Nationalism Unsettled presents a critical exploration of national imaginaries that disturb, defy or deviate from mainstream nation-state narratives, demanding renewed consideration of the nature of nationalism. In tackling this subject, we bring to the table speakers with cross-disciplinary expertise, spanning…

This virtual career panel hosted by the Cornell China Center features three accomplished Cornell alumni pursuing academic paths in sustainability research. Chinese panelists will share how they have built their academic paths in sustainability, with insights from their international and multicultural backgrounds.…

The Korean Language Program welcomes acclaimed musician Jung-Hee Oh and dancer Kate Kim. In this Korean traditional music performance and lecture, Ms. Oh performs gayageum byeongchang, a 12-stringed zither accompanied by song, and a p’ansori excerpt from The Song of Ch’unhyang, an epic Korean love story. Kate Kim…

For over 70 years, Chinese script has been a driving force in shaping the digital age and pushing it beyond familiar alphabetical ecologies. Western-designed screens, printers, keyboards, character encoding schemes, and more have all been forced to adapt to accommodate the intricacies of the world's one major…

It has long been recognized that the legacies of Japanese imperialism have continued to impact the production of an East Asian regional imaginary throughout the postwar years, and it has primarily been the U.S.-Japan alliance under Anpo that has exerted pressure to make the Japanese nation and the region coheres.…

Lund Critical Debate

Democracies worldwide—even many wealthy democracies long considered safely consolidated—are at risk today. Governments, policymakers, and voters face new conflicts over democratic institutions, checks and balances, which citizens can compete for office or deserve representation, and what…

Xingke tiben: A Murder Case from 1762

CCCC with Matthew Sommer (History, Stanford)

The Cornell Classical Chinese Colloquium (CCCC) 古文品讀 is a reading group for scholars interested in premodern Sinographic (古文) text. The group typically meets monthly during the semester to explore a variety of classical…

Matthew Sommer (History, Stanford University)

This talk presents three case studies from the Qing dynasty of people assigned male at birth who lived as women, while carefully concealing their assigned sex from others. One presented themself as a widow and had a successful career as a midwife for thirty…

Host Nation by Ko-woon Lee (2016, 116 minutes)

“Do you want to work in Korea?” Thus begins twenty-six-year-old Filipina woman Maria’s two-year journey into the sex industry in South Korea, which mainly caters to American soldiers stationed there.

Host Nation chronicles Maria’s hopes, dreams, and…

Liyu Hua, Ph.D. student in Asian Studies, Cornell.

“How does Language Work?: Vasubandhu(世親)’s Discussions from the Abhidharmakośa(bhāṣya) (阿毘達磨倶舍論)”

Liyu Hua studies the history of religions in northwestern India during the Kushan period (100 CE to 300 CE).

The Cornell Classical Chinese…

The Portrait as/in Ethnography: Work in Progress Screening and Discussion of These Days, These Homes

Jenny Chio is a cultural anthropologist and filmmaker at the University of Southern California.

Learn more about Professor Chio at http://www.jennychio.com/…

Japan is seen as an ethno-national country in which “Japanese” is synonymous with Japanese nationality, race, ethnicity, language, and customs. How solid is the boundary between the Japanese mainstream and those with immigrant backgrounds? In evaluating the Japanese native side of the international boundary, we…

Intergenerational family relations played a central role in the Chinese transition from empire to nation-state, according to Mara Yue Du, assistant professor in history. In a live, hybrid Chats in the Stacks book talk, Du will discuss her latest book, State and Family in China: Filial Piety and its Modern Reform (…

The Woman, the Orphan, and the Tiger by Jane Jin Kaisen & Guston Sondin-Kung (2010, 72 min)

Following a group of international adoptees and other women of the Korean diaspora in their 20s and 30s, the film uncovers how the return of the repressed confronts and destabilizes narratives that have been…

Michael Nylan (Jane K. Sather History Chair, University of California-Berkeley) will explore in the second of our four guest presenters:

Xunzi's (荀子) "On Rituals" (禮論)

She is a truly interdisciplinary scholar. Her single goal is to know as well as possible the extant texts and…

Michael Nylan (History, UC Berkeley) gives this year's Annual Hu Shih Distinguished Lecture on "Majority Rule and Consortial Policymaking: The Evidence from Early China."

