Description

In this talk, I will summarize and discuss the three basic trends in Japanese politics that emerged since the 3.11 earthquake and nuclear disaster, the disintegration of the Democratic Party of Japan, the rise of local political parties, and the growing distrust among the Japanese voters toward the existing political system. I will offer some prediction as to how these three trends will interact to develop into a new direction in Japanese politics for both short and long term future.

Masaru Kohno is a Professor of Political Science, and Director of the Research Institute of Contemporary Japanese Systems, at Waseda University. He graduated from Sophia University in Tokyo, and obtained his M.A. from Yale in International Relations in 1987 and Ph.D. from Stanford in Political Science in 1994. His major publications include Japan’s Postwar Party Politics (Princeton University Press) and Institutions (University of Tokyo Press).

Description

Stanley Zlotkin received his medical training at McMaster University and McGill and obtained a PhD in Nutrition at the University of Toronto. He has worked as a clinician-nutritionist and research scientist at The Hospital for Sick Children since 1980. He is currently a Professor in the Departments of Paediatrics and Nutritional Sciences at the University of Toronto, a senior scientist in the Research Institute of The Hospital for Sick Children, Medical Director of Nutrition Support at The Hospital for Sick Children and Head of the Division of Gastroenterology and Nutrition at the Hospital. As well as being a consultant on nutritional issues to the Canadian Federal and Provincial Government, he is past Chairman of the Nutrition Committee of the Canadian Paediatric Society and past Chair of the Research Ethics Board of the Research Institute of The Hospital for Sick Children.

Stanley has active research in Canada (supported by Health Canada and the Centers for Disease Control), Ghana (supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research), Mongolia (supported by World Vision and the HJ Heinz Foundation) and China (supported by the HJ Heinz Foundation). He recently received the HJ Heinz Humanitarian Award for his international efforts related to micronutrient deficiencies.

Description

A panel discussion and Q&A session for students to meet successful practitioners in business, law and media. The panel is followed by a brief coffee reception in which students will have the opportunity to interact with the speakers personally.

Description

This presentation examines certain representations of Metropolitan Manila during Martial Law, and the queer attachments, intimacies, and loves in the decaying metropolis. In particular, it analyzes Ishmael Bernal’s film Manila By Night (1980) and Jessica Hagedorn’s novel Dogeaters (1990). Released during a time when the Marcoses secured rule through an over-production of their conjugal “love team,” and by IMF supported justifications for molding a “beautiful and efficient” Manila, Manila By Night challenges the disciplinary plans for the city and its populace through the presence of queer characters that unabashedly love the dirty, dysfunctional and impoverished city. It was thus the only film that was banned from international screening abroad. In a similar vein, Dogeaters incorporates characters that practice queer love as they navigate a version of Manila antithetical to the one the government and the neo-colonial elite produced for the West. Manilaby Night and Dogeaters center on the city as the quintessential space for queer revolutionary politics. Bernal and Hagedorn re-imagine the urban space as connecting militant forms of queerness across geo-political spaces and temporalities. Both works also highlight the utility of a queer diasporic framework to understanding revolutionary politics during dictatorial rule.

Robert Diaz is an Assistant Professor in Women and Gender Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University. His research areas are Asian North American, Filipino, Gender and Sexuality, and Performance Studies. He has been awarded two Andrew Mellon Postdoctoral Fellowships from UCLA and USC. His book project, Reparative Acts: Postcolonial Fixations and the Queering of Philippine Nationalisms, examines how diasporic artists queer key figures in contemporary nationalisms in order to expand upon the meanings of historical reparation and monetary redress.

Description

A screening of John Woo’s A Better Tomorrow (1986) on 35mm.
Followed by Q&A with editor/director David Wu. Q&A conducted by Peter Kuplowsky (Senior Programmer, After Dark Film Festival; Assistant, TIFF Nexus).

David Wu is a prolific director, editor, producer, actor and writer, who first established his name as a creative force in his native Hong Kong before bringing his impressive talents to the North American film and television industry. A favorite among Chinese audiences, Wu directed and co-wrote the fantasy romance, The Bride with White Hair II, the action-comedy caper Spy Games, and From Zero to Hero, about a fighter pilot in war and peace. Since moving to North America over a decade ago, Wu has teamed with long-time collaborator John Woo in his series Once a Thief, as both editor and director. Most recently he directed and edited Merlin’s Apprentice, with Sam Neill and Miranda Richardson for Hallmark for whom he also directed Bridgit Fonda in the title role of the award-winning mini-series The Snow Queen.

A Better Tomorrow is a 1986 Hong Kong action film directed by John Woo and starring Chow Yun-fat, Ti Lung and Leslie Cheung.

Description

This program will commence with a screening of the documentary The Conscience of Nhem En directed by Steven Okazaki. It is En’s photographs which are featured in the ROM exhibition, Observance and Memorial: Photographs From S-21, Cambodia. En was appointed staff photographer at the notorious S-21 prison, where, from 1975 to 1979, more than 14 000 people were registered and photographed, then imprisoned and tortured, before they were killed. The Conscience of Nhem En includes personal accounts of 3 survivors of S-21, and a rare on-camera interview with En. A discussion with filmmaker Steven Okazaki andhistorian Hilary Earl will follow the screening. Okazaki and Earl will explore the process of collecting perpetrator testimony, and what such testimony offers the historical record. They will also consider the grey zone between perpetrator and victim in the case of En, who was 10 years old when recruited into the Khmer Rouge, and 16 years old when selected to head S-21’s photography unit. En defends his actions as a job he had to do in order to survive.

