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eBook
Heart of service : the untold story of Dr. M. P. L. Yegappan
Sim, Steven
Co-published With World Scientific
, 2024
; English
; 201 Pages
As the first elected chairman of the Bukit Mertajam Town Council and subsequently a State Executive Councillor in the Penang Merdeka cabinet during the transformative 1950s through to the 1960s, Dr M P L Yegappan emerged as a beacon of integrity and dedication. He stood shoulder to shoulder with the likes of Wong Pow Nee, Penang's first Chief Minister. Yet, despite his pivotal role, Dr M P L Yegappan's story has remained largely untold — until now.Heart of Service delves into the life of a town doctor whose commitment to his patients and his community transcended the allure of political power. Steven Sim Chee Keong's compelling narrative shines a light on Dr M P L Yegappan's enduring legacy and celebrates a true Malayan leader who embodied the essence of public service.Discover the untold story of a man whose unwavering dedication to service over self, and his ability to unite diverse political factions, made him a beloved figure in Bukit Mertajam, Penang, and beyond.
Sim, Steven
Co-published With World Scientific
, 2024
; English
; 201 Pages
As the first elected chairman of the Bukit Mertajam Town Council and subsequently a State Executive Councillor in the Penang Merdeka cabinet during the transformative 1950s through to the 1960s, Dr M P L Yegappan emerged as a beacon of integrity and dedication. He stood shoulder to shoulder with the likes of Wong Pow Nee, Penang's first Chief Minister. Yet, despite his pivotal role, Dr M P L Yegappan's story has remained largely untold — until now.Heart of Service delves into the life of a town doctor whose commitment to his patients and his community transcended the allure of political power. Steven Sim Chee Keong's compelling narrative shines a light on Dr M P L Yegappan's enduring legacy and celebrates a true Malayan leader who embodied the essence of public service.Discover the untold story of a man whose unwavering dedication to service over self, and his ability to unite diverse political factions, made him a beloved figure in Bukit Mertajam, Penang, and beyond.
eBook
Mary Kitagawa : a Nikkei Canadian life
Inouye, Karen M.; Chang, Gordon H. (Series Edited by)
Stanford University Press
, 2024
; English
; 248 Pages
This book tells the story of Japanese Canadian activist Mary Kitagawa. In the aftermath of the Pearl Harbor bombing, Mary was one of roughly 22,000 Nikkei uprooted from their homes on the Pacific coast and forbidden to return to western British Columbia until long after World War II had officially ended. In the decades that followed, Mary and her family navigated financial precarity and ostracism, but also found ways to pursue both economic stability and political engagement. Beginning with Mary's grandparents, who were among the earliest immigrants to Canada from Japan, this book tracks the family's experiences—and those of the larger Nikkei Canadian community—from the late 1800s to the present.
Concentrating on the interpersonal and intergenerational bonds that shaped Kitagawa, Karen M. Inouye describes the increasingly activist sensibilities that arose from transformative relationships—with family members, other members of the Nikkei Canadian community, Doukhobors, First Nations peoples, and white allies—as well as in response to the anti-Asian racism that Kitagawa encountered in many forms throughout her life. Inouye presents the Nikkei Canadian experience not as a linear triumph over a single adversity, but as a continual process of identity formation in relation to obstacles and opportunities, suffering and joy, isolation and connection.
Inouye, Karen M.; Chang, Gordon H. (Series Edited by)
Stanford University Press
, 2024
; English
; 248 Pages
This book tells the story of Japanese Canadian activist Mary Kitagawa. In the aftermath of the Pearl Harbor bombing, Mary was one of roughly 22,000 Nikkei uprooted from their homes on the Pacific coast and forbidden to return to western British Columbia until long after World War II had officially ended. In the decades that followed, Mary and her family navigated financial precarity and ostracism, but also found ways to pursue both economic stability and political engagement. Beginning with Mary's grandparents, who were among the earliest immigrants to Canada from Japan, this book tracks the family's experiences—and those of the larger Nikkei Canadian community—from the late 1800s to the present.
