Visualizing Southeast Asia in the classroom through film. Issues and possibilities

The expanding array in the last thirty years of documentaries, historical films, and fictional films on Southeast Asia, and produced from within the region, has provided an exciting resource pool for teaching about the region, not only for Southeast Asian cinema but also history, the social sciences, and other fields. The visual dimension is not new to the university classroom; images and films have become an important part of the teacher’s repertoire. Their effectiveness in terms of visualizing concepts, issues, events, and personalities and capturing the attention of student audiences has contributed to their popularity.