Women warriors in Southeast Asia

Description

"This book brings together a wide range of case studies to explore the experiences and significance of women warriors in Southeast Asian history from ancient to contemporary times. Using a number of sources, including royal chronicles, diaries, memoirs and interviews, the book discusses why women warriors were active in a domain traditionally preserved for men, and how they arguably transgressed peacetime gender boundaries as agents of violence. From multidisciplinary perspectives, the chapters assess what drove women to take on a variety of roles, namely palace guards, guerrillas and war leaders, and to what extent their experiences were different to those of men. The reader is taken on an almost 1,500-year long journey through a crossroads region well-known for the diversity of its peoples and cultures, but also their ability to creatively graft foreign ideas onto existing ones. The book also explores the re-integration of women into post-conflict Southeast Asian societies, including the impact (or lack thereof) of newly established international norms, and frequent turn towards pre-conflict gender roles in these societies. Written by an international team of scholars, this book will be of interest to academics working on Southeast Asian Studies, Gender Studies, low intensity conflicts and revolutions, and War, Conflict, and Peace Studies"-- Cover Half Title Series Page Title Page Copyright Page Contents List of figures List of contributors Preface Acknowledgements Glossary and abbreviations PART I: Introduction and background 1 Introduction: women warriors, palace guards, and revolutionaries in Southeast Asian history PART II: Women warriors in ancient and early modern Southeast Asia 2 ‘Lady Sinn’ (Xian Fu-ren 冼夫人) and the sixth-century Chinese incorporation of a Southeast Asian region 3 Querulous queens, bellicose brai: Cambodian perspectives toward female agency 4 The Regio Femarum and its warrior women: images and encounters in European sources 5 Geisha warriors? The incomparable prajurit estri at the court of Mangkunĕgara I PART III: Southeast Asian women warriors and revolutionaries in the modern period 6 Heroines and forgotten fighters: insights into women combatants’ history in Aceh, 1873–2005 7 Women in the early Vietnamese communist movement: sex, lies, and liberation 8 Recruiting the all-female Rani of Jhansi Regiment: Subhas Chandra Bose and Dr Lakshmi Swaminadhan 9 Women guerrillas of the Communist Party of Malaya: Nationalist struggle with an internationalist experience 10 Love and sex in times of war and revolution: women warriors in Vietnam and the Philippines PART IV: The United Nations, Security Sector Reform (SSR), and the gendering of Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration (DDR) 11 The aftermath for women warriors: Cambodia and East Timor 12 Brave warriors, unfinished revolutions : political subjectivities of women combatants in East Timor PART V: Conclusion 13 Rethinking the historical place of ‘warrior women’ in Southeast Asia Index