Lin Yusheng (Assistant Researcher, Center for Humanities and Social Sciences, Academia Sinica) Southeast Asian Studies with "Taiwan" Characteristics Although I had read some Southeast Asian ethnography earlier, my real interest in Southeast Asia was when I started deciding on a research topic for my master's thesis. I was originally interested in the study of the South Island of Taiwan, because at that time, in order to strengthen the connection with the international community, the Taiwan government promoted the World South Island Research Scholarship by the Ministry of Education. Instead, I turned my attention to overseas.
Taiwan has a preliminary accumulation of Southeast Asian studies. However, the dissertation still turned slightly later, from the original intention to study the Moken tribe of the Austronesian language group in the Andaman coast of Thailand, to a research industry email list dissertation on migrant workers who moved hundreds of miles inland and returned to Northeast Thailand after completing the work in Taiwan. After slowly getting in touch with Taiwan's Southeast Asian studies, I found that the studies at that time had some characteristics. I don't care about transnational politics and economics, which is not my expertise, but the more micro-level social and cultural studies have very "Taiwan" characteristics.
The most abundant Southeast Asian studies should be the Southeast Asian migrant workers working in Taiwan, and the Southeast Asian Chinese studies especially focusing on Malaysia. These are actually very related to "Taiwan". The former involves Taiwan's local social issues, while the latter is related to dozens of Taiwanese Over the years, the overseas Chinese policy and the connection with overseas Chinese are related. Looking back on the changes in my master’s thesis research interests, I am not immune to the “Taiwan” trend. From the Austronesian languages connected to Taiwan, to the transnational migrant workers returning from Taiwan to Thailand, these are Taiwan’s strengths in Southeast Asian studies, which should still be used in the future.