On the continuing necessity of anti-Americanism

Abstract

In Hong Kong, even though the Bill of Rights Ordinance (the localized version of ICCPR), Sex Discrimination Ordinance and a series of legal reforms (such as the cancellation of marital exemption of rape and the recognition of sexual discrimination in criminal law) were enacted and introduced respectively since the 1990s, gender/sexual discrimination in the legal discourse still persists; for example: Chinese customary law which only recognizes the male’s right to build small houses in the New Territories remains an exception under the Sex Discrimination Ordinance; the government insists on not tabling an anti‐sexual‐orientation discrimination bill; the right to same sex marriage/partnership is still absent from any legal‐political agenda; and so on. Some politicians and academics argue that any attempt to transplant a Euro‐American individual‐centric perspective of gender/sexual equality/justice will violate the Han‐Chinese culture of harmony. In the paper, I will adopt a critical perspective in examining the above argument and examine why harmony politics becomes a meta‐narrative in Han‐Chinese socio‐legal culture and how human nature/subjectivity is re‐constituted in such a context. I will further argue that a culture should always be meticulously and critically represented and investigated in order to reproduce ‘gender/sexual justice’. I will also investigate the possibility of scrutinizing and exploring the spaces of resistance within the Han‐Chinese socio‐legal culture in Hong Kong, where foreign theory of gender/sexual justice/equality and related legal reforms can be engaged to politicize current discrimination and suppression.     

Cinematic citizenship and the illegal city

Abstract

This paper examines some of the questions that could emerge from the relationship between Law and Cinema. While there has been some scholarship on law and cinema, most of it has largely focused on the formal properties of film, and not moved beyond the question of representation. This paper argues that for a fruitful enquiry to emerge, we would need to have an understanding of the complex relationship between the spatial implication of cinema, practices of groups like fan clubs, the question of changing technologies of cinema and how they relate to issues of citizenship and modernity. Finally, it argues for a more nuanced understanding of the phenomenon of non‐legal media circulation or piracy in the contemporary and links this to the question of citizenship and globalization.     

Negotiating the Past

ABSTRACT

In the history of Partition women have been long overlooked, often forced to hide in the shadows of their male counterparts. There are now a number of key works that have focused on the role of women, but these have largely focused on women's experiences in India. Sixty years on and we know little about Muslim women and their experiences of migration and resettlement in West Punjab, Pakistan. In an attempt to trace the experiences of the Muslim women, this article will explore their history by examining official documents, newspaper accounts and women's own testimonies. It attempts to understand how this silent history is documented from these various sources.     

In the ruins of truth: the work of melancholia and acts of memory

Abstract

This paper seeks to problematize and render inadequate the ‘truth’ of Truth Commissions, which have proliferated globally. It does so by questioning the relationship of ‘truth’ to ‘testimony’ by offering a critical account of their relationship to ‘trauma,’ on the one hand and by questioning the location of ‘testimony’ in relation to ‘resistance,’ on the other hand. Moving away from this ‘psycologistic register,’ the paper rehearses a re‐reading of Freud, which attempts to question the sharp distinction between mourning and melancholia, in his 1917 essay. Given this, a complex, psychoanalytic subject is constructed, whose psychic and social ‘work of melancholia,’ and ‘acts of memory,’ cannot be straightforwardly rendered in testimony or recollection, and is unavailable for nationalist appropriation. Empirical material is drawn from field work in Eastern Sri Lanka, on the after life multiple massacres that took place in the early 1990s, and is juxtaposed with Commissions of Inquiry into these events in the late 1990s.     

Extinguishing Lady Liberty’s Torch? Online Public Responses to the U.S. Executive Order to Ban Immigrants from 7 Countries

ABSTRACT

In January 2017, a seven-country ban blocked immigrants from entering the U.S. When the story broke, many people posted comments on online news sites. Analysis revealed themes of rejection and acceptance. Rejection themes focused on security, demeaning Muslims, and exclusion. Acceptance themes called for inclusivity and providing a safe haven for immigrants. Comments aligned into partisan camps reflecting political branding of the sites. Analyses revealed both pro-ban and anti-ban emotionally charged comments. Hate speech was used to justify support of the ban on ultra-conservative sites. These analyses described the emotional response to admitting Muslim immigrants into the United States.     

