In Asian Waters: Oceanic Worlds from Yemen to Yokohama by Eric Tagliacozzo

In Asian Waters: Oceanic Worlds from Yemen to Yokohama by Eric Tagliacozzo is an ambitious saga of Asian maritime history. Tagliacozzo charts micro and macro webs of exchange from Japan to the east coast of Africa, beginning roughly five hundred years ago and ending in present day (4). He divides his book into six parts, each with a preface that situates the section within the larger work, and proceeds geographically from East to West. His work includes smuggling in oceanic China, British imperialism, ecological and maritime cultures, and ends with ruminations on China's place in the modern world. Tagliacozzo poses two notable interventions in this work: the place of Southeast Asia in maritime history and the modern existence and relevance of age-old patterns of maritime trade in Asia.Part I explores the physical remnants of exchange between East Africa and China to at least within the first millennium CE (27). This section is important because it creates the westernmost boundary for the reader: the east coast of Africa. Tagliacozzo pitches China and East Africa as two nodes on opposite ends of Asian maritime history, while notably posing Southeast Asia as the pivot point of trade in the longue durée. This is a thought-provoking reconfiguration of directional Indian Ocean trade. It draws attention to the historical activity of Southeast Asian cities and ports. However, it may be difficult to conceptualize Southeast Asia as a "middle" point between China and Africa, considering the region's respective geographic proximity to both areas.Tagalicozzo's best work emerges at the microcosm: the intersection of his own personal journeys and the analysis of age-old Asian ports of exchange. Chapter 7 is an excellent example. This chapter documents Tagliacozzo's personal immersion in the port city of Zamboanga in the region of Mindanao. As an academic journeying through the Philippines, he documents his reliance on a system of connected individuals through the country. His experience as a seeming interloper relying on the credit and goodwill of third-degree contacts illustrates the older practices of trade that had existed in the region for hundreds of years. Later, in chapter 8, Tagliacozzo refers to guanxi, or the informal trade networks between friends and family that continue to define the "cadence" of Asian trade networks (209). Perhaps unintentionally, Tagliacozzo's own experiences in Chapter 7 demonstrate the modern significance of guanxi. The idea of informal connections that sustain trade is referenced and recorded by historians in other places and times, from Oceanic systems between the Middle East and Africa, to the Jewish Diaspora in the early modern period.1 His observation is significant because it brings social relationships and the principle of human connections back to the forefront of Asian economic history. Tagliacozzo uses this same technique later in chapters 10 and 11 while tracing the bounty of materials (spices, slugs, pearls, and fins) that contributed to the sustained trade networks in India. In relaying his personal anecdote while at an ethnically diverse spice firm in India, Tagliacozzo reflects much older trade routes, thus signifying the continued relevance of historical networks and ethnic connections in the modern day (305). His personal stories bring an alive-ness to trade routes that are continually relegated not only to the past but also to ancient times. These stories, along with his extensive material research, rejuvenate the argument that modern economic patterns still bear the imprint of the past five hundred years of trade.Although these considerations reinforce the relevance of Southeast Asia's great metropolises in the longue durée of Asian Oceanic exchange, the professed goal of his work is to chronicle the web of Asian maritime history, not politics or even legal frameworks. Tagliacozzo uses the longue durée as the overarching frame of his work (the term appears numerous times per chapter) while simultaneously musing about modern and future developments. Ostensibly, his point in this nontraditional use of the longue durée framework is to trace the impact and relevance of past historical events to the modern day. While an interesting exercise in relevance, this can be distracting for his readers. Tagliacozzo risks losing the historical value of his work by speculating on future trends and patterns. The space of those chapters would be better dedicated to investigating more deeply the historical connections between the many regions, cities, and countries that he covers throughout In Asian Waters.Despite the technical critiques of his methods, In Asian Waters still offers a refreshing perspective of Asian history through a maritime lens. This book curates a wide array of both specific and broad histories, from the coasts of Africa to the port cities of Indonesia. It is a work that should be lauded for its extensive historical background and masterful command of prose. For younger students, In Asian Waters could be the book that sparks curiosity at the wealth and prevalence of exchange within the intricate webs of Asian maritime history.The views expressed in this thesis are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the United States Air Force, Department of Defense, or the US Government.