Outreach > Brown Bag Series > Fall 2008
The Fall 2008 Brown Bag Series is complete, but the talks are still available on-line. Click here to download the audio portion of the lectures via the CSEAS Podcast.
Join the Center's Outreach E-mail Newsletter for the complete precis for and locations of brown bag lectures.
December 4 - Java, Japan and the Yayoi Revolution - Ann Kumar
December 2 - Burmese Film Industry - Jane Ferguson
November 24 - Thai Public Administration Conference - Various
November 13 - Pre-Angkorian Sculpture - Paul Lavy
November 3 - Mekong Ethnobotany and Conservation - Han Lau
October 24 - Business in the New Viet Nam - David Day
October 13 - Politics and Movie Making in Southeast Asia - Towria, et. al.
September 19 - Southeast Asian Digital Library Collections - Tillinghast, et. al.
Thursday, December 4, 12:00 p.m., Moore Hall 319 (Tokioka Room)
Java and Japan: A New View of the Yayoi Revolution
Presented by Professor Ann Kumar
Australian National University
The social changes that took place in Japan in the time-period when the Jomon culture was replaced by the Yayoi culture were of exceptional magnitude, going far beyond those of the so-called Neolithic Revolution in other parts of the world. They included not only a new way of life based on wet-rice agriculture but also the introduction of metalworking in both bronze and iron, and furthermore a new architecture functionally and ritually linked to rice cultivation, a new religion, and a hierarchical society characterized by a belief in the divinity of the ruler. Because of its immense and enduring impact the Yayoi period has generally been seen as the very foundation of Japanese civilization and identity.
In contrast to the common assumption that all the Yayoi innovations came from China and Korea, new scientific evidence from such different fields as rice genetics, DNA and historical linguistics indicates that the major elements of Yayoi civilization actually came, not from the north, but from the south and specifically from Java. Though many adherents of the prevailing belief in the Korean origin of early Japanese civilization regard this proposal as outrageous, it is supported by more compelling evidence than competing hypotheses. In shedding new light on the development of Japan and Java, this evidence cannot be disregarded.
Ann Kumar is a professor in the Faculty of Asian Studies, Australian National University, and concurrently Director of the International Centre of Excellence for Asia and the Pacific Studies Professor and Associate Director, Centre for Research on Language Change. Her publications include: Surapati, Man and Legend: a Study of Three Babad Traditions; The Diary of a Javanese Muslim: Religion, politics and the pesantren 1883- 1886; and Java and Modern Europe: Ambiguous Encounters. Her most recent work is Globalizing the Prehistory of Japan: Language, Genes, and Civilization.
Tuesday, December 2, 12:00 p.m., Moore Hall 319 (Tokioka Room)
The Burmese Film Industry and Shan Spectatorship
Presented by Dr. Jane M. Ferguson
Lecturer, Australia National University
IN SPITE of Burma's long and vibrant history of indigenous film production, critical material on the subject is extremely sparse. Similarly, within the critical material on the decades-long insurgency, popular culture consumption is an often overlooked dimension of the daily lives of ethnic insurgents and their affiliates. Ethnographic fieldwork conducted in one such Shan community shows that in spite of – or even because of – the ongoing conflict, Burmese popular culture is symbolically relevant and richly meaningful...even amongst some of the most adamant of Shan separatists. In this presentation, Jane Ferguson will give an overview of the history, structure, and some of the popular genres of the Burmese motion picture industry, and then discuss dimensions of spectatorship of Burmese films in a village of Shan insurgents and their affiliates at the Thai-Burma border.
JANE M. FERGUSON lectures on Mainland Southeast Asian Studies at the Australian National University in Canberra. Her interests includes nationalism, borderlands, popular culture, musical genres, digital media, Buddhist ritual and Burmese, Thai and Shan migration. Ferguson received her doctorate at Cornell University in May 2008 for her dissertation entitled Rocking in Shanland: Histories and Popular Culture Jams at the Thai-Burma Border. Ferguson’s publications include Rock Your Religion: Shan Merit-making, Ritual and Stage-show Revelry at the Thai-Burma Border in Asian Legacies and Inscriptions of the State (forthcoming) and Revolutionary Scripts: Shan Insurgent Media Practice at the Thai-Burma Border in Political Regimes and the Media in Asia: Continuities, Contradictions and Change.
Thailand-UH Public Adminstration Conferences
Five successful local leaders and public administrators from northeast Thailand will be visiting the Manoa campus during the week of November 24 and will talk about what they have accomplished in the areas of sustainability, health care, community development, heritage protection and environmental protection.
Challenges of Innovation and Change at the Local Level
Monday, November 24, 6:00 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. (Saunders 637)
Images of Local Leadership
Tuesday, November 25, 11:30 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. (Tokioka Room, Moore Hall 319)
Thai Politics and the Future of Thai Democracy: Recent Events and Underlying Issues
Tuesday, November 25, 6:00 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. (Saunders 637)
Jointly sponsored by the Public Administration Program, a graduate degree program for leadership in public service and the Center for Southeast Asian Studies through a grant from the U.S. Department of Education.
