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Taiwan's Super Saturday: Perspectives on the 2012 Polls from Canadian Election Observers
How is Taiwan's democracy affected by the island's authoritarian past and its relations with China and the United States? Panelists will weigh in on these critical questions in light of Taiwan's recent presidential and legislative elections.
Panelists Michael Stainton (President, Taiwan Human Rights Association of Canada) and Susan Henders (Associate Professor, Political Science) will also discuss their participation in an election observation mission organized by the International Committee for Fair Elections in Taiwan. Discussant B. Michael Frolic (Professor Emeritus, Political Science) will speak on the election in light of Taiwan-China relations and democratization in other contexts.
Tuesday, 14 February 2012 | 3:30 to 5:30pm | 857 York Research Tower | York University
From Impunity to Accountability? The Khmer Rouge Tribunal photo exhibition
Exhibition curated by Carla Rose Shapiro, Research Fellow at the
Asian Institute at the University of Toronto
The photos are now exhibited on the first floor, Scott Library, Keele campus until 15 February 2012.
The Exhibition is hosted at York University by York University Libraries.
Talk by Naisargi N. Dave (Anthropology, University of Toronto) on rethinking the concept of intimacy through a human witnessing of violence against a non-human life and the subsequent tethering of human to non-. As Elizabeth Povinelli has recently elaborated, the very meaning of 'intimacy' within Enlightenment thought is the freely chosen bond between sovereign subjects. Might the case of the human and animal further complicate that crucial fiction? These activists show us that where proper intimacy is inconceivable (between human and animal), the witnessing of violence both explodes and exacerbates the species divide, leading the human to a sense of singular, intimate knowledge of a singular Other's life, but an intimacy that requires the giving of 'voice' for that other which cannot speak.
Part of the YCAR and South Asian Studies Programme Colloquia on Contemporary South Asia and co-hosted the Department of Anthropology
Wednesday, 29 February 2012 | 12:30 to 2:30pm | 280A York Lanes | York University
The Making of Canada-Asia Relations: The Roles of “Other Diplomacies
Pre-conference workshop associated with the 2012 Association of Asian Studies Conference in Toronto organized by Mary Young and Susan Henders (By Invitation).
15 March 2012
Events organized by YCAR faculty associated with the 2012 Association of Asian Studies (AAS) conference
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for more information
Earlier 2011 events
The Qualities of Quantity: Scale, Number, Image and Authority in Post-Liberalization India
with Kajri Jain (Visual Studies, University of Toronto, Mississauga & Graduate Departments of Art History and Cinema Studies, University of Toronto, St George).
This paper is a preliminary attempt to think about the recent obsession with scale in contemporary India, as manifested in announcements for increasingly ambitious projects to build monumental statues, as well as in an intensified preoccupation with numbers in the form of statistics, opinion polls, and bar graphs. This event is part of the YCAR and South Asian Studies Programme Colloquia on Contemporary South Asia.
Wednesday, 1 February 2012 | 12:30 to 2:30pm | 280A York Lanes | York University
Gender Imbalances and Social Development in China: Consequences and Policies
Li Shuzhuo will describe recent trends and pattern in gender imbalance in China and reviews the current knowledge and debates about causes of gender imbalance and its social consequences. Li is professor and director of the Institute for Population and Development Studies at Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi'an. This event is co-sponsored by YCAR.
Thursday, 26 January 2012 | 2:30 to 4pm | 305 Founders College
| York University
YCAR Research Day
The York Centre for Asian Research (YCAR) cordially invites you to our first Research Day on Friday, January 20, 2012. In this day-long forum, YCAR Associates will be presenting their recently completed, ongoing, and new research on Asia and Asian Diaspora. This is a great opportunity to learn what our colleagues are doing. We hope you can join us.
20 January 2012 | 9:30am to 2:30pm | 519 York Research Tower | York University
Tribute to Tagore Film Festival 2011
The festival will consist of feature films based on stories by Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) and documentaries regarding this extraordinarily gifted poet, writer and educator whose 150th birth anniversary is being celebrated worldwide in 2011.
3-4 December 2011 | Innis Town Hall | University of Toronto
Balancing Multiculturalism and Gender Equality: Legal Pluralism and the Adjudication of Religious Family Laws in India
With Gopika Solanki, Carleton University
How do multireligious and multiethnic societies construct accommodative arrangements that can both facilitate cultural diversity and ensure women’s rights? Based on a rich ethnography of legal adjudication of marriage and divorce across formal and informal arenas in contemporary Mumbai, it is argued that the shared adjudication model in which the state splits its adjudicative authority with religious groups and other societal sources in the regulation of marriage can potentially balance cultural rights and gender equality.
This seminar is presented by International Development Studies, the Graduate Programme in Socio-Legal Studies and the Graduate Programme in Women’s Studies, and co-sponsored by YCAR.
10 November 2011 | 12:30 to 2pm | 305 Founders College | York University
What Factors Influence the Direction of Global Brain Circulation: The Case of Chinese Holders of Canada Research Chairs
Qiang Zha (York University) and Ruth Hayhoe (OISE)
As a result of globalization, academics have become more mobile and are tempted to move to institutions that have the most favorable research funding and work environment. The university is now viewed as a global magnet for academic talent, and a key institution that enhances competitiveness by connecting cities and nations to global flows of knowledge and talent. Then, what factors may influence and explain the direction of global brain flows?
This research intends to shed light on the relative strengths of the various factors that prompted a group of Canada Research Chair (CRC) holders originating from China to choose to work in Canadian universities, which is also happening against the backdrop of a gradual shift of the global centre of economic gravity towards Asia.
