OUR EVENTS

Filtering by: “Society”
The 20th International Policy and Planning Summit
Apr
2

The 20th International Policy and Planning Summit

Join NYU Wagner’s International Policy and Planning Association (IPPA) for its 20th annual summit. This year’s summit will bring together students, academics, and practitioners to explore cross-sectoral solutions to the interconnected global challenges of climate change, migration, and global urban resilience. As cities worldwide confront more frequent flooding, rising heat, and expanding informal or peri-urban settlements, the need to rethink urban planning, infrastructure design, and climate-resilient financing models has never been more urgent.

View Event →
Contesting Indigeneity, Connecting Peoples: The Doing and Undoing of Domination across the Spanish Empire
Apr
2
to Apr 3

Contesting Indigeneity, Connecting Peoples: The Doing and Undoing of Domination across the Spanish Empire

Join the Espacio de Culturas and Sulo: The Philippine Studies Initiative at NYU for a two-day symposium organized by Enrique Okenve that compares varied, contesting experiences of indigenous peoples and the possible ways in which their responses connected them across territories and throughout time. Speakers include Stephen Acabado, Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Los Angeles; Omar Badessi, Visiting Assistant Professor of Hispanic Studies at Vassar College; Jorge Ulloa Hung, Lecturer of Anthropology at the University of Miami, and Dana Velasco Murillo, Associate Professor of History at the University of California, San Diego.

View Event →
“Sotong” and “Against This Messy World” GETSEA Simulcast Screening
Apr
6

“Sotong” and “Against This Messy World” GETSEA Simulcast Screening

  • NYU Wagner – Lafayette Conference Room, Floor 2 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join NYSEAN and GETSEA for a screening of Sotong and Against This Messy World,  two short films highlighting the challenges to art and expression in Malaysia’s complex political, legal, and societal landscape. The documentary screenings are followed by an online discussion with the filmmakers.

View Event →
The Trade-Offs of Legal Status: Safe Migration, Documentation, and Debt in Southeast Asia
Apr
8

The Trade-Offs of Legal Status: Safe Migration, Documentation, and Debt in Southeast Asia

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa for a book talk by Maryann Bylander, Professor of Sociology at Lewis and Clark College. The Trade-Offs of Legal Status is the first book to explore the lives of Cambodian migrants in Thailand, and it offers a rare ethnographic portrait of migration and development in Southeast Asia.

View Event →
Brown Bag Roundtable: Gen-Z and Resisting Authoritarianism in Burma
Apr
9

Brown Bag Roundtable: Gen-Z and Resisting Authoritarianism in Burma

  • New York University – 19 University Place, Great Room (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join NYSEAN and the Program in International Relations at NYU for a brown bag roundtable on Gen-Z and resisting authoritarianism in Burma, hosted by Professor Frances O'Morchoe. Featured speakers include Morgane Dussud, PhD graduate of SOAS University of London with a professional background in human rights, and Kota Watanabe, Visiting Scholar at NYU Wagner studying civil wars and transnational organised crime in Southeast Asia.

View Event →
Toward Decolonizing Research on Digital Authoritarianism: Reflections from Studying Big Tech-mediated Politics in Southeast Asia
Apr
10

Toward Decolonizing Research on Digital Authoritarianism: Reflections from Studying Big Tech-mediated Politics in Southeast Asia

  • Northern Illinois University – Peters Campus Life Building, 100 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at Northern Illinois University for a talk by Dr. Mai Van Tran, Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science. Dr. Tran will examine the extent to which pro-democracy platform advocacy might affect Big Tech’s practices and curb platform-mediated repression in Southeast Asia, with a focus on Myanmar, Thailand, and Cambodia.

View Event →

Socialist Meaning-Making Through Rice and the 1967 Rice Riots in Burma/Myanmar
Apr
1

Socialist Meaning-Making Through Rice and the 1967 Rice Riots in Burma/Myanmar

  • The London School of Economics – The Marshall Building, Room 2.06 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the  Saw Swee Hock Southeast Asia Center at the London School of Economics and Political Science for a talk by Dr. Tharaphi Than, Associate Professor of World Languages and Cultures at Northern Illinois University. Dr. Than will discuss how rice became central to socialist meaning-making, resistance, and the politics of survival in Burma.

