Asia Institute - Theses
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ItemEconomic justice and Shari'a in the Islamic state(University of Melbourne, 2009)
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ItemA grammar of Maonan(University of Melbourne, 2008)
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ItemDemocratization and Islamic political activism in Muslim-majority countries: Egypt and Indonesia( 2008)The discussion concerning the prospects for democratization in Muslim-majority countries has been revived in recent years. It has been widely argued that the repression and exclusion of Islamic movements from the political process in Muslim countries breeds radicalism, while political engagement and inclusion, however, encourages moderation and compromise. The fact that only few Muslim states have been affected by the recent global wave of democratization has raised many questions concerning the impact of Islam and Islamic activism on democratization. Does Islam or Islamic activism hinder democratization and strengthen authoritarianism in the Muslim-majority countries? Can democratization progress in Muslim countries without the full inclusion of the major Islamic forces in the formal political process?
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ItemThe architecture of Balinisation: writings on architecture, the villages, and the construction of Balinese cultural identity in the 20th century( 2007-03)A number of studies of Bali emerging in the last three decades have come to read Balinese culture as a cultural construct that has been invented and reinvented as a means to legitimate power relations on the island (e.g. Schulte Nordholt 1986, 1996, 1999; Vickers 1990; Picard 1996, 1999). Constructions of 'Balinese culture' have been explored and identified as central projects within the island's internal contestation of dominance as well as within the establishment of colonial and postcolonial orders. Despite this scholarly exploration of the discursive nature of 'authentic Balinese culture', public obsession with a traditional Balinese architecture, conceived as an apolitical, exotic, and pre-existing architectural other, prevails. Architecture has been and continues to be an arena within which the notion of authentic Bali is convincingly authorised by its diverse proponents: the Dutch colonial government, the orientalist scholars, the travellers, the architects, and the local elites. This thesis explores the role of architectural discourses within the construction of identity in 20th century Bali. It investigates the way writings on Bali's architecture and contemporary formations of domestic architecture on the island are implicated by the political imagining of an 'authentic Balinese' cultural identity. Invoking the architecture of Balinisation, this thesis argues that writings and domestic architectural realms are productive fields in which and by which identity and power relations are continuously formulated by those who observe Bali and by the observed 'Balinese' people. The first half of the thesis demonstrates that dominant writings on Bali's architecture, while claiming to produce an account of the island's 'authentic' architecture, have instead configured a preferred architectural otherness of Bali - the so-called traditional Balinese architecture. Embodying certain notions of Balinese cultural othemess, the invented traditional Balinese architecture secures the sovereignty of the other subject positions occupied by those who write about the island. For orientalist scholars and the colonial government an 'ancient Hindu Balinese' civilisation was a strategic contrast to the political Moslem population of the Netherlands East Indies. For modern intellectuals and tourists a 'spiritual and exotic' Bali is the otherness compensating for their longing for a non-modem realm and 'cultural continuity'. For the local elites, a 'traditional' Bali is an enterprise which asserts and maintains their socio-cultural privileges. Investigating the mechanisms of interpretation and representation of 'Balinese architecture', this thesis demonstrates how architecture is incorporated within the formation of a 'Balinese' other and how it subsequently complicates the process. It explores how the writings carry and maintain certain assumptions regarding Bali's cultural otherness and how they perpetuate certain methodologies in framing the island's built environment. Through this process the writings select and frame preferred architectural examples, organise and narrate their assumed coherence and cultural meaning, and eventually display and simulate an imagined traditional Balinese architecture. This process constraints the 20th century interpretation and production of architecture of the island within fixed notions of identity and tradition, excluding the possibility of further imagining and configuring of new architectural formations in dealing with contemporary conditions of Bali. Such a persistent desire for an architectural authenticity eventually displaces the architectural culture of the island's multifaceted local inhabitants from the discourse about the authentic, which rather coincides with the architectural simulacra of the conceived exotic and spiritual Bali: the expatriate houses and the resorts. The second half of the thesis explores empirically the way elements of the island's multifaceted local society diversely engage with the enforcement and consumption of the imagined traditional Balinese architecture. It looks at the cases of Ubud, Legian, and Penglipuran, three customary villages which are commonly introduced in tourism discourses as respectively the 'real', the 'polluted', and the pilot project of 'traditional Balinese village'. Examining contemporary formations of houses in these villages, this thesis interprets the way architectural production accommodates the three villages' unfolding contestations of identity. The experiences of Ubud and Legian bring into view identity formulations that are undertaken by respectively the extravagant and the marginal elements of Bali Majapahit society - the dominant segment of Bali's local inhabitants who link their identity to the legendary Hindu Javanese Majapahit kingdom. The experience of Penglipuran - a member of the minority Bali Aga society that maintains an older interpretation of Hinduism - entails a different architectural development that for a while has been exempted from the authorisation and consumption of traditional Balinese architecture. However, as a pilot project of the 1992 Bali Regional Village Tourism Development, the village has had to appropriate its architectural formation according to the more dominant architectural images of the Bali Majapahit society. Through these two stages of analysis, the thesis re-examines what has been included, excluded, and produced by the Balinisation of architecture in the realms of both writings and domestic architectural sites on the island. Attempting to transcend the debates on cultural and architectural identity in Bali, the thesis offers a rereading of architecture that considers its constructive role within the broader history of 20?1 century Bali. Beyond its well-perceived exotic entity, the thesis argues that architecture in Bali is a site wherein identity can be observed as both a construct and a means of becoming. Through writings on architecture and productions of domestic architecture, 'Balinese culture' is continuously imagined and appropriated by observers of Bali and also by the island's multifaceted local society. Destabilising the canonical conceptions of Bali's otherness and cultural authenticity, domestic architecture offers a space wherein a dynamic imagining of the island's culture and self that oscillates with time can be reclaimed.