Finding a voice,fighting for rights: the emergence of the transgender movement in Hong Kong 1

Abstract

This paper is intended to provide a space for reflection on Hong Kong’s transgender movement at its current stage, with particular reference to the objectives and activities of the Hong Kong Transgender Equality and Acceptance Movement (‘TEAM’). Established in 2002, TEAM was the first organized group of transgender people and supporters in Hong Kong. First, the paper examines the emergence of the transgender movement in Hong Kong, situating the stated objectives of TEAM in the broader social, legal and political context in Hong Kong. It then considers the successes and limitations of TEAM’s activities to date, measured against its objectives. Finally, it examines why Hong Kong’s transgender community has not yet fought for the right to legal recognition of their gender identity, as have transgender individuals and transgender movements in many other countries around the world. In the Asia‐Pacific region these include Australia, Japan, the People’s Republic of China, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea and New Zealand. Through interviews with members of TEAM, the paper questions whether legal recognition is indeed a concern and/or priority for Hong Kong’s transgender community, and, if so, what prevents Hong Kong transgender people from claiming their right to legal recognition in the courts or through the political process.     

Will the Circle Be Unbroken? Continuity and Change of the Lex Rhodia's Jettison Principles in Roman and Medieval Mediterranean Rulings

Jettison is the practice of throwing goods overboard in order to lighten and consequently save a vessel, as well as the lives of those on board. This phenomenon has long been part of seafaring, with the dangers of navigation not having changed since ancient times. Accordingly, various bodies of maritime law emerged in the medieval era to handle the consequences of such events. This article will discuss how the principles of jettison and general average introduced by the Lex Rhodia and maintained in Roman law were understood in some medieval regulations. Although most legal texts indicate a common understanding of the principles of general average, opinions vary widely on details of procedure and events covered by the rulings. This analysis will show how the rules of jettison and general average are treated in different contexts and by the diverse societies administering them.     

Adultery and the double standard in a Dutch city in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries

Abstract

Analyzing Dutch criminal cases of adultery in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, this article shows that the legal definition of adultery as well as its prosecution changed in this period. Until 1811 both men and women received equally hard punishments and were prosecuted in similar numbers. Only with the introduction of the French Code Pénal in the Netherlands in 1811 did the double standard find its way into laws on adultery. But at the same time, sentences became more lenient and prosecution declined. The changes in the laws, as well as the discrepancies between the law and prosecution practice, show adultery’s constructed character and its differing meanings, the variability of the double standard and the precarious nature of heterosexuality.     

Muslims and others: anecdotes,fragments, and uncertainties of evidence

Abstract

Against the intensified communalization of civil society and the emergence of new modes of racism in contemporary India, this essay juxtaposes different histories of the Other through critical insights into the construction and demonization of the Indian Muslim. Working through anecdotes and fragments, bits and pieces of history, this disjunctive discourse on the Other attempts to trouble liberal assumptions of cultural identity by calling attention to the uncertainties of evidence by which ethnic identities are politicized in diverse ways. While critiquing the exclusionary mode of 'othering', the essay also calls attention to more internalized modes of disidentification and the double-edged benefits of political identity for the underprivileged and dispossessed, whose own assertions of the self invariably complicate official identitarian constructions. The enigmas of the self are perhaps most vivid in the brutal evidence of genocide, where the apparent 'dead certainty' of killing the Other has been interpreted as a means of making 'persons out of bodies' (Arjun Appadurai). Countering this position, the essay argues that ethnic violence is facilitated by the 'dead certainty' of (in)justice, reinforced by the 'banality of violence' legitimized through state-sponsored ethnic cleansing.     

Dinghaiqiao Mutual Aid Society: negotiating the common with/by/through the urban daily

ABSTRACT

This paper introduces Dinghaiqiao Mutual Aid Society (DMAS, dinghaiqiao huzhushe, its urban context, issues that it concerns and strategies that it uses by introducing three of its projects. As a group that locates itself in a historically working-class neighborhood under the pressures of urban renewal, it clarifies its vision by both embodying the participants to the projects, and extending knowledge production and imagination of the place into a more profound social and historical dimension. The “common” here, serves as the interactive element and mechanism in DMAS events, as well as in its operational logic. The strategies that it develops, based on this, is a reflection and transcendence of the social political atmosphere and questions the developmental ideology of the city.     

