Jane M. Ferguson:
"Beyond Borders is a tremendous work which details—with considerable intimacy and reflection—the lives of both Yunnanese Chinese in Burma as well as those who later migrated from Burma to Thailand, Taiwan, and Mainland China. Its nuanced attention to the historical relationship between the Kuomintang, civilian traders, the Shan insurgencies, and the Burmese government is compelling, especially since the information deals with firsthand accounts. Although the author could very easily bog the reader down with acronyms, dates, and events in military or political history, the priority placed on the subjects' lives allows the reader to assimilate the context inductively rather than with a preemptive road map of sorts."
Hiu Ling Chan:
"Undergraduate and graduate students will benefit from this text. Chang shows how ethnographers build rapport with informants, let them speak for themselves, and preserve the 'thicknesses' of their stories using first-person narratives.... this book is an eye-opening addition to the literature on borderland diasporas in Southeast Asia."
Jack David Eller:
"Rather than focusing on social structures and globalization processes, Chang explicitly concentrates on individuals and biographies.... [W]e can certainly claim that a person-centered approach shakes up anthropological categories just as the lives of these individuals shake up political categories."
Mandy Sadan, SOAS University of London, author of Being and Becoming Kachin: Histories beyond the State in the Borderworlds of Burma:
"In Wen-Chin Chang's discussion of caravan trading, gendered trading lives, and the jade trade she combines the life story approach with pertinent and interesting theoretical analysis. This is a valuable addition to our understanding of the diverse life histories of people of Chinese origin in Burma, in which the author brings both humanity and insight to her subject."
Caroline Grillot:
"The strength of this book is the space the author gives to personal narratives. In this refreshing ethnography, Chang demonstrates how the vivid descriptions of life trajectories and intimate relationships of ordinary people, supported by clear explanations on the chaotic historical political circumstances in which they are grounded, can be more revealing than reconstituted realities inspired by scarce documentation available to foreign observers.... Besides the fascinating stories that nourish this account of a largely ignored Chinese diaspora, and the rigorous historical approach to their contemporary situation, this book is also a real pleasure to read."
James C. Scott, Sterling Professor of Political Science and Anthropology, Yale University:
"The best way to convey the color and tumult of a borderland diaspora is with vivid personal narratives. In Beyond Borders, the chaotic postwar experience of wars, the drug trade, regime change, and economic turmoil along the Yunnan-Burma frontier bursts to life as an all-too-human experience. Far more rewarding than any six-foot shelf of statistics and demography. An achievement."
Robert H. Taylor:
"If you enjoy a good gossip, nicely told and full of human interest, Beyond Borders will be of interest. For those with an interest in migration and human mobility, the volume provides a number of personal insights."
Tadayuki Kubo:
"Wen-Chin Chang's Beyond Borders: Stories of Yunnanese Chinese Migrants of Burma provides a rich personal history of Yunnanese Chinese migrants in South-East and East Asia.... The significance of the book is in having recorded the voices of the voiceless. It successfully avoids analysing case studies through the lens of ethnicity theories.... All in all, this individual-centred ethnography, backed by its narrative power, provides a rich comprehension of people’s lives across borders."
Jacques P. Leider, Ecole Française d'Extrême-Orient:
"Wen-Chin Chang's Beyond Borders is a masterpiece. It is both deeply human and superbly academic. It plunges the readers into the complex life-worlds of Yunnanese Chinese migrating through Burma, Thailand, and beyond, yet combines meticulous ethnographic scholarship with a careful and rigorous self-reflective approach. Beyond the rich descriptions of individual destinies, this book is also a fascinating guide to the political history and the challenging environments on the Southeast Asian margins."
