ASIAN CITIES AND CULTURAL CHANGE Conference


Shanghai Museum, Shanghai, China
Raffles Statue, Singapore

Venue: Old Canberra House, The Australian National University

Date: Friday 1 July 2005

Program and Biographies and Report


‘At the beginning of the 21st century more than half the world’s population lives in cities, and most major and minor metropolitan regions are undergoing dramatic transformation. Both the diversity and speed of these changes and the fact that they often neither originate in nor are limited to the Western world have thrown into relief the inadequacies of the ‘modernist’ way of framing urban analysis through an ecology of urban forms and the distribution of population and institutional ‘centres’. At the same time, approaches to the urban predicated on the re-centring discourses of globalization and postcoloniality and on the effects of economic and social restructuring on a global scale cannot do justice to the intricate contingencies and specificities of local and national contexts. The cutting edge of change is now to be found in public cultures situated in dynamic urban settings, and brought into contact by global media industries, communication technologies and cultural economies. Such worldly urban ‘contact points’ are catalysts for change and movement at all levels of society across the globe.’

This colloquium explored critical issues related to contemporary urban public culture in Asian cities arising from a joint research project entitled “Urban Imaginaries” between HRC, ANU and Lingnan University, Hong Kong.

Speakers included:
Meaghan MORRIS, Lingnan University, Hong Kong, China
Stephen CHAN, Lingnan University, Hong Kong, China
Oscar HO, Hong Kong Arts Center, Hong Kong, China
WANG Xiaoming, Shanghai University, China
Anirudh PAUL, Collective Research Initiatives Trust (CRIT), Mumbai, India
Shekhar KRISHNAN, Collective Research Initiatives Trust (CRIT), Mumbai, India
Geremie BARMÉ, Australian National University
Graeme TURNER University of Queensland

Conveners:

Professor Meaghan Morris
Lingnan University
Email: mmorris@ln.edu.hk

Professor Stephen Chan
Lingnan University
Email: sckchan@ln.edu.hk

Dr Caroline Turner
Humanities Research Centre
Email: caroline.turner@anu.edu.au

 

A/Professor Jen Webb
University of Canberra

For more information on:

2005 HRC Theme and 2005 HRC Visiting Fellows


HRC Enquiries:
Leena Messina, Programs Manager, Humanities Research Centre, ANU.
Email: Leena.Messina@anu.edu.au