The theme of this year’s conference is a critical questioning about the evolving concept and the diverse and complex realities of “Minorities” in Asia and Africa as well as among migrants from these areas all over the world. The construction of the concept of “Minority" fits different definitions in terms of international law and it occasionally varied according to places and periods. Minorities arise in Asia and in Africa? What situations does the recognition of identity pluralism conduce to? Can any “areal” specificity be distinguished on this point? How does the “Minority Law” has evolved, within the framework of the willingness of the international organizations since 1947 to ensure and to protect it? The issue of Minorities in the context of immigration and the creation of Diaspora groups will be also explored.

Presentation

The theme of this year’s conference is a critical questioning about the evolving concept and the diverse and complex realities of “Minorities” in Asia and Africa as well as among migrants from these areas all over the world.

The construction of the concept of “Minority" fits different definitions in terms of international law and it occasionally varied according to places and periods.

It broadly refers to a numerically inferior group with specific ethnic, linguistic, cultural, religious, political or sexual features—whether claimed by the group itself or imposed by the dominant society—therewith maintaining more or less problematic relationship, marginalization or even discrimination, sometimes embracing violent forms.

But if “Minority” frequently appears as a symbol of otherness, there are often contacts, links and some permeability between the different social and societal components and a Minority may also, at certain moments in History, be acculturated, integrated into the leading group or even assimilated—although a specific identity affirmation eventually re-emerges with the 2nd or the 3rd generations or even much later, through memorial claims that participate in the resurgence of a  “subordinates’ culture” (A. Gramsci). Among other issues, the question of “indigenous peoples” is notably relevant.

On the other hand, inferiority in numbers is not always equated to a lower status and there are cases where it comes along a dominant position. In addition, one group may form a Minority in one region and make up a Majority in another one. Both in a national or in a transnational context, “Majority” and “Minority/ies » thus remain intertwined and mutually implicated—between processes of social inclusion and exclusion—despite apparent paradoxes. Then what are their most adequate “definitions”?

With the increasing advent of the idea of “supranationality” and the progress of globalization announcing the decline of the nation-state, but also in the context of a new rise of nationalisms—sometimes aggressive—and identity demands, how does the question of Minorities arise in Asia and in Africa? What situations does the recognition of identity pluralism conduce to? Can any “areal” specificity be distinguished on this point?

Another question: how does the “Minority Law” has evolved, within the framework of the willingness of the international organizations since 1947 to ensure and to protect it?

The issue of Minorities in the context of immigration and the creation of Diaspora groups will be also explored.

Program

INALCO (Paris), October 19th and 20th, 2018

Friday, October 19th

9.00 a.m.  – 9.30 a.m.

Opening word: Anne Grynberg, local Organizing Committee Chair

Welcome address: Manuelle FRANCK, President of INALCO, Paris

Introductory remarks: Sho HAGIO, CAAS Executive Coordinator, TUFS, Tokyo

9.30 a.m. – 10.15 a.m.

Keynote Speech: “A Theoretical Approach to the Constitutional Protection of Minority in the Context of International Human Rights — with Special reference to the Experience in Korea” — Hee Moon JO, HUFS, Seoul

Chair: Jean-François HUCHET, Vice-President for Research, INALCO, Paris

(Coffee break)

10.30 a.m. – 11.30 a.m.

Session One – NATIONS AND MINORITIES

Chair: Cheng TONG, SISU, Shanghai

Between Empire and Nation: Taiwanese Settler-Migrants in Interwar Xianmen, 1939-1937

• James GERIEN-CHEN, Columbia University, New York (PhD student)

Race, Religion and Numbers: Retelling the Formation of the Minority in India, 1890-1945

• Sayori GHOSHAL, Columbia University, New York (PhD student)

Social Realities and Ritual Constructions: An Anthropological Appraisal of a Naxi Village in Southwest China

• Emmanuelle LAURENT, INALCO, Paris (PhD student)

Extraterritorial Obligation of States on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights: the Case of Minority Population in Ethiopia

• Chika HOSODA, TUFS, Tokyo (PhD student)

11.30 a.m. – 12.00: PUBLIC DEBATE

12.00 – 1. 00 p.m

Session Two / PANEL — MINORITIES, IDENTITY AND “DIS-IDENTIFICATION”

Migrants Between Identity Struggle and Political / Religious Protection

Chair: Anne GRYNBERG, INALCO, Paris

How to Build a Legal Identity as a Stateless Person in Japan

• Isabelle KONUMA, INALCO, Paris

When Identification Papers are an Obstacle: the Dilemma of Tibetans Applying for Refugee Status in France

• Françoise ROBIN, INALCO, Paris

The Hindu and Buddhist Rakhines in/of Bangladesh: Indigenous, Refugee or Stateless?

