Visual Cultures of the Ethnic Chinese in Indonesia

One of the key strengths of this book is the careful contextualization of visual images in different time periods, showing how they communicated responses to opportunities and challenges for Indonesian Chinese in their evolving relations with Indonesian society and the Indonesian state. Another strength is Kusnos’s ability to draw on memories of his own experiences of growing up in Indonesia in the post-1965 period. * Indonesia *
This brilliant collection affirms Abidin Kusno’s place as a singularly insightful commentator on Indonesian ethnic Chinese experiences as illuminated through the lenses of visuality, the built environment, and memory. The essays offer refreshingly revealing accounts of the varied urban landscapes and visual media through which ethnic Chinese have imagined themselves and their troubled yet integral place in modern Indonesia. -- Karen Strassler, Associate Professor, The Graduate Center- City University of New York (CUNY)
Visual Cultures of the Ethnic Chinese in Indonesia is an excellent collection of essays and a major contribution to a new and exciting field of research. Kusno convincingly argues how visual modes of representation (film, family photographs, architecture and the built environment) expressed and shaped the experiences of the ethnic Chinese under changing landscapes of power. A pioneering work! -- Peter Post, Senior Researcher, The Netherlands Institute of War Documentation
This is a very informative and thoughtful book on visual cultures of Chinese Indonesians. Using visual materials to explain and visualize the subject matter, Dr. Abidin Kusno has successfully presented a complex picture of the Chinese Indonesian culture and identity in the changing socio-cultural and political landscape. A highly recommended book. -- Leo Suryadinata, Professor, ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, Singapore
Kusno forges new ground for understandings of Indonesia’s ethnic Chinese, their identity and culture over time. This book brings into focus a minority group who occupied the role of economic middleman in colonial and post-colonial Indonesia, and for whom the domestic and commercial spheres, rather than the political, were sites for cultural expression and for negotiating their sense of belonging in the wider society. Until now, these have been under-examined in the literature. Kusno presents new sites for historical analysis of the ethnic Chinese, from the family photo album, the commercial shophouse where many lived and worked, to representations on film; and in doing so enriches greatly what is known about how this minority has imagined itself, its place in the Indonesian nation in the past, and for the future. -- Jemma Purdey, Research Fellow in the Faculty of Arts and the Australia Indonesia Centre, Monash University