This series is an opportunity for students whose research focuses on Asia or the Asian Diaspora to present their research to colleagues and faculty to receive feedback critical to the development of their research. It is open to Masters and Doctoral students with the intention to assist students who may be at any stage in the development of their Graduate level thesis work.

Presentations

Tuesday, 23 February 2010 | Noon | 830 York Research Tower

Minority Rights Accommodation in China: The Tibet Case
Tenzing Jigme Dekyikhangsar | Master's Candidate, Public and International Affairs

This paper will discuss the marginalization of minority rights in Tibet and how certain policies (e.g. regional autonomy laws) limit the recognition of Tibetan identity, culture and development. These approaches to minority accommodation will be analyzed within a theoretical discourse on minority rights and 'politics of recognition', from Western and non-western perspectives.

Thursday, 25 February 2010 | Noon to 1:30pm | 830 York Research Tower

Expressions of Body and Gender in the Performances of He Chengyao
Doris Ha-Lin Sung | PhD Candidate, Social and Political Thought

This paper examines expressions of body and gender in the works of the Chinese female performance artist He Chengyao (b.1964). It analyzes strategies of subject formation in the artist's works by probing historical and philosophical expressions of selfhood in Chinese art, and tracing the renewal and reinterpretion of signs and conventions in contemporary body performances.

Gender and Nation in Korean Silent Films
Jooyeon Rhee | PhD Candidate, Humanities

This paper will discuss the representation of women reflected in two Korean silent films,
Airiang (1926) and A Boat without the Master (1931), written and directed by Na Un-kyu (1902-1937). These two films are known for the expression of the impoverished social conditions of Korea and the strong desire for regaining Korea's independence.  I will analyze the relationship between gender and nationalism in colonial context.

Thursday, Thursday, 11 March 2010 | 2:30 pm | 830 York Research Tower

Liquid Modernity, Fluid Brand Meaning: Urban Chinese Consumers' Changing Perception of Western Brands
Yikun Zhao | PhD Candidate, Marketing, Schulich School of Business

Brand meaning transformation has not been studied in the global context where the developed and the developing nations are redefining themselves relentlessly. This paper aims to examine how the changing macroeconomic landscape especially the rising status of China influences urban Chinese consumers’ perception of Western brands in general and fast food brands in particular (McDonald and KFC in this case), so as to reveal the increasingly fluid nature of brand meaning particularly in the context of globalization. A macro-level factor, the power dynamics among countries, is highlighted in this analysis.

Thursday, 25 March 2010 | 12:30 to 2:30pm | 280N York Lanes

The Making of Plant Gene in the Struggles of the Small-Scaled Farmers under the Global Seed Market Integration in Northern Thailand
Sakkarin Na Nan | PhD Candidate, Faculty of Social Sciences, Chiang Mai University

To challenge the understandings of agrarian transitions under the context of global seed market integration in the northern Thailand, I problematize the taken-for-granted view of "gene" as a naturally bounded entity in the genetics debates and plant genetic manipulations. By exploring the discourses of plant genetic improvement and peasant neo-populism development among the dominant actors like state officials, NGOs and seed companies, I show the various forms of bio-politics for plant genetic improvement upon the spatial arrangement and social practices of the local farmers in one village of Nan province.

I investigate the livelihood strategies being used by the local farmers in order to negotiate with those actors’ regulations involving with plant genetic manipulation. In such negotiation, "gene" is revealed as the ongoing social-nature object being made in the process of hybridization of knowledges under the context of global seed market integration.

Knowledge and Environmental Governance on the Nu-Salween River
Vanessa Lamb | PhD Candidate, Geography

In the face of hydroelectric and other impending developments on the Nu-Salween River, local knowledge has been promoted as one way that local residents can create a counter-discourse to and even serve to ‘democratize’ the scientific ways of knowing that normally dominate the development process. In this paper, I think critically about how such knowledge is incorporated (and indeed, transformed) in decision-making processes and environmental governance. To do so, I present and analyze two situations emerging from the unanticipated outcomes of one local knowledge initiative undertaken by communities in Thailand and Burma living along on the Nu-Salween River, an important transboundary river that serves as a source of livelihood and food for an estimated 6 million people in China, Burma, and Thailand.

For more information, contact YCAR at ycar@yorku.ca.