Steven Okazaki
The films of acclaimed documentary filmmaker Steven Okazaki give a human face to dramatic historical events and troubling social issues. He is an Academy Award winner (Days of Waiting,1990) and a four-time Oscar nominee, producing films on an extraordinary range of subjects (from Hiroshima to heroin addiction to the Minnesota State Fair to experimental guitarist Nels Cline) for HBO, PBS, NHK, and independently.

Professor Hilary Earl
Hilary Earl is Associate Professor of European History at Nipissing University, North Bay, Ontario. Her book, The Nuremberg SS-Einsatzgruppen Trial, 1945-1958: Atrocity, Law, and History, published in 2009 with Cambridge University Press, won the 2010 Hans Rosenberg prize awarded by the American Historical Association for the best book in Central European history. Earl has published extensively on genocide, war crimes trials, and perpetrator testimony.

This program is part of the Observance and Memorial Symposium taking place on November 8 and 10 at the Royal Ontario Museum. Observance and Memorial Symposium Details: http://www.rom.on.ca/programs/lectures/index.php?media=print&cat_id=1&ref=showinfo&program_id=8183

Description

To be followed by an informal reception

Yim Ho is one of the most famous Hong Kong directors of the 1980s, and a leader of Hong Kong New Wave. He learned his craft at the London Film School. He began his career in television production making television programs for RTHK, then became a film director in the lat 1970s. Making his first film in 1978, he spent his next 10 years acting solely as a director. His fourth film, Homecoming (Sishui liunian) landed him his first award nomination for Best Director from the Hong Kong Film Awards. This was followed closely by Red Dust, which garnered him two more nominations from the Hong Kong Film Awards for Best Director and Best Screenplay. Not only did this film mark his screenplay debut, but he also took a turn in front of the camera. His next project, The King of Chess (Kei Wong) (1991) found him writing, directing and even starring. His next three films (two of which he wrote and produced) earned him more awards and nominations from a number of different festivals. For the start of the new millennium, Ho has commenced with a more western approach, working with American actor Willem Dafoe in Pavilion of Women.

Filmography (director):

Butterfly Effects (2000)
Pavilion of Women (2000)
Kitchen / Wo ai chu fang (1997)
The Sun Has Ears / Taiyang You Er (1996)
The Day the Sun Turned Cold / Tianguo niezi (1994)
The King of Chess / Kei Wong (1991)
Red Dust / Gungun hongchen (1990)
Buddah’s Lock / Tian pu sa (1987)
Homecoming / Sishui liunian (1984)
Wedding Bells, Wedding Bells / Gong zi jiao (1981)
The Happenings / Ye che (1980)
The Extras / Ka le fei (1978)

Filmography (writer):

Kitchen / Wo ai chu fang (1997)
The Day the Sun Turned Cold / Tianguo niezi (1994)
The King of Chess / Kei Wong (1991)
Red Dust / Gungun hongchen (1990)

Description

This presentation concerns the figure of the yogini or dakini in Indian tantric Buddhism. One of the aims is to demonstrate the degree to which yoginis represent a goddess typology shared across the Buddhist-Hindu sectarian divide. While there is much that is similar in the early medieval esoteric traditions, it is within Buddhist and Shaiva yogini cults that parallels in ritual, text, and iconography attain their most remarkable levels, to the extent that one can speak of parallel ritual systems focused, to a surprising degree, upon yoginis. The presentation will examine this phenomenon historically, tracing the yoginis’ non-Buddhist antecedents and shifting representations in Buddhist tantric literature, and examining the roles of yogini veneration in Shaivism.

Shaman Hatley researches the literature, ritual, and social history of Esoteric or Tantric Śaivism in medieval India, and religion in premodern Bengal. Appointed at Concordia in 2007, his teaching spans Hindu Studies, religion in South Asia, ritual studies, religion and the performing arts, and Sanskrit. He completed his Ph.D. in Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania in 2007, under the direction of Harunaga Isaacson. He has authored several articles and book chapters concerning goddess cults and the history and practices of the tantric traditions, and is a contributor to the Tāntrikābhidhānakośa (“A Dictionary of Technical Terms from Hindu Tantric Literature”). Currently, he is preparing a monograph entitled Goddesses, Women, and Ritual: Yoginī Cults of Early Medieval India; and a multi-volume study and critical edition of the Brahmayāmalatantra, one of the earliest surviving works of Hindu tantric literature focused upon goddesses.

Description

Reception & Film Screening of War and Peace / Jang aur Aman (2002, 135 minutes)

6:00pm Reception with the Filmmaker
6:30-9:00pm Opening Remarks & Film Screening

War and Peace (Jang Aur Aman)
Filmed over three tumultuous years in India, Pakistan, Japan and the USA following nuclear tests in the Indian sub-continent, War and Peace is an epic documentary journey of peace activism in the face of global militarism and war. It is dramatically framed by the murder of Mahatma Gandhi and shows how fifty years after his death memories of Gandhi seem like a foil for our thirst for peace and our very distance from it. Ten years after it was made, this film is as relevant as ever to our present historical moment. This screening follows on the recent success of Patwardhan’s latest film Jai Bhim Comrade at Toronto’s Hot Docs earlier this year.

Anand Patwardhan is India’s leading documentary film maker. For over four decades his investigative documentaries have charted life in modern India, from the nature of its economic development to the power of nationalism and religious fundamentalism, and the struggles by the poor and the marginalized for justice. It has taken legal action, including a decision by India’s Supreme Court, to prevent successive Indian governments from censoring his films and blocking them from being screened.

