EASC Newsletter

EASC Upcoming Events

Colloquium series
Please join us for this fall’s colloquium series:

September 15 – 12:00 p.m., Walnut Room, Indiana Memorial Union
“Global Sushi: Soft Power and Hard Realities,” Ted Bestor, Professor of Anthropology and Japanese Studies, Harvard University
Horizons of Knowledge lecture, sponsored by EASC and the Departments of EALC and Anthropology

September 29 – 5:30 p.m., Radio-TV 251
“Paintings from the Guilin Chinese Painting Academy, Opening Lecture: Ink Painting in the Art World of Contemporary China,” Professor Julia F. Andrews, Department of History of Art, Ohio State University

October 27 – 12:00 p.m., Ballantine Hall 004
“Edogawa Rampō and the Transformation of Tokyo,” Eiji SEKINE, Associate Professor of Japanese, Purdue University
Horizons of Knowledge lecture, sponsored by EASC and the Departments of EALC and Comparative Literature

November 10 – 12:00 p.m., Ballantine Hall 004
“Japan's Welfare Policies in Comparative Perspective: Globalization or Divergence?” Gregory J. Kasza, Professor of EALC, IU

Preserving the Past - Facing the Future: Four Dynamic Asian Cities
With underwriting from EASC, the School of Continuing Studies is currently offering an informative course on East Asia called “Preserving the Past-Facing the Future: Four Dynamic Asian Cities.” Held each Thursday in October, the course focuses on a different East Asian city each week. The titles of the classes are “Beijing: Great Wall and Skyscrapers,” “Tokyo: Temples and Technology,” “Seoul: Shamans and Soccer,” and “Hong Kong: Dragons and Disney.” In an attempt to confront the rapid globalization ongoing in each city, the course poses such questions as “How does the past coexist peacefully with the future?” and “What parts of traditional culture do these cities showcase to others?” The instructors are Lynn Struve (Professor, History and EALC), Aiko Okamoto-MacPhail (Adjunct Assistant Professor, French and Italian), Hyo Sang LEE (Associate Professor, EALC), and Michael Stanley-Baker (M.A. student, EALC). Thanks go to Monroe Bank for providing the venue and to the IU Alumni Association for promotional activities.

Workshop on Japanese-Portuguese Relations
Along with West European Studies, the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies, the Department of Comparative Literature, and Horizons of Knowledge, EASC is co-sponsoring the workshop lecture “Portuguese Presence in Japan: From João Rodrigues to Wenceslau de Morais,” to be delivered October 12 at 5:30 p.m. in Ballantine Hall 215 by K. David Jackson. Jackson is a professor in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Yale University and will be a scholar-in-residence at IU from October 9 to October 12.

Abstract: The Portuguese presence in Japan begins in 1547 and lasts in its first phase until 1626. What the Portuguese “knew” about Japan in the sixteenth century can be reconstructed through letters and manuscripts, particularly those of João Rodrigues, S.J., known as “the translator,” a youth who arrived in Japan at age fifteen and wrote a history of Japan while in exile in Macau circa 1630. A second “stage” of Portuguese fascination with Japan occurs with Wenceslau de Morais, who travels as consul to Kobe in 1895 and devotes the rest of his days to writing and living what he perceived as the aesthetic exoticism of Japanese culture. The workshop reviews and compares these experiences separated by three hundred years and addresses issues of empire and colonialism, Eur-Asian relations, and “Orientalism” from the Portuguese perspective.

Midwest East Asian Education Network Dissertation Workshop
University of Illinois’s Center for East Asian and Pacific Studies and EASC are sponsoring a public forum and doctoral dissertation workshop at the University of Illinois on Friday, October 20 from 11:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.

The guest speaker at the public forum is Dr. Jing LIN of the University of Maryland, an internationally-known scholar on Chinese education. Dr. Lin’s research focuses on the social and political transformations in China since 1978. Her books include The Red Guards’ Path to Violence (1991), Education in Post-Mao China (1993), The Opening of the Chinese Mind (1994), Social Transformation and Private Education in China (1999), and Love, Peace and Wisdom in Education (2006).

After the public forum with Dr. Lin, network participants will engage in a dissertation workshop, focusing on the work of three to four advanced doctoral students. The purpose of the workshop is to encourage intense discussion among faculty and students of several dissertation chapters. The format is designed to encourage analysis of content and methodology, free exchange of ideas, mentoring of excellence in research, and networking opportunities for students working on related areas of scholarship. If you would like to get involved, please contact Professor Heidi Ross for more information.

