19 January 2023: China’s Development Projects in the Global South:Economic and political consequences 
Prof. Dr. Andreas Fuchs, University of Göttingen & Kiel Institute of Economics

Poster Prof. Dr. Andreas Fuchs– China’s development projects around the world are rapidly gaining importance. Many observers see this development as a threat to international development finance, which has so far been dominated by the US, Europe and Japan. Others praise Beijing for the great development opportunities that have emerged. This talk will provide an overview of recent research on China’s international development projects, as summarised in the book Banking on Beijing, published by Cambridge University Press in May 2022. We will explore the following questions: What determines the scale of Chinese development assistance and other government infrastructure projects? In which countries, provinces and sectors is China particularly active and why? What impact do Beijing’s development activities have on growth, good governance, conflict and other development indicators in recipient countries? What geopolitical challenges does this pose for Europe?


15 November 2022: China’s Environmental Authoritarianism as a Global Model? Opportunities and Challenges
Dr. Maria Bondes, Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nürnberg 
Poster Dr. Maria Bondes
– In view of the global environmental crisis and the failure of leading democratic states to effectively address the climate problem, there is much debate about whether authoritarian governance models – so-called “environmental authoritarianism” – might be more suitable to tackle the ecological crisis of our time in time. As part of its new assertive foreign policy, China’s government under Xi Jinping is promoting China’s top-down environmental governance system and its vision of an “ecological civilisation” as a global model for a more sustainable future for our planet. The country presents itself on the international stage as a pioneer of global environmental and climate governance. At the same time, China is struggling domestically with a massive environmental crisis that threatens the legitimacy of the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and is seen by some observers as the “Achilles’ heel of modern China”. Here, the Chinese leadership points to great successes in the fight against air pollution, progress in national climate and energy policy and China’s world-leading role in renewable energy. The lecture takes a critical look at China’s international ambitions and national successes in the environmental field and highlights the strengths and weaknesses of China’s top-down environmental governance system. On this basis, it will discuss to what extent China’s “environmental authoritarianism” could be a global model to address the ecological crisis of our time.


16 November 2022: Constructing ‘self’ and ‘other’ in the micropolitics of housework: Sri Lankan migrant domestic workers in Saudi Arabia
(Lecture in collaboration with the Department of Sociology and Human Geography)
Poster Dr. Wasana HandapangodaDr. Wasana Handapangoda, Johannes Kepler University (JKU) Linz

– In a workplace simultaneously characterised by a high degree of ‘personalism and asymmetry’ (in Evelyn Nakano Glenn’s terms, 1984), live-in migrant domestic work provides an ideal instance of private home as a site of political struggle embedded in the dynamics of contemporary global capitalism. Combining structural analysis of domestic labour, neoliberal globalisation and boundary-work as theoretical frameworks, this lecture gives insights into the making of ‘self’ and ‘other’ in the micropolitics of employing Sri Lankan migrant domestic workers in Saudi households. The lecture is based on some of the findings of my fieldwork in Saudi Arabia carried out in 2020. Both the employers and workers used everyday rituals, rules and behaviour regulations of paid domestic labour to distinguish between ‘self’ and ‘other’ categories and construct spatial territories in the not so private world of the Saudi private household. This included the everyday politics of space, mobility and communication, food, clothing/dress, gifting and religious beliefs, over which the boundaries ‒ physical, social bodily, symbolic ‒ were constructed, contested and negotiated. The boundaries were policed and protected, nevertheless they were movable and crossable. In doing micropolitics of housework, both the employers and workers simultaneously intensified and downplayed the structural divides that separated and connected them in the complex organisation of domestic work.


15 March 2023: „UNLOCKING POTENTIAL: A COMPARISON OF LABOUR MARKET INTEGRATION OF SKILLED MIGRANTS IN SOUTH KOREA AND JAPAN“
(Lecture in collaboration with the Department of Sociology and Human Geography)
Dr. Aimi MURANAKA (Institute of East Asian Studies, University of Duisburg-Essen) and Dr. Joohyun Justine PARK (Goethe University of Frankfurt)

FOR APAC Agorá

– How to attract and retain foreign skilled professionals is a crucial question for governments and businesses around the world. However, the literature on the international migration still largely focuses on “Western” traditional immigration countries, – the U.S., Canada, the UK and Australia-, while studies on skilled migration in Asia are limited. This on-going comparative study centres on “emerging migration countries” in East Asian economies, namely South Korea and Japan. Based on a comparison of skilled visa policies and interview data, this study explores the challenges faced by foreign skilled professionals in their pursuit of  labour market integration in these countries. Both countries are facing accelerated labour shortages due to their low fertility rate and aging populations, leading both governments to actively seek foreign talents. Nevertheless, despite strong efforts from the governments, the findings of this comparative study suggest that skilled migrants experience legal and structural barriers to enter the labour market and to purse upward career mobility. Even if they secure a job post, they are under precarious employment conditions and/or they cannot necessarily make use of their “skills”. The findings from the two research projects hint similar but slightly different labour market integration outcomes of foreign professionals in two countries. Despite the efforts made by both governments, the comparative study suggests that there is still a significant gap  in successfully retaining these skilled migrants.


