12-07-2025
Regional scholars hold dialogue, learning, community engagement in Kundasang
Dr Trixie Tangit and fellow organisers welcome participants at the SEANNET Workshop 2025 opening ceremony, held at Galeri Azman Hashim, Universiti Malaysia Sabah — setting the tone for a week of grounded exchange and neighbourhood-based research.
KOTA KINABALU (July 12): The quiet mountain town of Kundasang in Sabah becomes the setting for an extraordinary meeting of minds this week. From July 9 to 13, scholars, artists and educators from across Southeast Asia and beyond are convening under the banner of the Southeast Asia Neighbourhoods Network (SEANNET) for a workshop designed not only to share knowledge, but to deepen relationships between research, place and community.
Hosted in collaboration with Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS) and Universiti Malaya (UM) and generously supported by the Henry Luce Foundation, the workshop is a core part of SEANNET's ongoing work to reimagine urban research through the lens of neighbourhood life where everyday experience, memory, and resistance converge.
At the helm of this workshop is Vilashini Somiah, a feminist anthropologist and senior lecturer at Universiti Malaya, and a long-standing SEANNET member.
Having conducted fieldwork in Kundasang for over a decade, Dr Somiah recognised the opportunity to bring the network's regional expertise to her home state.
She reached out to Dr Trixie Tangit, senior lecturer in linguistics and anthropology at UMS, whose deep local ties and intellectual leadership made UMS the ideal partner to bring the workshop to life.
'Kundasang holds generations of Indigenous wisdom, memory and resistance,' said Dr Somiah.'This workshop is not just a return to a research site, it's a return to a living archive of knowledge. We wanted to bring SEANNET here because we believe that neighbourhoods like these hold answers to how we think about justice, belonging, and co-existence in Southeast Asia.'
Dr Somiah is widely known for her work on Sabah's Indigenous and migrant communities, and her long engagement with SEANNET includes a 2024 Visiting Fellowship at the London School of Economics' Southeast Asia Centre (LSE SEAC), supported by the Henry Luce Foundation. Her research into rural gendered spaces in Kundasang helped lay the intellectual foundation for the current workshop.
Dr Trixie's leadership has been instrumental in shaping the program's intellectual and ethical direction. A passionate advocate for community-based research and Indigenous knowledge systems, Dr Tangit brings both academic rigor and heartfelt commitment to her role.
'This gathering is more than an academic meeting, it's a chance to reconnect with what it means to research with care, with humility, and with attention to the communities who shape the knowledge we produce,' said Dr Tangit. 'By coming together in Kundasang, we're reminded that neighbourhoods are not just sites of study, they are living, breathing spaces of meaning.'
The five-day programme includes site visits to three rural highland villages; Cinta Mata, Bundu Tuhan and Kiau Nuluh, each known for its unique engagement with land, memory and community activism.
Participants from over 20 institutions will take part in collaborative presentations, roundtable discussions, and neighbourhood walks. Among the institutions represented are the University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney), Leiden University (Netherlands), National University of Singapore, University of the Philippines Diliman, Universiti Malaya, and grassroots partners such as the CRIBS Foundation.
'What makes this gathering special is its slowness,' said Dr Somiah. 'We're not rushing through theory or data. We're walking, listening, sharing food, witnessing ritual. This is what research can be relational, reciprocal, real.'
Since its inception, SEANNET has worked to challenge conventional approaches to urban research by foregrounding neighbourhoods as vital sites of creativity, struggle, and collective meaning-making. This year's workshop continues that tradition, focusing on place-based learning, ethical fieldwork, and intergenerational knowledge exchange.
'We're here not to extract knowledge,' added Dr Tangit, 'but to exchange, to honour, and to carry forward what's been shared with us. That, to me, is the essence of this workshop.'
As the cool mist rolls across Kundasang's hills, the SEANNET workshop offers something increasingly rare in academia: a space for thoughtful dialogue, genuine exchange, and the kind of intellectual hospitality that nourishes long-term collaboration.