Inspired by Hu Shih’s many contributions to the study of Chinese history — among them, his careful outline of “the logical…

Conducting international fieldwork provides significant value for dissertation research in various disciplines. Panelists will share information, guidance, and lessons learned related to planning, preparing, and conducting fieldwork overseas. Topics include factors shaping field site location(s) and/or partner(s),…

Over 500 Cornellians have crossed the globe with the Fulbright U.S. Student Program since the 1940s. You could be the next!

The program, administered by the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies, supports college graduates conducting research or teaching English in more than 150 countries. The…

Current calls to decolonize global research renew the institutional and personal scrutiny of our “best practices” in conducting field research. Beyond formal adherence to the Belmont principles of “respect, beneficence, and justice,” researchers must reexamine some of the hidden (and not so hidden) costs borne by…

Xinyu Guan (Ph.D. Candidate, Anthropology, Cornell University) leads this workshop.

Eighty percent of Singapore’s population lives in apartment blocks constructed by the Housing Development Board (HDB). Guan's talk examines how state-constructed housing estates in Singapore function as a site for the…

Featuring performance and video artist Soni Kum and her collaborators Hiroki Yamamoto and Kazuya Takagawa, this symposium will address themes of borders, visibility, and invisibility in relation to the Johnson Museum’s current exhibition Morning Dew: The Stigma of Being “Brainwashed,” Kum’s inaugural installation…

The Pregnant Tree and the Goblin (2019, 115 minutes) by Kim Dongryung, Park Kyoungtae

In a shanty village located next to the US military base in Uijungbu, lives a former US military comfort woman named Park Insun. Living in the village for more than 40 years, Insun feels uneasy after the news announcement…

Bartels World Affairs Lecture In this year's Bartels lecture from the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies, former president of Costa Rica Carlos Alvarado Quesada shares how conservation and sustainability are crucial for preserving democracy around the world. Costa Rica is one of the most biodiverse…

China researchers from many fields have adapted their inquiry due to the effects of the ongoing polycrisis — border exclusions, restrictions on movement, illness, and economic decoupling. This symposium will think through the challenges and obstacles that recent disruptions have presented to transregional China…

The 2023 Preston H. Thomas Memorial Symposium Exhibition highlights the work of leading creative experts around the world that explores and integrates regional cultural, material, technological, and spatial practices in the rural-urban territories of East and Southeast Asia. Through a collection of visual materials…

NOTE: The tour will take place from 10:30-11:00 am. (The second tour formerly listed from 11:15-11:45 am is canceled.)

You're invited to join a guided tour of the 2023 Preston H. Thomas Memorial Symposium Exhibition on the theme of "FRINGE: New Centers for Architecture and Urbanism," which…

Tour of Duty by Kim Dong-ryung and Park Kyoung-tae (2 hours 30 min. 2012)

There remains only silence in a US military camp town in the northern part of Gyeonggi province which will be pulled down any time soon.

In the town, three women are still living with pains engraved in their bodies. Aunt Bobby…

Faculty and staff are invited to join for an overview and open discussion of the Global Hubs initiative.

Vice Provost Wendy Wolford will explain the purpose of the Global Hubs, and faculty leads for several of the Hubs locations will discuss their experiences with institutional partners and ways for faculty…

Is the University Still a Site of Critical Thinking: Critical Thinking in the Ruins is Panel Two of a 4-panel series which is part of Working in the Traces of Area Studies hosted by faculty emeriti Brett DeBary (Asian Studies, Cornell) and Naoki Sakai (Asian Studies, Cornell).

One legacy of the discourse of…

by Yoshiko Okuyama (Department of Languages, University of Hawaii at Hilo)

Faculty host: Andrew Campana (Department of Asian Studies, Cornell)

This presentation draws from Okuyama's book, Tōjisha Manga: Japan’s Graphic Memoirs of Brain and Mental Health (2022). She will begin with a brief…