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Centre for Asia Pacific Social Transformation Studies (CAPSTRANS)

2009 Publications

Recent books and special journal collections showcasing the work of CAPSTRANS staff and affiliates can be found below.

ISBN numbers are included for the purposes of ordering these books from your regular supplier.

 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 | 2002 | 2001 | 2000 | 1999

Migrant Men: Critical Studies of Masculinities and the Migration Experience

Edited by Mike Donaldson, Raymond Hibbins, Richard Howson, Bob Pease

Part of the Routledge Research in Gender and Society series

CAPSTRANS researcher Dr Mike Donaldson and CAPSTRANS board member Dr Richard Howson, have teamed up with Dr Raymond Hibbins (Griffith University) and Dr Bob Pease (Deakin University), to edit a new publication which was released in early June.

This edited volume contributes an important collection of chapters to the growing theoretical and empirical work being undertaken at the international level on men and migration. The chapters presented here focus on what we might call ‘migratory masculinities': the experiences men have of masculinity upon immigration into another national, ethnic, and cultural context. How do these men (re)construct their conceptions of masculinity? Where are the points of tension, ambivalence or assimilation in this process? Featuring interviews and data drawn from migrants working and living in Australia, this book explores how the gender identity of men from non-English-speaking backgrounds is influenced by the experiences of migration and settlement in an English-speaking culture, across various cultural spheres such as work, leisure, family life and religion.

ISBN: 978-0-415-99485-9

The Book:

http://www.routledge.com/books/Migrant-Men-isbn9780415994859

Globalisation and the Middle Classes in India: The Social and Cultural Impact of Neoliberal Reforms

Ruchira Ganguly-Scrase and Timothy J. Scrase, London and New York: Routledge; 2009.

CAPSTRANS researchers, Dr Ruchira Ganguly-Scrase and Assoc Prof Tim Scrase recently published a major new work on social change and globalisation in India. The book titled: Globalisation and the Middle Classes in India: The Social and Cultural Impact of Neoliberal Reforms, and published by Routeldge, fills an important gap in the existing literature on economic liberalization and globalisation in India by providing much needed ethnographic data from those affected by neoliberal globalisation. Based on ethnographic fieldwork and interviews, it reveals the complexity of the globalisation process and describes and accounts for the contradictory attitudes of the lower middle classes. The authors challenge the notion of a homogeneous Indian middle class as being the undoubted beneficiaries of recent neoliberal economic reforms, showing that while the lower middle classes are generally supportive of the recent economic reforms, they remain doubtful about the long term benefits of the country's New Economic Policy and liberalisation. Significantly, this book discusses and analyses both the economic and cultural sides to globalisation in India, providing much-needed data in relation to several dimensions including the changing costs of living; household expenditure, debt and consumerism; employment and workplace restructuring; gender relations and girls’ education; global media and satellite television; and the significance of English in a globalising India. The book will be of interest to scholars and students working in the fields of Sociology, Social Anthropology and Development Studies, as well as Asian Studies - in particular studies of South Asia and India - and Globalisation Studies.

“Postcolonial Literary History and Indian English Fiction” 

Paul Sharrad, Cambria Press, 2008.

This book is the successful outcome of a difficult feat––it represents an interesting new approach to a well-trodden field of study. In this collection of essays, the author revisits certain issues within the distinctive frames of each essay. Of particular interest is the way the author is continually mindful of how postcolonial studies might be reconceptualised––an approach that many critics of note have taken in recent years, especially Neil Lazarus, Reed Dasenbrock, and Bart Moore-Gilbert, in different ways. This author’s way is, in part, to reconsider “postcolonial literary history… against ideas of History as a dominant epistemology.”

Another refreshing take here too is the way in which the theoretical positions are meaningfully explored in the context of imaginative literary texts; the book brings together the best scholarly qualities of close reading and a sophisticated and nuanced understanding of theory and the history that cloaks everything. This book is a very significant contribution to postcolonial studies and advances the ever more richly complicated discourse that has emerged in the field.

 Imposing Peace and Prosperity: Australia, Social Justice and Labour Reform in Occupied Japan 

by Christine De Matos, Melbourne: Australian Scholarly Publishing, 2008.

Current scholarship on the Allied Occupation of Japan (1945–1952) remains captivated by the overarching US role. Yet Australia also participated in the Occupation, held a vision for a Pacific future, and developed a postwar relationship with Japan. Australia and the United States often disagreed over contentious issues related to Japan’s postwar reforms. This is particularly evident in labour reform policy and on issues of social and economic justice. Comparisons with Iraq and Afghanistan are perhaps inevitable, and the narrative illuminates the paradox of the imposition of democratic reforms via military occupation.