A key economic, social, and political problem for the nations of Southeast Asia is posed by the economically important and abundantly organized Chinese minorities in their midst. The “economic stranglehold” of the “clannish” Chinese is often cited as the root of all evil by resentful local peoples, and on occasion these feelings have exploded in anti-Chinese demonstrations or riots.

Historiography has long been concerned with the problem of determining standards for evidence. For traditional Chinese historians, it was Confucius who provided the model for historical writing. As the attributed author of the Springs and Autumns, Confucius demonstrated qualities of narratival restraint, historical factuality, moral profundity, and a refusal to engage in idle speculation. Of course, his model was not an easy one to emulate, and later historical writings have drawn on both the factual records of the imperial court (which were not always factual or free of ideological interests) and nonofficial sources, such as private accounts, anecdotal literature, and hearsay. The present essay focuses on this intersection between anecdotal sources and historiography. This is precisely the point when historiography must reflect on its narrative condition, as narrative has interests other than factuality or moral truth. The author shows how the historiographic anxiety over unreliable sources has often coexisted with a fascination with anecdotal stories and gossip.

Because the so-called “three teachings” (Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism) lost much of their separate identity and exclusivist appeal during the 300 years between mid-T'ang and Southern Sung, the syncretism developed by Chu Hsi and others in the 13th century represented not an explicit fusion of these three teachings, but an integration of several 11th and 12th century interpreters, of proliferated early Confucian canonical literature, and a revival of the tao, which served to confirm the legitimate position of the “contemporary” Sung with respect to their classical heritage. This new syncretism, called tao-hsüeh, was immediately vulnerable as the vain, unnecessary and fundamentally unacceptable effort of a few men to monopolize the true tao, both to solidify their own philosophical position and to gain political advantages. As the attack on tao-hsüeh turned to an attack on wei-hsüeh (“false learning”) in the 1190's, it became associated with a wave of anti-intellectualism generated in part by the exclusivism of serious (i.e., tao-hsüeh) philosophers, the simultaneous commonization of general learning, and the pretention of would-be intellectuals. Tao-hsüeh then became orthodox in the early 14th century primarily in an effort to reverse this anti-intellectual trend.

Violence, non-violent civil disobedience, and mass demonstrations have been a part of Indian politics since independence; indeed, even before 1947. Occasionally these outbursts are truly spontaneous, and, when they are, they may be accounted for by the hypothesis that more discontent exists in Indian society than has been expressed by organized groups. But such anomic movements have been rare in India since 1947, although mob violence during the days of partition may be an illustration par excellence of this phenomenon in Indian life.

A venerable occupation in North Thailand is the production of miang, a delicacy consumed as a snack or dessert by local people and by those of neighboring regions ranging from Assam to Tonkin and north through Yunnan. The product is prepared from tea leaves fermented by peasants living along the upper slopes of the Northern hills, the natural habitat of the wild tea shrub. The finished product is transported from there to wholesalers located in most sizable towns and villages of the lowlands. Each market place in lowland villages includes the stall of at least one miang vendor, who is supplied with inventory on a credit basis by the wholesaler and who retails the commodity by the bundle or by the chew, each unit, ordinarily laced with a dash of salt, garlic, sugar-water, or shredded coconut, selling for one baht (approximately U. S. $ .05) or less.

The Philippine claim to the territory of North Borneo, or as it is now called, Sabah, is not of recent origin. Rather it is based on an older claim to the area by the Sultans of Sulu. But the Sulu claim itself is suspect. A look at the background and an analysis of the status of North Borneo is therefore essential to understanding the nature of the dispute.

In January 1878 Sultan Mohammed Jamalul Alam, granted a portion of North Borneo, which he claimed, to an international syndicate headed by Alfred Dent, a London businessman, and the Austrian Baron Gustav von Overbeck. A few weeks before this grant was made, in December 1877, the Sultan of Brunei had ceded North Borneo, including the whole of the area claimed by Sulu, to von Overbeck and Dent.

A wealth of information about individual land properties on Taiwan appears as part of the land records of various Chinese government agencies. The records contain reliable and accessible data on lowland properties since 1904 and on upland properties since about 1925. The purposes of this paper are to describe the information and its sources and to indicate some of the types of problems related to land properties which bear examination.

