Sunday, January 7
This symposium aims to contribute to the international and interdisciplinary discussion on the relationship between food and subsistence diversity, and biological diversity (diversity of ecosystems, species, and individual organisms).
Wednesday, January 31
This talk demonstrates how throughout the 1950s and early 1970s in Cambodia, scholarship focused on precolonial chronicles remained a dominant stream of collective historical imagination, alongside the colonial model of historiography. While chronicle scholarship emerged as a series of myths that encompassed very little sense of historical truth, the chronicle’s hegemonic role can be examined through its involvement in the composition of official textbooks, its significance to and influence on people’s collective values and beliefs, and finally its existence as an attractive source material for the production of popular and royal court cultural elements.
Thursday, February 1
Friday, February 2
Leong Clancy Fellowship Annual Lecture 2024, by Berkeley PhD student Gus Holley (4pm), followed by a musical performance (5:30pm)
The film tells the true story of evacuees from Futaba in Fukushima. Unable to return to their hometown because of the ongoing disaster of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, residents are scattered throughout the country and mourn the loss not only of their community but of their traditions, such as the Futaba Bon-Uta, a festival musical performance they have celebrated for centuries.
Friday, February 9
The Center for Korean Studies at UC Berkeley is honored to introduce the 2023 winner of the UC Berkeley Hong Yung Lee Book Award in Korean Studies, Language and Truth in North Korea (University of Hawai’i Press, 2021), by Professor Sonia Ryang (Rice University).
Thursday, February 15
Jane Jin Kaisen will do a screening of her recent short film Burial of this Order (2022), followed by a talk and Q&A.
We are the same substance! Zongmi’s theory of the True Mind
Jenny Hung , Assistant Professor, Division of Humanities at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.
Zongmi 圭峯宗密 (780-841) was a prominent Chinese Buddhist scholar who lived during the Tang Dynasty. He is considered to be one of the most important figures in the development of Chinese Buddhism, particularly the Huayan (Flower Garland) and the Chan school. When constructing his own theory of mind and nature, Zongmi proposed the concept of “true mind of original enlightenment” (本覺真心 benjue zhenxin).
In this presentation, I argue for two claims about the true mind: (1) we are the same substance: the true mind. Moreover, (2) the true mind is a cosmic mind, a fundamental mental substance as one unified whole, that is also the ontological ground of the myriad entities. I provide two interpretations of the characteristics of the true mind. The first is to say that it is pure awareness without content. The second is to say that it is pure awareness of all sentient being’s minds. I then devise a unity theory of consciousness modified from Brentano (1874/1995), according to which inner awareness is what unifies experience. I illustrate that this theory can be applied to explain how experiences merge to form a cosmic true mind, while each ordinary mind does not feel so.
Jenny Hung is an assistant professor in the Division of Humanities at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. She has two PhDs, one in philosophy, another in nanophysics. She investigates the nature of the self from both the Western and Eastern perspectives. She published in Philosophical Psychology, Philosophy East and West, Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy, Asian Philosophy, History of Philosophy and Logic, etc. She is now working on two books: Between Buddha-nature and Emptiness: The Peak Era of Chinese Buddhism (OUP) and What am I? Personal Ontology in Chinese Philosophy (under review).
Friday, February 16
This conference will thus be focused on political institutions as an aspect of transregional history, especially those involving collaborative governance, consultation, or condominial sovereignty. In the period under consideration, political institutions and traditions played a central role in integrating diverse regions or political cultures, building new, larger polities, and functioning as systems of extraction that moved goods, currency, and people across great distances.
Thursday, February 22
Lu Xun, one of the most important modern Chinese writers, once warned: “As long as you can still hear wailing, sighing, crying and begging, you should not be too worried. But confronted with cold silence, you must be careful: … it is the harbinger of real anger.”
Thinking across Ethnic Studies, Asian American Studies, and Southeast Asian Studies, this talk draws upon selected visual readings to examine how war losses incurred by Vietnamese bodies became incorporated back into the U.S. racial capitalist mode of production as site of value generation and extraction across race.
The ’Nanjing Miracle’ Reinterpreted: The Cult and Yogic Practices of the Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara in Ming China
2024 Khyentse Lecture
Shen Weirong, Tsinghua University, Beijing
Shen Weirong holds a Ph.D. in Central Asian Science of Language and Culture from Bonn University (1998). Currently, he is Professor of Tibetan and Buddhist Philology at Tsinghua University, Beijing. He is the author of Leben und historische Bedeutung des ersten Dalai Lama dGe ’dun grub pa dpal bzang po (1391–1474)—Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der dGe lugs pa-Schule und der Institution der Dalai Lama (Styler Verlag, Institut Monumenta Serica, St. Augustin, Germany, 2002) and Philological Studies of Tibetan History and Buddhism (Shanghai Press of Chinese Classics, 2010).
Thursday, February 29
For the past two decades since 2003, approximately 20 South Korean films have achieved the status of ‘Cheonman Yeonghwa,’ recording over 10 million ticket sales—the highest index of domestic popularity. While their dynamic diversity and industrial issues within mainstream Korean cinema have been extensively discussed, this talk directs critical attention to their shared sociopolitical foundation in terms of psychoanalytic biopolitics.
This talk explores the kinds of political and economic systems, agricultural landscapes, ecological sacrifices, and labor that are necessary to produce coffee in Vietnam, the world’s second largest coffee producing country.
