MedAsia Bulletin N.1

N. 1 - May-June 2007

This free e-publication is open to all. Subscription details are at the bottom of the newsletter.

A new tool is born

Welcome to this bimonthly newsletter. On the 20^th of February 2006, in Rome, Casa Asia from Spain, together with the Réseau-Asie-CNRS (France), the Istituto Italiano per l’Africa e l’Oriente (IsIAO, Italy), the Instituto de Estudos Estratégicos e Internacionals (Portugal), and the University of Athens (Greece), formed an association in order to promote exchange between private and public institutions of the Southern European Region, MedAsia: Asian Centres of Southern Europe. The signatory institutions aim at making known the human and material resources of each country they represent, facilitate the dissemination of specific knowledge of areas of expertise, and encourage scientific research and technology transfer. And while promoting Asian-Pacific studies in the Southern European Region, our final purpose of this initiative is the creation and establishment of a pan-European association of institutions and experts with an interest in the Asia-Pacific, together with the many other institutions in Northern Europe with a longer and deeper development in Asia-Pacific studies.

This MedAsia Bulletin is launched as a new step in fulfilling the mutual need of increase cooperation, initially conceived as a tool in the crucial aim of exchanging information. Focused on the scholarly activities, but also reporting on other cultural events, we need both the active cooperation of member institutions and of individuals to report about their present and future activities, either those organized for a local public or looking for an international impact. Creating synergies among Southern Europeans and with the rest of Europe will help in advancing scientific knowledge of Asia-Pacific in Southern Europe and vice-versa, thereby helping for a more balanced relationship between Northern and Southern Europe, a needed step in promoting the process of rapprochement between Europe and Asia.

MedAsia News

>> MedAsia founding members meeting (Paris, 5 February) Hosted by Réseau-Asie, MedAsia founding institutions held their second annual meeting, reviewing the perspectives for joint cooperation, discussing common issues, listening to the presentations of research reports and agreeing to hold a MedAsia conference at least once a year. Given the perspectives for enlargement, the members agreed in promoting new partners in Slovenia, Cyprus, Malta, Rumania, Croatia and Bulgaria.

>> Meeting Casa Asia-EIAS. The European Institute for Asian Studies (EIAS) invited Casa Asia to a bilateral meeting aimed at exploring bilateral cooperation and to get direct information about Casa Asia and MedAsia. Looking to strengthen bilateral relations, a number of potential projects and activities of common interest were mentioned for collaboration. In addition, it was discussed the interest to build up closer relations amongst EAAS and MedAsia through starting direct contacts and looking for possibilities for close collaboration. Also, the formulation of a “Common Declaration” to be drafted by EIAS and Casa Asia was proposed.

>> Archives in Southern Europe on Asia. The papers presented at the first MedAsia conference held in Barcelona will be published in their original languages to allow better access to the many persons interested in them. The conference was aimed at enhancing the information on the significant resources in Southern Europe on Asia, basically in History but also dealing with other areas such as anthropology and material culture. The websites of both Réseau-Asie and Casa Asia will host the papers, to be downloaded also as part of a new forthcoming EURASIA website.

>> Training day for the MedAsia Webmasters. In Vincennes, at the Institut National du Sport et de l’Education Physique (INSEP), the webmasters of the MedAsia institutions gathered in order to decide common features about the forthcoming EURASIA Database, whose code is patented by the CNRS. It will allow interactivity of data and the exchange of research information between scholars on Asia in Europe, including not only scholars affiliated to Institutions but also organizations such as NGOs or even individual scholars.

