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DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241128T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241128T203000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240724T114549Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20241105T122148Z
UID:20685-1732818600-1732825800@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:Mansi Rao: Dining tables on streets and carpets on floors - A study of vernacular furniture in north-west India
DESCRIPTION:  \nThe South Asia Collection Museum in Norwich\,UK has over 250 vernacular furniture items and related objects from north-west India. When it came to representing these objects\, available research was scarce. Emerging from this museological need of contextualising the collection\, a collaborative project\, ‘Vernacular Furniture of North-West India’ was conducted with the Design Innovation and Craft Resource Centre (DICRC)\, CEPT University\, India. The project was carried out in three phases between 2015 and 2021 with the aim to identify\, map\, document and study vernacular furniture that has traditionally been\, and continues to be an inherent part of day-to-day life in an Indian household. The project is the first of its kind. It not only provides extensive documentation of diverse furniture types that are used in the region\, but also challenges inherited narratives about what furniture is in an Indian context. It makes an important contribution to museological discourses and highlights the need for this important form of material culture to be regarded in the same light as other forms of cultural heritage such as architecture and textiles. \n  \nThe talk draws on the knowledge gained through fieldwork experiences. It presents a variety of vernacular furniture and everyday objects and includes the voices of the people who continue to make and use such furniture and for whom such items are an integral part of their everyday life. \n  \n  \nMansi S Rao \nCollection Curator \nThe South Asia Collection\, Norwich\, UK \n  \nMansi S Rao is the Collection Curator at The South Asia Collection and the SADACC Trust\, Norwich\, UK. Her professional work has mainly included projects relating to craft practices that are living traditions in South Asia\, predominantly in India and Sri Lanka. Her curatorial practice and research are focused on bridging gaps that exist in the study of craft objects and their socio-cultural bearing within source communities. \n  \nIn her previous role as a Senior Research Associate at the Design Innovation and Craft Resource Centre (DICRC)\, CEPT University\, India\, an important project she worked on as a Principal Researcher was the Vernacular Furniture of North-West India project. Her talk today is based on this project. Having first graduated as an architect\, Mansi has previous experience of spatial design\, heritage listing and documentation projects with INTACH\, and architectural conservation projects. Mansi is also an advisor for the Ena de Silva Foundation in Sri Lanka to develop projects and methods for archiving and researching Ena’s textile and other craft works. She has an MA in Museums\, Heritage and Material Culture Studies from SOAS\, University of London. She was awarded the Chevening Scholarship (2017–18) and the Charles Wallace India Trust and Simon Digby Charitable Trust Scholarship (2017–18) to study and conduct research in the UK.
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/mansi-rao-title-tba/
LOCATION:Royal Asiatic Society Lecture Theatre\, 14 Stephenson Way\, London\, NW1 2HD\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241031T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241031T203000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240724T114304Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240724T114304Z
UID:20681-1730399400-1730406600@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:Dr Stephen Murphy: Buddhist Landscapes: Art and Archaeology of the Khorat Plateau\, 7th to 11th Centuries
DESCRIPTION:Detail of Buddha image in carved into the rock face in mahāparinibbāṇa on the Phu Wiang Mountain range\, Chaiyaphum province\, Thailand. Late 8th to early 9th century. Author’s photograph.\nThe Khorat Plateau is a landscape of some 155\,000 square kilometres of what is now northeast Thailand and central Laos. Despite the rich evidence for the region’s dynamism and development in the metal age\, knowledge of subsequent first millennium developments on the Khorat Plateau remains limited. The spread of Buddhism across the region has been overshadowed by the attention given the Dvāravatī culture of the Chao Phraya Basin to its west and the Zhenla and later Angkor civilisations to its south and southeast. \nIn this lecture\, I discuss my new book which\, built on extensive fieldwork and archaeological surveys\, reveals the Khorat Plateau as having a distinctive Buddhist culture\, including new forms of art and architecture\, and a characteristic aesthetic. Moreover\, by combining archaeological and art historical analysis with an historical ecology approach\, I trace the outlines of Buddhism’s spread into the region\, along its major river systems. In this lecture I will illustrate how I read this history into and against the Khorat landscape\, attending to the emergence of monumental architecture such as stūpas and Buddha images carved into the rockfaces of hills and mountainsides\, and the importance on the Khorat Plateau of the use of