions regarding the nature of intercultural exchange, interrogated through theoretically critical lenses.Less
This book brings studies of modern Thai history and culture into dialogue with debates in comparative intellectual history, Asian cultural studies, and postcolonial studies. It takes Thai Studies in new directions through case studies of the cultural hybridity and ambivalences that have emerged from the manifold interactions between Siam/Thailand and the West from 1850 to the present day. The central aims of the book are to critique notions of Thai “uniqueness” or “exceptionalism” and locate Thai Studies in a broader, comparative perspective by arguing that modern Siam/Thailand needs to be understood as a semicolonial society. In contrast to conservative nationalist and royalist accounts of Thai history and culture, which resist comparing the country to its once-colonized Asian neighbours, this book's contributors highlight the value of postcolonial analysis in understanding the complexly ambiguous, interstitial, liminal, and hybrid character of Thai/Western cultural interrelationships. At the same time, by pointing to the distinctive position of semicolonial societies in the Western-dominated world order, the chapters in the book make significant contributions to developing the critical theoretical perspectives of international cultural studies. The contributors demonstrate how the disciplines of history, anthropology, political science, film and cultural studies all enhance these contestations in intersecting ways, and across different historical moments. Each of the chapters raises manifold themes and questions regarding the nature of intercultural exchange, interrogated through theoretically critical lenses.
Rachel Harrison
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9789622091214
- eISBN:
- 9789882207493
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789622091214.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This introductory chapter investigates the ways of drawing Siam/Thailand into potential comparative debate with a broader, global field via an engagement with postcolonial thought. It examines the ...
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This introductory chapter investigates the ways of drawing Siam/Thailand into potential comparative debate with a broader, global field via an engagement with postcolonial thought. It examines the issues at play in the ambiguous allure that the West has generated for Siam/Thailand in the development of new cultural identities post-1850.Less
This introductory chapter investigates the ways of drawing Siam/Thailand into potential comparative debate with a broader, global field via an engagement with postcolonial thought. It examines the issues at play in the ambiguous allure that the West has generated for Siam/Thailand in the development of new cultural identities post-1850.
Peter A. Jackson
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9789622091214
- eISBN:
- 9789882207493
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789622091214.003.0002
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter examines the history of Siamese/Thai attitudes to the West in relation to the situation of both colonized and other nominally independent societies. Drawing on postcolonial ...
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This chapter examines the history of Siamese/Thai attitudes to the West in relation to the situation of both colonized and other nominally independent societies. Drawing on postcolonial understandings of power, culture, and knowledge, it argues that while Siam/Thailand occupied a subordinate position in the Western-dominated world order, it was never a direct colony. The chapter also argues that the notion of semicolonialism provides an avenue to open a dialogue with postcolonial studies while recognizing the ambiguities of Western power in the Thai context.Less
This chapter examines the history of Siamese/Thai attitudes to the West in relation to the situation of both colonized and other nominally independent societies. Drawing on postcolonial understandings of power, culture, and knowledge, it argues that while Siam/Thailand occupied a subordinate position in the Western-dominated world order, it was never a direct colony. The chapter also argues that the notion of semicolonialism provides an avenue to open a dialogue with postcolonial studies while recognizing the ambiguities of Western power in the Thai context.
Tamara Loos
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9789622091214
- eISBN:
- 9789882207493
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789622091214.003.0004
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter examines how Siam's modernity developed in relation to areas on the Malay Peninsula, focusing on the role played by King Chulalongkorn and his closest advisors. The catalyst for ...
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This chapter examines how Siam's modernity developed in relation to areas on the Malay Peninsula, focusing on the role played by King Chulalongkorn and his closest advisors. The catalyst for Bangkok's centralization of control over territory was nineteenth-century European imperialism. Siam's leaders felt that the country's autonomy was under siege by imperial Britain and France, so they centralized and strengthened its provincial administration. The chapter argues that the decision by Siam's rulers to incorporate certain territories on the Malay Peninsula but not others, and the particular reforms pursued, were imbued with motives that went far beyond the original concern for Siam's independence, let alone survival. It entailed the direct administration of autonomously ruled Malay Muslim states and involved several other measures that appear characteristically imperial.Less
This chapter examines how Siam's modernity developed in relation to areas on the Malay Peninsula, focusing on the role played by King Chulalongkorn and his closest advisors. The catalyst for Bangkok's centralization of control over territory was nineteenth-century European imperialism. Siam's leaders felt that the country's autonomy was under siege by imperial Britain and France, so they centralized and strengthened its provincial administration. The chapter argues that the decision by Siam's rulers to incorporate certain territories on the Malay Peninsula but not others, and the particular reforms pursued, were imbued with motives that went far beyond the original concern for Siam's independence, let alone survival. It entailed the direct administration of autonomously ruled Malay Muslim states and involved several other measures that appear characteristically imperial.
