GUEST LECTURE Feeding the Mountains: Shifting Foodscapes in High Asia by Andrei Dörre Date & Time 1. 7. 2020 10 AM Location Trainee centre ONLINE on ZOOM Join Zoom meeting HERE Abstract High mountains represent fringe areas of the ecumene. Due to the often marginal productivity of locally available resources, high mountain populations commonly rely on external exchange relations to meet their basic needs. Reliable food provision in the high mountains is thus structurally based on…

GUEST LECTURE ‘Utopian Speak’: Language Assimilation in China’s Yanbian Korean Borderland, 1958-1976 by Dong Jo Shin Date 17. 6. 2020 2:30 PM Location Trainee centre ONLINE on ZOOM Join Zoom meeting HERE Abstract China’s ethnically Korean citizens in the Yanbian borderland underwent language suppression during the era of high socialism, driven by a sweeping vocabulary of Maoist social utopianism. As China’s ‘leading ethnic group’, the revolutionary Han undertook an ‘Anti-Local Nationalism’ campaign denunciation advising that ethnic…

GUEST LECTURE Maintaining Agricultural Livelihoods in Rural Tajikistan: Knowledge Practises Among Smallholder Farmers in the Zerafshan Valley by Andreas Mandler Date & Time 10. 6. 2020 10:00 AM Location Trainee centre ONLINE on ZOOM Join Zoom meeting HERE Abstract Due to its mountainous topography, Tajikistan has very little arable land at disposition. However, more than 70% of the Tajik population lives in rural areas. Since national independence, Tajikistan’s agricultural sector, and its rural communities too, undertake…

Guest lecture The Jews of Central Asia Between Bukhara and Jerusalem Date & Time 27. 5. 2020 10:00 AM Location Trainee centre ONLINE on ZOOMJoin Zoom meeting HERE Abstract In the late 19 th century, wealthy Jews of Central Asia (Russian Turkestan, Bukhara, andAfghanistan) founded a colony outside of the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem. The ‘Bukharan Neighbourhood’ (Shekhunat ha-Bukharim) quickly developed into the most important cultural and religious centre for Persian speaking Jews.…

GUEST LECTURE The Identity based Dilemma in Mongolia’s Relationship with China Date & Time 20. 5. 2020 10:00 AM Location Trainee centre ONLINE on ZOOMJoin Zoom meeting HERE Abstract Abstract: In this paper I evaluate current Sino-Mongolian relationship through focusing on the construction of the relationship between Mongolia and increasing importance of Chinese economic exchanges as it pertains to the formation of contemporary Mongolian identity. The main purpose of my study is to obtain both a…

Guest lecture Building merit—the moral economy of illegal resource extraction in the Mongolian borderlands Date & Time 22. 4. 2020 11:00 AM Location Trainee centre ONLINE on ZOOMJoin Zoom meeting HERE Abstract Although the widespread gathering and extraction of small-scale wildlife—like fish, medicinal plants, stone, animals, etc.—is formally illegal and contradicts historical pastoral treatment of the land, the province of Magtaal—the easternmost Mongolian township on the Mongolian/Chinese border—increasingly economically subsists off of these activities. Specifically, the…

Guest lecture The New Era of Sino-Burmese Relations: Changes in the Bilateral Relationshop in View of China’s rise and Myanmar’s reforms Date 26. 2. 2020 10:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract In this lecture you will learn about how Myanmar’s relationship with China has evolved from Myanmar (before 1989 Burma) being aligned with China; through Myanmar hedging on the side of the United States; to Myanmar employing a double-hedging strategy with two…

GUEST LECTURE Luboš Bělka: Six Years in Tibet: the Czechoslovaks in Lhasa 1954-1959 Date 15. 1. 2020 14:30 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract The lecture introduces the proposal for a project focused on the processing and subsequent use of research material relating to the unique period of the 1950s, when Czechoslovaks visited the People’s Republic of China; tourism at that time did not exist. The Czechoslovak visitors reported on their experiences through…

GUEST LECTURE Friedrich Edelmayer – The Sinophone Borderlands in the Context of Global Studies Date 18. 12. 2019 10:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract This presentation will deal with different aspects of the interactions between some Chinese influenced border regions and the “outer world”, mainly with the activities of the Spanish and Dutch during the 17th century at the island of Taiwan (Formosa with its European name) and the Portuguese in Macao. The…