Description

In recent years, Toronto has emerged as an important destination for North Korean refugees. Yet, information about North Korean refugees in Toronto remains scarce and unreliable. This presents us with an incomplete picture of how the refugees interact with the government, NGOs, and the Toronto community at large. Dr. James C. Simeon, Director of the Centre for Refugee Studies at York University, will start the conversation with an overview of Canada’s refugee policies and present issues they face – with a particular focus on Toronto. Next, the Director of the Romero House, Dr. Mary Jo Leddy will compare the situation of North Korean refugees in Canada to refugees of other nationalities. She will also discuss the involvement of religious organizations in the settlement of refugees in Toronto. Lastly, HanVoice Executive Director Randall Baran-Chong will present his NGO’s advocacy for North Korean refugees in Toronto. This workshop will address the current situation of North Korean refugees in Toronto in the context of the overall status of refugee issues in Canada.

Dr. James C. Simeon is the Acting Director at the Center for Refugee Studies at York University, Toronto, and Associate Professor in the School of Public Policy and Administration at the Faculty of Liberal Arts. He was previously Executive Director of the International Association of Refugee Law Judiges, and he served on the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada. Dr. Simeon specializes in Public Policy and Administration, International Refugee Law, International Human Rights Law, International Humanitarian Law. He holds a Ph.D from York University.

Dr. Mary Jo Leddy is the Director of the Romero House Community for Refugees, based in Toronto. The organization assists with the resettlement of refugees and provides advocacy services to more than 6,000 individuals and families. Dr. Leddy is also a lecturer at Regis College, UofT, an accomplished author, and a member of the Order of Canada. She is the author of At the Border Called Hope: Where Refugees Are Neighbors, which was a finalist of the 1997 Trillium Award. She holds a Ph.D from the University of Toronto.

Mr. Randall Baran-Chong is the Executive Director of HanVoice, a Toronto-based NGO that works in advocacy and awareness about North Korean refugees in Canada. The organization is the largest Canadian NGO operating in this field. Mr. Baran-Chong is also a board member of the Chinese Canadian National Council (Toronto chapter). He was Chair of the 10th International Conference on North Korean Human Rights and Refugees, the largest of its kind in 2010. He is a Manager at nD Insight, a management consultancy, and holds a degree in Economics and Latin American Studies from the University of Toronto.

Description

The pace and scale of China’s economic transformation in the last three decades have no historical precedent. In this paper I discuss the driving force of this transformation and the future prospects of China’s growth. I will begin by discussing briefly China’s historical growth performance and then compare the growth patterns for the period from 1952 to 1978 and the period since 1978. The main focus of this paper will be to examine the sources of growth since 1978. Perhaps surprisingly, given China’s well-documented sky-high rates of saving and investment, I will argue that China’s rapid growth over the last three decades has been driven by productivity growth rather than by capital investment. Overall, gradual and persistent institutional change and policy reforms that have reduced distortions and improved economic incentives are the main reasons for the productivity growth. I conclude by discussing China’s future growth prospects and the challenges the economy faces.

Xiaodong Zhu is a professor of economics at the University of Toronto and a special term professor at the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance. He has published many articles on growth, development and the Chinese economy in leading economics journals and is a co-editor of China Economic Review

Description

Thinking of getting a Master’s degree? Have an interest in the Asia-Pacific? The Master’s in Asia-Pacific Studies (MAPS) program allows you to add a specialization designation to your degree upon graduation. You are invited to an informal information session with the program director, administrator, and former MAPS students. You can learn more about the program, how to apply, as well as possible entry awards and scholarships for eligible students that will support language study or field research in East and Southeast Asia. Learn about unique resources and opportunities available to MAPS students, such as coordinating graduate conference with fellow Munk School Graduate students, or co-editing an e-journal. Come to the info session to meet other students and have your questions answered.

Description

In the Six Dynasties, literary scholars challenged the concept of literary writings truly reflecting one’s intention, a notion that has been entrenched in the Chinese literary tradition since the Book of Documents, which describes poetry as a spontaneous and involuntary genuine expression of one’s feelings. Although this is the explicitly accepted foundation for understanding classical Chinese poetry, the inconsistencies between writers’ personalities and their literary works provide space for mediated self-representation to grow and develop, which complicates the original uses and ideas of poetry.

Yue Zhang is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of East Asian Studies. He is completing his dissertation on historical memory and nostalgia in ‘poems on history’ during the Six Dynasties (220-589).

Description

Asia’s policy makers must pursue inclusive and green growth simultaneously if they wish their people to enjoy the fruits of sustainable growth. There is no trade off. Widening inequality within countries and between countries threatens the progress the region has made in fighting poverty. Much more needs to be done to ensure all segments of societies benefit from growth – as the region is still home to the world’s largest concentration of poor. Environmental degradation is another looming threat. The combined effects of both can strain social cohesion and destabilize gains made and in turn have spin-off effect on rest of the world.

Mr. Rajat M. Nag is the Managing Director General of the Asian Development Bank. He has been with the institution for more than two decades and assumed his current position in December 2006. Mr. Nag’s work has given him wide-ranging insight into several issues and challenges relevant to Asia, including infrastructure financing, public-private partnerships and regional economic integration. His particular interest is in working to enhance regional cooperation and integration in Asia and bridge the gap between the region’s thriving economies and the millions of poor people being left behind. He has held several top positions in ADB. Prior to his current post, he was head of ADB’s Southeast Asia Department and Special Adviser to the President on Regional Economic Cooperation and Integration.

