The Journal of Southeast Asian Studies is published for the Department of History, National University of Singapore, by Cambridge University Press. Contributions are invited from scholars working in all disciplines in the Humanities and Social Sciences, and should deal with the Philippines, Timor Leste, Indonesia, Brunei Darussalam, Singapore, Malaysia, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos or Vietnam.
The editorial board prefers manuscripts of between 9,000 and 12,000 words oriented toward a readership composed of scholars working in various disciplines, but written to be accessible to non-specialists.
Materials should be fully documented and have enduring value.
Analyses of current affairs that may quickly fall out of date, and pieces containing policy prescriptions, are rarely accepted.
Before a manuscript can be published, it must conform to the Journal’s style sheet, which is available upon request from the editor.
Material appearing in the Journal of Southeast Asian Studies does not necessarily represent the views of the editors or of the publisher, and responsibility for opinions expressed and the accuracy of facts published in articles rests solely with the individual authors.
STYLE SHEET
The Editors of the Journal of Southeast Asian Studies will review manuscripts prepared according to any standard set of scholarly conventions. The text should be prepared with double spacing throughout, pages should be numbered consecutively throughout the entire manuscript, and generous margins should be set.
Material accepted for publication will need to be brought into line with the following conventions.
1. Spelling
For the English language, follow British spelling conventions as found in the Oxford series of dictionaries with the exception of material in a direct quote, which should follow the original source. Authors should note the spellings of the following commonly used words:
centre, not center
programme, not program
colour, not color
flavour, not flavor
specialise, not specialize
honour, not honor
humour, not humor
saviour, not savior
organise, not organize
labour, not labor
2. Capitalization
For titles of books or articles written in languages using the Roman alphabet, capitalize the first word of the title plus the first word after a colon or semi-colon, as well as any proper nouns. In transcribing from languages written in non-Roman scripts, capitalize only proper nouns. When in doubt, do not capitalize.
3. Italics
Titles of books, pamphlets and periodicals should be italicised, as should words of non-English origin except for terms that have been incorporated into the English language. Examples of non-italicized words include ibid., per diem and vice versa. Italics should not be used for titles of chapters in books, titles of articles, personal names, and names of places and organizations in the English language. Avoid italicising words for emphasis.
4. Inverted Commas/Quotation marks
Use single inverted commas [quotation marks] for titles of articles, unpublished works, English translations of words from another language, and short quotations. Use double inverted commas to indicate quoted material within a quotation. All punctuation used in connection with phrases inside inverted commas must be placed according to the sense: if the punctuation marks are part of the material quoted, they should be placed inside the quotation marks; otherwise they should be placed outside the closing quotation marks.
5. Diacritical marks
The Journal can reproduce most diacritical marks, and these should be placed in the text submitted online.
6. Quotations
a. Fragmentary quotations must fit grammatically into the text in terms of syntax, verb tenses, personal pronouns, etc.
b. Block quotations or extracts of more than forty words should be set off from the text by indenting them a few spaces in from the left-hand margin. Inverted commas are not placed around block quotations, and paragraph indentation for the first sentence of the quotation is unnecessary. If, however, the quotation consists of two or more paragraphs, the second and any subsequent paragraphs should begin with a paragraph indentation.
7. Brackets
Use square brackets [ ] to enclose explanatory matter inserted into a verbatim quotation, or matter inserted to complete the meaning of a translation and intended to read as part of the translated text. The translation of the title of a book or article in a foreign language, if given, should be placed in square brackets after the original title.
8. Ellipses
For ellipses within a sentence use three full stops [periods] ... and for ellipses at the end of a sentence use four full stops ....
9. Numerals
Numbers of less than two digits should be spelled out except in technical or statistical discussions involving their frequent use, or in footnotes where space saving is recommended. Fractional quantities are also expressed in figures. ‘Per cent’ is written as two words, and the symbol % should not be used, except in Tables.
For dates in the main body of the text, use the following patterns:
X remained in office from 1927-1939
The Second World War (1941-45)
24 August 1971
eighteenth (not 18th) century
1890s (not 1890’s)
the fifties
221 BCE and 211 CE
10. Units of Measure
Use the international metric system of measurement for units of measure (length, weight and capacity). If other units of measure are indicated, supply metric equivalents.
11. Cross-references
Avoid cross-references to specific pages in the manuscript, or from one footnote to another.
12. Bibliographies
As a rule the Journal does not publish bibliographies, and all bibliographic references should be included in the footnotes.
13. Diagrams, Illustrations, Tables, Maps
All figures and tables should be on separate sheets and numbered as in the text. For further details of file formats please see Cambridge Journals Artwork Guide. The position of illustrations, maps, diagrams, and tables should be indicated in the margin of the text, and captions should be supplied. Tables should be numbered consecutively. Titles should identify the table briefly, and should not give background information or describe results. (Mixing of different kinds of information in one column is to be avoided; for example, put dollar amounts in one column, percentages in another, and so on). The source(s) of the information presented in a table should be indicated immediately below it.
If you request colour figures in the printed version, you will be contacted by CCC-Rightslink who are acting on our behalf to collect Author Charges. Please follow their instructions in order to avoid any delay in the publication of your article.
