Past Events
Burmese Lives: Ordinary Life Stories under the Burmese Regime
Organized by Wen-Chin Chang (Center for Asia-Pacific Area Studies, Academia Sinica, Taiwan) and Eric Tagliacozzo (Department of History, Cornell University, USA), and co-sponsored by the Harvard-Yenching Institute and the Center for Asia-Pacific Area Studies, Academia Sinica
Date: June 4-5, 2010
Time: 9 am - 5 pm (June 4), 9 am - 12:30 pm (June 5)
Location:Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave., Harvard University
This conference will gather together a group of eminent scholars who work on Burma to study the stories of Burmese people from different walks of life, using interdisciplinary approaches. Although Burma/Myanmar has been partially opened to foreign visitors since 1988, academic studies have largely centered on the ruling regime. What emerges is a lack of exploration of ?different versions of reality? as seen from the perspectives of the diverse ethnic groups that make up the Burmese people. Research into the life stories of Burmese people of different ethnicities, occupations, ages, and genders will help to reveal the multiplicities of Burma?s modern social history.
The conference will be open to the public.
18th Annual International Association of Chinese Linguistics Conference
Hosted under the joint auspices of the Department of Linguistics and the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations, Harvard University
Co-sponsored by the Harvard-Yenching Insitute, the Chiang Ching-Kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange and the International Association of Chinese Linguistics, and further supported by the Fairbank Center and Asia Center of Harvard University, and the Haide Foundation of Hong Kong.
Date: Thursday, May 20 - Saturday, May 22, 2010
Location: Harvard University
Conference Website: http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~iacl18/Site/index.html
The Issue and Role of Xunzi Studies for the Articulation of the Confucian Values for the 21st Century
Co-sponsored by the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies
A talk by SATO Masayuki, Professor of Philosophy, National Taiwan University; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010.
Discussant: Professor Michael Puett, EALC, Harvard University
Date: Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Time: 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm
Location: Vanserg Common Room, Vanserg Building, 25 Francis St.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Social Suffering, the Culture of Compassion, and the Divided Moral Experience in China
Co-sponsored by the Asia Center
Date: Friday, May 7 - Saturday, May 8, 2010
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Avenue
Early Korea and Japan Interactions: New Perspectives on Old Issues
Date: Monday, May 3 - Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Time: 9 am - 5 pm (May 3), 9 am - 5 pm (May 4)
Location: Day 1 (May 3) - Room S250, CGIS South Bldg., 1730 Cambridge Street
Day 2 (May 4) - Room S153, CGIS South Bldg., 1730 Cambridge Street
This workshop is planned and hosted by the Early Korea Project (EKP) at Harvard. Generous funding is from the Northeast Asia History Foundation in Seoul, the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies at Harvard, and the Harvard Yenching Institute. Please note that presentations will be given in Korean and Japanese and will be supplemented in some cases with PowerPoint presentations that have English subtitles on the slides. Translated papers will be available on the day of the workshop sessions so that those who use English can follow.
HYI Literature Symposium: Culture at Intersection
Date: Saturday, May 1, 2010
Time: 9 am - 5 pm
Location: William James Hall 1550, Harvard University
Development of the legal and institutional concept of property in Cambodia, China and Vietnam
A talk by KUONG Teilee, Professor of Law, Nagoya University, Japan; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010.
Discussant: Professor Duncan Kennedy
Date: Thursday, April 29, 2010
Time: 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Politicization of Association in Modern China
Co-sponsored by the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies
A talk by FENG Xiaocai, Professor of History, Fudan University, China; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010.
Discussant: Professor Elizabeth Perry (Director, Harvard-Yenching Institute; Henry Rosovsky Professor of Government, Harvard University)
Date: Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Time: 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Inner Asia and China: Cultural and Historical Connections
Date: April 24-25, 2010
Time: April 24, 9:50 am - 5:45 pm; April 25, 10 am - 6:20 pm
Location: Belfer Room S020, CGIS South Building, 1727 Cambridge St., Cambridge, MA
Conference website: http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~sanskrit/conference2010/conference2010.html
Antique Jades in Antiquity: Heritage? Collectible? or Material Resource?
