Join the Asian American / Asian Research Institute at CUNY for a book talk on Contemporary Art and Ecological Transformation in East and Southeast Asia, an edited volume that examines how contemporary art in East and Southeast Asia confronts environmental destruction, ecological degradation, and social injustice against the backdrop of global ecological crises. Featured speakers include Meqin Wang, Professor of Art at California State University, Northridge; Midori Yamamura, Associate Professor of Art History at Kingsborough Community College/CUNY and an Alcaly/Bodian Distinguished Scholar at the CUNY Graduate Center; Stephanie Benzaquen-Gautier, research fellow at the International Institute for Asian Studies in Leiden and the Center for Khmer Studies; and Vicki Kwon, Associate Curator of Korean Art and Culture at the Royal Ontario Museum.

Join the Southeast Asia Program (SEAP) at Cornell University for a talk by Dr. Liang Wu, a SEAP Postdoctoral Associate at Cornell University with affiliations in the Department of Science & Technology Studies and the interdepartmental consortium Cornell Oceans. Dr. Wu presents a case study of Filipino among other Southeast Asian seafarers working in the international shipping industry across the global oceans, thus expanding the conventional definition of “Maritime Southeast Asia” – the archipelagic region of Southeast Asian countries situated between Indian and Pacific Oceans.

Join the Southeast Asia Program at Cornell University for a talk by Lydia O’Meara, Postdoctoral Fellow at the Cornell Atkinson Center for Sustainability. Dr. O’Meara will explore how seasonal and environmental fluctuations in Timor-Leste shape access to nutrient-rich aquatic foods, while also providing insights into changes in marine biodiversity.

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Department of Environmental Studies, and Department of Earth, Atmosphere, and Environment at Northern Illinois University for a talk by Matthew E. Andersen, Senior Scientist for Biology for the U.S. Geological Survey Office of International Programs. Having led the development of decision-support tools for the Lower Mekong River Basin in Southeast Asia, this talk will explore the history, geography, and socioeconomic science of the Mekong River Delta.

Join York University’s Canadian Southeast Asian Studies Initiative for a talk by Maria Victoria Espaldon, Professor and Scientist at the University of the Philippines - Los Baños. Dr. Espaldon will discuss Project SARAI (Smarter Approaches to Reinvigorate Agriculture as an Industry in the Philippines), a national initiative to support the resilience and sustainability of small scale farming.

Join the Southeast Asia Program at Cornell University for a talk by Patrick Daly, a Staff Scientist for Sustainability and Resilience in the Department of Anthropology at Washington University in St. Louis. Dr. Daly synthesizes nearly two decades of historical and geo-archaeological research in Aceh, Indonesia to build a detailed paleo-tsunami history, demonstrating that the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami was the latest in a 7,000-year history of recurring, massive events in the region.

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor for a talk by Adam Bobbette, geographer and Lecturer in Political Geology at the University of Glasgow. Professor Bobbette’s talk explores how the modern earth and environmental sciences were shaped by Indonesian intellectuals and knowledge traditions on the slopes of Javanese volcanoes.

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Michigan for a talk by geographer and visiting professor Saw Yu May, who will discuss water challenges in Myanmar, from pollution and overuse to climate and governance pressures. It links research-based on water issues and community livelihoods with national policy efforts, highlighting the gap between environmental needs and implementation of the 2015 National Water Policy.

Join the Department of Anthropology and the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Michigan (U-M) for a talk by Dr. Alyssa Paredes, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at U-M. In this lecture, Dr. Paredes explores how “Big Agriculture” plantations systematically shirk responsibility for food waste, using legal contracts, scientific conventions, and standards of trade to frame them as “external” to their supply chains.

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa for a webinar on how grounded, context-sensitive research contributes to a deeper understanding of environmental challenges and supports more equitable and sustainable approaches to environmental knowledge production. Speakers include: Dr. Micah Fisher (UH Mānoa), Xiaoyun Neo (UH Mānoa), Areerat Worawongwasu (UH Mānoa), Abdurrahman Abdullah (Universitas Hasanuddin), Irfan Saputra (Universitas Hasanuddin), and Aswin Baharuddin (Universiti Malaya). Dr. Mary Mostafanezhad will moderate the webinar.

Join the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute for a seminar on the Southeast Asia Climate Outlook Survey, a region-wide annual survey to understand the climate awareness and perceptions of Southeast Asian citizens towards climate action. Presenters include Melinda Martinus, Lead Researcher at ISEAS, and Dr. Samuel Chng, Research Assistant Professor at the Lee Kuan Yew Centre for Innovative Cities, Singapore University of Technology and Design.

Join the Indonesia Project at ANU Crawford School of Public Policy for a talk by Dr. Andini Pramono, who will discuss the economic and environmental impacts of Commercial Milk Formula (CMF) in Indonesia, revealing substantial economic loss when CMF displaces breastmilk in Indonesia.