Conference on Early Modern Japanese Literacy
A conference on early modern Japanese literacy will be held November 1-2 in the Redbud Room of the Indiana Memorial Union and will be sponsored by the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), EASC, and the Department of EALC. Seven visitors from Japan will join Professor Richard Rubinger (EALC), Professor Emeritus Jurgis Elison (EALC and History), and EALC Visiting Scholar KAWAMURA Hajime (Dokkyo University) for this two-day conference titled “The History of Popular Literacy in Japan: Searching for Signatures.” They will be reporting on studies of individual marks on early modern documents to determine how they can be used to measure literacy among different sectors of Japanese society during the Tokugawa period (1603-1868).

In addition to Professors Rubinger, Elisonas, and Kawamura, the following scholars are scheduled to participate:

AMANO Haruko (Associate Professor, Japan Women’s University)
KIMURA Masanobu (Professor, Chikushi Jogakuen University)
ŌTA Motoko (Professor, Saitama Prefectural University)
ŌTO Yasuhiro (Professor, University of Tsukuba)
SUZUKI Rie (Associate Professor, Nagasaki University)
UMEMURA Kayo (Professor, Nara University of Education)
YAKUWA Tomohiro (Associate Professor, Niigata University)

Interested graduate students and faculty are welcome to attend.

East Asian Film Series
The East Asian Film Series will be showing the following films this semester:
September 30 – The Unforgiven (dir. YOON Jong-bin, 2005)
October 7 – The Blind Shaft (dir. LI Yang, 2003)
October 21 – Vengeance Is Mine (dir. IMAMURA Shōhei, 1979)
November 4 – 2046 (dir. WONG Kar-wai, 2004)
November 18 – The King and the Clown (dir. LEE Jun-ik, 2005)
December 2 – Kamikaze Girls (dir. NAKASHIMA Tetsuya, 2004)

All screenings take place at 7:00 p.m. in Woodburn 101 and are free and open to the public, although they are generally not suitable for a young audience.

YOON Jong-bin Screening and Discussion

On September 30, EASC hosted South Korean director YOON Jong-bin as part of his Midwest speaking tour to promote his film The Unforgiven (2005), which began as a student project while Yoon was still attending university. The screening was preceded by a short talk by Department of Communication and Culture Ph.D. candidate Jeeyoung SHIN about recent developments in Korean cinema in order to situate Yoon’s film within current social, political, and economic contexts. Following the film, director Yoon participated in a lively question-and-answer session in which the audience inquired about topics ranging from compulsory military service in South Korea to Yoon’s own cinematic influences.

“Tokyo in Film” Series
Organized by Professors Tom Keirstead and Sumie Jones for their respective courses EALC-E352 “Edo-Tokyo, History and Culture” and CMLT-C301 “City as Labyrinth—Tokyo,” the Tokyo in Film series presents modern Tokyo through several film genres by a variety of directors. Each showing will be preceded by a short introduction by either Keirstead or Jones. Students, faculty and staff of EALC and EASC, and their families are welcome to attend.

All movies will be shown on Wednesdays, 7:00-9:00 p.m. in Ballantine 242.

September 20 - Stray Dog (1949)
Director: KUROSAWA Akira
Starring: MIFUNE Toshirō, SHIMURA Takashi, AWAJI Keiko

September 27 - Early Summer (1951)
Director: OZU Yasujirō
Starring: HARA Setsuko, RYŪ Chishū

October 4 - Jin-Roh: The Wolf Brigade (1998)
Director: OKIURA Hiroyuki
Writer/Creator: OSHII Mamoru

October 11 - Tokyo Drifter (1966)
Director: SUZUKI Seijun
Starring: WATARI Tetsuya, MATSUBARA Chieko, NITANI Hideaki

October 18 - Family Game (1984)
Director: MORITA Yoshimitsu
Starring: MATSUDA Yūsaku, ITAMI Jūzō

October 25 - A Taxing Woman (1987)
Director: ITAMI Jūzō
Starring: MIYAMOTO Nobuko, YAMAZAKI Tsutomu

November 1 - Shall We Dance? (1997)
Director: SUŌ Masayuki
Starring: YAKUSHO Kōji, KUSAKARI Tamiyo

November 8 - Tokyo Godfathers (2003)
Director: KON Satoshi and FURUYA Shō go
Voices: EMORI Tōru, OKAMOTO Aya