Conferences

It is undoubtable that Marxism and the Russian Revolution of 1917 changed the nature and course of the entire Russian empire. However, the revolutionary wave also spread to different places as the news of it reverberated around the globe, including East and Southeast Asia. However, Asian governments, social groups, organizations, artists, activists, intellectuals, and last but not least workers interpreted both the Marxian revolutionary ideas as well as the Russian Revolution in divergent ways.  Hence, the objective of this conference is to analyze how Marxism and the Russian Revolution were communicated, understood and interpreted in East and Southeast Asia (with special emphasis on China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam and Indonesia). More concretely, the conference aims to discuss the following questions:

• How did Marxism and the Russian Revolution transform East and East Asian societies? What kind of changes did they trigger in local societies? How did they reflect in politics, economics, language, literature, culture and art in East and Southeast Asia?
• How did the leaders of revolutionary movements in East and Southeast Asia respond to Marxism and the Russian Revolution? How did they perceive Marxism and the Russian Revolution and integrate them into their discourses? How did they conceptualize both the phenomena?
• Which strategy did the Asian Marxists use to popularize and spread the notions of Marxism and the Revolution of 1917 to the masses? Why had Marxism become a relevant ideology for Asian activists?
• What kind of reactions/actions did revolutionary events in Russia trigger in East and Southeast Asia among different governments, social groups, organizations, artists, activists, intellectuals, and workers?

Papers on the above-mentioned topics but also other related topics are welcome.

This conference is inter-disciplinary and welcomes research findings in fields such as political science, history, sociology, literature, art history, anthropology, gender studies and cultural studies.  We welcome not only individual presentations that can be part of conventional panels, but also proposals for roundtable debates. We cordially invite teachers, researchers, and postgraduate students to propose presentations, which should be 20 minutes in length. The application for the conference should include: (1) title and abstract of the paper, 300 words maximum; and (2) full name, title, affiliation and contact details of the presenter(s).

PROGRAM (draft 31. 8. 2017)

Wednesday, 6th September

09:30–11:00   (open to all)

• Welcome speeches
• Apologies; introduction of participants
• Additions to and approval of the agenda
• Visits planned; meeting times and meeting points
• Farewell dinner – detail

11:00–11:30    Coffee break

11:30–13:30   Internal meeting (EASL members only)

13:30–15:30   Lunch break

15:30–17:45   Visit to Research Library in Olomouc (Bezručova 2, Historical Collections (open to all) (in groups, app. 45 minutes per group) – info in pdf

15:30–16:15    visit to library first group A, meeting point outside Research Library

16:15–17:00    visit to library second group B, meeting point outside Research Library

17:00–17:45    visit to library third group C, meeting point outside Research Library

18:30–21:00   Reception at the department (Historical Gardens of Palacký University, Křížkovského 14)

Thursday, 7th September

09:20–12:00   Vendors’ presentations (open to all)

09:20–09:30    Wang Xiaosen (China Data Center Michigan): “What is Unique about China Data Online”

09:30–09:40    Michael Peters (Eastview): “New & Noteworthy Electronic and Print Resources from East View”

09:40–09:50    Lü Huanglei (Chaoxing): “SUPERSTAR Journals Database and Resources Platform”

09:50–10:00    Andy Liu Mingdi/Jessica Gao (CEPIEC): “Ta Kung Pao Full Text Database> (大公报全文检索数据库)”

10:00–10:10    Sophie Han (CNKI): “China Data Insights”

10:10–10:20    Peng Mei (Shanghai Library): “Database Name: Chinese Newspaper of Modern China – Sin Wan Pao”

10:20–10:30    Catherine Berry (Adam Matthew): “Digitising the Past: China: Trade, Politics and Culture, 1793–1980”

10:30–11:00   Coffee break

11:00–11:10    Albert Hoffstädt (Brill): “Update on Brill’s Resources in Chinese Studies”

