The Precarious Past: Historical Practice in Premodern Java

In almost every era and in almost every place, humanity has studied the past in multifaceted ways that go far beyond the well-honed techniques of the professional discipline of history. Why do people practise history in such diverse ways around the world? This book argues that it is the creation, preservation, and transmission of texts that shape historical practices. It explores the global diversity of historical practices by focusing on a case study of the Indonesian island of Java during the premodern period (500–1500 CE). 

The historical practices of this society are in some ways recognisable to professional historians, but in other ways they defy the discipline’s expectations of how history should be done. The fundamental reason is that, for the premodern Javanese, the past was precarious. The striking features of Javanese historical practices, which often challenge the sensibilities of modern historians, are best explained by the ways that texts were created, preserved, and transmitted on that island. The book’s main theoretical claim, that historical practices are contingent on their relationships to texts, is relevant to many premodern societies across the world. The growing demand for comparative, global, and non-Eurocentric accounts of historiography requires in-depth research on the historical practices observed in particular societies, such as the study of premodern Java presented here. 

The book thus seeks to reveal new opportunities for practising history in a more truly global way.

More on the event here: https://chl.anu.edu.au/event/p...

About the Speaker

Wayan Jarrah Sastrawan is a historian specialising in the premodern history of Indonesia. He is Lecturer of Indonesian in the School of Culture, History and Languages in the College of Asia Pacific at the Australian National University. Jarrah’s active research projects focus on historical practices in precolonial Southeast Asia, digital approaches to traditional Indonesian and Malay manuscripts, the epigraphical cultures of Indonesia, the processes of early state development in Southeast Asia, and religious transformations in early modern Southeast Asia. He is especially interested in using indigenous Southeast Asian sources to rethink how history is practised. Jarrah has written widely on Southeast Asian history in leading history and area studies journals, including History and Theory, Journal of Global History, Bijdragen and Indonesia. He has written on his research for New Mandala, The Conversation, Inside Indonesia, as well as blogs of the British Library and Malay Heritage Centre. He has given public talks, seminars, and national radio interviews on his research, and has an active outreach program on traditional and social media.