Technology in Southeast Asian History

Technology in Southeast Asian History by Suzanne Moon explores the profound entanglement of technology with Southeast Asian politics, social life, economics, and culture over its long history. Moon offers a unique framework for understanding the place of technology in this region and its pivotal role in the emergence of the modern technological world. She uses analytics in the history of technology to highlight the processes and evolving patterns of technological dynamism that characterize the region. Drawing on research focused on specific technologies, such as temple construction, rice agriculture, weaving, and shipbuilding, Moon investigates the interconnectedness of these technologies within the larger political and economic fabric of Southeast Asian history. She demonstrates the richness of this region's technological cultures and rejects polarizing binaries such as traditional and modern or indigenous and foreign. This narrative of technological change offers students, scholars, and readers critical new perspectives on both technological history and Southeast Asian history.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 208 pages
Publication date: 25 July 2023
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press

In Technology in Southeast Asian History, Suzanne Moon delves into the intricate relationship between technology and Southeast Asian politics, society, economy, and culture throughout its extensive history. Moon presents a distinctive framework for comprehending the significance of technology in this region and its pivotal role in shaping the modern technological world. By synthesizing scholarship from history, archaeology, and anthropology, Moon explores and connects technological narratives from prehistoric times to the mid-twentieth century. She employs analytical approaches in the history of technology, such as circulation, coproduction, and assemblage, to highlight the processes and evolving patterns of technological dynamism that characterize the region. Drawing on research focused on specific technologies, including temple construction, rice agriculture, weaving, and shipbuilding, Moon investigates the interconnectedness of these technologies within the broader political and economic fabric of Southeast Asian history.

In contrast to portrayals of Southeast Asia as technologically deficient, Moon showcases the richness of this region's technological cultures. She challenges polarizing binaries such as traditional and modern or indigenous and foreign, instead emphasizing Southeast Asia's role as a dynamic cocreator of the modern technological world. Technology has played a significant role in shaping and disrupting social and political orders, facilitating engagements across barriers of distance, culture, and language, and producing and reproducing diverse cultures within this region. This narrative of technological change offers students, scholars, and readers critical new perspectives on both technological history and Southeast Asia.

Weight: 330g
Dimension: 229 x 152 x 17 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781421446912