Members Information

>> Asian Science Year in Casa Asia. From the 11^th to the 14^th of Last month of April, in collaboration with Barcelona University, Casa Asia has hosted a conference titled ”A shared legacy: Islamic science in the East and the West.” It had four plenary sessions that covered natural sciences and medicine; the exact sciences; technology and knowledge transfer and the mutual influences between East and West. Amongst other talks referring on subjects such as optics in ancient India, Chinese astronomy or Persian meteorology, Professor Mohsen Abhari from Iran, disserted over Medicine as a paradigm of Ethics in the Muslim world and Professor Paul Lettinck (The Malay University, Kuala Lumpur) discussed science in the context of the humanist literature known as Adab, covering the culture, history and traditions of the pre-Islamic Arabs as well as other influences ranging from Persian to Indian contributions. The commemorative year which Casa Asia has designed for 2007 has as its fundamental objective the highlighting of Asian scientific tradition. During the ancient and medieval eras many Eurasian sciences wee in contact throughout the Eurasian continent and Eurasian contributions to the development of modern science have to be understood in the context of the contacts between Europe, China, Babylon and the Arab world. For more information: http://www.ub.es/arab/conferenceabril2007/bcn2007.htm

>> The Lisbon Strategy, analyzed in Portugal. The Instituto de Estudos Estratégicos e Internacionals hosted last March an international conference on the Lisbon strategy, set forth by the EU to deal with the low productivity and stagnation of economic growth. The objectives of making Europe “the most competitive and the most dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world" include social, environmental and social aspects and relies on concepts such as the "learning economy", innovation as a crucial engine for economic change and both social and environmental renewal. Focusing on the changes occurring since the first days of the strategy, the conference dealt on its role amid an “information society without borders” and invited contributors to learn from the Indian, Chinese and Japanese perspectives. The contributions of the participants can be downloaded from http://www.ieei.pt/programas/estrategia-lisboa/conteudos/post.php?post=99&seccao=3

>> Joint research on Migrations and the world of Labour. Given the increasing number of researchers dealing with Immigration, Estelle Krzeslo from the Centre de Sociologie du Travail, de l'Emploi et de la Formation (TEF) and Catherine Lévy (CNRS), have organised a meeting of researchers on this topic in Paris with the aim of reflecting on the topic and think about future activities, including the possibility of organising a research group. Attendants arrived from Paris (CNRS and IRES), Madrid, Istanbul and Sofia. For more information, ekrzeslo@ulb.ac.be, catherine.m-levy@wanadoo.fr or the URL of the Seventh Research Framework Program http://cordis.europa.eu/fp7/home_en.html

>> Teaching with the alphabet and with the ideograms. The Centre d'étude de l'écriture et de l'image (CEEI), one of the research groups of the Research School "Langue, Littérature, image: civilisation et sciences humaines (domaines francophone, anglophone et d’Asie orientale)” [University Paris7, Denis Diderot] organised a workshop at the Institut National d'Histoire de l'Art (INHA) between French and Japanese scholars on Pedagogy and Image-use in France and in Japan. It aimed at comparing the use of images and concepts in schools, printers and especially nowadays, through the Manga stories. For more information Annie Renonciat, annie.renonciat@wanadoo.fr
http://www.ceei.univ-paris7.fr/ Program at www.reseau-asie.com

>> The Tale of Genji and the classical world of Japan, revisited. One of the best literary works in the history of literature is enjoying renewed attention. In March 25-27^th, the Donand Keene Center for Japanese Studies at the University of Columbia, in New York has organised the conference “The tale of Genji in Japan and the world: social imaginary, media, and cultural production” http://www.donaldkeenecenter.org/exhibit_photos/genji_schedule.html. Southern Europe is doing its part, partly under the shadow of Margerite Yourcenar and her work “The last love of Prince Genji” and her praising comments about the novel. While in Spain, the novel has been translated for the first time (by two different editorials, one of them, sponsored by Casa Asia, http://www.atalantaweb.com), the University of Venice held a seminar last December and January on “The Tale of Genji and the Heian world,” by Thomas Harper (University of Leiden) and the Centre Universitaire Dauphine (INALCO) organised an International symposium with the University Rikkyō,. For further information, the Société Française des Etudes Japonaises http://sfej.asso.fr or write to secretariat@sfej.asso.fr.

>> Reinforcing links with China when preparing its EU presidency. Portuguese Prime Minister José Socrates addressed Chinese entrepreneurs in Beijing during a visit to China last 31 January at a luncheon hosted by Horasis (www.horasis.org) and Edeluc (www.edeluc.com), two consultancy firms focused on improving contacts between Europe and China. Profiting from the burgeoning Sino-European economic relationship will be one of the priorities during the rotating Lisbon presidency starting next July 2007. Portuguese officials discussed growth strategies, specially the increasing number of their companies in the Chinese markets, and about the benefits of their country as a springboard, especially for Latin America and Africa.