11:10–11:20    Li Zhanling (Zhonghua shuju): “Oversea Chinese Ancient Books Catalogue”

11:20–11:30    Johnson Bian (Wisers HK): “WiseSearch 6.0”

11:30–11:40    Zhang Guifang (Beijing Zhenben): “China Studies System“

11:40–11:50    Zhu Min (CIBTC): “The new function of CIBTC online selection platform ‘OSPOL’”

11:50–12:00    Jason Dai (Wanfang Data): “Update on EPS China Statistics”

12:20–13:30   Bus transfer to Kroměříž (Kremsier – UNESCO) (lunch on bus provided: Sandwich A (with ham) or Sandwich B (vegetarian) +water), meeting 12:20 in the courtyard Křížkovského 14, 5 minutes walk to bus

13:30–18:30   Visit to the Kroměříž Library of Archbishop’s Chateau (Sněmovní nám. 1, 767 01 Kroměříž; Chateau + Art Gallery (+ gardens)) – info 1 a info 2 (in pdf)

13:30–15:00    Visit to Chateau & Library

15:00–16:15    Visit to Art Gallery

16:15–18:15    Free time (visit to nearby square, Chateau Tower (fee 50 CZK), Chateau Gardens (free) or Flower Garden (fee 70 CZK, 15 min. walk, reserve min. 1 hour for the visit) – meeting point in front of the Chateau 18:30 for bus boarding!!!

18:30–19:30   Bus transfer to Olomouc

Friday, 8th September

09:30–12:00   Members’ presentations (open to all)

09:30–09:50    Marc Winter (AOI Zurich): “How the image of the Giraffe traveled from China to Europe and back”

09:50–10:10    Marc Gilbert (Leiden): “The Gumbert collection: a way of collection the Dao”

10:10–10:30    Anne Labitzky (Heidelberg): “heiBIB – a short introduction”

10:30–11:00   Coffee break

11:00–11:20    Emma Goodliffe (British Library): Retro-conversion and Cataloguing Projects in the British Library

11:20–11:40    Matthias Kaun (Stabi Berlin): “FID Asia – latest developments”

11:40–12:00    Cordula Gumbrecht (Stabi Berlin): “The first Chinese in Germany. Fung Asseng 亞星 (1792/3–1889) and Fung Ahok 馮亞斈 (–1876) and their translations of the Luther Bible into Chinese”

12:00–14:00   Lunch break

14:00–16:00   Internal meeting (members only)

16:00–17:00   Visit to the Library (Armoury) of Palacký University Olomouc (open to all)

Ca. 18:30–     Farewell-Dinner (Atmosphere Restaurant, Polská 1, Galerie Šantovka, five course degustation menu (two choices – A) meat or B) vegetarian), price 1500 CZK (= app. € 55–60 incl. water and wine)

Since the establishment of Asian Studies as part of the university curriculum, the discipline has faced many changes in being pushed to define and redefine itself, in the process reorienting its aims over time. As a reflection of human societies at large, disciplines and the agents that carry them have their internal conflicts and generational divides. Amid changes, some practices and paradigms are strengthened, while others lose their momentum.

The Department of Asian Studies at Palacký University invites scholars from Asian Studies and scholars from other disciplines whose work intersects with this discipline to reflect upon the development of Asian Studies. During this conference, which takes place on November 4, 2016 in the historical city of Olomouc in Czech Republic, we will discuss the introduction of new approaches to Asian Studies and reflect upon conventional or even forgotten methods. We welcome not only individual presentations that can be part of conventional panels, but also proposals for roundtable debates. We cordially invite teachers, researchers, and postgraduate students to propose presentations, which should be 20 minutes in length. The application for the conference should include: (1) title and abstract of the paper, 300 words maximum; and (2) full name, title, affiliation, short CV, and contact details of the presenter(s).

Call for papers can be downloaded here

You can register for the conference here.

