SSEAC Newsletter
June 2021 edition
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Welcome to the Sydney Southeast Asia Centre's Newsletter.
Below you will get a glimpse of some of our current research projects, education initiatives, development programs, news, and past and upcoming events.
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Politics in Action 2021
This year, due to ongoing travel restrictions, the Sydney Southeast Asia Centre decided to once again hold its annual Politics in Action forum online. Unfolding over two days on 5-6 May, the country updates focused on Cambodia, Indonesia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. Our exciting line-up of speakers included:
- Cambodia – Dr Astrid Norén-Nilsson (University of Lund)
- Indonesia – Dr Burhanuddin Muhtadi (Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University)
- Myanmar – Professor Melissa Crouch (UNSW Sydney)
- The Philippines – Professor Maria Ela L. Atienza (University of the Philippines-Diliman)
- Singapore – Dr Elvin Ong (National University of Singapore)
- Thailand – Professor Duncan McCargo (University of Copenhagen)
The presentations were kept short and sharp and followed by a live Q&A with the audience on Zoom. The talks were also livestreamed on Facebook, and later posted on the Centre’s YouTube channel, attracting significant interest with over 2,900 views to date.
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Investigating China’s cultural soft power in Indonesia
Congratulations to Dr Josh Stenberg who has been awarded an ANU Indonesia Project Research Grant, along with Mr Tonny Dian Effendi (main investigator) from Universitas Muhammadiyah Malang, to research China’s cultural soft power in Indonesia and its approach to Chinese Indonesians.If you'd like to know more about Dr Stenberg's work, listen to our SSEAC Stories podcast where Dr Natali Pearson interviewed him about Sino-Southeast Asian self-representation in performance arts, and China's soft power in Southeast Asia. You can also read his blog post about wayang potehi, a cloth glove puppet theatre, arrived on the Indonesian island of Java in the 18th century, and soon became a feature of many Sino-Javanese communities.
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Building pathways for improving farm resilience in Cambodia
Congratulations to Professor Daniel Tan, Dr Van Touch and Dr Rebecca Cross who have been awarded an Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) grant to help transform small-scale farming production in northwestern Cambodia into a profitable and sustainable business.This project builds upon previous and existing agriculture research and development projects by synthesising and translating key research findings and recommendations into actions that are easily understandable and adoptable by small-scale farmers. This project has the potential to make significant contributions to agriculture research and development by producing an effective model for supporting resilience of farmers.
If you'd like to know more about this work, listen to Professor Daniel Tan's interview on SSEAC Stories where he talks about his lifelong work supporting sustainable farming practices in Cambodia, including through targeted capacity-building programs and the development of image-rich mobile phone applications to assist Cambodian farmers with insect pest identification and crop management.
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Book Release | Opposing Democracy in the Digital Age
Congratulations to Dr Aim Sinpeng who has recently published a new book with University of Michigan Press, which examines why ordinary people in a democratising state oppose democracy and how they leverage both traditional and social media to do so. Dr Sinpeng focuses on the people behind popular, large-scale antidemocratic movements that helped bring down democracy in 2006 and 2014 in Thailand. The yellow shirts (PAD—People’s Alliance for Democracy) that are the focus of the book are antidemocratic movements grown out of democratic periods in Thailand, but became the catalyst for the country’s democratic breakdown. Why, when, and how supporters of these movements mobilise offline and online to bring down democracy are some of the key questions that Sinpeng answers.Further information about the book is available here.
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Book Release | The Languages of Mainland Southeast Asia
Congratulations to Professor Nick Enfield who has recently published a new book with Cambridge University Press, The Languages of Mainland Southeast Asia, which provides a rich and comprehensive survey of the history and core systems and subsystems of the languages of one of the most fascinating and complex cultural and linguistic areas in the world. Drawing on his depth of expertise in mainland Southeast Asia, Enfield includes more than a thousand data examples from over a hundred languages from Cambodia, China, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam, bringing together a wealth of data and analysis that has not previously been available in one place. Chapters cover the many ways in which these languages both resemble each other, and differ from each other, and the diversity of the area's languages is highlighted, with a special emphasis on minority languages, which outnumber the national languages by nearly a hundred to one. The result is an authoritative treatment of a fascinating and important linguistic area.Further information about the book is available here.