>> Radio Manyla broadcasting in Spanish. Sponsored by the Andalusia Autonomous Government and the Spanish Development Agency (AECI), the Press Association of the province of Cadiz and the Philippine Broadcasting Office have agreed to start a two-year project aiming at producing a bilingual Tagalog/Spanish program “Filipinas, ahora mismo / Pilipinas, ora mismo” broadcasting music and mostly cultural information. The program is aimed at the increasing number of students of the Spanish language but also to the many Spanish speakers in the islands. Use of Spanish language declined dramatically after World War II, but during the American period (1898-1946) retained usage being used as a kind of anti-colonial tool, in spite of its origins. DZRM Radyo Manila 1278 Khz.

Scholarly events

>> The first real World meeting of Asian Scholars? The Association for Asian Studies (AAS), the most important gathering of Asianists, with annual meetings of over 4.000 participants that provide some of the most important contribution for the advancement in the knowledge of Asia, acting on a proposed by the International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS), is considering changing its usual practice and organising its annual meeting for the year 2011 in Singapore when it commemorates its 70^th anniversary, in lieu of its normal practice of meeting in an American city. Globalization is reaching also into the daily practices of researchers and the “much-needed effort toward internationalization,” together with the new “recruitment possibilities among Asia-based scholars” can balance the “higher travel costs and time commitments” for the AAS members based in North America, as Michael Paschal, Executive Director of AAS has pointed out when asking AAS members their opinion. www.aasianst.org

>> Buddhism in Italy. The Centro Studi Sul Buddhismo of Naples organizes its fourth series of conferences in Buddhism at the Palazzo Corigliano. Until the end of May, some of the most outstanding European as well as Japanese scholars are addressing different topics of their research. Giuliano Boccali (Università di Milano) on the classic Buddhist theatre, Ernst Steinkellner (Università di Vienna) on Tattvasiddhi, Cristina Scherrer-Schaub (EPHE Paris, Università di Losanna) on Medieval Buddhism, Ulrich Pagel (School of Oriental and African Studies) on Mantras, Alessandro Passi (Università di Bologna) on the biography of Buddha and, finally, Minoru Inaba (Kyoto University) on Chinese pilgrims to Afghanistan. http://www.unior.it/dsa/manifestazioni.php?id=11&lang=en

>> The first EuroSEAS Conference in Southern Europe. The European Association for South-East Asian Studies will hold its first triennial conference in Southern Europe next September, 12-15^th, at the University of Naples 'The Oriental'. The significant disparity of scholars arriving from Northern and Southern Europe is one of the imbalances MedAsia aims at solving similarly to the EuroSEAS Board, conscious of the need to promote specialization on Southeast Asia in the whole of Europe. The increasing popularity of the conferences is shown by the 43 different panels, organized by scholars mostly from Europe but with significant contributors from Asia, such as Anthony Reid or Mina Roces. The European Association for Japanese Studies (EAJS) will follow in September 2008 with its 12th International Conference at Lecce, in Southernmost Italy. For more information www.euroseas.org

>> ICAS Conference keeps growing. The The Selection Committee of ICAS 5, after evaluating proposals, announced that it has accepted in total 100 organized panels and 40 institutional panels, which brings the total amount of panels to 300, including those previously grouped after individual submissions. With the potential to become the largest Asia Studies Event in the world, the meeting will be held next 2 - 5 August 2007, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, organised by University Kabangsaam Malaysia/ATMA-IKON. Following the ICS Book Prize first awarded at ICAS 4, and with the collaboration of the IIAS Newsletter, the “Best Study in the Field of Humanities and Social Studies” and the “Best Ph.D. in Asian Studies” awards will be made. www.icassecretariat.org

