The New East Asian Studies Podcasts in the Age of AI

Dive into the complexities of U.S.-Japan relations in Southeast Asia amidst leadership transitions and shifting geopolitical dynamics. This panel discussion, part of a conference co-hosted by Columbia University and Keio University, examines potential policy changes during a second Trump presidency, the implications of reduced U.S. engagement, and Japan's evolving role in a multipolar world.

Featuring insights from Ambassador Derek Mitchell, Ambassador Masafumi Ishii, Ken Jimbo, and Lien-Hang Nguyen, with moderation by Ann Marie Murphy, the conversation explores strategies for fostering cooperation, engaging with the Global South, and maintaining regional stability in an unpredictable political climate.

Don't miss this expert analysis of the future of Southeast Asian security and global politics.

Explore the dynamic intersection of leadership changes in Tokyo and Washington and their implications for East Asian security. This panel discussion, co-hosted by Columbia University and Keio University, delves into critical challenges on the Korean peninsula and the evolving U.S.-Japan alliance. Featuring insights from prominent scholars, policymakers, and global advisors, this session is a must-listen for anyone interested in international relations and security studies.

Speakers include Junya Nishino, Ambassador Kathleen Stephens, Scott Snyder, and Carol Gluck, with moderation by Gerald Curtis. Opening remarks by Duy Linh Nguyen Tu, Lien-Hang Nguyen, and Yuichi Hosoya set the stage for a thought-provoking dialogue, complemented by an introductory video from Ambassador Park Cheol-hee of South Korea.

Join us for this insightful conversation shaping the future of East Asian geopolitics.

This episode delves into the profound transformation underway in North Korea following the death of Kim Jong Il and the rise of Kim Jong Un. We explore North Korea's shifting political ideology, the challenges faced by its economy, and the evolving role of its military and Workers' Party. We discuss key developments such as the emergence of a merchant class, cultural infiltration from South Korea, and North Korea's alignment with Russia in the wake of the Hanoi summit. What does this mean for U.S.-North Korea relations, regional stability, and the potential for a renewed Cold War dynamic? Join us as we unpack these critical issues with insights from the world’s leading North Korea experts.

This engrossing book, a brilliant blend of biography and criticism, tells the story of Feng Zikai (1898-1975), one of the most gifted and important artists to emerge from the politically tumultuous decades of the 1920s and 1930s. Barmé provides a closely woven parallel history, that of the life of writer-artist Feng, who was also an essayist and a translator, and that of China's turbulent twentieth century. He investigates Feng Zikai's aesthetic vision, its development, and how it relates to traditional and contemporary Chinese cultural values and debates.
Although Feng was known for his so-called casual drawings, he was reluctant to classify his art. According to Barmé, much of his writing and painting was rooted in a philosophy of self-expression. Difficult to position in relation to existing Chinese political and social nomenclature, Feng remains, to a large extent, an enigma. He was sympathetic to the average person and the impoverished peasant, yet he was a romantic, and often identified with the increasingly politicized intelligentsia. A devout Buddhist, he was a close observer of nature and children, and while his art appeared gentle, it often carried a strong message.
Much has been written about Feng Zikai, a figure who has become popular among elite and mass audiences in the Chinese world once more, but no other work has examined his place among May Fourth writers and intellectuals nor his position within the context of China's artistic, religious, and literary tradition. An Artistic Exile moves straight to the heart of debates surrounding modernization, religion, science, the essence of a tradition in an age of colonial modernity, and the ethos of political and social thought in twentieth-century China.

Contours of Colonialism delves into the legacies of colonialism and the evolving dynamics of postcolonial worlds. Through critical discussions inspired by thinkers like Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Dipesh Chakrabarty, and Edward Said, we explore themes of representation, identity, and power in global history. From the silenced voices of the subaltern to the myths of Eurocentric modernity and the enduring impact of Orientalism, this podcast examines the ways colonial frameworks continue to shape societies and cultures. Join us as we decode the complexities of postcolonial thought and amplify stories from the margins in a divided yet interconnected world.

Explore the strategies behind authoritarian rule in this analysis of Coalitions of the Weak, a groundbreaking book examining the leadership dynamics of the Chinese Communist Party. The lecture delves into how Mao Zedong strategically promoted weak, less-networked officials to maintain control, inadvertently creating a power vacuum that Xi Jinping later exploited to consolidate unprecedented authority.

Drawing on thousands of historical documents and data, the discussion highlights the implications of these leadership tactics for China's policies and governance. From late-Mao politics to Xi Jinping’s rise, this episode examines the institutional and policy consequences of one-party autocracy and what it means for China’s future.

For the first time since Mao, a Chinese leader may serve a life-time tenure. Xi Jinping may well replicate Mao's successful strategy to maintain power. If so, what are the institutional and policy implications for China? Victor C. Shih investigates how leaders of one-party autocracies seek to dominate the elite and achieve true dictatorship, governing without fear of internal challenge or resistance to major policy changes. Through an in-depth look of late-Mao politics informed by thousands of historical documents and data analysis, Coalitions of the Weak uncovers Mao's strategy of replacing seasoned, densely networked senior officials with either politically tainted or inexperienced officials. The book further documents how a decentralized version of this strategy led to two generations of weak leadership in the Chinese Communist Party, creating the conditions for Xi's rapid consolidation of power after 2012.

