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xiv Facts and Trends in Southeast Asian Archaeology The biannual conference of the European Association of Southeast Asian Archaeologists — entitled “Crossing Borders in Southeast Asian Archaeology” — was held in Berlin from 27 September to 1 October 2010 (). It was jointly organized by the Institute for Near Eastern Archaeology of the Freie Universität Berlin and the German Archaeological Institute (DAI). Southeast Asia consists of 11 countries, from Myanmar in the northwest to the Indonesian archipelago in the southeast. It covers a total of 4.5 million m2 , an area greater than all the EU states combined. In terms of cultural history, the present-day southern Chinese provinces of Yunnan, Guangzhou, Guangxi and Guangdong are seen as part of Southeast Asia, particularly if one considers the period before the Chinese Han Dynasty, around 2000 years ago, incorporating the “south-western barbarians” living in the region into their sphere of influence. But in more recent times as well, these peripheral Chinese regions have provided important ethnic and cultural impetus for the “core” countries of Southeast Asia. Despite Indian and Chinese influences, the region has retained an astonishing degree of cultural, ethnic and linguistic independence and diversity. Nevertheless, in most Southeast Asian countries today, the prospects for recovering the roots of early cultures, archaeological finds and monuments are extremely poor. Too little is still being done on an international level to stop the looting of artifacts of cultural history. Greater support is urgently needed to conduct archaeological research into this culturally fascinating region and should begin by excavating endangered archaeological sites. The number of field research projects launched in Asia by European and other non-Asian countries is quite small. To give just one example of the dissatisfactory state of archaeological excavations: in a country such as Cambodia, which is about half as large as Germany, only three excavations took place outside Angkor Vat in 2010. These consisted of the French-Cambodian project centred on the Neolithic settlement at Laang Spean [image on the back cover] cave (talk presented by Hubert Forestier / Heng Sophady); the Australian-Cambodian excavation of the Iron Age cemetery in Phum Sophy; and the German-Cambodian excavation of the Iron Age burial site of Prohear (paper by Andreas Reinecke / Vin Laychour / Seng Sonetra). By contrast, private collectors in Europe and the U.S. have shown a great interest in finds from illegal excavations in the region. Unlike South America, for example, which is also a heavily looted region, for 50 years large areas of Southeast Asia were heavily mined as war zones and then combed by metal detectors. Today, hundreds of “treasure seekers” use these metal detecting devices in their systematic and nearly unchecked search for finds. The destruction of prehistoric sites in countries such as Cambodia or Vietnam is probably unparalleled in the world. The small number of excavation projects that are launched in Asian countries (outside China and Japan) today often result from individual research interests. There is still no sign of a strategic realignment — e.g., in the form of a shift of research resources from the classical focuses of the 19th / 20th century to regions in the Far East that do not have an archaeology tradition of their own. If they wish to study Southeast Asian archaeology, German students, for example, must go abroad, ideally to Australia or the U.S. The general research situation outlined briefly above forms the backdrop against which the biannual conference in Berlin and others like it attempt to summarize current fieldwork and studies on Southeast Asia. The biannual conference has been held by European archaeologists in different European cities since 1986. In 2010 Germany once again served as host after a period of 12 years; in 1998 the meeting place was in Berlin. Whereas the very first conference in the series was attended by 50 people, this year’s event set a record, attracting 253 participants from 31 countries [Fig. 0.1]. xiv Crossing Borders hi res combined14 14 8/23/2012 7:44:25 PM xv Thanks to the 67 German participants, the home advantage was used and a presence was achieved that in terms of numbers almost matched that of the rest of Europe combined. Yet scientists also came from the Australian Pacific region and the U.S., where regularly held conferences of the same type (still) do not exist but will probably take place in the foreseeable future, thanks to the founding of the American Association of Southeast Asian Archaeologists. The large number of participants, which...

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