One of my goals as editor has been to develop cross-regional consideration in the pages of this journal of major issues drawing scholarly attention in both the social sciences and humanities. The most common approach for such projects is to bring groups of scholars together at a conference and then to publish a conference volume. Indeed, JAS has published groups of papers from such conferences, most recently the four articles on vernacular Muslim literature in Asia organized by John Bowen (JAS 52.3 [August 1993]). In a variation on that approach, other academic journals, such as Daedalus, assemble groups of articles around a common theme. Many scholarly journals have some or even all of their issues organized around special topics.

Interpretations of ethnic and cultural nationalism in South Asia have been marked by a tension between “primordialist” and “modernist” approaches. In keeping with the more influential general works on ethnicity and nationalism (Gellner 1983; Anderson 1983; Horowitz 1985; Tambiah 1989), modernist interpretations now generally prevail in scholarly accounts. These works usually trace the roots of ethnic and cultural nationalism to the social and religious reform movements of the nineteenth century, which are seen as indigenous responses to the impact of colonial rule. The emphasis given to particular aspects of colonialism varies, but includes cultural influences, such as Western education; economic factors, including changes in class structure; and political changes, such as the extension of representative government. These modernist interpretations, however, are not entirely unchallenged within scholarship, and primordialist views, which draw more direct links between ethnic nationalism and precolonial identities, remain strong in political, journalistic, and popular forums.

A commission sponsored by the meiji government and headed by Okakura Tenshin (Kakuzō), Kanō Tessai, and Ernest F. Fenollosa traveled to Nara Prefecture in 1884 to catalog the important artifacts in temples and shrines. Fenollosa's later description of an event of this trip, which is often presented to show how he with the assistance of Okakura “saved” Japanese art, brings out the major argument of my article: the role of fine art in the formulation of belief in the nation. Fenollosa describes his “discovery” of the Guze Kannon (Goddess of Mercy), a seventh-century gilt-wood sculpture, at the Hōryūji temple:

I had credentials from the central government which enabled me to requisition the opening of godowns and shrines. The central space of the octagonal Yumedono was occupied by a great closed shrine, which ascended like a pillar towards the apex. The priests of the Horiuji confessed that tradition ascribed the contents of the shrine to Corean work of the days of Suiko, but that it had not been opened for more than two hundred years.

It is well known that mahatma gandhi felt that sexuality and desire were intimately connected to social life and politics, and that self-control translated directly into power of various kinds, both public and private. Gandhi's enigmatic genius and his popular appeal among India's masses may be attributed, at least in part, to the degree he was able to embody a powerful ideal of sexual self-control that linked his sociopolitical projects to pervasive Hindu notions of renunciation (S. Rudolph 1967). Affecting the persona of a world-renouncer, Gandhi was able to mix political, religious, and moral power, thus translating personal self-control into radical social criticism and nationalist goals. Gandhi's mass appeal was partly effected on a visceral level at which many Hindu men were able to fully appreciate the logic of celibacy as a means to psychological security, self-improvement, and national reform. Although my concern in this paper is not directly with Gandhi's notion of self-control, it is against the larger backdrop of his political legacy that I situate this discussion of sexuality, gender, and nationalism in contemporary India.

By the 1990s it was a commonplace that Mao-era anti-imperialist nationalism in China was dead. The anti-imperialist perspective had pitted an exploitative foreign imperialism against a courageous Chinese people (Hu 1955). This nationalist understanding of Chinese history was encapsulated in the Great Leap Forward-era film on the Opium War, Lin Zexu, which drew a contrast between patriotic Sanliyuan villagers and traitorous ruling groups in the capital city. If the brave peasants would join with all patriotic Chinese and not fear to die, then, under correct leadership, the foreign capitalists who got rich in making Chinese poor by forcing opium into China would be thrown out. But ruling reactionaries, afraid of popular mobilization, preferred to sell out to the imperialists. As with patriots who had led exploited peasants throughout Chinese history, Mao's Communists would save the nation by providing the correct leadership that would mobilize patriotic Chinese, push imperialists out of China, and thus permit an independent China to prosper with dignity.

The following statement was made by a private taxi driver as I was on my way into the city from the Beijing Capital Airport shortly before the 1991 Chinese New Year's Spring Festival. It raises many of the issues addressed in this article:

I try to stay clear of politics. On New Year's Eve, I'm not going to light fireworks like everyone else, and that's how I'll show that I don't support the government. If I don't set off fireworks, all my neighbors will know that I don't give a damn about this country. I'm just going to sit at home and watch the special New Year's program on TV. They'll have a lot of acrobats, singers, comedians, and minority dances.

Structural upgrading and industrial dynamism in Pacific Asia—initially Japan, then the Asian NIEs (Newly Industrializing Economies: South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore) following closely behind, and most recently, ASEAN 4 (Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Philippines)—have been unprecedentedly phenomenal. This regional supergrowth in industrial activities has become the center of attention, but the evolving changes in the political systems and societal structures of the Pacific Asian nations have been, no doubt, equally important, although rather subtle and not so dramatic in appearance.