Door voormalig KITLV-fellow Anne-Lot Hoek: 'Iedereen wist het, maar niemand kon het zeggen'. "Oorlog werd ‘politionele acties’, structureel geweld werden ‘excessen’. De manier waarop Cees Fasseur en andere ...
'Rengat, 1949 (Part 1)': Dutch paratroopers massacred hundreds, perhaps thousands, in a Sumatran town during the Indonesian Revolution, yet nobody outside Rengat seems to know. Read more ...
On 13 September in the Erasmus House in Jakarta, Gert Oostindie, director of KITLV will present the Indonesian edition of his book Soldaat in Indonesië, 1945-1950 (Soldier in Indonesia, 1945-1950). This will...
Door Meindert van der Kaaij, redactie binnenland van het dagblad Trouw: "Auteur Gert Oostindie hoopt dat Indonesische historici met een frisse blik gaan kijken naar het oorlogsverleden". Lees het artikel in Trouw...
Op 13 september presenteert Gert Oostindie, directeur van het KITLV-KNAW in het Erasmushuis te Jakarta de Indonesische editie van zijn boek Soldaat in Indonesië, 1945-1950. ...
When in 2002 Indonesia established a constitutional court nobody anticipated just how important this new institution was going to be. Its rulings are widely reported and they have had an impact on fields ranging from economic policy...
President Jokowi is popular enough to do without military support. Yet New Order-era soldiers have always been close by his side. Now he has gone one further. Who is Wiranto? In a cabinet reshuffle on 27 July he ...
The Indonesian translation of Soldaat in Indonesië 1945-1950: Getuigenissen van een oorlog aan de verkeerde kant van de geschiedenis...
KITLV directeur Gert Oostindie sprak met diverse media over de Indië-herdenking. Op 15 augustus vond in Nederland de jaarlijkse Indië-herdenking plaats. Op die datum in 1945 capituleerde namelijk Japan, waarmee de Tweede Wereldoorlog...
Indonesia’s Chinese authored literature reached its peak of popularity in the 1930s. Access to these unique sources is slowly improving. Tom Hoogervorst escaped Jakarta’s archives for a rendezvous with two passionate...
A special issue of the Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences of Southeast Asia (Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde) is now available, in print ...
Young people’s desires to become educated and upwardly mobile are often understood as signs of rising affluence and changing markets for education and work in Southeast Asia. Meanings that young people attribute...
The road to Enlightenment is never easy, but for some people it is easier than for others. Last May I visited Borobudur. This giant eighth century Buddhist shrine and world heritage site is located in Indonesia where now ...
Over 3000 historic photographs and prints with images from the Dutch East Indies, China, Japan, Singapore and Suriname from the KITLV were donated to Wikimedia Commons, the image database of Wikipedia,...
Walking through the entrance gate to the shopping street ‘Pasar Baru’, Jakarta, was like stepping into my favourite movie, says Jemma Middleton. I recognised the different shops, the old and new architecture, the way a shopkeeper was advertising...
Het boek Soldaat in Indonesië, 1945-1950: Getuigenissen van een oorlog aan de verkeerde kant van de geschiedenis, door Gert Oostindie met medewerking van...
Bali in the early nineteenth century; The ethnographic accounts of Pierre Dubois, by Helen Creese, University of Queensland. In Bali in the Early Nineteenth Century, Helen Creese examines the nature of the earliest...
Shortly before his unexpected death Cees Fasseur accepted honorary membership of the Association KITLV. The chairperson of the Association, Susan Legêne, made the announcement at the Annual General Meeting on 10th June. The board of...
Kort voor zijn onverwachte overlijden accepteerde Cees Fasseur het erelidmaatschap van de Vereniging KITLV. De voorzitter van de Vereniging, Susan Legêne, maakte dit bekend op de Algemene Ledenvergadering van 10 juni jl. Het bestuur van de Vereniging ...
Javanese literature is the oldest literature in Southeast Asia. Its history goes back to the ninth century. The Dvenadcat vekov Javanskoj literaturi. Obzornija kurs (‘Twelve centuries of Javanese literature. A survey’) sets...
The fasting month in Indonesia comes with new gadgets and ‘special offers’ advertisements. Chris Chaplin wonders whether or not this affects the pious character of fasting. On the 6th June the majority of Muslims across the world welcomed the start...
(Only in Dutch) Het KITLV jaarverslag 2015 is nu online beschikbaar via de website. Een samenvatting in het Engels volgt binnenkort. Leden van het KITLV die een lidmaatschap hebben inclusief een geprinte versie van ...
Historian Bart Luttikhuis examines the origins of the widely-used estimate of 100,000 Indonesian victims of the Dutch-Indonesian War of Decolonization (1945-1950), and calls into question its accuracy. Ultimately, he wonders, does the number really matter?...
Indonesia's democratisation process is a case of the half-full glass. Pessimists argue that elections have descended into an ugly spectacle of vote-buying and manipulation that does little to distribute power in...
Het bijzondere van de Vereniging KITLV is dat ze leden heeft in alle leeftijdscategorieën. Ruim drie generaties ontmoeten elkaar rondom het KITLV. In alle generaties zijn leden die vanwege hun levensloop, beroep of ...
