This is primarily a book writing project which has emerged from earlier research undertaken by Professor Victor T. King for The Sociology of Southeast Asia: Transformation in a Developing Region (NIAS/Hawai'i, 2008). While in this book Professor King focused on political economy and historical analysis, the new companion volume examines cultural identities in the region in relation to such issues as nation building, consumption and middle classes, the media and performance, gender, and tourism. It draws on primary field research undertaken, among other themes, on the middle classes and consumption in Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam, and on cultural and ethnic tourism and heritage.

As with Professor King's earlier 2008 volume, this will be the first region-wide book of its kind and it attempts to understand Southeast Asia through the comparison of different countries, cases and ethnic groups in the region. It also draws on some 35 years of experience in undertaking wide-ranging research in Southeast Asia and supervising doctoral theses in anthropology and sociology. It is anticipated that the new book will be as widely read as his 2008 book, and it is currently being prepared for submission to NIAS Press and University of Hawai'i Press for publication sometime in 2010.

As a substantial amount of research on Southeast Asia becomes increasingly specialised and geographically and culturally narrow in focus, it requires some of us who have been around for a long time to be bolder in our ambitions and to attempt to understand the Southeast Asian region as a whole.