Work In Progress Seminar with Prof. Gregory Clancey

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Title: Japanese and their Earthquakes

Speaker: Associate Professor Gregory Clancey

Abstract:
My talk will be about a project that I thought was completed, but has become a ‘work-in-progress’ because of events. I published a book on the history of Japanese earthquakes in 2006, but then turned my attention to other topics. But with the ‘Great East Japan Earthquake’ and tsunami in March of this year, I was pulled back into discussions, and discovered I had more to think about, and more to say. The people who initially pulled me back in were reporters, who wanted to interview me about the Japanese peoples’ response to the disaster, and to previous ones. My talk to all of you will start with controversial questions that came up in these interviews and my reactions as an historian of Japan.

Fellow’s Tea with Dr. Jolynna Sinanan

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Tembusu College Fellow’s Tea

Dr. Jolynna Sinanan

6pm, Tuesday

28th February 2012

Student Common Lounge,

Level 1, Residential Block

Refreshments will be served.

Only 30 seats available!

Please register at dev-tembusu-nus.pantheonsite.io

Jolynna Sinanan is currently involved with “The Uses of Webcam”, a joint project between the Anthropology department of University College London and the School of Media and Communication at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT). She has recently completed ethnographic-based fieldwork in Trinidad under the supervision of Professor Daniel Miller (who has previously written several books on digital media and material culture in Trinidad). The aim of the study is to provide the first in-depth, systematic research on webcams and to understand the extent of their use in transnational and other relationships. Specifically the study is investigating the varying experiences of using webcam, advantages and disadvantages of webcam for its users, the different kinds of relationships in which webcams are used (e.g. parent-child, grandparents-grandchildren, business and commercial) and the likely consequences of this technology for transnational and other relationships in the future.

Prior to this project, Jolynna had a short career in Melbourne as comedic perfomer in stand-up. Jolynna has recently completed a PhD in Development Studies at the University of Melbourne. Her thesis examined the nature of engagement with development by ‘beneficiaries’, drawing on different case studies that centred on microfinance and the trafficking of women in Cambodia.