Spaces of Solidarity

Rachel Sharples is a Researcher in the Challenging Racism Project in the School of Social Sciences and Psychology at Western Sydney University. She has worked with the Karen and conducted research in the Thai-Burma borderlands since 2002.

• List of IllustrationsPrefaceAcknowledgementsList of AbbreviationsMapsIntroduction: Spaces of SolidarityChapter 1. Movements across space: The Thai-Burma borderlands as a social constructChapter 2. From buffer zone to friendship bridge: The contemporary context of the Thai-Burma borderlandsChapter 3. By the shade of a tree: Scales of resistance, patterns of activismChapter 4. This story is not for myself: Paths of connectivity/networks of solidarityChapter 5. ‘Symbolic anchors of community’: Processes of cultural recoveryConclusion: The Space BetweenReferencesIndex

“The strength of this wonderful monograph is thus a form of participatory action research, in which neutrality is not desirable and in which the researcher has a strong stake in the struggle for justice and the reconstruction of home and freedom in political exile…Sharples succeeds to use her position to amplify the voices of a very vulnerable, but resourceful people.” • Anthropos“This is a first-rate book… One of its major strengths is the position of the author in writing from an informed position, following many years of immersion in the context.” • Linda Briskman, Western Sydney University