Zomia

Zomia, also described as the Southeast Asian Massif, is a geographical term for the highland region above roughly 300 meters that stretches across parts of ten countries, including southwest China, northeast India, eastern Bangladesh, and the uplands of Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, peninsular Malaysia, and Taiwan. Home to some 100 million people from highly diverse ethnic and linguistic groups, the region is defined less by political borders than by its rugged terrain and the historical distance of its upland societies from lowland state governments.