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A behind the scenes look at the Chau Chak Wing Museum's collections
As SSEAC’s flagship interdisciplinary undergraduate field schools to Southeast Asia remain on hold due to the travel restrictions associated with COVID-19, SSEAC partnered with the University’s new Chau Chak Wing Museum to run object-based learning workshops for undergraduate students at the University of Sydney. The workshops were designed to stimulate creativity, connection and community across disciplines. The program received 60 applications and had a total of 34 participants. The series of workshops culminated with the organisation of an exhibition launch on 1 April, where the students got to showcase their curatorial work to families and friends.
Similar workshops were organised for academics and postgraduate students at the University of Sydney, which were all very positively received. SSEAC is also organising a dedicated object-based learning workshop for Research Portfolio Staff on Thursday 17 June 2021, from 3-4pm. You can register here.
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Postgraduate workshop: Your research in context
The aim of the workshop was to create awareness and encourage students to think about the context of their research. The discussions engaged with three domains of research context:
- Contemplating one's own research and knowledge production against the backdrop of tensions in the North/South dichotomy and the move to “decolonise” research and bring local and indigenous voices and perspectives to the fore;
- Honing understanding of how political context can impact conducting research and fieldwork in Southeast Asia;
- Situating one's own research in global debates and making the case for the importance of studying Southeast Asia.
In each session, academic experts were invited to share their insights and experiences on how research can benefit from a deeper engagement with each of these themes. The sessions also included opportunities for students to discuss their own research in small, facilitated, group discussions and to ask questions of our experts. Each session was supplemented with some key readings to help students better integrate these ideas into their research approach, methodology, and publication plans. The workshop was attended by 21 participants across disciplines from Australian and European institutions, who praised the workshop as a unique learning experience.
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Showcasing SSEAC's research excellence in Health
Throughout April, SSEAC organised a special webinar series dedicated to showcasing some of our top scholars working on health-related topics in Southeast Asia.
The inaugural talk was given by Dr Ngatho Mugo who shared about her research with NSW Health on female genital mutilation/cutting among Southeast Asian communities in New South Wales.
For the second talk in the SSEAC Health Webinar Series, SSEAC partnered with the Sydney Vietnam Initiative to host Dr Justin Beardsley who discussed his groundbreaking research into how agricultural pesticide use is driving antimicrobial resistance amongst fungi in Vietnam. You can watch his talk on Facebook and YouTube.
Associate Professor Navneet Dhand gave the third talk in the series, presenting his work training animal disease detectives across the Asia-Pacific to prevent the next pandemic. His talk is available on Facebook and YouTube.
Concluding the SSEAC Health Webinar Series, Dr Shannon McKinn gave a presentation discussing how Vietnam's public health campaigns around COVID-19 prevention have influenced the spread of the pandemic, not always in the most straightforward ways. Watch her presentation on Facebook and YouTube.
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IS4 Webinar | The Political Language of Islam
On 30 April 2021, SSEAC hosted the inaugural Indonesia Social Science Seminar Series - IS4 webinar, where Professor Vedi Hadiz, Dr Inaya Rakhmani, and Professor Nancy Smith-Hefner unpacked the complex structure of Islamic populism in Indonesia.The Zoom webinar attracted 384 registrations, and the livestream on the IS4 Facebook page has so far been watched over 700 times.
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Showcasing SSEAC's research excellence on the Environment
Throughout May, SSEAC continued to showcase the breadth of our research with a special webinar series focused on environment-related themes in Southeast Asia.
For the first webinar in the Environment series, civil engineer Dr Aaron Opdyke discussed new research in the Philippines which seeks to compare how communities perceive their exposure to natural hazards and the actions they take to prepare as a result, and comparing local knowledge against scientific models. You can watch his talk on Facebook.
The second webinar featured scientist Dr Ros Gloag, who gave an eye-opening talk about invasive Asian honey bee populations in Australia, and how studying these insects has revealed surprising insights into how biological invaders thrive and adapt in new environments. Dr Gloag's presentation is available on Facebook.
Dr Sabin Zahirovic gave the third talk in the series, explaining the relevance of geology in understanding and addressing many of the complex challenges of the 21st century facing Southeast Asia and the broader global community. You can watch his talk on Facebook.
For the last talk in the series, Dr June Rubis will discuss how complex human - orang utan relations persist in spite of neocolonial conservation enclosures, and invite us to rethink more than human relations. You can register here.
