Upcoming Events

“Reality and Divinity in Chinese Philosophy”

a public lecture by

Professor Chung-ying Cheng

Date: April 1, 2013
Time: 7:00 pm
Place: UCA College of Business Auditorium

A senior member of the Department of Philosophy at the UniveDr. Chengrsity of Hawai‘i since 1963, Professor Cheng has become an internationally well-known scholar-philosopher in Chinese philosophy and comparative philosophy. With a broad and deep background in the traditions of classical Chinese philosophy and Neo-Confucianism, he received his doctorate from Harvard University in the field of analytical philosophy and logic. He has lectured worldwide, and has received numerous honorary titles as honorary professor and university fellow. He is the founding president of the International Society of Chinese Philosophy, and executive editor of the Journal of Chinese Philosophy. Professor Cheng has authored and edited 21 books and over 250 articles in Western, Chinese, and comparative philosophy.

Sponsored by:
Humanities and World Cultures Institute, UCA College of Liberal Arts
Confucius Institute for Arkansas
UCA Department of Philosophy and Religion

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East-West Center

Asian Studies Development Program

Infusion Institute

Infusing Chinese and Japanese Religion, Art and Literature into the Undergraduate Curriculum

Dates:  July 22-August 9, 2013 
Location: East-West Center, Honolulu, Hawaii

This multidisciplinary, three-week Institute fosters faculty and program development aimed at enhancing undergraduate teaching and learning about Asian cultures and societies. Hosted annually through a generous grant from the Freeman Foundation, the institute on Infusing Asian Studies into the Undergraduate Curriculum offers undergraduate educators the opportunity to interact with leading Asian studies experts in an intensive program of lectures, discussions, film screenings, site visits and cultural events. The first two weeks of the 2013 program will include thematic overviews of Chinese and Japanese history; sessions on the religious traditions of Confucianism, Daoism, Buddhism, Shinto and Islam; and both China- and Japan-focused talks on premodern art traditions in modern and contemporary China and Japan. The 2013 Infusing Institute will be directed by Stanley Murashige (School of the Art Institute of Chicago) and Peter Hershock (East-West Center).

Designed to meet the needs of educators involved in both curriculum and program development, the Infusing Institute is open both to individual applicants and to two- to three-person teams from colleges and universities committed to furthering undergraduate Asian studies.

Participants will receive lodging in the East-West Center guesthouse and a modest stipend. The home institutions of selected participants are asked to cover airfares and a program fee of $350. The application deadline will be March 11, 2013.

For inquiries, please contact the ASDP Secretariat:  Sandy Osaki, osakis@eastwestcenter.org.

 Application Form

Schedule

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ARCAS Faculty Enhancement Program

“The Chinese Diaspora in Southeast Asia”

Supported by
The Luce Foundation

Program Directors
George Brown, Slippery Rock University of PA
Joseph L. Overton, Kapi’olani Community College

 

The Association of Regional Centers for Asian Studies, with the generous support of the Luce Foundation, is sponsoring two 5-week faculty development field studies, culminating in a publication on the Chinese diaspora in Southeast Asia.  The Chinese Diaspora in Southeast Asia project will consist of two groups of six (6) faculty and two (2) Co-Directors each, selected to create a balance of disciplinary interests and types of colleges served.  The first group (summer 2012) focused on the Chinese diaspora in Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia (MSI region).  The second group (summer 2013) will concentrate on Vietnam, Laos and Thailand (VLT region).