Re-imagining the local in national cultural policy formulation – the case of the Anglophone Caribbean

ABSTRACT

The formulation of cultural policies in the Anglophone Caribbean constantly straddles the demands of global, regional and national imperatives as a function of its position as a region of post-colonial, small-island states. This paper will argue that the role these factors play in the art of policy making problematises conventions in the current global/local (glocal) debate circulating in the arena of Cultural Policy Studies. The paper shows that cultural policy making in the Caribbean constitutes a mélange of approaches that are in a constant state of contestation during the policy-making process. It employs content analysis of cultural policy texts from selected Caribbean states, as well as an analysis of stakeholder views from the national cultural policy consultations in Trinidad and Tobago to derive its findings. A Five Factor framework was developed to illustrate the range of responses that guide and shape local actors and activities in the national cultural policy domain. The research concludes that the relationship between the national and local (nocal) actors has to be re-imagined if cultural policy is to deliver on its promise of social transformation in the Caribbean.     

“ʿAlā fūr Tuṭīla”: Jews and Muslims in the Administrative Culture of Post-Conquest Tudela,c.1118–1220

The early history of the Jewish and Muslim communities living under Christian rule in the Ebro Valleys tends to be overlooked in favour of the source-rich thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. However, the nature and organisation of these groups should not be taken as a constant, as they underwent a significant transformation over the course of the twelfth century. Through the case study of Tudela, this article proposes to re-examine the dynamics of administration and judicial practice that developed in the immediate aftermath of the Navarro-Aragonese conquest. This town has a rich corpus of charters that allows us to contrast the administrative layout enshrined in the franchise charters known as fueros with the legal practice reflected in some particular bilingual interlineated purchase-sale contracts. A comparison of both sets of documents emphasises the use of the fuero in inter-communal negotiation, both in framing encounters and in guaranteeing each group's autonomy, during a key period in the gestation of Jewish and Muslim administrative and judicial practices under Christian rule.

Abbreviations: DAr = Mercedes García-Arenal, “Documentos árabes de Tudela Y Tarazona”, Al-Qan?ara: Revista de Estudios Árabes 3 (1982): 27–72; FdN = Luis Javier Fortún Pérez de Ciriza, “Colección de ‘fueros menores’ de Navarra y otros privilegios locales (I)”, Príncipe de Viana 165 (1982): 273–348     

Muslim women wearing the niqab in Spain: Dialogues around discrimination,identity and freedom

The niqab provokes a heated debate in European societies and generates intolerance towards women who wear it. Some of the explanations used to criticize this Muslim garment refer to the idea that women wear the niqab as a form of patriarchal oppression. Furthermore—especially after the terrorist attacks perpetrated by Islamic extremists—the niqab is seen as a symbol of religious radicalization. We carried out 10 communicative daily life stories with Muslim women wearing the niqab in Spain, to explore the adverse experiences that they face, as well as the ways to transform them. Our analysis, informed by a communicative approach, revealed different forms of discrimination, such as prejudice, personal attacks and social isolation. Furthermore, it revealed some opportunities to transform these experiences, through the equality of differences, the egalitarian dialogue, and the support of faith-based organizations. Ultimately, our findings illustrated participants’ persistent defense of their right to express their religious identity.     

Japanese neo‐nationalism and an idea of an East Asian community

Abstract

The paper explains the relationship between Japan and its neighboring countries, and the influence of Japanese neo‐nationalism on the idea of an East Asian community.     

