The Forms Culture Takes: A State-of-the-Field Essay on the Anthropology of Southeast Asia

If each world region has its own style of anthropological analysis, then surely Southeast Asia has come to be the place where interpretive approaches to culture have reigned, whether in anthropology, history, or politics. Interpretive anthropologists, drawing largely on Boas and Weber, analyze culture into publicly accessible forms and the interpretations different actors give those forms. Despite recent criticisms by political economists as well as postmodernists, this approach continues to guide much of the current research by anthropologists working in Southeast Asia.