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HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies Volume 35 Number 2 Article 19 January 2016 Buffalo Conference Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/himalaya Recommended Citation . 2016. Buffalo Conference. HIMALAYA 35(2). Available at: https://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/himalaya/vol35/iss2/19 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. This Conference Report is brought to you for free and open access by the DigitalCommons@Macalester College at DigitalCommons@Macalester College. It has been accepted for inclusion in HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@Macalester College. For more information, please contact [email protected]. her 2014 monograph Taming Tibet: South Asia Across the Disciplines Se- itself not only at the forefront of the Landscape Transformation and the Gift of ries Board Meeting. In addition to the region’s cultural politics, but also its Chinese Development. Yeh is on the ed- above-mentioned panels, lectures, geopolitics. Fredrik Barth’s Ethnic itorial board of HIMALAYA. AAS con- and themed events, the conference Groups and Boundaries signified a ma- ferences are also an excellent oppor- also featured an impressive array of jor shift in the approach to the study tunity for graduate student research film screenings and a large book fair. of ethnic groups (Fredrick Barth. and dissertation development. With [1969] 1998. Ethnic Groups and Bound- Finally, while there was strong support from the Henry Luce Founda- aries: The Social Organization of Culture representation from scholars on tion and the Social Science Research Difference. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Nepal and the Himalaya across panels Council (SSRC), Dannah Dennis of the Press). Barth argued that if we focus and presentations at AAS 2015, this University of Virginia participated in on boundaries, we can see that the author hopes for even greater ANHS the AAS-SSRC Dissertation Workshop forms ethnicity takes are relation- engagement at AAS conferences in Series under the 2015 theme: Religion al—it is the boundary, in fact, which the years ahead. Situated at the cross- and the State in Asia. makes salient the cultural content roads of South, East, and Central Asia, of ethnic groups. This conference The annual AAS conference is a rich ANHS has much to offer AAS. This engaged with and utilized Barth’s and rewarding event for both estab- is particularly true with respect to early insights to investigate the role lished and emerging scholars and expanding conversations across Asian of language in boundary maintenance remains a professional gathering of landscapes and further disrupting among Himalayan peoples. intellectual rigor and social engage- traditional area studies frameworks ment. Numerous meetings of profes- in the academy and policy realms. Articulating Ethnicity: Language sional associations and academic ini- Towards a greater production of crit- and the Boundaries of the Hima- tiatives were held in Chicago. These ical knowledge and cross-disciplinary layas, organized by Walter Hakala meetings and receptions included but dialogue, these kinds of interventions (University at Buffalo) and Joseph were not limited to: the AAS South are among the most important con- Stadler (Gannon University), was a Asia Council and AAS China and Inner tributions to be made by scholars of workshop-style conference hosted Asia Council; the American Insti- Nepal and the Himalaya. at the University at Buffalo in April tute of Indian Studies; the American 2015 that brought together a re- Center for Mongolian Studies; the markable group of researchers for a Burma Studies Group/Burma Studies Galen Murton thought-provoking discussion. The Foundation as well as the Commit- University of Colorado-Boulder workshop was divided into three pan- tee on Teaching about Asia and the els that focused on (1) language, (2) Society for Asian and Comparative Himalayan populations living abroad, Philosophy. Many universities with and (3) land and territory. These unique histories in Asian Studies Articulating Ethnicity: Language three panels, which were chaired by also held receptions and networking and the Boundaries of the Elizabeth Mazzolini (University at events, including: University of Chi- Himalayas Buffalo), Elen Turner (Himal Southasia cago Affiliates Reception; University magazine) and Vasiliki Neofotistos of Washington Reception; Yale Asian University at Buffalo (University at Buffalo), respectively, Studies Councils’ Joint Reception; structured the conference’s conver- Stanford University Reception; UC 18 April 2015 sations. Berkeley Reception; and University To begin the workshop, Mark Turin of