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This lively, accessible book is the first new history of Thailand in English for two decades.
Drawing on new Thai-language research, it ranges widely over political, economic, social, and
cultural themes. Chris Baker and Pasuk Phongpaichit reveal how a world of mandarin nobles and
unfree labour evolved into a rural society of smallholder peasants and an urban society
populated mainly by migrants from Southern China. They trace how a Buddhist cosmography
adapted to new ideas of time and space, and a traditional polity was transformed into a new
nation-state under a strengthened monarchy. The authors cover the contests between urban
nationalists, ambitious generals, communist rebels, business politicians, and social movements
to control the nation-state and redefine its purpose. They describe the dramatic changes
wrought by a booming economy, globalization, and the evolution of mass society.
Covering the past three centuries of Thai history, this book reveals how a landscape of sparsely populated forest and jungle was transformed into villages and paddy fields, with a rural society of smallholder peasants and an urban society populated mainly by migrants from southern China. It demonstrates how throughout the twentieth century, Thailand has been drawn into the international system, the American camp in the Cold War, the economic gambit of rising Japan, and more recently, the forces of globalization. The authors also survey the country's transformation accompanying massive social evolution over recent decades. (Control of the nation state is still contested between forces with a patriarchal belief in change from above, and advocates of democracy and liberal values.) |
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BizTalk Server 2010 Cookbook
In your day-to-day job as a BizTalk developer, administrator, or consultant, you will face challenges when it comes to deploying a BizTalk Server environment, advising clients on integration with BizTalk, developing BizTalk solutions, working with its components such as Business Rules, or a feature such as AppFabric Connect. As an... | | | | Automatic Ambiguity Resolution in Natural Language Processing
Natural language processing is often called an "Al-complete" task, in the sense that in order to truly process language (i.e. to comprehend, to translate, to generate) full understanding is required, which is itself the ultimate goal of Artificial Intelligence. For those who seek solutions to practical problems, this is not a... |
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