Peter A. Jackson
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9789622091214
- eISBN:
- 9789882207493
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789622091214.003.0010
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This concluding chapter discusses postcolonial theories of cultural hybridity to delineate some of the main forms of Siamese/Thai responses to the West. It compares Nestor García Canclini's account ...
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This concluding chapter discusses postcolonial theories of cultural hybridity to delineate some of the main forms of Siamese/Thai responses to the West. It compares Nestor García Canclini's account of the hybrid mestizaje discourse of Latin American Hispanic elites as a mode of hegemonic rule to the nineteenth-century Siamese elite discourse of siwilai (“civilized”). In contrast, at the international level in which Siam's rulers were subordinate to the West, the chapter draws on Homi Bhabha to read siwilai as a hybrid discourse manifesting Thai elites' subaltern resistance to Western imperialism. Both Bhabha's and García Canclini's different accounts of postcolonial cultural hybridity are needed to explain all these patterns of Thai–Western cultural mixing.Less
This concluding chapter discusses postcolonial theories of cultural hybridity to delineate some of the main forms of Siamese/Thai responses to the West. It compares Nestor García Canclini's account of the hybrid mestizaje discourse of Latin American Hispanic elites as a mode of hegemonic rule to the nineteenth-century Siamese elite discourse of siwilai (“civilized”). In contrast, at the international level in which Siam's rulers were subordinate to the West, the chapter draws on Homi Bhabha to read siwilai as a hybrid discourse manifesting Thai elites' subaltern resistance to Western imperialism. Both Bhabha's and García Canclini's different accounts of postcolonial cultural hybridity are needed to explain all these patterns of Thai–Western cultural mixing.
Philip J. Stern
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195393736
- eISBN:
- 9780199896837
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195393736.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, World Early Modern History, British and Irish Early Modern History
This chapter shows how the political system detailed in the previous chapters responded to unprecedented challenges to its authority and integrity, beginning in the early 1680s. A rebellion led by ...
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This chapter shows how the political system detailed in the previous chapters responded to unprecedented challenges to its authority and integrity, beginning in the early 1680s. A rebellion led by its own soldiers at Bombay, a Dutch-backed coup at Banten in Java, and growing impositions on its jurisdiction from Asian powers led Company leadership to a much more aggressive posture in defense of its network of fortified settlements and the rights and privileges that network was intended to protect. The Company sought to secure its colonies and establish new settlements, ideally through diplomacy, most notably at Bengkulu in Sumatra, but also through two wars, one in Siam and another in Bengal, which ultimately resulted in the grant of zamindari rights for the government of Calcutta. Through all this, Company governors’ guiding concern was not territorial aggrandizement or imperial expansion, but the integrity of its rights and jurisdiction, particularly over English subjects in Asia.Less
This chapter shows how the political system detailed in the previous chapters responded to unprecedented challenges to its authority and integrity, beginning in the early 1680s. A rebellion led by its own soldiers at Bombay, a Dutch-backed coup at Banten in Java, and growing impositions on its jurisdiction from Asian powers led Company leadership to a much more aggressive posture in defense of its network of fortified settlements and the rights and privileges that network was intended to protect. The Company sought to secure its colonies and establish new settlements, ideally through diplomacy, most notably at Bengkulu in Sumatra, but also through two wars, one in Siam and another in Bengal, which ultimately resulted in the grant of zamindari rights for the government of Calcutta. Through all this, Company governors’ guiding concern was not territorial aggrandizement or imperial expansion, but the integrity of its rights and jurisdiction, particularly over English subjects in Asia.