>> Two Conferences on Iran in Europe. While the Sixth Biennial Conference of Iranian Studies is to be held at SOAS next 3 - 5 August, the Societas Iranologica Europaea organizes the 6th Conference of Iranian Studies, to be held in Vienna from Tuesday, Sept. 18 to Saturday, Sept. 22, 2007 at the Austrian Academy of Sciences (Oesterreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften). The deadline for submission of papers has been postponed to March 30, 2007. After that date, the programme will be updated in their webpage. For further information http://www.oeaw.ac.at/iran/ecis6.htm or ecis6@oeaw.ac.at

>> Portugal, the Persian Gulf and Safavid Persia. The Fifth centenary of the arrival of the Portuguese to Asia is approaching, and starts with the Afonso de Albuquerque's attempts to take Hormuz, in 1507. The Smithsonian Institution, in Washington DC, is commemorating this with a series of exhibitions during the summer entitled “Encompassing the Globe: Portugal and the World from the Fifteenth to the Eighteenth Centuries”. During the last week, on 8-9 September, the Smithsonian will hold also a meeting in order to examine the Portuguese interaction with other powers in the region, such as Safavid Persia, the Ottoman Empire, Arab principalities around the Gulf’s littoral, India, and rival European merchants active in the area. This encounter and the future publication are in charge of Iran specialist Rudi Matthee and Jorge Flores, one of the most outstanding scholars on the historical Portuguese interaction in Asia. For further information http://www.iranheritage.org/portugalconference/

>> Young Urban Researchers. The First International Conference of Young Urban Researchers (FICYUrb) will take place at Centro de Investigação e Estudos de Sociologia (CIES-ISCTE), in Lisbon, June 11th and 12th, 2007. Organized in cooperation with Fórum Sociológico, Journal from Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas da Universidade Nova de Lisboa (FCSH/UNL) and Instituto de Sociologia da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto (IS-FLUP), the meeting is intended to be an adequate space to disseminate the most recent academic researches in urban studies from a wide range of disciplinary perspectives. For further information, https://conferencias.iscte.pt/index.php?cf=3 or contact Graça Índias Cordeiro graca.cordeiro@iscte.pt

>> Migration, livelihoods and human rights: lessons from EU and ASEAN

July 2007, The Hague

ASEF/Alliance Workshop.

For more info

>> The 8^th Conference of the International Society for Shamanistic Research (ISSR)

2 - 9 June 2007, Budapest

For more info

>> 5^th Urban Language Survey Seminar

9 - 11 July 2007, Leiden

Specialist Seminar

13 - 15 July 2007, Leiden

Master Class

Organised by LUCL/IIAS/NOW. For more info

● Peace at Home, Peace at the World ICANAS - 38

10 - 15 September 2007, Ankara, Turkey

38^th International Congress of Asian and North African Studies. Organised by Ataturk Supreme Council for Culture, Language and History. For more info contact E-mail: yuksekkurum@ataturkyuksekkurum.gov.tr

● Syncretism in South and Southeast Asia: Adoption and Adaptation

24 - 27 May 2007, Bangkok, Thailand

Organised by SSRASR ans is co-sponsored as a Regional Conference by International Association for the History of Religions (IAHR). For more info

● The 11^th International Conference on History of Science and Technology in China

20 - 24 August 2007, Nanning, China

First Circular and Call for Papers. The 11^th International Conference on the History of Science and Technology in China will provide a unique opportunity to scholars working in this field to display their research and also to exchange ideas with their colleagues in the field. The general theme of the conference is Science and Technology Innovation & Scientific View of Development; Science, Technology and Civilization of Chinese Ethnic Groups. Organized by the Chinese Society of History of Science and Technology and the Institute for the History of Natural Science of the Chinese Academy of Science. E-mail: weidanfang@126.com

Research reports

>> Asian migrants in Greece. Following the September 2006 MedAsia meeting in
Barcelona and the identification of migration as a priority topic, the Institute of International Economic Relations has recently completed a research project on Asian migrants in Greece. Its official presentation was attended by officials from the Ministry of the Interior, the Greek Migration Policy Institute and the International Organization for Migration, together with representatives of research institutions, NGOs and migrant communities, and was given extensive coverage by the media. Noting that Greece has principally been a country of transit for most Asian migrants, there is a significant difference between tasks performed by Indians, mostly in Agriculture, and Pakistanis and Bangladeshis, mostly in industry, where merely an 18% of Indians work. The Executive Summary in English and the statistical Annex are available at www.idec.gr/iier/new/asian_migrants_en.pdf