The religious,the plural,the secular and the modern: a brief critical survey on Islam in Malaysia

Abstract

The embedization of Islam in Malaysia has gone through a long and complex process that involved an interaction with three major world civilizations (Indian, Chinese and European) and two colonial systems (Dutch and British) during which many aspects of its practices were reconfigured. This paper provides a brief critical survey of the evolution of the said embedization process during which Islam and the Muslims in Malaysia were moulded by a series of sociological realities, namely plural society, secularism and modernity. This has resulted, we argue, in the creation of 'moderate' Islam in Malaysia, one that is quite different from the fundamentalist image of Islam profiled in the contemporary worldwide discourse on global Islam     

Cross-dressing as whitewashing: the Kimono Wednesdays protests and the erasure of Asian/American bodies

ABSTRACT

During the summer of 2015, a series of events at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston called Kimono Wednesdays encouraged visitors to try on a replica of the kimono Claude Monet's wife wore in her husband's 1876 painting La Japonaise and then pose for photos in front of the painting. This seemingly benign act of appreciation sparked protests from those who considered the events as perpetuating an exoticizing imperialist gaze and orientalizing stereotypes. This paper contextualizes this controversy by examining the history of white women cross-dressing as Japanese, how it constitutes a form of naturalized whitewashing linked to the pleasure of consumption through its connections to Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado (1885), and how the same act for Asian American women at the turn into the twentieth century is fraught with the anxiety of racial identity suppression.     

The Right to Write in German Colonies of the Early Twentieth Century: Pugnacious Settler Newspapers,Anxious Governors and African Journalism in Exile

ABSTRACT

The entangled history of the German Colonial Press Law (written 1906–1912) begins with the wish of the German East African Governor to keep the pugnacious settler press under control. Under the influence of a racist discourse that sought to restrict education for Africans and feared anti-colonial actions and networks, the law developed into a legal basis that could impede publishing activities of the colonised in all German colonies. In Togoland, African writers bypassed such restrictions by publishing critical articles in the adjacent British Gold Coast Colony and thereby succeeded in entering transnational supportive networks.     

Judicial Authority and Qāḍīs' Autonomy under the ʿAbbāsids

As Joseph Schacht argued in the 1950s, the office of qā?ī began in the Umayyad period as that of a “legal secretary” to provincial governors. Documentary evidence from Egypt confirms that governors were indeed regarded as the highest judicial authority in early Islam, and that their legal powers far surpassed that of any other judge. In large cities, governors appointed and dismissed qā?īs at will; decisions taken by qā?īs could be swiftly overruled by political authorities.

Although the ?Abbāsids reformed and centralised the judiciary in the second half of second/eighth century, qā?īs were still subordinate to reigning rulers and unable to impose judgements that displeased the caliph or his main representatives. The increasing political and social influence of scholars and the development of classical schools of law eventually changed this situation. Relying on a body of both narrative and legal literature, this article addresses the qā?īs' attempts to resist political rulers' interference with the judiciary by asserting themselves as true representatives of the sharī?a. It argues that ?anafī legal literature, dating from the third/ninth and fourth/tenth centuries, gradually elaborated a theory on the relationship between the qā?ī and the ruler. This theory was instrumental in doing away with political infringement on the judicial prerogative and was soon incorporated into adab literature, whose stories of rulers entirely subjugated to the rule of law became a new political model.     

Shifting agendas: the decay of the mainstream and rise of the independents in the context of Philippine cinema

Abstract

Philippine Cinema, one of the oldest and richest cinemas in Southeast Asia, is currently undergoing a facelift. ‘Indie’, the short form for independent, has become a popular buzz word in the local media as well as in film circles. This report focuses on the current state of independent feature‐filmmaking in the Philippines, compares it briefly to its past, highlights some of the key figures that have propelled it to its present, and proposes the main area wherein development is needed for it to progress further.     

Violence in the south of Thailand

Abstract

This paper explores the possible reasons behind the current violence in southern Thailand with a focus on the violent events that took place on 28 April 2004, which resulted in the death of 107 Muslim militants in the southern Thai provinces of Pattani, Yala and Songkhla.While the authorities seem to believe that the perpetrators of this violence are separatists the author argues that the recent violence is perpetrated by a new group or groups of individuals who are not connected to the old separatist groups that operated in the south until recent times. The very fact that this new movement perpetrating violence uses Islam as a rallying cry, by appealing to the recent international assaults on Muslim militants in Palestine, Afghanistan and Iraq,means that it is able to garner support for its cause among the Thai-Malays who have long given up their separatist fight against the Thai state.