Serhat Ünaldi
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824855727
- eISBN:
- 9780824868673
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824855727.003.0006
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
Siam-Ratchaprasong is the major center of Thailand’s royalist-led capitalist development and of its inherent contradictions. A birds-eye view on its architecture reveals just how much orientations ...
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Siam-Ratchaprasong is the major center of Thailand’s royalist-led capitalist development and of its inherent contradictions. A birds-eye view on its architecture reveals just how much orientations towards the monarchy have shaped this stretch of land in the heart of Bangkok. Case studies of Sra Pathum Palace, the private palace of the king’s family, and of the controversial destruction of Phetchabun Palace, the former residence of a prince from a family line rival to that of the king, illustrate how developers in the Siam-Ratchaprasong area have been working towards the monarchy through space. However, a third case study shows how local business owners have become religious patrons themselves by setting up Hindu shrines at Ratchaprasong intersection. Their popularity often outshines that of more established royal places of worship. The weakening of the royal monopoly over religious sponsorship is indicative of the threat posed to the monarchy by capitalists.Less
Siam-Ratchaprasong is the major center of Thailand’s royalist-led capitalist development and of its inherent contradictions. A birds-eye view on its architecture reveals just how much orientations towards the monarchy have shaped this stretch of land in the heart of Bangkok. Case studies of Sra Pathum Palace, the private palace of the king’s family, and of the controversial destruction of Phetchabun Palace, the former residence of a prince from a family line rival to that of the king, illustrate how developers in the Siam-Ratchaprasong area have been working towards the monarchy through space. However, a third case study shows how local business owners have become religious patrons themselves by setting up Hindu shrines at Ratchaprasong intersection. Their popularity often outshines that of more established royal places of worship. The weakening of the royal monopoly over religious sponsorship is indicative of the threat posed to the monarchy by capitalists.
Trais Pearson
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781501740152
- eISBN:
- 9781501740176
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501740152.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This introductory chapter briefly discusses the major themes of this book. It argues that the investigation of unnatural death was an early—and unlikely—site of direct interaction between the state ...
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This introductory chapter briefly discusses the major themes of this book. It argues that the investigation of unnatural death was an early—and unlikely—site of direct interaction between the state and its subjects. Furthermore, the chapter illustrates how the emergence of a necropolitical regime at the turn of the twentieth century offered a troubling rebuke to the master narrative of modern Thai historiography: namely, the doctrine of Siamese/Thai exceptionalism. Thailand's status as the only nation-state in Southeast Asia to avoid direct control by European imperial power marks it as a singular state with an exceptional past. And it is within this context that the chapter addresses certain morbid subjects—alluding not merely to death but also to the social, cultural, and political lives of the dead.Less
This introductory chapter briefly discusses the major themes of this book. It argues that the investigation of unnatural death was an early—and unlikely—site of direct interaction between the state and its subjects. Furthermore, the chapter illustrates how the emergence of a necropolitical regime at the turn of the twentieth century offered a troubling rebuke to the master narrative of modern Thai historiography: namely, the doctrine of Siamese/Thai exceptionalism. Thailand's status as the only nation-state in Southeast Asia to avoid direct control by European imperial power marks it as a singular state with an exceptional past. And it is within this context that the chapter addresses certain morbid subjects—alluding not merely to death but also to the social, cultural, and political lives of the dead.
Trais Pearson
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781501740152
- eISBN:
- 9781501740176
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501740152.003.0008
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This concluding chapter discusses the brief rise and fall of forensic medical authority in Siam and how it might have corresponded with the arrival of a new paradigm of state consideration for the ...
