Between Land and Sea / By Wang Gungwu

**Foreword by Joseph Y. S. Cheng | Recommended by Takashi Hamashita, Anthony Reid, and Cheng Yung-chang** **How has Southeast Asia, situated between land and sea, continually redefined itself under the influence of major civilizations, past and present?** **Historian Wang Gungwu's 60 years of academic accumulation, contemplating the essence and future of civilization.** "Two images remain vividly etched in my mind: 'Ujong Tanah' (Land's End) and 'merantau' (to wander or travel). With these two images in mind, I observed the many unexpected connections between Singapore and the wider world with a fresh perspective. ... The former prompts me to consider the origins of culture and civilization, while the latter leads me to explore the ethnic issues faced by modern civilization in a globalized world." Drawing on sixty years of dedicated scholarship and his personal experiences in diverse cultural environments such as Malaysia, Singapore, and Hong Kong, the eminent historian Wang Gungwu concisely outlines the interactions and intersections of ancient civilizations like India, China, and Islam with modern civilization in Southeast Asia. He explores how the region has forged its own history and traditions amidst the complex, layered tapestry of global historical contexts, narrating an "extraordinary story of adjustment and adaptation" within the grand currents of civilization, past and present. Professor Wang offers a new interpretation of the classic themes of "civilization" and "culture," and attempts to provide possible solutions for the conflicts and anxieties of the contemporary world. Full Title: Between Land and Sea: Southeast Asia and World Civilizations Author: Wang Gungwu. Translated by Wan Chi-chun ISBN: 978-988-237-379-2 Binding: Hardcover Language: Traditional Chinese Pages: 208 Dimensions: 216 x 140 mm **About the Author** **Wang Gungwu** University Professor Emeritus at the National University of Singapore, Academician of the Academia Sinica, Taiwan. He has served as Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at the University of Malaya, Singapore; Head of the Department of Far Eastern History at the Australian National University; and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Hong Kong. After his retirement from HKU, he has resided in Singapore and contributed significantly to institutions such as the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute and the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. His research spans Southeast Asian history, maritime history, modern Chinese history, and the history of overseas Chinese, with numerous publications to his name. In 2020, he was awarded the fourth Tang Prize in Sinology and Singapore's Distinguished Service Order. **About the Translator** **Wan Chi-chun** Holds a Master of Arts in Literary Translation from the University of Edinburgh. Her translated works include "The People's West Lake" (2024), "Integrating China and the West" (2023), and "Revolutions in the Borderlands" (2018). **Endorsements** Wang Gungwu leads us on a "journey of discovery" into Southeast Asia. Here, Professor Wang demonstrates the imaginative power of a historian's insightful scholarship. The book moves from the distant to the near, and from the small to the large, not only composing a "micro-history of regional civilizations" for Southeast Asia—a place without a name before World War II—but also weaving a magnificent scroll of millennia-long interactions between the four great world civilizations and Southeast Asia, creating a grand history of "civilizational encounters" that is ever-evolving. —**Joseph Y. S. Cheng**, Former President and Emeritus Professor of Sociology, The Chinese University of Hong Kong The author attempts to define Singapore and Southeast Asia from historical and contemporary perspectives, attributing the region's cultural characteristics to an open, regional culture. Through this, Singapore, Southeast Asia, and ASEAN can function in today's world as a global cultural complex, based on a new, "calculus-like" mode of thinking. This not only offers a new perspective but also serves as a warning to modern society, which often emphasizes competition and confrontation. —**Takashi Hamashita**, Senior Fellow and Director of Research, Toyo Bunko; Professor Emeritus, The University of Tokyo In this era of globalization marked by identity conflicts, the world urgently needs new thinking with a global perspective, yet few scholars possess the courage and qualifications to propose such grand propositions. Professor Wang Gungwu, having immersed himself in and profoundly analyzed diverse cultures throughout his life, consistently approaches all civilizations with empathy and curiosity, thus establishing his authority on these issues. —**Anthony Reid**, Professor Emeritus, Australian National University; Fellow of the Royal Historical Society Although Mr. Wang Gungwu emphasizes that this book does not focus solely on Southeast Asian history, he masterfully reviews how the region's history has interacted and blended with major civilizations from the perspective of ancient and modern civilizational development, presenting a Southeast Asian panorama rich in historical depth. Singapore, as the "Land's End" and a "wandering island," has become a multicultural international hub. Whether it can give birth to new civilizations in the future is precisely what Mr. Wang anticipates. —**Cheng Yung-chang**, Adjunct Professor, Department of History, National Cheng Kung University