• Mara MATTA, Sapienza Universita, Rome

Protestant Churches as Multicultural Places in Korea

• Huy-Yeon KIM, INALCO, Paris

1.00 p.m.  – 1.30 p.m.: PUBLIC DEBATE

(Free time for lunch)

2.45 p.m.  – 3.30 p.m.

Session Three – MINORITIES IN DIASPORA

Chair: Chong Jin OH, HUFS, Séoul

Heterogeneous Racial Constructions: Contemporary Literary Representations of Asian Diaspora, Colonial Memories and Ethnic Identities

• Jungah KIM, City University of New York

Self-Positioning of New Chinese Community in Tanzania: Take the ‘Tianshui’ Community as an Example

• MA Jun, SISU, Shanghai

Educational Factors Affecting Language Use among Young Vietnamese Immigrants in Japan

• Mayumi ADACHI, TUFS, Tokyo

3.30 p.m. – 4.00 p.m.: PUBLIC DEBATE

(Coffee break)

4.15 – 5.45 p.m.

Session Four / PANEL — MINORITIES AND CROSS-BORDER PERSPECTIVES

To Be or not to Be: the Indigenous Ainu Minority in Japan and Russia in a Cross-Border Perspective, 19th-21st Centuries

Chair: Ethan MARK, Leiden University

From “Former Aborigines” to “Indigenous Minority” — Ainu Indegeneity in Japan in a Historical Perspective (1868-2008)

• Noémi GODEFROY, INALCO, Paris

1937, Year Zero for the Ainu People?

• Gérald PELOUX, Cergy-Pontoise University

Exhibiting Indigenous Culture in a National Museum of Ethnology — the Case of the Ainu in Japan

• Alice BERTHON, INALCO, Paris

The Role of Traditional Dance Within Ainu Communities

• Chikako MAJIMA, EHESS, Paris

The Russian Ainu Minority at a Crossroads — Between Russia and Japan, Between Extinction and Rebirth

• Milena BOCLE-REZNIKOFF, Paris VIII University

“Where Solid Ground Meets Solid Sky”. Ainu Indegeneity in the Russian Far East in a Comparative Perspective

• Dominique SAMSON NORMAND de CHAMBOURG, INALCO, Paris

6.00 p.m.  — 6.30 p.m:  PUBLIC DEBATE

Saturday, October 20th

9.00 a.m.  — 10.00 a.m.

Session Five — LANGUAGE AND MINORITIES

Chair: George ALAO, INALCO, Paris

Linguistic Variation and the Dynamics of Language Documentation: Editing in “Pure” Kigulu

• Lutz Marten, SOAS, London / Hannah GIBSON, University of Essex, Colchester (G. B.)  / Malin PETZELL, Gothenburg University

Is Naija (aka Nigerian Pidgin) a Solution to the Curse of Indigeneity?

• Bernard CARON, IFRA/CNRS, Ibadan, Nigéria

Studies on Orality: A Minoritized Discipline ?

• Ursula BAUMGARDT, INALCO, Paris

10.00 a.m.  — 10.30 a.m:  PUBLIC DEBATE

(Coffee break)

10.45 a.m. — 12.15 p.m.