Friday, March 1
When can “machines be seen as the measure of men”, as the historian Michael Adas so beautifully opined? This talk focuses on three moments when technology became crucial in “wiring” maritime Asia into larger landscapes of modernity and colonization. First, we examine the laying of telegraphs across Indochina’s coasts en route to China, as the French started to plant flags in this part of the world. Second, we will look at the notion of building a canal across the Isthmus of Kra, in what is today southern Thailand, and what was then the semi-independent kingdom of Siam. Finally, we will also analyze the spread of lighthouses as Foucauldian instruments of coercion in the Anglo-Dutch sphere of Insular Southeast Asia, in land-and seascapes that currently comprise Malaysia and Indonesia. I argue in this presentation that all of these Asian processes were inter-related, and that they show in regional miniature the shadow and shape of larger forces that were then sweeping the globe.
Thursday, March 7
Presenting part of her book-in-progress, Dignity Archives, Kim examines the discourses of roadkill, habitat fragmentation, and animal confinement in relation to roads and in/human otherness. Through an analysis of contemporary cultural texts in various media, Kim reflects on the dignity that is revealed in the material presence of dead animals on the roadside, even in the absence of social mourning for them.
Friday, March 8
Southeast Asian Students for OrgaNizing (SEASON) Conference is a 2-day conference with various advocacy training workshops, keynote speakers, and community building activities. Our main goal is to provide a safe space for Southeast Asian students nationwide to strategize campus-based actions to effectively advocate for their community.
This year’s theme is LegaSEA: Leading a legacy involves creating a lasting impact or contribution that is remembered and valued by future generations. Students will learn from Southeast Asian organizations and community leaders from various fields to learn about what legacy they want to lead and leave behind.
RSVP priority deadline is February 24th. RSVP here
You can find this form and additional information at https://seasonconference.wixsite.com/home.
Additionally, if you have questions regarding SEASON, please do not hesitate to contact us via email at seasonconference@gmail.com.
This conference will bring together scholars from Europe, Asia and North America and serve as a platform for our graduate students and recent graduates with a specialization in Nepal, as well as current postdoctoral fellows, to present their work.
This talk presents a fascinating look at the anxious pleasures of Japanese visual culture during World War II.
This talk explores the stratified community that emerged under George Clunies-Ross, the kingly master of the Cocos-Keeling Islands from 1871 until his death in 1910.
Please kindly note this event has been rescheduled to 4pm, Friday March 8 at the same venue due to an emergency. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.
Like any theoretical term, the word local, together with its conceptual affiliates such as localism, locus, and location, invites different approaches of exploration, but in the context of Hong Kong literature and culture, the question that seems unavoidable is why and how the local as such has become or persisted as a question worth asking. In a world that is increasingly described as global (with Hong Kong officially promoting itself as “Asia’s World City”) but also simultaneous and instantaneous, should the local be understood as a time lag, a gap, and a pause in that incessant stream of simultaneity and instantaneity? If locality needs to involve time as much as space, how should it be discussed, in film and other visual media, other than factographically?
Saturday, March 9
This conference will bring together scholars from Europe, Asia and North America and serve as a platform for our graduate students and recent graduates with a specialization in Nepal, as well as current postdoctoral fellows, to present their work.
Sunday, March 10
This conference will bring together scholars from Europe, Asia and North America and serve as a platform for our graduate students and recent graduates with a specialization in Nepal, as well as current postdoctoral fellows, to present their work.
Tuesday, March 12
This talk asks: Having survived the colonial era, the World Wars, and through the end of the Cold War, how did the royalist elite of Thailand manage to survive US withdrawal from the Vietnam War without having the kingdom overrun by communist forces and even maintain a degree of dominance in domestic politics?
Tuesday, March 19
This talk focuses on circumstances in Myanmar to identify the indeterminate nature of political activist time. Activists must assess any action both for what it does (relatively) immediately, and for what it might produce in the (relatively) longer term: provisional failures can be resources for future victories, while erstwhile successes can become sundered after their moment of apparent achievement.
“The Yaksha Kingdom” (Yecha guo) in Liaozhai zhiyi 聊齋誌異 (Liaozhai’s Records of the Strange) by Pu Songling 蒲松齡 (1640-1715) tells the story of a Chinese merchant who suffers a shipwreck, drifts to an island, and with no better options, establishes a family with a female islander whom he identifies as a yakshini (mu yecha 母夜叉). This tale, intertwining fear, despair, reconciliation and humor, is a rewriting of earlier Chinese yaksha narratives, which emerged with the spread of Buddhism into China during the medieval period. Placing the tale within the context of cross-cultural encounters, this talk will examine the yakshas’ transition from Indian to Chinese culture and their various depictions in the Tang dynasty tales. It will also consider the recurring theme of the perils faced by shipwrecked merchant as portrayed in Yijian zhi 夷堅志 (Records of Yijian) from the Southern Song period. These two veins of investigation will enable us to further analyze how Pu Songling transforms the traditional horrific yaksha encounters into a nuanced story of separation and reunion, and to gain insight into the literary and cultural significance of this fantastic tale, which blends irony, ambivalence and shades of hope.
Wednesday, March 20
Activism, in its collective form, has become a ubiquitous practice for those members in Japanese opposition or minority groups, using different methods and approaches to make their voice heard. Using theoretical tools that read into the choir and polyphony in Mikhail Bakhtin and Jacques Rancière’s writings, I argue that the choir is the immediate embodiment of polyphony, but also transformation of the silenced into the arena of activism and voicing of minorities who were silenced and left behind, in the name of Japanese homogeneity
Thursday, March 21
When we study modern Buddhist history, we often use “modernity” as a frame of reference. But in the case of women, how well-balanced is the picture of the period that the term “modernity” provides? My argument is that assessing modernity through the creation of institutions and reforms does not tell the whole story of women’s history and their lives.
