Stanford University

India's Right to Know

-

Born in Chennai, Aruna was an IAS officer at Delhi until 1974. She resigned from the IAS to join the Social Work and Research Center in Rajasthan, set up by her husband Sanjit Bunker Roy.

Aruna Roy is a leader in the movement for "Right to Information". Aruna showed the poor rural people of drought-ridden Rajasthan how information could give them power to stop corrupt officials from siphoning off funds allocated to dig wells and how to demand the wages that were due to them.

In 1990, Ms. Roy set up the "Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathana". The MKSS built a grassroots movement that triggered a nationwide demand for the public's right to scrutinize official records. The "Right to Information Bill", was adopted by nine states including Rajasthan, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, and Maharashtra, and the "Freedom of Information Act 2002" was adopted by the Parliament.

In 2000 Aruna Roy was awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership and International Understanding. She put the award money into a trust to support the process of democratic struggles.

Ms. Roy's talk is co-sponsored with the Association for India's Development, PrajaNet, and Sanskriti. For more information, please contact Ramani at 408-833-8494.

Building 320 (Geology Corner), Room 105. 450 Serra Mall, Stanford University Campus

Aruna Roy Award-winning activist and community leader
Seminars

Healthcare Policy in Japan: Challenges and Opportunities

-

Dr. Kiyoshi Kurokawa received his MD degree in 1962 from the University of Tokyo Faculty of Medicine. Currently, Dr. Kurokawa serves as president of both the Science Council of Japan and the Pacific Science Association. He is also adjunct professor at the Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology of the University of Tokyo and of the Institute of Medical Sciences of Tokai University. He is professor emeritus of the University of Tokyo and serves as a member of the Committee for Science and Technology Policy of the Cabinet Office and several committees for Prime Minister Koizumi's office.

Co-sponsored with the Center for Health Policy/Center for Primary Care and Outcomes Research.

Philippines Conference Room

Kiyoshi Kurokawa President Science Council of Japan
Seminars

Stanford hosts researchers from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea

News Type
News
Date
Paragraphs

On October 13, 2004 the Korean Studies Program at the Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC) and the Project on Peace and Cooperation in the Asian-Pacific Region at the Center for International Security and Cooperation hosted a delegation from the Institute of Disarmament and Peace, Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

The discussion at today's workshop was wide-ranging, with participants exchanging views on the current state of relations in Northeast Asia. This gathering is part of ongoing efforts in both countries to enhance mutual understanding and to reduce tensions in the region.

The U.S. participants were, in alphabetical order, Ambassador Michael Armacost, Shorenstein Distinguished Fellow, APARC; Ellsworth Culver, founder and senior vice president, Mercy Corps; John W. Lewis, director, Project on Peace and Cooperation in the Asian-Pacific Region; Daniel Okimoto, director emeritus, APARC; Gi-Wook Shin, director, Korean Studies Program at APARC; Susan Shirk, professor, University of California, San Diego; and Philip Yun, Pantech Fellow in Korean Studies, APARC. The guests from North Korea were Kim Myong Gil, Choe Kang Il, Jong Tong Hak, and Ri Hak Chol, all from the Institute of Disarmament and Peace.

All News button
1

After the Election: How Best to Resolve the North Korean Nuclear Crisis

-

Charles Pritchard has had a distinguished career in government. He was the Ambassador and Special Envoy for Negotiations with North Korea, and the U.S. Representative to the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization, State Department. He has also served as the Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Asian Affairs, and Director for Asian Affairs in the National Security Council.

Philippines Conference Room

Charles Pritchard Visiting Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies The Brookings Institution
Seminars
Walter H. Shorenstein Forum for Asia Pacific Studies

Gender and National Identity in Contemporary Japanese Fiction

-

Japan Brown Bag Series

Co-hosted with the Center for East Asian Studies and the Stanford Society of Fellows in Japanese Studies. A light lunch will be served.

Philippines Conference Room

John Treat Professor of Japanese Literature Yale University
Seminars

Divine Encounters, Wolf Killing and Mythological Patricide: Ainu Identities and Japanese Colonialism

-

Throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Japanese "nationalism" (if such a term is even applicable) depended less on imagined similarities among Japanese than it did on their contrived customary differences from foreign peoples such as the Ainu. The boundaries of the early modern Japanese realm were ethno-geographical, and Ainu identity and difference was critical in constructing the borders of Japan.

