Gatty Lecture Series

Join us for a talk by Mark Sanchez, Assistant Professor of Asian Studies (Asian American) at Vanderbilt University.

This Gatty Lecture will take place at The Kahin Center, 640 Stewart Ave. Lunch will be served. For questions, contact seapgatty@cornell.edu.

Abstract
This talk explores how legal advocates fought to defend civil liberties during the martial law era in the Philippines (1972-1981). During martial law, legal activists tried to challenge the Marcos regime in Philippine courts while trying to avoid legitimating martial law. Other legal advocates sought to garner international support while maintaining the centrality of Filipino people’s voices and experiences. The Free Legal Assistance Group (FLAG), an organization started by former Senator Jose W. Diokno and other lawyers to fight for the civil liberties of everyday Filipinos helped lead such fights. So too did anti-Marcos activists in the National Democratic Front (NDF) of the Philippines and the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF). This work operated on a local level with documentation efforts and habeas corpus filings as well as an international level, with examples such as the Permanent People’s Tribunal (PPT) trial against the Marcos government in 1980. Despite the challenge of laying claim to the law against an authoritarian state, legal activists continued to advocate against the regime’s excesses and worked to shift local and international opinions against the Marcos state. Their work greatly contributed to transnational efforts to document human rights violence in the Philippines and offers insights into productive collaborations between grassroots and international solidarity activists.

About the Speaker
Mark John Sanchez teaches Asian American and Philippine history courses at Vanderbilt University. He is currently completing a book on the making of a transnational opposition to the martial law regime of Ferdinand Marcos, Sr. He is also working on a project on Philippine labor migration, speculation, and gambling.

This conference explores the interrelationships among political literary, and religious culture in early second-millennium South India and Sri Lanka. Scholars of premodern South Asia and Indian Ocean political culture now recognize that transregional processes fundamentally shaped political environments in this region. The substantial migration of scholars, military operators, ritual specialists, and pilgrim-patrons led to substantial transfers of knowledge. During this period, textual forms, material culture, languages, and technical sciences were on the move. Speakers will highlight the potential of working across languages and between key political-cultural centers to identify core characteristics of premodern political culture in peninsular India and Sri Lanka from approximately 900-1500. The culture of politics in this region underwent substantial changes during this period, bookended by the Indian Ocean imperial vision of the Cōḷas to the advent of the Portuguese Indian Ocean colonial empire.

Conference participants include:

Manasicha Akepiyapornchai, Asian Studies, University of Texas at Austin

Daud Ali, South Asia Studies, University of Pennsylvania

Stephen Berkwitz, Religious Studies, Missouri State University

Anne Blackburn, Asian Studies, Cornell University

Whitney Cox, South Asian Languages & Civilizations, University of Chicago

Elaine Fisher, Religious Studies, Stanford University

Alistair Gornall, History & Religion, Singapore University of Technology and Design

Larry McCrea, Asian Studies, Cornell University

Bruno Shirley, Buddhist Studies, Heidelberg University

Achieve fluency in a language of South Asia with the help of a Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) summer fellowship. You’ll gain valuable knowledge about cultures and countries in which your language is commonly used, while developing skills in a language critical to the needs of the United States. Graduate and undergraduate students are eligible.

Eligible South Asian languages available for in-person or virtual intensive language study include Bengali, Dari, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Nepali, Oriya, Pashto, Persian, Punjabi, Sinhala, Tamil, Telugu, Tibetan & Urdu.

The deadline to apply is February 18, 2026.

Can't attend? Contact sap@einaudi.cornell.edu for more information.

Join us to learn about opportunities for graduate students with the Einaudi Center for International Studies. This session will discuss how to discover or strengthen global interests, including research and travel grants, guest lectures, fellowships, and more!

Can't attend? Email programs@einaudi.cornell.edu for more information.

The Laidlaw Scholars Leadership and Research Program promotes ethical leadership and international research around the world—starting with the passionate leaders and learners found on campuses like Cornell. Open to first- and second-year students, the two-year Laidlaw program provides generous support to carry out internationally focused research, develop leadership skills, engage with community projects overseas, and become part of a global network of like-minded scholars from twenty universities worldwide.

At this session, we'll share more information about the program, including independent international projects with the Einaudi Center’s trusted partners around the world for the summer 2026 leadership-in-action portion of the program, and tips for writing a successful application. Applications are due January 12, 2026.

Register here. Can’t attend? Contact programs@einaudi.cornell.edu.

The Laidlaw Scholars Leadership and Research Program promotes ethical leadership and international research around the world—starting with the passionate leaders and learners found on campuses like Cornell. Open to first- and second-year students, the two-year Laidlaw program provides generous support to carry out internationally focused research, develop leadership skills, engage with community projects overseas, and become part of a global network of like-minded scholars from twenty universities worldwide.

At this session, we'll share more information about the program, including independent international projects with the Einaudi Center’s trusted partners around the world for the summer 2026 leadership-in-action portion of the program, and tips for writing a successful application. Applications are due January 12, 2026.

Register here. Can’t attend? Contact programs@einaudi.cornell.edu.