View Event →
How to Do Research in the Philippines
Mar
31

How to Do Research in the Philippines

Join the Graduate Education and Training in Southeast Asia (GETSEA) consortium for a webinar on conducting research in the Philippines. Speakers include scholars with unique and extensive backgrounds on Philippine research: Dr. Louward Zubiri, Lector in Philippine Language Studies at Yale University, and Yi-Yu Lai, a PhD candidate in anthropology at University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. Dr. Verne de la Peña, Visiting Distinguished Professor of Music at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa and Professor of Musicology at the University of the Philippines College of Music, will moderate the discussion.

View Event →
Turang: An Indonesian Film Forum Screening
Mar
29

Turang: An Indonesian Film Forum Screening

Join the Indonesian Film Forum for the East Coast premiere of Turang (1957) by Bachtiar Siagian. This seminal piece of Indonesian film history was screened at the 1958 Afro-Asian Film Festival in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. Until its rediscovery in a film archive in Moscow in 2023, Turang was considered lost due to the Suharto regime’s repression of leftist and neorealist art.

View Event →
Socializing Land: Plantations, Dispossession and Resistance in Laos
Mar
27

Socializing Land: Plantations, Dispossession and Resistance in Laos

  • Northern Illinois University – Peters Campus Life Building, Room 100 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at Northern Illinois University for a book talk by Dr. Miles Kenney-Lazar, Senior Lecturer of Human Geography at the University of Melbourne. Dr. Kenney-Lazar’s book investigates the development of Chinese and Vietnamese pulpwood and rubber plantations on the lands of the ethnic minority Brou people in eastern Savannakhet of southern Laos.

View Event →
Empty Hands: Kinship and Loss in a Former Phang Nga Mining Town
Mar
27

Empty Hands: Kinship and Loss in a Former Phang Nga Mining Town

  • University of Michigan, Ann Arbor – Weiser Hall, Room 555 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Michigan for a talk by Chantal Croteau, PhD Candidate in Sociocultural Anthropology at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Croteau will discuss the relations of kinship, precarity, and loss generated through the volatile world of the boom-and-bust tin mining industry in southern Thailand.

View Event →
Clothing as Coding: New Approaches to Reading the Costume, Narrative Logic, and Iconography of Baphuon Temple
Mar
26

Clothing as Coding: New Approaches to Reading the Costume, Narrative Logic, and Iconography of Baphuon Temple

Join the Center for Khmer Studies (CKS) for a talk by Dr. Borbála Száva, CKS Senior Research Fellow, who is conducting fieldwork in Cambodia on the iconography and costume typology of 11th-century Angkorian temples. Dr. Száva’s lecture presents the preliminary results of a four-month fieldwork project examining costume and attire in the figural depictions of the Baphuon temple (11th century, Angkor).

View Event →
Art and Everyday Life in Southeast Asia: A Case of Two Urban Centers
Mar
25

Art and Everyday Life in Southeast Asia: A Case of Two Urban Centers

  • Institute of Fine Arts, New York University (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Institute of Fine Arts at NYU for a talk by Geok Yian Goh, Associate Professor of History at Nanyang Technological University, who will discuss the archaeological record and everyday life of Singapore and Bagan, Myanmar, which are two urban centers that overlapped in time.

View Event →
Exposing Disinformation Economies: Lessons from Asia and the Global South
Mar
23

Exposing Disinformation Economies: Lessons from Asia and the Global South

  • Room 280A, Second Floor, York Lanes, Keele Campus, York University (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join York University’s Canadian Southeast Asian Studies Initiative for a talk by Jonathan Corpus Ong, Professor and Founding Director of Global Technology for Social Justice Lab in the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Dr. Ong’s lecture critiques the “mainstream” of disinformation studies and presents alternative visions of more globally minded and community-driven approaches to building healthier public spheres.

View Event →
Dialogue Exploring Comparative Education in the United States and Cambodia
Mar
19

Dialogue Exploring Comparative Education in the United States and Cambodia

Join the SUNY/CUNY Southeast Asia Consortium and the Small Business Development Center at Buffalo State University for a cross-country dialogue  exploring cultures and education systems in the United States and Cambodia. Speakers include faculty and students of the Education Department at the Royal University of Phnom Penh and the Department of Human Geography at Buffalo State University.