Language and language education are two central topics in the studies of Chinese diasporic culture. However, existing scholarship has overwhelmingly focused on how overseas Chinese populations deal with language politics in their hosting societies. This talk adopts a different perspective by examining how overseas Chinese played central roles in establishing Indonesian language programs in mainland China between the mid-1940s and mid-1960s.
This talk will examine writings by and about the men and women of one Huzhou literati family to explore its fraught process of reinvention in the wake of personal and political disarray during the Qing conquest. The complex interplay of familial and political meanings of loyalty and disloyalty is a central theme of this story. Two brothers of the Fei family fought with Ming loyalist forces to defend their hometown against the Qing invaders, one dying valiantly, while a second went on to write a secret account of the region’s notorious literary inquisition in the 1660s that implicated thousands of people in a seditious history of the fallen Ming Dynasty. Their younger brother and his son worked assiduously to build political and economic foundations for success as officials loyal to the new dynasty. Yet the family’s traumas continued to haunt them, shaping personalities and priorities in gendered ways, complicating aspirations for family cohesion, and presaging the betrayals that would destroy the family in the mid-eighteenth century.
Friday, March 22
The Centers for Japanese Studies and Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, together with Ōtani University and Ryūkoku University in Kyoto announce a workshop under the supervision of Mark Blum that will focus on critically examining premodern and modern hermeneutics of the Tannishō, a core text of the Shin sect of Buddhism, and arguably the most well-read religious text in postwar Japan.
Saturday, March 23
The Centers for Japanese Studies and Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, together with Ōtani University and Ryūkoku University in Kyoto announce a workshop under the supervision of Mark Blum that will focus on critically examining premodern and modern hermeneutics of the Tannishō, a core text of the Shin sect of Buddhism, and arguably the most well-read religious text in postwar Japan.
Wednesday, March 27
The Institute of Buddhist Studies and the Center for Japanese Studies at UC Berkeley are excited to announce this bilingual workshop, which brings together chaplaincy educators and working chaplains in Japan and the United States to reflect on how we connect Buddhist teachings with effective service.
Thursday, April 4
In this talk, I offer a critical reading of key scenes in One to One. I consider these scenes in relation to representations of orphanhood, Christian benevolence, and faith-based humanitarianism in the musical performances by the Korean Children’s Choir (formerly known as the World Vision Korean Orphan Choir) and by Julie Andrews.
How do European-language scholars with a Western cultural background perceive, understand and describe the human phenomena they observe in East Asia? How does their mind process written or spoken information conveyed in foreign script and languages? This lecture will discuss the cognitive and epistemological relationship existing between Sinology and source-language data from several complementary perspectives, including the role of metalanguage and culturally predetermined categories in the generation of learned discourse, the formation of terminologies, the coinage of neologisms, the epistemic value of the information produced, and the conditions of its reception by neighbouring disciplines in the humanities and by the educated public.
Friday, April 5
This lecture retells the story of Dunhuang art through the perspective of space. This is necessary because although there are countless overviews of the art of Dunhuang, the framework is generally temporal. Guided by the dynasties of China’s past, these overviews present a linear history of the Mogao Caves, supplanting the actual place with an abstract temporal sequence. This lecture presents an alternative narrative based on visitors’ experience and discusses some representative caves to demonstrate a new methodology in studying Dunhuang art Mogao.
Tuesday, April 9
In conjunction with the International Decade of Indigenous Languages, GETSEA, CSEAS and the Bophana Center present four short films by Indigenous Cambodian filmmakers on the themes of “Healing, Memory & Care.”
Wednesday, April 10
Through poetic exploration of voice, body, and costume, performer Aine Nakamura (Ph.D. student, Music) will present a new performance, Okaiko.
Thursday, April 11
This talk seeks to shed light on both the Philippines’ fraught democratic trajectory as well as its high-stakes diplomacy vis-à-vis the superpowers. Crucially, it also analyzes how deepening US-China competition is dramatically affecting the fate of pivotal states across the Indo-Pacific region.
The Birth of Prince Siddhārtha: From Divergent Textual Sources to Distinct Visual Narratives
Osmund Bopearachchi, Chao Visiting Professor of Buddhist Art
University of California, Berkeley
Monday, April 15
The Bancroft Library’s collections of materials relating to the Philippines span nearly 500 years. Highlights in this exhibit include a transcript of an Inquisitorial trial from 1646, a prayer book written in the Cebuano language, and UC Berkeley Filipino student publications from 1905 to the present. The exhibit also features selections from the personal papers of acclaimed author Jessica Hagedorn, including typewritten drafts of her novels, poetry, song lyrics, and a screenplay, as well as childhood drawings and writings.
Tuesday, April 16
The Bancroft Library’s collections of materials relating to the Philippines span nearly 500 years. Highlights in this exhibit include a transcript of an Inquisitorial trial from 1646, a prayer book written in the Cebuano language, and UC Berkeley Filipino student publications from 1905 to the present. The exhibit also features selections from the personal papers of acclaimed author Jessica Hagedorn, including typewritten drafts of her novels, poetry, song lyrics, and a screenplay, as well as childhood drawings and writings.
Wednesday, April 17
The Bancroft Library’s collections of materials relating to the Philippines span nearly 500 years. Highlights in this exhibit include a transcript of an Inquisitorial trial from 1646, a prayer book written in the Cebuano language, and UC Berkeley Filipino student publications from 1905 to the present. The exhibit also features selections from the personal papers of acclaimed author Jessica Hagedorn, including typewritten drafts of her novels, poetry, song lyrics, and a screenplay, as well as childhood drawings and writings.
