A Brief Introduction to South-East Asia

Defining the geographic location of Southeast Asia is quite challenging. Though there are different view points, Southeast Asia is commonly an area representing countries that lie east of Myanmar and west of the Philippines. Most of these countries gained their independence after World War II, such as Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei (gaining independence from Britain in 1984) and East Timor. The climate of Southeast Asia is uniformly tropical, but it is rather difficult to identify specific racial or cultural commonalities in such a broad area of diverse races, religions and languages.

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The languages of the area may be broadly divided into two groups; the Austro-Asian languages of the continent, and the Austronesian languages of the islands, the latter stretching across a wide area from Easter Island in the east to Madagascar in the west, and extending as far north as Hawaii. Situated between India and China, Southeast Asia has long been influenced by many cultures. The region might be referred to as a “Crossroads of Culture,” with heterogeneity being one of its distinctive characteristics. The articles on display were collected solely from the island-states of the Southeast Asia regions.

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