>> Migrations Europe-Asia-Oceania from a interdisciplinary view. Noting that the phenomenon of migration is now global and transcultural and that connects in many ways the Economic North with the Economic South, Reseau-Asia has started the research “MAO: Migrations Asie Océan. Migrations asiatiques en Asie, Océanie, Europe - Histoire, représentations, enjeux contemporains”. Although the project is open to research from different institutions and to discuss the appropriate methodology, it has identified some starting points, such as Education in Asian Migration, in charge of the director of Réseau-Asia, Jean-François Sabouret; Asian Migrations in the Pacific, by Yannick Fer, and other areas, such as Women in Asian Migration or the Representation of the migrants. For further information, Vivianne Fayaud. vfayaud@msh-paris.fr

>> Dynamic Atlas of Industrial Diseases in Europe and Asia (DALDEA). Réseau-Asie is involved in a project to create an international network of industrial and sanitary surveillance by means of an Internet site, accessible to all and regularly updated by member researchers of the project. The site would present a series of thematic maps of the European and Asian countries, basing the input on researches located on current or former industrial sites. Both environmental data concerning the state of pollution and pollution related diseases would be collected. It also aims at mobilizing the local actors, bypassing disciplinary barriers, social status and political or economic pressures. For further information Jenyu Peng: jpeng@msh-paris.fr

>> Macao as springboard to Africa. The Instituto do Oriente, affiliated to the Instituto Superior de Ciências Sociais e Políticas, is involved in the Project "Macau – Plaça giratória económica entre a RPC e a África lusófona" on the increasing investment of China in Africa and the role of the former colony of Macau in it, as well as the role Portugal can play in the future. The coordinator is Narana S. Coissoró, together with a large research team in which António Vasconcelos de Saldana is a participant.

For more information http://ioriente.iscsp.utl.pt/index_para_loadmovie.html

Publications

>> French Bulletin on South-East Asia. An excellent new Bulletin devoted to South-east Asia, with informed contents, nice design, reader-friendly format: Focus Asie du Sud-Est. Lettre d’information et d’analyse. The Newsletter includes articles on contemporary issues in the region, such as the flooding in Thailand, the situation of Aceh after the elections, the vulnerabilities of Indonesia, or the recent decision at the ASEAN Conference in Cebu to prepare a common Chart, that can lead to a process resembling the EU. The editorial board is composed by Arnaud Dubus, Pierre Pacaud and Jean-Claude Pomonti, French journalists with a long presence in the region prone to proclaim their independence, whose aims are providing a reading complement for operators and observers. For subscriptions, included distribution by e-mail, write to www.focusasie.com or contact@focusasie.com

>> Trafficking on Women. The Mediterranean Institute for Gender Studies, the only institution in Cyprus involved in Asian Studies, has made available its Guide to Reference Sources on Trafficking in Women and its Guide to Websites on Trafficking in Women. Its aim is to identify reference sources in English for trafficking issues worldwide, while that of the Website is to provide a comprehensive list of websites which deal with the subject of trafficking in women. Both guides are addressed to students, researchers, policy makers, scholars and/or anyone interested in such issues. Contact: Rania Tollefson (+357 22 351 276) rania@medinstgenderstudies.org to download the files traffickinginwomen_referenceguide.pdf or traffickinginwomen_website_guide_12_12_06.pdf

>> The Jesuit presence in Asia, compared and demystified. The Portuguese historian José Eduardo Franco has published the second volume of his heavily annotated work O Mito dos jesuítas em Portugal, no Brasil e no Oriente (sécs. XVI a XX) [The myth of Jesuits in Portugal, Brazil and the Orient (16^th to 20^th centuries)] (Lisbon: Gradiva) on the religious order that provided many of the more important characters in the cultural exchange Europe-Asia. The introduction by Philippe Bountry and the preface by prestigious historian Lluis Filipe Barretto, director of the Centro Científico e Cultural de Macau, an institution affiliated to the Science Ministry of Portugal and devoted to the research on the intercultural relations Portugal-China and Europe-East Asia. http://www.cccm.mctes.pt/

>> Japan after the war. Michael Lucken, Anne Bayard-Sakai and Emmanuel Lozerand have directed the book Le Japon Après La Guerre (Paris: Editions Philippe Picquier). This book examines different types of relationships to war in a detailed and organized fashion. Many different areas, such as politics, education, the environment, as well as arts and literature, are studied in order to exemplify the vastness and complexity of the subject at hand.

