
Past lectures of the Royal Asiatic Society are available to listen to online
Lecture Series 2019 – 2020:
16 January 2020:
George Thomas Staunton and the Perils of being a China Expert in early nineteenth-century London
Professor Henrietta Harrison (Oxford University)
20 November 2019:
The Human Odyssey – East, West and the search for Universal Values
Lord Stephen Green
19 November 2019:
Bagan and the Theravada Buddhist Ecumene in the 12-13th Centuries CE
Dr Tilman Frasch (Manchester Metropolitan University)
14 November 2019:
Phebe Gibbs, Our Calcutta Correspondent
Professor Michael Franklin (Swansea University)
12 November 2019:
Vision and Landscape: New Perspectives on Oriental Scenery by Thomas and William Daniell
Dr Giles Tillotson (DAG, New Delhi)
6 November 2019:
Thai Silver and Nielloware
Paul Bromberg (Editor, Journal of the Siam Society)
22 October 2019:
The Sun King and the Sultan: Louis XIV and the Ottoman Empire
Dr Philip Mansel (Author)
17 October 2019:
Surviving Asia, Sponsoring Mozart: The Polymathic Portrait of Dr Ferdinand Dejean
Professor Stephen Martin (University of Chiang Mai)
26 September 2019:
Two Missionary Accounts of Southeast Asia in the Late Seventeenth Century
Dr Stefan Halikowski-Smith (Swansea University)
Lecture Series 2018-2019:
6 June 2019:
Systems of Religion and Morality in the Collections of the Royal Asiatic Society
Edward Weech (Librarian, Royal Asiatic Society)
21 May 2019:
Painting Manuscripts with Metals and Insects: Grind or flatten, catch and cook
Cheryl Porter (Director of the Montefiascione Project)
2 May 2019:
Lost Warriors- Seagrim and Pagani of Burma – The Last Great Untold Story of WWII
Philip Davies (Author)
25 April 2019:
When Tehran was the Brightest Star: A Global History of the 1979 Iranian Revolution
Dr Simon Wolfgang Fuchs (Albert-Ludwigs-Universitat Freiburg)
11 April 2019:
The Hidden History of Studio Ghibli: Short Films, Advertising and the Industrial Reality of Japanese Animation
Dr Rayna Denison (University of East Anglia)
14 March 2019:
Lost Maps of the Caliphs: Drawing the World in Eleventh-Century Cairo – Lecture and Book Launch
Dr Yossef Rapoport (Queen Mary, University of London)
7 March 2019:
Forceps, Stethoscopes and Sisterhood: British Female Doctors in 19th Century India
Dr Jharna Gourlay (University of Lucknow)
19 February 2019:
The Languages of Indonesian Socialism
Dr Oliver Crawford (University of Cambridge)
7 February 2019:
Collecting Tibet at the South Kensington Museum: the legacy of the 1904 expedition and beyond
Dr John Clarke (Victoria and Albert Museum)
10 January 2019:
The Arts of the Book in a Time of Conflict: Manuscripts of Late Medieval Konya
Dr Cailah Jackson (Oxford University)
13 December 2018:
Sir Stamford Raffles: Civilised Views of Java
Dr Alexandra Green (British Museum)
11 December 2018:
The Scottish Sinologist Alexander Wylie 1815-1887: Missionary, Man of Letters, Mathematician
Professor Ian Gow (Edinburgh)
27 November 2018:
Britain-Georgia Connection through Personalities & Arts; Rustaveli and Shakespeare
2018 Annual Rustaveli Day: Professr Elguja Khintibidze (Tbilisi State University) and Dr Henry Sanford
20 November 2018:
The Ancient Silk Road: Its enduring impact on China and renewed objectives
Dr Jacob Ghazarian (Oxford University)
15 November 2018:
The Prince who beat the Empire: How an Indian Ruler took on the might of the East India Company
Moin Mir (Author) in conversation with Dr Rosie Llewellyn-Jones MBE
2 November 2018:
