This article, based on field research in temples in urban areas of Cambodia, aims to examine the roles of lay ascetics in Cambodian Buddhist temples from the viewpoint of the food supply system for temple residents. A number of Cambodian Buddhist temples are not only monasteries inhabited by monks but also residential places for laypeople of various categories, including female ascetics called daun chi. Cambodians in general view lay ascetics as needy people who have no family to rely on in their old age; most monastic laypeople are elderly. In reality, if we focus on food, we can see that lay ascetics do not depend entirely on the temples in which they live. From detailed observations at three temples in Phnom Penh, it is clear that temples are supported by the Buddhist community in general but that food for monks and laypeople comes through different systems of supply routes that are partly connected to each other. This article first explores how these two different food supply systems are run and maintained. Second, by depicting how female ascetics get involved in food-related practices, this article examines their dual position: female ascetics are temple residents just like monks but remain in the lay category.

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This paper provides an in-depth exploration of a previously under-utilized Arabic source for the history of Islam in Southeast Asia. This text, Al-Nafas al-Yamani was compiled in the Yemen by 'Abd al-Rahman b. Sulayman al-Ahdal (d. 1250 H./1835 C. E.), and includes a biographical sketch of the Sumatran scholar 'Abd al-Samad b. 'Abd al-Rahman al-Jawi al-Palimbani. Through a close, annotated reading of that text this article develops new insights into the configuration of people and ideas populating specific nodes of trans-regional networks in Sumatra and Arabia in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. At the same time, it also brings to light important dimensions of Sufi belief and ritual practice during this important transitional period of Islamic history in Southeast Asia. This material is then further explored through a discussion of some ways in which documents of this type might be approached by historians working on the intellectual and cultural history of early modern Southeast Asia more broadly.

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The most contentious issue in the Revolutionary Congress that crafted the 1899 Malolos Constitution pertained to the separation of church and state, which won by a mere one vote. Until now this episode in Philippine history has not received a satisfactory explanation, which this article seeks to offer. The debate in Malolos, as argued here, was profoundly divisive because the two sides were driven by differing visions of national community. A crucial point was the Filipinization of the Catholic Church, which the proponents of church-state unity championed and which their opponents sidestepped. Even as the debate raged, however, Aguinaldo's revolutionary government acted on the church-state issue out of political expediency. In the end, the issue that Filipino elites could not resolve was settled by US colonialism, which imposed church-state separation without Filipinization.

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During the Maluku interreligious violence from 1999 to 2002, both Islam and Christianity contributed to the initiation and intensification of the collective conflict. This article examines the role of religion, especially Christianity, and discusses how Christian identities, teachings, doctrines, symbols, discourses, organizations, and networks became some of the contributing factors in the early phases of the Maluku mayhem. It also examines the complex roles played by Moluccan Christian actors, especially the religious militias, in initiating and intensifying the strife, highlighting how Ambonese militant religious leaders framed the violence, recruited, and mobilized the masses in the combat zone, and how the local ordinary Christian fighters portrayed the violence and transformed their everyday experience in the warfare.

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This article demonstrates that the beginnings of the heritage conservation debate in Singapore extend back to the colonial period. It argues that the early colonial and postcolonial debates on heritage conservation in Singapore were influenced by a Western hegemony over what constituted heritage and how it could be conserved. A non-governmentalorganization, the Friends of Singapore, emerged in 1937 and battled to preserve what it saw as the heritage of Singapore. The organization helped the colonial government draw up a list of historic sites, monuments, and buildings for preservation in Singapore's 1958 Master Plan. The coming to power of the People's Action Party in 1959 began a debate within bureaucratic circles on urban renewal versus heritage conservation. The People's Action Party believed it had a mandate to demolish what it saw as old slums in the central city area and replace them with better housing in the form of modern government high-rise apartments. In the 1960s, various government committees considered the 1958 heritage list and proposed setting up a government body to administer the preservation of heritage buildings. The Preservation of Monuments Board (now called the Preservation of Sites and Monuments) was charged with carrying out this task when it was established in 1971. However, by the late 1970s, Singapore's Urban Redevelopment Authority increasingly became the state agency to conserve whole zones while the Preservation of Monuments Board was allocated the task of gazetting for the preservation of individual buildings and sites.

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The Cao Lan are a Tai-speaking ethnic group living in the Midlands of Northern Vietnam. Homegardens are an important component of their agroecosystem. The ecological structures of each homegarden of 17 households of the Cao Ngoi village in Tuyen Quang province were described and modal patterns identified. Most homegardens have organically shaped planting areas with indeterminate boundaries, polycentric planting patterns, and contain multiple species within the same bed or planting area. All of the gardens have multiple vegetation levels, with the largest share having 5 levels and a majority having more than 50% of their planting area covered by overlapping vegetation layers. Biodiversity is high with a total of 113 species recorded. Most plant species are used for food, but smaller numbers have ornamental, medicinal, and construction uses or are used for animal fodder, as stimulants, or for other purposes.Comparison of the modal structure of the Cao Lan homegardens with several Tai minority groups in Northeast Thailand, shows that, although the Cao Lan have been geographically isolated from other Tai groups for many centuries, their homegardens share a similar structural pattern, one commonly referred to as the tropical forest type. This structure is very different from the temperate type gardens of the Kinh in Vietnam with whom the Cao Lan share a common environment and are in frequent contact. The persistence of a common structural pattern among these related Tai ethnic groups, despite their inhabiting different environments, and having had no direct contact with each other for a very long time, suggests that culture exerts a strong influence over agroecosystem structure.

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