Mr. Nag began his professional career at the Bank of Canada and held senior positions in a leading international consulting firm before joining ADB. He holds engineering degrees from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi and the University of Saskatchewan (Canada). He also obtained Masters degrees in Business Administration from the University of Saskatchewan and in Economics from The London School of Economics

Description

Diasporic parallaxes: viewing China from its peripheries
by Angelina Chin, Assistant Professor, Department of History, Pomona College

This project begins with a proposal to reclaim the concept of “diaspora” as a political strategy for the people on the southeastern peripheries of the PRC, in particular Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macau. In this context, “diasporic Chinese” functions not just as a descriptive term referring to Chinese people living “outside of China proper”; instead, it is deployed to evoke new subjectivities in a transnational solidarity alliance confronting an expansive PRC state. I also attempt to acquire Slavoj Zizek’s articulation of “the parallax view” to understand the cultural implications of such an alliance. Parallax is generally defined as “the apparent displacement of an object, caused by a change in observational position.” Interestingly, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, until recently, were always being referred to by Western popular media as “windows” into China or China’s “windows” to the world. Although the original meaning of the metaphor refers to the opportunities and spectacles that were provided by these places, the metaphor is also useful in my analyses of the “diasporic parallaxes”. The concept of “parallax” reminds us that the position of the outside observer (or the window from which one is viewing) not only shapes the observer’s point of view about China, but also constitutes the meanings of the viewed object – “China”—as well. This framework might help to transcend the current political fixations on the polarities between the oppositional “local” identities/ territories and mainland China, and to rethink the positionalities of these peripheral territories as vantage points. My paper explores some of the historical conditionings that have produced the “parallax gaps” – namely, the experience of alternative modernities under foreign colonialisms and the traumatic memories of escaping from an oppressive state in the late 1940s-1970s.

‘Mind Your Own Business!’: The Hong Kong Government Confronts the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) over Chinese Refugees in Hong Kong
by Glen Peterson, Professor, Department of History, University of British Columbia

This paper examines the series of manoeuvres performed by Hong Kong’s colonial government to deflect, thwart, contain and shape the activities of the UNHCR’s Hong Kong Survey Mission, which was created for the purpose of investigating the situation and fate of the more than 700,000 mainland Chinese who fled China for the perceived sanctuary of Hong Kong in the years immediately preceding and following the establishment of the People’s Republic of China in October 1949. Lest it be thought that this is essentially the story of a stubborn and conservative colonial state resisting the actions of a forward-looking and progressive international institution of the postwar world, this paper also pays close attention to the motivations and assumptions of the early UNHCR in order to show that it, too, was, in certain critical respects, a colonial era institution.

Hoping they will go back: Hong Kong Government attitudes to Chinese migrants, 1950 and 1999
by Alan Smart, Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of Calgary

Worries about “floods” of mainlanders entering Hong Kong have been pervasive in the post World War II era. Its Executive Council decided on July 13, 1948 to clear all squatters from the urban districts “with the hope that at least some would thereby be sufficiently discouraged and decide to return to China”. In May 1999, Hong Kong’s Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa asked the National People’s Congress to reinterpret the clause on right of abode in the Basic Law, arguing that Hong Kong could not afford the influx of mainlanders that would otherwise flood into the SAR. In this paper, I discuss these two periods in which both colonial and post-colonial Hong Kong governments have acted to discourage migrants from the mainland of China. Drawing on my past research on both situations, I attempt to draw out similarities in the attitudes and practices, despite the great differences in the contexts, and to make some suggestions about the implications for our understanding of the governance of migrants and refugees in the Hong Kong context.

Description

This paper explores state and non-state practices of sovereignty and citizenship in times of civil war, the way in which each side inscribes its own ‘people’ through uniforms and lists of the dead, and the way in which indigenous people (adivasis) experience everyday membership under the different regimes of the Indian state and the Maoist parallel regime. As against traditional theories of sovereignty which see it either as authored from below (contract theory) or scripted from above (domination), I argue that in civil war the display and practical exercise of sovereignty is primarily authored by the enemy. The strategy of each ruling side – government and guerrillas – is governed by their repudiation as well as mimicry of the other. For civilians, however, the real danger is the absence of identifiable authors or the multiplicity of possible authors behind any action.

Nandini Sundar is Professor of Sociology at the Delhi School of Economics, Delhi University. Her publications include Subalterns and Sovereigns: An Anthropological History of Bastar (2nd ed. 2007), Branching Out: Joint Forest Management in India (2001), as well as several edited volumes. From 2007-11, she co-edited Contributions to Indian Sociology, and serves on the boards of several journals. In 2010, she was awarded the Infosys Prize for Social Sciences – Social Anthropology. Her current interests relate to citizenship, war and counterinsurgency in South Asia, indigenous identity and politics in India, the sociology of law, and inequality. Her public writings are available at www.nandinisundar.blogspot.com

Description

David Morley is President and CEO of UNICEF Canada. Mr. Morley’s extensive experience in international cooperation began when he volunteered with street children in Central America in the 1970s. Since then, he has worked in community development and humanitarian projects in the Congo, Zambia, Mozambique, Sierra Leone, Mexico, Dominican Republic, El Salvador and Brazil.

Prior to his appointment to UNICEF Canada, Mr. Morley served as President and CEO of Save the Children Canada, and before that as Executive Director of the Canadian section of Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders. He has also served as the founding Executive Director of the Institute for Canadian Citizenship; on the Board of Directors of the Canadian Council for International Cooperation; as President of the Ontario Council for International Cooperation; as a mentor with the Trudeau Foundation and on the Board of Directors of the Brazilian‐based Abrinq Foundation for the Rights of Children. He is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the Stephen Lewis Foundation, and is on the Advisory Board of McGill University’s Institute for the Study of International Development.