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ItemA Chinese legal journal in transition( 2005-11)In this thesis I examine the popular Chinese legal magazine Woodpecker, which has been published since 1981. Woodpecker combines crime and police fiction with factual accounts of current legal cases and issues. Woodpecker’s long history has meant that it has undergone a number of major changes. I argue that Woodpecker has made these changes in response to the increasingly competitive media market in China, but that at the same time it is also trying to maintain its traditional target audience. I argue further that these changes reflect the changing perceptions of law and rights in modern China. I begin by describing the political, economic and social context in which Woodpecker emerged. It began as a way of raising consciousness of the socialist legal and policing system as it developed during the reform period: at the same time, it reflected a wave of interest in culture and literature. Woodpecker started its life as a literary publication, but it has become less focused on fiction and more on factual articles aimed at the general public. The change to a bi-monthly publication at the start of 2004 exemplifies this. I argue that this transition has occurred both because of the changes in economic climate (where the Chinese media has expanded, and publications are expected to make profits), and because of the public’s decreasing interest in matters cultural. (For complete abstract open the document)
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ItemNature and the garden: ideas of nature and the Japanese gardens designed in Australia by Nakajima Ken and Nakane Shirō( 2003)This thesis discusses the connection between ideas of Nature and Japanese gardens, especially those designed by Nakajima Ken and Nakane Shiro in Australia. First, it establishes the problematic status of the European idea of Nature in the discussion of Japanese gardens by analysing garden related texts from the late Heian, Kamakura, Momoyama and Edo periods. In this section indigenous Japanese ideas, which were partly congruent with the European idea of Nature, are linked with the development of traditional Japanese garden design. Next, the thesis traces the intrusion of the Romantic idea of Nature into the discussion of Japanese gardens during the 19th and 20th centuries, when the theory that Japanese people enjoy a special connection with Nature became part of Nihonjinron arguments about the unique characteristics of the Japanese. The thesis argues that there remain some peculiarly Japanese elements in thinking about Nature and the garden: Nature has a human scale, since the focus has always been on the designer’s perception, traces of human activity are happily accommodated, and it still refers to certain parts of China and Japan rather than the whole world. While non-Japanese Romantic concepts, such as that of "the wild" might complicate the analysis of gardens which are composed in a conventional way, the thesis argues that the Japanese gardens at Cowra and the Melbourne Zoo demonstrate how important the potent, poetic Romantic idea of Nature is in the design and discussion of contemporary Japanese gardens. Since the 19th century, Romantic literary ideas about the role of emotion and imagination in the relationship of human beings with Nature can be found, along with literary terms such as “symbolize” and "express", in Japanese writing about gardens. An analysis of the two gardens in Australia, based on frequent visits, interviews with the designers and a study of their writing, argues that the Japanese version of the Romantic idea of Nature has in fact revitalized Japanese garden design.
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ItemFaith and the state: a history of Islamic philanthropy in Indonesia( 2008)Zakat (almsgiving), sedekah (donation, giving) and waqf (religious endowment) are forms of philanthropy Muslims in Indonesia, as well as in other parts of the world practice. This thesis examines the historical development of Islamic philanthropy and questions how Islamic philanthropic activities have affected the relationship between faith and the state. It discusses a contestation between the state and Muslim civil society in managing Islamic philanthropy. The thesis shows that the history of Islamic philanthropy in Indonesia is one of rivalry between faith and the state: between efforts to involve the state in managing philanthropic activities and efforts to keep them under the control of Muslim civil society which uses Islamic philanthropy to empower itself and to promote social change. Activities and efforts to modernise Islamic philanthropic practices have mostly been supported by Reformist Muslims in their aim to Islamise society and by Islamists who aim to Islamise the state. The interrelation between Muslim civil society and the state in the history of Islamic philanthropy in Indonesia is dynamic. It demonstrates a contested balance between private faith and the public realm, or between Muslim civil society and the state. From the time of the Islamic monarchs, through the period of Dutch colonialism and up to contemporary Indonesia, there have been different levels of development and interest in Islamic philanthropy, either from the rulers or from Muslim civil society. Philanthropy is an indication of the strength of civil society. Throughout Islamic Indonesian history, there has been a balance between the efforts to either keep philanthropy under the control of Muslims or to institutionalise it under state control. When the state was weak, philanthropy developed powerfully and was used to challenge the state. When the state was strong and powerful, Muslim civil society tended to weaken but still found ways to use philanthropic practices in the public sphere to promote social change. In modern-day Indonesia this phenomenon is very much still the practice. While state imposition of philanthropic practices, in particular zakat, has been contested, philanthropy remains a firm basis of civility. The thesis argues that although political circumstances influence the development of Islamic philanthropy, the state‘s capacity to control it is sharply limited because Muslim philanthropic practice is generated by the altruistic and reciprocal nature of people. For the most part, Islamic philanthropy remains in the hands of Muslim civil society, irrespective of the political nature of the state.