GUEST LECTURE Vladimir S. Oskolkov: In search of the grave of Chingiz Khan Date 4. 12. 2019 11:30 Location Room 1.47, Křížkovského 10, Olomouc Abstract The personality of Genghis Khan is surrounded by many legends. Legends accompanied him from birth to death. Some of these legends were created among the advisers of the Mongol khans and were intended to exalt and deify the personality of the founder of the Mongol empire. Some authors of some…

GUEST LECTURE Ishani Naskar: India Neighbourhood Policy and China Date 27. 11. 2019 10:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract Thus the limelight has turned now on to Asia, particularly on the two giant neighbours of Asia, India and China. In various ways which both these countries are described, Asian giants, geo-civilisational neighbours, the elephant and the dragon, the relationship between both these countries blow hot and cold. Now the popular understanding about…

GUEST LECTURE Haowen Jiang: Inclusory constructions in Formosan languages Date 27. 11. 2019 13:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract This talk addresses synchronic types, diachronic changes, and implicational relationships of inclusory constructions in Formosan languages. Inclusory constructions are often made up of a plural pronominal and an NP, but they refer to the singular counterpart of that pronominal in conjunction with that NP. The plural pronominal is then said to be “inclusory”…

GUEST LECTURE Steven Saxonberg: Semi-Civil Society: A Missing Link in Explaining the Democratization of Communist Dictatorships? Date 6. 11. 2019 10:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract Much has been written about the role of civil society in bringing down communist regimes; however, scholars have largely ignored the officially sanctioned organizations. Using the examples of Hungary and Czechoslovakia, this article shows that when political openings arise, official organizations (which evolve into ‘semi-civil society’)…

GUEST LECTURE Shu-Fen Lin: The New “Social” Question: Refugee, Social Policy and State-Building in Wartime China Date 30. 10. 2019 13:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract Over the last two decades or so, a growing literature on China during World War II (or the second Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1945) has taken a revisionist turn and reappraised the role and practices of the Nationalist Government, focusing on a wide array of the military-party-state’s attempts…

GUEST LECTURE Asio Liu: PLACE OF EXCEPTION: Penghu Vietnamese Refugee Camps in the Taiwan Strait Date 29. 10. 2019 15:00 Location Class 203, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract The boat people who came to Taiwan in 70s and 80s created the oldest strata of Vietnamese diaspora in Taiwan. Trough the narrations of the refugees, the documentary movie is depicting the lives, fates and sufferings of the Vietnamese boat people who finally settled in Taiwan. Between 1979-1988,…

GUEST LECTURE Thi Ha Hoang: ASEAN-China Community of Common Destiny: Towards the Future or Fast-forward to History? Date 23. 10. 2019 13:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract As the power balance in Southeast Asia is shifting due to China’s rise, the regional order is being re-shaped with Beijing’s strategy to bind the future of Southeast Asia into its own under the brand of an ASEAN-China Community of Common Destiny (CCD). In this…

GUEST LECTURE Peter Hays Gries: How the West feels and thinks about China—and why Date 23. 10. 2019 10:00 Location Auditorium 1.25, Křížkovského 10, Olomouc Abstract How do Western publics feel about a rising China? What China policies would they prefer? And what are the primary drivers of their views? Based on nationally representative surveys of the American, British, French, and German publics, this talk will argue that a shared Liberal heritage unites much of…

GUEST LECTURE Laurent Sagart: The formation of Sino-Tibetan from the point of view of animal and plant domestications Date 23. 10. 2019 10:15 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract Drawing on the conclusions of a recent collective paper, this presentation will examine how a gradually improving understanding of East Asian domestications throws light on the age and homeland of the ST family. Language families are born when speakers of a language gain access…

GUEST LECTURE Penelope Howe: Word order and the verb voice system in Northern Malagasy dialects Date 23. 10. 2019 09:15 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract Malagasy is often cited as a language that clearly exhibits Verb-Object-Subject (VOS) basic word order. While a rare trait worldwide, this is relatively more common among Austronesian languages, since verb-initial word order (VSO or VOS) descends from Proto-Austronesian. Although pragmatic considerations and certain syntactic constructions permit other…

