September 2018 AAS Member News & Notes

We extend our congratulations to the AAS Members who have been awarded fellowships by the American Institute of Indian Studies to carry out research projects in India in 2018-19:

Roy Bar-Sadeh (Columbia University), “The Transnationalization of Islamic Modernism: Religion, Politics and Anti-Colonialism Between India and Egypt, 1857-1947”

Ananya Chakravarti (Georgetown University), “The Konkan: Regional History on an Indian Ocean Coast”

Swati Chawla (University of Virginia), “Between Homelessness and Homecoming: Tibetan Migration in Late Twentieth Century India”

Jed Forman (University of California, Santa Barbara), “Yogic Perception”

Ayesha Irani (University of Massachusetts, Boston), “Situating the Bengali Darves: Texts, Practices, and Communities of Reception in Bengal”

Harshita Mruthinti Kamath (University of North Carolina), “Temple Poems on Copperplates: The Material Life of Annamayya’s Telugu Padams”

Tulasi Srinivas (Emerson College), “The Absent Goddess: Ecology, Religion and Politics in an Accidental Megacity”

Kelsey Utne (Cornell University), “Landscapes of Death: War Memorials and Military Cemeteries in South Asia”

Tyler Williams (University of Chicago), “In God’s Bazaar: Merchant Religion, Literature and Early Modernity”

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Registration and housing for #AAS2019 in Denver, Colorado are now open! After a successful introduction of GREEN registration rates in Washington, D.C. this year, we are pleased to offer them again in Denver. Those who GO GREEN will save $10 on their conference registration; they will NOT receive a copy of the print program.

Graduate students: enter this year’s graduate student lottery for a chance to win one of ten (10) free student registrations! The submission deadline is October 15, 2018; see the conference website for more details.

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The Northeast Asia Council of the AAS is currently accepting applications to its small grant programs, with a submission deadline of 5pm Eastern Time on October 1, 2018. Grants are available in Japan Studies and Korean Studies; please see each program’s page at the AAS website for more details.

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Early career scholars are invited to apply for the next round of our Emerging Fields workshop, to be held in May 2019 on the theme of “Law, Society, and Justice in Asia.” Applications are due by October 1, 2018. We thank the Henry Luce Foundation for its generous support of this initiative.

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The Southeast Conference of the AAS will meet January 18-20, 2019 at Rhodes College in Memphis, TN. Paper and panel abstracts must be submitted for consideration by October 31, 2018.

Conference Report

An international workshop on “Chinese Economic Statecraft since 1991” was held at City University of Macau on May 30-31, 2018. This event was organized by the Asia Pacific Business Research Centre of City University of Macau, with the generous financial support of the Macau Foundation. This was the opening event in a series of workshops to be held over several years, as part of an international team project to explore the nature and implications of Chinese economic statecraft since 1989.

Professor William Norris of the Bush Public Policy School of Texas A&M University opened the workshop with a keynote address on “A Theoretical Framework for Understanding Economic Statecraft.” Professor Margaret Pearson of the University of Maryland delivered a formal commentary, followed by extensive discussion by those attending.

The following day included sessions focusing upon broad issues relating to Chinese economic statecraft and economic statecraft as a whole, followed by consideration of more detailed case studies of Chinese economic statecraft in particular regions or institutions. Participants discussed at length whether there exists a distinct brand of economic statecraft with Chinese characteristics, and whether one can genuinely speak of economic statecraft as a credible concept.

Speakers and participants included Prof. Zhang Shu Guang, Rector of City University of Macau; Prof. Jean-Marc F. Blanchard, Distinguished Professor of East China Normal University and Executive Director of The Mr. and Mrs. S. H. Wong Center for the Study of Multinational Corporations, United States; Prof. Geoffrey Gunn, Professor Emeritus of the University of Nagasaki and Honorary Professor of the University of Macau; Prof. Margaret Pearson, Dr. Horace E. and Wilma V. Harrison Distinguished Professor and Distinguished Scholar-Teacher in the Department of Government and Politics, University of Maryland, College Park; Prof. Priscilla Roberts of City University of Macau; Prof. Wang Jianwei of the University of Macau; Dr. Jan Knoerich of King’s College, London; Dr. Allison Kai-yin Li Haga of National Taiwan University; Dr. Timothy Summers of Chatham House and the Chinese University of Hong Kong; Dr. Sun Degang of Shanghai International Studies University; and Dr. Nicholas Thomas of City University of Hong Kong. There was also a Skype session with Prof. Evelyn Goh, Shedden Professor of Strategic Policy Studies at Australian National University.

A selection of papers are likely to be published as a special journal issue, possibly with a book to follow. The team envisage a series of three further workshops, again mixing broad thematic and theoretical presentations and more detailed case studies, to be organized chronologically, around a periodization of 1989-2001, 2001-2008, and 2008 to the present.

—Submitted by Priscilla Roberts

We welcome submissions for the AAS Member News & Notes column, so please forward material for consideration to mcunningham@asian-studies.org. Please note that we do not publish book announcements in this space; new books by AAS Members will be announced on the association’s Twitter feed (@AASAsianStudies) and Facebook page (@AASAsianStudies).