Asian Studies Special Events

SPRING 2013

Jewish Studies in China: The New Frontier

Dr. Lihong Song, Associate Professor of Religous Studies and Deputy Director, Glazer Institute of Jewish Studies, Nanjing University

Sponsored by the Institute for Jewish Thought and Heritage

April 3, 2013

4:00 pm

120 Clemens Hall, UB North Campus

Click here for more information.

The Chinese Rebel Scholar Li Yan

Work-in-Progress Discussion with Professor Roger Des Forges

Friday, April 12, 2013

3-5:00 pm

532 Park Hall, UB North Campus

According to many sources, in the early 1640s a Chinese scholar named Li Yan helped the commoner rebel Li Zicheng overthrow the Ming dynasty. After taking and losing the capital, Li Zicheng suspected that Li Yan planned to create an independent rebel base and had Li Yan assassinated. This act opened the way for the establishment of the Qing dynasty. It now appears that the storied Li Yan was a composite figure whose hagiography came to include elements drawn from the lives of many other people. In this paper, Professor Des Forges attempts to unravel the complex relationship between the original historical personality and the legendary heroic figure.

Professor Des Forges requests that attendees read the paper ahead of the discussion. To obtain a copy, email backer@buffalo.edu or vardi@buffalo.edu, or access it through UB Libraries course reserve using course number HIS000 (UBIT name required).

Click here for an event flyer.

NGO Founder Visits UB to Discuss Anti-trafficking and Community-building Work in Vietnam

March 25-27, 2013

In a series of meetings and public events, Caroline Nguyen Ticarro-Parker, founder and executive director of Catalyst Foundation, will discuss the organization’s multi-pronged approach to preventing human trafficking by developing and empowering marginalized communities through education, housing, job training, improved healthcare, and social services.

See below for a list of scheduled public presentations.

Click here for a flyer announcing Ticarro-Parker's three public appearances at UB.

A Catalyst for Freedom and Dignity: Protecting Children and Building Communities in the Mekong Delta

Monday, March 25
3:30-5:00 pm
509 O’Brian Hall, UB North Campus

Catalyst Foundation works to prevent human trafficking in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta by developing and empowering marginalized communities through education, housing, job training, healthcare, and social services. Caroline Ticarro-Parker will discuss Catalyst’s multi-pronged approach to preventing child trafficking and building sustainable communities that provide for basic needs, recognize and protect individual rights, and respect the cultural heritage of minority groups. Cosponsored by the UB Asian Studies Program, Gender Institute, Buffalo Human Rights Center, and Baldy Center for Law and Social Policy. For more information, contact Asian Studies Assistant Director Bruce Acker (backer@buffalo.edu / 645-0763). For more about the Catalyst Foundation, view the 2012 CNN Freedom Project documentary Children of the Trash Dump or visit www.catalystfoundation.org.

Building Communities of Hope: Fighting Poverty and Trafficking in Vietnam

Tuesday, March 26
2-3:30 pm
17 Norton Hall, UB North Campus

Thousands of children in Vietnam live without identity papers. Many are forgotten, ignored, and without hope; and child protective services are scarce. In 2007, the Catalyst Foundation became aware of a community of displaced Cambodian refugees in the Mekong Delta who were so poor that they were living and working on a garbage dump, with children as young as three gathering recyclable materials for resale, and families selling their children to traffickers to survive. Caroline Nguyen Ticarro-Parker will discuss the Catalyst Foundation's holistic community development approach to preventing child trafficking by empowering these marginalized communities in Vietnam through education, housing, job training, improved healthcare, and social services. Learn about work and internship opportunities with Catalyst to help build stronger communities in Vietnam and save children from trafficking. Cosponsored by the Undergraduate Academies, Gender Institute, and Asian Studies Program.

Poverty and Human Trafficking in Vietnam

Wednesday, March 27
12-1:00 pm
182 Farber Hall, UB South Campus

Office of Global Health Initiatives 2013 Seminar Series

For more information, contact Bruce Acker at backer@buffalo.edu / 645-0763

Film

In God’s Land

Film screening and conversation with Director Pankaj Rishi Kumar
Thursday, March 28, 2013
5:00 pm
Screening Room, Center for the Arts, UB North Campus

Sponsors: UB Asian Studies Program and Center for Global Media, Department of Media Study

Centuries ago, six nomad families transformed dry land into wet farmlands. Impressed, the Nizam gifted the lands to the people. During British rule, the Vanamamalai Temple controlled by Brahmins became the legal owners of the land and the villagers mere tenant farmers. Five years ago, the temple secretly sold the farmlands to the government as a special economic zone, but claimed it was for the “welfare of society at large.” If the temple represents the old power structure, the SEZ is just another new development the villagers have to fight. The only solace for them is the myriad questions they ask their God Sudalai Swami, who promises to protect them.