David Morley’s writing on international issues has appeared in newspapers across Canada and around the world. He is a frequent commentator on radio and television. His most recent book, Healing Our World: Inside Doctors Without Borders, was published in Canada, South Korea and the United States, where it won a number of awards.

Description

In this paper I wish to consider the links between bhakti and the social imaginaries that sustain modern Indian liberal-democratic political thought. I probe the largely overlooked democratic implications of the practices of bhakti and suggest that an analysis of these practices can significantly contribute toward understanding aspects of the culture of Indian democracy. In the paper I also consider how the moral vocabulary of bhakti has influenced dominant articulations of freedom in modern Indian political thought. Through the aforementioned exercise I hope to respond to assessments of liberalism and secularism that consider these doctrines to be tied ineluctably to cultural formations associated with the modern west, and thus unsuited for polities such as India.

Rinku Lamba is Assistant Professor at the Centre for Political Studies in Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, where she teaches political theory. She is interested in modern Indian political thought and contemporary political theory, and is presently working on a book length manuscript on Indian liberalism. Her recent and forthcoming publications combine themes in modern Indian political thought (nationalism, for example) with concerns of contemporary political theory (such as the place of the instrumentalities of the law and state in schemes to accommodate religious and cultural diversity). She has been a Max Weber Postdoctoral Fellow at the European University Institute in Florence, and an invited Visiting Professor at the Institute for Asian and African Studies at the Humboldt University in Berlin. Between August and December 2012 she holds the Harold Coward India Research Fellowship at the University of Victoria’s Centre for Studies in Religion and Society.

Description

The talk re-examines the famous Anglo-Chinese War in 1839-1842 (better known as the First Opium War) in the context of nineteenth-century globalization and international conflicts. Studied here as a classic scandal of empire, the Opium War illustrates the precarious and contradictory ideological foundation of the modern empire and international law. The intense debates over the opium trade and the war in the British Parliament, mercantile community, evangelical circles, and mass media unexpectedly exposed the morally and legally questionable origins of empire. They also revealed the complicated processes by which the presumed but contested universality of the colonial empire and civilization was finally institutionalized by the post-war treatises and positivist international law. Many of the legal, moral, cultural, and political-economic arguments deployed in 1839-1843 for or against empire remain uncannily similar to what we hear in the twenty-first century.

Li Chen is Assistant Professor of History and Global Asia Studies in the Department of Historical and Cultural Studies (UTSC) and the Graduate Department of History at the University of Toronto. His research interests focus on late imperial and modern China, Sino-foreign relations, comparative legal history, international law, and critical studies of empire, modernity, and globalization. The talk is based on part of his recently completed book project “Precarious Empire: Law, Sovereignty, and Cultural Politics in the Sino-Western Encounter, c.1740s-c.1840s.”

Description

Hong Kong’s Cantonese Opera – Virtuosity and Innovation
A talk by opera master Dr. Lam Kar Sing

Dr. Lam Kar Sing will be discussing the achievements of his artistic career, highlighting the legacy he had bequeathed and the virtuosity and innovation of Hong Kong’s Cantonese opera. Video clips from several of his productions will be screened.

Dr. Lam Kar Sing is a preeminent figure in Cantonese Opera in Hong Kong. Born in 1933, he became a disciple of the maestro Sit Kok Sin in 1949 and, inspired by Sit’s artistic influence, he committed himself to a lifelong and tireless pursuit of excellence. Lam quickly became a versatile exponent of his mentor’s art and, developing as a maestro in his own right, he went on to establish the theory that a performing artist must seek to fulfill four criteria – “breadth, virtuosity, depth and innovation”. He also founded two Cantonese opera troupes, Hing Sun Sing and Chung Sun Sing, both of which won a wide following with their popular productions. Lam eventually retired from the stage in 1993, and since then he has dedicated himself to promoting this art form and to ensuring its continued survival and development. Dr. Lam has won many accolades and awards from the government, the education sector and the field of traditional Chinese theatre in recognition of his lifelong and his lasting contribution to Cantonese Opera. Dr. Lam Kar Sing will be discussing achievements with the Toronto audience his artistic career, highlighting the legacy he has bequeathed, and the virtuosity and innovation of Hong Kong’s Cantonese opera. Video clips from several of his productions will also be screened.

【香港本土粵劇研究】─林家聲之「博、精、深、新」粵劇講座

目的 ─
2009年，粵劇獲聯合國教科文組織列入《人類非物質文化遺產代表作名錄》，顯示粵劇藝術已得到國際社會的肯定，需要努力保存及弘揚。為推動香港本土粵劇研究，特別邀請林家聲博士主講「博、精、深、新」粵劇講座，透過重溫林博士舞台演出珍貴片段，林博士親自講解其獨特的「博、精、深、新」表演原則，如何生動地演繹文學經典人物，藉以提高觀眾對欣賞香港式粵劇之興趣。