The Chinese Diaspora in Southeast Asia project aims to provide a highly focused research experience around which faculty from disciplines such as Political Science, History, Sociology, Economics, Anthropology, Philosophy, Religion, Literature, and Education may group themselves. Although the project will surely include the development of an historical grounding in the Chinese experience in the various countries under study, it will bring forward ongoing and contemporary issues related to the dynamics of life in the Chinese diaspora.  Questions such as the following will be asked across the six cultures of the project:  Where did these disparate communities come from in China, and what explains their geographic dispersion throughout Southeast Asia?  What led the Chinese to migrate from locations in China to different locations in Southeast Asia?  What values and beliefs, social and cultural practices were brought by the Chinese into their new locations?  How were these groups assimilated, changed, or made influential in the culture under study?  In what ways did the Chinese engage with locally existing powers in their new locations (political, social, cultural, educational)?  What roles do the Chinese play now in the politics, culture, and economics/ business/ trade of these Southeast Asian societies? How were (are) Chinese treated within these societies and how did (do) they treat others (prejudice, discrimination, equity, racism)?   How are Chinese portrayed in the literature and arts of the culture?  What role is given to the place of the Chinese in the transmission of the culture and education in these countries?

The objectives of this project are:

  1. Enhance Asian Studies programs at the widely-diverse ARCAS institutions.
  2. Identify and examine variations of human interaction playing out in these societies, ranging from tension and conflict to the creation of viable, cohesive, and community-building strategies, by focusing on one diasporic community in several different societies.
  3. Sharing the findings of the research in objective #2 with faculty, scholars, and those interested in global interactions at ARCAS member institutions, and other communities of concerned scholars and teachers of Asia.

In order to realize the objectives of the project, each of the two field study group experiences will be divided into four phases: Orientation, Research, Reflection and Production, and Implementation.

  • In the Orientation phase, each group will assemble in Honolulu, Hawai’i for a 4 day (3 night) orientation to the project design and countries to be visited, the logistics of the work ahead of them, and the expectations of the Directors of the project.  Participants will be sent a set of selected readings to do before they arrive in Honolulu for the orientation.  Faculty selected in consultation with the University of Hawaii’s National Resource Center on Southeast Asian Studies and the Co-Directors will provide a preview of the sites to be visited and a set of preliminary research questions.   Participants will receive introductions to the speakers who will be in-country resources for the seminar.
  • In the Research phase, the teams will leave from Honolulu. One group of faculty will depart in the summer of 2012 to conduct its research in Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia (MSI region). The MSI group research period will be divided as follows: 14 nights in Malaysia; 4 nights in Singapore; and 14 nights in Indonesia.  The other research team will leave in the summer of 2013 for Vietnam, Laos and Thailand (VLT region).  The VLT group research period will be divided as follows: 14 nights in Vietnam; 5 nights in Laos; and 13 nights in Thailand.  The Co-Directors will lead the participants by making use of the research topics they have created and which they have communicated to in-country guest lecturers, as well as the preliminary inquiry and engagement questions participants generated in the Orientation phase of the project. Appropriate de-briefing sessions for processing the experiential learning of the participants will be moderated by the Co-Directors.
  • In the Reflection and Production phase, each group will return to Honolulu for 4 days (3 nights) for an intensive working seminar reporting on their findings and projects for incorporating them into the curriculum and programs at their home institutions.  The reflection process of the seminar project will feature collaboration with other group members, the Co-Directors of the seminar and specialists from the University of Hawaii’s National Resource Center for Southeast Asia.  The participants will make corrections, identify ongoing issues to research, generate comparisons between their own projects and between the countries studied, and receive detailed briefings on the expected results of their work.  The production phase for each group will stretch over approximately six months in duration and include the creation and implementation of new or modified course syllabi which will also be made available at the ARCAS website, the development of conference presentations, including dedicated panels at the Asian Studies Development Program’s national conferences, and the development of course units designed by the groups that will be published in 2012 and 2013 respectively as special reports to the ASDP journal, East-West Connections :A Review of Asian Studies.  The concluding event in the production stage of each group’s project will be a final faculty development workshop on the mainland U.S. each year which will be open to faculty of any of the ARCAS institutions, as well as any regional institutional faculty who wish to attend, and hosted by one of the ARCAS regional centers.

