Activists and Advocacy Beyond Academia

Monday, May 2, 2022

9:00-11:00AM Eastern Time

The third webinar in our Academics Online series, this event will feature activists who work in public domains in connection with sensitive topics in East and South Asia. Whereas our first event, Digital Harassment Across Asias, focused on scholars sharing their knowledge and experiences with digital extremism from academic perspectives and our second event, Best Practices for Social Media Safety, provided practical advice on managing one’s online experiences as a public-facing educator and researcher, this webinar will center the experiences of activists. Sharing information on how activists have encountered attacks on their work and persons in digital and analog spaces in relation to venues such as non-profits, government organizations, or other capacities, the speakers will educate scholars and listeners on how they can operate in solidarity with activists and grow our global networks of collaboration.

Session Participants

Kavita Krishnan

Politburo member, CPIML Liberation

Kavita Krishnan is a communist feminist activist, Secretary of All India Progressive Women’s Association, and Politburo member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Liberation.

Lala Lau

Member of the Taiwan International Student Movement (TISM)

Lala Lau is a member of Taiwan International Student Movement (TISM), a student organization based in Taiwan concerned with labor rights and the right to education for non-local students. She has also been involved in sex-workers organization advocacy since 2012. 

Stephanie Minyoung Lee

Program Director, Comfort Women Action for Redress and Education

Stephanie Minyoung Lee volunteers as a Program Director for Comfort Women Action for Redress and Education (CARE). She is a practicing lawyer and writes about culture, place, and identity.

Ahkok Chun-Kwok Wong

PhD candidate in City, University of London

Ahkok Chun-Kwok Wong is a musician, sound artist, curator, writer, and activist. He is currently a PhD candidate in City, University of London.

Session Discussant

Ethan Mark

Associate Professor of Asian History at the Leiden University Institute for Area Studies

Ethan Mark is Associate Professor of Asian History at the Leiden University Institute for Area Studies, with specializations in modern Japanese and Indonesian history.”

Sponsoring Institutions

Asian Languages and Cultures, UCLA

Association for Asian Studies

Center for Chinese Studies, UCLA

Center for Korean Studies, UCLA

Comfort Women Action for Redress and Education (CARE)

The Haruhisa Handa Professorship of Shinto Studies, UCLA

Japanese Arts & Globalizations Group, UCLA

Tadashi Yanai Initiative for Globalizing Japanese Humanities

Terasaki Center for Japanese Language Studies, UCLA

Verge: Studies in Global Asias and the Global Asias Initiative (GAI), The Pennsylvania State University