View Event →
AAPI New York: Stories From The Bronx
Mar
18

AAPI New York: Stories From The Bronx

Join Asian American / Asian Research Institute’s Localized History Project, and The Asian American Education Project, for an immersive evening dedicated to the rich, localized history of The Bronx’s Asian American community. Hosted by NYC Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Studies K-12 Project, this interactive event invites New York City teachers, community members, and youth to bridge the gap between history and the classroom through storytelling, community building, and curriculum development. Attendees will walk away with tangible resources to support AAPI history education in K-12 schools.

View Event →
Enduring Otherwise: Muslim Queer and Trans Worldmaking in Indonesia
Mar
18

Enduring Otherwise: Muslim Queer and Trans Worldmaking in Indonesia

  • NYU Wagner – 2nd Floor, Lafayette Conference Room (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join NYSEAN for the book launch of Enduring Otherwise: Muslim Queer and Trans Worldmaking in Indonesia by Ferdiansyah Thajib, Senior Lecturer in the Standards of Decision-Making Across Cultures MA Program at Friedrich-Alexander Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg. Rianne Subijanto, Associate Professor of Communication Studies at Baruch College-CUNY, will moderate the discussion.

View Event →
Hot and Hazy Choices: Digital Consumers’ Adaptation to Environmental Shocks
Mar
16

Hot and Hazy Choices: Digital Consumers’ Adaptation to Environmental Shocks

Join the Crawford School of Public Policy at Australian National University (ANU) for a talk by Pyan Amin Muchtar, PhD candidate in Economics at ANU, who will discuss how air pollution and heat affect digital consumers’ demand on online ride-hailing and food delivery in Indonesia.

View Event →
Beyond the Capital City: Rethinking Jakarta’s Urban Future
Mar
12

Beyond the Capital City: Rethinking Jakarta’s Urban Future

Join the Indonesia Studies Program at ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute for a webinar examining how the relocation of Indonesia’s administrative capital to Nusantara is reshaping Jakarta’s governance, planning priorities, and everyday urban experience. Speakers include Dr. Irna Nurlina Masron, Fellow of the Regional Social and Cultural Studies and the Indonesia Studies Programs at ISEAS, and Dr. Siwage Dharma Negara, senior fellow, Co-Coordinator for the Indonesia Studies Program, and Coordinator for the Singapore APEC Study Center at ISEAS. Rita Padawangi, Associate Professor at the College of Interdisciplinary and Experiential Learning, Singapore University of Social Sciences, will moderate the discussion.

View Event →
Subjects and Sojourners: A History of Indochinese in France
Mar
12

Subjects and Sojourners: A History of Indochinese in France

  • Columbia School of International and Public Affairs – Room 918 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University for a talk by Visiting Scholar, Dr. David Thang Moe. Drawing on firsthand experience, current research, and his forthcoming monograph Beyond Buddhist Nationalism (Oxford University Press), he will discuss ungovernability, centralized nationalism, decentralized resistance, ethnic reconciliation, and visions of democratic nationhood in Myanmar.

View Event →
Stuck at Home: Pandemic Immobilities in the Nation of Emigration
Mar
10

Stuck at Home: Pandemic Immobilities in the Nation of Emigration

  • Room 280N, Second Floor, York Lanes, Keele Campus, York University (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join York University’s Canadian Southeast Asian Studies Initiative for a book talk by Yasmin Y. Ortiga, Associate Professor of Sociology at Singapore Management University’s School of Social Sciences. In this pioneering book, Yasmin Y. Ortiga studies the narratives that emerged around two groups of Filipino workers: nurses banned from leaving the country and cruise workers who returned home after COVID-19 shut down the travel industry. Soma Chatterjee, Associate Professor of Social Work at York University, will moderate the conversation.

View Event →
Becoming Ungovernable: Hill Peoples, Decentralized Resistance, and Buddhist Nationalism in Myanmar
Mar
4

Becoming Ungovernable: Hill Peoples, Decentralized Resistance, and Buddhist Nationalism in Myanmar

  • Columbia School of International and Public Affairs – Room 918 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University for a talk by Visiting Scholar, Dr. David Thang Moe. Drawing on firsthand experience, current research, and his forthcoming monograph Beyond Buddhist Nationalism (Oxford University Press), he will discuss ungovernability, centralized nationalism, decentralized resistance, ethnic reconciliation, and visions of democratic nationhood in Myanmar.

