‘China and India in the Modern World’ examines the shared experiences that have shaped the two continental-sized entities since the nineteenth century, when both societies were inducted into the international capitalist order as objects of imperialist expansion. Issues discussed include colonial education, Chinese and Indian diasporas, social activism of industrial capitalists, redrawing of national boundaries in the postcolonial period, intellectual politics during the Cold War, and contemporary relations between Beijing and New Delhi. Primary sources held by public archives in India and the People’s Republic of China related to China-India interactions will be introduced. The workshop aims to identify strains common to the two Asian countries in their extended transformation from (semi)colonies under Western hegemony to nation-states that command significant power within their boundaries and beyond. The workshop is part of the ‘Beyond Pan-Asianism: China-India Connections, 1911-1949’ research project funded by the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange.

Free and open to the public.

SCHEDULE

Thursday 7 August

9:00-9:30 Registration

9:30-10:15 Welcoming Remarks, Richard Rigby

10:15-10:30 Morning Tea

10:30-11:15 Unwilling Subjects: Colonial Education in India and Hong Kong - Liang Hongling and Meera Ashar

11:15-12:00 ‘Where China Meets India’, Face to Face: Interactions and Comparisons between Chinese and Indian Migrant Communities in Colonial Burma - Yi Li

12:00-12:45 Inter-cultural Encounters and Construction of Knowledge: ‘Boxer’ China in Travelogues of Thakur - Gadadhar Singh and Mahendu Lal Garg, Kamal Sheel

12:45-13:45 Lunch

13:45-14:30 Imagining Decolonisation: National Capitalists and Enterprise Communities in China and India, 1926-1945 - Anne Reinhardt

14:30-15:15 The Cold War Demise of Asianist Unity: Zhang Junmai on India - Brian Tsui

15:15-16:00 Absorbing Goa: Democracy and the Legitimacy of Postcolonial Violence - R. Benedito Ferrão

16:00-18:00 Afternoon tea and break

Friday 8 August

9:30-10:15 Understanding the Indian Voices Driving the Sino-Indian Water War Debate - Palmo Tenzin

10:15-11:00 The Documentary Connection: Archival Materials on Modern China in Indian Archives - Madhavi Thampi

11:00-11:15 Morning Tea

11:15-12:00 The Intelligence Bureau Files at the West Bengal State Archives: New Sources for India-China Connections - Tansen Sen

12:00-12:45 Sino-Indian Connections during the Republican Period: Archival Materials in Shanghai - Zhang Ke

12:45-13:45 Lunch

13:45-14:30 Concluding remarks

14:30-16:00 Meeting of the ‘Beyond Pan-Asianism’ research project collaborators (closed session)

16:00-19:00 Film screening Awara (The Vagabond, 1951), Law Link Theatre, Law Building