A talk by Jenny SO (Professor of Fine Arts, Director, Institute of Chinese Studies, C.U.H.K., Hong Kong; Harvard-Yenching Coordinate Research Scholar)
Co-sponsored by the Harvard East Asian Archaeology Seminar and the Harvard-Yenching Institute
Date: Friday, April 23, 2010
Time: 12:00 pm
Location: Room 14A Peabody Museum
http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~anthro/eaas/
The Morpheme SU -- Determiner and Complementizer in Nuosu Yi Language
A talk by HU Suhua, Professor at the Institute for Chinese Minority Languages, Minzu University of China (formerly Central University for Nationalities); Harvard-Yenching Visiting Scholar 2009-10
Discussants: Professor James Huang, Linguistics Department, Harvard University and Professor Feng Shengli, EALC Department, Harvard University
Date: Thursday, April 22, 2010
Time: 11:30 am - 1:00 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Trans-Himalayas Interaction during the First Millennium BC
A talk by LU Hongliang, Professor of Archaeology, Sichuan University, China; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010.
Discussant: Professor Rowan Flad, Anthropology Department, Harvard University
Date: Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Time: 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Case Study of a Lesbian Health Hotline in a Peripheral Chinese City
A talk by CAO Jin, Professor, School of Journalism, Fudan University, China; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010.
Discussants: Joan Kaufman (Lecturer in Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School and founding Director of the AIDS Public Policy Training Project, Harvard Kennedy School) and Bradley S. Epps (Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures and of Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality, Harvard University)
Date: Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Time: 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm
Location: HYI-Vanserg Common Room, Vanserg Building, 25 Francis Ave., Cambridge
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
The Sinic World in Perspective
A symposium in honor of Tu Weiming, Harvard Yenching Professor of Chinese History and Philosophy and of Confucian Studies, on the occasion of his seventieth birthday. Organized by the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations, in cooperation with The Harvard University Asia Center, The John K. Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies and The Harvard-Yenching Institute.
Date: Saturday, April 10, 2010
Time: 9 am - 5 pm
Location: Boylston Hall (Fung Auditorium and Ticknor Lounge),
Harvard University
East Asian Programs Graduate Reunion
Date: Friday, April 9, 2010
Time: 12:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Location: Harvard Faculty Club, 12 Quincy St., Cambridge, MA
For a schedule of events and information, visit: http://www.gsas.harvard.edu/alumni/east_asian_graduate_programs_reunion.php
High Precision of Radiocarbon Dating for the Key Project of Origins and Development of Chinese Civilization in China
Co-sponsored by the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies
A talk by WU Xiaohong, Professor of Archaeology, Peking University, China; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010.
Discussant: Professor Rowan Flad
Date: Thursday, April 8, 2010
Time: 11:30 am - 1:30 pm
Location:Vanserg Common Room, 25 Francis Ave., Suite 20
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
How the East Was Won: "Imposed Constitutionalism" in Postwar Japan and Postcolonial Korea, 1945-1948
Co-sponsored with the Korea Institute and the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies
A talk by KIM Sung-ho, Professor of Political Science, Yonsei University, South Korea; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010
Discussants: Professors Carter Eckert and Andrew Gordon
Date: Wednesday, April 7, 2010
Time: 12:30 pm - 2:00 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Explaining the Rise of China: A Challenge to Western Social Science Theories?
Co-sponsored by the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies
Date: Monday, April 5, 2010
Time: 2:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Location: Lower Level Conference Room, Busch Hall/Center for European Studies, 27 Kirkland St., Cambridge, MA
What explains China's stunning economic record and continued political stability decades after most other Communist systems in the world collapsed? Does the Chinese case pose a challenge to certain basic social science assumptions about the relationship between economic and political change?
Is the People's Republic of China simply an example of "delayed democracy"? Or is China on a trajectory that defies standard Western predictions about the connection among markets, civil society, and democratization? If the Chinese case does indeed depart significantly from standard models of transition and transformation, what wider lessons can we draw from its experience -- for other developing countries as well as for social science theory?
This roundtable brings together an inter-disciplinary group of distinguished international scholars -- from China, Taiwan, Japan, Germany and the United States -- to offer their perspectives on these complex questions.
Following the panel, please join us for a reception in the lobby of Busch Hall.
This event is open to the public. Registration is not required.
Red Legacy in China: An International Conference
Co-sponsored by the CCK Foundation Inter-University Center for Sinology, the Harvard-Yenching Institute, and the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies
Date: April 2-3, 2010
Location: Belfer Case Study Room, S020, CGIS South Building
1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA
Red Legacy in China is a two-day conference that seeks to bring together an international group of scholars from various disciplines in Chinese studies to promote a lively exchange of ideas and perspectives. "Red legacy" refers to remainders and reminders of the Chinese Communist revolution in the post-Mao era. It encompasses three types of manifestations: remnant traces of the Communist revolution, contemporary reinventions inspired by the Socialist past, and ongoing process of the Socialist experience. Associated with persons and artifacts, texts and sites, politics and capital, individual and collective memory, red legacy has been exerting its influence on various dimensions in contemporary China: intellectual and mundane, spiritual and material, spatial and temporal, socio political and commercial.