Michigan Reception. Meetings Situated at the peripheries of the (University of British Columbia) and planning sessions in Chicago for world’s two most populous na- succinctly arranged and discussed a other organizations committed to the tion-states—India and China—the number of issues related to language growth of Asian Studies across the Himalayan region represents an and ethnicity throughout the Hima- academy include: the AAS Editorial exceptional site for the study of the layan region. Addressing the politics Board Meeting; the Asian Librari- intersection of language and ethnic of language and the language of pol- ans Liaison Committee meeting; the and national politics. As the Hima- itics as both expressions of political Midwest Conference on Asian Studies layas are home to both contested identity and public displays of cultur- (MCAA); the National Endowment ethno-nationalisms and disputed and al belonging, he argued that the rapid for the Humanities meeting; and the shifting borders, language often finds 165 | HIMALAYA Fall 2014 HIMALAYA Volume 35, Number 2 | 165 transformation from boli (speech, or zation in New York, originally formed relationships between the localized spoken language) to bhasa (written to assist Nepali-speaking immigrants, expression of territorial practices language), or from malleable, oral blurs the boundaries of “Nepali- and the national and transnational cultures to fixed, written cultures, ness.” Hangen’s paper illuminated configurations within which these deserves careful analysis. Turin’s elu- how in this immigrant community practices occur. Though this project cidation of these problems, bolstered the boundaries demarcating belong- is very new, Shneiderman’s work will by his two decades of fieldwork in the ing—and the ethnic markers that not only lead to a greater understand- region, helped to contextualize our define them—have shifted with the ing of territoriality in the Himalayan discussion throughout the day. welcoming of Tibetan speakers. Yet, region, but also to new theoretical while the organization she described and methodological insights for Next, Heather Hindman (The State has blurred the Nepali-Tibetan anthropologists, who can sometimes University of Texas at Austin) looked boundary, Hangen showed that it has find themselves encumbered by the at the “micropolitics of transforma- also remained Nepali-centered in its scale at which they conduct their tion” to explore the shifts in Nepalis’ representations. research. motivations in teaching and learning foreign languages. Hindman noted Joseph Stadler’s paper described a Andrew Nelson (University of North how exchanges in labor migration, similar set of issues regarding the Texas) explored the issues of land and tourism, and aid work over the past reworking of boundaries in the Ne- territory through a case study of land several decades have accordingly pali-Bhutanese refugee community conflict between a family of Newar reoriented many Nepalis toward of Erie, Pennsylvania. Stadler showed Jyāpu farmers and a Chetri broker in languages other than English, which how the Bhutanese Community the Kathmandu Valley. Nelson found offer their own strategic and econom- Association of Erie attempts to bal- that the farmers framed their ethnic- ic opportunities. Rather than making ance social integration with cultural ity in terms of being moral guardians general claims about an abstract preservation. However, the circum- of inalienable lands, as they felt the globalization and its effects on Nepal, stances of resettlement have neces- threat of losing land to “outsiders” Hindman made an excellent argu- sitated new definitions of just what such as the state, upper-caste traders, ment for understanding the partic- “culture” they are trying to preserve. and Bahun and Chetri migrants. Nel- ular contexts in which Nepalis are Some older ethnic boundaries have son demonstrated how land practices made into specific kinds of cosmopol- receded, while new ones have become and land beliefs can regulate group itan subjects who, in some cases, turn salient. Stadler suggested that one membership and considered how east rather than west for a language meaningful new boundary is the one different scalar factors affect the of power. between Nepali-Bhutanese Christians relationship between land and Jyāpu and those who belong to what this identity. Nelson’s paper was most Ingrid Hakala (University of Virginia) particular Nepali-Bhutanese commu- effective at taking the discussion considered the mother tongue edu- nity term the “Omkar Family”—Hin- of ethnicity out of the realm of the cational efforts of a Limbu-language dus, Buddhists, and Kiratis. political and into the realm of the primary school program, Anipaan, everyday. to examine how ethnic