2024 prizes announced

At the annual business meeting of SEC-AAS, the 2024 prize winners were announced.

The 2024 undergraduate paper prize went to Sam Dietrich of UNC-Chapel Hill for his paper entitled “Privacy, Psychology, and the Panopticon in Xia Jia’s Short Stories.” This paper was written in Prof. Robin Visser’s class, CHIN 545 “Chinese Science Fiction“.

The 2024 graduate paper prize went to Nelson Jiajie Meng of the University of Kentucky, for his paper entitled “Travel of Dora and Nora: On Women’s Identities and the Writing of Disease in Zhang Zipeng’s The Last Happiness, Black Romance, and Red Mist.” This paper was written under his advisor, Prof. Charlie Yi Zhang.

The 2024 article prize went to Prof. Pamela Lothspeich of UNC-Chapel Hill for her article “Pandit Radheshyam’s Ramayan: A Sourcebook for Ramlila Scripts in the Orbit of Bareilly,” published in the Journal of Hindu Studies.

The 2024 book prize goes to Prof. Gennifer Weisenfeld of Duke University for her book Gas Mask Nation: Visualizing Civil Air Defense in Wartime Japan (University of Chicago, 2023).  Gennifer Weisenfeld’s book creatively uses visual sources from across Japanese life in the 1930s and 1940s to bring to life the modernist cultural dimension of air defense. Looking at bombs, airplanes, gas masks, and other related themes in magazines, pamphlets, movies and every kind of public art, she presents a fresh take on Japan’s home front in the long Pacific War. This book speaks not only to art and art history, but also to cultural studies, history, and peace war and defense.

Six travel grants were also made to students attending the conference:

  • Dah Kim, University of Georgia

  • India Green, Florida State University

  • Genn Ruan, University of California, Riverside

  • Jacquelyn Wilder, University of Kentucky

  • Jennifer Luckey, University of Georgia

  • Huaqing Shi, Florida State University

2024 annual meeting a success!

With many thanks to our hosts Profs. Andy Rodekohr and Yaohua Shi of Wake Forest University, the 2024 annual meeting of SEC-AAS was a success!

One exciting innovation this year was a well-received undergraduate research poster session. Several colleagues got to share their new books with the rest of the conference. Panels throughout the day on Saturday and on Sunday morning were lively and engaged.

To see the full conference line-up, check out the 2024 conference program.

2024 Conference Proposal Deadline Extended

The 2024 annual meeting organizing committee, led by Prof. Andy Rodekohr and Prof. Yaohua Shi of Wake Forest University, are extending the deadline to submit proposals for the SEC-AAS annual meeting on January 26–28, 2024.

The extended deadline is November 13, 2023. Please submit your proposals to the the appropriate form:

Individual papers: https://forms.gle/pGMUjfVUi3tHdzuu7

Panels: https://forms.gle/uoLvmki57Skmwkqw7

New book roundtable: https://forms.gle/e8Gx45ffASrBDNLy6

2024 SEC-AAS Prize Competition

As at past conferences, at the SEC-AAS annual meeting in January 2024 we will award prizes for an outstanding book, an outstanding article, an outstanding graduate paper, and an outstanding undergraduate paper. The deadline for submissions is October 30, 2023. Books and articles published during 2023 and graduate and undergraduate papers written during 2023 and nominated by a faculty advisor are eligible.

All submissions should be by Asianists or students in the Southeastern US. See this map on the Association for Asian Studies website for the region covered by SEC-AAS, although we have in the past accepted submissions from Asianists in Virginia and Louisiana who were already active with the Southeast Conference.

Books and graduate papers should be sent to Dr. Kevin Fogg.

Articles and undergraduate papers should be sent to Professor Yuxin Ma.

Any further questions about this competition can be directed to the SEC-AAS Past President, Dr. Kevin Fogg.

2024 Annual Meeting and Prize Competition Announced

The president of the Southeast Conference of the Association for Asian Studies, Prof. Gengsong Gao, has issued his presidential letter—including details on the 2024 annual meeting. You can download a copy by clicking this link.

Below is the text of this letter:

May 19, 2023

Dear Colleagues,

I am pleased to announce that the fully in-person 63rd annual meeting of the Southeast Conference of the Association for Asian Studies, “Regional and Global Flows,” will be held on January 26–28, 2024, at Wake Forest University, North Carolina. Our local coordinators are arranging some very exciting events. All conference information will be posted online at https://www.sec-aas.com/conf as it becomes available.

The program committee welcomes proposals for individual or panel presentations and round tables. Please submit your proposals to the following sites:

Individual papers: https://forms.gle/pGMUjfVUi3tHdzuu7

Panels: https://forms.gle/uoLvmki57Skmwkqw7

Roundtables: https://forms.gle/e8Gx45ffASrBDNLy6

We plan to have a “new book roundtable” for authors who have published their new books in 2023. Pease let us know if you are one of them and share your success together! Please submit your proposals no later than October 30, 2023. All proposals will be collectively reviewed by our 2024 program committee. Please direct questions about conference logistics to Professor Yaohua Shi shiy@wfu.edu.

Prizes for an outstanding book, one best article will be awarded at the 2024 Conference. The deadline for submissions is October 30, 2023. Books and articles published during 2023 and graduate and undergraduate papers written during 2023 and nominated by a faculty advisor are eligible. Books and graduate papers should be sent to Dr. Kevin Fogg, kfogg@email.unc.edu; articles and undergraduate papers should be sent to Professor Yuxin Ma, yuxin.ma@louisville.edu.

Three $200 travel awards are available to graduate students. Those who wish to be considered for these awards should note this on their paper proposals. Preference will be given to students in the Southeast region who must travel more than two hundred miles to attend.

