Coda: Commoning a Discipline—Toward an Asian Cultural Studies

The authors of this volume came together from the vantage point of their own disciplinary training and research interests and area to think through the ideas of Asian Commons and Commoning Asia. In a sense, therefore, we approached Asian Commons and Commoning Asia as concepts on the empirical ground that the authors had already developed. To us, this made most sense conceptually and methodologically. When we asked the authors to think about their work through the lens of Asian Commons and Commoning Asia, we were hoping that this would bring to the fore the aspect of “communing” organically. Each section of this book and each chapter dwelled on what it meant to think about Asia in a shared way even if the mainstream academic understanding may call it micro-studies. We think this is our first contribution as a collective, which is to use the constructed distinction between micro and macro studies to find connections and establish foundations for conversation and commoning at multiple scales within Asia. Following this, we think it also gives us a fruitful way to think about Cultural Studies in the Asian context.