Dr. Lisa Arensen, Assistant Professor of Environment and Sustainable Development in Southeast Asia at the Institute of Asian Studies at Universiti Brunei Darussalam, has been awarded First Prize in the 2021 Creative Ethnographic Prose Writing Competition, sponsored by the Society for Humanistic Anthropology.An experiment in reflexive writing about development work in Cambodia, Dr. Arensen’s paper is entitled “Province of Thieves: An Essay on Violence, Reflexivity and the Cross-Cultural Encounter.”The Creative Ethnographic Prose Competition is meant to highlight the potential for story to simultaneously engage readers and explore topics of anthropological concern.Dr. Arensen’s award-winning paper will be published in a forthcoming…

Dr. Victor T. King, Professor of Borneo Studies at the Institute of Asian Studies at Universiti Brunei Darussalam recently gave a talk to the Panaga Photographic Society (PPS) on Borneo through photographs.In this talk, Professor King discussed photographs that he had taken over 50 years of conducting research on Borneo and highlighted the ways that these photographs can illuminate the many changes that societies on Borneo, including Brunei, have undergone over that period.In noting the value of photographs for documenting societies, Professor King encouraged members of the PPS to take photos of current societies, as those photos will in time…

The Institute of Asian Studies (IAS) had a strong presence at the recent Universiti Brunei Darussalam – Borneo Studies Network (UBD-BSN) Borneo Studies Conference held 30 June - 1 July 2021 at UBD and virtually with the theme of “Borneo Within, Borneo Beyond.”IAS Director, Associate Professor Bruno Jetin, a member of the conference organizing committee, introduced the first keynote of the conference by Dr. Victor T. King, Professor of Borneo Studies at IAS. Professor King’s keynote was entitled “A Contextualization and Deconstruction of Borneo Studies over the last 50 Years,” and it provided a comprehensive context for understanding how Borneo…

The Institute of Asian Studies at Universiti Brunei Darussalam (IAS @ UBD) is pleased to announce the publication of Ethnobotany of the Mountain Regions of Southeast Asia.Edited by Deputy Director of IAS, Assistant Professor F. Merlin Franco, and part of Springer’s “Ethnobotany of Mountain Regions” series, this volume is a compendium that discusses the medicinal, cultural, and economic importance of major plant species of the mountainous regions of Southeast Asia.At 1137 pages, and with contributions from 37 individual authors, Ethnobotany of the Mountain Regions of Southeast Asia offers the latest full-range research on important plants in Southeast Asia’s mountainous regions.The…