5 May 2023: „The Chinese Archaeology-‘Oscar’: The ‘Ten Great Annual Discoveries’ between Science and Politics“
Prof. Dr. Maria KHAYUTINA (Institute of Sinology, University of Munich)

FOR APAC Agorá Poster_Prof. Maria KHAYUTINA_2023_05_05– For a hundred years, modern archaeology has served as an important binding agent for the Chinese national historical narrative. Research results have traditionally been communicated to the population in edited form through textbooks, museums and, where appropriate, newspapers. Since the beginning of the 21st century, the state has been trying to keep public interest in archaeology alive with the help of new ways of presenting the material. The annual awards ceremony for the ten most important archaeological excavations of the previous year causes quite a stir. Although these are often spectacular finds, only a few of them – such as the sacrificial pits with bronze figures and gold masks in Sanxingdui in 2021 – are noticed in the West. This lecture provides information on the political background, scientific significance, public resonance as well as economic impact of the Chinese archaeology “Oscar” and introduces three outstanding award winners from the last five years.

 


22 June 2023: „THAILAND AS A SECOND HOME FOR RETIREES“ Documentary Screening and Discussion“
Prof.  Dr. Sirijit SUNANTA (Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia Mahidol University, Thailand)

Prof. Dr. Sirijit Sunanta_ Poster_final3This documentary is an episode in the documentary series „Some One“ that explores contemporary diversity in Thai society. Thailand has been a destination for international retirement migration. The Thai government promotes long-stay tourism and the transnational retirement industry as a strategy for economic development. Foreign retirees constitute a new group of population in Thailand, a middle-income country that is facing rapid population ageing.  Link to the documentary    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SrRLwrQq0c&t=47s

Sirijit Sunanta is associate professor in the PhD Program in Multicultural Studies, Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia, Mahidol University, Thailand. Her research interests include gender and migration, globalization and food cultures, and the politics of diversity in Thailand. The geographical focus of her research is transnational mobilities between Europe and Thailand. She has published widely in leading journals in the areas of Asian Studies, Migration Studies, Gender Studies and Tourism Studies. Sirijit’s current research projects focus on care transnationalization, old age care and migration, and gendered labour in the Thai tourism industry.


23 June 2023: „Collaborative German-Austr(al)ian Materials Science on Extracellular Matrices of Plants“
Dr. Michaela EDER (Max Planck Institute of Colloids and InterfacesPotsdam, Germany)

2023_06_23 Agorá Plakat_ Dr. Michaela EderAustralia is blessed by an extremely old ecosystem and a large biodiversity, especially in areas with extreme conditions caused by regularly occurring fires. To adjust to such environmental conditions plants have evolved various strategies. A particularly spectactular example is the seed storage and protection mechanism of the iconic Australian plant genus Banksia. Banksias can keep their seed on the plant for many years, building up a canopy stored seed bank. The delicate embryos are well protected in seed pods, consisting of dead yet functional tissues. Foci of our research were the protection of the seeds during storage and fire exposure of the cones and their 2-step opening mechanism, which depends on a climatic gradient and requires location-dependent temperatures between 55 – 72°C for initial opening and subsequent exposure to water for seed release. On the example of our research on these fascinating structures I will also talk about our collaboration with Austria and Australia and about the Max Planck Queensland Center for the Materials Science of Extracellular Matrices which started in April 2022  and its impacts on our research.

Academic career

  • from 09/2011: Research group leader at the Max-Planck-Institute of Colloids and Interfaces, Department of Biomaterials, Potsdam, Germany
  • 10/2007 – 09/2011: Post-doc at the Max-Planck-Institute of Colloids and Interfaces, Department of Biomaterials, Potsdam, Germany
  • 09/2004 – 09/2007: PhD student at the Max-Planck-Institute of Colloids and Interfaces, Department of Biomaterials, Potsdam, Germany
  • 07/2003 – 08/2004: research assistant at the Institute of Meteorology and Physics (since 01/2004 Department of Material Sciences and Process Engineering)
  • 03/2003 – 06/2003: research fellowship at the Institute of Meteorology and Physics
  • from 2002 – 2003 tutor at the Institute of Meteorology and Physics

Other

  • since 01/2019 involved in the Excellence Cluster „Matters of Activity“
  • 01/2015 – 12/2018 Associated Member in the Excellence Cluster „Image-Knowledge-Gestaltung“

11/2008 – 10/2012: leader of working group 2 “(Hygro)-mechanical behaviour of wood”, COST Action FP0802 – Experimental and Computational Micro-Characterization Techniques in Wood Mechanics