Seeing Utopia, Past and Future: Wang Di and Xing Danwen Art Exhibit, Panel Discussion, and Lectures
Date: Wednesday March 31, 2010 (opening event)
Location: Fairbank Center office area (CGIS South, 1730 Cambridge St., Cambridge MA)
This will be a week-long series of events, including an exhibition of photographs by two contemporary artists, Wang Di and Xing Danwen. Lectures and panel discussions will feature Yin Jinan, Dean of the School of Humanities, Central Academy of Fine Arts, as well as Wang Di and Xing Danwen.
Re-examining the Relations between the Imperial Diet of Japan and Colonial Korea
Co-sponsored with the Korea Institute and the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies
A talk by LEE Sung Yup, Professor of History, Kyoto University, Japan; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010.
Discussant: Andrew Gordon, Lee and Juliet Folger Fund Professor of History
Date: Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Time: 3:00 pm - 4:30 pm
Location: Vanserg Common Room, 25 Francis Ave., Suite 20
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
HYI Reception at The Association for Asian Studies Annual Meeting
Date: Friday, March 26, 2010
Time: 7 pm - 9 pm
Location: Liberty Ballroom Salon B, Philadelphia Marriott
Downtown, 1201 Market St., Philadelphia
What is Chinese Philosophy? Four Expositions on its Characteristics by Scholars from National Taiwan University
Date: Friday, March 19, 2010
Time: 10 am - 4:15 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Taiwan, along with Hong Kong, was once known among scholars of Chinese philosophy as one of the two major "bases" of contemporary Neo-Confucianism. However, changes in the domestic socio-political environment and a drastic increase in international scholastic activities have caused considerable diversification in research topics and methods. In particular, there has been remarkable development in research on Daoism and Buddhism over the past twenty years, a trend best represented by the scholars from the philosophy department of the National Taiwan University (NTU).
This workshop will complement the "International Workshop on the Research of Chinese Philosophy: Critical Retrospection and Prospects", to be held at the Harvard-Yenching Institute on March 20-21, 2009. In that workshop, four NTU scholars will be reviewing the current issues and problems of Chinese philosophy research in Taiwan and Japan. In contrast, in this workshop, these four scholars will expound upon the characteristics of Chinese philosophy through discussions of the following four major subjects:
- On Self-cultivation (by Bau-ruei Duh)
- On Meaning of Life and Death (by Yao-ming Tsai)
- On Language and Knowledge (by Wim De Reu)
- On State and Society (by Masayuki Sato)
These lectures, while engaging topics close to the heart of scholars of Chinese philosophy, and both graduate and undergraduate students of the EALC and philosophy departments, also target a more general audience, and those who want a comprehensive introduction to the subject of Chinese philosophy are most welcomed.
International Workshop on the Research of Chinese Philosophy in Japan and Taiwan: With Critical Retrospections and future Prospects
Co-sponsored by the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations
Date: Saturday, March 20 - Sunday, March 21, 2010
Time: Saturday 10:00 - 5:00 pm; Sunday 10:00 am - 5:40 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Avenue
In the last several years, scholars in many fields have benefited from a worldwide exchange of research, and have begun to share their new findings and novel ideas with their colleagues in other countries. Yet the field of Chinese philosophy in East Asia has unfortunately lagged behind in this respect. Over the past few decades, scholars in this field have failed to take advantage of the resources offered them by the emerging global research environment, and have become more insular than ever before. This workshop aims to respond to this situation by providing Western scholars with comprehensive yet critical accounts of research on Chinese philosophy in Japan and Taiwan in four major research fields: early Chinese philosophy, Song-Ming Neo-Confucianism, Buddhist philosophy, and Contemporary Neo-Confucianism. The workshop will be momentous for Japanese scholarly circles in this area because it will be the first such workshop in which six Japanese scholars on Chinese philosophy will all present papers in English.
The Impact of Market Reforms on the Health of Chinese Citizens: Examining Two Puzzles
A talk by Martin Whyte, Professor of Sociology, Harvard University
Date:Thursday, March 11, 2010
Time: 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm
Location: Vanserg Common Room, 25 Francis Ave., Suite 20
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Institutions, Institutionalization, and Governance in China
A talk by Joseph Fewsmith.