GUEST LECTURE Jinjin Lu: Chinese academic “going out” and “bringing in” mobility plan: Mars hits the Earth Date 16. 10. 2019 11:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract Chinese academics (academic staff and research students) have been encouraged by the national mobility strategic plan of “going out” and “bringing in” for years. This program not only speeds up the academic mobility for Chinese overseas returnees but also opens a window for foreign academics…

GUEST LECTURE Konstantinos Tsimonis: ChinaThreat.eu: Securitizing Chinese economic presence in Europe Date 16. 10. 2019 10:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract This paper unpacks the discursive construction of a European ‘China Threat’ narrative by European think tanks. We theorize think tanks as crucial actors in the securitizing process, especially at the initial stages where ideas and reference frames are formed. Despite having no decision-making authority, think tanks participate as securitizing actors in…

GUEST LECTURE Alan Chong: Singapore Engages China’s Belt and Road Initiative: The Pitfalls and Promises of Soft Strategies Date 25. 9. 2019 10:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract As a trading state that practices ‘abridged Realism’, Singapore engages China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) through soft strategies. On the politico-security front, Singapore has maintained a measured continuity in criticizing China’s disregard of international law in relation to territorial disputes in Asia and…

GUEST LECTURE Bill Hayton: The Recent Developments in the South China Sea Date 18. 9. 2019 10:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract Confrontation has returned to the South China Sea. In the past few months there have been clashes between Chinese vessels and those of Vietnam and Malaysia over rights to offshore gas fields. The Philippines has backed away from confrontation and left its offshore resources untapped. In all three countries, China’s…

GUEST LECTURE Preciosa de Joya: The Filipino-Chinese (Tsinoys) and their narratives of loyalty to the motherland Date 10. 7. 2019 10:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract In a country where a great number of people are either unemployed or forced to seek employment abroad, the influx of Chinese migrant workers has created a backlash of anti-Chinese sentiment among many Filipinos. Adding insult to injury, some weeks ago, a Chinese trawler allegedly rammed…

GUEST LECTURE Jan Mrázek: Encounters with China and Singapore in Riau Islands and Indonesian ‘South China Sea’: Images, Stories, Nets Date 3. 7. 2019 10:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract In the last few years, Jan Mrázek has organized several seafaring voyages for his students mostly Singaporean Chinese, with a few Malays – to the Riau Islands Province of Indonesia, a sea of hundreds of islands, historically, culturally and economically closely linked…

GUEST LECTURE Hermann Aubie: Freedom of expression and repression in China from 1989 to 2019 When 19 June 2019, 14:00-15:00 Where Trainee Center, 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract Thirty years ago, during the protests of 1989 on Tiananmen Square in Beijing and in other Chinese cities, students and workers-led demonstrations called for democracy, greater press freedom and freedom of expression. Thirty years on after the massacre of the 1989 movement, state repression has been increasing…

GUEST LECTURE Malcom Cook: Australia’s Myth-Busting Relation with China When 19 June 2019, 11:00-12:00 Where Trainee Center, room 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract Australia’s current relations with China seriously challenge two very popular grand strategic assumptions that are frequently referred to by Chinese interlocutors. The first challenged assumption is that the more another state trade with China, the more its economic and non-economic policies will or should become aligned with those of China or risk…

GUEST LECTURE Tuong Vu: Rethinking War and Revolution in Vietnam Date June 19, 2019, 10:00-11:00 Location Trainee Center, 3.40, Vodární 6 Abstract This talk presents Tuong Vu’s arguments in his latest book titled Vietnam’s Communist Revolution: The Power and Limits of Ideology. This book focuses on the evolving worldview of Vietnamese revolutionaries over 80 years as they led Vietnam through wars, social revolution, and peaceful development. Vu’s findings show the depth and resilience of their commitment…

GUEST LECTURE Jeanne Marie Stumpf-Carome: Ethnography: The Risky Business of Documenting Repression Date May 29, 2019, 10:00-11:30 Location Trainee Center, 3.40, Vodární 6 Abstract Fieldwork, even in the best of “democratic” environments, can have data management and security snares.  Ethnography pursued in settings with legislative conditions, such as an Internal Security Act and/or post 9/11 a Patriot Act, holds hazards¾not unlike a Chinese Finger Puzzle.  Charged to “Tell it like it is” by Singaporeans without…

