C009: Living Heritage & Historical Memory in Southeast Asia (I)

Organizer(s)

• 

  Taylor Easum

  Indiana State University, United States
• WN

  William Noseworthy

  McNeese State University, United States

Chair(s)

• WN

  William Noseworthy

  McNeese State University, United States

Paper Presenter(s)

• 

  Taylor Easum

  Indiana State University, United States
• 

  Lauren Yapp

  University of Colorado, Boulder, United States

Co-Author(s)

• 

  Dwirahmi Suryandari

  South East Asian Museum Services, Yogyakarta, Indonesia

Paper Presenter(s)

• WN

  William Noseworthy

  McNeese State University, United States
• MC

  Mya Chau

  Loyola Marymount University, United States

Discussant(s)

• GD

  George Dutton

  University of California, Los Angeles, United States

Session Abstract: Heritage is all the rage in Southeast Asia today. The discourse of “heritage” and “preservation” – particularly as expressed through UNESCO – permeates our scholarship, either as contemporary or historical observers. However, the question remains: how can we as scholars of Southeast Asia – and Asia more broadly – use these terms productively, rather than passively transmit neoliberal or functionalist notions of the past and its material remains in the present? Amid an apparent “heritage rush,” the papers on this panel examine the historical and contemporary changes in who gets to decide what counts as heritage, what it means, how to preserve it, and to what end. Easum, for example, places the ongoing campaign to list the city of Chiang Mai as a World Heritage site in the historical context of state elites, deciding what was and wasn’t heritage or history in the semi-colonial north. Yapp, then explores the curious surge of interest Dutch colonial sites as aspects of post-colonial Indonesian heritage. The state additionally plays a role in Noseworthy & Quang’s study of who has the power to define authenticity in the case of Cham living heritage sites in Vietnam. Moving the focus toward Champa sites in Vietnam, Chau examines the tension between the material remains of heritage and the recreation of spaces lost to either time or war. Thus, in this panel, we explore these conceptions of living heritage among local Southeast Asian communities, the commodification of heritage sites, along with the shaping and reshaping of historical memory.

Presentations:

• ‘Mr. Damrong, Tear Down this Wall!’ The Historical Context of Urban Heritage in Modern Thailand
  

  Paper Presenter: Taylor Easum – Indiana State University
• Rushing to Heritage: Civil society, local government, and the online politics of historic preservation in urban Indonesia
  

  Paper Presenter: Lauren Yapp – University of Colorado, Boulder
• Incensed at Incense: Authenticity & Tourism Development at Cham Living Heritage Sites in Vietnam
  

  Paper Presenter: William B. Noseworthy – McNeese State University
• Sites of Sanctuary and Refuge: Recreating the Champa Past in Vietnam
  

  Paper Presenter: Mya Chau – Loyola Marymount University