主講嘉賓 ─
粵劇表演藝術家林家聲博士生於1933年。1949年獲粵劇泰斗薛覺先納入門下，盡得薛氏真傳。他秉承薛覺先對藝術的嚴謹態度，對粵劇對藝術不斷追求、探索和改革，以「博、精、深、新」為表演原則。他先後領導「慶新聲劇團」及「頌新聲劇團」演出，深受戲迷歡迎。1993年退出職業舞台後，仍熱心推動粵劇，積極關注粵劇藝術的發展和承傳工作，把一生貢獻粵劇藝術。林博士在粵劇藝術上成就和貢獻，多次獲得政府、學界及戲曲界的肯定：1981年獲港英政府頒發「榮譽獎章」、2000年獲香港藝術發展局頒發「戲曲終身成就獎」、2005年獲香港特別行政區政府頒授「銅紫荊星章」、1999年及2010年獲香港演藝學院頒授榮譽院士及榮譽博士、2010年獲中國戲曲表演學會頒 [終身成就獎]、2011年獲香港特別行政區政府頒授「銀紫荊星章」。(部份資料來源:香港文化博物館網頁)

SUPPORTED BY
Hong Kong Economic & Trade Office (Toronto)

Description

At the Rotman School of Management, under our Dean Roger Martin, we’ve spent a decade deciphering and teaching how truly successful leaders think. From interviews with more than 50 highly successful leaders across industries – leaders like A.G. Lafley of Procter & Gamble, Isadore Sharp of the Four Seasons and Dr. Victoria Hale of the Institute for One World Health– we found a specific pattern of thinking that informs better decisions and more effective action. Called Integrative Thinking, this pattern of thinking represents the ability to generate new and better options in the face of opposing ideas. This talk will cover the theory of integrative thinking and offer some illustrative examples of integrative thinking in action. Finally, we’ll put the theory to use, working together to explore models and create new ideas.

Jennifer is academic director for Rotman’s flagship open-enrollment Integrative Thinking Program. She has created and led custom workshops with large public and private sector organizations in Canada, the United States, Europe, the Middle East and Australia. She collaborates closely with Rotman Dean Roger Martin on his writing, including The Opposable Mind: How Successful Leaders Win Through Integrative Thinking (2007), The Design of Business: Why Design Thinking is the New Competitive Advantage (2009) and Fixing the Game: Bubble, Crashes and What Capitalism Can Learn from the NFL (2011).

She has published articles in Businessweek, Strategy Magazine and Rotman Magazine, as well on online at Fortune.com and the Daily Beast.

Jennifer received her MBA from the Rotman School of Management in 2006. Prior to joining Rotman, she worked as a project manager and copywriter in the retail and non-profit sectors.

Description

To register, please click here

Japanese healthcare is ranked amongst the world’s best. The average Japanese visits a doctor 13 times a year, more than twice the Canadian rate. Average lengths of stay in hospitals are more than twice those in Canada. Japan’s life expectancy is the world’s longest and nearly a quarter of its people are aged 65 or more. Yet Japan spends only 9.5% of its GDP on healthcare, lower than Canada’s ratio, 11.4%. How does this system work? What can Canada learn from the Japanese approach? Dr. James Tiessen (Ryerson University) and Dr. Ken Kato (Aichi Medical Association Research Institute) take you on a journey through Japanese healthcare.

James (Jim) H. Tiessen is Associate Professor, School of Health Services Management, at the Ted Rogers School of Management, Ryerson University, where he served as Director, MBA. He earned degrees at the University of Alberta (B.Sc.), Guelph (M.Sc.) and York University’s Schulich School of Business (Ph.D.). Prior to joining Ryerson, he was on the faculty of the DeGroote School of Business, McMaster University for 10 years. Prior to his university career, Jim lived in Japan and later worked for the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO). Dr. Tiessen’s research has been published in the Journal of Business Venturing, International Marketing Review, Canadian Journal of Administrative Studies and other journals. He has served as President of the Japan Studies Association of Canada. He is a visiting Scholar at the Asian Institute, Munk Centre of Global Affairs, University of Toronto (2012-13). In fall 2012, he was a visiting research fellow at the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, Tokyo Japan. Dr. Tiessen studies Japanese healthcare, particularly its hospitals, which sit at the centre of that system. He teaches courses on healthcare management, research methods, strategy and international business.

Dr. Ken Kato is Senior Researcher at the Aichi (Prefecture) Medical Association Research Institute in Japan. He is interested in community health policy, and healthcare information and patient report outcomes. His current research focuses on homecare for senior citizens, particularly developing a practical approach to facilitating inter-professional coordination of these activities. Raised in Japan, he earned a Bachelor of Science in Sociology from Texas A&M University in 1999, Master of Public Health from the University of Texas School of Public Health in 2003, and PhD in Medical Sciences from Nagoya University in 2010.

Description

Japan’s healthcare system is considered to be one of the world’s best. It is relatively inexpensive, accounting for less than 10% of its GDP, despite offering high levels of service to the world’s oldest population. Like Canadians, Japanese have access a universal system. But its financing is more “public” than Canada’s, comprising about 80% of outlays, compared with just over 70% in Canada.

Hospitals, which sit at the centre of Japanese care delivery, are all not-for-profit. However, they feature a broad mix of owners: public (national, prefectural, municipal, universities), semipublic (e.g. Red Cross, public health insurance organizations), and private (corporations, universities and individuals). This provider mix, which has existed for more than 100 years, has contributed positively to healthcare quality, innovation and sustainability. This talk addresses the question: Do private providers contribute positively to Japanese healthcare?