GUEST LECTURE Pascal Abb: Think Tanks in China When: May 28th, 2019, 15:00-16:30 Where: Trainee Centre, 3.40, Vodární 6 Abstract: Since the Chinese government’s 2015 announcement to establish a series of „new-type think tanks with Chinese characteristics“, such institutes have featured heavily within current efforts to improve domestic governance and gain a more prominent voice on the global stage. Significant amounts of money have been made available, mainly to overhaul existing institutes that are tightly…

GUEST LECTURE Shogo Suzuki: Will the AIIB trigger off a ‘new round of rivalry’ between China and Japan? Date May 22, 2019, 10:00-11:00 Location Trainee Centre, room 3.40, Vodární 6 Abstract The establishment of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank has had a significant impact on economic diplomacy in East Asia. The AIIB is substantially funded by China, and there are some anxieties that it will come to rival and eclipse the Asian Development Bank, where Japan plays a key role. Will the…

GUEST LECTURE Adam Yuet Chau: The Indonesian Chinese in Indonesia, China and Hong Kong: Serial Migration and Cultural Identity Date Wednesday, March 22, 2019, 11:00-12:00 Location Trainee Centre, Vodární 6 Abstract This talk is on the lives and cultural identities of the Indonesian Chinese, particularly the few hundred thousand among them (mostly youth) who returned to China between 1950s and 1970s, worked and formed families there, but eventually left China in the 1980s, mostly for…

When: Wednesday, March 15, 2019, 10:00-11:30 Where: Trainee Centre, Vodární 6 Abstract: Since the launch of the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), the project has been compared to the expansion of the Roman Empire, the rise of the Ming Dynasty or to the Marshall Plan. Indeed, recent developments – an escalating trade war between China and the USA, warnings against “new colonialism” by the Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad, and the EU’s acknowledgement of…

GUEST LECTURE Mark Beeson: The China Challenge in the Asia Pacific When: Monday, May 13, 2019, 11:30 -13:00 Where: Trainee center 3.40, Vodární 6 Abstract: The rise of China is the most important development in the Asia-Pacific region in recent times – possibly ever. Whatever China’s leaders do and however its economy performs, it will have global ramifications. This seminar looks at some of these possibilities in a region in which the United States has…

GUEST LECTURE Ian Ja Chong: Where Have I Seen This Before? Colonialism, the Cold War, and China’s Belt and Road Date April, 24, 2019, 10:00 -11:30 Location Trainee center 3.40, Vodární 6 Abstract China’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) seeks to connect East Asia with Europe and Africa through a network of railroads, highways, ports, and airports traversing Central and Southeast Asia. Optimists see the exercise as bringing much needed infrastructure, development, capital, and…

When: March 28, 2019, 15:00-16:30 Where: Room KC-2.04, Křížkovského 14, Olomouc Abstract: The lecture provides a basic understanding of Vietnamese migration to Taiwan that attempts to analyse and explain various phenomena such as push and pull factors shaping Vietnamese migration to Taiwan; decision process leading to the migration; historical trajectory of Vietnamese migration to Taiwan; brokerage agents that dominate the process of Vietnamese migration to Taiwan; or living and working conditions of Vietnamese people in…

GUEST LECTURE Ian Storey: The South China Sea Dispute: The Key Issues Date March 27, 2019, 13:00-14:30 Location Trainee center 3.40, Vodární 6 Abstract This presentation aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the South China Sea issue, one of the Asia-Pacific’s most complex and intractable territorial and maritime jurisdictional disputes. It will examine the dispute from a number of aspects, including the legal, resources, political and strategic dimensions. The speaker will explore the development…

GUEST LECTURE Wing-Fai Leung: Chinese Cinema in the Era of Capitalisation, Globalisation and Digitalisation Date 06 February 2019, 13:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6 Abstract This talk presents a comparative study of Chinese and Indian freelancers who use the global crowdsourcing platform Upwork. It is the result of research conducted in collaboration with Professors Premilla D’Cruz and Ernesto Noronha of the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad.  In this lecture, Dr. Leung examines (a) how…