After 1799, the Tokugawa shogunate and, later, the Meiji state, undertook policies of deculturation and assimilation toward the Ainu, because the Meiji strategy toward state building relied less on difference than on myths of internal homogeneity. The Meiji state conscripted Ainu into the myth of Japanese homogeneity through assimilation; but earlier forms of Ainu autonomy and difference first had to be destroyed.

Interestingly, wolf eradication offers one vantage point from which to view the process of Ainu deculturation and assimilation in the context of the colonization of Hokkaido and the creation of the modern myths that provided the foundation for Japan's ethnic nationalism. Ainu origin mythology held that the Ainu people were born from a union of a wolf and a goddess, and so when Ainu tracked and killed wolves and wild dogs under state bounty programs legitimized as "imperial grants," they committed mythological patricide, replacing their origin myths with Japanese ones that, over the course of the late Meiji period, served as the foundation of Japan's modern nation.

Japan Brown Bag Series

Co-hosted with the Center for East Asian Studies

Philippines Conference Room

Brett Walker Professor of History Montana State University
Seminars

Director's Welcoming Remarks

Authors
Gi-Wook Shin
News Type
News
Date
Paragraphs
Director, Gi-Wook Shin welcomes the new members to the Korean Studies Program at the beginning of 2004-2005 academic year.

Dear members of the Korean Studies community,

I trust that all of you have had a great summer and are now ready for the beginning of a new academic year. I welcome all of you back to campus and to another exciting year for the Korean Studies Program (KSP) at Stanford University.

First of all, I welcome the new members to our program this year. Philip Yun and John Feffer are our inaugural Pantech Fellows and will conduct research related to Korea, both North and South. Both Philip and John have distinguished careers and will be great assets to all of us at KSP. Philip has held high-level positions at the State Department and worked closely with former Secretary of Defense, Dr. William Perry, in addition to practicing law in both Korea and the U.S. John is an accomplished writer and editor, and his most recent publication is North Korea/South Korea: U.S. Policy at a Time of Crisis. I would also like to welcome Jasmin Ha, who will serve as our new Program Coordinator and assistant to me. She worked previously at The Korea Society in New York City and brings to us both her experience and vision for Korean studies at Stanford. Soyoung Kwon, a North Korean expert, will also be staying at APARC as a Shorenstein Fellow for the coming year.

Hong Kal and Chiho Sawada, post-doctoral research fellows, will remain with us for another year. Hong has accepted a tenure-track assistant professorship at York University, but will not start her appointment until the 2005-06 year. Rakhi Patel, our student assistant, will continue to work part-time to assist Jasmin and myself.

We will resume our popular luncheon seminars on October 15 with a presentation by Eric Larson of the Rand Corporation on his project on South Korean attitudes towards the United States. There will also be numerous other exciting events and programs on Korea-related issues throughout the coming year. Please visit our website for more detailed and continuously updated information.

KSP is also now home to the Journal of Korean Studies for which Chiho and I serve as associate editor and co-editor, respectively, of the journal. In addition, we have been engaged in a number of exciting projects. I have just finished my overdue book on Korean ethnic nationalism and am currently working with Kyu Sup Hahn, a doctoral student in Communications, on a project on U.S. media coverage of Korea and South Korean media coverage of the U.S. from 1992-2004. We will also continue on-going projects such as "Globalization in Korea" and "Historical Injustice, Reconciliation, and Cooperation." I appreciate the assistance of the many students and researchers who have been working with me on these projects over the years.

This year we will do an international search to fill the William Perry Chair in contemporary Korea. This is an extremely important appointment for the Korean Studies Program at Stanford, and you will have the opportunity to meet candidates throughout the year.

Thanks again for your continued support of the Korean Studies Program at Stanford. I look forward to seeing you at the various KSP events and programs throughout the year.

Cordially,

Gi-Wook Shin,

Director

All News button
1
Subscribe to Asia-Pacific