Delve into the fascinating history of the Sino-Russian border, one of the longest and most geopolitically significant land boundaries in the world. Based on Soeren Urbansky’s groundbreaking research in Beyond the Steppe Frontier, this episode explores the evolution of this border from a loosely defined frontier in the seventeenth century to its transformation into a tightly controlled geopolitical boundary in the twentieth century.

Through the perspectives of local communities—railroad workers, herdsmen, smugglers—and the transnational flows of people, goods, and ideas, this episode highlights the complexities of border-making. Learn how state policies of assimilation, reeducation, and propaganda suppressed traditional borderland cultures and reshaped this pivotal geographical periphery.

Explore the complexities of Tibet's integration into China's national development strategies in this deep dive into The Disempowered Development of Tibet in China. This episode examines how rapid economic growth, driven by central government subsidies, has created both improved living standards and intensified marginalization among Tibetans.

Based on interdisciplinary research and extensive fieldwork, the discussion delves into the socio-economic stratification in urban areas, the impact of assimilationist policies, and the cultural and political disempowerment of Tibetan communities. Learn how economic integration, coupled with structural inequality, has led to tensions and protests, offering broader insights into the interplay of development, inequality, and conflict.

Series: Studies in Modern Tibetan Culture, Lexington Books Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University Since the central government of China started major campaigns for western development in the mid-1990s, the economies of the Tibetan areas in Western China have grown rapidly and living standards have improved. However, grievances and protests have also intensified, as dramatically evidenced by the protests that spread across most Tibetan areas in spring 2008 and by the more recent wave of self-immolation protests that started in 2011. This book offers a detailed and careful exploration of this synergy between development and conflict in Tibet from the mid-1990s onwards, when rapid economic growth has occurred in tandem with a particularly assimilationist approach of integrating Tibet into China. Fischer argues that the intensified economic integration of Tibet into regional and national development strategies on these assimilationist terms, within a context of continued political disempowerment, and through the massive channeling of subsidies through Han Chinese dominated entities based outside the Tibetan areas, has accentuated various dynamics of subordination and marginalization faced by Tibetans of all social strata. Whether or not these dynamics are intended to be discriminatory, they effectively accentuate the discriminatory, assimilationist and disempowering characteristics of development, even while producing considerable improvements in the material consumption of local Tibetans. In particular, strong cultural, linguistic and political biases intensify ethnically-exclusionary dynamics among middle and upper strata of the Tibetan labor force, which is problematic considering the rapid shift of Tibetans out of agriculture and towards the highly subsidy-dependent sectors of the economy, especially in urban areas. The combination of these disempowering dynamics with the sheer speed of dislocating and disembedding social change provides important insights into recent tensions given that it has accentuated insecurity while restricting the ability of Tibetan communities to adapt in autonomous and self-determined ways. The study represents one of the only macro-level and systemic analyses of its kind in the scholarship on Tibet, based on accessible economic analysis and extensive interdisciplinary fieldwork. It also carries much interest for those interested in China and in the interactions between development, inequality, exclusion and conflict more generally.

The Buddha’s nirvana marks the end of the life of a great spiritual figure and the beginning of Buddhism as a world religion. Surviving Nirvana is the first book in the English language to examine how this historic moment was represented and received in the visual culture of China. It is also a study about a pictorial image that has been in use for over 1,500 years. Mining a selection of well-documented and well-preserved examples from the sixth to twelfth centuries, Sonya Lee offers a reassessment of medieval Chinese Buddhism by focusing on practices of devotion and image-making that were inspired by the Buddha’s “complete extinction.” The nirvana image, comprised of a reclining Buddha and a mourning audience, was central to defining the local meanings of the nirvana moment in different times and places. The motif’s many guises, whether on a stone stele, inside a pagoda crypt, or as a painted mural in a cave temple, were the product of social interactions, religious institutions, and artistic practices prevalent in a given historical context. They were also cogent responses to the fundamental anxiety about the absence of the Buddha and the prospect of one’s salvation. By reinventing the nirvana image to address its own needs, each community of patrons, makers, and viewers sought to recast the Buddha’s “death” into an allegory of survival that was charged with local pride and contemporary relevance. Exhaustively researched, this study engages methods and debates from the fields of art history, religion, archaeology, architecture, and East Asian history that are relevant to both scholars and students alike. The many examples analyzed in the book offer well-defined local contexts to discuss broader historical and theoretical issues concerning representation, patronage, religion and politics, family values, and vision.

Discover the untold stories of North Korean women reshaping their society amidst economic and social transformation. This podcast explores the rise of informal markets led predominantly by women, challenging traditional gender roles and family dynamics. Dive into how the collapse of the command economy, the influx of foreign media, and the regime’s tightening grip create a complex interplay between empowerment, societal change, and state control. With in-depth discussions and expert insights, this series sheds light on the gendered dimensions of North Korea's evolving economic and cultural landscape.