“In a nutshell, this book explores how the fishermen and fisherwomen in the coastal commune of Sa Huynh and Ly Son Island have circumnavigated multiple binaries: inland versus coastal, agrarian versus maritime, state versus religion, state versus society and religious versus secular” writes Minh Chau Lam in Journal of Contemporary Asia.
This book is a remarkable and detailed study, long in preparation and extremely timely in its arrival. “Fishers, Monks and Cadres” portrays a once-peripheral area in central Vietnam now at the centre of a global struggle for sovereignty, influence and control in the South China Sea. This release is an ethnographically important study breaking out from the usual focus on urban or agrarian Vietnam. You can listen to this interview with the author in the Nordic Asia Podcast, in Spotify or your usual podcast app.