>> The Red Kmer. Solomon Kane, has published a much-needed job in order to understand this movement’s inner-workings, to clarify its protagonists’ backgrounds, and mapping out a territory subjected to terror. His Dictionnaire des Khmers rouges (Paris: IRASEC), with an introduction by foremost specialist David Chandler, contributes to elucidating one of the contemporary world’s fundamental questions, that is, “what is a criminal political administration?”

>> Asian Names: an anthropological study. Charles Macdonald, Directeur de Recherche of CNRS at the Unit of Anthropology at Marseille is to publish an edited book with Zheng Yangwen, Asian Names: History, Culture and Identity (Singapore: National University of Singapore Press). The introduction has been written by MacDonald with renowned scholar Anthony Reid, and the preface is by James C. Scott, Sterling Professor of Political Science at Yale University who published in 1979 The Moral Economy of the Peasant: Rebellion and Subsistence in Southeast Asia (New Haven: Yale University Press)

Web sites

>> Cultural relations between China and the West (1245-2000): a biographic & bibliographic database. The Ostasiatisches Seminar (OAS) of the University of Zurich, Switzerland has started a free-access database project dedicated to the cultural relations between China and the West that links systematically collected and scientifically validated biographic and bibliographic information. The main items are chronology and names, which are indexed and searchable and the subject fields are: history, religion, history of missions, travel and legation accounts, history of media, geography, history of universities, sinology, literature, philosophy, art, and science. Items providing from Southern Europe are still scarce. http://idoasdb.unizh.ch/oas/

>> Online Japanese dictionaries. After a request for advice by Ekaterina Korobtseva about online and electronic Japanese dictionaries at the H-Japan electronic list (www.h-net.msu.edu), a summary of the replies has been put by Guven Witteveen, wittevee@umich.edu at http://big1file.googlepages.com/jdico. Another important contribution mostly worked on by peers, providing information and comments on mutual needs. We add a new one, on medicine http://www.medo.jp/cgi-bin/je.cgi

>> Asian legal information. The Asian Legal Information Institute provides for searching and browsing databases of legislation, case-law, law reform reports, law journals and other legal information, where available, from each country in the region. This non-profit and free access website covers all 27 countries and territories in Asia, includes over 140,000 cases from at least 15 countries, and over 15,000 pieces of legislation from at least 18 countries and all databases can be searched flexibly. http://www.asianlii.org/

>> Resources on Christianity in Asia. The Centre for the Study of Christianity in Asia, sponsored by the Trinity Theological College, in Singapore, keeps compiling information about Christians and their history in Asia, and the resources can be used for research purposes. http://www.ttc.edu.sg/csca/csca.htm

Exhibitions

>> Afghanistan, rediscovered treasures: Collections from the national museum of Kabul

From 6 December 2006 to 30 April 2007, Paris

This exhibition, displays no less than 220 items, puts the development of Afghan history into perspective, from the Bronze Age to the Kushan Empire, and highlights the continuity, uniqueness and wealth of Afghan heritage. Venue: Guimet Museum of Asiatic Arts. For more info

>> Matteo Ripa and the Chinese College of Naples (1682-1869)

From 18 November 2006 to 31 March 2007, Naples

Venue: Archivio di Stato di Napoli. For more info contact E-mail: asna@archivi.beniculturali.it

>> Museum of Asian Art in Corfu

The Museum of Asian Art (the only one in Greece) was founded in 1927 after the donation of 10500 items by Gregorios Manos. Until 1974 it was a Chinese and Japanese Art museum, but later it was enriched with other private collections of items from Central Asia, so it became an Asian Art museum. For more info

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