Presentation

China’s Top Designer Han Lixun Presents at the University at Buffalo

March 9, 2013 @ 10:30
Center for the Arts Screening Room

Han Lixun, the chief designer for 2008 Beijing Olympic Opening Ceremony, speaks March 9, 2013 at 10:30am at the University at Buffalo, North Campus, Center for the Arts Screening Room. He will reveal the ins and outs of working behind the scenes of the Ceremony with some of the most well-known figures in the contemporary arts world. From conceptualization and bidding to material and technical choices, from contextualizing the design in a given space to the collaboration with architects and engineers, from experimentation on mechanical, multi-media and lighting devices, to testing the validity of his visual modeling, from what was not realized in the Ceremony to what has happened in China’s design/tech world after the Ceremony, his presentation will provide insight into China’s historical inventions and contemporary culture, including its politics, ethics, aesthetics, technology and the world of design. He will discuss ways to meet today’s societal demands in the field of arts, illuminating career-building skills and strategies. The presentation, made possible through the Confucius Institute at the University at Buffalo and the Technē Institute for Arts and Emerging Technologies at the University at Buffalo, is part of the United States Institute for Theatre Technology’s Upstate New York Regional Section Spring Conference, will last one-hour with a fifteen-minute period for questions and answers. The event is free and open to the public.

To view the official UB press release, click here.

For further information, contact:

Name: Dr. Eric Yang, Executive Director, Confucius Institute at UB
Address: University at Buffalo --202 Baldy Hall- Buffalo, NY 14260
Phone: 716-645-7919
E-mail: wenzhong@buffalo.edu

OR

Name: Professor Lynne Koscielniak, Director of Design and Technology
Address: University at Buffalo – Dept. of Theatre and Dance - 285 Alumni Arena - Buffalo, NY 14260
Phone: 716-645-0574
E-mail: lk2@buffalo.edu

Celebrate Chinese New Year!

February 10, 2013

2:00 - 4:30 pm

Mainstage Theater, Center for the Arts

University at Buffalo North Campus

Sponsored by the UB Confucius Institute and the Chinese Club of Western New York, in partnership with the Gold Summit Organization for the Development of Eastern Culture.

Click here for an event flyer.

Read more about this Chinese New Year celebration.

Presentation

U.S.-China Relations and China’s International Role

Paul Haenle, Director of the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center, Beijing

Former National Security Council Director for China, Taiwan, and Mongolia

Tuesday, February 12

3:30-5:00pm

280 Park Hall, UB North Campus

Free and Open to the Public

Prior to becoming director of the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center, Mr. Haenle, a native Buffalonian, served from 2007-2009 as director for China, Taiwan and Mongolia on the National Security Council staffs of Presidents George W. Bush and  Barack Obama, and from 2004-2007 as executive assistant to National Security Advisors Condoleezza Rice and Stephen Hadley. Trained as a China foreign area officer in the U.S. Army, Haenle was assigned twice to the U.S. embassy in Beijing and served as a U.S. area commander in the Republic of Korea. Sponsored by the UB Asian Studies Program, Undergraduate Academies, and Interdisciplinary Social Sciences Program.

Special opportunity for students!

Preparing for an International Career: A Conversation with Paul Haenle

2:00-3:00pm

280 Park Hall

Paul Haenle, former National Security Council director for China, Taiwan, and Mongolia, will discuss various paths to building an international career and the courses, skills, and experiences that will help students launch careers in the international arena. He will also comment on the opportunities and challenges for Americans living and working in China. Mr. Haenle offers a rare, personal, glimpse into the workings of international relations from someone with experience at the highest levels of U.S. foreign-policymaking. Sponsored by the UB Asian Studies Program, Career Services, Undergraduate Academies, and Interdisciplinary Social Sciences Program.