Concentrating on the interpersonal and intergenerational bonds that shaped Kitagawa, Karen M. Inouye describes the increasingly activist sensibilities that arose from transformative relationships—with family members, other members of the Nikkei Canadian community, Doukhobors, First Nations peoples, and white allies—as well as in response to the anti-Asian racism that Kitagawa encountered in many forms throughout her life. Inouye presents the Nikkei Canadian experience not as a linear triumph over a single adversity, but as a continual process of identity formation in relation to obstacles and opportunities, suffering and joy, isolation and connection.
eBook
To be an actress : labor and performance in Anna May Wong’s cross-media world
Wang, Yiman
University of California Press
, 2024
; English
; 286 Pages
Between 1919 and 1961, pioneering Chinese American actress Anna May Wong established an enduring legacy that encompassed cinema, theater, radio, and American television. Born in Los Angeles, yet with her US citizenship scrutinized due to the Chinese Exclusion Act, Wong—a defiant misfit—innovated nuanced performances to subvert the racism and sexism that beset her life and career. In this critical study of Wong's cross-media and transnational career, Yiman Wang marshals extraordinary archival research and a multifocal approach to illuminate a lifelong labor of performance. Viewing Wong as a performer and worker, not just a star, To Be an Actress adopts a feminist decolonial perspective to speculatively meet her as an interlocutor while inviting a reconsideration of racialized, gendered, and migratory labor as the bedrock of the entertainment industries.
Wang, Yiman
University of California Press
, 2024
; English
; 286 Pages
Between 1919 and 1961, pioneering Chinese American actress Anna May Wong established an enduring legacy that encompassed cinema, theater, radio, and American television. Born in Los Angeles, yet with her US citizenship scrutinized due to the Chinese Exclusion Act, Wong—a defiant misfit—innovated nuanced performances to subvert the racism and sexism that beset her life and career. In this critical study of Wong's cross-media and transnational career, Yiman Wang marshals extraordinary archival research and a multifocal approach to illuminate a lifelong labor of performance. Viewing Wong as a performer and worker, not just a star, To Be an Actress adopts a feminist decolonial perspective to speculatively meet her as an interlocutor while inviting a reconsideration of racialized, gendered, and migratory labor as the bedrock of the entertainment industries.
eBook
The King's Chinese : from barber to banker, the story of Yeap Chor Ee and the Straits Chinese
Yeap, Daryl
World Scientific
, 2023
; English
; 258 Pages
An informative and well-researched book, The King's Chinese provides a superb account of the Straits British Chinese, a distinct migrant society from various districts of South China in the late 19th Century. Daryl Yeap gives us a fascinating story of this hybrid community, taking us on tour through one man's journey, beginning with how he left a war-ravaged China to Penang, where he started life as an illiterate itinerant barber to becoming one of the most successful bankers in South East Asia. As she takes us through his story, Daryl brilliantly captures its unique society and wonderful mix of cultures explaining how Penang was once considered the Cinderella of the East what the earliest forms of passports were how a coconut scraper, so novel, was confused as 'one musical instrument' by the British eye
and exactly how a borrower's credit profile was assessed with just one glance of the face. A highly readable book with plenty of witty anecdotes and compelling analysis, it is undoubtedly a book that sheds light on a significant development in Malaysia's history
Yeap, Daryl
World Scientific
, 2023
; English
; 258 Pages
An informative and well-researched book, The King's Chinese provides a superb account of the Straits British Chinese, a distinct migrant society from various districts of South China in the late 19th Century. Daryl Yeap gives us a fascinating story of this hybrid community, taking us on tour through one man's journey, beginning with how he left a war-ravaged China to Penang, where he started life as an illiterate itinerant barber to becoming one of the most successful bankers in South East Asia. As she takes us through his story, Daryl brilliantly captures its unique society and wonderful mix of cultures explaining how Penang was once considered the Cinderella of the East what the earliest forms of passports were how a coconut scraper, so novel, was confused as 'one musical instrument' by the British eye
and exactly how a borrower's credit profile was assessed with just one glance of the face. A highly readable book with plenty of witty anecdotes and compelling analysis, it is undoubtedly a book that sheds light on a significant development in Malaysia's history
eBook
As equals : the Oei women of Java
Yeap, Daryl
World Scientific
, 2023
; English
; 261 Pages
"As Equals: The Oei Women of Java is the story of Hui-Lan, Ida and Lucy, daughters and wife of Java's Sugar King and Asia's richest man at the turn of the 20th century - Oei Tiong Ham. Born at the height of Sinophobic fears, Western imperialism and the eugenics movement, the three became the epitome of the modern woman. They punctured through cultural stereotypes, defied social conventions and boldly brushed aside the double burden of being born Chinese and female. Their life stories intertwine with two parallel narratives: the glamourous and dark sides of modernity"-- Provided by publisher
