New Mandala readers will be keen to know that a new book on highland Southeast Asia has been recently published. Edited by François Robinne and Mandy Sadan it is titled Social Dynamics in the Highlands of Southeast Asia: Reconsidering Political Systems of Highland Burma by E.R. Leach. More information about this important collection is available here.
Robinne has also recently released another book, which focusses specifically on the Kachin, titled Prêtres et chamanes: Métamorphoses des Kachin de Birmanie.
When I get my hands on copies I will be sure to provide more details for interested readers.
3 responses so far ↓
1 aiontay // Jun 26, 2007 at 12:01 pm
Not to take away anything from “Political Systems of Highland Burma” , but Leach certainly is worth reconsidering. Some Kachins I knew thought that he mis-interpreted the mayu/dama relationship, and I can think of some other areas worth another look.
2 jonfernquest // Jun 26, 2007 at 7:29 pm
Thank you very much for this link. It makes my day.
I think of Leach’s work continually when reading historical sources (c. 1250-1350) a time when Mongol influence in mainland Southeast Asia was paramount and everything was in a flux. For example, Luce’s two papers from the late 1950s extracting from the Yuan Shi.
The influence of cultural contact on social organisation seems to difficult difficult to prove though.
3 Johpa // Jun 28, 2007 at 1:49 pm
I’m glad to know I was not the last person to actually read Political Systems of Highland Burma in its entirety back when I was an undergraduate in the 1980s.
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