James (Jim) H. Tiessen is Associate Professor, School of Health Services Management, at the Ted Rogers School of Management, Ryerson University, where he served as Director, MBA. He earned degrees at the University of Alberta (B.Sc.), Guelph (M.Sc.) and York University’s Schulich School of Business (Ph.D.). Prior to joining Ryerson, he was on the faculty of the DeGroote School of Business, McMaster University for 10 years. Prior to his university career, Jim lived in Japan and later worked for the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO). Dr. Tiessen’s research has been published in the Journal of Business Venturing, International Marketing Review, Canadian Journal of Administrative Studies and other journals. He has served as President of the Japan Studies Association of Canada. He is a visiting Scholar at the Asian Institute, Munk Centre of Global Affairs, University of Toronto (2012-13). In fall 2012, he was a visiting research fellow at the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, Tokyo Japan. Dr. Tiessen studies Japanese healthcare, particularly its hospitals, which sit at the centre of that system. He teaches courses on healthcare management, research methods, strategy and international business.

Dr. Ken Kato is Senior Researcher at the Aichi (Prefecture) Medical Association Research Institute in Japan. He is interested in community health policy, and healthcare information and patient report outcomes. His current research focuses on homecare for senior citizens, particularly developing a practical approach to facilitating inter-professional coordination of these activities. Raised in Japan, he earned a Bachelor of Science in Sociology from Texas A&M University in 1999, Master of Public Health from the University of Texas School of Public Health in 2003, and PhD in Medical Sciences from Nagoya University in 2010.

Description

Red Rock: The Long, Strange March of Chinese Rock & Roll tells the tale not only of the rise and development of yaogun – more than just the Chinese word for “rock and roll” – but of China as well. As China’s international role expands, so, too, does yaogun’s potential – to rock, but also to teach, because at its best, yaogun embodies the power, promise and potential of rock and roll long forgotten in the West. Campbell will look back on his ten years in Beijing, spent mostly in the rock scene performing, writing, promoting, managing and more, as well as shed light on yaogun’s path and its future.

Jonathan Campbell lived in Beijing from 2000-2010, spending much of that time in the local rock scene as drummer, chronicler, booster, agent and more. His writing has appeared in a range of international publications, he’s put together China tours for dozens of bands from around the world, arranged European tours for Chinese bands, attended international music conferences as part of China delegations, and preached the yaogun gospel at literary festivals, schools, universities and venues around the world. He has been called a “stalwart of the Chinese music scene”; “an instrumental behind-the-scene (figure)”; “the busiest man in Beijing showbiz” and “the Dr. [Norman] Bethune of China’s rock scene.” He lives in Toronto with his wife, and dog. Red Rock: The Long, Strange March of Chinese Rock & Roll is his first book. For more, visit jonathanWcampbell.com.

This event is part of a series of events leading up to the 2013 INDePth Conference, a student organized initiative that will address development issues in China. For more information on INDePth, please visit www.indepthconference.com

Description

In this presentation I examine the processes and practices of translation across multiple accounts of a dispute that began with Adivasi (original inhabitants) protests against Hindustan Coca‐Cola Beverages Private Ltd. in a village in Kerala in South India. The sit‐in agitation started by Adivasi residents of the area soon after the company set up a beverage bottling plant and began to extract large amounts of groundwater is now in its tenth year. The dispute has been widely reported and has attracted much analysis. Drawing on scholarship on literal and conceptual translation I examine the ways in which meanings change as claims originating in contested, layered histories and in narratives of displacement and exclusion are
translated into the stronger languages of social movements and the formal legal system. I suggest that a meaningful resolution of the dispute for those whose lives have been most affected by it requires a closer look at the processes and practices of translation through which the Adivasis’ experience of injustice and their opposition to Coca‐Cola, have been eclipsed, more often than not, in pursuit of justice for them.

Dr. Pooja Parmar is the inaugural Catalyst Fellow and a visiting professor at the Osgoode Hall Law School. She completed an LLM and PhD at the UBC Faculty of Law. She received her Bachelor of Laws degree from Panjab University in India and practiced law in New Delhi for several years. Her research addresses issues of legal pluralism, intersections of law and colonialism, indigeneity, human rights, development and displacement. Her most recent article entitled “Undoing Historical Wrongs: Law and Indigeneity in India” will be published in a forthcoming issue of the Osgoode Hall Law Journal.

Description

More than 1.6 million Chinese students went abroad between 1978 and 2009, and 32 percent returned. Recently, outbound number jumped to 385,000 in 2011. Most now receive only a one- or two-year MA, not a PhD, and combined with expanding domestic college graduates from within China, 30% wait over three months to find a job. Thus “reverse migration” has limits if the supply of returnees surpasses demand for their skills. Still, our regression models demonstrate that those who studied in Japan and Canada were more likely to have larger incomes than members of the public who had no overseas education but similar levels of domestic education. The “Length of Time Working Overseas” affected income, while studying and working in Canada increased the returnees’ annual income relative to returnees from Japan. However, costly overseas study may not be compensated for as long as 10 years.

David Zweig is Chair Professor, Division of Social Science, Director, Center on Environment, Energy and Resource Policy (www.cctr.ust.hk), HKUST, and Associate Dean, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, HKUST. He is an Adjunct Professor, School of Social Sciences and Humanities, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha, Hunan and Deputy Director of the South China Center on China’s Globalization, Guangzhou. He is the former president of the Hong Kong Political Science Association. He taught at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University, the Department of Political Studies, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, and the Department of Political Science, Florida International University (Miami, FL). He is the author of four books, including Internationalizing China: domestic interests and global linkages (Cornell Univ. Press, 2002), which will be out in a Chinese edition from Renmin University Press in 2013. He edited special issues of Pacific Affairs (September 2008) and the Journal of International Migration and Integration (Fall 2006), both of which focus on migration of ethnic Chinese in East Asia, and recently organized a special issue of Asian Survey, focusing on Hong Kong- Mainland relations. He has also edited five other books in both English and Chinese. He is currently editing a book on US-China energy competition in third countries and writing a book on Mainlanders who studied overseas and returned to China.