 



3 November 2023: „
Mapping Peking 1688 – 1914: a Czech Jesuit and a Russian Priest, Chinese Painters and German Soldiers, the Interweaving of City Plans“
Prof. ZHENG Cheng (Chinese Academy of Social Science)

Final Prof. ZhengBefore the detailed surveyed map finally established a „standard“ representation of old Peking in the beginning of the 20th century, various city plans of Peking had been produced and published in European languages since the late 17th century. Intelligence gathering, commercial competition, academic pursuit or sheer curiosity drove missionaries, envoys, soldiers, and merchants engaged in making new maps. The development of European plans and Chinese maps were interwoven and closely related to the modernization process of China. Therefore, the evolution of plans of Peking is not only a history of competition in intellectual and military domains, but also a history of cultural exchange. It serves a case study in the broader context of global history.

ZHENG Cheng 郑诚 received his doctoral degree and became a researcher of the Institute for the History of Natural Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2012. His main research field is the history of science and technology in Ming-Qing period. His publications include Gunpowder Weaponry and Warfare in Ming-Qing China (2022), An Illustrated History of Gunpowder Weapons in China (2020), critical editions of a selection of Chinese treatises on European military technology during the Ming-Qing transition (2019), and Ryu Seong-ryong’s memoir of Imjin war Jingbirok (2019).  For more information on Prof. Zheng please click here.


24 November 2023: “妈妈, I Miss You’: Emotional Multilingual Practices in Transnational Families”
Prof. Dr. Xiao Lan CURDT-CHRISTIANSEN (University of Bath, UK)
24 November 2023, 10:30am – 12:00pm, Sigmund-Haffner-Gasse 18, 3rd floor, HS 888Online Participation:  LINK

Vortrag Prof. Xiao LanThis study is situated in the context of the UK, in which transnational families often engage in multilingual practices with their family members near and far via digital devices or face-to-face interactions. Involving six families from two transnational communities, the Chinese and the Polish, the study focuses on emotionally related language practices. Data sources include recordings of mealtime conversations, daily WhatsApp/WeChat texts, and digital mediated family talk. Using affective repertoire as analytical framework, the study investigates linguistic features and situated language use of home language(s) in emotional negotiations between family members. In addition, it explores how multimodalities and languages are mixed to contribute to the interactional dynamics underlying ‘family talk’ and how children and adults position themselves emotionally in moment-by-moment discourse of family life.

Findings include five linguistic and non-linguistic features in emotional expression: emojis, term of endearment, diminutive, direct declaration of love, and situated emotive language use. The findings contribute to FLP literature by looking into how emotions are involved in the practices of family life and the construction of familyness. Emotions, as a key factor in FLP, are directly related to parents’ perceptions of and investment in their heritage language. Although these perceptions are linked to the powerful societal languages that often represent educational possibilities, when it comes to emotional expressions, the primacy is given to the first language/heritage language.

Xiao Lan Curdt-Christiansen is Professor in Applied Linguistics at the Department of Education, University of Bath, UK. She is Director of the Centre for Research in Education in Asia and Cluster Leader in Language, Education and Practice. Her research interests encompass ideological, sociocultural-cognitive and policy perspectives on children’s multilingual education and biliteracy development.  As an active researcher, she has examined bi/multilingual community-home-school contexts in the UK, Canada, France, China and Singapore on topics of curriculum policy, language-in-educational policy and family language policy. Her most recent research project is entitled Family Language Policy: A Multi-Level Investigation of Multilingual Practices in Transnational Families, funded by The Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). She has published widely in the field of applied linguistics. Her publications have appeared in leading academic journals, such as Language Policy; International Journal of Bilingualism and Bilingual Education; Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development; Language and Education; and Language, Culture and Curriculum, etc.


15 December 2023: Establishing Transdisciplinary Research and Teaching in Asian Studies: the Foundational Role of Languages and Linguistics”
Prof. Dr. Lorna CARSON (Trinity College Dublin, Ireland)

Prof. Lorna CarsonThis talk argues for the foundational role of languages and linguistics in the establishment of transdisciplinary research and teaching in Asian Studies. Drawing on our experience at Trinity College Dublin and the launch of the Trinity Centre for Asian Studies in Ireland just under a decade ago, I will reflect on key elements that shaped our university’s decision-making process, including our partnerships and our disciplinary expertise. I will examine how the model we followed placed the study of language & culture and theoretical & applied linguistics at the centre of our activities. I will share some key research axes which underpin our centre’s teaching and public outreach activities, examining in particular some of the interesting (and, perhaps, surprising!) applications of primary research in languages and linguistics. Finally, I will reflect on some of the challenges we have faced in our efforts to maintain a focus on languages and linguistics in our Chinese, Korean and Japanese programmes as well as in our future plans.