14. Material in Asian Languages
The Journal can print titles and terms using the scripts of most Southeast Asian languages, although where terminology is not ambiguous the Editors may opt for Romanization.
For authoritative spellings and definitions, the following dictionaries are recommended:
Bahasa Malaysia: T. Iskandar, Kamus Dewan (Kuala Lumpur: Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, 1985).
Indonesian: John M. Echols and Hassan Shadily, revised by John U. Wolff and James T. Collins, Kamus Indonesia Inggris (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, and Jakarta, Penerbit PT Gramedia, 1989), Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia (Jakarta: Departemen Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan, Balai Pustaka, 1989), or any other dictionary that follows the 1972 system of standardized spelling for Bahasa Indonesia/Bahasa Malaysia (Ejaan yang disempurnakan).
Tagalog: Leo James English, C.Ss.R., English-Tagalog Dictionary (Metro Manila: National Book Store, 1992).
For transcriptions of material in Thai or Chinese or Japanese, use the following standards:
Thai: the Library of Congress/Modified Cornell System of transcription.
Chinese: Romanization should be in Hanyu pinyin. For questionable cases, refer to Beijing Foreign Language Institute, The Chinese-English Dictionary (Hanying cidian) (Beijing: The Commercial Press, 1978). Omit tonal marks.
Japanese: the system found in Kenkyusha’s New Japanese-English Dictionary.
15. Appendices
Each appendix should start on a new page; appendices should be arranged in alphabetical sequence (Appendix A, B, C, ...) and each should be given a title.
16. Citations in the Text
When referring to the work of other scholars, give the full name and not the surname alone for the first occurrence in the text: not ‘as Reid says in his book Southeast Asia in the Age of Commerce, but ‘as Anthony Reid says in his ....’
17. Footnotes
a. Use abbreviated forms, e.g., 24 Aug. 1971, 18th century; for months use the following abbreviations: Jan., Feb., Mar., Apr., May, June, July, Aug., Sept., Oct., Nov., Dec. For abbreviations include full stops except in the case of acronyms (such as ASEAN), which should be written in capitals, and titles such as Dr for Doctor (in which the final letter of the short form is the final letter of the word written in full).
b. Page numbers should be indicated in accordance with the following examples.
p. 179
pp. 107-9 [for pages 107-109]
pp. 168-72 [for pages 168-172]
pp. 244-9 [for pages 244-249]
pp. 116-18 [for pages 116-118]
pp. 178-202.
Passim, ff. (following, as in pp. 178 ff.), and et seqq. should be avoided.
Ibid. is allowed.
Do not cite a footnote (fn.). Just provide the page number.
c. In citing references from books, give each source in full the first time it appears, arranging the elements as follows: author’s name in the normal order, title of the book italicised, publication details in parentheses (city: publisher, year), and the page number(s) where the cited information appears, as in the following examples:
1 T.N. Harper, The end of empire and the making of Malaya (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), pp. 57-62.
2 Mina Roces, ‘The gendering of post-war Philippine politics’, in Gender and power in affluent Asia, ed. Krishna Sen and Maila Stivens (London and New York: Routledge, 1998), p. 294. (In this example, ‘ed.’ means ‘edited by’ and should not be ‘eds.’)
d. To cite articles that have appeared in journals, give the name of the author(s) in the normal order, the title of the article within single inverted commas, the name of the journal or periodical italicised, the volume and issue numbers, the year of publication, and the relevant page number(s).
1 Wim F. Wertheim, ‘Conditions on sugar estates in colonial Java: Comparisons with Deli’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 24, 2 (1993): 268-9.
e. The title of any unpublished work (dissertation, a paper read at a meeting, or a manuscript, etc.) is enclosed in quotation marks and not italicised, including material in mimeographed form. For example:
1 Lee Chae Jin, ‘Chinese Communist policy in Laos, 1954-1965’ (Ph.D. diss., University of California, Los Angeles, 1966), p. 25. (Please note that it is not necessary to state that a dissertation or other paper is ‘unpublished’.)
f. For references to a work already cited in full, omit the publication details and include only the author’s surname and shortened title of the book or article, followed by the page numbers. When a footnote refers to the same source as the one immediately preceding it, ‘Ibid.’ should be used. The Journal does not use ‘op. cit.’ or ‘loc. cit.’
Copyrighted material
If your article contains any material in which you do not own copyright, including figures, charts, tables, photographs or excerpts of text, please see the seeking permission to use copyrighted material page for instruction.
Publishing ethics
Please refer to the publishing ethics page while preparing your materials for submission to ensure you comply with the relevant policies.
Policy on prior publication
When authors submit manuscripts to this journal, these manuscripts should not be under consideration, accepted for publication or in press within a different journal, book or similar entity, unless explicit permission or agreement has been sought from all entities involved. However, deposition of a preprint on the author’s personal website, in an institutional repository, or in a preprint archive shall not be viewed as prior or duplicate publication. Authors should follow the Cambridge University Press Preprint Policy regarding preprint archives and maintaining the version of record.