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This concluding chapter discusses the brief rise and fall of forensic medical authority in Siam and how it might have corresponded with the arrival of a new paradigm of state consideration for the dead. In the ensuing years, concerns over obtaining justice for Siamese subjects in the plural legal arena created by extraterritorial law gave way dramatically to a new fixation on the threat of contagious disease in an increasingly interconnected world. The chapter shows how the threat of such diseases helped the Siamese state to establish new procedures for recording every death within the capital city along with its cause. In the larger context, the chapter addresses the issue of sovereignty as foreign imperialism and Siamese political authority struggled to keep up with the complications surrounding the legal status of the dead. In doing so, the chapter reveals the Siamese capital to be a city crowded with actors and forms of agency that do not figure in normative accounts of Thai history.Less
This concluding chapter discusses the brief rise and fall of forensic medical authority in Siam and how it might have corresponded with the arrival of a new paradigm of state consideration for the dead. In the ensuing years, concerns over obtaining justice for Siamese subjects in the plural legal arena created by extraterritorial law gave way dramatically to a new fixation on the threat of contagious disease in an increasingly interconnected world. The chapter shows how the threat of such diseases helped the Siamese state to establish new procedures for recording every death within the capital city along with its cause. In the larger context, the chapter addresses the issue of sovereignty as foreign imperialism and Siamese political authority struggled to keep up with the complications surrounding the legal status of the dead. In doing so, the chapter reveals the Siamese capital to be a city crowded with actors and forms of agency that do not figure in normative accounts of Thai history.
Gary L. Atkins
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9789888083237
- eISBN:
- 9789882209305
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888083237.003.0003
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
Prince Vajiravudh left England in the early 1900s to return to Siam, including a month long tour of the USA. His refusal to pursue relationships with women distressed his mother the queen. At his ...
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Prince Vajiravudh left England in the early 1900s to return to Siam, including a month long tour of the USA. His refusal to pursue relationships with women distressed his mother the queen. At his palace of Saranrom, Vajiravudh would imagine and create his own island home populated by young men who were not from the royal family. At Saranrom, he would begin to deploy the strategy he would use to link the oppositional narratives he now needed both to write and to live.Less
Prince Vajiravudh left England in the early 1900s to return to Siam, including a month long tour of the USA. His refusal to pursue relationships with women distressed his mother the queen. At his palace of Saranrom, Vajiravudh would imagine and create his own island home populated by young men who were not from the royal family. At Saranrom, he would begin to deploy the strategy he would use to link the oppositional narratives he now needed both to write and to live.
Amrita Malhi
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781474435093
- eISBN:
- 9781474453660
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474435093.003.0008
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Middle Eastern Studies
From 1891 to 1895, the Pahang War disrupted Britain’s enclosure of territory on the Malay Peninsula. Fought in response to an uprising by up to 700 rebels in Pahang, the war was not only a means for ...
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From 1891 to 1895, the Pahang War disrupted Britain’s enclosure of territory on the Malay Peninsula. Fought in response to an uprising by up to 700 rebels in Pahang, the war was not only a means for controlling damage to British interests but also an arena for a subtle, geopolitical contest between Britain and Siam for the Siamese tributaries, including Kelantan and Terengganu. During this period Terengganu, sheltered by legal and territorial constructs that kept the Siamese frontier open until 1902, was becoming a hub for perang sabil (‘holy war’) against British and Siamese ‘competitive colonialisms’. Known to be providing discursive, human, and other political resources to the Pahang rebels, Terengganu came to be portrayed as a ‘wild’ and ‘benighted’ place by Pahang’s British Resident Hugh Clifford, an important broker of the colonial race-thinking deployed as a means for controlling and taming the frontier.Less
From 1891 to 1895, the Pahang War disrupted Britain’s enclosure of territory on the Malay Peninsula. Fought in response to an uprising by up to 700 rebels in Pahang, the war was not only a means for controlling damage to British interests but also an arena for a subtle, geopolitical contest between Britain and Siam for the Siamese tributaries, including Kelantan and Terengganu. During this period Terengganu, sheltered by legal and territorial constructs that kept the Siamese frontier open until 1902, was becoming a hub for perang sabil (‘holy war’) against British and Siamese ‘competitive colonialisms’. Known to be providing discursive, human, and other political resources to the Pahang rebels, Terengganu came to be portrayed as a ‘wild’ and ‘benighted’ place by Pahang’s British Resident Hugh Clifford, an important broker of the colonial race-thinking deployed as a means for controlling and taming the frontier.
Ruth Streicher
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- May 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781501751325
- eISBN:
- 9781501751356
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501751325.003.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
This introductory chapter provides an overview of how counterinsurgency practices contribute to producing Thailand as an imperial formation: a modern state formation with roots in the premodern ...
