Except where otherwise specified, the conference will take place in the Holsti-Anderson Family Assembly Room of the Rubenstein Library. Please refer to our logistics page for parking and transportation information.
note: Advance registration (at least one week before the conference) is kindly requested. Registered attendees are welcome to attend the on-site reception on Friday evening. Dinners are reserved for those with an invitation from the organizers.
Times and locations are subject to change, so please bookmark this page. Downloadable versions of the schedule are available.
Thursday, 28. August
6:30 Welcome dinner
reserved for those with an invitation from the organizers; please refer to your email for the location
Friday, 29. August
10:00 Welcome & opening remarks—Haiyan Lee and Viren Murthy
10:15–12:00
Panel 1: Global Regimes and 20th–century China
Moderator: Tansen Sen
Yanjie Huang. Towards a Chinese Monetary Revolution: Geopolitics, Global Monetary Regimes, and the Ideas of Non-convertible Paper Money in China, 1912-1945
Tong Lam. Let the ore speak: Extractivism and early Cold War mobilization
Jeffrey T. Martin. Taiwan as Method for Writing the World History of Policing
Limin Teh. Universal Labor Standards, National Sovereignty and the Engendering of Industrial Labor in Republican China
12:00–1:00 Lunch break
note: lunch is provided only for conference panelists; guests are requested to either bring their own meal or take advantage of nearby campus dining options
1:00–2:45
Panel 2: Borderlands
Moderator: Ralph Litzinger; Discussant: Jasnea Sarma
Yin Cao. Indigenous Knowledge in Motion: The Shaanxi Mules, the Militarization of the Sufis, and the Panthay Exploration of Northern Burma
Nianshen Song. Can History Survive the Nation-state? Rethinking the Sino-Korean Koguryŏ Controversy
Yi Wang. Borderland Modernity: Railway, Plague, and Autonomy in a Qing-Russian Frontier, 1900–1912
Wasana Wongsurawat. Buddhadasa’s Dharmic Socialism: The Foundation of Thailand’s Royalist Personality Cult
2:45–3:15 Break
3:15–5:00
Panel 3: Science, Industry, and the Logics of Reform
Moderator: Nicole Elizabeth Barnes
Sean Hsiang-Lin Lei. Civilization vs. Essence-Function (Tiyong 體用): Tianyan lun 天演論 (On Heavenly Evolution) and the Birth of Science as Cultural Authority in China
Xiaoqing Diana Lin. “The Industrial Party” and Its Collaboration with Think Tanks in Contemporary China
Tie Xiao. Valences of Xinli: Hypnotism in Modern China
Yaming You. Good Medicine, Bad Medicine, Weird Medicine: The Chinese Communist Party’s Wartime Medical Policies in the 1940s
5:00 Reception
On site; open to registered attendees
6:30 Dinner
offsite; reserved for those with an invitation from the organizers
Saturday, 30. August
10:00–11:45
Panel 4: Global and Planetary Implications from China Studies
Moderator: Saul Thomas
Haiyan Lee. To Kill a Tiger: On Fearing Ferocious Animals in the Anthropocene
Viren Murthy. Wang Guowei’s Philosophy and the Problem of Modernity
William Schaefer. Fragments, Circulations, Sequences: Photobooks and the Perception of Geological Time
Yiching Wu. The Coming of Mao’s Last Revolution: Toward a Non-teleological and Open-ended History
11:45–1:15 Lunch break
note: lunch is provided only for conference speakers; guests are requested to either bring their own meal or take advantage of nearby campus dining options
1:15–3:00
Panel 5: Circulatory Histories
Moderator: Eileen Chow
Janice Hyeju Jeong. Meccan Routes: From Heavenly Square to Heavenly Destination
Scott Relyea. A Political History for Tibet: Independence and Nationalism in the Origin and Goals of Tsepon W.D. Shakabpa’s 1967 Text
Guo-Quan Seng. Marriage Law Reform and Chinese Confucian Feminism in Dutch Indonesia and British Malaya Compared (1910s–1930s)
Shuang Shen. Circulatory History and Its Provocations for Comparative Chinese Literary Studies
3:00 – 3:30 Break
3:30–5:00
Panel 6: Figural Representations of the Past and the Future
Moderator: Arunabh Ghosh
John Crespi. Reality and Seriality in The Wandering Life of Sanmao, 1947–1948
Suk-Jung Han. Manchurian Modern: The Key to the 1960s Korean Developmental Regime
Krista Van Fleit. Arise! The Orientalist Gaze and Progressive Politics in Dr. Kotnis ki Amar Kahani
Fei-hsien Wang. The Disappearance and Resurrection of the Fragrant Concubine in China’s New Era of Empire
5:15
Dr. Prasenjit Duara. Navigating Circulatory Currents: A Personal Journey (keynote address)
7:00 Dinner
offsite; reserved for those with an invitation from the organizers