Yeap, Daryl
World Scientific
, 2023
; English
; 261 Pages
"As Equals: The Oei Women of Java is the story of Hui-Lan, Ida and Lucy, daughters and wife of Java's Sugar King and Asia's richest man at the turn of the 20th century - Oei Tiong Ham. Born at the height of Sinophobic fears, Western imperialism and the eugenics movement, the three became the epitome of the modern woman. They punctured through cultural stereotypes, defied social conventions and boldly brushed aside the double burden of being born Chinese and female. Their life stories intertwine with two parallel narratives: the glamourous and dark sides of modernity"-- Provided by publisher
eBook
The Beggar Lama : the life of the Gyalrong Kuzhap
Jinba, Tenzin
Columbia University Press
, 2023
; English
; 304 Pages
The Beggar Lama is the story of the Gyalrong Kuzhap, a Tibetan Buddhist polymath and reincarnated lama who has led a remarkable life through the vicissitudes of the twentieth century. Born in 1930 in Tsanlha, Gyalrong, on the easternmost fringes of the Himalayan-Tibetan Plateau, he would go on to become a monk, a Communist official, a professor of Tibetan studies, and a leader in the Tibetan cultural survival movement in China. Drawing on hundreds of hours of in-depth and open-ended conversations over more than a decade, Tenzin Jinba presents the Gyalrong Kuzhap’s life story. The Beggar Lama chronicles his journeys—from Gyalrong to Lhasa, from steadfast Communist to critic of the Chinese regime, from scholar to activist—painting a compelling portrait of an influential and unconventional figure. In so doing, the book shows how the Gyalrong Kuzhap’s tale intertwines with larger social and political developments, providing a wide-ranging history of Tibet, the Sino-Tibetan borderlands, and China over the past century. The Beggar Lama shares the Gyalrong Kuzhap’s insightful and often critical views on Tibetan cultural and religious institutions, the Chinese Communist Party’s social and political agendas, Tibetan studies in China, and the prospects for Tibetan cultural rebirth. Above all, it is a story of hope in dark times, as the Gyalrong Kuzhap seeks with his “last breath” to prevent Tibetan culture and memory from vanishing.
Jinba, Tenzin
Columbia University Press
, 2023
; English
; 304 Pages
The Beggar Lama is the story of the Gyalrong Kuzhap, a Tibetan Buddhist polymath and reincarnated lama who has led a remarkable life through the vicissitudes of the twentieth century. Born in 1930 in Tsanlha, Gyalrong, on the easternmost fringes of the Himalayan-Tibetan Plateau, he would go on to become a monk, a Communist official, a professor of Tibetan studies, and a leader in the Tibetan cultural survival movement in China. Drawing on hundreds of hours of in-depth and open-ended conversations over more than a decade, Tenzin Jinba presents the Gyalrong Kuzhap’s life story. The Beggar Lama chronicles his journeys—from Gyalrong to Lhasa, from steadfast Communist to critic of the Chinese regime, from scholar to activist—painting a compelling portrait of an influential and unconventional figure. In so doing, the book shows how the Gyalrong Kuzhap’s tale intertwines with larger social and political developments, providing a wide-ranging history of Tibet, the Sino-Tibetan borderlands, and China over the past century. The Beggar Lama shares the Gyalrong Kuzhap’s insightful and often critical views on Tibetan cultural and religious institutions, the Chinese Communist Party’s social and political agendas, Tibetan studies in China, and the prospects for Tibetan cultural rebirth. Above all, it is a story of hope in dark times, as the Gyalrong Kuzhap seeks with his “last breath” to prevent Tibetan culture and memory from vanishing.
eBook
Strike patterns : notes from postwar Laos
Zani, Leah
Redwood Press
, 2022
; English
; 210 Pages
A strike pattern is a signature of violence carved into the land—bomb craters or fragments of explosives left behind, forgotten. In Strike Patterns, poet and anthropologist Leah Zani journeys to a Lao river community where people live alongside such relics of a secret war. With sensitive and arresting prose, Zani reveals the layered realities that settle atop one another in Laos—from its French colonial history to today's authoritarian state—all blown open by the war. This excavation of postwar life's balance between the mundane, the terrifying, and the extraordinary propels Zani to confront her own explosive past.
From 1964 to 1973, the United States carried out a covert air war against Laos. Frequently overshadowed by the war with Vietnam, the Secret War was the longest and most intense air war in history. As Zani uncovers this hidden legacy, she finds herself immersed in the lives of her hosts: Chantha, a daughter of war refugees who grapples with her place in a future Laos of imagined prosperity
Channarong, a bomb technician whose Thai origins allow him to stand apart from the battlefields he clears
and Bounmi, a young man who has inherited his bomb expertise from his father but now struggles to imagine a similar future for his unborn son. Wandering through their lives are the restless ghosts of kin and strangers.