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This introductory chapter provides an overview of how counterinsurgency practices contribute to producing Thailand as an imperial formation: a modern state formation with roots in the premodern Buddhist empire of Siam that secures its survival by constructing the southern Muslim population as essentially and hierarchically different. Reinforcing notions of the racialized, religious, and gendered Otherness of Patani, counterinsurgency thus fuels the very conflict it has been designed to resolve. From this perspective, it is possible to understand the marginalization of the southern conflict in official discourse, the denials of obvious connections between the insurgency and the August 2016 bombings, and the culturalization of a deeply political conflict as integral parts of imperial policing practices. The counterinsurgency motto “Understanding, Reaching Out, Development” has guided military operations in the southern region under various governments and juntas, and it encapsulates how counterinsurgency discourse is predicated on and produces the essentialized differences of the southern population. Most conspicuously, the motto positions Thai military as the paternal caretaker of the South and relocates the causes of insurgent violence in the differences of the southern population.Less
This introductory chapter provides an overview of how counterinsurgency practices contribute to producing Thailand as an imperial formation: a modern state formation with roots in the premodern Buddhist empire of Siam that secures its survival by constructing the southern Muslim population as essentially and hierarchically different. Reinforcing notions of the racialized, religious, and gendered Otherness of Patani, counterinsurgency thus fuels the very conflict it has been designed to resolve. From this perspective, it is possible to understand the marginalization of the southern conflict in official discourse, the denials of obvious connections between the insurgency and the August 2016 bombings, and the culturalization of a deeply political conflict as integral parts of imperial policing practices. The counterinsurgency motto “Understanding, Reaching Out, Development” has guided military operations in the southern region under various governments and juntas, and it encapsulates how counterinsurgency discourse is predicated on and produces the essentialized differences of the southern population. Most conspicuously, the motto positions Thai military as the paternal caretaker of the South and relocates the causes of insurgent violence in the differences of the southern population.
Ruth Streicher
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- May 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781501751325
- eISBN:
- 9781501751356
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501751325.003.0002
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
This chapter examines a handbook produced for military officers stationed in the South, relating some of its central notions to an imperial construction of history in the modern Thai state formation ...
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This chapter examines a handbook produced for military officers stationed in the South, relating some of its central notions to an imperial construction of history in the modern Thai state formation that simultaneously erases the state's conquest of the Islamic sultanate while marking Patani as its Muslim feminized Other. The epistemological grounds on which the handbook rests are central to the whole military project of building understanding. In this narrative, Patani emerges as an ancient Buddhist land incorporated into Siam by mere administrative reform, Siam's crushing of the legal and political power of the former Islamic sultanate is elided, and the Patani population is characterized as adhering to a private Muslim culture. Based on this narrative, the handbook constructs state officers as paternal protectors of the southern population. The military aligning itself with objectivity is especially noteworthy in a conflict region where claims to knowledge — about history, in particular — are among the stated reasons for violence, and in a country where the government restricts open discussions about Patani's history.Less
This chapter examines a handbook produced for military officers stationed in the South, relating some of its central notions to an imperial construction of history in the modern Thai state formation that simultaneously erases the state's conquest of the Islamic sultanate while marking Patani as its Muslim feminized Other. The epistemological grounds on which the handbook rests are central to the whole military project of building understanding. In this narrative, Patani emerges as an ancient Buddhist land incorporated into Siam by mere administrative reform, Siam's crushing of the legal and political power of the former Islamic sultanate is elided, and the Patani population is characterized as adhering to a private Muslim culture. Based on this narrative, the handbook constructs state officers as paternal protectors of the southern population. The military aligning itself with objectivity is especially noteworthy in a conflict region where claims to knowledge — about history, in particular — are among the stated reasons for violence, and in a country where the government restricts open discussions about Patani's history.
Serhat Ünaldi
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824855727
- eISBN:
- 9780824868673
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824855727.003.0007
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
At street level, Siam-Ratchaprasong becomes a site of artful engagement with urban space, a site where the disciplining measures of dominant institutions are contested and subverted but also accepted ...
