Abstract

In Sumit Mandal’s book, Becoming Arab: Creole Histories and Modern Identity in the Malay World (Cambridge University Press, 2018), he uncovers the hybridity and transregional connections underlying modern Asian identities. This lecture and panel discussion marked the author’s first presentation about the book in Singapore where he discussed what prompted him to write it and its major findings. By considering Arabs in the Malay world under European rule, Becoming Arab explored how a long history of inter-Asian interaction was altered by nineteenth-century racial categorisation and control. It argued that the racialisation constrained but did not eliminate the fluid character of Arabness. Creole Arabs responded to the constraints by initiating transregional links with the Ottoman Empire and establishing modern social organisations, schools, and a press. Becoming Arab also cited contentions that emerged between organisations respectively based on Prophetic descent and egalitarianism, advancing empowering but conflicting representations of a modern Arab and Islamic identity. This landmark book can be ordered at the event at special discounted rates.

(Becoming Arab book launch in Singapore is a collaboration between the MEI Arabia-Asia Cluster and the Arab Association of Singapore – Al-Wehdah Al-Arabiyah bi Singhafura .)