Spotlight March 2025
CAS Briefs - Bangladesh 2.0: A Nation Reimagined by Its Youth, Upholding Democracy
By Musabber Chisty, a PhD student in Sociology
In the summer of 2024, Bangladesh witnessed a profound and transformative moment in its history, a wave of political and social change led by its young people, now remembered as the Students–People’s Uprising or the July Revolution. The spark for this movement came in early June 2024, when the Bangladesh Supreme Court reinstated a contentious job quota system in the public sector. This decision ignited widespread frustration, particularly among the youth, who saw it as a barrier to fairness and opportunity. In response, a group called Students Against Discrimination took to the streets, demanding reforms to the quota system. What began as student-led protests soon grew into a nationwide movement, drawing in young people from universities, colleges, schools, and madrasas (Islamic educational institutions), united by a shared vision of a more equitable future.
As the protests gained momentum, the government’s reaction grew increasingly harsh. By late July, the situation escalated dramatically when security forces launched a violent crackdown on demonstrators, an event that would later be known as the July Massacre. According to reports from the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), between July 16 and August 11, over 1,400 lives were tragically lost, including more than 180 children. The darkest days came on August 4 and 5, when at least 250 people were killed. These events shook the nation to its core, galvanizing even greater resolve among the protesters.
On August 3, the leaders of the Anti-Discrimination Students Movement issued a clear and unified demand: the resignation of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her cabinet. Two days later, as massive crowds filled the streets of Dhaka, their voices could no longer be ignored. Prime Minister Hasina resigned and fled to India, a longtime ally of her government. Her departure was met with both jubilation and chaos. While many celebrated what they saw as a victory for democracy, the power vacuum also led to sporadic violence, including attacks on properties linked to the ruling Awami League and its supporters.
In the wake of these events, the military, in collaboration with President Mohammed Shahabuddin, announced the formation of an interim government. To guide the nation through this turbulent period, they appointed Muhammad Yunus, the esteemed economist and Nobel laureate, as chief adviser. Yunus, a figure revered for his work in poverty alleviation and social entrepreneurship, was seen as a unifying force capable of steering Bangladesh toward stability and reform.
Read the full brief here
CAS Celebrates 25 Years
By Danielle Rocheleau Salaz, Executive Director of CAS
This year marks the 25th anniversary of the establishment of the Center for Asian Studies. The occasion provides an opportunity to look back at the history of Asian Studies on the CU Boulder campus and the impact that CAS has made.
It may seem odd to begin discussion of a 25th anniversary by going back 89 years, but CAS stands on the shoulders of those who came before, and this history is worth reviewing:
In 1935, the first full-time faculty hire in Asian Studies was Professor Earl Swisher, who specialized in East Asian history. In his first year, 130 students enrolled in his Asia-related courses.
In 1942, the Navy Japanese Language School moved to CU from the University of California Berkeley. Renamed the Navy School for Oriental Languages in 1944, 684 officers were enrolled in credit-bearing CU courses in Japanese, Chinese, Malay, and Russian before the school again relocated in 1945. Alumni included many diplomats, intelligence officers, and scholars such as Donald Keene, Edward Seidensticker, and Theodore de Bary.
In 1944, the CU Institute of Asiatic Affairs was established by modern history professor Carl Eckhardt, with support from the Rockefeller Foundation, Guggenheim Foundation, and Social Science Research Council. Funding for the Institute dropped off in the 1950s, after the immediacy of World War II had started to recede into the past.
In 1958, the degree-granting Asian Studies Program was established. The first B.A. degrees in Asian Studies were granted in 1961. Though requirements and course offerings have shifted through the years, this is the same Asian Studies programthat CAS houses today.
In 1967, CU was designated as a “Language and Area Center: East Asia” by the U.S. Office of Education, one of only 21 such centers nationwide. That designation led to the establishment of an East Asian Studies Program in
1968 and the Department of Oriental Languages and Literatures (today’s Department of Asian Languages and Civilizations) in 1969.
InterAsian Circulations
The CAS theme for 2024-2025 is InterAsian Circulations. In recent years, Asian Studies has emphasized the importance of transnational connections within Asia and between Asia and other parts of the globe. Inter-Asian movements of people as well as economic and cultural ties have long been powerful forces within Asia. For example, the economies of China, India, and the Middle East are increasingly integrated through trade. This year, we seek to highlight exchanges, links, and connections across borders within Asia, with particular emphasis on circulations between West and East Asia. We seek to explore the historic and contemporary connections between West and East Asia, with attention to how phenomena such as migration, religious and cultural exchanges, and political/economic connections build transregional relationships and influence Asian societies.