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IS4 Webinar | The Non-Government Accountability Initiatives in Indonesia's National Health Insurance (JKN)
On 27 May 2021, SSEAC held the 2nd Indonesia Social Science Seminar Series - IS4 webinar, where Associate Professor Dinna Prapto Raharja, Binus University, and Assistant Professor Diego Fossati, City University of Hong Kong, discussed the non-government accountability initiatives in Indonesia's National Health Insurance (JKN). The event attracted a lot of interest, with over 100 registrations on Zoom and as many views for the Facebook livestream. Watch the talk on Facebook or YouTube.
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Seeing the utan (forest) for the orang (people): A decolonial Indigenous approach to orang utan conservation
Join Dr June Rubis to discuss how complex human - orang utan relations persist in spite of neocolonial conservation enclosures, which seek to securitize orang utans as ‘biodiversity’ and control humans as a threat thereto. Through analysis of Indigenous naming practices, knowledges, and narratives, Dr June Rubis will advocate for relating to orang utans not as objects to protect, but instead as beings to coexist with. This, she proposes, is what it takes to sustain wild orang utans as more than an abstract(-ed) species with conservation value.
When: Thursday 3 June 2021, 9am CEST / 3pm SGT / 5pm AEST
Where: Online via Zoom
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Postgraduate Skills Dating Workshop
Being successful as a postgraduate student is about much more than just producing a good thesis. From finding the right software referencing system and crunching stats to managing supervisor relationships and getting to grips with your methodology, there is a lot for postgraduate students to get up to speed on.
In this skills-dating workshop, we invite you to identify what you’re great at, what you need help with and, most importantly, to learn from and share these skills with your peers. You don’t need to be an expert in EndNote or Mixed Methods to attend; you simply need to be willing to share your approach to learning. And, if you’re not sure exactly what skills you have to share with your peers, you can come along and learn from other postgrads who’ve been in the same situation during their research journey.
Who: Higher Degree by Research students with interests in Southeast Asia at the University of Sydney
When: Wednesday 16 June 2021, from 3-5pm (AEST)
Where: The University of Sydney, Camperdown Campus
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Wartime sexual violence against men: Making sense of the silences in Cambodia's war crimes tribunal
Join Dr Rosemary Grey for an insight into the prosecution of gender-based crimes in the International Criminal Court and Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia.
Following a long tradition of critical legal scholarship, Dr Rosemary Grey's research investigates the historical and social forces that shape how law is made, interpreted, and applied. In this talk, she applies this critical lens to an ongoing war crimes trial in the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC).
Based in Phnom Penh, and run by the United Nations and the Cambodian government, the ECCC is mandated to prosecute crimes committed in the 1970s by the so-called "Khmer Rouge." In 2019, it convicted two surviving Khmer Rouge leaders for their role in these crimes, which included war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. At over 1,000 pages, the judgment presents a detailed account of the Khmer Rouge period, but there are gaps. These include silences around sexual violence against men, which will be the focus of this webinar. Dr Rosemary Grey will consider the following questions: what traditions in international law contributed to this "blind spot" in the judgment, and what role did Cambodian law and culture play in this respect?
When: Thursday 17 June 2021, 9am CEST / 5pm AEST
Where: Online via Zoom
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Public Speaking Workshop
With Australia’s borders still closed, the days of delivering a face-to-face research presentation to an international audience remain a distant dream for most of us. Instead, webinars and online conferences will be the norm for researchers at Australian universities for the foreseeable future. This online shift will have a particularly significant impact on postgraduate students and early career researchers, who only have limited time to share their research projects but may not yet have the networks to support them in presenting online. In this workshop, you will learn how to deliver an engaging online presentation, why speaking to a screen feels so different to presenting in person, and what to do when everything goes wrong.
Who: Higher Degree by Research students and Early Career Researchers with interests in Southeast Asia at the University of Sydney
When: Monday 21 June 2021, from 10:30am to 1pm (AEST)
Where: The University of Sydney, Camperdown Campus
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From troops to trolls: Inside Thailand's information operations
Join Dr Aim Sinpeng for an eye-opening discussion of how the Thai State uses social media for political purposes.
