Abstract:
Soe Tjen Marching joins Loh Kah Seng on the Scholar Chronicles podcast, co-organised with Under The Banana Tree Archival Network, to discuss the 1965-1966 mass killings in Indonesia. Soe Tjen will relate her efforts, along with others in Indonesia, to conduct oral histories of a horrific event which remains difficult to talk about publicly today. Her father was tortured and her mother beseeched her not to say anything which might endanger the family. From Soe Tjen’s activist research, we will consider ways to document and disseminate memories of similarly traumatic pasts in Southeast Asia.
Speaker: Soe Tjen Marching
Soe Tjen Marching was born and grew up in Surabaya, Indonesia. She completed her Ph.D in Southeast Asian Studies at Monash University, Australia. After lecturing for several years at different universities in Australia, she moved to the UK and started teaching at SOAS in 2016. Her research interests are the study of languages, gender studies in Indonesia, Indonesian literature, and Indonesian history and politics especially in relation to the 1965 genocide.
Besides being an academic, Soe Tjen is also a creative writer and an award winning composer. She has published several poems and short stories in English and Indonesian, and published three novels in Indonesian. One of her poems won third place at the competition held by Ballarat City Council in Australia. As a composer, she won a national competition for Indonesian Contemporary Composers held by the German Embassy. One of her compositions has been released in the CD Asia Piano Avantgarde: Indonesia.
Moderator / Host: Loh Kah Seng
Loh Kah Seng is a historian and director of Chronicles Research and Education, a research consultancy. He is interested in all things that happened in the history of Singapore and particularly the ‘little histories’ of the people. His books include Squatters into Citizens: The 1961 Bukit Ho Swee Fire and the Making of Modern Singapore; Tuberculosis – The Singapore Experience, 1867-2018: Disease, Society and the State; Theatres of Memory: Industrial Heritage of 20th Century Singapore; and Pandemics in Singapore, 1819-2022: Lessons for the Age of COVID-19. He is finishing a book on the shopkeepers of Chinatown.
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This event is co-organised by Chronicles Research and Education and Under The Banana Tree Archival Network in Southeast Asia with publicity partner, Pusat Sejarah Rakyat. It is also in collaboration with History Department, Bristol University and International Institute of Social History (Netherlands) and funded by Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), UK Research and Innovation