Lorna Carson is Head of the School of Linguistic, Speech and Communication Sciences and Professor in Applied Linguistics. She holds a B.A. (Mod.), M.Phil. in Applied Linguistics and Ph.D. from Trinity College Dublin, and an M.A. in European Studies (Human Resource Management) from the College of Europe, Bruges, Belgium. In 2015 she was elected a Fellow of Trinity College Dublin. She was the Founding Director of the Trinity Centre for Asian Studies, a multidisciplinary teaching and research centre which brings together the university’s expertise in Japanese, Korean and Chinese Studies. She was elected to the University Council in 2021. Professor Carson’s research on language learning addresses issues located at the interface between individual and societal multilingualism, with a particular attention on the language classroom, with a focus on language learning, language education policy and assessment. Her books include „Language and Identity in Europe: The Multilingual City and its Citizens“ (2020, Peter Lang), „The Multilingual City: Vitality, Conflict and Change“, co-edited with Lid King (2016, Multilingual Matters); „Language Learner Autonomy: Policy, Curriculum, Classroom“, co-edited with Breffni O’Rourke (2010, Peter Lang), and „Multilingualism in Europe: A Case Study“ (2003, 2005, Peter Lang). She is a former President of IRAAL, the Irish Association for Applied Linguistics (2014-2017). She is a member of the Governing Body of Marino Institute of Education, and sits on its Academic Council.


19 January 2024: “Civilized Cities or Social Credit? Overlap & Tension Between Governance Infrastructures in China”
Dr. Alexander TRAUTH-GOIK (University of Vienna)

Dr. Trauth-GoikForeign imaginaries of surveillance and informatization in China are commonly connected to notions of omnipresence, advanced technology, and coherent governance. In reality, the Chinese government’s efforts at building a digital society are permeated by confusion over the meaning of central edicts, interdepartmental and regional fragmentation, and overlap between different governance systems. This presentation interrogates the connection between two emerging governance infrastructures embedded in the Chinese Party-state’s latest informatization drive, the “National Civilized Cities Award” (NCCA) and the “Social Credit System Project” (SCSP) through a mixed methods approach. It combines data from an analysis of a recent NCCA assessment system government work manual, project websites, and findings from thirty qualitative video interviews with residents from twenty different cities in China to demonstrate that overlap between these projects is clear in terms of 1) criteria and indices measuring project development; 2) promoted virtues and individual behaviors; and 3) data sharing between systems. Local governments charged with the design and implementation of these initiatives conflate their targets and objectives, prompting occasional reprimand from higher-level authorities. Public confusion about the meaning and purpose of both the NCCA and SCSP has meanwhile accompanied haphazard system development, demonstrating that the path towards a “digital society” in China is fraught and far from uncontested.


5 April 2024: Imaginary Cosmography Revival in Late Joseon Korea: Circular World Maps and Their Early Chinese Sources
Dr. Vera Dorofeeva-Lichtmann (EHESS, Paris – MPIWG, Berlin)

The “Maps of the Under-Heavens” (天下圖 Korean Cheonhado, Chinese Tianxiatu 天下) shaped as a nest of concentric zones inscribed into a circle are a cartographical puzzle in many ways. These maps serve as key maps in popular atlases which became outstandingly widespread in late Joseon Korea (18th-19th centuries). The circular world maps are the first and the only extant cartographic representations of the famous early Chinese description of the entire inhabited world, which is translated as the “Classic or Itineraries of Mountains and Seas” (Shanhaijing 山海經, compiled about the 1st century BC). Considerable time gaps between a source geographical text and the attempts to represent information derived from it as maps are rather common in the history of cartography. Ptolemaeic maps, as well as mediaeval mappaemundi provide good illustrations of this phenomenon. The Korean circular world maps are typologically similar to the mediaeval mappaemundi, and this is how the former are referred to in their first studies in order to facilitate comprehension of their nature for Western scholars (Rosetti 1905, Nakamura 1947). Both are schematic representations of the world aimed to convey a certain conceptual organisation of space, without much concern for accuracy. There is, however, one substantial difference: one can hardly imagine a wide circulation of mediaeval mappaemundi-type of maps in late modern Europe, when mathematical cartography became completely dominant. In contrast, the confusingly archaic and simplistic maps of the popular Korean atlases, including the circular world maps, continued to be produced and reproduced in an almost unchanged form, not matching the mainstream of modern cartography and insensible to its development, what apparently was one of the reasons of their popularity.

