The Institute of Asian Studies at Universiti Brunei Darussalam is pleased to announce the publication of IAS Working Paper No 86: Ong Sum Ping and the Early History of Borneo in Chinese Sources by Lee Cheuk Yin.Please see below for details. Download the Working Paper Abstract: Many years ago, I went to Nanjing regularly to do fieldwork on Muslim communities and mosques in Nanjing. I had the opportunity to visit the tombs of Zheng He and the King of Borneo. At that time, I believed that the person lying in the tomb was the King of Borneo. It was recorded on…

The Institute of Asian Studies at Universiti Brunei Darussalam is pleased to announce the publication of IAS Working Paper No 85: Urang versus Orang: The frequency of Bruneian students’ use of Standard and Brunei Malay by Ili Arina Zainal.Please see below for details. Download the Working Paper Abstract: Despite the various research done about the languages and many linguistic aspects in Brunei Darussalam, little is known regarding the current frequency and perception towards the official language, Standard Malay, as the majority of Bruneians prefer to speak in English and Brunei Malay. This paper investigates how frequent students use Standard Malay within…

The Institute of Asian Studies at Universiti Brunei Darussalam is pleased to announce the publication of IAS Working Paper No 84: Doing Fieldwork on Indonesian Chinese Migrant Workers in Brunei Darussalam by Westly Lo Siong Wei.Please see below for details. Download the Working Paper Abstract: This paper makes the case for a more spontaneous approach to collecting data from the field in qualitative studies of labour migration rather than an overly planned one. It shows the benefit of this supplemental method in fine-grained investigations by illustrating how my own fieldwork in a circle of the Indonesian Chinese migrant workers transitioned from…