Contact
- workRoom EA13 Building E
Malaysia Campus
Jalan Broga
43500 Semenyih
Selangor Darul Ehsan
Malaysia - work+6 (03) 8924 8744
- ray.sandeep@nottingham.edu.my
Biography
Sandeep Ray is a visual artist, writer and historian. He is head of the School of Humanities. Prior to joining Nottingham Malaysia, Sandeep taught at the 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ of Wisconsin, Rice 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@, and the Singapore 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ of Technology and Design. His research emphasizes connections between media and history. Sandeep has related interests in non-fiction film; the novel; old media; global refugee crises; and transnational approaches to Asian Studies. His 2021 monograph Celluloid Colony (NUS Press) about ethnography in Dutch propagandistic film in colonial Indonesia was a finalist for the EuroSEAS 2022 Social Science Book Prize. His debut novel A Flutter in the Colony (Penguin Random House-SEA) is set in 1940s Bengal and 1950s Malaya and explores suppressed historical pasts through the experiences of an uprooted family. Sandeep has been a reviewer for several academic journals including the Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, American Historical Review, Historical Journal of Radio, Film and Television and History of Photography. In 2024, Sandeep received the David H. Culbert Routledge-IAMHIST Prize for Best Article by an Established Scholar. He was elected to the Council of the International Association for Media and History (IAMHIST) for a 4-year term in 2025.
Sandeep's films (IMDB link) have been reviewed in The American Anthropologist and the Journal for Visual Anthropology and have been screened at several film festivals including at Busan (BIFF), Taiwan (TIDF), Sydney, Paris (Jean Rouch), Tehran (IIFF), Copenhagen (DOX), and have curated at the Flaherty Seminar, the Margaret Mead Festival, the Films Division of India and the Whitney and Getty Museums. His films are distributed internationally by Documentary Educational Resources in Massachusetts. He recently had a solo photo exhibit at Hikayat Gallery, Penang titled Afternoon Histories. Sandeep has guest-lectured widely and been invited to serve on several festival juries.
Personal website: www.sandeepray.com
Teaching Summary
For the 25-26 AY I am teaching:
Documentary Film (Theory and Practice) HUMS 3014
Literature And Rebellion: Stories From Late-Colonial Southeast Asia HUMS 1007
Beginning Creative Writing HUMS 4026
188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ Summary
Sandeep will be a 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ing 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ Scholar at the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ from June to September 2025 to work on a new book project tentatively titled Scenes From a Slow… read more
Recent Publications
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2023. What Did the Haji Jawa See in Mecca? A film from 1928 as Primary Source, Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, 43:4, 1023-1049 Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television.
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2023. Susie Protschky. Photographic Subjects: Monarchy and Visual Culture in Colonial Indonesia. The American Historical Review. 128(3), 1427-1478
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2023. Frenemies on Film: Rescreening the Sino-Indian War of 1962 positions: asia critique. 31(4), 769-801
Current 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@
Sandeep will be a 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ing 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ Scholar at the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ from June to September 2025 to work on a new book project tentatively titled Scenes From a Slow Departure: Postwar visuals of Japanese Surrendered Personnel in Southeast Asia. He is analyzing film footage from archival various sources, including the National Archives of Singapore, the Imperial War Museum, NHK, and the Dutch repositories Eye Filmmuseum and Beeld en Geluid. The study also investigates associated secondary sources such as "dope sheets" (camera logs) and newspaper articles. Some of this material has already been located and archived, including declassified SEAC (South East Asia Command) reports. Contextualizing historically significant, at times gruesome footage, the study hopes to provide a multifaceted understanding of the aftermath of the Japanese occupation, extending scholarly discourse beyond textual and testimonial sources.
Collaborating with his students with support from the Singapore 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ of Technology and Design in 2021, Sandeep created an open database of primary sources for the study of the Japanese Occupation of Southeast Asia.
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2023. What Did the Haji Jawa See in Mecca? A film from 1928 as Primary Source, Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, 43:4, 1023-1049 Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television.
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2023. Susie Protschky. Photographic Subjects: Monarchy and Visual Culture in Colonial Indonesia. The American Historical Review. 128(3), 1427-1478
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2023. Frenemies on Film: Rescreening the Sino-Indian War of 1962 positions: asia critique. 31(4), 769-801
- KIM, HAN SANG and RAY, SANDEEP, 2023. Encountering Violence: Media and Memory in Asia positions: asia critique. 31(4), 733-740
- MCDONALD, K.,, RAY, S.,, YI, H. X.,, BALAJI, V. S. R.,, V. S. R., HUGHES,, RISAM, R., and GUILIANO, J., 2022. Review: Southeast Asia Under Japan Reviews in Digital Humanities. Volume 3(3),
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2018. Inadvertent Ethnography in Propaganda: J. C. Lamster’s Films (1912–13) Indonesia. 106(106), 137-56
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2018. The komedi bioscoop: Early cinema in Colonial Indonesia by Dafna Ruppin Journal of Southeast Asian Studies. 49(1), 163 - 164
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2017. Two Films and a Coronation: The Containment of Islam in Flores in the 1920s. In: Colonial Documentary Film in South and Southeast Asia Edinburgh 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ Press.
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2016. Epistemological Considerations of 188体育网址_188体育在线-【唯一授权网站】@ History Through Film with Reference to Indonesia Transnational Asia. 1(1),
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2015. Tanah Mama by Asrida Elizabeth Inside Indonesia. 119(Jan-Mar 2015),
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2015. Review: To Singapore, with Love New Mandala.
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2014. Film review: Daniel Ziv’s acclaimed 'Jalanan' Inside Indonesia. 118(Oct-Dec 2014),
- RAY, SANDEEP, 2014. Film review: Atambua 39? Celsius Inside Indonesia. 117(Jul-Sep 2014),