Thursday, April 18
The Bancroft Library’s collections of materials relating to the Philippines span nearly 500 years. Highlights in this exhibit include a transcript of an Inquisitorial trial from 1646, a prayer book written in the Cebuano language, and UC Berkeley Filipino student publications from 1905 to the present. The exhibit also features selections from the personal papers of acclaimed author Jessica Hagedorn, including typewritten drafts of her novels, poetry, song lyrics, and a screenplay, as well as childhood drawings and writings.
I would like to raise the question of militarism to view Korean modernization beyond the idea of colonial modernity and colonial exploitation.
In this talk, Peter Frankopan will talk about the past, present and future of the Silk Roads, and set out some ideas of the benefits and challenges of focusing of joining up geographies, cultures, disciplines and periods that link Asia, Africa and Europe.
Friday, April 19
To mark the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War, April 30, 1975, this conference, sponsored by the Department of History and CSEAS, features scholarship that centers Vietnamese individuals, communities, movements, institutions, and discourses in the history of twentieth century Vietnam.
This talk examines the strange case of the historiography of the Vietnam War, where a major belligerent, South Vietnam, has been consistently left out, depicted only as the background cast.
Tuesday, April 23
This book launch features renowned poet, artist, and writer Afrizal Malna, whose poetry collection, Document Shredding Museum, was recently translated by UCB Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies (DSSEAS) graduate student Daniel Owen.
Thursday, April 25
Through the story of Annah la Javanaise, a trafficked 13-year-old girl who was found wandering the streets of Paris in 1893 and who became the maid and model of painter Paul Gauguin, Fatimah Tobing Rony introduces theories of visual biopolitics to examine those who are allowed to live and those who are allowed to die, in representations of Indonesian women. In her talk she will be reading from her book and screening her short, animated film, Annah la Javanaise.
Widely acclaimed as China’s foremost 20th century painter, Chang Dai-chien (1899-1983) spent his last three decades living in self-imposed exile from his beloved homeland. This film unravels the mystery and controversy of his creative and spiritual quest abroad and his journey East to West to become an artist of global significance.
“Of Color and Ink” is a feature-length documentary that follows the journey of the Chinese artist Chang Dai-chien as he embarks on a quest from the East to the West in search of the Peach Blossom Spring, a utopian place of life and the ultimate truth of art. The film delves into Chang’s extraordinary exile journey and sheds light on his mission in the global art world.
Monday, April 29
This talk examines the DRV’s nation-building project since 1955 through a close examination of the ways in which “sex” entered the language, and from there to be deployed by the state.
Monday, May 6
This talk examines enduring fears and anxieties about ‘Chineseness’ that widely circulate in the Philippine social and cultural imaginary.
Wednesday, September 4, 2024
Jane Ferguson considers the meanings of motion picture “remakes” in Burma in the parliamentary democracy years (1948-1962) and the socialist era (1962-1988), exploring the remake as a cultural bellwether for Burmese engagement with global cinema.
Thursday, September 5, 2024
Unprecedented challenges from geopolitical rivalry, emerging technology, and autocratic bloc formation have rendered ineffective many of the traditional institutions of regional and global governance including the UN, WTO, and G20. The mandate is not to create new institutions but to “bend” existing ones to meet the moment. The G7 is the only viable institution of like-minded partners to support the rules-based international order. However, reforms are necessary for the grouping to take on this task, including an expanded role for industrialized Asian democracies.
In this talk I will consider in what sense the three surviving works of the 2nd cent. Buddhist monk (bhadanta) and great poet (mahākavi) Aśvaghoṣa of Sāketa can be identified as Buddhist poetry (kāvya). The question of “What makes a poem Buddhist?” finds analogues in a long line of disputes recorded in Alaṅkāraśāstra treatises seeking to define poetry as a distinct form of literature. Was Aśvaghoṣa a Buddhist monk who composed poetry, or was he a poet who composed Buddhist poetry? Or something else altogether? Is what he himself declares about the purpose of his literary activity credible?
Thursday, September 12, 2024
Patrick Flores looks at how the American colonial project partly shaped Philippine national form through a matrix of images from different periods in art history.
This paper analyses the evolution of the Korean film industry from its struggling inception to its global prominence as an interplay of market liberalization, state intervention, and the rise of new players. The process of market liberalization, which initially seemed like a potential threat, ultimately served as a pivotal window of opportunity for the industry’s transformation. This was not the demise of the local movie industry, but rather an opening for new firms with profit motivations to enter the scene.
2024 Numata Lecture in Buddhist Studies
Antonello Palumbo
Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies, UC Berkeley
Friday, September 13, 2024
Celebrate the publication of Bangtan Remixed: A Critical BTS Reader, which delves into the impact of celebrated K-Pop boy band BTS, exploring their history, aesthetics, and the fan culture and industry that surrounds them. The collection’s contributors approach BTS through inventive and wide-ranging perspectives to show how one band can inspire millions and provide a broad range of insights into contemporary social and political life.
Tuesday, September 17, 2024
Filmmaker, author and artist Jean-Baptiste Phou screens an excerpt from his play, Cambodia, Here I Am, and screens his short film, My Mother’s Tongue, followed by a discussion.
Thursday, September 19, 2024
Author Jean-Baptiste Phou screens an excerpt from his stage adaptation of L’anarchiste (Soth Polin, 1980) and reads from his recently translated memoir, Coming Out of My Skin (Seagull Books, 2023, trans. Edward Gauvin), followed by a discussion.
This book starts with a paradox in Korea’s economic development: an ultra-modern industrial economy has been achieved, yet traditional networks of obligation and solidarity, such as blood, school, and regional ties have persisted, and even become more deeply reinforced, profoundly affecting the fundamental aspects of Korean politics and socio-economic relations. This book contends that this paradox is not accidental, and that the course of Korea’s late economic development shaped and entrenched these “primordial” ties into Korea’s politics, society, and economy.
