Disturbing Conventions

Rachel V. Harrison is a Reader in Thai Cultural Studies in the Department of South East Asia at SOAS, University of London. She has published widely on issues of gendered difference, sexuality, modern literature and cinema in Thailand as well as the comparative literature of South East Asia. She is the co-editor, in collaboration with Peter A. Jackson, of The Ambiguous Allure of the West: Traces of the Colonial in Thailand (Hong Kong University Press and Cornell University Press). She is also editor of the journal South East Asia Research.

[The book] offers a unique collection of contemporary Thai literature and Thai society as a whole. . . .We must salute the talented editing work led by Rachel Harrison: the general introduction and introductions of each part are solid and particularly well documented and thoughtful. . . .Let us hope that this collection will quickly become an essential reference for those who want to study literature and Thai society.

• Foreword: Decentering Siam/Thailand in Southeast Asia and the World - Thongchai Winichakul (University of Wisconsin–Madison)/ Introduction: Theoretical F(r)ictions: Cultures of Criticism, Modes of Colonialism and Thai Literary Studies - Rachel V. Harrison/ Section I: Implication, Influence and the Colonial West/ 1. The Making of the Thai Canon: Semicoloniality, Print Capitalism, and the Reconfiguration of Cultural Authority (Thanapol Limapichart, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok)/ 2. Through the Literary Looking Glass: Vajiravudh’s Writings and Siam’s Negotiations with the Imperial West - Thosaeng Chaochuti (Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok)/ 3. Mummies, Sex and Sand: Bangkok Gothic and the Adventure Fiction of “Victorian” Siam - Rachel V. Harrison/ Section II: Conceptualizing Thai Modernity through its Others: The Rural-Urban Divide/ 4. Luk Isan (A Child of the North East): Techniques of Composition and Issues of Cultural Nationalism - Nopphorn Prachakul (Thammasat University, Bangkok)/ 5. Orientalisation from Within and Consuming the Modern World: Rural-Urban Contact in Thai Popular Literature of the 1970s - Janit Feangfu (Chiangmai University, Chiangmai)/ Section III: Individuality, Noncomformity and Sexuality: Reading Against the Grain/ 6. New Readings of The Verdict and Somsong’s Appeal - Chusak Pattarakulvanit (Thammasat University, Bangkok) / 7. Feminist Perspectives in the Analysis of the Modern Thai Novel - Kham Phaka (Chiangmai University, Chiangmai)/ 8. Gender, Sexuality and Family in Old Siam: Women and Men in Khun Chang Khun Phaen- Chris Baker (Independent scholar) and Pasuk Pongphaichit (Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok)/ Section IV: Going Global and its Effects / 9. Cosmopolitanism and its Limits in Contemporary Thai Novels - Suradech Chotiudompant (Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok)/ Afterword / Part 1: Thai Literature as World Literature - Chusak Pattarakulvanit, Ben Tran, Suradech Chotiudompant and Rachel V Harrison / Part 2: Disturbing Crossings: The Unhomely, the Unworldly and the Question of Method in Approaches to World Literature - Ayman El-Desouky / Bibliography/ Index