UCLA Terasaki Center Junior Faculty Roundtable Series 2021-22
UCLA Tersaki Center for Japanese Studies announces that the Junior Faculty Roundtable Series is back again this year.
This series brings together eminent and emerging scholars from around the world for focused and unscripted dialogue on contemporary concerns in interdisciplinary Japanese Studies, broadly conceived. Given the myriad challenges faced by scholars especially since the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic, the roundtables provide an occasion for scholars to come together for a series of critical reflections on the current state and post-pandemic future of scholarship related to Japan.
Rather than replicating traditional presentation styles, this “born digital” format foregrounds the potential for digital platforms to create large-scale dialogue. Roundtables are open to the public, but significant time is reserved at the end of each one for audience questions and engagement,
Roundtable 1
February 22, 2022
4:00PM (PST)
Japanese Tradition in the 21st Century
https://www.international.ucla.edu/japan/event/15393#
Webinar Registration:
https://ucla.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_hDA3IdpyQtGUZs-wo_FHGw
This webinar brings together fours scholars who examine different Japanese traditions to discuss the concept of tradition and the ways to approach it as a topic of research.
Morgan Pitelka, professor of Japanese history at University of North Carolina, has examined the Raku house of pottery and the hand turned tea bowls; Michelle Liu Carriger, assistant professor at UCLA and moderator of the panel, is a practitioner of the Urasenke school of tea; Yuko Eguchi Wright, adjunct lecturer at the University of Pittsburg, studies and teaches kouta, the music and dance of the geisha; and LeRon Harrison, independent scholar, practices and researches gagaku, Japanese imperial music.
Among these four art forms, the term tradition (dentō in Japanese) gets used in numerous ways: as a classifier pointing out the history and preservation of the forms, as a terms that brings certain arts together and excludes others, as a signifier that suggests the inflexibility of the arts. And with the current situation of people outside of Japan engaging in the variety of arts that fall under the heading of “traditional Japanese culture,” the meaning of tradition is worthy of reconsideration.
Over a 90-minute webinar, the four scholars will discuss the concept of tradition among themselves over the first 60 minutes and with the audience via a Q & A session for the final 30 minutes.
Speakers:
LeRon Harrison, Independent scholar (PhD UCI, postdoc Stanford University, faculty Murray State University)
Morgan Pitelka, University of North Carolina
Yuko Eguchi Wright, University of Pittsburgh
Moderator: Michelle Liu Carriger (School of Theater, Film & Television)
Roundtable 2
March 14, 2022
5:00PM (PDT)
Digital Health in Japan and USA
Moderator: Yusuke Tsugawa (School of Medicine, School of Public Health)
Roundtable 3
April 28, 2022
5:00PM (PDT)
Butsuzō: New Horizons on the Study of Japanese Buddhist Sculpture
Moderator: Kristopher W. Kersey (Department of Art History)