How do we construct, deconstruct, and maintain Southeast Asia? Who is doing this labor and why? The sinews by which we entangle Southeast Asia take many forms: from the epic to the quotidian and every shade in between and beyond; as connective strands; as resonating sounds; as adjoining bridges; as shared images; as documenting videos; as so much more. This year's Cornell Southeast Asia Program Graduate Student Conference theme, (De)Constructing Southeast Asia, thinks about the dynamic ways we come to, work with, and move from the region as a constructed space. With these considerations, (De)Constructing Southeast Asia is an inquiry which brings these strands together, tugs at them, or perhaps pulls them apart. We encourage submissions which seek to think through how Southeast Asia is formed and Southeast Asia forms geographies and ecologies.

The Graduate Student Conference will be held in a hybrid format 11–13 March, 2022 at the George McT. Kahin Center for Advanced Research on Southeast Asia, located on Cornell University’s campus in Ithaca, New York and online over Zoom. COVID restrictions will be applied as per university policy and are subject to change.

Keynote Address:

(Re)Producing Knowledge: Gamelan and Southeast Asian Music within and without Academe

Senior Lecturer, Christopher J. Miller, Department of Music

Panel 1: The Stuff of History

Nicole Yow Wei, "Melaka is Minangkabau: Oral Historical Poetics in the Hikayat Anggun Cik Tunggaland the Making of an Early Malay Regionalism"Eunike G. Setiadarma, "Feeling Strange, Feeling Home: An Annotation of Indonesian History" Indah Wahyu Puji Utami, "Conflicts and negotiations: The representation of the National Revolution in Indonesian history textbooks"Panel 2: Southeast Asian America

Bradley DeMatteo & Sokunthary Svay, "An American Samleing: Music and Multivocality in the Poetry of Sokunthary Svay"Cai Barias, "Transnational Asian America: Vietnamese International Student Ac-tivism and the Asian American Movement (1968-1975)"Sokunthary Svay, "Playing Kaa (កា): Memory Work, Music, and Song-Speaking"Panel 3: Contesting Power

Chanatip Tatiyakaroonwong, " 'Surveillance-Disinformation’ Assemblage and The Politics of Tech-Driven Counterinsurgency in Thailand's Southern Border Conflict"Matthew Venker, "Legal Engagements: Buddhist Law and the Construction of Chinese-Burmese Families in Colonial Burma"Chao Ren, "Yankees on the Irrawaddy: Race, Migration, and Plural Society in a Burmese Oilfield, 1921-27"Panel 4: Politics and Identity

Kelvin Ng, "Itineraries of Self-Respect: Urban Sociality and Tamil Reform in Interwar Malaya, 1929–1940"Jonalyn C. Paz, "Colonial Beasts and Where to Find Them: Constructs of Sex Tourism in Olongapo, Zambales Philippines"Chu May Paing, "Gali-hto-thaw Images: Dangerous Laughter as Viral Spread in Contemporary Myanmar"Film Screening

Grace Simbulan, "A is for Agustin"Panel 5: Futures of Study

Bunkueanun “Francis” Paothong, "Despot on the Spotlight: Analyzing Thailand’s Actions Against its Pro-democracy Demonstrators"Dexter Lin, "Catholic Identification as a Mode of Protection for Asian Indios across Time and Space in the Early Modern Spanish Empire"Minh-Tiến Nguyễn, "“Đây là Viet Rap?”: Contesting Americanization and internal colonialism in Vietnamese rap"Panel 6: Colonial Makes

Harry Burke, "Emiria Sunassa: Archipelagic Painter"Linh Mueller, "From “Civilizing Mission” to “Heroic Railway”: Railroad Colonialism and Infrastructural Meaning-Making in Vietnam"Jefferson R. Mendez, "Deconstructing the Colony: Filipinization of Urban Spaces and Manila’s Role in the 19th Century Global History"Panel 7: Embodiment

Andrew Hollister, "Movement and the Body: Exploring Cambodian Young Adult Experience in Kavich Neang’s Short Films"Amira Noeuv, "Girl with the Sak Yon Tattoo"Nam Nguyen, "Cannibalism, Madness, (Tw)incest, and Death: Mobilizing theVietnamese Diasporic Body in Linda Lê’s Works"Anyone seeking accommodations of any kind, including COVID safety procedures, should reach out to us at seapgatty@cornell.edu.