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At street level, Siam-Ratchaprasong becomes a site of artful engagement with urban space, a site where the disciplining measures of dominant institutions are contested and subverted but also accepted and supported. The slum community Chumchon Lang Wat Pathumwanaram demonstrates that people who are working towards or against the monarchy might live in the same neighborhood. Splits run deep not just between but through classes. Another case, that of illegal street vendors at Siam Square, illustrates that resistance does not necessarily challenge the status quo but may be marked by its intelligent manipulation. Some groups at Siam-Ratchaprasong, however, have started to actively work against the monarchy. Anti-royal graffiti drawn by red shirt protesters on a construction hoarding at Ratchaprasong intersection show how strong opposition to the monarchy has become at this site where the unequal distribution of charismatic benefits in Thailand assumes material form.Less
At street level, Siam-Ratchaprasong becomes a site of artful engagement with urban space, a site where the disciplining measures of dominant institutions are contested and subverted but also accepted and supported. The slum community Chumchon Lang Wat Pathumwanaram demonstrates that people who are working towards or against the monarchy might live in the same neighborhood. Splits run deep not just between but through classes. Another case, that of illegal street vendors at Siam Square, illustrates that resistance does not necessarily challenge the status quo but may be marked by its intelligent manipulation. Some groups at Siam-Ratchaprasong, however, have started to actively work against the monarchy. Anti-royal graffiti drawn by red shirt protesters on a construction hoarding at Ratchaprasong intersection show how strong opposition to the monarchy has become at this site where the unequal distribution of charismatic benefits in Thailand assumes material form.
Tomas Larsson
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801450815
- eISBN:
- 9780801464089
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801450815.003.0004
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter examines the continued evolution of land rights as the threat of colonization diminished with the outbreak of World War I, along with the emergence of Thai nationalism as a political ...
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This chapter examines the continued evolution of land rights as the threat of colonization diminished with the outbreak of World War I, along with the emergence of Thai nationalism as a political force and the impact of the Great Depression on rural society. Before discussing the interaction between the parallel development of nationalism and property rights in land in Thailand, the chapter considers the role of Japan in the continued evolution of Siamese land policy and law. It also discusses the land-titling law passed by Parliament in 1936 and goes on to analyze how the new political forces and historical experiences reinforced rather than challenged the status quo in regards to rural land rights in Thailand. The chapter concludes by comparing the impact of the Great Depression in Burma and Siam to illustrate the significance of the legacy of institutional underdevelopment.Less
This chapter examines the continued evolution of land rights as the threat of colonization diminished with the outbreak of World War I, along with the emergence of Thai nationalism as a political force and the impact of the Great Depression on rural society. Before discussing the interaction between the parallel development of nationalism and property rights in land in Thailand, the chapter considers the role of Japan in the continued evolution of Siamese land policy and law. It also discusses the land-titling law passed by Parliament in 1936 and goes on to analyze how the new political forces and historical experiences reinforced rather than challenged the status quo in regards to rural land rights in Thailand. The chapter concludes by comparing the impact of the Great Depression in Burma and Siam to illustrate the significance of the legacy of institutional underdevelopment.
Brockman-Hawe Benjamin E.
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199671144
- eISBN:
- 9780191751516
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199671144.003.0003
- Subject:
- Law, Public International Law, Legal History
This chapter examines a specific provision inserted into one of the two treaties that marked the end of hostilities between France and Siam in 1893 — a provision that stipulated the establishment of ...
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This chapter examines a specific provision inserted into one of the two treaties that marked the end of hostilities between France and Siam in 1893 — a provision that stipulated the establishment of a Mixed Court. The chapter is organized as follows. Section II discusses how such an unusual article came to be included in an otherwise typical colonial-era agreement. Sections III and IV describe the prosecutions before a Siamese Special Court and later before the Article III Franco-Siamese Mixed Court. Finally, Section V discusses the significance of the Mixed Court as an international criminal law phenomenon, including its role as a progenitor of contemporary international criminal law mechanisms and the substantive and procedural laws they apply.Less
This chapter examines a specific provision inserted into one of the two treaties that marked the end of hostilities between France and Siam in 1893 — a provision that stipulated the establishment of a Mixed Court. The chapter is organized as follows. Section II discusses how such an unusual article came to be included in an otherwise typical colonial-era agreement. Sections III and IV describe the prosecutions before a Siamese Special Court and later before the Article III Franco-Siamese Mixed Court. Finally, Section V discusses the significance of the Mixed Court as an international criminal law phenomenon, including its role as a progenitor of contemporary international criminal law mechanisms and the substantive and procedural laws they apply.