Friday, September 20, 2024
In Crossings, a group of international women peacemakers sets out on a risky journey across the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea, calling for an end to a 70-year war that has divided the Korean peninsula and its people. Comprised of Nobel Peace Laureates and renowned activists like Gloria Steinem and Christine Ahn, the intrepid team faces daunting logistical and political challenges as they forge a path with their Korean sisters toward peace and reconciliation.
This performance is a celebration of the vibrancy and continuity of Khmer arts amidst conflict and displacement.
Monday, September 23, 2024
Learn about wax resist dyed textiles from the island of Java in Indonesia with Ibu Dalmini, master batik artist.
Wednesday, September 25, 2024
Kimberly Kay Hoang, Professor of Sociology at the University of Chicago, will discuss her recent book, Spiderweb Capitalism which analyzes the shadow economy of offshore finance, uncovering the mechanics behind the invisible, mundane networks of lawyers, accountants, company secretaries, and fixers who facilitate the illicit movement of wealth across borders and around the globe.
Thursday, September 26, 2024
In the mid-1990s, China’s hope for a “reverse brain drain” of overseas scientists, academics, and entrepreneurs stalled. So, in 2001, Jiang Zemin introduced China’s ‘Diaspora Option,’ to encourage PRC-born Chinese living abroad to “serve the country” without “returning to the country.” Through a multipronged array of programs organized by government ministries and the CCP, these former citizens have transferred their knowledge back home, some to repay or strengthen their former homeland, others from self-interest.
In 2018, the Trump Administration declared war on China’s efforts to access this information through the “China Initiative.” Hundreds of Chinese were investigated, their research was disrupted, and more than 100 were fired. Yet almost none were found guilty of espionage or theft of intellectual property.
This seminar documents China’s “over-the-top” effort to gain the help of these talented Chinese, as well as the US government’s harsh effort to disrupt the transfer of US technology to China. It tells the stories of unknown victims of that campaign. It also highlights the harm this war has brought to Sino-American academic exchanges and scientific collaboration.
Friday, September 27, 2024
Join us for an insightful discussion on how People’s Republic of China has exerted pressure on academic freedom in think tanks and universities around the world. This event will feature remarks from three distinguished speakers, each offering a unique perspective on the challenges posed by China’s influence on academic institutions.
Speakers:
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Salvatore Babones is a quantitative comparative sociologist whose research focuses on the political sociology of democracy. He is a prominent commentator on public policy issues, especially in Australian higher education, and his work has been widely cited. Babones is the author of The New Authoritarianism: Trump, Populism, and the Tyranny of Experts, which was recognized by the Wall Street Journal as one of the Best on Politics in 2018. He is currently researching a book on Indian democracy.
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Mikko Huotari is the Executive Director of MERICS (Mercator Institute for China Studies). His research delves into China’s political and economic development, foreign policy, and China-Europe relations, with a focus on global economic governance and competition. Huotari has extensively published on China’s rise as a financial power, its trade and investment relations with Europe, and the geopolitical shifts related to China’s emergence as a global security actor.
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Jeffrey Fields serves as the Special Agent in Charge of the San Francisco FBI Field Office. With a deep understanding of national security and intelligence, Fields brings a critical perspective on the implications of foreign influence on academic institutions, particularly within the context of China’s global strategies.
Through the fascinating story of the Sufi master Aghā-yi Buzurg and her path to becoming the ‘Great Lady’ in sixteenth-century Bukhara, Aziza Shanazarova invites readers into the little-known world of female religious authority in early modern Islamic Central Asia, offering a far more nuanced gender history than previously recognized. Her recently published book, Female Religiosity in Central Asia: Sufi Leaders in the Persianate World, challenges traditional narratives by mapping female religious authority onto early modern Muslim contexts, reshaping the debate on women and religion by viewing gender as a historical construct. Drawing on previously unknown primary sources, Shanazarova highlights a rich world of female religiosity involving communal leadership, competition for spiritual authority, and negotiation with the political elite, transforming our understanding of women’s history in early modern Central Asia.
Tuesday, October 1, 2024
Breaking The Cycle captures the political awakening among Thais after the rise and fall of Thanathorn, a young politician who calls to end the cycle of coups d’etat in the 2019 election.
Friday, October 4, 2024
The post-500 CE period in South and Southeast Asian Buddhism came with various religious, socio-political, and economic changes. Patronage patterns changed dramatically after the decline of the imperial Guptas; Brahmanical religions and image-based practices began to gain significant popularity, followed by changing ritual technology with the compilation and dissemination of tantric texts by the early medieval period. Fertile artistic advancements at new and longstanding Buddhist monastic centers responded to these changes. This conference brings together scholars discussing the adaptations, innovations, and interactions in Buddhist art of the medieval period at both the center and periphery of Buddhist South and Southeast Asia through diverse topics. Papers that take the form of case studies, comparative analysis, and diachronic analysis focused on the intertwined themes of changing ritual and patronage, congruent patterns of artistic innovation, gender, and the roles of the marginalized in Buddhism will add to a rich tapestry of a globally connected yet regionally and locally distinct medieval Buddhist South and Southeast Asia.
This panel discussion will explore the challenges and successes in safeguarding the rich heritage of Chinese American art and architecture, highlighting notable examples of the Chinatown San Francisco. Panelists will examine current initiatives in protecting Chinese American art and architecture, shedding light on the systemic and practical obstacles that hinder preservation. By integrating historical perspectives with contemporary realities, this discussion aims to stimulate dialogue on innovative strategies to better preserve and celebrate this vital aspect of American cultural history.
