CENTRE NEWS
North American Studies Programme Dr Hal Jones, Director of the North American Studies Programme
O
n 26-27 September 2013, the North American Studies Programme at St Antony’s hosted a successful conference examining the challenges of governance in the North American Arctic. Though the reach and capacity of national governments in the Arctic has historically been limited, climate change, new opportunities for economic development, and geostrategic rivalries have increasingly drawn the attention of policymakers to the far north. At the conference, Canadian former MP John English shared his research on the development of the Arctic Council, an international body that is
unique in the recognition – and the formal representation – that it gives to indigenous peoples, and Inuit leader William Iggiagruk Hensley recounted the process that culminated in acknowledgment of the land claims and economic rights of Alaska Natives. Work on this project is continuing and is expected to culminate in the publication of a volume that will bring together the insights generated at the conference.
A view of the Arctic from the space
Russian and Eurasian Studies Centre Richard Ramage, Administrator of the RESC
T Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies Professor Ian Neary, Director of the Nissan Institute
I
t is probably the uncertainty with which Japan views the world that has made it easy to persuade Japanese funders to support a series of seminars and workshops on ‘Why Japan matters’. The Nissan Institute took advantage of this generous support and held a two-day conference in mid-March on this theme, to which we invited contributors from the US, Australia, elsewhere in Europe and, of course, Japan. One interesting conclusion was that in spite of the impression that “rising China” has been accompanied by “rising Chinese studies”,’ Japanese studies is more than holding its own against the competition. There is no uncertainty about our commitment to or interest in the study of Japan. In autumn 2013, we had 11 external speakers contributing to our seminar series on topics as varied as Transnational History and Japan, Noh Theatre, Miyazaki Hayao, and Japan’s demographic revolution. We hope to make some of these presentations available to a wider audience as podcasts – please visit our website for further details.
he Russian and Eurasian Studies Centre says au revoir to Professor Robert Service this year and welcomes Professor Dan Healey, whose historical research into sexualities in Tsarist Russia and the Soviet Union has great contemporary resonance, given the Putin regime’s recent legislation against ‘non-traditional sexual relationships’. Dr Lia Tsuladze joins us in the role of Research Fellow in Georgian Studies, and Dr Uilleam Blacker is the incoming Max Hayward Fellow, with a research focus on Russian writers’ visualisation of the diverse pasts of Kaliningrad and Kyiv. The Michaelmas Term Monday seminar series – on Post-Soviet Politics – is
convened by the Centre Director, Dr Paul Chaisty, and includes relevant presentations on Internet mobilisation and neopatrimonialism. On Wednesdays in Michaelmas Term Dr Elizabeth Teague will – with the assistance of Dr Julie Newton – be convening a Russian and East European Studies Press Group in the RESC Library Reading Room. The Reading Room, which was refurbished in 2008-9, remains an acclaimed and popular amenity with researchers; it also continues to host well-attended events organized by Dr Oliver Ready, the Research Fellow in Russian Society and Culture. The RESC Library
9