The modern Hindi writer Phanishwarnath Renu developed a distinctive “regional” style in his fiction, which Hindi critics have defined in terms of his focus on the way of life of a particular area, the Purnea region of northeastern Bihar. However, Renu's regionalism cannot be separated from his innovations in the language and form of fiction. He employed a variety of dialects and deviated from conventional spelling and grammar, to draw the reader into the rural universe of sound. He included indigenous genres, such as the folk song, folktale, and rural drama, within the frame of the modern novel, thereby creating a new structure for the regional novel.

Loyalty is at present an agonizing question to many concerned Chinese who face either divisive circumstances or imposition of particular political lines. Few topics could be more relevant than their heritage of loyalty and its implications today. Never a simple matter in politics, loyalty often produced great tensions and even ironical tragedies that filled the pages in Chinese history. As early as the Shang period, according to the ancient legend, an official most loyal to the state was killed by the displeased last king for not being loyal to him. In the more recent period of the Ming, for example, Yü Chien (1398–1457) suffered the same fate. Having defended Peking and thus saved the realm during the emperor's brief captivity, he was later executed by the same emperor who returned and eventually retook the throne. Of all these ironical tragedies—loyal men condemned as disloyal—the case of Yüeh Fei has been highly significant. He was for centuries a much mythologized and even deified symbol of loyalty. With superstitious beliefs swept away by modern waves, many Chinese still identify his image with nationalism, anti-imperialistic stands, and attachment to the fatherland. This essay will analyze the following: pertinent points in Yüeh Fei's career, the neo-Confucian theory and practice of loyalty in political science terms, and his evolving myths in intellectual history with regard to both the elite heritage and the mass heritage.

In the twentieth century, authoritarian states throughout Asia mobilized mass populations to adopt modern subjectivities and national identities. Literacy campaigns and the development of formal education systems were key strategies in shaping these subjectivities and identities, a social process that continues to have enormous material, affective, behavioral, and epistemological ramifications, even long after the eclipse of the authoritarian governments themselves. To contribute more to the understanding about how these massive social projects coerced and persuaded nonurban, pastoral, and semi-nomadic populations, this article explores the 1950s and 1960s Cultural Campaigns in the socialist Mongolian People's Republic (1924–90), which emphasized hygiene, health, literacy, and ideology. Oral history accounts document how the socialist Mongolian state infiltrated the private spaces of Mongolians and shaped their attitudes toward reading and writing and other desirable social goals. Additionally, these accounts suggest ways that pastoral Mongolians subtly resisted and challenged the authority of the socialist Mongolian state.

The second national or parliamentary elections in Burma for the Chamber Deputies were held on April 27, 1956. The Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League, the majority coalition party in power since independence, predominantly socialist in orientation, ran against the Communist-led National Unity Front and several right-wing opposition coalitions. The AFPFL and allied vote did not measure up to pre-election predictions but it again overwhelmingly captured control of the Chamber. The AFPFL, whose president was Prime Minister U Nu, conducted a vigorous campaign, running on its record. During the campaign rally U Nu urged his party to acquaint “the people with our activities.” In fact, he went on to say, “we have not been successful in putting across even one tenth of our accomplishments to the people. In the short period of seven or eight years since independence, the AFPFL have made very remarkable achievements in the fields of education, health, national economy, national unity, public morality and rehabilitation, while at the same time we are busily engaged in the suppression of the general insurrection.” Toward the conclusion of his address he spoke of foreign policy. On this issue he scored the opposition parties as “advocates of one bloc or other [which] will plunge Burma into a holocaust of war as in the case of Indo-China and Korea.” He defined the elements of this policy as “not aligning Burma with any power bloc…establishing friendly relations with all countries…pursuing the cause of world peace…a line of action receiving the approbation of even those persons and those countries which had in past criticised our neutral policy and suspected our motives.”

It is useful to assess the effect of Nanking fiscal policy on the Chinese economy since we are once again in the strategic position of rendering aid and advice to under-developed areas. (Nanking fiscal policies were predominantly repressive of economic development; they were not designed to alleviate the traditional economic burden on the peasant nor to promote the growth of industry.)

Historical materialism entered Chinese thought as part of the new wave of socialism during the New Culture movement. By the late 1920's, during the ebb of communism as a political movement, it had gained a foothold in the consciousness of many Chinese intellectuals. Its application to the analysis of Chinese history reached its peak in the “social history controversy” of the late twenties and early thirties.1 After the mid-thirties interest in the Marxist discussion of history dwindled, not reaching a comparable degree of intensity until its revival after 1949.