English language editing services
Authors, particularly those whose first language is not English, may wish to have their English-language manuscripts checked by a native speaker before submission. This step is optional, but may help to ensure that the academic content of the paper is fully understood by the Editor and any reviewers.
In order to help prospective authors to prepare for submission and to reach their publication goals, Cambridge University Press offers a range of high-quality manuscript preparation services, including language editing. You can find out more on our language services page.
Please note that the use of any of these services is voluntary, and at the author's own expense. Use of these services does not guarantee that the manuscript will be accepted for publication, nor does it restrict the author to submitting to a Cambridge-published journal.
Competing Interests
All authors must include a competing interest declaration in their title page. This declaration will be subject to editorial review and may be published in the article.
Competing interests are situations that could be perceived to exert an undue influence on the content or publication of an author’s work. They may include, but are not limited to, financial, professional, contractual or personal relationships or situations.
If the manuscript has multiple authors, the author submitting must include competing interest declarations relevant to all contributing authors.
Example wording for a declaration is as follows: “Competing interests: Author 1 is employed at organisation A, Author 2 is on the Board of company B and is a member of organisation C. Author 3 has received grants from company D.” If no competing interests exist, the declaration should state “Competing interests: The author(s) declare none”.
Authorship and contributorship
All authors listed on any papers submitted to this journal must be in agreement that the authors listed would all be considered authors according to disciplinary norms, and that no authors who would reasonably be considered an author have been excluded. For further details on this journal’s authorship policy, please see this journal's publishing ethics policies.
Author affiliations
Author affiliations should represent the institution(s) at which the research presented was conducted and/or supported and/or approved. For non-research content, any affiliations should represent the institution(s) with which each author is currently affiliated.
For more information, please see our author affiliation policy and author affiliation FAQs.
ORCID
We encourage authors to identify themselves using ORCID when submitting a manuscript to this journal. ORCID provides a unique identifier for researchers and, through integration with key research workflows such as manuscript submission and grant applications, provides the following benefits:
- Discoverability: ORCID increases the discoverability of your publications, by enabling smarter publisher systems and by helping readers to reliably find work that you have authored.
- Convenience: As more organisations use ORCID, providing your iD or using it to register for services will automatically link activities to your ORCID record, and will enable you to share this information with other systems and platforms you use, saving you re-keying information multiple times.
- Keeping track: Your ORCID record is a neat place to store and (if you choose) share validated information about your research activities and affiliations.
See our ORCID FAQs for more information. If you don’t already have an iD, you can create one by registering directly at https://ORCID.org/register.
ORCIDs can also be used if authors wish to communicate to readers up-to-date information about how they wish to be addressed or referred to (for example, they wish to include pronouns, additional titles, honorifics, name variations, etc.) alongside their published articles. We encourage authors to make use of the ORCID profile’s “Published Name” field for this purpose. This is entirely optional for authors who wish to communicate such information in connection with their article. Please note that this method is not currently recommended for author name changes: see Cambridge’s author name change policy if you want to change your name on an already published article. See our ORCID FAQs for more information.
Supplementary materials
Material that is not essential to understanding or supporting a manuscript, but which may nonetheless be relevant or interesting to readers, may be submitted as supplementary material. Supplementary material will be published online alongside your article, but will not be published in the pages of the journal. Types of supplementary material may include, but are not limited to, appendices, additional tables or figures, datasets, videos, and sound files.
Supplementary materials will not be typeset or copyedited, so should be supplied exactly as they are to appear online. Please see our general guidance on supplementary materials for further information.
Where relevant we encourage authors to publish additional qualitative or quantitative research outputs in an appropriate repository, and cite these in manuscripts.
Author Hub
You can find guides for many aspects of publishing with Cambridge at Author Hub, our suite of resources for Cambridge authors.
Use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools
We acknowledge the increasing use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools in the research and writing processes. To ensure transparency, we expect any such use to be declared and described fully to readers, and to comply with our plagiarism policy and best practices regarding citation and acknowledgements. We do not consider artificial intelligence (AI) tools to meet the accountability requirements of authorship, and therefore generative AI tools such as ChatGPT and similar should not be listed as an author on any submitted content.
In particular, any use of an AI tool:
- to generate images within the manuscript should be accompanied by a full description of the process used, and declared clearly in the image caption(s)
- to generate text within the manuscript should be accompanied by a full description of the process used, include appropriate and valid references and citations, and be declared in the manuscript’s Acknowledgements.
- to analyse or extract insights from data or other materials, for example through the use of text and data mining, should be accompanied by a full description of the process used, including details and appropriate citation of any dataset(s) or other material analysed in all relevant and appropriate areas of the manuscript
- must not present ideas, words, data, or other material produced by third parties without appropriate acknowledgement or permission
Descriptions of AI processes used should include at minimum the version of the tool/algorithm used, where it can be accessed, any proprietary information relevant to the use of the tool/algorithm, any modifications of the tool made by the researchers (such as the addition of data to a tool’s public corpus), and the date(s) it was used for the purpose(s) described. Any relevant competing interests or potential bias arising as a consequence of the tool/algorithm’s use should be transparently declared and may be discussed in the article.