History Memory and Territorial Cults in the Highlands of Laos

<p>This book captures the dynamics of history memory and territorial cults in Houay Yong a Tai Vat village situated in the multiethnic highland frontier between Laos and Vietnam. By taking seriously the experiences of the villagers it partakes in a broader movement to reintegrate highlanders and their agency into history at large.</p><p>Based on comprehensive fieldwork research and the examination of colonial archives this book makes accessible for an English-speaking audience untapped French archives on Laos and early publications on territorial cults written by French ethnologists. In so doing it provides a balanced perspective drawing from the fields of memory studies and classical historical research. Following a chronological approach stretching from the nineteenth century to the present it extends narrative analysis through a comparative ethnography of territorial cults a key component of the performative and material presentification of the past.</p><p>Highly interdisciplinary in nature <i>History Memory and Territorial Cults in the Highlands of Laos </i>will be useful to students and scholars of anthropology history and religious studies as well as Asian culture and society.</p>