A pdf conference packet is available here, with more information on speakers and panels and Zoom links to attend virtually. This information is also available on the conference website.

The United States is not the only country where democracy is vulnerable. The forces of polarization, populism, and autocracy have provoked deep conflict and democratic backsliding across the globe in recent years. Countries such as Venezuela, Turkey, Hungary, and Russia that once seemed to be on the road to democratization have reversed course, with often tragic and devastating consequences. How does the United States fit into this global pattern? What lessons does a global perspective hold for the challenges of democratic vulnerability in the United States? And what have been the most effective sources of resilience in the global struggle for democracy?

Please join us for a discussion featuring some of the nation’s leading experts on global democratic vulnerability and resilience and what it might mean for American democracy.

Moderator:
Zack Beauchamp (Vox)

Panelists:
Jennifer McCoy (Georgia State University)
Cas Mudde (University of Georgia)
Ken Roberts (Cornell University)

This event is the second in our webinar series, Democracy in the Balance: Vulnerability, Resilience, and Reform, sponsored by the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies, the American Academy of Political and Social Science, and the American Democracy Collaborative. These three panels will assess the state of American democracy and evaluate prospects for its reform and renewal, based on the latest evidence and insights from political and social science.

MartÍn Caparrós is a distinguished Argentine author, writer, and narrative journalist, and one of the fundamental Latin American voices of our time. In 2017, he was awarded the prestigious Maria Moors Cabot award by the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, for outstanding reporting on America; specifying work on his nonfiction book-length work El Hambre (Hunger: The Mortal Crisis of Our Time, 2016), in which the author visits both the richest and poorest people of the earth in order to explore why hunger is one of today’s big unresolved issues. The book has been translated into 14 languages.

He was the recipient of the prestigious Herralde Prize (2011) for his novel, Living; the Planeta Prize (2004) for his novel, Valfierno; and the Guggenheim Fellowship (1994). He also writes biweekly columns for The New York Times and Spain’s El País. His expertise interconnects with a range of cross-disciplinary topics including inter-American dialogue, food insecurity, and climate change.

This event is part of Caparrós’s first visit as an A.D. White Professor-at-Large (ADW-PAL) to Cornell. His on-campus residency runs March 7-11, 2022. He was elected as an ADW-PAL in 2019. His appointment runs through 2025.

The talk will be in English.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine constitutes the first major land war in Europe in decades. It threatens lives across the region, the post–Cold War international order—and the stability of the global economy, as the United States, European allies, and countries around the world have imposed severe sanctions on Russia and supplied varying levels of aid to Ukraine.

In cooperation with the Cornell Jeb E. Brooks School of Public Policy and College of Arts and Sciences, the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies has convened this expert panel to respond to the injustice and massive violation of sovereignty, human rights, and peace.

Join us for a wide-ranging discussion of Russian domestic and foreign policy, Ukrainian nationhood and security response, human rights and migration, economic sanctions’ impact, and international and European consequences of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The panel includes Dmitry Bykov, a Russian dissident and Open Society University Network threatened scholar sponsored by Global Cornell and hosted by the Einaudi Center's Institute for European Studies (IES), in partnership with Ithaca City of Asylum.

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Panelists:

Mabel Berezin (IES Director; Professor, Department of Sociology/A&S)Dmitry Bykov (Russian writer and dissident; scholar at risk hosted by IES)Cristina Florea (Assistant Professor, Department of History/A&S)Nicholas Mulder (Assistant Professor, Department of History/A&S)Bryn Rosenfeld (Assistant Professor, Department of Government/A&S)Stephen Yale-Loehr (Migrations faculty fellow; Professor of Immigration Law Practice, Cornell Law School)Moderator:

Rachel Beatty Riedl (Einaudi Center Director; Professor, Department of Government/A&S and Cornell Brooks School)

Introduction:

Wendy Wolford (Vice Provost of International Affairs; Professor, Department of Global Development, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences)

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Live Screening: Statler 196

Students: Join the campus community in Statler 196 at 4:30 to watch the panel live. Sponsored by the Einaudi Center, A&S, and Cornell Brooks School.

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About the Series

The new Einaudi Center Critical Conversations Series brings together world-class regional, historical, and comparative experts to promote deeper understanding of global current events and emerging crises on the world stage. The stakes for our shared future have never been higher—so please join us for these critical conversations.