Call for Papers: Indigenous Asias

Amerasia Journal Special Issue Call for Papers

Indigenous Asias

Guest Editors
Dr. Greg Dvorak (Hitotsubashi University) and Dr. Miyume Tanji (Australian National University)

Publication Date
Spring 2015

Due Date
Paper submissions (up to 5,000 words) due May 1, 2014

This special issue of Amerasia Journal is devoted to a rigorous exploration of “Indigenous Asias,” with an aim to reposition, as Vicente M. Diaz would put it, native understandings of community, place, region, and self in ways that critically redefine Asia and Asian America in the twenty-first century. “Indigenous Asias” will explore how Asian nations or national identities conceptualize indigeneity both within the geographic constructs of Asia and throughout Asian diasporic communities. We seek to examine how indigenous cultures or identities in Asia and Asian America are marginalized as “ethnic minorities,” rendered as “extinct,” or lauded as “loyal citizens” through cultural assimilation projects. What are the limits and consequences of such political constructs of the “indigenous” on human health, geopolitics, and the natural environment? Likewise, how are native lands memorialized and territorialized as “Asian” or “Asian American” in recent history, such as with Indonesia’s engagement in West Papua or as with the Asian labor movement in the U.S. Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands? How do indigenous populations inside and outside Asia and Asian America engage with and resist settler cultures, transnational imperialism, or globalization in China, Japan, and the U.S.?

More vitally, we ask what exchanges exist between indigenous groups across regions, such as those in Northeast/Southeast Asia and their counterparts in the Americas and Oceania. What new transoceanic conversations have emerged, for instance, between Austronesians in Taiwan and the Pacific Islands, or between Ainu and Aleutian communities? What kinds of solidarities are created, for example, in Okinawan feminist engagements with indigenous sovereignty groups in Guam, Hawai‘i, Puerto Rico, and other “American” colonial sites? We thus invite contributions that ask how nuanced explorations of indigenous identities, cultural practices, networks, and geographies problematize the very notions of Asia or Asian-ness in the U.S. and internationally.

This special issue seeks papers of approximately 5,000 words in length. We encourage the submission of interdisciplinary and accessible writings that may be adopted for courses in Asian American Studies, American Studies, American Indian Studies, Asian Studies, Critical Ethnic Studies, and Pacific Islands Studies.

Submission Guidelines and Review Process
The guest editors, in consultation with the Amerasia Journal editorial staff and peer reviewers, make decisions on the final essays:

• Initial review of submitted papers by guest editors and Amerasia Journal editorial staff
• Papers approved by editors will undergo blind peer review
• Revision of accepted peer-reviewed papers and final submission

All correspondence should refer to “Amerasia Journal Indigenous Asias Issue” in the subject line.

Dr. Greg Dvorak: g.dvorak@r.hit-u.ac.jp
Dr. Miyume Tanji: miyume.tanji@anu.edu.au
Dr. Arnold Pan, Associate Editor, Amerasia Journal: arnoldpan@ucla.edu