Sea Nomads of Southeast Asia: From the Past to the Present.

Edited by Bérénice
Bellina, Roger Blench, and Jean-Christophe Galipaud. Singapore: National
University of Singapore Press, 2021. xv + 383pp., index, tables, b/w maps, and b/w
illustrations, $32.00 (PB). ISBN: 978-981-3251-25-0.

A collection of essays on a fascinating topic, Sea Nomads of Southeast Asia presents a set
of studies of groups engaged in activity "defined by the suite of subsistence strategies of
populations based on the exchange of patchy maritime resources, staples and trade
goods" (p.4). The "sea nomads" have had multiple roles, including "guardians of the sea-
lanes to pirates, merchants or explorers" (p.2).

The editors of this volume note that prior studies have been limited to monographs on
particular groups, anthropological studies, and so on. By contrast, this work takes an
interdisciplinary approach, including archaeological and genetic data, and provides a
deep historical perspective. In addition, the essays in Sea Nomads of Southeast Asia
attempt to place in a geographical, social, economic, and political context the history and
activity of groups that have come to be marginalized, yet still survive. Indeed, the editors
note in their introduction that this nomadic maritime activity "is a characteristic lifeway
in island and coastal Southeast Asia today" (p.3).

The editors also add that, "if sea nomads today are poor and marginalized by national-
states, this was not the case in the past... [T]hey were economically and politically-valued
partners of regional trading polities" (p.9). In terms of context, then, the authors in this
volume relate sea nomadism with "the rise of trading states or trading polities" (p.6),
thalassocratic entities dating back at least to the seventh century. But the Bellina, Blench,
and Galipaud see even deeper roots, dating all the way back to the Paleolithic period, and
Austronesian "fisher-foragers". In short, the sea nomads are seen as having their roots as
"originally coastal forager-traders, characterized by their adaptive capacities" (p.9). Some
of essays in the book develop this contextual knowledge through archaeological studies
based on particular categories of evidence: material, locational/spatial and
physical/biological (p.10).

In terms of mapping and navigational knowledge — subject areas of particular interest to

many readers — the editors point out that sea nomads possess a "mastery of the sea" and
carry out "complex mental mapping of maritime routes" (p.4). Also relevant to geography
is the fact that today sea nomads are active in three main regions of Southeast Asia: the
Mergui Archipelago (west of Thailand and Myanmar), the Riau Islands and Sumatra
(Indonesia), and the seas between Borneo, the Sulu Archipelago (part of the Philippines),
and northwest Papua.

There are thirteen essays in this book, studying sea nomads from the perspective of trade,
technology, mapping, genomics, and so on. Archaeological, linguistic, and ethnographic
perspectives all play a role in these studies. The opening essay, written by the three
editors of the volume, gives an overview of "sea nomadism" with brief comments on the
history, early sources, and current research, along with a basic map showing how sea

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nomad groups extend west to east from the Gulf of Thailand to West Papua, and north to
south from the Philippines to East Timor.

The subsequent essays look at a wide range of evidence and topics: the sea nomad trade
in obsidian and use of shells; the deep history of maritime exchange in "ISEA" (Island
Southeast Asia); the rise of a "Maritime Silk Road"; the culture of the Orang Suku Laut
(literally, "Tribal People of the Sea"); the languages of the sea nomads, and their possible
connection to the Vezo people of Madagascar; a preliminary study of the genetic history
of the Bajau, another sea nomadic group; the role of the Bajau in the complex regional
geopolitics of South Sulawesi in Indonesia; a look at the culture of the Moken and
Moklen (sic), two Austronesian groups of sea nomads; an ethno-archaeological study of
sea nomads in the Andaman Sea and their "cultural resilience"; an examination of how
sea nomad culture can influence local cultures, looking at areas of East Timor; a
linguistic and historical study of the Bajau diaspora; and a research piece — with a series
of engaging maps — on the distribution of Bajau communities from the Philippines
southward. A chapter by the linguist and anthropologist Roger Blench will be of
particular interest to readers of Terrae Incognitae, as it looks at early shipbuilding and
navigation in the South China Seas.

The essays vary in terms of style — some are highly technical, and clearly intended to be
read by experts in the same field as the particular essay's author(s). Others are more
accessible to lay readers. Overall, however, the volume provides someone new to the
subject with an intriguing and multi-disciplinary approach to an important topic. Not only
will readers learn about the history and geography of these sea nomads, but they also gain
insight into the history of these cultures. How is it, indeed, that peoples over a vast stretch
of ocean and innumerable islands were able to create viable cultures that survive into the
present? Some of the essays in the book present not only scientific analysis of such
questions, but also allude — directly or indirectly — to what such resilient cultures can
teach us today about our relationship with the marine environment, engagement with
natural resources, and interactions with other human cultures.

— Benjamin B. Olshin
Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.A.