Histories of Asia's Gendered Armed Frontiers, 1780-2021

Histories of Asia’s Gendered Armed Frontiers, 1780-2021 (HAGAF) is an ambitious five‑year research project funded through a prestigious European Research Council Advanced Grant. Led by Professor Mandy Sadan, the project will reshape how scholars and policymakers understand one of the world’s most complex and long‑running conflict regions: the Indo‑Burma borderlands.

This region—stretching across parts of Myanmar, northeast India, and the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh—has long been marked by political marginalisation, militarisation, and the enduring legacies of colonial frontier governance. Despite its strategic importance, it remains one of the least understood areas of Asia. HAGAF addresses this gap by bringing together historical, ethnographic, and community‑based research to build a new, inclusive account of how conflict has shaped everyday life over more than two centuries.

A central innovation of the project is its focus on gender and kinship as key to understanding how conflict is sustained, experienced, and remembered. Rather than treating the borderlands solely through the lens of armed groups or state security, HAGAF examines how households, families, and community networks have navigated upheaval and adapted to shifting political pressures. Distinctive highland kinship systems—often overlooked in mainstream histories—play a crucial role in shaping social organisation, authority, and resilience. By analysing these systems alongside archival and contemporary sources, the project offers a richer and more grounded understanding of how conflict becomes embedded in social life.

HAGAF aims to strengthen the visibility and voices of communities living in some of Asia’s most politically marginalised regions. By foregrounding gendered experiences and local knowledge, the project challenges dominant narratives and offers new ways of understanding how conflict persists—and how communities continue to adapt, resist, and imagine their futures.

This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme (Grant agreement no. 101200245).