Today, much of Laos remains contaminated with dangerous leftover explosives. Despite its obscurity, the Secret War has become a shadow model for modern counterinsurgency. Investigating these shadows of war, Zani spends time with silk weavers and rice farmers, bomb clearance crews and black market war scrap traders, ritual healers and survivors of explosions. Combining her fieldnotes with poetry, fiction, and memoir she reflects on the power of building new lives in the ruins.
Zani, Leah
Redwood Press
, 2022
; English
; 210 Pages
A strike pattern is a signature of violence carved into the land—bomb craters or fragments of explosives left behind, forgotten. In Strike Patterns, poet and anthropologist Leah Zani journeys to a Lao river community where people live alongside such relics of a secret war. With sensitive and arresting prose, Zani reveals the layered realities that settle atop one another in Laos—from its French colonial history to today's authoritarian state—all blown open by the war. This excavation of postwar life's balance between the mundane, the terrifying, and the extraordinary propels Zani to confront her own explosive past.
From 1964 to 1973, the United States carried out a covert air war against Laos. Frequently overshadowed by the war with Vietnam, the Secret War was the longest and most intense air war in history. As Zani uncovers this hidden legacy, she finds herself immersed in the lives of her hosts: Chantha, a daughter of war refugees who grapples with her place in a future Laos of imagined prosperity
Channarong, a bomb technician whose Thai origins allow him to stand apart from the battlefields he clears
and Bounmi, a young man who has inherited his bomb expertise from his father but now struggles to imagine a similar future for his unborn son. Wandering through their lives are the restless ghosts of kin and strangers.
Today, much of Laos remains contaminated with dangerous leftover explosives. Despite its obscurity, the Secret War has become a shadow model for modern counterinsurgency. Investigating these shadows of war, Zani spends time with silk weavers and rice farmers, bomb clearance crews and black market war scrap traders, ritual healers and survivors of explosions. Combining her fieldnotes with poetry, fiction, and memoir she reflects on the power of building new lives in the ruins.
Audiobook
This Is One Way to Dance: Essays
Shah, Sejal; Ayyar, Priya
Blackstone Publishing
, 2022
; English
A powerful meditation on identity and belonging, Sejal Shah explores the tension of being both invisible and hyper-visible in a country that struggles with race. The daughter of immigrants from Indian and Kenya, Shah wrestles with her experiences growing up in—and returning to—western New York, an area of stark racial and socioeconomic segregation. Her work illuminates how we are all marked by family and place; by the limits of our bodies; by our losses and regrets; by who and what we love; by our ambivalences and our silences. This is a book about growing up Indian in non-Indian places, about what it means to be American, South Asian American, a writer of color, and a feminist. Shah considers the implications of being asked where are you from—the geographic and cultural distances between people, how these gaps are imagined and real, constructed and changing. These literary essays will certainly appeal to readers of short stories and poetry as well.
Audiobook
Shah, Sejal; Ayyar, Priya
Blackstone Publishing
, 2022
; English
A powerful meditation on identity and belonging, Sejal Shah explores the tension of being both invisible and hyper-visible in a country that struggles with race. The daughter of immigrants from Indian and Kenya, Shah wrestles with her experiences growing up in—and returning to—western New York, an area of stark racial and socioeconomic segregation. Her work illuminates how we are all marked by family and place; by the limits of our bodies; by our losses and regrets; by who and what we love; by our ambivalences and our silences. This is a book about growing up Indian in non-Indian places, about what it means to be American, South Asian American, a writer of color, and a feminist. Shah considers the implications of being asked where are you from—the geographic and cultural distances between people, how these gaps are imagined and real, constructed and changing. These literary essays will certainly appeal to readers of short stories and poetry as well.
Audiobook
The Curse of the Turtle: The True Story of Thailand's "Backpacker Murders"
Buchanan, Suzanne; Buckley, Eileen
Blackstone Publishing
, 2022
; English
--‘’ Coming soon: a documentary series featuring the book!
Koh Tao, a small island in the Gulf of Thailand, surrounded by pristine beaches, swathed in sunshine, and a mecca for tourists, divers and backpackers. But "Turtle Island" has its dark side. In 2014, Koh Tao was the site of the brutal double murders of two British backpackers, but theirs weren't the only suspicious backpacker deaths.
