Asia Institute - Theses
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ItemGekokujo: folklore, reformation and suppression in the Samurai era( 2018)Whilst the concept of gekokujo (low overcoming high) is well documented in the study of medieval Japan it has traditionally been confined to the militarism that characterized the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. This is not without reason as the phrase tends to appear more frequently in the historical record after the Onin War which began in 1467. The purpose of this thesis is essentially to expand these parameters and consider the role of gekokujo in Japanese society prior to this event, as well as to consider the various civil or literary contexts to which gekokujo may have applied. By utilizing a wide range of sources from folk stories to clan codes and shogunate case rulings this thesis examines gekokujo and its applications from the establishment of the Kamakura Shogunate in 1192 to the conclusion of the Sengoku Period in the year 1600. The thesis has three main assertions: 1) Evidence of gekokujo as a thematic concept can be traced at least as far back as the emergent Japanese folklore of the 13th century. 2) Gekokujo may have civil as well as military manifestations. 3) The concept of gekokujo influenced civil, legislative and social systems. The manner by which the latter occurred was dependent upon time and region. Whereas under the Kamakura regime it could be argued that gekokujo played a role in mechanisms of meritocratic class mobility, the fear of gekokujo held by the ruling class during the political turbulence of the Sengoku Period appears to have contributed to the legislative restrictions implemented provincially by the independent daimyo in the 15th and 16th centuries. In utilizing a diversity of sources the thesis takes an expansive approach in an attempt to create a holistic blueprint of gekokujo’s social impact across a four hundred year period.
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ItemContextualising wasaṭiyyah from the perspective of the leaders of the Malay/Muslim community in Singapore today( 2018)The need for this research arises from the current discourse associating extremism and violence to the Muslim ummah (community). In one corner of the discourse, certain sections have unequivocally associated violence and terror to Islam and Muslims. On the other corner, the constancy of suicide acts, arrests and acts of violence and terror perpetuated in the name of Islam have traumatised Muslims and non-Muslims alike all over the world. This violence-related discourse that the Muslim ummah (community) is presented in our present time, calls upon this research to understand how the text of the Qur’ān, being the primary revealed source of Islam, defines the central characteristic of the Muslim ummah (community). The focus of this research is on the ummatan wasaṭan verse in Qur’ān 2:143 which says: ‘We have indeed made you an ummatan wasaṭan’. The central characteristic of the Muslim ummah (community) is described in the Qur’ān as wasaṭan which is translated as ‘just, middlemost, and balanced’. Since the revelation of this verse, scholars have continued to address this wasaṭī characteristic aligning the Muslim community with the concept of wasaṭiyyah. This research attempts to continue this scholarly tradition. As much of the available scholarship on the wasaṭiyyah discourse have been focused from the context of a Muslim majority community, this research seeks to understand the applicability of the Qur’ānic concept of wasaṭiyyah from the context of the Malay/Muslim minority community in Singapore today. To understand the applicability of the Qur’ānic concept of wasaṭiyyah today from the context of the Singaporean Malay/Muslim minority community, this research uses Abdullah Saeed’s contextual approach to reading the Qur’ān. Saeed’s contextual approach deals with four levels of analysing the Qur’ānic text which are the linguistic context, macro context 1, connector context, and macro context 2. In this research, these levels of analysis provide a structured framework to understand three basic questions. Firstly, what is the Qur’ānic concept of wasaṭiyyah as understood at the time of revelation by the Prophet and his