November 13, 12:00 p.m., Tokioka Room (Moore Hall 319)
Copycats and Body Doubles:
Defining the Limits of Authentic Imitation in Preangkorian Sculpture
THE PRASAT ANDET HARIHARA and its eponymous artistic style have long been lauded as high-points of Preangkorian (7th - 8th cent.) Khmer sculpture and indeed of Southeast Asian art in general. Given the praise that this piece has continuously attracted, it is of considerable interest that during the past thirty years numerous additional, previously unknown, and unprovenanced sculptures of Harihara in the Prasat Andet style have come to light on the art market, including some that scholars have argued to be "copies"-whether ancient or modern - of the Prasat Andet Harihara.
Several of the recently revealed images, however, share unusual traits exclusively among themselves that distinguish them from previously known and unimpeachable examples and which place them outside the stylistic development of Preangkorian sculpture as it is currently understood. Through formal analysis of the various Prasat Andet style Hariharas and related images, the speaker argues that stylistic inconsistencies raise questions not only about the nature of "copying" in early Southeast Asian art and the way scholars classify Khmer sculpture, but also about the authenticity of many of the recently revealed images.
THE DISCUSSANT, Paul Lavy, assistant professor of South and Southeast Asian Art History, University of Hawaii at Manoa, joined the art department in August, 2008. Professor Lavy has taught Art and Architecture of Maritime and Mainland Southeast Asia, Art and Architecture of Pre-Colonial South Asia, Monuments and Nationalism in Southeast Asia, and Hindu Visual Culture.
He has conducted field research in Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, India, Laos and Malaysia. Professor Lavy received his Ph.D. at the University of California, Los Angeles in 2004, where he did his dissertation on Visnus and Harihara in the Art and Politics if Early Historic Southeast Asia.
October 24, 12:00 p.m., Tokioka Room (Moore Hall 319)
Business in the New Viet Nam
What Can You Afford Not to Know?
In this talk, David Day will discuss the key areas of business understanding necessary to break into this dynamic market: What do you have to know about the unique role of women in business in Vietnam? How do you handle the challenge of corruption? What are the key negotiating strategies and tips when trying to put a deal together with the Vietnamese?
David Day is one of the Hawaii's senior international lawyers, with special emphasis on Southeast Asia, Viet Nam and China. Based in Hawaii. Day workesd extensively throughout Asia in deal-structuring and negotiations. He has practical experience in most Asian countries, including Viet Nam and China. He is a frequent speaker on international business and legal topics at symposiums throughout the Asia/Pacific Region.
Day was also instrumental in the brokering and creation of the first public discussions on the subject of economic normalization with Viet Nam in early 1997 which led to the initial MFN (the Bilateral Trade Agreement) draft with the United Sttes. In 2006, at the request of the American Embassy in Hanoi, the United States State Department asked Day to serve as a special advisor and principal speaker in Viet Nam on the delicate topics of corruption, bribery, graft, corporate governance, and business ethics.
October 13, 1:30 p.m., Korean Studies Auditorium
The Politics of Making Movies in Southeast Asia
In Partnership with the Hawaii International Film Festival
POLITICS AND GOVERNMENT in Southeast Asia changed dramatically over the last twenty-five years, from the fall of Marcos and Suharto in the Philippines and Indonesia to the doi moi (restructuring) movement in Vietnam to the coups (and threatened counter-coups) in Thailand. Making movies in the region today is not the same as it was yesterday. As part of the Hawaii International Film Festival, the Center is bringing seven new Southeast Asian films to campus and is bringing to Hawaii seven filmmakers for a special discussion of politics and movies in the region.
THE DISCUSSANTS will include Pimpaka Towira, the feature filmmaker from Thailand, whose political exposé cum documentary THE TRUTH BE TOLD captured a portrait of idealism, integrity and activism against then-Prime Minister Thaksin. From Indonesia, Melissa Karim, scriptwriter of CHANTS OF LOTUS, an omnibus film made by four women directors, will discuss the movie in terms Indonesian women, teen sex, human trafficking, AIDS and rape - and talk of the film's battle with censors. Also attending will be Gotot Prakosa, director of the Indonesian rock opera/concert film KANTATA TAKWA, about the explosive and politically-charged 1991 Iwan Fals concert. From the Philippines, award-winning directors Tara Illenberger and Ellen Ongkek-Marfil will discuss alternative and independent filmmaking in one of the most prolific filmmaking countries in Asia. Finally, Nguyen Thanh Van, director of A LITTLE HEART, will talk of commercial filmmaking in Vietnam after doi moi. The moderator will be Christian Razukas, graduate student in Southeast Asian Studies and a former Film Programmer for HIFF.
September 19, 12:00 p.m., Tokioka Room
Using ScholarSpace!
Making Southeast Asian Digital Collections at UH
Beth Tillinghast, Margie Bodemer, Yati Paseng, Claire Chen
University of Hawaii
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