Date: Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Time: 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
There are many reasons to expect political reform of some sort to take place in China - the economy has grown rapidly over three decades, new generations of leaders have come to power, there are many demands for greater public participation, and there are numerous "mass incidents" that can seemingly be addressed only through political reform. By looking at a number of reforms, this talk will try to lay out the logic of the ever increasing number of political reforms in China as well as the limits to such reforms.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Variation and change in language: an East Asian perspective
A talk by C.T. James Huang, Professor of Linguistics, Harvard University
Date: Thursday, February 18, 2010
Time: 3:00pm - 4:30pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Humanistic Buddhism and Its Global Philanthropic Reach
A talk by KUAH-PEARCE Khun-Eng
Discussant: Arthur Kleinman, Esther and Sidney Rabb Professor, Department of Anthropology, Harvard University and Professor of Medical Anthropology in Social Medicine and Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School; Director, Harvard University Asia Center.
Date: Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Time: 12:00 - 1:30
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Is the Past Always Behind Us? A Past-Oriented Model for the Chinese Perfective Aspect Marker "Le"
A talk by WANG Wei, Professor of Linguistics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010.
Discussants: Professors Gennaro Chierchia and James Huang
Date: Thursday, January 28, 2010
Time: 3:00pm - 4:30pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
It is generally believed that temporal meanings in human languages are universally construed in terms of space, and that almost equally universally, the past is construed as the world behind us whereas the future is the one in front of us. Professor Wang's talk, however, points out that in Chinese, it is very hard to associate the word qian (前 front/before) with the meaning of 'future' and the word hou (后 behind/after) with the meaning of 'past'--it is actually always the other way around. The underlying schema of the so-called 'universal' spatial construal of time involves a moving-ego metaphor in which time is a road the ego moves on. The talk manages to point out that the Chinese perfective aspect le (了) prefers the other metaphor of moving-object, in which time is a flowing river beside which the ego stands still.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
The Politics of "Illicitly Brewed Liquor" in Colonial Korea
Co-sponsored by the Korea Institute.
A talk by ITAGAKI Ryuta, Professor of Anthropology, Doshisha University, Japan; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010.
Discussant: Andrew Gordon, Lee and Juliet Folger Fund Professor of History, Harvard University
Date: Friday, December 11, 2009
Time: 11:30 am - 1:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Ethnographic Biography: How the Personal Connects with the Professional
A talk by LIU Heng, HYI Coordinate Researcher 2009-2010.
Discussant: Michael Herzfeld, Professor of Anthropology, Harvard University
Date: Friday, November 20, 2009
Time: 11:30 am - 1:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
The Alchemy and Jouissance of Death: Sichuan Sarcophagi in New Perspective
A talk by Eugene Wang, Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Professor of Asian Art, Harvard University.
Date: Friday, November 13, 2009
Time: 11:30 am - 1:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Proba's Virgilian Cento
A talk by GAO Fengfeng, Professor of Literature, Peking University; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010.
Discussant: Richard Thomas, Professor of Greek and Latin, Classics Department, Harvard University
Date: Monday, November 16, 2009
Time: 3:00 - 4:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Harvard-Yenching Institute Panel at the Beijing Forum: Grassroots Mobilization in 20th Century China: A Rural-Urban Comparison
Date: November 7, 2009
Time: 2:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Location: Beijing, China
This panel will be part of the session: Crisis and Mobilization in Twentieth Century China (under the sub-theme "Crisis and Opportunity -- Historical reflection on Contemporary Challenges").
Panel Chair: Elizabeth Perry
Panel Discussants: Michael Herzfeld and Elizabeth Perry
Presenters: Jeong Jong-Ho, Liu Jundai , Liu Chun (Brenda), Yan Xiaojun, Yu Jianrong, Zhou Yi
Social Consequences of Rapid Expansion of Higher Education in South Korea
Co-sponsored by the Korea Institute
A talk by HAN Joon, Associate Professor of Sociology, Yonsei University, South Korea; HYI Visiting Scholar 2009-2010.
