Monarchy and Sovereignty in Twentieth-Century Asia A Symposium
Organized by Prasenjit Duara and Adam Mestyan
April 13 Friday 2018
8:30 am – 5:30 pm
John Hope Franklin Center
Ahmadieh Family Conference Hall, Room 240
Duke University
8:45 Welcome by Prasenjit Duara & Adam Mestyan
9:00-11:00 Panel 1. Monarchy in the Colonial Age
Chair & commentator: Engseng Ho (Duke University)
Cemil Aydin (University of North Carolina) – “What do the Muslim Admirers of the Meiji Emperor teach us about the Connected Histories of Monarchies in Long 19th Century Asia?”
Faiz Ahmed (Brown University) – “Modern Muslim Kingship and the Islamic Nation-State: Royal Legitimacy, Religious Authority, and the Amani-Kemalist Dialectic”
Adam Mestyan (Duke University) – “ ‘Like Sons to the Father’: The Codification of Dynasties in Arabic Constitutions, 1860-1940s”
11:00-11:15 Coffee
11:15-13:15 Panel 2. Monarchy and Decolonization
Chair & commentator: Prasenjit Duara (Duke University)
Milinda Banerjee (Presidency University, Kolkata / LMU Munich) – “Monarchic Idioms in Modern Indian Thinking about Sovereignty: European Challenges, Asian Solidarities, and Subaltern Militancy”
David Malitz (Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok) – “American Monarchism and Monarchical Anti-Communism: The Japanese and Thai Monarchies and the Beginning Cold War”
Axel Michaels (Heidelberg University) – “The Śāha Monarchy in Nepal’s Constitutions (1854 – 2016)”
13:15-14:15 Lunch
14:15-16:15 Panel 3. Monarchy and Global Transformation
Chair & commentator: Giovanni Zanalda
Noriko Kawamura (Washington State University) – “Emperor Hirohito and the Cold War in Asia”
Wasana Wongsuravat (Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok) – “The Crown and the Communists: The Thai Monarchy and the People’s Republic of China in the Post-Mao Era”
Ervand Abrahamian (The City University of New York) – “The Iranian Monarchy: An Anachronism?”
16:15–16:30 coffee
16:30-17:30 Summary discussion
Chair: Adam Mestyan (Duke University)