Description

Ambassador Zhang will be the Munk School’s welcome guest for a talk that will help illuminate the role of the People’s Republic of China in the global arena of the early 21st century – and, especially, the state of China-Canada relations. The Ambassador will bring the benefits of a wealth of experience to his audience, given the way his road to Ottawa was preceded by significant postings in New Zealand, Australia, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing.

Description

Information is not yet available.

Description

Korea has seen rapid economic growth and social development with relatively low inequality in the last 5 decades. Since 1997, however, income inequality and bipolarization in the economy have increased while the potential growth rate has decreased. Therefore, Korea faces two intertwined fundamental challenges of sustaining economic growth and ameliorating bipolarization. This paper analyzes the status of the Korean economy in terms of inclusive growth indicators, and suggests some policy implications to respond to the challenges – productive employment, income inequality and poverty, human capital, and social protection for inclusive growth. The paper also provides an explanation of financial exclusion and microcredit programs in Korea, and suggests policy implications for financial inclusion.

Young Youn Lee is a Visiting Professor at the Centre for the Study of Korea, Asian Institute, University of Toronto. He is a Professor of International Trade and Business at the Kangwon National University. Dr. Lee received his BA and MA from the Korea University, and PhD from the University of Missouri-Columbia in 1985. He worked as a research fellow at the Overseas Economic Research Institute affiliated with the Korea Trade Association, Kangwon Development Research Institute, and as an evaluation administrator of the University Education Association of Korea. He served as the Dean of Office of Planning and Coordination and Asia-Pacific Cooperation Academy of Kangwon National University. Dr. Lee also served as the President of Northeast Asia Economic Association of Korea, President of the Accreditation Board for International Trade Education of Korea, and Chairman of the Smile Microcredit Bank Gyeonggi-guri Br. He published several books as a coauthor (Principles of International Trade and Business, Korean Ways of Economic Development: Past, Present, and Future, and Digital Monetary Economics) as well as articles related to international trade, welfare economics, and economic development.

Description

The talk will show various widespread and regularized adaptive strategies adopted by individuals, households, and communities. It will demonstrate that not all locally initiated strategies to survive on a daily basis and to address individual and collective needs lead to the promotion of trust, autonomy, collective welfare, or democratic culture. Most of these efforts are responses by individuals, households, communities, and organizations to manage, evade, or take advantage of constraints and opportunities that are often specific to local areas and they may have long-term detrimental effects on society, polity, and the economy. The research highlights the utility of applying interdisciplinary and holistic lenses to assess political implications, and suggests context specific policy prescriptions that are more sensitive to the needs of targeted populations.

Ardeth Maung Thawnghmung is Associate Professor of Political Science Department. Her areas of specialization are on Burma/Southeast Asian politics, ethnic conflicts, and political economy. She teaches Introduction of International Relations, Research and Simulation in International Organization, Southeast Asian Politics, Politics of Identity, and Democracy and Democratization in Southeast Asia. She is the author of the “Other” Karen in Myanmar (Lexington books 2012), Beyond Armed Resistance (East West Center 2011), Karen Revolution in Burma (2008), and Behind the Teak Curtain: Authoritarianism, Agricultural Policies and Political Legitimacy in Rural Burma/Myanmar (2004). Her articles appeared in Journal of Asian Studies, Asian Survey, Asian Journal of Political Science, Southeast Asian Affairs, Journal of Peasant Studies, Sojourn: Contemporary Southeast Asian Affairs, and Foreign Policy, and in edited volume published by Stanford University Press and Cambridge University Press. Ardeth has received fellowships from Fulbright-Hays Faculty Research Abroad, the Australia National University, Asian Research Institute at the National University of Singapore, East West Center Washington DC, and Southeast Asian Institute Singapore.

Description

What are the political conditions conducive to growth-oriented policies in poor democracies? To gain insight into this larger question, my research examines subnational policy variation in the competition for private investment in India, which ensued as a result of economic reforms in 1991. Despite being affected by the common shock of liberalization in 1991, some Indian states have been far more pro-active and investor-friendly in the competition for investment than others. Why have some states been more business-friendly than their counterparts? At a proximate level, I argue that certain class configurations of electoral coalitions in India are more favorable to pro-business policies than others. At a deeper level, I trace the emergence of different types of electoral coalitions to the role of identity politics and underlying social demography in Indian states. The broader research project combines qualitative case studies of Gujarat, Punjab, Andhra Pradesh and Bihar with quantitative analysis. In this talk, I present evidence from the case studies.

Kanta Murali is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto. Her research interests include comparative political economy of development, Indian politics, politics of growth and economic policy, state-business relations and labor policy.

Description

In this talk I will explore the various interrelated ways in which inauspiciousness and femininity relate to power and authority in a broad range of recent Indian texts in English. The talk will center on readings of contemporary authors and relate social and cultural contexts to forms of literary representation.

Margaret Herrick is working on a PhD through the Department of English and the Centre for South Asian Studies. Margaret works primarily on South Asian fiction, poetry, and drama written in English in the postcolonial period. In her dissertation project, she is theorizing the interplay between ‘femininity’ and ‘inauspiciousness’ in contemporary Indian texts.

Description

Leung Ping-kwan (Yesi) is a representative figure of the native literature in Hong Kong. To commemorate his lifetime contribution to Hong Kong Literature, Richard Charles Lee Canada-Hong Kong Library will organize a forum and a display to showcase his selected literary works on January 31, 2013.

Refreshments will be served. Please RSVP by January 28, 2013.