Intrepid Travellers: Mobility and Migration in Southeast Asian

Session Submission Type: Organized Panel Proposal Application

Abstract

Migration research in the last two decades in the region has been dominated by issues related to the movements of people as a result of the intensification of globalization. The steady flow of migrants into the receiving societies of Southeast Asia, particularly Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei and Thailand has been activated by a labor market in which the local populations avoid certain job categories due to uncompetitive wages and unattractive labor conditions. However, migration inherent in the formation of societies in Southeast Asia has had a much longer history and is more varied. Intraregional mobility is deeply embedded in Southeast Asia, which is just as significant as interregional mobility. Some examples include Vietnamese ethnic migrants to Malaysia, Singaporean Malay retirees to Johore, Filipino professionals in the United Arab Emirates, and Arab migrants to the southern Philippines. These few examples exemplify the diversity of migration patterns in a globalization context and moves the discussion beyond the traditional paradigm of global labor market demands.
The papers in this panel provide an opportunity for migration scholars to investigate inter- and intra-regional migration in Southeast Asia. It also identifies additional areas for research that are significant to understanding the inter- and intra-regional migration against a background of the history between and among countries and regions. Finally, these papers reflect the migrant backgrounds of the scholars themselves, all of whom come from the Asian region but working within inter- and intra-regional contexts.

Area of Study

• Southeast Asia

Session Organizer

• Teresita Cruz del Rosario, Thammasat University

Individual Presentations

• Weaving life across borders: Resiliency of the Cham Muslims Traversing Vietnam and Malaysia - Angie Ngoc Tran, California State University, Monterey Bay

• Middle-class Filipinos in Voluntary Associations and their Diasporic Identity in the United Arab Emirates - Naomi Hosoda, Kagawa University

• Balik Kampung: Transborder Retirement Migration to Johor, Malaysia - Mohammad Kamsya, National University of Singapore

• Interrupted Histories: Arab Migration to Pre-Colonial Philippines - Teresita Cruz del Rosario, Thammasat University