Activists around the world have reported rising levels of online attacks against their activities on social media in recent years. Many believe that government agencies, particularly in authoritarian states, are behind such attacks, often employing their own staff or contract outside firms to manipulate public opinion online. Such influence operations are often aimed at sowing discord in society, discrediting political opposition, and mobilising support for those in power. Research on state-backed information operations (SIOs), however, has long been fraught with speculation as empirical evidence of state-sponsored disinformation is extremely limiting. This talk is based on a new research made possible by Twitter's release of new data of state-backed disinformation campaigns in Thailand. It argues that Thailand's information operations in the Twittersphere is centred on the use of military personnel to perform influence campaigns against political opposition. They also actively promoted the work of the Thai Army to shore up public support for the institution and strengthen its political legitimacy. These findings provide critical insights as to how state-sponsored influence campaigns operate in Thailand and their implications on the study of SIOs more generally.
When: Thursday 24 June 2021, 9am CEST / 3pm SGT / 5pm AEST
Where: Online via Zoom
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IS4 Webinar | Competence and Control: The Effect of Democratization on the Civil Service
Does democratization lead to more meritocracy in the civil service? In this webinar, Associate Professor Jan Pierskalla argues that electoral accountability increases the value of competence over personal loyalty in the civil service. While this resembles an application of merit principles, it does not lead to an automatic reduction in patronage politics. In the context of elections in low-income countries, competent civil servants are used to facilitate the distribution of clientelistic goods at mass-scale to win competitive elections. The selection of competent but less loyal civil servants also requires the increased use of control mechanisms, like the timing of promotions, to ensure compliance by civil servants. Associate Professor Jan Pierskalla tests these claims using novel micro-level data on promotions in Indonesia's civil service before and after democratization in 1999.
We warmly invite you to join Associate Professor Jan Pierskalla, Ohio State University, in conversation with Professor Tom Pepinsky, Cornell University to explore the effect of democratization on Indonesia's civil service. The conversation will be moderated by Assistant Professor Jessica Soedirgo from the University of Amsterdam.
When: Thursday 24 June 2021, 7am PT / 10am ET / 4pm CEST / 9pm WIB
Where: Online via Zoom
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Transitional Justice and Preventing Violent Extremism: Lessons from Southeast Asia
The contributing factors to violent extremism include ‘pull’ factors such as religious ideology and claims of global victimization of minorities as well as ‘push’ factors that compel an individual to accept certain ideas and be driven towards active engagement. Although a security approach is an important element of any solution, it often precludes sufficient attention to key elements of prevention such as the relevance of justice.
Research shows that where mass violations have been committed without any form of redress, the most powerful factor for young people to join violent extremist groups is a desire for revenge. Across Southeast Asia, a failure to address past mass crimes has left a legacy of anger and injustice that contributes to young people joining violent extremist groups. Examples include Poso in Indonesia, Mindanao in the Philippines, Southern Thailand, Rakhine state and other areas of Myanmar. Transitional Justice (TJ), which includes all of the steps a society takes to address a legacy of mass violations, is therefore crucial for any strategy aimed at preventing the growth of violent extremism.
When: Tuesday 29 June 2021, 8am CEST / 2pm SGT / 4pm AEST
Where: Online via Zoom
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Assailing accountability: Executive aggrandisement under the Jokowi administration
Join Mr Thomas Power as he exposes the illiberal tendencies of Indonesian democracy under Joko Widodo's presidency.
Executive aggrandisement is among the most widespread modes of democratic backsliding in the post-Cold War era. It occurs when elected governments weaken democracy “from within” by eroding accountability mechanisms – both formal and informal – that are designed to check the accumulation and exercise of executive power. In this seminar, Mr Thomas Power argues that at the heart of Indonesia’s contemporary democratic decline is a concerted effort by the incumbent government to accrue and wield power in anti-democratic ways. The Joko Widodo (Jokowi) presidency has overseen the coercive deployment of law enforcement agencies and regulatory powers to restrict criticism of the administration and curtail opposition activity. The national executive has engaged in the partisan strong-arming of opposition parties and subnational administrations; assaulted the autonomous Corruption Eradication Commission; and cracked down on government critics and popular democratic protest using an increasingly authoritarian toolkit. Taken in sum, these measures have stripped away reserves of independent political power and hastened Indonesia’s slide into deepening illiberalism.
When: Thursday 1 July 2021, 9am CEST / 3pm SGT / 5pm AEST
Where: Online via Zoom
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Precarious homeland activists: The case of Myanmar
Join Dr Susan Banki for an essential discussion of the dilemmas faced by Myanmar political activists who have fled overseas.
