Shadows of Empire - Colonial Discourse and Javanese Tales

"A challenging book. Laurie Sears provides a wide range of provocative insights into Javanese and colonial culture and a radical rethinking about the "wayang" as a major area for the negotiation of power relationships between the Javanese and the Dutch."--Amin Sweeney, University of California, Berkeley

List of contents

Note on Spelling and Translations vii
Preface ix
Acknowledgments xix
Introduction: Histories, Mythologies, and Javanese Tales 1
1. Hearing Islamic Voices in "Hindu-Javanese" Tales 34
2. Colonial Discourse and Javanese Shadow Theatre 75
3. Failed Narratives of the Nation or the New "Essence" of Java? 121
4. Javanese Storytellers, Colonial Categories, Mahabharata Tales 170
5. Revolutionary Rhetoric and Postcolonial Performance Domains 214
6. Fictions, images, and Allegories 266
Selected Glossary 303
Selected Bibliography 311
Index 335

About the author

Laurie J. Sears is Associate Professor of History at the University of Washington. She is editor of Fantasizing the Feminine in Indonesia, also published by Duke University Press.

Summary

Analyzing the Mahabharata and Ramayana tales in relation to court poetry, Islamic faith, Dutch scholarship, and nationalist journals, this title shows how the shadow theater as we know it today must be understood as a hybrid of Javanese and Dutch ideas and interests, inseparable from a particular colonial moment.

Product details

• Authors: Laurie J. Sears, Sears, Laurie J Sears, Laurie J. Sears, Laurie Jo Sears
• Publisher: Duke University Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 20.03.1996
• EAN: 9780822316978
• ISBN: 978-0-8223-1697-8
• No. of pages: 376
• Dimensions: 156 mm x 234 mm x 27 mm
• Weight: 640 g
• Subjects: Non-fiction book > Politics, society, business > Politics; Social sciences, law, business > Sociology > Sociological theories; Soziologie, Indonesien, Theaterwissenschaft, Sozial- und Kulturanthropologie, Ethnographie, Nationale Befreiung und Unabhängigkeit, Postkolonialismus