            A revival of interest in imaginary cosmography occurred about a century earlier in China where appeared ‘cosmograph’-tailoured maps, which convey the symbolism of the square earth inscribed into the round heavens. These maps usually entitled “Maps of Established Positions of Heavens and Earth” (Tian Di ding wei zhi tu 天地定位之圖) are found in Chinese compendiums on divination dating from the early 17th century onwards. I shall try to demonstrate that the Korean circular maps have a close affinity with these ‘cosmograph’ maps, which, in their turn have structural parallels with the early Chinese divination boards – ‘cosmographs’ (shipan 式盤) and especially the diviner’s bronze mirrors. This allows one to see the shape of the circular world maps in a new light – not as an attempt to match it to the image of the round earth, diffused together with the Western cartography, as it is often explained, but as a symbolic representation of the heavenly circle, encompassing the terrestrial surface. The title of the maps can then be seen as referring to this cosmological idea. It should be noted that the Korean cartographical tradition favoured circular configurations.

For more information on Prof. Dorofeeva-Lichtmann, please click   here and   here.


26 April 2024: „THE TIANXIA VIEWPOINT IN THE TRADITIONAL CHINESE CULTURE AND THE CONTEMPORARY CONSTRUCTION OF THE COMMUNITY WITH A SHARED FUTURE FOR MANKIND”
PROF. DR. OUYANG KANG (Director of the Institute of State Governance, Former Vice President of the Huazhong University of Science and Technology), in cooperation with the Institute for a Global Sustainable Information Society   GSIS

Outline of the FOR APAC Lecture Series Agorá Talk:

  1. The historical generation, subsequent evolution, and contemporary development of the traditional worldview;
  2. From the perspective of the concept of the world, modernization, globalization, and the evolution of the world pattern;
  3. Chinese path to modernization, new globalization and the construction of a community with a shared future for mankind.

A Brief Introduction to Professor Ouyang Kang

Prof. Ouyang Kang Agorá Poster Doctor of Philosophy, National Teaching Master, Dean of the Institute of National Governance at Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Director of the Institute of Philosophy, Second level Professor of the School of Philosophy, Leading Professor of Outstanding Scholars in HUST Doctoral Supervisor, and „Changjiang Special Post Scholar“ of the Ministry of Education, Former Vice President of Huazhong University of Science and Technology, member of the Discipline Evaluation Group of the Academic Degrees Committee of the State Council, judge of the National Social Science Foundation, member of the Social Science Committee of the Ministry of Education, Deputy Director of the Academic Style Construction Committee of the Ministry of Education, decision support consultant of the Hubei Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China, advisory committee member of the Hubei Provincial People’s Government, and member of the Hubei Provincial Political Consultative Conference.

He has authored more than 20 works, including „Introduction to Social Epistemology“, and published over 400 academic papers in Chinese and English in „Chinese Social Sciences“ and other journals. He has won more than 20 awards for outstanding achievements in social sciences from the national, Ministry of Education, and Hubei Province. He has led more than 20 national, provincial, and international collaborative research projects, and has gone abroad dozens of times to engage in academic exchanges and collaborative research.

Since 1992, he has been receiving special allowances from the State Council and has been selected as one of the „Cross Century Excellent Talents“ by the Ministry of Education, the „Hundred and Ten Thousand Talents Project“ by the Ministry of Human Resources, the „Teaching Master“ of the National Ten Thousand Talents Plan of the Central Organization Department, and the „Changjiang Special Post Scholar“ by the Ministry of Education. He has been teaching the „Introduction to Philosophy“ video open course in Chinese universities and the „Philosophy, Culture, and Life Wisdom“ national first-class undergraduate course. Currently, he is the chief expert of the National Social Science Fund’s major project „Big Data Driven Modernization of Local Governance“.


FOR APAC LECTURE SERIES
RINGVORLESUNG

WINTER TERM 2024/2025 Program

 

In this lecture series, academics from the PLUS and other universities, present their research on topics in the context of the Asia-Pacific region. Students of the study supplement and the study focus Asia-Pacific Studies can take an exam in the last week of the semester and receive credit for their participation in the lecture series.

We also welcome others interested in the FOR APAC lecture series to participate!

LECTURES IN WINTER SEMESTER 2024/2025

 Wednesday, 23 October 2024, 1:00-3:00 PM, Bibliotheksaula at the PLUS Hofstallgasse 25020 Salzburg
“Interconnectivity and Entanglement in the Ancient Worlds of Afro-Eurasia: From the Levant to China and Back”
Prof. Dr. Robbert ROLLINGER
University of Innsbruck

The lecture offers an overview of the history of Eurasian networking from early times to the late 1st millennium BC, focussing on several historical regions such as China, Japan, Southeast Asia, Australia and Oceania, but also Central and Western Asia, which were always closely interlinked and connected. Different actors play a specific role in each case. These include early seafarers, migrating farmers, traders, but also diplomats and warriors. In this way, a variety of material and intellectual products were exchanged, which can be regarded as essential components of dynamic historical processes.