Join the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute for a seminar on the importance of peatlands in Southeast Asia as carbon sinks and contributors to megadiverse ecosystems. Discussions will highlight the potential and challenges of peatlands as Nature-based Solutions (NbS) in Southeast Asia, particularly from data and community perspectives. Speakers include: Dr. Matthew Ashfold (University of Nottingham, Malaysia), Dr. Azliyana Azhari (Monash University Malaysia), Dr. Alex Lechner (Monash University Indonesia), Dr. Helena Varkkey (Universiti Malaya), and Dr. Gusti Z. Anshari (Tanjungpura University, Pontianak, West Kalimantan, Indonesia).

Join the Harvard University Science and Technology in Asia seminar series for a talk by Jenna Grant, Associate Professor of Sociocultural Anthropology at the University of Washington, who will discuss drug-resistant malaria and its implications in the Greater Mekong subregion. Victor Seow, John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences in the Department of the History of Science at Harvard University, will moderate the discussion.

Join the Department of Anthropology and the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Michigan (U-M) for a talk by Dr. Alyssa Paredes, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at U-M. In this lecture, Dr. Paredes illustrates “Big Agriculture” plantations produce significant industrial waste in the form of water pollution in Mindanao, Philippines.

Join the Institute for Comparative Modernities at Cornell University for a talk by Shaoling Ma, Professor of Asian Studies and Fellow at the Society of the Humanities, who will discuss her current research on rural circuits and Southeast Asia’s computational environments across local, national, regional, and transnational levels.

Join the Southeast Asia Program at Cornell for a talk by Marlie Lukach, PhD student in Plant Breeding and Genetics, who will discuss the historical significance of bottle gourd lagenaria siceraria in Southeast Asia.

Join the Council on Southeast Asia Studies at Yale for a presentation by Dinny Risri Aletheiani, faculty member at the Council on Southeast Asia Studies in the MacMillan Center for International and Area Studies and Director of Southeast Asia Language Studies at Yale University. The presentation will look at the Orang Rimba, inhabitants of the rainforest of Southern Sumatera, and how adapting to new environmental changes in their ancestral forest due to land developments have made them a target for a new “educational project.”

Join Graduate Education and Training in Southeast Asia (GETSEA) for a virtual discussion with Adam Bobbette, author of The Pulse of the Earth: Political Geology in Java, winner of the 2025 Benda Prize. All participants should read the Preface and Chapter 1: “Political Geology as Method.” Those interested in reading more should also consider Chapter 3: “Intercalated: The Political and Spiritual Geographies of Plate Tectonics.”

Join the Department of Anthropology and the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at University of Michigan (U-M) for a talk by Dr. Alyssa Paredes, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at U-M. In this lecture, Dr. Paredes illustrates how food cosmetic standards in destination markets lead “Big Agriculture” plantations to produce significant food waste.

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at UH-Mānoa for the virtual book launch of  Halo-Halo Ecologies, an anthology that gathers a transnational community of food enthusiasts, engaged scholars, and social and environmental activists to reimagine Philippine Studies and Food Studies. Speakers include Dr. Alyssa Paredes, Dr. Marvin Montefrio, Felice Prudente Sta. Maria, Chef Giney Villar, and Paolo Ven B. Paculan.

Join the Southeast Asia Program (SEAP) at Cornell University for a talk by Caitlyn Sears, SEAP Postdoctoral Associate and NYSEAN member, who will discuss how recent production and regulation dynamics in Malaysia exemplify transformations in global chemical geographies.

Join the Sustainability in the Urban Environment graduate program at the City College of New York for the book launch of Reimagining Sustainability, a collection of writings on environment, climate justice, and sustainable development by the late Isagani Serrano, a thought leader on these issues as they related to social movements.

Join the Harvard University Asia Center for a talk by Jiaporn Laochaoroenwong, Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Sociology at Chulalongkorn University, who will discuss the supply chain of square oxen at the Myanmar-Thailand border.

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at University of Michigan for a talk by Dr. Kathleen Cruz Gutierrez, Assistant Professor of History at University of California, Santa Cruz. Dr. Gutierrez will discuss the first decades of U.S. colonization in the Philippines and institutions of botanical research aimed to scale up plantation-style production.

Join the Council on Southeast Asia Studies at Yale University for a talk by Dr. Alyssa Paredes, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of Michigan. This talk uses the pejorative Filipino expression naka-aircon or “air-conditioned person” meaning detached from reality, to capture class-based inequalities in access to cooled spaces to argue that the indifference of the elite bears repercussions for the delivery of the law.

Join ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute for a seminar by Donghyun Park and Shu Tian of the Asian Development Bank (ADB). They will examine interesting new empirical research on the links between digital transformation, climate change and inclusive development, drawing from the second edition of the Asian Development Policy Report 2025.