community? Secondly, was the concept of wasaṭiyyah prevalent among the Malay/Muslim community of the past in Singapore before the arrival of Raffles in 1819? Finally, how has the Malay/Muslim leadership understood and applied the concept of wasaṭiyyah in Singapore today? Based on these questions, this research examines the akal-hati-budi (rationality-belief-mannerism) of the Malay/Muslim community in terms of how wasaṭiyyah is read, understood, and applied by three key components of the community in Singapore – the political leadership, the ‘ulamā’ (religious scholars) and asātidhah (religious teachers), and the Islamic religious education. This research adopts a qualitative research method by interviewing relevant key political and religious leadership figures within the political and religious spheres, participating in conferences and seminars, and analysing khuṭbahs (Friday sermons). It also refers to a rich array of written literature, both classical and modern, in three different languages: English, Bahasa Melayu and Arabic with particular focus on the fields of Islamic studies, theology, tafsīr (Qur’ānic exegesis), Malay studies, minority studies, psychology and sociology. In summary, this research concludes that the concept of wasaṭiyyah has evolved since the revelation of the verse that moulded the wasaṭi (just, middlemost, and balanced) characteristics of the Medinan community in Prophet Muhammad’s time. Based on the subjectivity of these characteristics, over the different contexts of time and place, the concept of wasaṭiyyah has taken different forms. In medieval Islam, wasaṭiyyah took the form of a moral ethical framework, and today, it has adopted a more legalistic outlook. Focusing on the Malay/Muslim world, this research discovers that while the usage of the term wasaṭiyyah was a rarity in classical Malay/Muslim literary tradition, the values associated to wasaṭiyyah were inherent within the past Malay/Muslim’s aspects of power, diplomacy, language, and religion. In the context of the Malay/Muslim minority community in Singapore today, this research concludes that the applicability and degree of pervasiveness of the Qur’ānic concept of wasaṭiyyah within contemporary Malay/Muslim minority community in Singapore is determined by the current Malay/Muslim leadership’s conscious effort to balance living Islam faithfully as a minority community within the needs of progress and inclusivity in a modern, secular, and multicultural nation.
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ItemAn inconsolable cry: Yu Hua, Fictional History and China’s post-Mao zhishifenzi( 2018)In this thesis I offer a cultural history approach to the issue of zhishifenzi identity in post-Mao China, and above all between the 1990s and the present. I examine the ideology of the zhishifenzi group – by which I mean both the stratum of educated people who saw themselves as having a leading position in the post-Mao reforms and also intellectuals belonging to that stratum who engage in critical discourse about thought and culture – by reading well-known works by prominent zhishifenzi writers and film-makers produced since the early 1990s. To examine these works, I introduce the category of Fictional History – fictionalized or fiction-inflected narratives of history which I see as reflecting the shared cultural perspectives of the zhishifenzi as a social group. I regard Fictional History as a means by which zhishifenzi assert a distinct identity and ideology, one that contrasts with that of other members of the Chinese middle class which emerged with the post-Mao economic reforms. I argue that Fictional History incorporates five different types of historical experience into a single socio-cultural perspective. These five experiences are: a particular experience of childhood, a particular experience of trauma in history, an experience and perception of marginalization by the rich in the post-reform period, a particular set of gender relationship experiences, and a particular narrative about experiences of social alienation and cultural detachment. It is hoped this research will assist in theorising the social behaviour and agency of an influential grouping in Chinese society as well as offering a new way of conceptualising recent Chinese cultural production.
