AAS Call for Proposals

Hello everyone! We are two students based in the U.S. and China. We are currently organizing a panel for the AAS 2026. We are seeking two additional panelists and a discussant to join us.

Our proposed panel explores how everyday spaces are produced, practiced, and managed with social, political, and symbolic significance across diverse Asian contexts. We are particularly interested in how spatial practices intersect with broader forces such as urban development, migration, and governance.

Current panel topics include:

• Hotel space management

• Spatial production of independent bookstores
  Both focus on contemporary China, so we may narrow down the geographic scope of the panel depending on the submissions we receive.

If you think you are a good fit, please feel free to reach out to me: xuandai@uw.edu with a short abstract and a brief bio by July 18. 

We look forward to hearing from you!

Dear all, we currently have enough panelists. But we are still looking for one discussant. If you are interested, please feel free to contact me at: xuandai@uw.edu.

Here is our current proposal abstract. I would be happy to provide more details:

Cultural Reinscriptions: Negotiating Tradition, Space, and State Power in Contemporary Asia

In contemporary Asia, tradition is not a fixed inheritance but a dynamic terrain of mediation. States seek to legitimize authority. Communities reclaim identity. Institutions respond to shifting publics. In this process, traditional forms, such as rituals, kinship structures, architectural styles, and cultural institutions, are reinscribed with new meanings and functions. 

This panel investigates how tradition is reinterpreted, co-opted, and repurposed in response to evolving political, economic, and social forces through contemporary cultural and spatial projects across Asia. The panel traces how "old forms" of built environments and cultural practices are transformed and managed to address the demands of state power, market logics, and shifting values. Rather than viewing tradition as pure continuity or abrupt rupture, we approach it as a layered, contested process shaped by institutional designs and everyday practice.

We ask: How is "tradition" mobilized in contemporary spatial and cultural projects? How do everyday actors navigate, contest, or transform inherited forms under shifting conditions of governance, capital, and social change? What civic, aesthetic, or political possibilities emerge from these acts of reinscription?

Drawing on ethnographic and historical research from diverse sites of Asia, this panel brings together interdisciplinary perspectives on how tradition operates not as a static relic but as an evolving arena of cultural production, negotiation, and meaning-making in the present.

Looking forward to hearing from you! Thanks in advance!

Hello everyone! We are two students based in the U.S. and China. We are currently organizing a panel for the AAS 2026. We are seeking two additional panelists and a discussant to join us.

Our proposed panel explores how everyday spaces are produced, practiced, and managed with social, political, and symbolic significance across diverse Asian contexts. We are particularly interested in how spatial practices intersect with broader forces such as urban development, migration, and governance.

Current panel topics include:

• Hotel space management

• Spatial production of independent bookstores
  Both focus on contemporary China, so we may narrow down the geographic scope of the panel depending on the submissions we receive.

If you think you are a good fit, please feel free to reach out to me: xuandai@uw.edu with a short abstract and a brief bio by July 18. 

We look forward to hearing from you!