CFP: East Asian Studies Grad Conference (Jan. 07, UAlberta)

East Asian Studies Graduate Student Conference
University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada
January 19 - 20, 2007

Conflict, Crisis, and Negotiation in East Asia

The graduate students of East Asian Studies, in cooperation with their
Department at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada are
pleased to invite proposals from a wide range of academic
fields-including: Anthropology, Art History, Cultural Studies,
Education, History, Language Pedagogy and Linguistics, Literature,
Political Science, Religious Studies, Sociology, and Women's Studies-for
their second Conference to be held January 19 - 20, 2007. The
Conference, a dynamic environment for graduate students to present
original work, exploring together the Conference theme of "Conflict,
Crisis, and Negotiation in East Asia", will examine how East Asian
states and societies, both past and present, manage the social and
political complexity of local and global interactions, religious and
ethnic diversity, linguistic and cultural pluralism. In such a forum, we
hope to voice questions of identity in East Asian contexts involving
conflict and dialogue between civilizations, between cultures, between
linguistic groups, between religious and political ideologies, and
between the present and the past.

We aim to look at how ethnic, cultural, and national identity is, or has
been, (re)asserted to compensate for perceptions of loss of, or threats
to, social identity resulting from increasing pressures and trends
towards uniformity of life-worlds brought about by the formation of
nation-states and globalization. Fully cognizant of the ways in which
identity is being, or has been, exploited to serve as justification for
disputes and conflicts, we also invite papers exploring how culture,
religion, and language, rarely themselves the primary cause of conflict,
become instrumentalised means for conflicts premised not on valid
desires for self-preservation, but instead on increasing an actor's
power over those of competing interests. As well, contrary to current
claims of the inevitability of a "clash of civilizations", there
seemingly also exists a counter-impulse for subtle dialogue between
systems of thought apparently opposed by epistemic differences. Such
dialogues are often given relief by cultural and temporal markers of
disjunction and conjunction-in the present's invocation of the past, for
example-that lay challenge to both traditional and modern constructions
of cultural belief systems. Viewed in this light, the study of the
life-worlds (cultures, histories, languages, literatures, and societies)
of this region can offer us phenomenon both disturbing and rich in
implication.

Papers will be given in English and should be no longer than 15 minutes
(7 - 8 pages double spaced). Abstracts should be submitted to the
conference committee by e-mail (or post-marked) by November 5th, 2006,
and should be no longer than 250 words in length, single-spaced (include
all necessary contact information and affiliations). Notification of the
results shall be no later than November 25th, 2006. We suggest
presenters assemble and submit their own thematically-linked panels of
three- to four-persons. Groups submitting panels in this manner should
send individual abstracts together in the same e-mail or envelope with a
brief panel abstract (also no more than 250 words). The Organizing
Committee reserves the right to restructure papers and panel proposals
it deems necessary.

Selected papers (as chosen by the Conference Committee Review Board)
will be published in a special issue of the Canadian Review of East
Asian Studies dedicated to the Conference Proceedings.

CONFERENCE CHAIRS
Brad Ambury
Yoshi Ono
Yukari F. Meldrum

CONFERENCE COMMITTEE
Ross Krekoski
Neill Walker
Yumi Sasaki
Janice Brown
Anne Commons
Jack Lin

E-mail panel submissions/proposals to: eaconf@ualberta.ca