Final conference program can be downloaded here.

Book of abstracts can be downloaded here.The conference theme is focused on contemporary trends in Chinese, Japanese, Korean and other East Asian societies, inviting an exploration into various areas, including lifestyle habits, rituals, cultural memory, consequences of globalization, changes in the family, visual culture, ethnicity, language, forms of communication and others along the lines of this general theme. We cordially invite teachers, researchers and postgraduate students to propose research presentations, which should be of 20–25 minutes and their submissions should include: (1) Title and abstract of the paper, 300 words maximum, (2) Full name, title, affiliation, short CV, and contact details of the presenter(s).

Deadlines:

• The deadline for the call for papers abstracts: August 31, 2015
• Information for notification of acceptance of abstracts: September 7, 2015

Participants will cover all their personal costs, including transportation, accommodation, visas, etc. Our staff can provide you with an invitation letter for embassies if necessary.

Conference fee: 25 EUR or 500 CZK

Conference topic:

Wedged between the Han and the Tang, both great unified empires, the period of early medieval China has been long considered a “dark age”, notorious for its lack of unity, predominance of non-Han ethnic groups and cultural decadence. As such, it still remains a rather understudied epoch of Chinese history. Yet, it was precisely this crucial period that witnessed the birth of many a phenomenon or institution which we readily associate with the much later unified empire. Therefore, the understanding of the transformation and development China underwent between the 3rd and the 6th centuries is essential for the better understanding of Chinese history as a whole.

The conference is the next step in a broader initiative supported by the CHINET project which aims at establishing a research group of mainly Europe-based, early-career researchers with a common interest in early medieval China, which might stimulate research into this period of Chinese history and contribute to the founding of a specialized “field” with connected communities pursuing the same research interests. Participants of the conference will present the outcomes of their individual research ranging from political and institutional history, historiography and geography to philosophy and literature. It is hoped that the conference will help to draw attention to this fascinating period of Chinese history and will initiate a fruitful discussion on research topics which might be shared by early medieval China scholars Europe-wide.

Keynote speakers:

• Gerda Wielander (University of Westminster, UK)
• Fan Lizhu (Fudan University, China)
• Chen Na (Fudan University, China)
• Dan Smyer Yu (Yunnan Minzu University, China)
• Benjamin Penny (Australian National University, Australia)
• André Laliberté (University of Ottawa, Canada)

Conference topics:

Religion in contemporary Chinese society is undoubtedly one of many important neuralgic points that have arisen from its turbulent development and will also shape its future. Compared with the professional and public interest in popular themes of development in contemporary China (such as economics, social policy, environmental issues, ethnic relations, demographics, urbanization, migration, militarization, nationalism, etc.), analysing the changes and the impacts of religions in Chinese society plays rather a minor role. However, if we inspect this topic taking the Chinese historical experience into account, or if we consider it with regard to knowledge of the developments in the world after the fall of the Berlin Wall, it is religion that has the potential to motivate and frame major changes at both the local and global levels. Chinese political elites are quite aware of the importance of religious issues, and since the unexpected conflict with the religious movement Falun Gong at the end of 20th century, their religious policy has therefore been, at least nominally, rather strictly defined. This strict approach cannot prevent an unstoppable development and transformation of the religious situation in contemporary China that involves multiple varieties of religious traditions at all social levels and in all regions inhabited or controlled by the Chinese people.
The potentials, motivations, effectiveness and impacts of particular policies that are attempting to rectify the spontaneous religious developments will constitute the focus of this conference. We are looking forward to open a forum for all those interested in debating and further analysing the changes in the field of religion in contemporary China, and of the impact that various official policies have had on this process. We are seeking research presentations (20–30 minutes in length) or session proposals of any disciplinary backgrounds which relate to the general theme of Religions and Politics in Contemporary Chinese Societies. These could include, but are not confined to, the following subthemes:

• The religious policy of the Chinese state – historical, ideological and international contexts
• The blending of religious and ethnic policies
• Christianity as a threat from across the borders vs. Christianity with Chinese characteristics
• Islam and its representations in the global and local contexts
• State policies towards “superstition” and new religious movements
• Matchmaking between the Chinese state and Chinese religious “ideology”
• Local government and local religious traditions
• Commercialization and commodification of religion
• Repression, regulation and support of religion by the Chinese state
• International religious policy and religious policy of the Overseas communities
• The role and concept of religion in the Chinese political system
• The religious dimension of Chinese politics and the Chinese state
• Political ambitions of the Chinese religious community

The Czech and Slovak Sinological Conference provides a platform for experts, academics, and researchers from near and far to exchange their insights and thoughts on a wide spectrum of China related topics. Student presenters are also welcome and encouraged to participate. Papers on the following areas are particularly welcome:

• Chinese language and literature
• Chinese history and religion
• Chinese culture
• Chinese politics, economics and society

Submission guidelines:

Click here to submit your abstract (max. 300 words). Each presentation will last 20 minutes, followed by a 10 minute discussion.

• Abstract submission deadline: June 30, 2014
• Notification on acceptance: July 31, 2014
• Final registration deadline (both speakers and attendants): September 30, 2014

Conference fees:

The conference is free of charge. Participants will need to cover all their personal costs, including transportation, accommodation, visa etc. Invitation letters will be provided on request.

Practical information about traveling to Olomouc and accommodation can be found here.

For more information or other inquiries, please contact us at the e-mail: chinet.conference@gmail.com

Conference topic: The conference focuses on interpretative approaches to the early Chinese “Masters” (zhuzi) in the light of recent developments in philology, textual criticism, manuscript studies, and the history of philosophy. The participants scrutinize approaches to zhuzi writings as “philosophical texts”, a term prone to evoke the image of a single author expressing a coherent set of ideas. The conference highlights aspects such as text production, purpose, use, and circulation that present valuable clues to a constructive reading. Traditionally, the Masters have tended to be understood as unified books. Apparent incongruities resisting easy interpretation were frequently neglected or assimilated into unifying hermeneutic strategies. It is now relatively uncontroversial, however, to consider the Masters texts as heterogeneous in terms of their generic variability, genesis and subsequent textual history. The conference treats this as a starting point for explorations into novel hermeneutic approaches, reading strategies, and methods of meaning construction. For this purpose, various specific questions are addressed by the conference:

Compositionality: How can we arrive at a workable definition of compositionality? What motivates compositionality? How does it relate to intertextuality? Is it a feature that emerges from or is encouraged by the physical properties of ancient writing materials and scribal practices, or do we need to look for other motivations, possibly philosophical or cognitive ones?

Coherence: Does compositionality undermine coherence? Do structuring devices exist that create coherence in spite of a text’s composite character, and are such devices characteristic of specific genres or purposes?

Authorship: Is the ancient Chinese author ‘dead’? Or are we, in posing this question, merely rehashing a problem that has long been settled in Western literary criticism? Does it make sense still to discuss the philosophy of a text if its readers cannot conclusively identify the author, or if they need to assume multiple authorship?

Contexts: Assuming that in early China existing textual units were regularly integrated into new compositions, can we still reconstruct these units’ original (or at least earlier) contexts, understood as the co-texts and discourses in which they were embedded and the social constellations in which they were produced? What do such reconstructions tell us about the zhuzi as a bibliographic or generic category?

Hermeneutics: In light of what can be inferred about the origins and early history of the zhuzi texts, is it a productive strategy to focus on the reconstruction of coherent philosophical arguments? Would it be more fruitful to single out ideas or textual snippets we are interested in and then use them for philosophical inspiration? Do the texts themselves, through certain features, imply ways to integrate textual data into a coherent understanding?

