Enforced Migration and Sedentarization in Modern Central Asia

Panel discussion preceding film screening of "Koryo Saram: The Unreliable People"

Wednesday, May 14, 2008
2:30 PM - 4:30 PM
243 Royce Hall
UCLA
Los Angeles, CA 90095

Koryo Saram: The Unreliable People (2006), by Y. David Chung, documents the forced resettlement of Koreans to Kazakhstan during the Stalinist regime. An earlier screening of Little Angel, Bring Me Joy (1992), by Usman Saparov, depicts the deportation of the German population out of Turkeminstan during the same era.

Through a discussion of this year's Central Asia Initiative theme of "Mobility and Governability," scholars from different fields contextualize these population transfers into and out of Central Asia under Stalin.  Asking whether these events are best understood as a product of early 20th-century Soviet history, or from a long-view perspective of political contestation, movement through and settlement in the region, the panel will set the framework for the screening of Koryo Saram: The Unreliable People, immediately following, and the upcoming "Mobility and Governability" conference to be held October 18, 2008.

Schedule of Events:

Panel Discussion 2:30-4:30 pm

Nile Green, UCLA (Moderator)
Dru Gladney, President of the Pacific Basin Institute and Professor of Anthropology at Pomona College
Arash Khazeni, Claremont McKenna College
Ali Igmen, CSU Long Beach
Sanjay Subrahmanyam, Director of the Center for India and South Asia and Doshi Professor of History, UCLA (Respondent)
with
Y. David Chung, Director, Koryo Saram: The Unreliable People

Reception 4:30-5:30pm

Film Screening 6:00-7:30 pm

Koryo Saram: The Unreliable People, with an introduction by Y. David Chung

Lenart Auditorium, Fowler Museum

At a time when Central Asia is of growing consequence to the global economy and security, the Asia Institute has launched an initiative to foster greater understanding of the history and the significance of Central and Inner Asia within the campus and broader academic communities and among the general public. The organizing theme for this first year will be "Mobility and Governability." Highlighting the significance of Central Asia as a distinct geographic region which has been the site of repreated migrations and conquests from earliest times, this rubric  encourages reflection on how the mobility of Central Asian peoples has allowed both for conquest within and outside Central Asia, and for the ungovernability that has faced occupiers from outside the region.

More information about the Asia Institute Central Asia Initiative

Rsvp for the panel discussion and reception to (310) 825-0007, or email kanara@international.ucla.edu

Cost : Free; Reception to Follow

Sponsor(s): Center for European and Russian Studies, Asia Pacific Center, Program on Central Asia