This panel focuses on research into the commonalities in society, ideology, art, and culture that potentially existed along the East-West Cultural Corridor of Mainland Southeast Asia (MSEA), from Vietnam through Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Myanmar. Cultural, social and ideological connections have been identified from the Palaeolithic onwards, and manifest in the types of material culture recorded across the region, as well as the emergence and diversification of burial traditions. Recent research has indicated that both ‘local’ and long-distance trading and exchange networks likely existed from the Late Pleistocene. There is still a substantial amount that we do not yet understand about the relationships between communities across MSEA. We invite research papers centred on identifying and interpreting communication networks and cultural relationships between the various regions of MSEA in the past. This panel is aimed at bringing together practitioners in the hope of enhancing our knowledge of the long-term interactions between human populations.