"McCargo notes that any discussion of autonomy in Thailand is a major challenge to that country’s narrative of a homogenous country under the benevolent rule of a monarchy that saved Thailand from colonisation, and is immediately conflated in the Thai language with separatism (rendered in Thai as ‘tearing apart the land’; also the title of McCargo’s 2008 book publis
"McCargo notes that any discussion of autonomy in Thailand is a major challenge to that country’s narrative of a homogenous country under the benevolent rule of a monarchy that saved Thailand from colonisation, and is immediately conflated in the Thai language with separatism (rendered in Thai as ‘tearing apart the land’; also the title of McCargo’s 2008 book published by Cornell University, which is a highly recommended companion text to the one under review).
…Mapping National Anxieties challenges a number of popular impressions of Thailand.
…McCargo’s extensive fieldwork in southern Thailand, and his astute reading of broader Thai politics, makes him required reading on this subject."