This edited collection explores the possibilities, perils, and politics of constructing a regional identity. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), a multinational institution comprised of 10 member states, is dedicated to building a Southeast Asian regional identity that includes countries along Southeast Asia's Mekong River delta: Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, and Myanmar. After successfully establishing an economic community in 2015, where capital and people can freely move across national borders, ASEAN and its partners now aim to develop a sociocultural community that is fully functional in a wide range of sectors by 2025. As part of this vision, ASEAN wishes to construct a regional identity by uniting over 600 million people, which will be achieved partly through national school systems that teach shared histories. In this text, the contributors critically examine the many questions that arise in the face of this significant change: What does an ASEAN identity look like? Is it even possible or desirable to create a common identity across the diverse peoples of Southeast Asia? Given the divergent memories of history, how would a regional identity exist alongside national identity? Memory in the Mekong grapples with these questions by exploring issues of shared history, national identity, and schooling in a region that is frequently underexamined and underrepresented in Western scholarship. Book Features: First comparative study of regional identity and schools in the Mekong. In-depth analysis of UNESCO Bangkok's Shared Histories project. Use of historical memory theoretical tools to understand identity formation, extending the work on imagined communities. Chapters written by researchers from across the Mekong.
Will Brehm is an associate professor at the UCL Institute of Education, University College London. Yuto Kitamura is a professor at the Graduate School of Education, University of Tokyo.
Contents Foreword?Thongchai Winichakul ?ix Acknowledgments ?xi Introduction: Toward a Southeast Asian Identity? Schools as Contested Sites of Collective Memory ?1 Will Brehm Part I: Regional Memory 1. ?The UNESCO Shared Histories Curriculum: Paradoxes and Possibilities ?23 Rosalie Metro and Will Brehm 2. ?Regional Memory in Contemporary Cambodia: "Cautious Resistance and Calculated Conformity" ?47 Will Brehm Part II: National Memory 3. ?Whose Kingdoms and Whose Settlement? Hegemonic National Memory Inside Thai Textbooks ?75 Vong-on Phuaphansawat and Will Brehm 4. ?Vietnamese Citizenship in Transition: State Curricula Pre- and Post-Doi Moi ?103 Bich-Hang Duong Part III: Public Memory 5. ?Thinking With History in Pursuit of Truth in Myanmar ?133 Anna Zongollowicz 6. ?Finding Unity in Diversity: Public Identity Patterns in Lao PDR ?153 Will Brehm, Thongdeuane Nanthanavone, Somsanit Larvankham, and Yasushi Hirosato 7. ?Exploring Unity and Diversity in the Histories of Southeast Asia ?177 Yuto Kitamura Afterword?Shigeru Aoyagi ?187 About the Editors and Contributors ?191 Index ?193
"Mainstream scholarship on the cultivation of social identities in school education often focuses on just national, ethnic, or religious identities. What is noteworthy about Memory in the Mekong is that it examines the fascinating aspect of a unified regional identity in the Mekong subregion, one of the most diverse places on Earth. As a result, this endeavor generates complex insights that will interest not just practitioners and scholars of history and citizenship education but any reader interested in themes of nationhood, belonging, and identities." -Harvard Educational Review "An essential resource that should be on the bookshelves of all academics, practitioners, and students interested in the topics of historical memory, curriculum development and reform, and identity." -Comparative Education Review " Memory in the Mekong, a well-crafted book, fills a gap in the literature, bringing together diverse perspectives. The case studies also provide a fascinating glimpse into the international relations in the region." -Sir Read a Lot