Traditionally, Chinese dynasties were characterized by the maintenance of a highly centralized bureaucracy whose prime objective was the preservation of central control over all important aspects of national life. The degree of effectiveness of the bureaucracy determined the degree of central power, the diminution and loss of which invariably led to the weakening and downfall of a dynasty. Since the economy of China was based on intensive farming, regulation of water, either for the positive purpose of irrigation or the Negative purpose of flood prevention, remained throughout Chinese history a matter of utmost importance and a principal concern of the state. The success or failure of a dynasty in handling this vital problem reflected the effectiveness of its bureaucracy, which in turn determined the fate of the dynasty itself.

Late eighteenth-century East Asia witnessed similar events with the Qianlong emperor's (r. 1736–96) literary inquisition in China, King Chŏngjo's (r. 1776–1800) fight against heterodoxy in Korea, and Matsudaira Sadanobu's (1759–1829) Ban on Heterodoxy (Igaku no kin, 1790) in Japan. As is well known, Qianlong sought to destroy anti-Manchu writings, whereas Matsudaira sought to impose order by mandating the neo-Confucian orthodoxy of Zhu Xi (1130–1200) in elite education. Chŏngjo's activities are less understood, but equally significant. His own literary inquisition developed around threats Catholicism posed to the centrality of neo-Confucian orthodoxy, but it encompassed wider concerns over heterodox books imported from Qing China (1644–1911). What Matsudaira desired, Chŏngjo took for granted as defining Chosŏn (1392–1910) Korea's historic claim to guard civilization, and his fears over the threats of barbarism intensified as Catholicism and other forms of heterodoxy arrived via Qing China. This study examines Chŏngjo's response to those threats.

Working in Bali in the late 1930s, anthropologists Gregory Bateson and Margaret Mead made an extraordinary advance in the understanding of human performance. They observed bodily practices constituting processes of signification that resembled linguistic communication far more closely than had ever been suspected. The Mead/Bateson theory of human performance prefigured research in performance studies that has only recently begun to challenge poststructural convictions regarding the ephemerality of symbolic action. Essential to Mead and Bateson's achievement was their pioneering use of film. Equally vital, however, was their construction of Bali as a place, phenomenologically speaking. The Bali in which Mead and Bateson lived and worked was a cosmopolitan yet excessively localized product of their own design, to an extent contemporary perspectives find highly problematic. Nonetheless, the actual complexities of Balinese history and culture can be seen to have intervened into their collaborative process in ways that enabled pathbreaking insights.

Until the middle of the nineteenth century, when internal disorder and the impact of Western influences began to work striking changes in the structure of Chinese governmental finance, the revenue of the Ch'ing dynasty may be divided into five main categories. The first and most important was the land tax, which was imposed on most agricultural land throughout the empire and provided the major portion of the funds with which the routine administrative operations of both the central and provincial governments were financed. The second, far smaller in amount than the first, was the grain tribute, which was imposed like the land tax on agricultural land but was levied only in certain areas and was devoted normally to the feeding of the official population of Peking, including the metropolitan garrison, the court, and the metropolitan bureaucracy. The third was the governmental monopoly of the production and distribution of salt. The fourth and fifth categories were respectively the regular (or “native”) customs and certain miscellaneous indirect taxes.

The Malay Archipelago is not only by far the largest group of islands in the world, but it is also from the standpoint of its vegetation one of the very richest regions on the globe. In this paper the term Malaysia is used to cover not only the Sunda Islands that form the center of the Netherlands East Indies—Sumatra, Java, and Borneo—but also the Malay Peninsula, in itself almost an island and biologically a part of the region, the Philippine Islands to the northeast, the Lesser Sunda Islands, Celebes, the Moluccas, and New Guinea. From northern Sumatra to eastern New Guinea the distance is approximately 3,000 miles and the land area of the region designated herein as Malaysia is somewhat in excess of 1,200,000 square miles.

In China, as in the West, fiction is a late development in the literary scene and serious fiction criticism is correspondingly a recent endeavor. The similarity goes further in the case of the historical novel, which critics of Chinese and Western fiction alike have either consciously avoided or customarily regarded with critical disfavor. In the Chinese case, the San-Kuo chih yen-i (The Three Kingdoms) is the only historical novel which has received constant serious attention, but many of its features are exceptions rather than rules.2 One will look in vain for anything as essential as a general survey of elements basic to works of this genre.3 For a genre so numerically significant, the unavoidable sketchiness of such a preliminary outline as the present one may be compensated for by a selective coverage. Here the main concerns are the most important themes and certain related contextual characteristics.