ARABIA ASIA TRANSREGIONAL STUDIES ROUNDTABLE
The third Arabia Asia Transregional Studies Roundtable discussed the fascinating book, Miracles and Material Life: Rice, Ore, Traps and Guns in Islamic Malaya, Cambridge University Press 2020 by Teren Sevea on 20 March 2024 @ 21.30 SGT.
The Arabia Asia Transregional Studies Roundtable Series, organized by the Muhammad Alagil Distinguished Chair, meets to discuss challenges and solutions in research and publishing on all aspects of Arabia Asia relations. While the potentially large spatial and temporal dimensions of such relations pose challenges in framing research and narrating findings, we now have a number of methodologically innovative books and projects creatively building this field with all manner of empirical materials. And there is more to be done! The third roundtable will focus on the book, Miracles and Material Life: Rice, Ore, Taps and Guns in Islamic Malaya, by Teren Sevea. His ground-breaking study unravels the significance of Islamic miracle workers (pawangs) in the nineteenth- and twentieth-century Malay world, locating them in the spiritual economy of the Indian Ocean. Examining the connections between miracles and material life, Sevea explains how the production and extraction of natural resources, as well as the uses of technologies, were intertwined with the knowledge of charismatic religious figures. For registration: ARABIA ASIA TRANSREGIONAL STUDIES ROUNDTABLE SERIES – Miracles and Material Life: Rice, Ore, Traps and Guns in Islamic Malaya » Asia Research Institute, NUS