The Islamic Architecture of the Deccan
Dr George Michell (Independent Architectural Historian) and Dr. Helen Philon (Deccan Heritage Foundation) in conversation
23 October 2018:
More than a Stuffed Bird Show: The RAS Legacy in Shanghai
Peter Hibbard MBE (RAS Shanghai)
11 October 2018:
The Mughal Madonna: Representations of the Virgin in Jahangiri-era Architecture
Dr Mehreen Chida-Razvi (SOAS)
4 October 2018:
‘My Dear Schomberg’: Letters from Sir Aurel Stein
Dr Rosie Llewellyn-Jones MBE (Independent Scholar)
Lecture Series 2017-2018:
15 June 2018:
The Contribution of the Chinese Labour Corps in the First World War
John de Lucy and Dr Frances Wood
7 June 2018:
Like Sweet Smelling Blooms: Arabic Calligraphy in the Islamic West
Dr Umberto Bongianino (University of Oxford)
24 May 2018:
Silk, Slaves and Stupas: Material Culture of the Silk Road
Dr Susan Whitfield (Institute of Archaeology, University College, London)
15 May 2018:
The Yildiz Kiosk and the Queen Mothers of the Tanzimat Era: Gender, Landscape, and Visibility
Dr Deniz Tuerker (University of Cambridge)
10 May 2018:
The Illustration of Mirkhwand’s Raudat al-safa in RAS Ms. P.38
Professor Charles Melville (University of Cambridge)
3 May 2018:
Plunder and Restitution: Britain and the Mandalay Regalia
Professor Anthony Stockwell (Royal Holloway, London)
26 April 2018:
The View from the Palace: The Sikkim Royal Archives
Dr Alex McKay (Sikkim Palace Archive Digitisation Project)
19 April 2018:
A Glorious Galaxy of Monuments.’ Photography and Archaeology in India in the 19th Century
John Falconer (British Library)
12 April 2018:
K.A.C. Creswell’s Photographic Archive at the V and A Museum
Omniya Abd al-Barr (Victoria and Albert Museum, London)
10 April 2018:
Book Launch of Memory, Identity and Colonial Encounter in India:
Essays in Honour of Peter Robb (SOAS, University of London)
8 March 2018:
Arab Origins: Identity, History and Islam
Dr. Peter Webb (University of Leiden)
6 March 2018:
The Domestic Collecting of Islamic Artefacts in 19th Century Cairo: The Meymar Objects at the Victoria and Albert Museum
Professor Mercedes Volait (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique)
20 February 2018:
Mr. Punch and Chinamania: Blue Willow China and Consumer Consumption in ‘Punch’ Magazine, 1874-1880
Dr Amy Matthewson (SOAS, University of London)
23 January 2018:
Images and (Post)colonial Encounters: A History of the Visual Representation of the Nagas of Northeast India
Dr. Alban von Stockhausen (Bern)
18 January 2018:
Anarchists, Revolutionaries, and Franco-British Imperial Policing in French Chandernagore, 1905-1930
Dr. Mark Condos (Queen Mary, University of London)
11 January 2018:
European Science and Colonial Anthropology in British India, c. 1871-1911
Professor Christopher Fuller (London School of Economics)
13 December 2017:
William Mesny: How a British Adventurer Became a General in Qing-Dynasty China
David Leffman
23 November 2017:
Lapis and Gold, Exploring Chester Beatty’s Ruzbihan Qur’an
Dr Elaine Wright (Chester Beatty Library, Dublin)
21 November 2017:
RAS Collections Open Evening with a presentation by
Rebecca Snow (Camberwell College of Arts)
24 October 2017:
Introducing the New Edition of Ralph Russell’s Anthology of Urdu Literature: A Thousand Yearnings
Professor Francis Robinson Royal Holloway, London), Marion Molteno & Dr Rakhshanda Jalil
12 October 2017:
A Journal of Three Months’ Walk in Persia in 1884 by Captain John Compton Pyne
Russell Harris (Institute of Ismaili Studies)