boundary markers\, or sīmā. The book provides a new picture of the region in the first and early second millennia\, adding to our understanding of the development of Buddhism in Southeast Asia. \nhttps://nuspress.nus.edu.sg/products/buddhist-landscapes-of-the-khorat-plateau \nAbout the speaker \nStephen A. Murphy is Pratapaditya Pal Senior Lecturer in Curating and Museology of Asian Art at SOAS\, University of London. He specializes in the art and archaeology of Buddhism and Hinduism in first millennium CE Southeast Asia with a focus on Thailand and Laos. He has a particular interest in the 7th to 9th centuries CE as well as maritime connectivity between Southeast Asian cultures\, Tang China\, and the Indian Ocean world in general. His museological focus engages with issues of restitution and curation of Asian art. \nHis book Buddhist Landscapes: Art and Archaeology of the Khorat Plateau\, 7th to 11th Centuries has just been published with NUS Press (May 2024) and explores the development of this religion in northeast Thailand and Central Laos. He is co-editor\, with Nicolas Revire of Before Siam: Essays in Art and Archaeology\, published by the Siam Society and River Books in 2014; co-editor with Alan Chong\, of The Tang Shipwreck: Art and exchange in the 9th century (2017) published by the Asian Civilisations Museum Singapore\, and has contributed papers to leading academic journals such as Antiquity\, Asian Perspectives\, The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society and The Journal of Southeast Asian Studies amongst others.
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/dr-stephen-murphy-buddhist-landscapes-art-and-archaeology-of-the-khorat-plateau-7th-to-11th-centuries/
LOCATION:Royal Asiatic Society Lecture Theatre\, 14 Stephenson Way\, London\, NW1 2HD\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241024T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241024T203000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240724T114018Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240918T114828Z
UID:20679-1729794600-1729801800@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:Book Launch: Goderdzi Chokheli’s ‘Human Sadness’ with talks by Professor Dan Healey\, Ms Lia Chokoshvili\, and Translators
DESCRIPTION:
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/lia-chokoshvili/
LOCATION:Royal Asiatic Society Lecture Theatre\, 14 Stephenson Way\, London\, NW1 2HD\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241017T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241017T203000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240724T113839Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240918T132441Z
UID:20677-1729189800-1729197000@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:Islamic Bookbinding revealed through the lens of the Montefiascone Conservation Project
DESCRIPTION:
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/cheryl-porter-title-tba/
LOCATION:Royal Asiatic Society Lecture Theatre\, 14 Stephenson Way\, London\, NW1 2HD\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241016T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241016T203000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240912T113949Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240918T132408Z
UID:20865-1729103400-1729110600@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:Professor Suranjan Das: Revisiting the Nehru Years in India\, 1947 - 1964
DESCRIPTION:
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/professor-suranjan-das-revisiting-the-nehru-years-in-india-1947-1964/
LOCATION:Royal Asiatic Society Lecture Theatre\, 14 Stephenson Way\, London\, NW1 2HD\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241010T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241010T203000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240724T113607Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240724T113625Z
UID:20675-1728585000-1728592200@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:Marcus Milwright: Writing Art History as Fiction: A Story of Islamic Art
DESCRIPTION:It is a sign of the growing maturity of the field of Islamic art history that there are already many introductory surveys. Some attempt to cover all regions and periods\, though it is more common for these books to establish chronological and geographical boundaries. More recently\, introductions to the study of Islamic material and visual cultures have been offered in a variety of online formats. This talk discusses the value of a hybrid approach to the writing an introductory art-historical text\, combining narrative fiction and academic research. Published at the end of 2023\, A Story of Islamic Art charts the history of Islamic art and architecture through fifty case studies\, the first dating to 660 and the last to 2020. The chosen objects and buildings encompass a broad range of dynasties and regions\, with each chapter set in a different location. Art historical concepts are communicated to the reader through the interactions the four protagonists (two of whom are drawn from the Maqamat of al-Hariri) have with objects\, structures\, and people who made or commissioned them. The talk describes the diverse inspirations for the book and the decisions taken during the processes of research and writing. The conclusion offers reflections on the potential pitfalls of presenting speculative reconstructions of historical events and the motivations and attitudes of past cultures.
