Download full text
(external source)
Citation Suggestion
Please use the following Persistent Identifier (PID) to cite this document:
https://doi.org/10.11588/iqas.2020.3-4.13363
Exports for your reference manager
New Area Studies as an Emerging Discipline: The Way Ahead for Southeast Asian Studies
[journal article]
Abstract Southeast Asian Studies and Area Studies have a rather weak position in German academia, according to Vincent Houben, due to internal, but especially external institutional factors, with universities being part of a neoliberal machinery. As a field of study, Area Studies is more financially vulnerab... view more
Southeast Asian Studies and Area Studies have a rather weak position in German academia, according to Vincent Houben, due to internal, but especially external institutional factors, with universities being part of a neoliberal machinery. As a field of study, Area Studies is more financially vulnerable than a discipline, and constantly has to prove itself academically, which is why Houben calls for a disciplinary reinvention as a singular New Area Studies. Area Studies already has most of the important characteristics that make a discipline, but lacks the necessary coherence. Houben proposes the advancement of middle-range theories and Situational Analysis as a meta-methodology to solve this issue and draws attention to the importance of cooperation among scholars. Ramon Guillermo and Elísio Macamo offer different perspectives on this proposal. Guillermo criticises Houben's piece as being too rooted in an internal Western conversation that reflects power relations in Southeast Asian Studies. Similarly, Macamo warns against exerting Western dominance through an approach such as Houben's, while also arguing that the interdisciplinary integration of Area Studies has actually given it significant symbolic capital.... view less
Classification
Philosophy of Science, Theory of Science, Methodology, Ethics of the Social Sciences
Free Keywords
New Area Studies; Southeast Asian Studies; disciplinarity; cooperation; power relations; situational analysis
Document language
English
Publication Year
2020
Page/Pages
p. 51-64
Journal
International Quarterly for Asian Studies (IQAS), 51 (2020) 3-4
Issue topic
New Area Studies and Southeast Asia
ISSN
2566-6878
Status
Published Version; reviewed
Licence
Creative Commons - Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0