Robert Rollinger is Professor of Cultural Relations and Cultural Contacts between the Cultures of the Ancient Near East and the Mediterranean Region at the University of Innsbruck, he is Chair of the ÖAW Commission ‘Transformation Processes and Empire in the Ancient Worlds of Afro-Eurasia’ and a full member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. In addition, he is NAWA chair of the international project ‘From the Achaemenids to the Romans: Contextualising empire and its longue-durée developments’, 2021-2025 (University of Wrocław/Breslau) and member of the board of the FWF Cluster of Excellence ‘Eusrasian Transformations’. His research focuses on the history of ancient Asia Minor, the history of the Achaimenids, ancient historiography and the history of Afro-Eurasian networks in antiquity, with a particular focus on comparative imperial history. (Photo: see poster)

Ring-VO Prof. Rollinger 


Tuesday, 5 November 2024,1:15-2:45 PM, HS 888, Forum Asia Pacific, Sigmund-Haffner Gasse 18, 5020 Salzburg
“Neither invisible nor Mute: On the Historicity and Conceptualization of Asian Germans”
Dr. Kien Nghi HA
University of Tübingen

In his lecture, Dr. Kien Nghi Ha will outline the history of Asian immigration to Germany and discuss the cultural-political concept of “Asian Germans”. The term “Asian Germans” goes back to the anthology “Asian Germans. Vietnamese Diaspora and Beyond” (2012), and reflects historical experiences of anti-Asian racism. In addition to exoticization and social exclusion, this history is also linked to massive racist violence such as the pogrom in Rostock-Lichtenhagen (1992) against the Vietnamese community. However, the self-designation “Asian Germans” also represents a self-constructed form of cultural and political identity that recognizes the diversity and differences within the Asian diaspora and offers solidarity and cooperation on this basis. Recently, some efforts have been made to establish Asian German Studies as a new field of research. Rather than reproducing the dominant white view of German majority society, this scholarly approach aims to focus on Asian Germans and their perspectives. Against this background, Dr. Ha would like to conclude by addressing the question of what academic and socio-political potential this entails.

RV 2024/2025 Dr. HA

Kien Nghi Ha holds a doctorate in cultural and political science and is head of the Postcolonial Asian German Studies department at the Asia-Orient Institute at the University of Tübingen. He has conducted research at New York University and at the universities of Bremen, Heidelberg and Bayreuth and was awarded the Augsburg Science Prize for Intercultural Studies. As a curator, he has realized various projects on the Asian diaspora at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin, the Hebbel am Ufer-Theater and the Sinema Transtopia, among others. He has published more than ten books on postcolonial criticism, racism, migration and the Asian diaspora. Most recently, the anthologies “Asian Germans Extended. Vietnamesische Diaspora and Beyond” (Association A 2012/2021) and ‘Asiatische Präsenzen in der Kolonialmetropole Berlin’ (Association A, 2024). The volume “Anti-Asian Racism in Transatlantic Perspectives: History, Theory, Cultural Representations and Social Movements” (transcript) is planned for 2025 (Photo: © private).


Tuesday, 12 November 2024,1:15-2:45 PM, HS 888, Forum Asia Pacific, Sigmund-Haffner Gasse 18, 5020 Salzburg
“Climate-Environment-People: Asia’s Natural Areas in Transition”
Prof. Dr. Jussi GRIESSINGER
PLUS

The regions of Asia are characterised by an enormous variety of different ecosystems, which are characterised by unique sequences of very dry and cold to warm and humid natural areas between high mountains and lowlands. At the same time, these regions have long been settlement areas for different cultures, which in the course of their history have developed highly adapted land utilisation systems, for example, to these specific climatic conditions. The lecture offers an overview of these natural areas, looks at their respective specifics and also shows how these areas are currently changing and (have to) adapt as a result of current developments. (Photo: see poster)

Jussi Grießinger 



Tuesday, 19 November 2024,1:15-2:45 PM, HS 888, Forum Asia PacificSigmund-Haffner Gasse 18, 5020 Salzburg
“Cyborg in Otaku Culture: An Analysis of the Representation of Cyborg Bodies in Two Anime Works, ‘Ghost in the Shell’ and ‘She, the Ultimate Weapon’’’
Dr. Miyuki HASHIMOTO
PLUS

Since the mid-1990s, Japanese otaku culture, which includes anime, manga and computer games, has become internationally popular and an important part of contemporary popular culture. This culture has now gained significant cultural importance not only for its fans, but also for international society.

In this lecture, I would like to explore the topic of ‘cyborg’ by analysing the two anime works ‘Ghost in the Shell’ and ‘She, the Ultimate Weapon’. A cyborg is a hybrid between a machine and an organism. In her famous essay ‘A Cyborg Manifesto’, Donna Haraway claims that we are all cyborgs. By this she means that we are always using technology in a high-tech society and cannot live without it. This view is understandable. On the other hand, we can discard technology at any time, whereas cyborgs in science fiction cannot, because their bodies are irrevocably connected to the machine. This is the difference between a cyborg and a human being.