Discussant: Frank Dobbin, Professor of Sociology, Harvard University
Date:Friday, November 6, 2009
Time:11:30 am - 1:30 pm
Location:Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
During the 1980s and 1990s, South Korea experienced an exceptionally rapid expansion of higher education, reflecting a sharp increase in demand for higher education among Korean parents. In this presentation, the social consequences of higher education expansion will be discussed, with a focus on inequality. Professor Han's research has investigated whether the expansion of higher education has affected class mobility among Korean males, finding that a mechanism of class inheritance has changed from direct inheritance to one mediated by education. He has also examined inequality among college graduates in the labor market and has found a substantial wage gap among different groups of college graduates. Results from previous research indicate that expansion of higher education in Korea did not alleviate the degree of inequality but rather modified the mechanism of generating inequality.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
"The Spirit of the Chrysanthemum" (Kiku no sei monogatari) and Flower Personification in Medieval Japanese Art
A talk by Melissa McCormick, Professor of Japanese Art and Culture, Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations, Harvard University
Date: Friday, October 30, 2009
Time: Time: 11:30 am - 1:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Co-sponsored by the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies
From as early as Ovid's representation of the goddess Flora, the personification of flowers by women appears throughout Western art and literature, signifying seasonal regeneration, fertility and reproduction, beauty, and its ephemeral nature. An equally common visual and literary trope in medieval Japan, however, is the flower who materializes in masculine form. "The Spirit of the Chrysanthemum", a sixteenth-century Japanese illustrated narrative scroll, provides the starting point for a consideration of how flower personification structures medieval Japanese illustrated narratives, metaphorically, allegorically, and symbolically.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Harvard-Yenching Institute Alumni Conference: Multiple Perspectives on the Meaning of Community and Citizenship
Sponsored by Peking University and the Harvard-Yenching Institute
Date: October 31-November 2, 2009
Location: Beijing, China
Conference description:
The conference aims to promote active discussion among scholars from universities and research institutes in East Asia on the topics of citizenship and community. The fast pace of economic and information globalization in the latter half of the 20th century has greatly influenced human development. In China, after 1949, and particularly after reform and an open policy were implemented in 1978, the fast pace of modernization has lead to rapid changes of the social structure. This conference will look at China's social progress and social development from the perspectives of community construction, citizenship, and civilian society. At the same time, the conference will enhance international understanding of China's situation by offering international comparisons. Scholars will further explore the ideas of community and citizenship development and evolution, and discuss contributions to world development and cooperation in the 21st century.
For more information, contact Guan Shijie, guansj@pku.edu.cn
Religion and the Public Good in Modern Chinese Societies
A talk by Robert Weller, Professor and Chair of Anthropology and Research Associate, Institute on Culture, Religion and World Affairs, Boston University
Date: Friday, October 23, 2009
Time: Time: 11:30 am - 1:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
While during much of China's twentieth century religion was separated from broader society, the last few years have brought a reversal in all Chinese societies. Based on case studies from China, Malaysia, and Taiwan, this talk examines the new rise of religious philanthropy. It focuses on four core questions: (1) the influence of denomination (with particular attention to local temples, Buddhists, and various forms of Christianity), (2) the role of scale (the effects of large scale institutions vs. local and less institutionalized groups), (3) the power and ability of varying state/society relationships to affect the public role of religion, and (4) the revival of ritual, with its important implications for managing social relations between individuals and groups in a pluralist context.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Comparative World Literature: China and the United States
A talk by Professor David Damrosch, Department of Comparative Literature, Harvard University
Date: Friday, October 9, 2009
Time: Time: 11:30 am - 1:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
World literature is often regarded today as a global phenomenon, sometimes even seen as a cultural expression of an emerging "world system." Yet any view of the world is a view from somewhere, and in practical terms, world literature is experienced very differently in different places. It consists first and foremost of the body of material that is available to actual readers: works that are assigned in schools, sold in bookstores, and reviewed and analyzed in a country's journals. In this talk, the speaker would like to explore the shaping of world literature in a national cultural and institutional environment, looking at the United States and then at China. He will argue that the American and Asian cases show reciprocal possibilities and limitations and have much to learn from study of each others' approaches.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Self-reflection by Mirroring : Understanding the culture of China from Japanese and Korean Literature
A talk by GE Zhaoguang, Fudan University (2009 HYI Coordinate Researcher).
Date: Friday, October 2, 2009
Time: 11:30 am -1:30 pm
Location:Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Talk will be given in Chinese.
Please feel free to bring your lunch with you; coffee and beverages will be served.