Hoko Horii is a PhD candidate at KITLV, conducting research on international human rights law and its implication on child marriage practice in Indonesia. She has been working with Mies Grijns, who is an ...
At the end of his brief European tour (Germany, Belgium, the UK), President Joko Widodo (‘Jokowi’) last Friday paid a one day visit to the Netherlands. He had breakfast with the prime minister, and visited a large scale ...
Ward Berenschot was afgelopen woensdag te gast in het Wetenschapsprogramma Science071. Hij sprak tijdens de uitzending over democratie en 'rule of law' in Indonesië en de Caraïben. Op vrijdag 22 april...
What is the impact of Indonesia’s democratization process on everyday interactions between Indonesian citizens and power holders? Democratic reforms have led to a much livelier ...
Gender relations in an Indonesian society; Bugis practices of sexuality and marriage, by Nurul Ilmi Idrus (Hasanuddin University), offers a comprehensive ethnography of Bugis marriage through an exploration of gender ...
Het bestuur van de Vereniging KITLV nodigt u van harte uit voor de lezingenmiddag ‘Democratie en ‘rule of law’ in Indonesië en de Nederlandse ...
On 23 March 2016 the Research Center for Material Culture and KITLV invite you to the lecture ‘Uncovering the secrets of sound and rhythm in the context of the ethnic Moluccan music of Indonesia’ delivered by dr. Christian Tamaela, ethnomusicologist and theologist...
Indonesians have forgotten the genocidal violence of 1965. Or have they? In this town in Central Java, locals and officials recently gathered for a remarkable commemorative service to the 1965 dead. Gerry van Klinken investigates. "Every time I visit Indonesia...
On the 13th of March, historian Cees Fasseur passed away in a Leiden hospital at the age of 77. We lost an important historian and a friend.As a colonial historian, Fasseur carried out ground-breaking research on the Cultivation System in nineteenth century...
What’s not to love about a big Indonesian wedding? Food, socialization, and the chance to pull on your best kebaya. But, writes Jacqueline Hicks, for Indonesia’s political and economic elites, they are much more than that....
(Also in Dutch) Leiden University Libraries has started the project Maps in the Crowd. Nearly 7,000 digitized maps of the Dutch East Indies will be unlocked with help from visitors, students and others who are interested...
Het krijgt in Nederland nog weinig aandacht, maar wat in New Delhi begon als een studentenprotest is uitgelopen op een dagenlange grote demonstratie voor vrijheid van meningsuiting. Ward Berenschot (KITLV), politicoloog en India-kenner...
As from 1 February Adriaan Bedner is the new KITLV professor (by special appointment) of Law and Society in Indonesia at the Van Vollenhoven Institute (VVI), ...
On 5 January 1949, the Sumatran city of Rengat was occupied by Dutch paratroopers, at the cost of large numbers of civilian casualties. NRC Handelsblad published a report on this massacre written by KITLV...
This weekend Anne-Lot Hoek reports for NRC Handelsblad and Reporter Radio KRO-NCRV about the forgotten bloodbath in Rengat, Sumatra. The idea was to find out what happened. But what happened was not what struck her most. Every year a memorial service ...
'Informal Politics Is Real Politics; A Research Blog on the Machinations of Power in Asia and beyond'. By Ward Berenschot. How do governments actually work? Informal politics – the ways in which people draw on personal ...
Earthquakes resulting from the extraction of natural gas for decades on end are now taking a heavy toll on the people of Groningen in the north of Holland. Typically, according to Willem van der Molen, the Dutch government reacts to the demand...
To my surprise I encountered an old Oral History project of mine, the SMGI, featuring in a novel, writes Fridus Steijlen. And it plays its role with excellence. Between 1997 and 2001 I coordinated the oral history project...
Chris Chaplin reflects on recent debates about radical Islam in Indonesia and warns against the use of simplistic labels. Islam in Indonesia has recently been in media headlines for all the wrong reasons, as the ...
KITLV researcher Chris Chaplin gives his opinion on the Jakarta bombing at Aljazeera.com: 'The threats to Indonesia after the Jakarta attack. Let us not overstate the significance of ISIL in Indonesia'...
Thursday morning January 14, a terrorist attack in downtown Jakarta was on the news. Media contacted KITLV for comments. How did Dutch media react? Observations by Henk Schulte Nordholt and Fridus Steijlen....
Lotte Akkerman, Kimberley Bootsma, and Bente de Leede reflect on a public symposium held at the National Archives about the KITLV project Dutch Military Operations in Indonesia, 1945-1950. They explain that...
Article 'Haze of democracy' by KITLV researcher Ward Berenschot in online journal Inside Indonesia: elections are fuelling the forest fires in Central Kalimantan. Berenschot is currently working on a book on local ...
With great sadness we announce the passing of professor Mario Rutten on December 26, 2015. Mario was the chair of KITLV’s wetenschapscommissie (Scientific Committee) from 2006 to 2012 and continued as ...
A little more than three years ago Ridho Reinanda joined KITLV as a researcher in the Elite Network Shifts project. Since then he found several things to be done that are unavoidable for applying computational approaches...