Malay Muslim History as Seen by Western Colonialist

Initiated by the Portuguese and since the early days of their presence, Europeans have been deeply involved in studying, collecting and documenting a huge number of historical works on the Malay Muslims around South East Asia. Next to the Portuguese, the Dutch which was peculiarly led by a company emerged to be the second European power to control not only the region but also the historical perspectives. The perspective of local history was then seen only from the Eurocentric view, the view that sees the history of the Malay Muslim world only from the European perspectives. Through this view, the presence of Europeans in this region was seen as the centre point of the historical writings. It was dubbed as the earliest European worldview in the Malay Muslim history as in the case of the Portuguese and the Dutch and was also true with the British when they joined the colonial rule in the Malay Muslim world particularly in the Malay Peninsular. This paper aims at discussing the perspectives of Europeans colonialists on the Malay Muslim History since the early days of colonialism. Two most dominant views were identified, the old and new views. The old view concerns more on the utilization of colonial sources in describing the Malay Muslim world. On the other hand, the new view concerns more on the utilization of local sources to describe the history of the local Malay Muslims.

Source: World Journal of Islamic History and Civilization

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