It is Southeast Asia’s middle-class intelligentsia that pose a thorny situation for some Southeast Asianists outside Southeast Asia. They cannot be totally silenced and made mere objects of analysis, for they are neither purely ‘one of us’ (Southeast Asianists in Western centers of Southeast Asian studies) and subjected to the pressure of Western academic ethics, traditions, and industry, nor are they completely separable and distinguishable from ‘us.’
Heryanto, Ariel (2007) ”Can There Be Southeast Asians in Southeast Asian Studies?”, in L.J. Sears (ed.) Knowing Southeast Asian Subjects, Seattle: University of Washington Press, pp. 75-108.
keywords: agency, difference, mother tongue, national, orientalism, positions, representation, Southeast Asians, Southeast Asian Studies
Ariel Heryanto 