IKMAS Seminar Series No.1/2017
Date: Thursday, 2nd February 2017
Time: 10.00 am – 4.30 pm
Venue: IKMAS Seminar Room, Level 1, IKMAS Building, 43600 Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia
Session 1 (10.00 am – 1.00 pm)
Title: Sites of Translocal Encounter: Hui Mobility, Place-making and Boundary-crossing in Urban Malaysia and Indonesia
Speaker: Dr Dr Hew Wai Weng, Visiting Fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, Singapore
ABSTRACT
Hui Muslims have a long existence in Southeast Asia. Their recent increase and visibility of presence in Malaysia and Indonesia started since 1990s. Many Hui Muslims, primarily from the Northwestern parts in China, arrived in Malaysia to further studies. Some of them came as businessmen or religious scholars. They run shops selling Islamic clothes which are imported from China, open restaurants serving halal Chinese cuisine, operate a website on Islam in Mandarin and participate in the activities of Chinese-style mosques. For many Hui migrants, mobility goes hand in hand with business, and their business activities intersect with their religious commitments.
This seminar aims to examine the intersection between trans-local mobility, economic aspirations and religious activities of Hui migrants; as well as the interconnection between migration, urban diversity and social encountered in Malaysia and Indonesia today. Hui mobility entails not only the movement of people, but also the travel of architectural style, cuisine and knowledge, as reflected in various urban infrastructures such as the Hui restaurants, Chinese-style mosques and various Islamic educational institutions. These places provide sites of interaction between Muslims and non-Muslims, between Chinese and non-Chinese, between citizens and non-citizens.
Based on ethnographic fieldwork, informal conservations and semi-structured interviews, this paper explores trans-local migration routes many Hui have taken, often begin with travelling across different cities in China, before reaching Malaysia and Indonesia, and followed by the desire to visit to Middle Eastern countries. I will discuss two possibilities to further develop this research project – first, a comparison of Hui Muslims in Thailand and Myanmar; second, a multi-sited ethnography of Hui mobility by visiting their places of origin in China. Broadly speaking, this research on contemporary Hui mobility allows us to reflect on key issues such as globalisation, migration, urban diversity and identity politics (especially related to Islam and Chinese) in Southeast Asian region
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Dr. Hew Wai Weng is a Visiting Fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, Singapore and working on a project, ‘Religious Gentrification: Islam, Middle Classes and Place-Making in Urban Malaysia and Indonesia’. He has been writing on Chinese Muslim identities, Hui migration patterns, and urban middle class Muslim aspirations in Malaysia and Indonesia. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the International Institute for Asian Studies, Leiden and a research fellow at Zentrum Moderner Orient, Berlin. He is the author of Identiti Cina Muslim di Malaysia: Persempadanan, Perundingan dan Kacukan Budaya [Chinese Muslim Identities in Malaysia: Boundary-making, Identity Negotiation and Cultural Hybridity] (UKM Press, 2014) and Chinese Ways of Being Muslim: Negotiating Ethnicity and Religiosity in Indonesia (NIAS Press, 2017).
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Session 2 (2.30 pm – 4.30 pm)
Title: Exorcising Ghosts and Phantasms: Reinterpreting Indonesia’s Past through unseen Realms
Speaker: Dr. Leong Kar Yen (Tamkang University Department of Global Politics and Economics, Taiwan)
ABSTRACT
The historical interpretation as well as presentation of the events of post-Sukarno 1965 is often shrouded in fear and silence. Despite the efforts of NGOs, human rights groups and academics, attempts at reinterpretation or revising the Indonesia’s past has often been met with fierce opposition. Groups which are religiously or militarily-affiliated often brand any such attempts at revising the history of 1965 as being a form of conspir
acies to the flag of communism on Indonesia’s soil. Fringe groups such as the Islamic Defenders Front and the Anti-Communist Front have been at the fore front of violently disruptive actions against, exhibitions, movie screenings or even discussions about that specific period. These groups often brand any revisionist retelling of 1965 as arising from an ethereal latent danger (bahaya laten) present in Komunisme Gaya Baru or new-style Communism.
This discourse bears an uncanny resemblance to the New Order regime’s paranoiac fears of ‘formless organizations’ or ‘organisasi tanpa bentuk’ subverting the state from within. Utilising opaque language and taking advantage of an ‘occult economy’ already present within Indonesia, the New Order regime was able to create an atmosphere of fear and foreboding. Nonetheless, despite the overthrown of Suharto’s New Order regime, Indonesia continues to live amongst the shadows and phantasms which have yet to exorcise even after nearly 20 years of democratic transition. This paper aims to investigate the rising phenomenon of an ‘occult economy’ arising from the ‘unspoken’ events of 1965. My paper will specifically look at how spaces of past violence have been transformed into memorials testifying to Indonesia’s ‘silenced past’. I will also be investigating rumors and ghosts stories hypothesizing that these elements of the ‘occult economy’ represent a way in which the past expresses itself even as fringe factions and groups continue to maintain an ‘enforced silence’ on the events of 1965. This paper highlights that through the investigation of these events and by presenting them as symbolic tropes, we can gain deeper understanding of how nations and societies reconcile with their pasts in transitional contexts.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Dr. Kar-Yen Leong is an assistant professor of Global Politics and Economics at Tamkang University in Taiwan. With a background in Southeast Asian Studies, Dr. Leong is interested in the ways the region grapples with its past, present as well as future.
We kindly request to confirm your attendance through this link: https://goo.gl/PIW2h6
We look forward to your participation in this seminar. Confirmation of your attendance is greatly appreciated. For further information please call 8921- 4169 or 8921-5855.