View Event →
Woven Wisdom: Understanding the Visual Narratives within Sarawak Pua Kumbu
Feb
27

Woven Wisdom: Understanding the Visual Narratives within Sarawak Pua Kumbu

  • Northern Illinois University – Peters Campus Life Building 100 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at Northern Illinois University (NIU) for a talk by Wan Juliana Emeih Binti Wahed, NIU Fulbright Visiting Scholar and Senior Lecturer at the College of Creative Arts, MARA University of Technology Sarawak Branch, Malaysia. In this lecture, Dr. Wahed will discuss the aesthetic design of Pua Kumbu, a traditional patterned multi-coloured ceremonial cotton clothing created and occasionally worn by the Iban people of Sarawak, West Kalimantan in Indonesia, and Brunei.

View Event →
Public Perceptions and Acceptance of Vaccination in Malaysia and Indonesia: Insights from Recent Fieldwork
Feb
27

Public Perceptions and Acceptance of Vaccination in Malaysia and Indonesia: Insights from Recent Fieldwork

  • University of Michigan-Ann Arbor – 555 Weiser Hall (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Michigan for a talk by Dr. Yogambigai Rajamoorthy, Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Accountancy and Management at Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR), Malaysia. This presentation offers a comparative examination of the acceptance and perception of different types of vaccination in Malaysia and Indonesia, comparing and contrasting factors shaping public attitudes toward immunization across these countries.

View Event →
Fostering Belonging and Resilience: Thai Performing Arts and Community Engagement in Southern California
Feb
25

Fostering Belonging and Resilience: Thai Performing Arts and Community Engagement in Southern California

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at UCLA for a lecture by Dr. Supeena Insee Adler, the curator and conservator of the World Musical Instrument Collection at UCLA and an adjunct associate professor in the Department of Ethnomusicology, where she directs the Music of Thailand ensemble. In this lecture, Dr. Adler will discuss the efforts of the Thai performing arts community in preserving cultural heritage and strengthening social bonds in Southern California’s Thai diaspora.

View Event →
Misremembering EDSA, 40 Years Later: A Reading and Conversation with Novelist Gina Apostol and Scholar Neferti Tadiar
Feb
25

Misremembering EDSA, 40 Years Later: A Reading and Conversation with Novelist Gina Apostol and Scholar Neferti Tadiar

  • NYU Wagner – 3rd Floor, Faculty Seminar Room (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join NYSEAN and Sulo: The Philippine Studies Initiative at NYU for a talk by Gina Apostol, acclaimed author who teaches writing at the Fieldston School, Barnard College, and The New School; and Neferti Tadiar, Professor of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Barnard College.

View Event →
Pain and Buddhism in Thailand: How does Bodily Experience affect Religious Worlds?
Feb
20

Pain and Buddhism in Thailand: How does Bodily Experience affect Religious Worlds?

  • University of Michigan-Ann Arbor – Weiser Hall, Room 555 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Michigan (U-M) for a talk by Scott Stonington, Associate Professor of Anthropology and internal medicine physician at U-M. In this talk, Dr. Stonington explores how religious practice might emerge in the face of domineering experiences, through interviews and participant observation with people coping with severe pain in Northern Thailand.

View Event →
Logics of Localization: Vernacular Islamic tombstone traditions of Sumatra
Feb
19

Logics of Localization: Vernacular Islamic tombstone traditions of Sumatra

  • The Institute of Fine Arts, New York University – The James B. Duke House (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Institute of Fine Arts at NYU for a talk by Dr. Jessica Rahardjo, Research Associate at the Khalili Research Centre, University of Oxford. Dr. Rahardjo’s lecture will explore the adoption of Islam in Indonesia through the adoption of specific tombstone forms and their subsequent transformations in Aceh and the Minangkabau highlands in western Sumatra.

View Event →
Beyond “Maritime Southeast Asia”: Seafarers of the International Shipping Industry and the Making of a Global Maritime Region
Feb
19

Beyond “Maritime Southeast Asia”: Seafarers of the International Shipping Industry and the Making of a Global Maritime Region

  • Cornell University – Rockefeller Hall, 374 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

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.

