Borneo-Kalimantan Inter-University Conference on "Social Transformation in Coastal Communities of Borneo" was held August 29-30, 2005, at the Institute of East Asian Studies (IEAS), Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS), Kota Samarahan.

Borneo-Kalimantan Inter-University Conference on "Social Transformation in Coastal Communities of Borneo" was held August 29-30, 2005, at the Institute of East Asian Studies (IEAS), Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS), Kota Samarahan.

Conference Background: Since the fifteenth century the culture area of Nusantara has been fragmented by successive colonial powers resulting in the formation of the modern political entities of Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei and the Philippines. Often these nations are hardly more than a political boundary line marked out by the politics of the Anglo-Dutch-Spanish imperial powers and in some instances by poor cartography and the fanciful ethnology of colonialism. After several hundred years, each of these nations has developed according to imperial templates. Consequently, scholars in these countries not only differ markedly in their epistemological and ontological positions but have also not been "talking to each other" academically or intellectually. As a result, we are missing out on a tremendous wealth of knowledge that researchers in each of these countries have accumulated and constructed. Upon realizing the lack of academic and intellectual interaction between Sarawak, Sabah, and the four provinces of Kalimantan, and to lesser extent Brunei, the Institute of East Asian Studies initiated, with support of the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, Universitas Tanjungpura, Pontianak, West Kalimantan, the establishment of a common forum to increase and intensify such interaction.

The theme of the 29-30 August conference was "Social Transformation in Coastal Communities in Borneo." It was intended to provide an academic forum and meeting ground for scholars, academics, and public intellectuals, particularly those of Borneo-Kalimantan origins, who are concerned with issues of social transformation. Particular attention was given to young academics who have done research, but have not yet participated in larger conferences in the region.

Bernard Sellato reports that a third edition of Hornbill and Dragon is being printed and is scheduled to appear in early 2006. Although it is a reprint of the previous edition, and not a new work, the book will appear, however, under a new title, as Borneo: Heritage of Art & Culture.

In addition to this reprinting of Hornbill and Dragon, the last two years have been unusually well-served by books on Borneo art, beginning in December 2003 with Traude Gavin's Iban Ritual Textiles (reviewed in this volume of the BRB by Mattiebelle Gittinger), and last year (2005) with Heidi Munan's Beads of Borneo and Michael Heppell, Limbang ak Melaka and Enyan ak Usen's Iban Art: Sexual Selection and Severed Heads.