MINUTES

Return to Contents, Volume XXVII, Southeast Review of Asian Studies

MINUTES

ANNUAL BUSINESS MEETING JANUARY 15, 2005

SOUTHEAST CONFERENCE, ASSOCIATION FOR ASIAN STUDIES

44^TH ANNUAL MEETING, LEXINGTON, KENTUCKY

President Kate Kaup called the business meeting to order at 1:20 pm in the ballroom of the Radisson Lexington, then thanked Kristin Stapleton and Paige Johnson Tan for the meeting arrangements.

Local Arrangements Chair Kristin Stapleton welcomed SEC members, reminding them that the SEC had last met in Lexington in 1979 with George Gadbois as local arrangements chair. She noted he was in attendance today. She introduced David Bettez, the director of the Office of International Affairs at the University of Kentucky. Bettez welcomed all attendees to Lexington and described the many changes since he first arrived as a boy in 1957. He thanked Stapleton and her staff for their efforts and commended the Asia Center for its growth in its first three years. He credits the center for his own trip to China. Bettez noted that we need more people teaching about Asia and thanked SEC participants for taking on that task and for coming to Lexington.

President Kaup introduced the president of the Association of Asian Studies, Mary Elizabeth Berry, and members of the SEC executive committee in attendance.

Minutes of the 43^rd annual business meeting were submitted to the group and approved.

Local Arrangements Chair Stapleton reported that the scheduled lunch time musical performance had been cancelled due to the hoarseness of both student Butterflies, but invited all from the area to attend the February performances of the University of Kentucky Opera’s Madame Butterfly. She announced several panel location changes and corrected a program misprint. Those flying out of Lexington were reminded to make reservations on the Radisson airport van for Sunday. Final figures showed 135 had registered for the conference, as well as 35 area teachers. She apologized for the lack of space at Friday night’s musical performance; the lack of a UK basketball game might have increased the local audience. She had scheduled a showing of a Chinese documentary, “The Secret of My Success,” Saturday night in the Downtown Public Library, gave directions, and warned of strong language. Distribution information could be found in the registration packet. She thanked her hard-working local arrangements staff, particularly Brian Taylor, Valerie Boggs and the band of student recruits.

Paige Johnson Tan, Program Chair, thanked all who had proposed papers and panels, and thanked Kate Kaup and the executive committee for giving her the learning opportunity of organizing the program. There were 26 panels, 10 of which were submitted as such and 16 she’d cobbled together, with three sessions on Saturday and two on Sunday. There were three panels on teaching, six on politics and the economy, five panels on literature, theatre and film, four on history, four on religion, two on art history, one on women, and one on inter-cultural communication. Presenters had come from Hong Kong, Japan and India. Tan asked those graduate students who had been informed they’d won travel grants to find the Secretary Treasurer for their checks.

Vice President Farley Richmond directed attendees’ attention to biographies of the vice presidential and at-large candidates and ballots on the tables. Bill Head and Chris Jespersen were candidates for vice president, and Ann Wehmeyer and Dorothy Figueira were candidates for member at large. Tom Pynn and Paul Foster were to collect ballots and tally the vote. SEC members then cast ballots..

As the SEC representative to the Council on Conferences, Kristin Stapleton reported on the 2004 COC session at the San Diego meeting of the Association for Asian Studies, where programs of the various regional conferences were compared and outreach activities discussed. The University of Kentucky had successfully applied to the COC in 2004 for a grant for an outreach program in music. A session on Indonesian, Chinese and Vietnamese music had been held for 35 area teachers, led by Prof. Han Kuo-huang; she thanked AAS and COC.

Daniel Metraux, new editor of the Southeast Review of Asian Studies [SERAS], thanked all who had helped get the journal out this year and apologized that an index page had been omitted. He encouraged this year’s presenters to submit papers to SERAS, and solicited book reviews of publications of use for teaching about Asia or of more specialized books on Asian topics from members. He also requested one to four-page “scholarly notes” on members’ current research projects and asked that all who were presenting papers at the meeting to submit abstracts for the next issue. Deadline for all submissions was March 1. Metraux called for volunteers for the editorial board. Panel chairs were asked to update panel information. Back issues for 2002 and 2003 were available to members without charge.

Secretary Treasurer Charlotte Beahan had distributed the treasurer’s report for 2004, which was approved as submitted. Auditors Joshua Howard and ED Krebs reported that the SEC books were in order.

On behalf of David Jones, chair of the Graduate Prize Committee, Kate Kaup first announced two honorable mentions: Paul Worley of UNC Chapel Hill, nominated by Robin Visser, and Susan Rosenkranz of Florida Atlantic, nominated by Heather Frazer [the Rosenkranz paper is published in this issue]. This year’s graduate student prize was awarded to Li Qingjun of Belmont University for “Dying for Love in The Peony Pavilion and Romeo and Juliet.” Her paper was nominated by Ronnie Littlejohn of Belmont and is published in this issue of SERAS. On behalf of Undergraduate Prize chair Tamara Valentine, Dorothea Martin announced the undergraduate winner, Yevgeny Germanovich of the Georgia Institute of Technology, for “China’s Energy Interests in the Caspian,” nominated by John Garver. Undergraduate Honorable Mention went to Jeffrey Todd of the University of Virginia, nominated by Brantly Womack. Kaup urged both winners and those awarded honorable mention to submit their papers to SERAS.

Lucien Ellington from Education about Asia noted EAA’s tenth anniversary and thanked all present who had contributed. He described some editorial changes and upcoming special issues, including a second on World History for the fall, a retrospective on the Hiroshima bombing, and one focusing on Asian travel tales. EAA is no longer included in AAS membership, but a reduced rate of $15 per year is offered to AAS members.

Vice President Farley Richmond announced Atlanta as the proposed site of the 45^th annual meeting in 2006. Susan Walcott of Georgia State will handle local arrangements; Mark Ravina of Emory will serve as program chair. He solicited bids for the 2007 meeting; names of local arrangements chairs and a commitment from a prospective host institution should be submitted by March 1, 2005.

Election results were announced by Tom Pynn and Paul Foster. Bill Head will be the next vice president, and Dorothy Figueira the new at-large member.

Announcements from the floor: Marc Gilbert expressed a willingness to host a reception at his home near Atlanta during the 2006 meeting, and promised dragon boats. Paul Rodell, describing a shortage of Asianists in the Association of Third World Studies, invited all to the 2005 meeting of same in Santo Domingo, the Dominican Republic, in mid-November.

There was no new business.

President Kaup adjourned the meeting at 2:07 pm.