Southeast Asia Program
Global Intern Explores Archives, Creates Community
Emma Alexander '26 in Cambodia
Alexander writes: “This internship solidified my interest in global academic work and deepened my commitment to cross-cultural storytelling.”
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The Political Legacy of War in Southeast Asia
November 18, 2025
5:00 pm
Kahin Center
Join us for a teach-in on how the political legacies of war continue to shape governance, identity, and everyday life in Southeast Asia. The session focuses on Vietnam, Cambodia, Myanmar, and the Philippines, and will be led by student presenters from the collaborating organizations and CDM law professor and human rights educator Dr. Su Yin Htun.
This event is a collaboration between the Asian & Asian American Center, the Cambodian Student Association at Cornell, the Cornell Filipino Student Association, and the Southeast Asia Program.
Dinner from Taste of Thai will be provided. All are welcome. Please RSVP: https://cglink.me/2ee/r2295106
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Program
Einaudi Center for International Studies
Southeast Asia Program
Cornell Gamelan Ensemble with Peni Candra Rini (CU Music)
December 11, 2025
3:00 pm
Lincoln Hall, B20
The Cornell Gamelan Ensemble is joined by singer and composer Peni Candra Rini for a concert held in memory of the ensemble’s founder, Marty Hatch, who passed away in August. The program features Rini’s compositions along with some of Hatch’s favorites from the standard repertoire.
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Program
Einaudi Center for International Studies
Southeast Asia Program
Einaudi Students Learn in Global Communities
Laidlaw Scholars in Ecuador and Global Intern at Singapore Hub
We sent Cornell students abroad last summer to benefit from learning communities.
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Why Indonesia’s Hero Status for ‘Successful Autocrat’ Suharto Splits Opinion
Tom Pepinsky, SEAP
Tom Pepinsky, a professor of government at Cornell University specializing in Southeast Asian politics, provides analysis on how Suharto's legacy continues to shape Indonesian politics.
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Indonesia in 10 Films
Episode 2 of the podcast out now.
In this second episode, host Michael Kirkpatrick Miller explores the film Soegija (2012), an ambitious historical drama by director Garin Nugroho.
Soegjia follows the non-traditional Catholic national hero Monsignor Albertus Soegijapranata, during one of the most volatile periods in Indonesian history — from the Japanese occupation to the return of Dutch forces after World War II. Rather than focusing solely on its titular figure, the film paints a multifaceted image of intersecting lives of diverse characters.
Michael first speaks with Neen about the film’s cinematography, then interviews Dr. Arnoud Arps, Assistant Professor of Extended Cinema, Film Heritage and Memory at the University of Amsterdam. Dr. Arps, who previously interviewed Garin Nugroho, shares the director’s intention to create a film grounded in humanity and emotional resonance. He also collaborated with the Eye Filmmuseum and the National Museum of Indonesia to curate a special screening series on Indonesian War of Independence films, with Soegija selected as one of the featured works.
Together they discuss the three major waves of the Indonesian Independence War films, the evolution of how nationalism, heroism, and “Merdeka” are portrayed, and the film’s subtle treatment of colonizers and revolutionaries, particularly through the conflicted character Robert.
Listen to our newest episode here: https://gattyrewind.libsyn.com/
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Program
Students Reflect on Ashley Thompson's Golay Lecture
Restitution in the Making of Southeast Asia Today.
It was a pleasure to welcome Professor Ashley Thompson (SOAS University of London) for the 13th Frank H. Golay Memorial Lecture on November 6.
Following her talk, “Restitution in the Making of Southeast Asia Today,” SEAP graduate and undergraduate students had the opportunity to meet with her and reflect on her work.
Carrie (MA student, Asian Studies) shared that Professor Thompson’s visit “offered us a deeper understanding of restitution as a process shaped by state power and cultural sovereignty that still define Southeast Asia. During our conversation, Prof. Thompson’s reflections on learning Khmer and collaborating with practitioners encouraged us to think about how we understand the field, connect with local people, and build meaningful research in and for Southeast Asia.”
Mutty Un (B.S. Global Development ’26) added that “Professor Thompson's perspectives on restitution and museums have transformed how I think about the museum as an institution that reproduces colonial behaviour and power dynamics. Beyond expanding on topics discussed during her Golay, it was a pleasure to learn about how she came to study Cambodia, including her influential role in shaping Cambodia's cultural restoration and conservation institutions. ”
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Program
A United States That is No Longer a Leader in Asia
Tom Pepinsky, SEAP
In this op-ed, Thomas Pepinsky (SEAP/SAP) writes, “Weakened institutions, politicized governance, and unchecked executive power in the United States leave its Asia Pacific allies with an uncertain future.”
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Multiple Diasporas: The Class and Geopolitical Dimensions of Chinese Migration to Malaya and Singapore
December 5, 2025
4:30 pm
281 Ives Faculty Wing, Doherty Room
This multi-disciplinary panel brings together scholars studying Chinese migration to 20th century Malaya and contemporary Singapore. The overarching concern is to assess how geopolitics and class differentiation have shaped the experiences of Chinese migrants to the region as well as their local reception. The speakers hail from anthropology, labor relations, and history, and will discuss the experiences of Chinese university students in Singapore amid a rapidly shifting geopolitical landscape; the responses and interactions of local industrial workers towards their migrant counterparts, including Chinese workers, in contemporary Singapore; and how racialized citizenship policies in Cold War-era Malaya and Singapore reshaped the Chinese diaspora's relationship to China.
Panelists:
Zach Howlett, Associate Professor, Sociology and Anthropology, National University of Singapore
Wen Li Thian, PhD student, ILR, Cornell University
Darren Wan, PhD student, History, Cornell University
Moderator: Shaoling Ma, Associate Professor, Asian Studies, Cornell University
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Program
Einaudi Center for International Studies
Southeast Asia Program
East Asia Program
Anthropology Colloquium: Xinlei Sha
November 14, 2025
3:00 pm
120 Mary Ann Wood Drive, B21
Title: Indebted Sisterhood: Sex Work and Social Reproduction Across Kenya, Vietnam, and China
Abstract: The heightened China’s presence in Kenya has provoked rampant rumors around Chinese women working in local brothels or Vietnamese women being trafficked to Chinese sham entertainment business. While the rumors demonstrate growing public attention to gendered labor in connection to Chinas One Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), they also reveal lack of reliable information about immigrant life of Chinese and Vietnamese female sex workers (VCFSWs) in Kenya. Hence, VCFSWs more likely suffer from police arrest, immigration scrutiny, and even Uber driversviolence. Drawing on fieldwork of six Chinese hostessing nightclubs in Nairobi, Kenya, this talk focuses on VCFSWs’ interpersonal relationships with their employer and sex worker “sisters”. Although the international anti-trafficking campaigns and Kenyan authorities stereotype VCFSWs as trafficked victims or indentured labor, this talk highlights debt embedded in culturally-mediated emotional ties and social reproduction that disrupts popular belief of non-Western migrant sex workers as temporary, and forced labor.
Xinlei Sha is PhD candidate in Anthropology at Cornell University whose research examines the circulation of intimate labor and relations alongside Chinese business and immigration in Kenya. This research was supported by the Wenner Gren, Social Science Research Council, East Asian Program, and among others.
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Program
Einaudi Center for International Studies
Southeast Asia Program