The Implementation phase of each group’s experience will bring to fruition the impact of the faculty member’s development on the curriculum and program areas of his/her home college or university.  Every participant, in the application process, will have submitted an anticipated plan of implementation at the home campus for what he/she will learn in the seminar.  Indeed, a significant factor in the selection of participants will be the expected measurable and sustainable impact of their learning on the curriculum and program of Asian Studies at their own institutions. It is anticipated that work completed in the production phase of the project will find its way into the implementation phase on each participant’s campus.

The Chinese Diaspora in Vietnam, Laos and Thailand (VLT) Region

**Tentative Itinerary**

Mid-June – Late-July 2013

Orientation in Honolulu

As with the Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia regional study, we will begin the Vietnam, Laos and Thailand (VLT) experience byspending three days at the University of Hawai’i’s National Resource Center on Southeast Asian Studies, engaged in  a group orientation for this project before each of the field study abroad.  We will work closely with faculty at the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at UH, including Dr. Steve O’Harrow, the Director of the Center and Cathryn H. Clayton (China in Asia), and the School of Pacific and Asian Studies.  We will ask Jeff Fox, an EWC researcher who has been studying  rubber planting in Laos - which is being done by Chinese - to provide an overview of the ways in which Chinese supply capital, labor and planting material and also buy up the product. This venture is having transformative effect on Northern Laos.  In addition, we will go over our itinerary, get the participants started on their curriculum projects, make sure that everyone is comfortable with our common Google documents file that will include our trip calendar and common documents.  This will allow us to collaboratively develop a common set of documents, photos etc., that can be used by all of the participants as they develop their curriculum projects.

 

Socialist Republic of Vietnam

We will visit Hanoi, the Central Highlands, Ho Chi Minh City, and the Mekong Delta.  We will use the following resources in identifying support personnel and scholars for the field study.

1) United States Embassy in Vietnam

2) Hanoi University (Kapi’olani Community College, Dr. Overton’s campus, has an academic relationship with this university)

3) Danang and Hue Universities in the Central Highlands of Vietnam (Kapi’olani Community College has academic relationships with both universities.)

4) National University of Vietnam –Ho Chi Minh City (University of Hawaii has an academic relationship with them)

5) Canpho University – in the Mekong Delta (academic relationship with University of Hawaii)

Lao People’s Democratic Republic

In Laos, the group will focus most of its time in two cities: Vientiane, the capital and Luang Prabang, which is a World Heritage site. In planning the program in Laos, we are seeking the assistance of a number of individuals and institutions with whom we already have contacts. In Dr. Overton met with Ms. Shannon Dorsey, Public Diplomacy Officer  at the U.S. Embassy in Laos, and with Ambassador Huso in January 2010, and she and the Ambassador agreed to help us develop our program in Laos. We will make extensive use of the U.S. Embassy resources.

Other Lao Resources

1) The National University of Lao in Vientiane , Associate Dean Khamla Phanvilay

2) The Chinese University in Laos (scheduled to open in Vientiane in 2012)

3) The Hunan Chamber of Commerce, Vientiane

4) Mr. Puonpung Sananikone, Chairman of the Board of Governors of the East-West Center, who was born in Laos and has extensive government and business contacts there through his business advisory company.

5)  Ms. Vantheng Keopany, Director of the National Museum in Luang Prabang.

Kingdom of Thailand

We will use the following resources in identifying support personnel and scholars for the field study.

1) Thailand-United States Educational Foundation (Fulbright Commission)

2) U.S. Embassy in Thailand

3) Chulalongkorn University (Bangkok)

4) Mahidol University (Bangkok)

5) Thommasat University (Bangkok)

6) Chiang Mai University (University of Hawaii has varying degrees of academic ties with these institutions)

7) Chinese Temples and Philanthropic Associations in Thailand (e.g. Chip T’ua Association) –their goals are to preserve the religious traditions of South China and promote social integration into Thai society.

Honolulu

The group will then return to Honolulu for 3 days (3 nights) for an intensive working seminar, reporting on their findings, and developing projects for incorporating what they have learned into the curriculum and programs at their home institutions.

Post-trip Workshop One for the VLT region group, November 2013. 