Wednesday, 9 November | 12:30pm | 626 YRT | York University
Translation and the World of Literature
A.N.D. Haksar
Translation is an age old means of communication and understanding between readers and listeners from different literary traditions in our multicultural world. The methods and techniques of translation have themselves become subjects of specialized academic study. In this background it is interesting to broadly consider, with some examples, how translation can improve cultural understanding, not only between North and South, East and West, but also between ancient and modern, classical and contemporary aspects of literature. My examples of this are mainly from my own area of Sanskrit translation and also from some other languages of South Asia.
Thursday, 3 November 2011 | 11:30am to 1:30pm | 626 YRT | York University
Launch of Sino-Canadian Relations in the 21st Century (Huhua Cao and Vivienne Poy, eds., University of Ottawa Press, 2011) co-hosted by YCAR and the Richard Charles Lee Canada-Hong Kong Library at the University of Toronto
Tuesday, 18 October 2011 | 10am to 1pm | Richard Charles Lee Canada-Hong Kong Library, 8th floor | 130 St. George St. | University of Toronto
Critical Political Ecologies: Shifting Contours of Environmental Knowledges and Governance
12-13 October 2011 | York University
A Brief History of Taiwanese Film: Three Waves
Film Critic Alice Shih will speak on Taiwanese film as a part of the Taiwanese Film Festival at York University. Ms. Shih is the film critic and program host for Fairchild Radio, Canada’s leading Chinese language radio and television group. She is a board member of the Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival. She has written widely on Asian filmography.
Friday, 7 October 2011 | 2 to 3pm | Room 313, York Student Centre | Keele Campus, York University
Taiwanese Film Festival
The Festival includes the screening of four Taiwanese films, and a reception and keynote address by film critic Alice Shih.
3-7 October 2011 | Nat Taylor Cinema | N102 Ross Building | York University
Worker’s’ Trauma through Failed Solidarity: Lessons from a Korean Car Industry
Su-Dol Kang (Koryo University) will speak on the labouring people in the Korean car industry in terms of their dynamic life experiences. The Ssangyong workers, whom I highlight in my case study, began to struggle on 22 May 2009 against the drastic restructuring of the factory in which they worked, which included mass layoffs of up to 2,400 workers. An unprecedented factory occupation by furious workers continued for 77 days under the slogan “The layoff is death.” Their struggle ended on 6 August 2009, with violent oppression by the state and by the company. In spite of a written agreement between the management and the striking unions for “industrial peace” following the end of the factory occupation, the workers were denied any of the promised solutions to their grievances afterwards. These workers have undergone psychological trauma since then, and the results have been dire, and even fatal.
5 October 2011 | 2:30 to 4:30pm | 280A York Lanes | York University
YCAR Fall Reception and Celebration of Publications
The York Centre for Asian Research invites YCAR Associates, friends and the York University Asian research community to its annual Fall Reception on 27 September 2011. The reception will also celebrate recent publications from YCAR and by our Associates.
We hope to see you there!
27 September 2011 | 3 to 5pm | 280N York Lanes | York University
Fear of Extinction: Environmental Protection as Political Metaphor among China's Ethnic Minorities
Nimrod Baranovitch (East Asian Studies, Haifa University, Israel)
His talk will focus on the discourse and meanings of environmental protection among several ethnic minorities in China, particularly the Tibetans, the Uyghurs, and the Mongols. To illustrate his points, he will present and analyze several video clips of rock songs by Tibetan, Mongol, and Uyghur musicians who live, create, and perform in China.
21 September 2011 | 1 to 3pm | 626 YRT | York University
The Fight for Sri Lanka and the Last Days of the Tamil Tigers
A talk and launch of a book, The Cage, by Gordon Weiss. Gordon Weiss, a veteran journalist and UN official for two decades, saw closehand the conflict between the government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam). As spokesperson for the United Nations in Colombo, he was a central observer of the final stages of the civil war in the first half of 2009 when tens of thousands of civilians perished along with the last of the Tamil Tigers. His recently published book, The Cage: The Fight for Sri Lanka and the Last Days of the Tamil Tigers, narrates the history which lead up to that horrific moment, peeling back the Sri Lankan government’s cloak of denial to seek the truth of those tragic events.
Thursday, 15 September 2011 | 12:30 to 2:30pm | Ignat Kaneff Building, Room 2027 (Faculty Lounge) | Osgoode Hall Law School (west end of second floor) | York University
Japanese Literature Today
Readings (in Japanese and English translation) and commentary by four of Japan’s leading literary figures including; haiku poet Minoru Ozawa; novelists Hiromi Kawakami and Hideo Furukawa, and translator/essayist Motoyuki Shibata. For other events celebrating the launch of the journal Monkey Business International, click here.
Monday, 12 September 2011 | 12:30 to 2:30pm | Harry Crowe Room | 109 Atkinson | York University
Legislative Council Election in 2012 and the Future of the Universal Suffrage Movement
Hong Kong Seminar Series with the Honourable Alan Kah-kit Leong, SC and Dennis Kwok.
RSVP to events.RCLCHKL@utoronto.ca.
Friday, 22 July 2011 | Richard Charles Lee Canada-Hong Kong Library | Eighth Floor of Robarts Library | 130 St. George Street | University of Toronto
A list of 2010.2011 YCAR Events can be found here. For last year's event highlights, click here.
Find a complete listing of YCAR events since 2007 in the
YCAR Events Archive.
If you have an idea for an event to profile Asian or Asian Diaspora research, please contact us at 416.736.5821 or by email at ycar@yorku.ca
Visit the YCAR Events Archive
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