Mapping national anxieties: Thailand's southern conflict

Lecture by Prof. Duncan McCargo, co-hosted by NIAS and ADI
NIAS conference room, 3rd floor, Leifsgade 33
Thursday, 17 November at 15:15

Duncan McCargo, professor of Southeast Asian politics at the University of Leeds, is best known for his fieldwork-based studies of Thailand's political complexities. His "Tearing Apart the Land: Islam and Legitimacy in Southern Thailand" (Cornell 2008) won the inaugural 2009 Bernard Schwartz Book Prize from the Asia Society of New York.

McCargo's latest book, "Mapping National Anxieties: Thailand's Southern Conflict", builds on previous projects to elucidate new aspects of the intractable Southern conflict that has claimed more than 4,700 lives since 2004. In this presentation, he locates the insurgency in the context of Thailand's wider political conflicts, exploring the ambiguous relationships between the Thai state and organised religion, the recent resurgence of Buddhist chauvinism and nationalism. He argues that the deep South graphically illustrates the way in which the Thai state could begin to unravel as old narratives about nation, religion, King and Thai-ness become increasingly difficult to sustain.

This seminar will be immediately followed by a reception at NIAS launching Professor McCargo's new book. All seminar attendees are most welcome to join this celebration.