Indonesian scholars too inward-looking: Historian

Indonesian scholars too inward-looking: Historian

DEPOK, West Java (JP): As Indonesia embarks on various
regional cooperation programs, leading historian Taufik Abdullah
warned yesterday that the nation has a dire shortage of scholars
who really know about the region.

Most Indonesian scholars are still only interested in their
own country and lack knowledge about their neighbors, Taufik told
The Jakarta Post. "We must be the only place that does not have a
study center on Southeast Asia," he said.

Taufik disclosed that he and other historians from Thailand,
the Philippines and Malaysia are currently working together in
setting up a Southeast Asian studies center in Indonesia.

He had mentioned the plan in passing during yesterday's talks
on Japanese-Indonesian relations at the Center of Japanese
Studies at the University of Indonesia.

Indonesian students mostly want to study Indonesia alone, he
said. One reason for this, he said, is that "we have been too
busy with nation-building."

Nation-building had been necessary, he added, as Indonesia and
other countries in Southeast Asia were fractured by colonization.

Now, however, it was time for Indonesia to give greater
attention to the rest of the region, he said.

"We have sketches for future scenarios -- AFTA (ASEAN Free
Trade Area), APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum) --
but Indonesians are still looking inward," he said.

Indonesians can no longer afford to only understand the past
and present of their own country, he added.

"How can we understand Riau (in Sumatra) without studying
Malaysia? How can you look at Manado (in North Sulawesi) without
understanding the southern Philippines?" he asked.

But in five or 10 years, with the help of the new center, "we
will hopefully have our own experts on Southeast Asia," Taufik
said.

A program related to the plan for the center is a research
project on the contemporary flow of peoples within the region.

The center is expected to facilitate studies across the
region. Foreign students wishing to study Javanese, for instance,
may be directed to Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta.

So far the only Southeast Asian studies centers are found in
the United States, including New York's Cornell University,
together with the Institute for Southeast Asian Studies in
Singapore and similar centers at Monash University in Australia
and the University of Malaya in Malaysia.

The other historians working with Taufik on the plan are
Shaharil Talib from the University of Malaya, Charnwit Kasetsir
from Thammasat University in Thailand and Maria Diokno of the
University of the Philippines.

The University of Indonesia and the Indonesian Institute of
Sciences, LIPI, where Taufik is a researcher, will be among the
institutions involved, he said.

Assistance from a Japanese foundation may also be forthcoming,
said Taufik.

Taufik and other speakers, including one from the Sumitomo
foundation, touched on exchanges between Indonesian and Japanese
students and other forms of cooperation between the two
countries. (anr)