Writing the South Seas : Imagining the Nanyang in Chinese and Southeast Asian Postcolonial Literature

Postcolonial literature about the South Seas, or Nanyang, examines the history of Chinese migration, localization, and interethnic exchange in Southeast Asia, where Sinophone settler cultures evolved independently by adapting to their "New World" and mingling with native cultures. __Writing the South Seas__ explains why Nanyang encounters, neglected by most literary histories, should be considered crucial to the national literatures of China and Southeast Asia. Title Page 4 Copyright Page 5 Table of Contents 6 Preface 8 Acknowledgments 14 Introduction 20 1 Modern Chinese Impressions of the South Seas Other 46 2 Transcolonial Challenges to Diasporic Ethno-Nationalism 71 3 Creolizing the Sinophone from Malaysia to Taiwan 98 4 An Ecopoetics of the Borneo Rainforest 126 5 De-Racializing Cultural Legibility in Postcolonial Singapore 153 6 Popular Sino-Thai Integration Narratives 181 Conclusion 208 Chinese and Thai Glossary 218 Notes 230 Bibliography 258 Index 278