With this premise in mind, I would like to analyse the representation of the cyborg bodies of Motoko Kusanagi and Chise, protagonists of two anime works. How are the bodies of Motoko and Chise portrayed in their respective anime? Does it look different in terms of the ‘male gaze’ according to Laura Mulvey? How do Motoko and Chise feel about their own cyborg bodies? What identity do they have as a result? I deal with these questions. I also use the term ‘fetishism’ (human as object = objectified body) to explain the connection between these works, otaku culture and our modern society.

Miyuki Hashimoto received her BA and MA in Human Sciences from Waseda University and her PhD in Philosophy from the University of Vienna. Since then she has been conducting research in the field of Japanese popular culture with a focus on otaku culture. She received a research fellowship from IFK Vienna in 2008. Since 2019, she has been working on her habilitation project at the Faculty of Japanese Studies at the University of Erlangen.Miyuki Hashimoto was also a lecturer at the Department of Japanese Studies at the University of Vienna from 2004 to 2010. She has been teaching Japanese at the Language Centre of the University of Salzburg since 2023. (Photo: see poster)

Dr. Miyuki Hashimoto


Tuesday, 3 December 2024,1:15-2:45 PM, HS 888, Forum Asia Pacific, Sigmund-Haffner Gasse 18, 5020 Salzburg
“’Statistics with Chinese Characteristics’ in the Field of Tension between Science and Politics”
Prof. Dr. Andrea BRÈARD
University of Erlangen-Nürnberg

Since the second half of the 20th century, China has repeatedly made efforts to explicitly counter international standards, both in statistical methodology and in the underlying mathematical theory. In particular, Chinese characteristics of statistics have been worked out. So even if one believes the economic growth of 5.2 % in 2023 currently communicated by the National Bureau of Statistics – after a temporary pause in autumn 2023 – it is not guaranteed that the underlying calculation of GDP makes the figure comparable with other industrialized nations. The lecture will analyze the political-historical conditions that have led and continue to lead to tensions between China’s efforts to fit into a global quantified world on the one hand, while at the same time wanting to retain “Chinese characteristics”. This tension also leads us to question the cultural character of statistics and the normative ambitionsdeclared by international bodies.

RV WS 2024/2025 Breard

Andrea Bréard was Professor of History of Science at the Université Paris-Saclay, Faculté des Sciences d’Orsay, before taking up an Alexander von Humboldt Professorship at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg in 2021, where she holds the Chair of Sinology with a focus on the intellectual and cultural history of China and the position of Vice-President Education. Trained as a mathematician, sinologist and historian of science, she works at the interface between mathematical sciences and sinology, with her research topics ranging from antiquity to the 21st century with numerous publications on topics from the early history of the concept of number in China to the global knowledge history of statistics (Photo: © Gudrun-Holde Ortner).


Tuesday, 17 December 2024, 1:15-2:45 PM, HS 888, Forum Asia Pacific, Sigmund-Haffner Gasse 18, 5020 Salzburg
“Trade and Geopolitics in the Pacific Region”
Prof. Dr. Andreas DÜR
PLUS

This presentation will provide an overview of key trade policy developments in the Pacific and how these relate to the increasing geopolitical tensions in this region of the world. It will focus on the trade war between the US and China, China’s attempt to use trade as leverage against Australia and how the EU is positioning itself in these conflicts. It will look at how trade influences security conflicts and how these conflicts influence trade. The presentation ends with an outlook on possible developments in the near future.

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Andreas Dür is Professor of International Politics and Head of the Department of Political Science at the University of Salzburg. He conducts research on trade policy, interest groups and European integration. His publications include The Political Influence of Business in the European Union (Michigan University Press, 2019), Insiders versus Outsiders: Interest Group Politics in Multilevel Europe (Oxford University Press, 2016) and Protection for Exporters: Discrimination and Power in Transatlantic Trade Relations, 1930-2010 (Cornell University Press, 2010). Since 2024, he has been leading the GEOTRADE project funded by the European Research Council with an Advanced Grant (Photo: © fotohech.at).

Tuesday, 7 January 2025, 1:15-2:45 PM, HS 888, Forum Asia PacificSigmund-Haffner Gasse 185020 Salzburg“China and Japan or the Eternal Competition for Regional Hegemony”Prof. Dr. Susanne WEIGELIN-SCHWIEDRZIKUniversity of Vienna

Since the middle of the 19th century, it has become clear that there are two contenders for regional hegemony in East Asia. With its defeat in the First Sino-Japanese War, Japan won this competition for the first time and imposed a form of rule on the region that combined Chinese rule with the approach of European colonial powers. The division of East Asia into two camps after the Second World War initially led to a stalemate between the two rivals, but it took less than 20 years for Japan to achieve by economic means what it had previously been unable to achieve by military means. It was the dominant regional power and became a competitor to the world power USA. With China’s rapid economic development from 1978 onwards, the cards were reshuffled again. Now it is China that is making its presence felt as a hegemonic power in the region and, like Japan before it, is acting as a competitor to the USA.