View Event →
Communication Against Capital: Red Enlightenment at the Dawn of Indonesia
Feb
17

Communication Against Capital: Red Enlightenment at the Dawn of Indonesia

Join the LSE Saw Swee Hock Southeast Asian Center for a talk by Rianne Subijanto, Associate Professor in the Department of Communication Studies at Baruch College, City University of New York. Her book, Communication against Capital: Red Enlightenment at the Dawn of Indonesia, tells a story of the processes through which ordinary people mobilized an anticolonial communist resistance against Dutch rule through the production of revolutionary communication in the 1920s.

View Event →
Lunar New Year Extravaganza: Year of the Horse
Feb
15

Lunar New Year Extravaganza: Year of the Horse

To celebrate the Year of the Horse, join the World’s Borough Bookshop for author/illustrator Aram Kim reading Tomorrow Is New Year’s Day and author Monique Truong reading Mai's Áo Dài. The book readings are followed by activities learning all about customs and traditions important to the Lunar New Year, including an art workshop for kids by Bonnie Wong and a lion dance performance.

View Event →
Myanmar in 2026: “Elections,” Expectations, and Realities
Feb
12

Myanmar in 2026: “Elections,” Expectations, and Realities

Join the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute for a seminar assessing what to expect from the State Security and Peace Commission’s recent polls, which are viewed widely as being orchestrated to continue the military’s political dominance in Myanmar. Speakers include: Dr. Kyaw Yin Hlaing, Visiting Senior Fellow in the Myanmar Studies Program at ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute and a visiting scholar at Cornell University, and Dr. Mary P. Callahan is an associate professor in the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington.

View Event →
Ocean and Human Health in Southeast Asia: Developing an Innovative Mobile Phone Tool for Monitoring Marine Biodiversity and Human Nutrition in Timor-Leste
Feb
12

Ocean and Human Health in Southeast Asia: Developing an Innovative Mobile Phone Tool for Monitoring Marine Biodiversity and Human Nutrition in Timor-Leste

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.

View Event →
Roundtable on Youth and Health in Southeast Asia
Feb
11

Roundtable on Youth and Health in Southeast Asia

  • ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute, Seminar Room 2 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute for a roundtable discussing insights and innovative approaches to inform more responsive policymaking in order to address the needs and aspirations of Southeast Asia’s next generation. Speakers include: Professor Nina T. Castillo-Carandang, pioneering health sociologist at  the University of the Philippines’ College of Medicine; Shahhanim Yahya, Senior Research Executive for the Institute for Youth Research Malaysia; Voradon Lerdrat, Director of Research and Policy Partnerships at 101 Public Policy Think Tank (Thailand); Dr. Sari Damar Ratri, Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Research (IFAR), Monash University Indonesia; Dr. Rayner Kay Jin Tan, Assistant Professor at the Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, National University of Singapore and National University Health System; and Dr. Tu-Anh Hoang, founder and Director of the Center for Creative Initiatives in Health and Population (CCIHP) and chair of the Vietnam Gender-based Violence Prevention and Response Network.

View Event →
Language Resource Center Speaker Series - The Southeast Asian Language Council (SEALC) Projects, 2019–2024: Cornell Collaborations
Feb
11

Language Resource Center Speaker Series - The Southeast Asian Language Council (SEALC) Projects, 2019–2024: Cornell Collaborations

  • Cornell University - Stimson Hall, GG25 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Southeast Asia Program at Cornell University for a panel by Southeast Asian language faculty at Cornell on their experiences with, and contributions to, the Southeast Asian Language Council from 2019 to 2024. Speakers include: Yu Yu Khaing, Burmese Language Lecturer; Jolanda Mendaun Pandin, Senior Lecturer of Indonesian; Hannah Phan, Khmer Language Instructor; Thess Savella, Filipino Language Instructor and President of the Consortium for the Advancement of the Philippine Languages and Cultures; and Thúy Tranviet, Vietnamese Language Instructor.

View Event →
Beauty and the Nation: Women, Culture, and the National Image in Interwar Vietnam
Feb
11

Beauty and the Nation: Women, Culture, and the National Image in Interwar Vietnam

  • Yale University – Luce Hall, Room 203 (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Join the Council on Southeast Asia Studies at Yale University for a talk by Christina E. Firpo, Professor of Southeast Asian history at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo. Dr. Firpo will discuss her new book, Beauty and the Nation, which explores the changing perspectives on Vietnamese women's beauty and their role in society during the interwar years.

View Event →