The group will meet at a designated ARCAS institution in November 2013 for a two day workshop in order to present to the group their finalized projects, and to lay out plans for distributing their projects through the ARCAS website, the East-West Connections Journal, and through the ASDP National Conference.

The final group project will be to present findings from their field study at the ASDP National Conference in Spring, 2014.

Expectations for the Participants. 

  • Participants will be expected to be in attendance at all project events.
  • Each participant will work with other faculty on his/her team and with the Co-Directors responsible for the regions to design a project and a presentation based on the research done.  The project may be an essay to be published, but may also include conference presentations, or a new course syllabus, or a substantial revision in a syllabus currently being offered.
  • Every participant will make some type of presentation in the reflection and production phase of the project.
  • Every participant’s institution (not the individual participant) will pay a $1,500 registration fee to assist with the funding of the post-trip workshop.

Costs

All transportation, housing, entry fees, and meals for the participants on the field studies program in Honolulu and in Asia will be covered through the grant.  Participants will be reimbursed up to $700 for the cost of round-trip air travel from the US mainland to Honolulu.  The $1500 institutional fee will be used to cover the costs of the post-field study workshops and, if available, will also be used to supplement the participant’s costs of travel for the ASDP National Conference presentations.  The $1500 institutional fee must be received by the ARCAS Treasury by May 10th, 2013.  Once accepted into the program, participants will receive an invoice for this payment.

Application Details

The faculty participants in the Chinese Diaspora in Southeast Asia field seminars will be chosen from the eighteen member institutions of the ARCAS consortium.

Each applicant must submit the following as e-mail attachments:

  1. a completed application form (available on the ARCAS website, http://www.arcas-us.org/ );
  2. a cover letter;
  3. a short, current CV;
  4. a 3-4 page statement of purpose explaining why the applicant wishes to participate in the program; a discussion of the academic, research, and teaching experiences which have prepared him/her for this faculty development program; a plan for incorporating the lessons of this experience into existing or new courses, so that the design becomes part of the process and experience and not something that is begun from scratch at the end of the seminar abroad;
  5. two signed letters of recommendation (in pdf form). One of these must be from a Department Chair, Dean, or higher officer. The other should be from someone in academia who can evaluate the applicant’s experiences as a teacher-scholar.
  6. a signed letter (in pdf form) on institutional letterhead from the appropriate administrative officer committing the applicant’s institution to pay a $1,500 registration fee to assist with the funding of the post-trip workshop.

Deadlines

The application is due as a single (merged) electronic pdf document attached to an email and sent to luce-3@googlegroups.com  by Monday, February 4, 2013.

Notification of acceptance will be made by February 15, 2013.

The $1500 institutional fee must be received by the ARCAS Treasury by May 10th, 2013.  Once participants are accepted into the program, they will receive an invoice for this payment.

Selection of Participants

The Seminar Program Co-Directors will select the faculty participants from applicants drawn from ARCAS member institutions. Selection of participants will be made on the basis of their training, teaching assignments, proposed project, and statement detailing how participation in the field study for which they are applying will enrich their teaching and strengthen their institution’s Asian Studies curriculum. Among other decision factors will be the academic discipline of the applicant and balancing the group of scholars without any discrimination based on race, color, national origin, gender, age or disability.

Two faculty members from the same institution may apply for the same field seminar (e.g., MSI region), provided that in addition to their individual plans for the project, they also explain  how their collaboration will have a desirable curricular or program impact at their institution.

Moreover, one faculty member from a given institution may apply for the MSI region study and another from the same school may apply for the VLT region the following year without prejudicing the second applicant’s possibilities of selection.  We believe there are situations in which this may help an institution build a core faculty or core set of courses that the college does not have at present.

Additional Information.

For additional information, please contact:

Dr. George Brown, georgebrownsru@gmail.com, 724 738-2435

Dr. Joseph Overton, overton@hawaii.edu, 808 734-9832

Funding for this project was provided by a generous grant from the Henry Luce Foundation.