My name is Suzanne Buchanan. I am the former owner and editor of the Samui Times, a news publication on Koh Samui, and covered the stories of the so-called "backpacker murders" and other suspicious deaths. Although I am a British citizen, because of my investigation and stories, as well as my support for the two Burmese migrant workers sentenced to death for the murders, I had to flee Thailand for my own safety. There is currently an active warrant for my arrest should I return to Thailand, which had been my home for more than twenty years, and I continue to receive death threats.In The Curse of the Turtle, listeners can make up their own minds on who is responsible for the murders that so devastated the victims' families. Were the Burmese migrant workers responsible? Or were the powerful, tribal families who run Koh Tao involved? And if so, were they aided by corrupt law enforcement?
Buchanan, Suzanne; Buckley, Eileen
Blackstone Publishing
, 2022
; English
--‘’ Coming soon: a documentary series featuring the book!
Koh Tao, a small island in the Gulf of Thailand, surrounded by pristine beaches, swathed in sunshine, and a mecca for tourists, divers and backpackers. But "Turtle Island" has its dark side. In 2014, Koh Tao was the site of the brutal double murders of two British backpackers, but theirs weren't the only suspicious backpacker deaths.
My name is Suzanne Buchanan. I am the former owner and editor of the Samui Times, a news publication on Koh Samui, and covered the stories of the so-called "backpacker murders" and other suspicious deaths. Although I am a British citizen, because of my investigation and stories, as well as my support for the two Burmese migrant workers sentenced to death for the murders, I had to flee Thailand for my own safety. There is currently an active warrant for my arrest should I return to Thailand, which had been my home for more than twenty years, and I continue to receive death threats.In The Curse of the Turtle, listeners can make up their own minds on who is responsible for the murders that so devastated the victims' families. Were the Burmese migrant workers responsible? Or were the powerful, tribal families who run Koh Tao involved? And if so, were they aided by corrupt law enforcement?
eBook
More than the eye can see : memoirs of Gopinath Pillai
Pillai, Gopinath; Vater, John
World Scientific
, 2022
; English
; 327 Pages
More Than The Eye Can See tells the story of Gopinath Pillai, a Singaporean businessman and diplomat who served as Singapore's Non-Resident Ambassador to Iran (1989–2008) and High Commissioner to Pakistan (1994–2001). Alongside working with prominent members of Singapore's pioneering generation to strengthen the country's manufacturing profile and international trade during the Cold War, he broke into liberalising India as a trailblazing entrepreneur and contributed to the nation's public life as the first Chairman of NTUC Fairprice and Founder Chairman of the Institute of South Asian Studies.
A self-described "Jack of All Trades", Gopi's memoirs frame episodes of personal struggle against milestones in the progress of the nation. Born in Singapore to Malayalee parents in 1937, Gopi spent his early childhood in India throughout the Japanese Occupation, where he witnessed the Communist Movement in Kerala first-hand. When he returned to Singapore in 1946, Gopi grew up in a multi-racial society taking its fledgling steps as a democracy. His career took him all over — to Thailand and Malaysia as an economist and journalist and the Middle East and America as a manager — reflecting Singapore's early industrialisation and the pursuit of its values and interests abroad and at home.
Co-written with John Vater, More Than The Eye Can See offers a panorama of a man and his century.
Pillai, Gopinath; Vater, John
World Scientific
, 2022
; English
; 327 Pages
More Than The Eye Can See tells the story of Gopinath Pillai, a Singaporean businessman and diplomat who served as Singapore's Non-Resident Ambassador to Iran (1989–2008) and High Commissioner to Pakistan (1994–2001). Alongside working with prominent members of Singapore's pioneering generation to strengthen the country's manufacturing profile and international trade during the Cold War, he broke into liberalising India as a trailblazing entrepreneur and contributed to the nation's public life as the first Chairman of NTUC Fairprice and Founder Chairman of the Institute of South Asian Studies.
A self-described "Jack of All Trades", Gopi's memoirs frame episodes of personal struggle against milestones in the progress of the nation. Born in Singapore to Malayalee parents in 1937, Gopi spent his early childhood in India throughout the Japanese Occupation, where he witnessed the Communist Movement in Kerala first-hand. When he returned to Singapore in 1946, Gopi grew up in a multi-racial society taking its fledgling steps as a democracy. His career took him all over — to Thailand and Malaysia as an economist and journalist and the Middle East and America as a manager — reflecting Singapore's early industrialisation and the pursuit of its values and interests abroad and at home.
Co-written with John Vater, More Than The Eye Can See offers a panorama of a man and his century.