Asia Symposium
Friday, April 11th
Center for British and Irish Studies, 5th floor
Norlin Library
Symposium Schedule
11am-12:15pm Meet and greet/reception
12:15pm Introductions and welcome
12:30-2pm Panel 1: Migration/Refugee Circulations in Asia
2-2:15pm break
2:15-3:45pm Panel 2: Social and Religious Movements – InterAsian Connections
3:45-4pm break
4-5pm Keynote presentation - Ismail Alatas, NYU
This event is funded by a grant by the Title VI National Resource Center grant from the U.S. Department of Education.
CJAS 2024 now online!We are thrilled to announce that the latest issue of the Colorado Journal of Asian Studies is now available! This edition highlights the exceptional work of undergraduate students, offering a diverse mix of research and creative pieces that explore various aspects of culture, history, and contemporary issues. From an in-depth analysis of queer Korean cinema to the memorialization of Lao-Hmong service members during the Vietnam War, this issue provides fresh perspectives and thought-provoking content from exceptional undergraduate scholars. |
CAS Executive Director elected Chair of national CLAC Consortium
Salaz’s election follows CAS’s participation in the 2024 CLAC Conference, themed “Innovative Approaches to Support CLAC Programs: Leveraging Institutional and Community Strengths,” held at the University of Utah on October 25-26, 2024. Salaz, alongside CAS CLAC Coordinator Hannah Palustre, also presented a session titled “Positioning CLAC as an Internationalization Initiative at CU Boulder,” which highlighted how CLAC could be adopted and adapted by various campus units to support the university’s internationalization efforts.
CAS established the CLAC program at CU Boulder in 2017 and has since worked with 11 faculty members to develop 17 one-credit CLAC co-seminars. With support from a National Resource Center grant from the U.S. Department of Education, CAS offers CLAC course development grants annually to encourage faculty to create co-seminars, taught in the target language, that complement their primary content courses.
A Glimpse of Discovering Indonesia through Bahasa Indonesia Class
Indonesia is the largest archipelago in the world with over 18 thousand islands, more than 300 ethnic groups and over 800 known languages spoken. Even with its vast and diverse characteristics, it still maintains its unity as one country. Stretching from Sumatra to Papua, the people of Indonesia share a national language, Bahasa Indonesia. Bahasa Indonesia thus plays a vital role helping to create unity within the diversity of Indonesia.
Read the full article here
Susan Schmidt recipient of 2024 Kentaro Kaneko Award
America-Japan Society announces recipients
The 2024 Kentaro Kaneko Award ceremony will be held Oct. 15 at the International House of Japan in Tokyo’s Minato Ward.
The America-Japan Society has announced this year’s recipients of the Kentaro Kaneko Award, which honors individuals who have significantly contributed to bilateral relations through grassroots efforts.
This year’s awardees are Masako Kawai from Gifu Prefecture, who has been involved in volunteer activities relating to international exchange, and Susan Schmidt from Colorado, who has worked to promote Japanese-language education in the United States as well as via exchange programs in higher education.
Recent Faculty Publications
Difficult Attachments: Anxieties of Kinship and Care explores how family relations may be about connection and inclusion but are also about disconnection, exclusion, neglect, and violence. The volume features eighteen chapters from diverse anthropologists, examining the ambivalent ways we are in relation to each other.
Indians on Indian Lands: Intersections of Race, Caste, and Indigeneity (University of Illinois Press, 2024) unravels Indian diasporic complicity in its ongoing colonial relationship with Indigenous peoples, lands, and nations in Canada. In the book, Upadhyay examines the interwoven and simultaneous areas of dominant Indian caste complicity in processes of settler colonialism, antiblackness, capitalism, brahminical supremacy, Hindu nationalism, and heteropatriarchy.
“Inspiration as Worship: Creativity, Circulation, and Divinity in the Indonesian Modest Fashion Scene” by Carla Jones. In Routledge International Handbook of Islam and Consumer Culture. Francois Gauthier and Birgit Krawietz, eds.
If you have a recent publication you want us to feature, please email Liza Williams with your information.