Saturday, October 5, 2024
The post-500 CE period in South and Southeast Asian Buddhism came with various religious, socio-political, and economic changes. Patronage patterns changed dramatically after the decline of the imperial Guptas; Brahmanical religions and image-based practices began to gain significant popularity, followed by changing ritual technology with the compilation and dissemination of tantric texts by the early medieval period. Fertile artistic advancements at new and longstanding Buddhist monastic centers responded to these changes. This conference brings together scholars discussing the adaptations, innovations, and interactions in Buddhist art of the medieval period at both the center and periphery of Buddhist South and Southeast Asia through diverse topics. Papers that take the form of case studies, comparative analysis, and diachronic analysis focused on the intertwined themes of changing ritual and patronage, congruent patterns of artistic innovation, gender, and the roles of the marginalized in Buddhism will add to a rich tapestry of a globally connected yet regionally and locally distinct medieval Buddhist South and Southeast Asia.
Tuesday, October 8, 2024
Over the last 25 years, South Korea has witnessed growing inequality through non-standard employment, mushrooming real estate prices, and the growth of its super-conglomerates. That this expansion has taken place amid declining rates of economic growth and turbulent political events marks a departure from Korea’s past recognition as a high growth ‘developmental state.’ This presentation insists that to understand the challenges associated with this transformation what is needed is nothing less than a revision of the very standpoint of developmental state research itself.
Wednesday, October 9, 2024
The Asian American Research Center, Asian American and Asian Diaspora Studies, Asian Pacific American Student Development, and the Asian American Political Activation program are pleased to announce the inaugural Critical Southeast Asian American Studies Artist in Residence, Nyingv Jae Saechao, who will be joining us at UC Berkeley from October 9 -11, 2024.
What does press freedom mean in the age of algorithms? And are there still spaces where independent media can hold power to account?
Join artist Nyingv Jae Saechao for an evening of poetry, storytelling, and community dialogue. Nyingv Jae will perform selections from their latest writing collection, Rice Water Reflections, an exploration of identity, memory, language and spirituality in relationship to their gender-expansive lineages and deep indigenous refugee roots. Following the poetry reading, Nyingv Jae will lead a community conversation, delving into the themes of their work and discussing the transformative power of creativity x culture and reflecting on how art and storytelling can serve as catalysts for social change, cultural autonomy, and collective healing in Khmu, Iu Mien and other Southeast Asian communities of diaspora.
Thursday, October 10, 2024
Scholar and artist Dewi Candraningrum discusses the organizing efforts of women and other community members in North Kendeng, Central Java, Indonesia, in the face of ecologically destructive cement mining. Candraningrum also situates their resistance in relation to her own engagement with them as an artist and activist.
Duo YUMENO (Yoko Reikano Kimura, koto and voice, and Hikaru Tamaki, cello) present a new work written for them by UC Berkeley professor and composer Ken Ueno. Ueno will give a short talk following the performance of his piece, which will be followed by a food and drink reception.
Re-reading the Scripture in Forty-two Sections (Sishier zhang jing 四十二章經, T784): New Light on an Enigmatic Text
In this talk, Eleana Kim discusses the ecological, cultural, and political transformations that have contributed to the DMZ’s resignification from a scar of fratricidal war to a green belt representing biodiversity and peace. Drawing upon ethnographic research in the border areas near the DMZ, this talk examines ecological encounters that hold promise for a different kind of politics at time of heightened military tensions on the peninsula.
Friday, October 11, 2024
The Asian American Research Center, Asian American and Asian Diaspora Studies, Asian Pacific American Student Development, and the Asian American Political Activation program are pleased to announce the inaugural Critical Southeast Asian American Studies Artist in Residence, Nyingv Jae Saechao, who will be joining us at UC Berkeley from October 9 -11, 2024.
Thursday, October 17, 2024
Author talk with New York Times’ diplomatic correspondent and Berkeley Journalism alum Edward Wong ’98.
Friday, October 18, 2024
AMERICA LED THE GLOBAL TRADING SYSTEM FOR 75 YEARS. NOW, IT’S WALKING OUT.
From tariff wars to torn-up trade agreements, Michael Beeman explores America’s recent and dramatic turn away from support for freer, rules-based trade to instead go its own new way. Focusing on America’s trade engagements in the Asia-Pacific, he contrasts the trade policy choices made by America’s leaders over several generations with those of today-decisions that are now undermining the trading system America created and triggering new tensions between America and its trading partners, allies and adversaries alike.
Advances in AI, exemplified in tools like ChatGPT and perplexity.ai, are likely to have a broad impact on the humanities, and the field of Buddhist Studies is no exception. As computers become more proficient at both the translation and analysis of Buddhist texts, one wonders what the effects will be on the training of graduate students and the nature of the field. The Numata Center for Buddhist Studies at UC Berkeley is hosting a two-day workshop (October 18-19, 2024) to take measure of the present status of these new technologies and to assess their future impact. The workshop is organized in collaboration with Kurt Keutzer and Sebastian Nehrdich of the Berkeley AI Research lab, who are developers of the MITRA translation system for the languages of Buddhism, and Jann Ronis, Executive Director of the Buddhist Digital Research Center.