Twenty-First Century Urbanization: Social Science Perspectives on China's Urban Transformation
Sponsored by the University of Michigan Center for Chinese Studies, the Association for Asian Studies and the Harvard-Yenching Institute
Date: Saturday, October 3, 2009
Location: Ann Arbor, MI
Meanderings Between Borders--Cultural Transmission and the Production of Knowledge in Contemporary East Asia
Held under the joint administration of the Graduate Institute of Taiwanese Literature at National Taiwan University and the Harvard-Yenching Institute, with the assistance and backing of Taiwan's Ministry of Education as well as the National Science Council.
Date: Sept. 10-11, 2009
Location: National Taiwan University
Twenty papers will be presented over the course of the conference from scholars in Europe, the United States, Japan, Korea, Southeast Asia, and Taiwan. Two round table discussions will also be held, the first of which, "Revisiting Formosa," will focus on the issue of East Asian cultural transmission in Taiwanese literature.
The other round table discussion, "Borders, Meanderings, and Interdisciplinary Talks," will be a interdisciplinary forum. During this forum Harvard-Yenching Institute fellows involved in different fields of study will explore questions concerning the transmission of East Asian culture and the production of knowledge in and around East Asia.
For more information, contact Mei Chia-ling, meicl@ntu.edu.tw.
13th Harvard (Biennial) International Symposium on Korean Linguistics
Date: August 8-9, 2009
Location: Science Center, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
Co-sponsored by the Harvard-Yenching Institute
For more information on Harvard-ISOKL, visit http://www.harvard-isokl.org/
Ideas, Networks, Places: Rethinking Chinese History of the Middle Period
Date: July 7-8, 2009
Location: CGIS South, Room S020, Harvard University
Sponsored by the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations, the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, Harvard University Asia Center and the Harvard-Yenching Institute
Introduction
Over the past few decades, there have been significant advancements in the scholarship of middle period China (roughly 8th-17th centuries), particularly in the areas of 1) intellectual history, 2) the study of social networks, and 3) local history. Although these approaches have often developed separately and with their own sets of paradigms, connecting them leads to new insights into the patterns of historical change. Professor Peter K. Bol has been a leading figure in the attempt to fuse the historical study of ideas with research on society and culture. On the occasion of Professor Bol's sixtieth birthday this conference aims to bring together these various approaches, delineating how the articulation and promotion of ideas influenced social structures, and how intellectual discourse in turn was shaped by historical and social developments. The papers for the conference not only will deepen our understanding of middle period history through the analysis of rarely used sources such as maps, architectural images, and archeological sources, but also will provide new perspectives on the significance of local dynamics within broader geographical and political configurations and the definition and status of the literati.
Approaches to Chinese Material Culture: an Interdisciplinary Discussion
Date: Wednesday, May 27, 2:30-5:30 pm
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave.
Program agenda
Media in Chinese Politics
Date: Saturday, April 25, 2009, 8:30 am-4 pm
Introduction:
In recent years a growing body of scholarship has emerged that examines the evolving role of media in Chinese politics. While traditionally the mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party, mass media have periodically performed a watchdog role by exposing governmental misconduct. The rising popularity of new media has also expanded public awareness of environmental problems, health threats, and natural disasters.
The Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University and the University of Michigan Center for Chinese Studies have invited scholars researching media and politics in the People's Republic to present papers at a workshop held at Harvard on 25 April 2009 for publication in a special issue of a refereed journal. Themes of particular interest include the effect of commercialization on media content, propaganda and public opinion, political expression and new media, interaction between new media and traditional media, governmental use of the internet technology, and journalists as actors in political and legal processes.
In addition to advancing scholarship, the workshop aims to increase awareness of the role of media in Chinese politics in the Boston area by hosting a round table discussion open to the public and the press.
For a program agenda and list of participants, please visit http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~fairbank/events/Postdoctoral_Workshops_Ashley.html
East Asian Studies and Science & Technology: Towards Productive Cross-fertilization
Date: Friday, April 24, 2009, 12:00-6:00 PM
Location: Yenching Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave., Cambridge, MA
Program agenda
This conference aims to encourage interaction between EAS (East Asian Studies) and Science & Technology Studies, to appreciate the importance of science and technology in understanding the histories of China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan, to incorporate the multifaceted perspective of EAS into the analysis of science and technology phenomena in East Asian countries, and to promote the study of science and technology phenomena in East Asia.
Asian Neighborhoods Research Group: "Mobility and Territory" Workshop
Date: April 17-19, 2009
Location: Yenching Common Room
Directed by Prof. Michael Herzfeld (Harvard University),
Workshop
Assistant Chiara Kovarik
Click here for program agenda.
2006-2008 HYI Past Events