Conference participants must be dues-paying members. SEC/AAS dues are $20 ($10 for students). The membership application form is available on the SEC/AAS website under “Membership.” Please submit this form with the correct dues to Professor Li-ling Hsiao, Department of Asian Studies, New West 113, CB#3267, UNC-Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599.

I look forward to seeing you at the 2024 meeting!

Sincerely,

President SEC-AAS 2023

2023 SEC-AAS Prize Competition

As at past conferences, at the SEC-AAS annual meeting in January 2023 we will award prizes for an outstanding book, an outstanding article, an outstanding graduate paper, and an outstanding undergraduate paper. The deadline for submissions is October 30, 2022. Books and articles published during 2022 and graduate and undergraduate papers written during 2022 and nominated by a faculty advisor are eligible; all submissions should be by Asianists or students in the Southeastern US.

Books and graduate papers should be sent to Professor Yuxin Ma.

Articles should be sent to Dr. Kevin Fogg.

Undergraduate papers should be sent to Professor Yanbing Tan.

2021 Prize Winners

Faculty

Dr. Margherita Zanasi, Professor of History at Louisiana State University, was awarded the 2021 SEC/AAS Annual Book Prize for her publication, Economic Thought in Modern China: Market and Consumption, C.1500-1937 (Cambridge University Press, 2020).

Dr. Charlie Yi Zhang of the University of Kentucky was awarded the 2021 SEC/AAS Annual Article Prize for his publication Releasing Masculinity for a More Just World: Lessons of How to 'Be Water' in Hong Kong in the Journal of Asian Studies 80 no. 3 (April 2021): 683-704.

Students

Bradley Sadowsky was given an award for his paper “Post-War Japanese Society and Mishima Yukio’s The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea.” (University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, adviser: Kevin Fogg) 

Sabrina Simpson was given an award for her paper “Animal Ethics in Thai Buddhism.” (Rhodes College, Advisor: Brooke Schedneck) 

SECAAS Member Publications Since July 2021

Xiaolin Duan
History Department, North Carolina State University

Remembering West Lake: Place, Mobility, and Geographical Knowledge in Ming China. Ming Qing Studies, 2021: 9-46.

Documentary, Song Dynasty and Silk. OER World History Project, July 2021.

Joshua H. Howard
History Department, University of Mississippi

Beyond Repression and Resistance: Worker Agency and Corporatism in Occupied Nanjing. Modern Asian Studies. 56.1 (January 2022): 309-349.

Paperback issue of Composing for the Revolution: Nie Er and China’s Sonic Nationalism . Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2021.

Jeffrey L. Richey
(Asian Studies Department, Berea College)

Daoist Cosmogony in the Kojiki Preface. Religions 12/9 (2021):761.

Editor. Special Issue: Chinese Influences on Japanese Religious Traditions. Religions 12/9 (2021).

Timothy Yang
History Department, University of Georgia

A Medicated Empire: The Pharmaceutical Industry and Modern Japan (Cornell University Press, 2021)

SECAAS Member Publications Since June 2020

Annika A. Culver
History Department, Florida State University

Annika A. Culver and Norman Smith, eds., Manchukuo Perspectives: Transnational Approaches to Literary Production (Hong Kong University Press, 2020)

Collection of Literary Selections by Each Ethnicity in Manchukuo-1, "Statements by Selectors". In Jonathan Henshaw, Craig A. Smith, & Norman Smith (Eds.), Translating the Occupation:  The Japanese Invasion of China, 1931–45 (pp. 103-114). (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2020).

Joshua H. Howard
History Department, University of Mississippi

“Beyond Repression and Resistance: Worker Agency and Corporatism in Occupied Nanjing” Modern Asian Studies. FirstView, 2021

Composing for the Revolution: Nie Er and China’s Sonic Nationalism (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2020).

Yuxin Ma
History Department, University of Louisville

“Technology transcending ideologies: Chinese cinema technicians at Manying,” Journal of Modern Chinese History, 14:2 (2020), 300-328.

“Collaborating with Japanese in Making Entertainment Movies for Chinese Viewers: Chinese Filmmakers at Manchurian Film Association,” The Chinese Historical Review, 27:2 (2020), 119-145.

Masako Mori
Department of Comparative Literature and Intercultural Studies, University of Georgia

“The Infiltrated Self in Murakami Haruki’s ‘TV People’” in Japan Studies Review 24 (2020): 85-108.

Haruki Murakami and His Early Work: The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Running Artist (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2021).

Margherita Zanasi
Department of History, Louisiana State University

Economic Thought in Modern China: Market and Consumption, c.1500-1937 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020).

Congratulations to our prize winners for their outstanding papers, articles, and books!

Dr. Harshita Mruthinti Kamath (Visweswara Rao and Sita Koppaka Assistant Professor in Telugu Culture, Literature and History) at Emory University was awarded the 2020 SEC/AAS Annual Article Prize for her publication, “Kṣētrayya: The Making of a Telugu Poet” (The Indian Economic and Social History Review, 2019).

Dr. Harshita Mruthinti Kamath at Emory University was awarded the 2020 SEC/AAS Annual Book Prize for her publication, Impersonations: The Artifice of Brahmin Masculinity in South Indian Dance (University of California Press, 2019).

Two students from the University of Richmond were awarded the 2020 SEC/AAS Annual Undergraduate Student Paper Prize.

Bryan Carapucci, "Governance in a Multiethnic Republic: Nationalist Rule and Response in Xinjiang and the Frontier, 1933-1935."

Peizhen (Pixie) Zhang, "The Impact of the one-child policy on Chinese returnees."