Histories of Scale: Java, the Indies and Asia in the Imperial Age, 1820-1945.

Book excerpt: This major study explores the spatial history of the Dutch East Indies as an imperial formation between the early nineteenth century and the end of empire. It consists of six in-depth case-studies on pertinent themes such as rural capitalism, indirect colonial rule, border politics, coolie circulations, un-modern nationalism and the beginning of Indonesian independence. These studies are set within a novel theory, which connects local, intra-imperial, transimperial and global history in the format of specific topochrones. As such this book is a contribution both to Indonesian transcultural history and the field of New Area Studies.