The phenomenon of refugees crossing borders in the face of persecution is well-known, and a rich literature on the creation and construction of such exiled populations explains both their treatment and their relationships to their hosts. What is less studied, however, is those elements of refugee populations who flee as activists, with the intention of continuing to carry out their work across proximate borders. That very proximity, Dr Susan Banki argues, has inherent characteristics that render such activists precarious. In this talk, Dr Susan Banki applies these ideas to the recent case of Myanmar, where refugees-cum-activists and activists-cum-refugees have conflictual relationships with the proximate destinations where they land.
When: Thursday 8 July 2021, 9am CEST / 3pm SGT / 5pm AEST
Where: Online via Zoom
Photo credit: UN Women/Allison Joyce
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Postgraduate Retreat
From stalled fieldwork plans to Zoom fatigue, being a PhD candidate during a global pandemic is hard. To help get you through the year, SSEAC has scheduled a “mini” version of our popular postgraduate writing retreat. Join us on campus for two days of quiet writing time interspersed with just the right amount of peer support and interaction to keep you motivated and energised.
The program will include dedicated writing time, work-in-progress discussions and debriefing sessions. Expected outcomes of the retreat include:
- Making meaningful progress on an academic output, be it a chapter or a journal article
- Daily work-in-progress sessions to help you address writing "problems"
- Connecting with other research students from University of Sydney
Who: Higher Degree by Research students focusing on Southeast Asia at the University of Sydney
When: Monday 26 & Tuesday 27 July 2021, from 09:30am to 5pm (AEST)
Where: The University of Sydney, Camperdown Campus
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SSEAC Emerging Scholars Conference
This conference is an opportunity for postgraduates and early career researchers working on Southeast Asia-related topics to present their research in preparation for upcoming conferences. It’s also a chance for academics, practitioners and the wider community to engage with the next generation of Southeast Asia research excellence.
The conference is multidisciplinary, with sessions organised across SSEAC’s five areas of research strength to go beyond disciplinary boundaries:
- Economic and social development
- Environment and resources
- Health
- Heritage and the arts
- State and society
Who: Higher Degree by Research students and Early Career Researchers with interests in Southeast Asia
When: Wednesday 28 July 2021, from 10:00am (AEST)
Where: Online via Zoom
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Honours Bootcamp
Over three days, participants of this Honours Bootcamp co-hosted by the Sydney Southeast Asia Centre (University of Sydney) and the ANU Indonesia Project (Australian National University) will take part in a range of interdisciplinary workshops, seminars, discussions and group activities designed to help them complete their Honours research project and plan for life after Honours.
In this special pandemic edition, students will learn from scholars and professionals working in a diverse range of Southeast Asia-related positions about how to do research in the time of COVID, what academia is REALLY like, and how to pivot from research to a non-academic profession. Students will also hear from Honours graduates about tips for thesis success, disseminating their Honours research, and how to nail a conference presentation (even on Zoom).
As part of the bootcamp, participants are required to prepare a short conference presentation before arrival, with a prize awarded to the student who delivers the best presentation. They are also required to attend (as observers) the Southeast Asia Emerging Scholars Conference, to be held online on 28 July 2021.
Students from universities across Australia are eligible to register; however, priority will be given to students from the University of Sydney and the Australian National University, with all other applicants assessed on a first come, first served basis.
Who: Honours students with research relating to Southeast Asia
When: 28-30 July 2021
Where: 28 July: online; 29-30 July: in-person at the University of Sydney, Camperdown Campus
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 | Opening Australia's Multilingual Archives to Rethink Australian Identity in the Asia-Pacific: An interview with Professor Adrian Vickers
Australia has always been multilingual. Yet English language sources have dominated political and popular discourses over the last few centuries, overshadowing the significant contribution made by other languages and cultures in shaping Australian history and identity.
