This year’s CU Boulder Asian Studies Graduate Student (CUBASGA) conference was an enormous success. The conference took place February 27th and 28th and featured two distinguished keynote speakers: Dr. Michael Emmerich of the University of California, Los Angeles and Dr. Ding Xiang Warner of Cornell University. Conference participants also included eight visiting graduate students from academic institutions around the United States who joined a number of CU Boulder graduate students in presenting on topics in East Asian studies, from poetry and literature to art history and dance. Faculty and students, as well as members of the community attended the seven panels. With an average attendance of 35 people, the question and answer sessions that followed each presentation generated rich dialogue and explored numerous interesting academic avenues.
The primary goal of the CUBASGA conference each year is to foster interdisciplinary and intercultural exchange with students and faculty from around the United States as well as to encourage the academic, professional and personal development of students and faculty at CU Boulder. The overwhelmingly positive response to this year’s conference is just one indication that the conference achieved its goal and so much more. Dr. Warner’s keynote presentation, “When Stone Speaks: Challenges and Opportunities for 21st-century Sinology,” was captivating and addressed challenges relevant to any student in the field of Asian or literary studies. Advice about and encouragement to follow your sources to their logical conclusions without attempting to make them fit a preconceived mold is just one of the many topics touched upon by Dr. Warner. Dr. Emmerich’s keynote address, “World Literature as Tale of Genji,” was dynamic and engaging. Dr. Emmerich was able to connect his presentation with a number of concepts touched upon in earlier presentations, which generated splendid conversation on cross-cultural representations of texts and other cultural artifacts. His research on the global flows of texts shows the many influences at work in the canonization of world literature.
The CUBASGA conference is an annual event held in cooperation with the Department of Asian Languages and Civilizations and the Center for Asian Studies. To these organizations and our conference sponsors, the CU Boulder Asian Studies Graduate Association would like to extend its deepest gratitude for their generous support. Please join us next year for the 2016 CUBASGA conference.