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ItemSpatiality, education and subjectivity: prescription, negotiation and the spatial politics of interethnic interactions in a Xinjiangban school( 2018)The aim of this thesis is to examine interethnic politics and the spatial issues associated with these politics that unfold in the daily operations of a Xinjiangban school. The Xinjiangban (Neidi Xinjiang gaozhongban, 内地新疆高中班) is a preferential educational policy inaugurated in 2000 which targets the Xinjiang region. It is aimed at reducing educational inequalities between different ethnic groups by recruiting junior secondary school graduates from different ethnic backgrounds in Xinjiang and providing them with what is considered to be superior schooling in select senior secondary schools in Central and Eastern (coastal) provinces of China. Its practice of relocating students geographically and its adoption of a multi-ethnic recruitment strategy combine to make the Xinjiangban a special educational space in which a wide range of new interethnic interactions can be expected to occur. To achieve the aim of this thesis, one key research question is addressed: how do the spatial politics of interethnic interaction in the Xinjiangban programme play out in the dynamics of prescription and negotiation that structure the daily operations of a local Han Chinese majority school that hosts a Xinjiangban class? This thesis approaches the Xinjiangban policy from the disciplinary perspective of cultural geography. By using the concepts of space of prescription and space of negotiation, this research examines how the prescriptions of the Xinjiangban have been produced and spatialised by the policy implementers in the local school, and how both the implementers and recipients of the policy in the local school have reworked, altered, and thereby negotiated the prescribed educational space. By analysing the dynamics of prescription and negotiation that affect the policy implementers and recipients in the local school, this research investigates the inter-ethnic politics of the Xinjiangban, in which the relationships between and/or among policy implementers and recipients, prescribers and negotiators, and the ethnic majority and minority, are analysed. Drawing on seven months of field work in a Xinjiangban school in Southern China, this research argues that the Xinjiangban experience is neither as successful as the state has suggested nor as conflicted as most of the existing literature has claimed it is. The policy has had some success in promoting mutual understanding between Han and Uyghurs. However, this success coexists with other unexpected forms of ethnic tension, making the Xinjiangban a contested educational space. This research seeks not only to add to the scholarly literature on the Xinjiangban policy by presenting and analysing first-hand empirical evidence of the implementation of the policy in a local school, but also to offer some new perspectives on ethnic issues in Xinjiang and China more broadly, as well as on the geography of education in China and its significance in relation to China’s distinctive social and political system.
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ItemMuslim community organisations and leadership in Australia( 2018)Contemporary Islamophobia, strengthened by its intersectionality with overlapping phenomena, such as racism and protectionist attitudes towards migration, has impacted and affected Australian Muslim communities in a variety of ways. Muslim community organisations (MCOs), often serving as the link between Muslim communities and government, media and wider society, are consistently required to navigate the challenges that arise amidst the socio-political context in which they operate. By exploring the socio-political context and developing an enhanced understanding of the overall structure of MCOs in Australia, this thesis identifies and examines the key contemporary challenges facing Australian MCOs. Through semi-structured, in-depth interviews with twenty-four representatives of MCOs from across the five Australian cities with the largest self-identifying Muslim populations (Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, Brisbane and Adelaide), this research provides a new and valuable insight into issues that are both contemporarily important and significant for Australia’s future. After separating MCOs into three categories (peak bodies, collective religious leadership and community groups), this thesis identifies several key themes that emerged from the interviews representing internal challenges to MCOs. These included: the generation gap, employment of imams, diversity of Muslims in Australia, and staff, funding and governance. It then explores Islamophobia as an external challenge, addressing how it affects MCOs and some of the ways in which they have responded. Finally, building on the discussion in previous chapters, it discusses how the nature of MCOs’ relationships are shaped by these internal and external challenges. This qualitative research provides a comprehensive, yet accessible introduction to Australian MCOs and assists researchers and organisations intending or committed to working with Australian MCOs to better understand their natures and realities.
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ItemThe museum circuit in contemporary China : the institutional regulation, production and consumption of art museums in Shenzhen, Guangzhou and Hong Kong( 2018)This thesis questions the dominant analytical approaches in the study of China’s museums, which tend to privilege the structure and modes of production, the state and market factors, and limit the study of museum publics and visitor reception to the public-relations management approach and practical functions. This thesis suggests a new conceptual framework for studying museums in the context of China’s current political-economic transition and its related socio-cultural processes. It proposes the “museum circuit” as a model to examine the museal processes of institutional regulation, production and consumption, as well as relevant issues of representation and identity. Using this constructive and multi-perspectival approach, the thesis specifically asks why and how political and economic agents play a role in museum regulation, what meanings and modes of production are conveyed by cultural intermediaries, and how visitors can be differentiated based on their ways of appropriating or resisting museum consumption. The study is illuminated by case studies of three art museums, namely the He Xiangning Art Museum (Shenzhen), the Hong Kong Museum of Art (Hong Kong) and the Times Museum (Guangzhou). The museums, each with their own institutional organisation form, demonstrate different circuit modes in mediating the relation between the interlinked political-economic, cultural and social spheres. They address the “politics of signification” in three different ways. Firstly, this thesis analyses the historical-institutional changes of the museum, which are the result of the central and special administrative governments and the state and private enterprises imposing their own agendas and values. Secondly, it analyses how different networks of cultural intermediaries have been involved in signification struggles, in their response to national, regional, local, global and post-colonial representational forces and agents, including the state, the market and the public. Thirdly, it analyses the visitors’ cultural orientations and social actions towards the museum based on their signification capabilities. It identifies the different segments of the public based on their modes of museum consumption, which are compatible or in conflict with the production models of the state or the museum. In this thesis, the art museums surveyed are understood as multiple cultural circuits in which different institutional modes co-exist in complex arrangements. The circuits underlie the processes of regulation, production, and consumption and involve different agents for articulating representation and identity. The case studies interrogate the institutional boundaries that are established by political and economic agendas, and contribute to a research paradigm that highlights the socio-cultural processes in which the museums are involved. They also offer a comparative complement to aid understanding the different museum discourses and practices in the Greater Pearl River Delta Region of southern China. More importantly, the “circuit view” demonstrates that the study of China’s museums should incorporate reflection upon institutional-regulatory changes, processes of cultural production by networks of cultural intermediaries, and processes of museum consumption as practices of appropriation or resistance.