Saturday, October 19, 2024
Advances in AI, exemplified in tools like ChatGPT and perplexity.ai, are likely to have a broad impact on the humanities, and the field of Buddhist Studies is no exception. As computers become more proficient at both the translation and analysis of Buddhist texts, one wonders what the effects will be on the training of graduate students and the nature of the field. The Numata Center for Buddhist Studies at UC Berkeley is hosting a two-day workshop (October 18-19, 2024) to take measure of the present status of these new technologies and to assess their future impact. The workshop is organized in collaboration with Kurt Keutzer and Sebastian Nehrdich of the Berkeley AI Research lab, who are developers of the MITRA translation system for the languages of Buddhism, and Jann Ronis, Executive Director of the Buddhist Digital Research Center.
Tuesday, October 22, 2024
ARF’s Special Fall Lecture by Dr. Barbara L. Voss (Stanford University) presents work-in-progress from a new book project about Chinese diaspora archaeology that connects archaeological research on historic Chinese American communities with parallel studies of qiaoxiang – home villages of Chinese migrants – in Guangdong Province, China. Through close analysis of the production, circulation, and use of selected artifacts, this project traces the material practices through which Chinese migrants and their kin in China developed and sustained social and economic networks across the Pacific.
Thursday, October 24, 2024
Film critic Paul Kendel Fonoroff delves into the history of Chinese cinema and shines a light on Berkeley’s unique resources for research on East Asia. The Paul K. Fonoroff collection offers an extraordinary window onto Shanghai and Hong Kong cinematic history. It is also a treasure trove for the exploration of popular culture in Greater China and amongst the Southeast Asian Chinese diaspora. Fonoroff will discuss his pick of rare artifacts and publications dating back to the 1920s, demonstrating the vast diversity that makes the collection so unique.
In this presentation, speakers will give an overview of their larger project focused on recent youth mobilizing across Asia that is characterized by efflorescent LGBTQ+ visibility, often in tandem with newly assertive feminist messaging. Then they delve into Thailand as an especially intriguing case of how youth protesters infused calls for democracy with commitments to gender and sexual diversity, as well as a deep sense of historical consciousness.
Berkeley Center for the Study of Religion is pleased to welcome artist Lee Mingwei to the UC Berkeley Campus. Mingwei will present a talk titled, “Five Stories” on the topic of his art, religion, and spirituality.
Yasuko (Yoshiko Tanaka), a young Japanese woman, is in Hiroshima when the U.S. Air Force drops a nuclear explosive on the city. Despite the destruction all around her, Yasuko manages to escape unscathed, and, as other survivors fall ill with radiation poisoning, she is able to stay healthy. But later, when Yasuko goes to live with her uncle Shigematsu (Kazuo Kitamura), who tries to help her start a new life, she finds herself unable to escape the social stigma of radiation sickness. This event is co-presented by the On the Same Page program and the Center for Japanese Studies. It is part of a series this fall around Oppenheimer, presented by the On the Same Page program.
Friday, October 25, 2024
Key discussions will explore the impact of climate fluctuations on constructed landscapes, the domestication and dissemination of crops that underpinned agricultural and economic transformations, the role of genetic diversity in human migration and adaptation, and the intricate networks established by nomadic communities that facilitated trade, communication, and cultural exchange across immense distances.
Through a multidisciplinary approach, this conference seeks to illuminate the deep interconnections between environmental, biological, and social factors in shaping Eurasia’s historical trajectory.
Grantees in the year one cohort of the Southeast Asian Lives and Histories Project Small Grants Program share their insights from their research projects, followed by a keynote talk by Tyrell Haberkorn.
Three scholars of Japanese literature and culture — Jon Pitt, Brian Hurley, and Shelby Oxenford — present perspectives on the impact of the events depicted in Oppenheimer, rendered invisible in the film. Moderated by Miryam Sas, Professor of Comparative Literature and Film & Media, UC Berkeley. This event is co-presented by the On the Same Page program and the Center for Japanese Studies. It is part of a series this fall around Oppenheimer, presented by the On the Same Page program.
Haberkorn will deliver the keynote talk for the SEALIVES Symposium. Her talk focuses on Resistant Citizen, a coalition of sixteen activists, lawyers, artists, and survivors of state violence filed charges of treason and rebellion against the NCPO. She first places Resistant Citizen’s struggle in the seventy-year history of the people’s attempts to hold coupmakers to account. Then, drawing on feminist judgment methodology and emphasizing the long arc of people’s resistance to dictatorship, Haberkorn offers several new decisions rendered in the name of a Court by and for the People that reverse precedent and writes towards a different future in which sovereignty is not reduced to brute force, but is a shared project between the rulers and the ruled.
Tuesday, October 29, 2024
Andrew Way Leong, Assistant Professor of English at UC Berkeley, will discuss how the tools of literary study can inspire more inclusive ways to recover and understand the early literary history, or lost generation, of Japanese America.
Deforestation and dam building together with climate change along the Lancang/Mekong have upended centuries and even millennia of bio-cultural management. The river and the rainforests in this part of monsoon Asia provide the livelihood for over 70 million people in Yunnan and SE Asia and are among the most important rainforest cover and carbon sinks in the world after the Amazon basin. It is a major bio-diversity hotspot. The loss of local knowledge has contributed greatly to the loss of healthy ecosystems. The paper considers not only this loss but also the ways in which indigenous communities and civil society organizations are pushing back against the overpowering profit motive of the ‘epistemic engine’ of the capitalist nation-state system.
VIDAN proudly presents performances based on Hunminjeongeum (The Korean Script), Arirang, Chunhyangjeon (The Story of Chunhyang), Admiral Yi Sun-shin, Palaces of the Joseon Dynasty, and other Korean heritage including registered UNESCO World Heritage.
Friday, November 1, 2024
This event celebrates the winner of the 2024 Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism, Matthew Kapstein (Professor Emeritus, École Pratique des Hautes Études), for his edited book Tibetan Manuscripts and Early Printed Books, Vol. 1: Elements (Cornell University Press, 2024).
