[TimorLesteStudies] Are no Timor-Leste writers writing?

[Charles Scheiner]

Friends,

As I review the plethora of announcements of recent publications 
about Timor-Leste announced, I'm struck that none of them are written 
by Timor-Leste citizens or residents.  Most of them are, I believe, 
written by people who have spent very little, if any, time here in 
the last few years.  Although I can't access most of the papers, I 
wonder how much their authors know about what's happening in this 
country now, except as seen through the eyes of other foreign 
academics with little local contact with Timorese people -- it's very 
rare to see a non-government Timorese source cited by a foreign academic.

Please encourage Timorese writers -- academics and others -- to 
write, circulate writings by Timorese people to this list, and use 
Timorese sources to inform your own knowledge. Imagine how Australia 
would be perceived if almost everything the wider world knew about 
the lucky country was filtered through the minds of Indonesians or Americans!

Thanks,
Charlie

***********************************************************
Charles Scheiner
La'o Hamutuk (The Timor-Leste Institute for Development Monitoring 
and Analysis)
P.O. Box 340, Dili, Timor-Leste (East Timor)
Telephone:  +670-3325013 or +670-734-0965 mobile
email: cscheiner at igc.org    website: 
http://www.laohamutuk.org    skype: cscheiner