Scot BarmZ is visiting fellow in the Division of Pacific and Asian History, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, at The Australian National University.

Scot BarmZ mines a rich lode of previously ignored cultural ephemera found in popular newspapers, magazines, novels, short stories, film booklets, and cartoons to create a vibrant cultural history of early modern Thailand that moves radically beyond conventional, elite-based historical studies of the period. By focusing on such controversies and conflicts as the status of women, relations between the sexes, class antagonisms, and the growth of a commercial mass culture, this book offers a new interpretation of the key decade of the 1920s and its significance for contemporary Thailand.

Chapter 1 Introduction Chapter 2 Proto-feminist Discourses in Early Twentieth Century Siam Chapter 3 Cinema, Film and the Growth of National Culture Under Absolutism Chapter 4 In and around the Cinema: Romance and Sex in the City Chapter 5 Visually Challenged: Graphic Critiques of the Royal-Noble Elite Chapter 6 Evocations of Equality: Female Education and Employment Chapter 7 A Question of Polygamy Chapter 8 Bourgeois Love and Morality: Gender Relations Redefined Chapter 9 Romance and Desire in Film and Fiction Chapter 10 Gender, Class, and Popular Culture in Post-absolutist Siam: 1932-1940 Chapter 11 Conclusion