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/marcus-milwright-writing-art-history-as-fiction-a-story-of-islamic-art/
LOCATION:Royal Asiatic Society Lecture Theatre\, 14 Stephenson Way\, London\, NW1 2HD\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241008T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241008T203000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240909T160908Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20241002T105550Z
UID:20859-1728412200-1728419400@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:*Cancelled* Prof Mark Liechty (Winner of the 2023 Surya P. Subedi Prize): Building Capacity\, Not Infrastructure:  Lessons from Hydropower Development in Nepal
DESCRIPTION:*PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS EVENT HAS BEEN CANCELLED*\n 
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/prof-mark-liechty-winner-of-the-2023-surya-p-subedi-prize-building-capacity-not-infrastructure-lessons-from-hydropower-development-in-nepal/
LOCATION:Royal Asiatic Society Lecture Theatre\, 14 Stephenson Way\, London\, NW1 2HD\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241004T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241004T210000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240815T112609Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240815T112609Z
UID:20769-1728066600-1728075600@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:Dr Liz Driver: Reasons for Tod's dismissal as Political Agent in the Western Rajput States 1818-1822
DESCRIPTION:  \nThis talk aims to re-assess Tod’s role as Political Agent in the Western Rajput States for the brief period 1818-1822 and to determine what went wrong. It will address Tod’s visit to Maharaja Man Singh in Jodhpur but the focus will be on the events in Kotah in 1820-21. It will draw on Tod’s own account in the Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan and on the\, often vituperative\, correspondence between Tod and his immediate superior\, Sir David Ochterlony\, and with the government in Calcutta. \n 
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/dr-liz-driver-reasons-for-tods-dismissal-as-political-agent-in-the-western-rajput-states-1818-1822/
LOCATION:Royal Asiatic Society Lecture Theatre\, 14 Stephenson Way\, London\, NW1 2HD\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20240926T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20240926T203000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240724T113311Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240918T160916Z
UID:20673-1727375400-1727382600@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:Alice Casalini: The art of crossing over: Gandhāran pathways to nirvāṇa
DESCRIPTION:  \nThe art of Gandhāra—a region stretching across modern-day Pakistan and Afghanistan—has often been heralded as prime example of proto-globalization: its rich and syncretic visual vocabulary that freely borrows from Hellenistic\, Iranian and Indian models easily lends itself to this discourse in the early centuries of the first millennium. Aquatic imagery in Gandhāra is one of the many lemmas in such vocabulary: nereids\, tritons\, and other sea monsters are commonly discussed as one of the figurative vehicles through which Hellenism reached Central and South Asia and took hold there. This talk\, however\, takes a different approach to this kind of images and explicitly asks what the role and function of aquatic imagery was within a Buddhist context. This talk demonstrates that the answer can be found in the Buddhist visual rhetoric of salvation. Through the careful analysis of several panels from the site of Andan Dheri\, in the Swat Valley\, and a series of preliminary reconstructions of the original architectural context of those panels depicting sea creatures\, I show that aquatic imagery was in fact a fundamental part of a specific iconographic program centered around metaphors of water-crossing—indeed\, one of the most enduring and popular metaphors of spiritual refinement meant to lead the devotee towards nirvāṇa. \nAlice Casalini received her MA in Chinese Studies from Ca’ Foscari University of Venice and trained as an archaeologist at the Department of Archaeology and Museology of Peking University and with the Italian Archaeological Mission in Pakistan. She is currently a PhD candidate in Art History at the University of Chicago.