To view the poster for these events, click here

For more information, contact Bruce Acker at backer@buffalo.edu

Film

UB Asian Studies Program, Undergraduate Academies & Center for Global Media, Department of Media Study present:

Adda: Calcutta, Kolkata (52 minutes)

A film by Surjo Deb

CFA screening room 112

January 24, 2013

5 PM 

A free-flowing, intimate portrait of Calcutta/Kolkata and its people, using the Bengali phenomenon of "adda"—informal conversations between groups of people that go on for hours at a stretch—at street corners, cafes, markets and living rooms. The city of Calcutta is undergoing gigantic changes, yet the conversations (“adda”) never stop. Calcuttans love to talk, and they talk about everything under the sun. The film chronicles some of these conversations and, through them, expresses that elusive feeling of what it feels like to live in this city.

Researched and co-scripted by UB English student Shayani Bhattacharya, Ph.D.

FALL 2012

Presentation

Iconic Or ?: Regional Practice Within Global Context
by Li Xiaodong, Chair, School of Architecture, Tsinghu University, Beijing.

Date: October 31
Time: 5:30 pm
Location: 301 Crosby, UB South Campus
Free and open to the public

Li Xiaodong, an architect and founder of the firm Li Xiaodong Atelier, has won numerous architectural prizes, including the Aga Khan Award for Architecture in 2010 for his design of a school built on a bridge attached to a Hakka Roundhouse in southern China and the World Architecture Festival Prize in 2012 for the Liyuan Library in the Beijing suburb of Huairou. He believes that a good design product is the result of spiritual exploration of ideas with rational thinking, it engages with both technical knowledge and artistic judgment. The richness of a good design relies on how the matrix of detail, scale, proportion and commonsense are carefully orchestrated.

Event is co sponsored by the UB Confucius Institute

China Town Hall: Local Connections, National Reflections
Featuring live interactive webcast with Gary Locke, U.S Ambassador to the People’s Republic of China
Local speaker: Andrew Mertha Associate Professor of Government, Cornell University

Date: Monday, October 29
Time: Reception at 6:00 pm; Program starts at 7:00 pm
Location: 120 Clemens Hall, UB North Campus
Free and open to the public
For event itinerary, click here

China Town Hall is a national day of programming on China involving 50 cities throughout the United States.

The webcast will be moderated by Stephen A. Orlins, President, National Committee on U.S-China Relations. Speaking and leading discussion on-site at UB will be Andrew Mertha, Associate Professor of Government, Cornell University. Before his appointment as Ambassador to the People’s Republic of China, Gary Locke was Secretary of Commerce in the Obama Administration and Governor of Washington.
Dr. Mertha is the author of The Politics of Piracy: Intellectual Property in Contemporary China and China’s Water Warriors: Citizen Action and Policy Change.

Event is co sponsored by UB Confucius Institute, UB Asian Studies Program, International Institute of Buffalo, National Committee on U.S-China Relations, with funding from the Starr Foundation.

Juxtapositions Lecture Series, Department of English

The First Golden Age of Sanskrit Poetics: Dandin in Asia 

Yigal Bronner, Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Date: Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Time: 5:00 - 7:00 p.m.

Location: 306 Clemens Hall

The Mirror of Poetry (Kāvyādarśa) by Daṇḍin (c. 700, Kanchipuram) is one of the most influential treatises ever produced in South Asia. This essay on poetic language was translated and adapted into a variety of languages in the south (Kannada, Sinhala, Pali, and Tamil), travelled to Southeast Asia (it survived in Burma, and there is reason to believe that it played a role in literary production in old Javanese), was translated into Tibetan (where it became a foundational text, repeatedly commented upon), and may even have exercised influence on the formation of Recent Style poetry in China. In this presentation Bronner will discuss the Mirror and some of the secrets behind its extraordinary success.

Film Screening

“Rashomon”
In Japanese with subtitles

Date: October 9, 2012
Time: 5:00 - 6:30 pm
Location: Clemens 120

“Rashomon” is a 1950 Japanese crime drama based on Akutagawa Ryunosuke's famous short stories, "In a Grove" and “Rashomon.” The plot centers on the testimonies of each character involved in the murder of a samurai.Revolutionary for its time, Kurosawa uses the multiple perspective approach to reveal the subjective nature of truth and the unreliability of testimony. A stunning example of cinematic art, this film marks an important moment in Japanese and film history. Film directed by Kurosawa Akira.