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Studied Sinology, Japanese Studies and Political Science (1973-1978) in Bonn, Beijing and Bochum, doctorate in 1982, habilitation in 1989 at the Ruhr University Bochum. 1989-2002 Full Professor of Modern Sinology at the University of Heidelberg. 1999-2001 Vice-Rector for International Relations at the University of Heidelberg. 2002-2020 Professor of Sinology at the University of Vienna, since 2012 k. Member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. 2011-2015 Vice-Rector for Research and Promotion of Young Researchers at the University of Vienna. Member of the Academic Council of the Austrian Academy of Sciences since 2022 and Program Director for China at the Center for Strategic Analysis, Vienna.research stays and visiting professorships in the People’s Republic of China, the USA, Japan and Hong Kong.research interests: Chinese history in the 20th century, history of East Asia, politics and memory in the PRC, politics and foreign policy of the PRC. Most recent publication: China und die Neuordnung der Welt, Vienna: Brandstätter Verlag, 2023 (Photo: © Christoph Glanzl).

Tuesday, 14. January 2025, 1:15-2:45 PM, HS 888, Forum Asia Pacific, Sigmund-Haffner Gasse 18, 5020 Salzburg
„From Daoism to Pseudo-Christianity: Chinese Rebellion History in Alfred Doebling’s and Stefan Thome’s Novels”
Prof. Dr. LI Shuangzhi
Fudan University, Shanghai, China

The European encounter and engagement with China since the Middle Ages is one of the most exciting chapters in world history. The confrontation with a completely different, tradition-steeped culture brings both challenges and inspiration. And nowhere is this more evident than in the world of poetry, where China takes centre stage. Beyond the purely exotic fantasy, a poetics of foreign experience can be found in numerous authors who use China to open up and reflect on a field of tension between the self and the other. Interestingly, there are two examples from German literary history that share a theme and at the same time present different types of writing. Alfred Döblin’s The Three Leaps of Wang-lun (1916) presents a Chinese peasant uprising in the 18th century and emphasises Daoism as its philosophical basis, while Stefan Thome’s novel God of the Barbarians (2018) develops a rather ironic view of the Tai Ping Tian Guo rebellion in the 19th century, especially pseudo-Christianity as an instrument of the resistance movement in China. The two variants of literary engagement with China reveal a diverse, revealing and productive history of reception that can not only say something about China, but also a lot about Germany and Europe itself.

LI Shuangzhi is Professor of German Studies at Fudan University in Shanghai. He studied in Beijing and Berlin and completed his doctorate at the FU Berlin. With an Alexander von Humbodlt scholarship, he conducted research on Chinese-German literary relations at the University of Göttingen. He has published a German monograph on decadent literature around 1900 in Germany and Austria, two Chinese books and numerous essays on German literature. He has also translated works by Hesse, Hofmannsthal, Bachmann, Benjamin etc. into Chinese.

He is currently a guest researcher in the Scientist-in-Residence Programme of the City of Salzburg.(Photo: © LI Shuangzhi)

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Tuesday, 21 January 2025, 1:15-2:45 PM, HS 888, Forum Asia Pacific, Sigmund-Haffner Gasse 18, 5020 Salzburg
“In Chain Mail to Hangzhou: The Journey of the Franciscan Odorich of Pordenone to Yuan-period China”
Prof. Dr. Romedio SCHMITZ-ESSER
University of Heidelberg

The report by the Franciscan missionary Odorich of Pordenone (d. 1331) was one of the most widely read texts in Latin Europe at the end of the Middle Ages. His travel experiences, which took him from the Venetian hinterland via India to the China of the Yuan dynasty at the beginning of the 14th century, are still among the most important testimonies to an open Eurasian world, in which China and Italy in particular were in close contact. The lecture uses Odorich’s example to outline the surprising results of Mongol expansion in the mid-13th century and then shows how the report itself was received and received in Europe. Of particular interest here is the question of the representational intention of Odorich’s report itself and how Latin European perspectives influenced the new insights of the numerous Asian travelers of the time and made them usable for their own discourses.

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Romedio Schmitz-Esser is Professor of Medieval History at the University of Heidelberg. After studying history and art history at the University of Innsbruck, he initially worked as a town historian for the city of Hall in Tyrol. In 2008, he moved to the LMU in Munich, where he completed his habilitation with a thesis on the corpse in the Middle Ages. From 2014-2016, he headed the German Study Center in Venice before being appointed Professor of General Medieval History at the University of Graz. Longer stays abroad have taken him to Rome, Paris, London, Guangzhou and Duke University, NC/USA. His work focuses primarily on cultural history; he is currently writing a book on the reception of Buddhism in medieval Latin Europe (Photo: © Heidelberg University, Communications and Marketing).

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