Home > Events > Islam and Southeast Asia: Local, National and Transnational Studies

(Photo of two mosques after the 1926 earthquake in West Sumatra.)

The events of September 11, 2001 and the policy directions pursued by powerful states since then have spawned a cottage industry of popular and scholarly works about the relationship between Islam and terrorism around the world. As a region with substantial Muslim populations, Southeast Asia has naturally been the focus of a good deal of this work. Unfortunately, the hyperbolic attention to terror has threatened to cloud our understanding of Islam in the region, and to provide a misleadingly simplistic set of imposed categories for Southeast Asian Muslims.

This symposium seeks to re-open the field of discussion about Islam in Southeast Asia beyond the preoccupation with the war on terror, and to explore its complexity. Bringing together several of the world’s leading scholars, it will examine the role of Islam from local, national and transnational perspectives. Among other topics, the papers will consider: Islam as an idiom of social and political criticism; experiments in cultural innovation within an Islamic mode; the role of Islam in regional rebellions; the production of knowledge about religious violence; and the nature and significance of transnational Islamic linkages.

8:30 - 9:00 a.m. Registration; coffee

9:00 - 9:15 a.m. Opening remarks

9:15 - 11:00 a.m.

Panel 1 Local Historical Studies

• Jeffrey Hadler, University of California, Berkeley
  "A Historiography of Violence and the Secular State in Indonesia"
• James R. Rush, Arizona State University
  "Hamka and 'Our Place in the World'"
• Tamara Loos, Cornell University
  “Competitive Colonialisms: A History of Siam and the Malay Muslim South"
• Discussant: Sanjay Subrahmanyam, UCLA

11:00 - 11:15 a.m. Break

11:15 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.

Panel 2 Islam in Contemporary Indonesia

• Michael Laffan, Princeton University
  "What is Indonesian Islam?"
• Fadjar Thufail, University of Wisconsin, Madison
  "Transactions of Accountability: Islah, Silaturahmi, and the Legacy of State Violence in Post-New Order Indonesia"
• P.M. Laksono, Gadjah Mada University
  "When Majority Matters: Muslim-Christian Relations in Southeast Maluku"
• Discussant: Geoffrey Robinson, UCLA

1:00 - 2:00 p.m. Lunch

2:00 - 4:00 p.m.

Panel 3 Transnational Linkages

• Eric Tagliacozzo, Cornell University
  “Financing Devotion: The Longue-Duree Economics of the Southeast Asian Hajj”
• Rachel Silvey, University of Colorado at Boulder
  “Managing Migration: Transnational Islam and the Politics of Indonesian Labor in Saudi Arabia”
• Sidney Jones, International Crisis Group
  "International Influences on Indonesia's Jihadist Movement"
• Discussant: Nikki Keddie, UCLA

4:00 - 5:00 p.m. Closing remarks and Discussion

Cost: Free and open to the public.

Special Instructions

Parking in UCLA's Lot 4 costs $8.

For more information please contact

Barbara Gaerlan
Tel: 310-206-9163
cseas@international.ucla.edu
www.international.ucla.edu/cseas/

Sponsor(s): Center for Near Eastern Studies, Center for Southeast Asian Studies, UCLA International Institute, UCLA Program in Islam Studies