SKSE 1043

Asia Tenggara: Politik dan

Masyarakat
By Clarence Ngui Yew Kit
 Part A
The Nitty Gritty
The Teaching Team
Pn Zubaidah VP Hamzah
Sejarah Asia Selatan
Sejarah India-Malaysia
Metodologi Sejarah
En Clarence Ngui Yew Kit
Economic and Business History
Thai History
Chinese in Southeast Asian History
 CNYKs Classes (Week 1-7)
Introduction to Southeast Asia
Early Settlements / Social Structure
Agrarian vs Maritime SEAsia/ Cultural Models
Economic Activities in Southeast Asia
China and Southeast Asia
 Pn Zubaidahs Classes
(Week 8 14)
Southeast Asia and India
The Indianisation Process
Hinduism and Buddhism in Southeast Asia
Islam in Southeast Asia
 Course Evaluation
Per cent

Individual Assignment 25

Group Assignment 25

Final Exam 50

Total 100
 . One

Melaka / Malay Peninsula / Malaysia CANNOT be

used in Tutorial Assignments and Exams
 Part B
Introduction to
Southeast Asian History
What is Southeast Asia?
 Muzium Negara
(National Museum of Malaysia)
2. Early Malay Peninsula (AD600 1400)
3. Malay Sultanate of Melaka and its Legacy (1400s- 1800s)
4. Arrival of European Powers: Old Colonialism (1500s 1800s)
5. Arrival of European Powers: High Imperialism (1776 1957)
6. Emergence of a Plural Society (1800s 1900s)
7. Nationalism (1930s 1957)
8. Japanese Occupation of Malaya (1941-1945)
9. Independence From Malaya to Malaysia (1957-1965)
Early SEAsian History in Popular Culture

Chronicles of Merong Mahawangsa

 Introduction
Suvarnabhumi = The Golden Khersonese or
The Land of Gold.
Southeast Asia noted for its riches in pepper,
rainforest products, aromatic woods, resins,
and the rarest and finest spices.
From the 7th to the 10th centuries, the Arabs
and Chinese knew Southeast Asia as the spice
capital of the world.
Suvarnabhumi = Islands of Gold
Yavadvipa = Millet Island
 By the beginning of the CE, Southeast Asia
already had skilled farmers, musicians,
metallurgists and mariners.
But Early SEA had no written language, no large
urban concentrations and no bureaucratic
states of recognisable proportions
 Four Unique Points of Early
Southeast Asian History
1. Innovative Farmers
2. Metallurgical Advancement
3. Sailing
4. Women
 1. Innovative Farmers
Southeast Asians - first to domesticate rice-
planting and to develop wet-rice cultivation.
Early archaeology sites in Northeast Thailand
showed a rice culture as early as 2000BC.
Other crops = sugar cane, yam, sago, bananas
and coconuts. It is believed Southeast Asians
were also among the first to domesticate
chickens and pigs.
 Wet rice or sawah cultivation Millet
cultivation decline.
Sawah cultivation = High population
density and burgeoning non-food producers
What made wet-rice cultivation successful
was the control of water.
 2. Metallurgical Advancement
Southeast Asians independently discovered
bronze and discover sophisticated metallurgical
techniques based on the special qualities of the
bamboo.
Archaeologists have dated bronze objects
uncovered in Northeast Thailand to 1400BC
and iron bracelets and spearheads to about
500BC.
 3. Sailing

Discovery of Dong Sons ceremonial drums all

over Southeast Asia showed early watercraft
development
Early Southeast Asians knew how to ride the
monsoons and use the seasonal winds to sail
thousands of kilometres from their homes to as
far as the East African Coasts to Easter Islands on
the Pacific.
Pliny: Southeast Asias cinnamon traders rode
the winds from gulf to gulf between Asia and
Africa on rafts or the double outrigger canoes
of the Malays.
 4. Women
Another unique characteristic
of Southeast Asias economy
was the role of women in the
local market systems.
SEAsian women enjoyed a
high degree of economic and
social status a contrast to the
low economic and social status
of Chinese and Indian women.
Kota Bahru Market
 Reading List
Castles, L and Reid, A. (1975). Pre-colonial state systems in Southeast Asia : the
Malay Peninsula, Sumatra, Bali-Lombok, South Celebes. Kuala Lumpur: Malaysian
Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society.

Coedes, G. (1968). The Indianised States of Southeast Asia. Kuala Lumpur:

University of Malaya.

Reid, Anthony (1993). Southeast Asia in the early modern era: trade, power and
belief. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

Reid, Anthony (2000). Charting the shape of early modern Southeast Asia.
Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.

Sharifah Maznah Syed Omar (1993). Myths and Malay ruling class. Singapore:
Times Academic Press.
ykngui@ukm.edu.my