Thursday, November 7, 2024
In a play-by-play account of the elite politics that led to the military crackdown, Yang Su addresses the repression of the protest in the context of political leadership succession. Beneath the political drama, Deadly Decision in Beijing explores the authoritarian regime’s perpetual crisis of leadership transition and its impact on popular movements. The book received honorable mention of the 2024 Distinguished Scholarly Book Award of the American Sociological Association.
Speaker: Francesco Sferra, University of Naples “L’Orientale”.
Tuesday, November 12, 2024
West Papua, a region of Indonesia on the island of New Guinea, is home to a diverse array of cultures and languages. Material cultures from this region are often created to communicate with spirits and ancestors. A primary challenge in displaying Papuan objects when removed from their original context, such as in museums, is maintaining their local significance and connection to indigenous communities. Join us for a thought-provoking discussion with Enrico Kondologit and Ajeng Arainikasih as they reflect on their month-long research period in the US, during which they visited museums with Papuan collections, and discussed with museum professionals practices of ethical acquisition, display, knowledge-sharing methods, and care for these valuable artifacts.
Wednesday, November 13, 2024
In this book chat, Dr. Satsuki Ina will discuss the process of writing The Poet and the Silk Girl: A Memoir of Love, Imprisonment, and Protest, a “compelling and prismatic love story of one family’s defiance in the face of injustice—and how their story echoes across generations.” Based on diary entries, haiku poetry, letters, and photographs collected by Ina’s parents, Itaru and Shizuko, The Poet and the Silk Girl “ illustrates through one family’s saga the generational struggle of Japanese Americans who resisted racist oppression, fought for the restoration of their rights, and clung to their full humanity in the face of adversity.” Connecting the past to the present, Ina links her family’s story to struggles against ongoing mass incarceration at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Thursday, November 14, 2024
The planetary crisis and the urgent need for sustainability demand a radical re-evaluation of the epistemologies underlying modern academic knowledge production. Within this context, intellectual history has traditionally revolved around human-centered narratives that compartmentalized ideas of the historical past into what Arthur Lovejoy termed “unit-ideas” such as ‘philosophy,’ ‘religion,’ ‘art,’ and ‘science.’ This talk argues that there are identifiable paradigms from the past that do not neatly fit into these established categories and that recognized nonhuman organisms as crucial ‘actors.’
Drawing from her recently published book Constructing Student Mobility (The MIT Press, 2023), higher education scholar Stephanie Kim illustrates how an expansive ecosystem of ancillary people and organizations funnel students to specific universities according to market demands, from education agents in South Korea to community college recruiters in California. Kim ultimately shows how these diverse stakeholders constitute a much broader industry of global higher education and reinforce the global student supply chain from South Korea to the United States.
Sunday, November 17, 2024
Javanese Gamelan-New and Traditional: An afternoon of Javanese Gamelan featuring a variety of works for traditional gamelan instruments.
Midiyanto, director
Monday, November 18, 2024
Artists Anuj Vaidya and Praba Pilar discuss Larval Rock Stars, their multi-modal conceptual project encompassing digital, textual, performance, sound, and video experimentation.
Wednesday, November 20, 2024
The rise of “new economic statecraft” (Aggarwal and Reddie 2020) is having a profound effect on international economic relations and security around the world. In the Asia-Pacific, we have seen aggressive intervention by countries in trade, finance, and investment, with all major countries in the region engaging in such behavior. This development raises a host of key academic and policy questions: What are the implications of such policies for international business? What are the effects of such policies on middle powers in the region, often on the receiving end of such policies by the U.S. and China? And what are the prospects of controlling such intervention from an international institutional perspective?
14:00: Opening remarks | Vice Chairman Shigetoshi IKEYAMA and Vinod K. Aggarwal
14:05-14:25: Presentation | Yasuyuki TODO
14:25-14:35: Q&A
14:35-14:55: Presentation | Andrew Reddie
14:55-15:05: Q&A
15:05-15:55: Panel discussion | Yasuyuki TODO, Shujiro URATA, Vinod K. Aggarwal, and Andrew Reddie (Moderator - Vinod K. Aggarwal)
15:55-16:00: Closing remarks | Shigetoshi IKEYAMA and Vinod K. Aggarwal
Thursday, November 21, 2024
Captain Hans Koester, as was his official title, was a prolific aviator who in the 1920s and 30s flew planes over Europe, Africa, both the Americas, and Asia. In a heavily illustrated article Koester authored for the May 1938 edition of National Geographic, he noted that China held a particularly “incomparable fascination” for him. Koester’s photographic legacy of his four thousand hours in the air over China consists of over 500 black and white prints which are held in Berkeley’s East Asian Library.
Wednesday, December 4, 2024
Japan has two traditions of tea practice: chanoyu and sencha. While chanoyu involves whisking powdered tea in the Song Chinese style, sencha uses loose-leaf tea, influenced by Ming and Qing Chinese literati culture. In this special event, Professor Yukitada Shimamura will talk briefly about the history of sencha tea culture in Japan, and demonstrate how the art of sencha is practiced.
Friday, December 6, 2024
Silver objects from the early Islamic and Classical periods (7th to 14th centuries CE) evoke vibrant traditions of metalworking and contain traces of their global exchanges within the Islamic World and beyond. Not least, Islamic silver has been associated with people, materials, and landscapes connected by the Silk Road network. Ranging from coins and jewellery to high-status metalware, Islamic silver objects often contain inscriptions, most notably in Arabic. These inscriptions frequently reference religious verses, poetry, or proverbs, and can also identify information about the workshop, artist, patron, and owner.