Strategies and Consequences of Intercultural Exchange in Southeast Asia 1500-1800: 25 April 2009, Jesus College, Cambridge University
From Indopedia
- Strategies and Consequences of Intercultural Exchange in Southeast Asia c.1500-1800
-- An interdisciplinary conference
-- Saturday, 25 April 2009
-- Jesus College, Cambridge University (UK)
-- Historical views of Southeast Asia as a composite cultural unit become significantly more complex once they take into account the multiple levels of interactions and exchanges material and abstract alike that linked different peoples, groups and states within the region. For thousands of years, intricate webs of intercultural contact have been woven within Southeast Asia. Meanwhile, sustained engagement with civilisations of the Middle East, India, China and Japan contributed to increased variegation in cultural practices and linguistic development. With the inception of regular trade with Europe in the sixteenth century, another set of matrices imperial projects, commercial ventures and missionary endeavours was added to these elaborate networks.
-- Merchants, missionaries (Muslim and Christian), ambassadors and adventurers were the most obvious conduits of intercultural exchange and the most visible agents of the traffic in commodities and ideas. But what of the exchanges occurring on the edges of the record, involving women, slaves, renegades and other liminal characters? Silences and obscurities on the historical periphery are the type of lacunae that this conference aims to redress.
-- We invite proposals for 20-minute papers from scholars working in any academic discipline. The conference will be an interdisciplinary investigation into Southeast Asia as a highly significant region for intercultural exchange in the early modern world, and a crucial nexus in the establishment of global networks: commercial, cultural, social, political, linguistic, and religious. We extend a warm welcome to any graduate students who wish to make a submission to present their work.
-- Please send the title of your proposed paper and an abstract (250 words maximum) to David R. M. Irving (<drmi2@cam.ac.uk>) or Tara Alberts (<tmaa2@cam.ac.uk>) by 15 January 2009.
