Ranjit Singh, associate professor of political science and international affairs, will deliver the keynote address opening a two-day workshop titled “Conflict, Collapsed States, and Social Movements in the Contemporary Middle East and Asia,” which will be held in Kyoto on October 8.
The workshop is jointly organized by Kyoto University’s Center for Islamic Area Studies, the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies and an organization called Humanosphere. Singh’s address, “Reflections on the Arab Spring,” focuses on the recent popular uprising in Bahrain, and recalls a period, twenty years ago, when he worked as a ghostwriter for a member of that country’s ruling family. His address provides a glimpse into the life of a now-prominent Bahraini minister and the inner workings of the monarchy. It will appear in the workshop’s published proceedings.
Singh will deliver the same talk a few days later to another audience at Tokyo University. At the Kyoto workshop, he will also formally comment on the research papers on Middle East topics delivered by Japanese MA and Ph.D. students. Kyoto and Tokyo Universities are sponsoring the week-long trip.
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