East Asian Studies

World-renowned calligrapher Masako Inkyo will be giving a calligraphy performance based on Oborozukiyo from The Tale of Genji. After her performance, she will lead two calligraphy workshops at 5:30 PM and 6:30 PM where attendees will have the opportunity to practice the art of calligraphy. You must RSVP to attend the workshop at go/inkyo or by emailing japaneseclub@middlebury.edu.

Speaker: Scott D. Rozelle, Stanford University

Title: Rural China’s Schools: Challenges and Potential Solutions

This event will place in conversation two high profile translators of Asian novels. Stephen Epstein, translator of The Wandering by Intan Paramaditha, and Stephen Snyder, translator of The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa will discuss their work as professional translators of novels in Asian languages. Epstein, Director of the Asian Languages and Cultures Programme at Victoria University in Wellington has translated multiple novels from Korean and Indonesian to English.

Kofi Bazzell-Smith will share his knowledge about manga techniques that he learnt under the tutelage of Japanese artists and will teach the audience how to draw Japanese comic books.

Kofi Bazzell-Smith will share his knowledge about manga techniques that he learnt under the tutelage of Japanese artists and will teach the audience how to draw Japanese comic books.

: Participants are encouraged to bring a pencil and ruler, if possible, and to sign up using this form.

Paula Park, Associate Professor of Spanish at Wesleyan University

“Ultra-unreal” (chaohuan) is novelist, essayist, editor and blogger Ning Ken’s coinage to describe contemporary China, where the speed and scale of change is disorienting and the news full of stories of prosperity, progress, corruption, and inequity that defy imagination. Ning Ken is the author of five novels, including the “Heaven / Tibet,” of which Nobel Prize for Literature winner Mo Yan said, “Ning Ken combines keen political critique with penetrating analysis of human nature.” Ning Ken will talk about writing fiction about an “ultra-unreal” time and place.

The Vermont Humanities Council and the Ilsley Library present Michael Puett, professor of Chinese history at Harvard, and journalist Christine Gross-Loh, who will speak about their new book, The Path: What Chinese Philosophers Can Teach Us About the Good Life. Hosted by the East Asian Studies program, the History Department, and the Religion Department.

“The Chinese Safari: Cultural Identity and Wildlife Conservation in Kenya’s Tourism Industry,” a talk by Amanda Kaminsky (class of ‘13). Ms. Kaminsky will talk about the social and environmental consequences of Chinese tourism in Kenya, which she has been studying as a graduate student at the Univesity of Michigan. In her Master’s thesis Ms.

Namiko Kunimoto, Assistant Professor of Japanese Art History, Ohio State University