About
I study how the Global South remade the international order after 1945, mostly through the histories of Malaysia and Singapore.
I’m a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Harvard University Asia Center and a Senior Tutor in the Department of Malay Studies at the National University of Singapore. My work sits where the Cold War, international organizations and decolonization meet, with a focus on Muslim Southeast Asia and on how smaller states shaped the postwar order.
I received my PhD in History from Trinity College, Cambridge, where I was the Prince of Wales Student. Before that I studied history and Malay studies at NUS and was a Research Associate at the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute.
My name is sometimes written Muhammad Suhail bin Mohamed Yazid. Bin means “son of,” and Mohamed Yazid is my father’s name. I go by Suhail.
Writing
First book
He Who Is Made Lord
Empire, Class and Race in Postwar Singapore
ISEAS Publishing and University of Hawai‘i Press, 2023
Shortlisted for the 2025 Alan HJ Chan Spirit of Singapore Book Prize
Before Singapore had a president, it had a Yang di-Pertuan Negara, Malay for, roughly, “he who is made lord of the state.” This is the first detailed study of that office. It recovers the politics around it in late colonial Singapore, and the many meanings people found in it, through the lenses of empire, class and race.
“This book is exceptionally well researched.”
Muhammad Suhail Mohamed Yazid. He Who Is Made Lord: Empire, Class and Race in Postwar Singapore. Singapore: ISEAS Publishing; Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2023.
Reviewed in Asian Ethnicity, Asian Studies Review, Berita, BKI, JMBRAS, Kajian Malaysia, Pacific Affairs, The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History and Southeast Asian Studies.
Articles and chapters
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2026
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2026
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2021
“Singapore’s First Malay Minister: The Political Life of Abdul Hamid Bin Jumat”
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2020
Book reviews
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2025
Cold War Asia: A Visual History of Global Diplomacy, edited by Matthew Phillips and Naoko Shimazu
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2020
Aristocracy of Armed Talent: The Military Elite in Singapore, by Samuel Ling Wei Chan
Full list on Google Scholar.
Talks
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Book talk: He Who Is Made Lord
Interviews
“Global instability is not a new phenomenon.”
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Conversation
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Podcast
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Interview
Contact
Email is the best way to reach me.
mbinmohamedyazid at fas.harvard.edu
- Elsewhere
- Google Scholar, ORCID and LinkedIn
- Post
- Harvard University Asia Center
CGIS South, 1730 Cambridge Street
Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
For event organizers
A short bio you can use as is.
Muhammad Suhail Mohamed Yazid is a historian of global and international history and a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Harvard University Asia Center. His research examines how the Global South tried to remake the international system after 1945. He received his PhD in History from Trinity College, University of Cambridge, where he was the Prince of Wales Student, and is the author of He Who Is Made Lord: Empire, Class and Race in Postwar Singapore (ISEAS Publishing and University of Hawai‘i Press, 2023), shortlisted for the Alan HJ Chan Spirit of Singapore Book Prize.