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ItemThe virtual sphere and the women’s movement in post-reform Iran( 2018)The present study provides an analysis of the role of the Internet in the activities of the women’s movement and explores the extent to which cyberspace has been assisting the women’s movement in achieving its objectives. The thesis investigates whether there has been successful interaction between cyberspace and the Iranian women’s social movement resulting from a dynamic adaptation between functions of social and political groups in the real world and the virtual world. It also examines how factors such as social participation, increasing awareness, changing beliefs, traditional views of women and social mobility have been affected by the application of the Internet, and whether cyberspace has been able to make women’s voices heard in Iran’s patriarchal society.
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ItemLonging for the caliphate while living in the state: an agent-structure analysis of the appeal of Hizb ut-Tahrir to Muslims in the West( 2018)This project investigates the appeal of the group Hizb ut-Tahrir, primarily focusing on its Australian and British branches, and serves as a contribution to recent scholarly debates on why non-violent (vocal) radical forms of Islam still attract segments of Muslim communities in the West. This thesis places emphasis on a topic still neglected by the current literature: vocal and radical Islamists. Such groups advocate for the caliphate and for the implementation of shari’a but also reject violence as a tool to achieve these goals. This thesis questions the common opinion that terrorism stands out as the final manifestation of the multi-faceted process of radicalisation. This account of Hizb ut-Tahrir points out how an Islamist group can remain vocal and radical for over six decades, while continuing to expand around the world, recruiting new members and impacting the ideology of new groups. Unfolding the discourse through the structure/agent debate, this project uncovers the dual nature of Hizb ut-Tahrir, acting both as an agent (vis-a-vis the national political authorities and its competitors) and as a structure for its members, providing a specific system of values and a group identity, which not only assures the group new recruits in the contemporary Western context but also long-term memberships. Employing methods of semi-structured interviews, participant observation, and thematic analysis, this project uncovers the specific elements of Hizb ut-Tahrir that make it appealing for some segments of Muslim communities in the West. In particular, this project identifies four main factors that make Hizb ut-Tahrir appealing to some segments of Muslim communities in the West: Hizb ut-Tahrir’s evolution into a transnational organisation, Hizb ut-Tahrir’s ideological premises used to challenge the West at thepolitical and social level, a set of Hizb ut-Tahrir’s unique features that make the group different from the plethora of Islamic revivalist groups advocating for the caliphate today, and Hizb ut-Tahrir’s role as a structure creating a strong system of meanings and identities for its members. Studying the main ideological tenets of vocal radicals like Hizb ut-Tahrir fosters a deeper understanding of both intellectual and violent forms of Islamic activism in the West, since they share the same ideological tenets but give voice to their claims in very different ways. Without denying that radicalization is the basis for any sort of violent ideological expression, this thesis argues that radicalisation and terrorism are not alwaysnecessarily intertwined.