Documentary Screening

Vincent Who ? A documentary of Asian-American empowerment

Date: Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Time: 4:30 pm

Location: 240 Student Union, UB North Campus

Free and open to the public

In 1982, at the height of anti-Japanese sentiments, Vincent Chin was murdered in Detroit by two white autoworkers who said, “it’s because of you mother** that we’re out of work.” When the judge fined the killers a mere $3,000 and sentenced them to three years of probation, Asian Americans around the country galvanized for the first time to form a real community and movement.

Through interviews with the key players at the time, as well as a whole new generation of activists, this film explores the history of the case, as well as other important touchstones in Asian American history including the Chinese Exclusion, Japanese Internment, the 1992 LA Riots, the recent murders of Joseph Ileto and Cha Vang and post 9/11 racial profiling. “Vincent Who?” asks how far Asian Americans have come since then and how far we have yet to go.

Curtis Chin is an award-winning writer and producer and cofounder of the Asian American Writers Workshop and Asian Pacific Americans for Progress.

Event is cosponsored by the UB Asian Studies Program, Undergraduate Academies, Multicultural and Diversity Center and Department of Transnational Studies

Conversations in Christ & Culture Performance, Canisius College
Featuring Indian Classical Music Performance by Kalapini Komkali

Date: Tuesday, October 2
Time: 7:30 pm
Location: Palisano Pavilion, Canisius College
Event is free and open to the public

The Joseph J. Naples'41 Conversations in Christ & Culture Performance and Lecture Series presents Kalapini Komkali, a Hindustani (often called 'Indian') classical vocalist celebrating her first U.S. tour this year. She will perform a mix of classical ragas, Indian devotional songs (bhajans) and Malwa folk songs. For more information visit Kalapini Komkali at Canisius College or contact Dr. Christopher Lee at lee4@canisius.edu or 716-888-2874.

2012 Moon Festival Celebration

Sunday, September 30

7:00 pm

Slee Hall, UB North Campus

Free and open to the public

The celebration will feature lively performances that evoke the spirit of the Chinese people and draw on the traditions of ancient China. The program will be presented by student artists from Beijing’s Capital Normal University. It will include performances on the guzheeng (similar to a zither), erhu (a two-stringed instrument played with a bow), and gourd flute, as well as spectacular dancing and acrobatics such as Chinese Yoyo and Monocycle.

The Moon Festival Celebration is sponsored by:
The Confucius Institute @ UB, Hanban//Confuciuus Institute Headquarters,Capital Normal University, UB College of Arts annd Sciences

Triveni Concerts
 
Mala Ramadorai
Hindustani Vocal Concert
Friday, September 28
7:30 pm
Baird Recital Hall, UB North Campus
 
Spirit of Krishna Band
Sunday, September 30
7:00 pm
Drama Theatre, UB Center for the Arts
Featuring Shashank Subramanyam (flute/vocals), Anwar Khan Manganyar (folk vocals), Purbayan Chatterjee (sitar), Firoze Khan Manganyar (dholak), Patri Satishkumar (mridangam, khanjira, konnakol)
 
For more information, contact Arvind (716-689-6294), Teja (716-639-0902), or Dinesh (716-689-2835).

Asian Studies Program Annual Picnic

Saturday, September 8, 2012.
1:00 - 4:00 pm.
Ellicott Creek Park "Casino", Tonawanda, N.Y.

All are welcome to join us for our annual Asian Studies Program picnic on September 8th. Feel free to bring a dish to share with everyone. Ellicott Creek Park is off Niagara Falls Boulevard, approximately 1.5 miles north of I-290. RSVP to Valerie Bailoni at 645-0759 / vbailoni@buffalo.edu.

A Humble Offering: Reflections of a Poet’s Journey through Life

Celebrating the Vision of Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore through Images, Words, and Dance

Sunday, August 26

7:00 pm

Drama Theater, Center for the Arts

University at Buffalo North Campus

Suggested donation: $20 / $15 for students

This contemporary, multimedia experience brings to life the vision of Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore, a philosopher, poet, and artist who transcended boundaries of time and place and championed multiculturalism and freedom of expression. The first non-westerner to be awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1913, Tagore’s words evoked great beauty and introduced many in the West to Indian culture for the first time. Sponsored by Triveni and cosponsored by Sanskriti and the UB Asian Studies Program. For more information, contact Arvind (716-689-6294); Teja (716-639-0902); Dinesh (716-689-2835); or Kakali (716-580-3172).