Professor Adrian Vickers spoke to Dr Natali Pearson about his work as part of an ambitious new Australian Research Council Discovery Project that seeks to investigate and document how speakers of (mainly non-Indigenous) languages apart from English have recorded and represented Australia. In examining Australia’s history from non-English perspectives, the project challenges dominant narratives of what being Australian means and asks how language both shapes and reflects notions of belonging in an Australian context.
| |  | Pirates of the South China Sea: A Brief Introduction to Maritime Piracy in Southeast Asia with Professor Justin Hastings
Since the decline of piracy off the coast of the Horn of Africa, Southeast Asia has re-emerged as the world’s hotspot for maritime piracy, with 85 reported attacks in the region in 2020 alone. Unlike much of the rest of the world, Southeast Asia has also seen a resurgence of sophisticated maritime piracy, beyond just simple robberies. Yet this recent upsurge in maritime piracy is no coincidence.
Professor Justin Hastings spoke to Dr Natali Pearson about Southeast Asia’s long history of maritime piracy, highlighting how the region’s archipelagic geography, legacies from colonial rule, trade integration, contested maritime boundaries, political unrest, and weak governance have all contributed to the rise of maritime piracy, and explaining the many strategies pirates have adopted over time to respond to state crackdowns.
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| Opening Australia's Multilingual Archives to Rethink Australian Identity in the Asia-Pacific: An interview with Professor Adrian Vickers
Australia has always been multilingual. Yet English language sources have dominated political and popular discourses over the last few centuries, overshadowing the significant contribution made by other languages and cultures in shaping Australian history and identity.
Professor Adrian Vickers spoke to Dr Natali Pearson about his work as part of an ambitious new Australian Research Council Discovery Project that seeks to investigate and document how speakers of (mainly non-Indigenous) languages apart from English have recorded and represented Australia. In examining Australia’s history from non-English perspectives, the project challenges dominant narratives of what being Australian means and asks how language both shapes and reflects notions of belonging in an Australian context.
| |  | Keeping Lungs Healthy: A Discussion of Respiratory Health in Vietnam with Professor Gregory Fox
The COVID-19 virus has brought the spotlight to respiratory health. Over the past year, we have become more aware than ever of cough and cold-like symptoms, fevers, feeling tired, shortness of breath and any other indicators that our immune system is fighting off an infection. But COVID-19 is not the only health condition to affect the respiratory system. Tuberculosis is one of many infectious bacterial diseases that share a number of symptoms with COVID-19, and can also result in death.
Professor Gregory Fox talked to Dr Natali Pearson about his work on infectious lung disease in Vietnam, and how his research is contributing to better respiratory health outcomes throughout the country.
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 | Of Rice and Men: How Food Production is Driving Antimicrobial Resistance amongst Fungi in Vietnam
Fungal infections are amongst the leading infectious disease killers globally. They result in more deaths than malaria, and almost as many as tuberculosis. However, they are often overlooked and receive less research attention and funding than viral or bacterial infections. Over the past decade, this has started to change as the emergence of resistance in fungal pathogens has caused global alarm. New, resistant organisms have emerged, and old familiar ones have become harder to treat - agricultural antifungal use is thought to be driving these trends.
Dr Justin Beardsley spoke to Dr Natali Pearson about the problem of resistant fungal infections in Vietnam, describing how agricultural practices are contributing, and what can be done to mitigate the risks.
| |  | Back from the Barracks? A Discussion of Civil-Military Relations and the Erosion of Philippine Democracy with Professor Aries Arugay
From drugs, communism and terrorism, and now the COVID-19 pandemic, the Philippines under Duterte can been characterised as a rolling series of security threats. To manage these threats, the Duterte administration has relied heavily on the military. So what is the role of the military in Philippine politics under Duterte? How does it compare with the role of the military in other Southeast Asian countries? And what does it mean for democracy in the Philippines?
Professor Aries Arugay joined Dr Natali Pearson on SSEAC Stories to discuss civil-military relations and the erosion of democracy in the Philippines under the Duterte presidency.
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 | Decolonising Research Collaboration Practices in Indonesia: A Discussion with Dr Elisabeth Kramer
In the final episode in our mini-series of podcasts on research partnerships in Southeast Asia, Dr Thushara Dibley speaks with Dr Elisabeth Kramer about her collaboration with Indonesian partners on tobacco control in Indonesia, the challenges she encountered as an Early Career Researcher, and how she shifted her approach to academic research to focus on positive impact on real-world problems in Southeast Asia.
Listen here.
| |  | Tales of Unsung Heroes: How Thailand’s Village Health Volunteers Helped Combat the COVID-19 Pandemic
On 13 January 2020, Thailand confirmed the first known case of COVID-19 outside of China. As one of the world's most popular tourism destinations, with the majority of its travellers coming from China, this news came as no surprise. One year on, COVID-19 cases and related deaths have remained remarkably low in Thailand, and the country’s management of the pandemic has been hailed as a striking success. So what's the secret behind Thailand's COVID-19 response?