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/alice-casalini-the-art-of-crossing-over-gandharan-pathways-to-nirva%e1%b9%87a/
LOCATION:Royal Asiatic Society Lecture Theatre\, 14 Stephenson Way\, London\, NW1 2HD\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20240923T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20240923T210000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240815T112814Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240918T132237Z
UID:20773-1727116200-1727125200@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:Dr Donna Brunero (NUS): Visiting the ‘Liverpool of the East’:  Singapore’s place in tours of Empire
DESCRIPTION:
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/dr-donna-brunero-nus-visiting-the-liverpool-of-the-east-singapores-place-in-tours-of-empire/
LOCATION:Royal Asiatic Society Lecture Theatre\, 14 Stephenson Way\, London\, NW1 2HD\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20240916T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20240916T203000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240724T113024Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240724T113024Z
UID:20671-1726511400-1726518600@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:Dr Robert Morton: Sir Rutherford Alcock: First British Minister to Japan (1859-1865)\, Consul (1844-1859) and Minister (1865-1870) to China
DESCRIPTION:The son of a village doctor\, Rutherford Alcock trained in medicine and became a battlefield surgeon\, working in Portugal and Spain during the civil wars there in the 1830s. In a major career shift\, he entered the consular service\, went to China\, and ended up as British Minister (the equivalent of today’s ambassador) to Japan and then China. This progression was unique\, indeed bizarre\, especially as every senior position he got was one he specifically said he did not want. Nonetheless\, he was the man who commenced Britain’s relations with Japan and introduced Japan’s arts and crafts to the UK\, in addition to playing a central role in Britain’s relationship with China. He was no rampant imperialist and expressed ambivalence about Britain’s position in East Asia as he contended with intractable issues like the opium trade and how to punish attacks on British interests without starting a war. This book fills a major gap in the study of Japan’s opening to the West from a British perspective\, as well as Britain’s relationship with East Asia as a whole\, through the eyes of a brilliant\, but complicated and contradictory figure.
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/dr-robert-morton-sir-rutherford-alcock-first-british-minister-to-japan-1859-1865-consul-1844-1859-and-minister-1865-1870-to-china/
LOCATION:Royal Asiatic Society Lecture Theatre\, 14 Stephenson Way\, London\, NW1 2HD\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20240912T183000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20240912T203000
DTSTAMP:20260524T023039
CREATED:20240724T112647Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240905T113231Z
UID:20667-1726165800-1726173000@royalasiaticsociety.org
SUMMARY:*Cancelled* Online Talk: Professor Robert Arnott (Oxford): A Century of the Harappans:  Celebrating the Discovery of a Civilisation
DESCRIPTION:*Please note that this event has been cancelled*\n  \n \n  \nThe existence of this complex urban society that was the Indus or Harappan Civilisation\, remained unknown until the 20 September 1924. It was then that Sir John Marshall\, Director-General of Archaeology in the Raj\, announced its discovery in the pages of the Illustrated London News.  He named it the Indus Civilisation\, because the finds came from two sites in the Upper and Lower Indus Valley\, Harappa\, near Lahore in The Punjab and Mohenjo-daro in Sindh\, six hundred kilometres to the south. This discovery was based on the fieldwork of the Indian archaeologists R. B. Daya Ram Sahni at Harappa in 1921 and from 1923 and Rakhal Das Banerjee and Madhu Sarup Vats at Mohenjo-daro from 1922. It was shortly to be dated to the middle and late third millennium and the early part of the second millennium BCE. \nWe are reminded of Marshall’s background. Following studying classics at King’s College\, Cambridge and before his appointment in India\, his archaeological career was with the British School at Athens in the early years of the discovery of Minoan Crete. He was strongly influenced by Sir Arthur Evans and his discoveries at Knossos\, where he had worked unearthing of the Minoan Civilisation. He wanted to find his own. \nSince a century ago\, archaeological research both in modern India and Pakistan and even farther afield in Afghanistan and the Persian Gulf has been constantly enlarging our knowledge. \n 
URL:https://royalasiaticsociety.org/event/professor-robert-arnott-oxford-a-century-of-the-harappans-celebrating-the-discovery-of-a-civilisation/
LOCATION:Zoom
CATEGORIES:RAS Lecture series 2024-25
END:VEVENT
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