The list of participants:

• Attilio Andreini, Ca’Foscari University, Italy
• Scott Cook, Yale-NUS College, Singapore
• Carine Defoort, KU Leuven, Belgium
• Joachim Gentz, The University of Edinburgh, UK
• Paul R. Goldin, University of Pennsylvania, USA
• Michael Hunter, Yale University, USA
• Lisa Indraccolo, University of Zurich, Switzerland
• Martin Kern, Princeton University, USA
• Lee Ting-mien, KU Leuven, Belgium
• Andrew Meyer, The City University of New York, USA
• Christian Schwermann, University of Bonn, Germany
• Dušan Vávra, Masaryk University, Czech Republic
• Oliver Weingarten, Oriental Institute, Czech Republic

The list of papers can be viewed here
If you want to attend the conference, click here for registration!

Conference fees: The conference is free of charge. Invitation letters will be provided on request.
Accommodation: Detailed information on accommodation in Brno can be found HERE.

In recent decades, the world has witnessed the enormous economic, social, cultural and political development of China. As the most populous country in the world, China’s transition process influences directly one fifth of the world’s population and indirectly almost all the rest of the world. Chinese economic activities cover the whole globe, Chinese living overseas constitute the largest diaspora, and China’s political and economic influence is significant. On the other hand, China and its government face many challenges, as Chinese society as well as the environment are affected by these massive processes. The conference theme is focused on the opportunities and potential threats China faces or will face in the near future.

We are seeking research presentations (20-30 minutes’ duration) or session proposals, which relate to these broad themes. These could include, but are not confined to, the following areas:

• China and Asia, the world and supranational activities
• China’s economy, its plans and reality
• Social and economic processes within China
• Labour and people transiting China (micro and macro perspectives)
• Chinese abroad and the economic and social impacts on both China and the world
• Legitimacy and the legal system
• Negotiating growth and development – different approaches to the social and economic transition in China and the world (comparative studies, theories on development issues etc.)
• The ecology of transitioning China

Deadlines:
The deadline for the Call for Sessions and Paper Abstracts is: 31st January 2014
Information for notification of acceptance of abstracts: 21st February 2014
The deadline for final registration for the conference: 9th March 2014
The deadline for full paper submissions: 4th May 2014 (submitted after the conference)

Conference fees: The conference is FREE OF CHARGE.

Note: Participants will cover all their personal costs, including transportation, accommodation, visas, etc. Our staff can provide you with an invitation letter for visa if necessary.

Call for Papers in pdf can be downloaded here.

Recommended accommodation and travel information can be found here.

Members of the sinological, anthropological and related communities are invited to propose sessions and papers for the Conference on Ethnic Minorities, Ethnicity and Ethnic Policies in China.

The conference has a theme of Ethnic Minorities, Ethnicity and Ethnic Policies in China, inviting exploration of the many ways that ethnicity can be employed as a concept and politics or as a way of being or understanding. 

Session organisers and delegated of any disciplinary backgrounds are invited to submit sessions and paper proposals to the conference, especially those which contribute to:

• the contemporary situation (field research)
• theory, ethnography and other methodology
• diachronic understanding of the phenomenon of ethnicity in Asian and worldwide context
• ethnicity-religion interaction
• state-individual perspectives on ethnicity and identity
• ethnic minority policies
• minority language situation and policies
• China and its ethnic groups in wider East Asian, Asian and worldwide context
• any other relevant as well as alternative topics 

Deadlines and submission process:

• The Call for Sessions and Papers starts on: Friday 16 August 2013
• The deadline for the Call for Sessions and Papers: Monday 23 September 2013
• The deadline for final Registration for the conference: Friday 11 October 2013

Submit a session proposal - click here.

Each session will be given 90 minutes time. Minimum number of papers presented within one session is 2, maximum 5. Number of presenters or authors is not restricted.

Submit a paper proposal - click here.

For detailed information contact us at the conference e-mail: caea.olomouc@gmail.com