Dr Anjalee Cohen joined Dr Natali Pearson to explore the many factors that have contributed to Thailand’s success in managing COVID-19 thus far, including the country’s long history of public healthcare, the overturning of medical elitism, the influence of certain cultural practices, and the critical role played by Thailand’s village health volunteers.
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 | Building Relationships in Vietnam from a Distance: A Discussion with A/Prof Jeffrey Neilson
In the third episode in our mini-series of podcasts on research partnerships in Southeast Asia, Dr Thushara Dibley interviews Associate Professor Jeffrey Neilson about a new collaborative project investigating sustainable agricultural production in Vietnam. He talks about the challenges of building relationships with partners he'd never met before, beyond language barriers and closed international borders, and how this has had unexpectedly positive consequences for the project.
| |  | The Subject and the Partner in Malaysia: A Discussion with Dr Fiona Lee
For our fourth episode in our mini-series of podcasts on research partnerships in Southeast Asia, Dr Thushara Dibley speaks with Dr Fiona Lee about a unique research project she's been managing on cultural archives in Malaysia, where her research partner is also the subject of her research.
Photo credit: Malaysia Design Archive
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 | Working with Government in Timor-Leste: A Discussion with A/Prof Jenny-Ann Toribio
In our first episode of a mini-series of podcasts on research partnerships in Southeast Asia, Dr Thushara Dibley speaks with Associate Professor Jenny-Ann Toribio about a ten-year long research collaboration that she’s developed with the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries in Timor-Leste to combat animal diseases.
| |  | Delving into the Unknown in Myanmar: A Discussion with Professor Michael Dibley
For the second episode in our mini-series of podcasts on research partnerships in Southeast Asia, Dr Thushara Dibley interviews Professor Michael Dibley about a collaborative project looking at food security and malnutrition in Myanmar - a country he had previously never worked in before, and where he had to rely on local partners to navigate an array of complex challenges.
Photo credit: Stefan Munder via Flickr
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 | Exploding the Archive: A Reimagining of Archival Records in Malaysia with Dr Beth Yahp
What exactly is an archive? Who and what are involved in the making and naming of memory projects as archives? What kinds of stories become told through archives, and what stories are muted?
Dr Beth Yahp chats with Dr Thushara Dibley about her work with Malaysia Design Archive, exploring the inner workings of the archive-making process, and inviting us to pay closer attention to the everyday stories of objects around us. This conversation is based on Beth’s participation in a series of Living Archives workshops developed in collaboration with Dr Fiona Lee from the Department of English and Ezrena Marwan and jac sm kee from Malaysia Design Archive. If you'd like to know more, you can also read Dr Beth Yahp's blog post about her work with Malaysia Design Archive. Photo credit: Malaysia Design Archive
| |  | Rethinking Rural Livelihoods and Food Security in Myanmar with Assistant Professor Mark Vicol
After decades of economic and political isolation, Myanmar’s rural economy is rapidly shifting from a narrow reliance on low-productivity agriculture, to a more diverse array of farm and non-farm activities. This transition poses urgent policy and scholarly questions for the analysis of inequality, livelihood patterns and food security among the country's rural population. Despite some gains, poverty, landlessness, access to non-farm job opportunities, and food insecurity remain significant challenges for rural Myanmar.
Assistant Professor Mark Vicol caught up with Dr Thushara Dibley to discuss his work investigating the changing relationships between livelihood patterns, land, poverty, and food security in Myanmar, arguing that in order to create impactful change, we need to rethink food and nutrition security and adapt to the local context.
If you'd like to know more, you can also read Assistant Professor Mark Vicol's blog post about the role of agriculture as a driver of social and economic transformation. | |
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SSEAC is connecting with thousands of individuals and organisations engaging in Southeast Asia every month on social media. Join the conversation to share your work, hear about our latest events and seminars, and be the first to know about grants, research, and opportunities in Southeast Asia.
If you have a recently published article, book review, or interview that you'd like to share with a Southeast Asia-focused community, let us know! Email sseac@sydney.edu.au with the details, or tag us in your tweet @seacsydney.
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