GUEST LECTURE Wing-Fai Leung: Freelancing globally: Upworkers in China and India, neoliberalisation, and the new international division of labour Date 05 February 2019, 10:00 Location Trainee centre 3.40, Vodární 6 Abstract This talk presents a comparative study of Chinese and Indian freelancers who use the global crowdsourcing platform Upwork. It is the result of research conducted in collaboration with Professors Premilla D’Cruz and Ernesto Noronha of the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad.  In this lecture,…

GUEST LECTURE Lectures by Sergey Abashin Ethnic Category in Historic Context: forgotten people and new nations Date 24 January 2019, 10:00 Location Krizkovskeho 14, room KC-1.07 Abstract We are accustomed to calling Central Asian inhabitants Uzbeks, Kyrgyzs, Tajiks, Kazakhs, and Turkmens. However, a little over a hundred years ago, the ethnographic map looked quite different. At that time, Sarts, Kara-Kirghizs, and Kirghiz-Kaisaks comprised the majority of the population. What happened with the names of the…

GUEST LECTURE Ildikó Bellér-Hann: Homogenization and Fragmentation: knowledge production of the Uyghur elite in Xinjiang during reform socialism Date 22 January 2019, 10:00 Location Krizkovskeho 14, room KC-1.07 Abstract In my talk I would like to introduce my research project titled “Between homogenization and fragmentation: textual practices as strategies of integration and identity maintenance among the Uyghurs of Xinjiang, China (20th‒21st centuries)” which has been running since 2017 and which is supported by the Danish Velux…

GUEST LECTURE Victor H. Mair: The Tarim Basin as the Crossroads of Eurasia from the Bronze Age to the Middle Ages Date 21 January 2019, 10:00 Location Krizkovskeho 14, room KC-1.07 Abstract Since the glory days of the Silk Road, mainly from about the 2nd c. BC to the 15th c. AD, the importance of the trade routes that passed through Eastern Central Asia was widely recognized.  What was not known were the facts about…

GUEST LECTURE Nicholas Evans: Waving to the other side: the language of poetry in indigenous Australian song Date 17 December 2018, 14:30 Location Krizkovskeho 10, auditorium 3.05 Abstract Poetry and song are inextricably interwoven in most indigenous Australian traditions. And the poetic masterpieces found across the continent are little-known outside their immediate communities, tied up as they are with the intricacies of the languages they are sung in. As a result, Australia has little awareness…

GUEST LECTURE Ivan Franceschini: Dreamwork China Date 06. 12. 2018 Location Meeting room 1.25, Křížkovského 10, Olomouc Abstract Dreamwork China is a 2011 documentary by Tommaso Facchin and Ivan Franceschini. In the suburbs of Shenzhen, in Guangdong province, young workers talk about their lives, existences built on a precarious balance between hope, struggles, and wishes for the future. Around them, activists and NGOs strive to give sense and meaning to words like rights, dignity, and equity.…

GUEST LECTURE Ivan Franceschini: Outsourcing Exploitation: Chinese and Cambodian Garment Workers Compared Date 05. 12. 2018 Location Meeting room 3.40, Vodární 6, Olomouc Abstract In recent years, Cambodian garment workers have often launched extensive, coordinated strikes to demand higher minimum wages and other political concessions. In China, on the contrary, most protests in the garment sector target specific employers and remain contained inside single factories or industrial zones. How to explain these different patterns of…

GUEST LECTURE Elisa T. Bertuzzo: Archipelagos. From Urbanisation to Translocalisation Date 15. 11. 2018 Location Křížkovského 10, room 1.25, Olomouc Abstract How do increasing movement and mobility impact the production of space in fast urbanising regions? When everyday life is determined by multi-locality and temporary inhabitation, which chances of participation, representation and self-determination do inhabitants retain? The author, who accompanied everyday commuters, seasonal migrants, street vendors, across Bangladesh as well as various states of India…

SPEAKER Dr. Natalia Rhyzova TOPIC Survey on China perception; Planning of activity within DU3, DU4, DU7 DURATION 16. 08. 2018 – 23. 08. 2018 LOCATION Trainee centre, room no. 3.40, Vodární Street No. 6, Olomouc CONTENT Consultation and training in connection with survey on public opinion (economic anthropology) Training “Databases and Surveys on Economy at borders: Exchange, validation and evaluation methods” Training within the DU3: Trends in development on Russian-Chinese borders Russian Federation Case Studies…