Session Six / PANEL — LITERATURES IN AFRICAN LANGUAGES AND MINORITIES IN THE CONTEXT OF GLOBALIZATION. Methodology and Theoretical Issues

Chair: Lutz MARTEN, SOAS, London

The Iraqw of Tanzania as an « Expanding » Minority: Verbal Art and Conflicting Identities

• Maarten MOUS, Leiden University / [Daniela MEROLLA, INALCO, Paris]

Between Africa and     Asia/ Hypotheses on the Invisibility of Pluricultural Malagasy Language Literature

• Louise OUVRARD, INALCO, Paris

Decolonising the Literary Institution: Rethinking the Issue of Minorities in a Cosmopolitan Perspective

• Mélanie BOURLET, INALCO, Paris

When a Majority Becomes a Minority and Vice-Versa. Diverging Representations and Self-Representations of Berber “Minorities” in North Africa

• Daniela MEROLLA / Kamal NAIT-ZERAD, INALCO, Paris

Literature as Minority Speech on Ecology: the River Senegal Valley Example

• Marie LORIN, INALCO, Paris

Minority Writing for the Future of a Linguistic Majority: Alexis Kagame’s Commitment (1912-1981) for the Teaching of Kinyarwanda

• Chantal GISHOMA, INALCO, Paris (PhD student)

12.15 p.m.  — 12.45 p.m:  PUBLIC DEBATE

(Free time for lunch)

2.00 p.m. — 2.45 p.m.

Session Seven — ETHNIC MINORITIES

Chair: Angela IMPEY, SOAS, London

Analysis of Lebanon Ethnic Politics — Based on a Field Study

• MIN Jie, SISU, Shanghai

Assyrians “Suryan” of Syria: Between the Memory of a Genocide and the Threat of a Kurdish Self-Governance Rule

• Meryam AZAR, TUFS, Tokyo

Elite Bargain in South Sudan and the Future of Ethnic Minorities in South Sudan

• Amelia Maisha TUNZINE, TUFS, Tokyo

2.45 p.m. — 3.30 p.m.

Session Eight —RELIGIOUS MINORITIES

Chair: Carol GLUCK, Columbia University, New York

Confessional Minorities in Nineteenth Century Tehran

• Nobuaki KONDO, TUFS, Tokyo

An Analysis on the Living Conditions of Christians in Syria and Iraq Since the Middle East Upheavals: Dilemmas and Solutions

• Liu Yaohong, SISU, Shanghai (PhD student)

Coptic Christian Between Muslim Brotherhood and El-Sisi’s Regimes: Reshaping the Relation Between the Egyptian State and Copts, 2012-2017

• Eman FAKHRY, Cairo University

3.30 p.m.  — 4.00 p.m:  PUBLIC DEBATE

(Coffee break)

4.15 – 5.00 p.m.

Session Nine: SEXUAL MINORITIES

Chair: Joseph THACH, INALCO / Manusastra, Phnom Penh

On Practice of Education of the LGBT in Japan’s Elementary Schools

• Aline HENNINGER, INALCO, Paris / Yoshiaki FUJII, TUFS, Tokyo

The Representation of Love in Sotus and Two Moons. A Study of Love in Y Literature as a Part of LGBT Sub-Culture in Thailand

• Kosit TIPTIEMPONG, TUFS, Tokyo

5.00 p.m.  — 5.15 p.m:  PUBLIC DEBATE

5.15 – 6.30 p.m.

Session Ten —  MINORITIES AND CULTURAL EXPRESSIONS

Chair: Nobuaki KONDO, TUFS, Tokyo

Horseback Maid: Mary Sibande’s The Reign as Counter-Monument

• Ivana DIZDAR, Columbia University, New York (MA student)

PANEL — WORKING WITH MUSIC IN MARGINALIZED COMMUNITIES: QUESTIONS OF VOICE AND VOCALITY (panel)

Black Oaxaca: Strategies for Reinvigorating Local Traditions in Oaxaca, Mexico

• Lucy DURAN, SOAS, London

Sound and Silence as Territorial Redress in West Namibia

• Angela IMPEY, SOAS, London

Revitalising Meshrep in China and Kazakhstan

• Rachel HARRIS, SOAS, London

Music, Religion and Voice in Tel-Aviv – Jaffa Border

• Clara WENZ, SOAS, London (PhD student)

6.30 p.m. – 7.00 p.m.: PUBLIC DEBATE

7.00 p.m. – 7.30 p.m.

CONCLUDING REMARKS: George ALAO, INALCO, Paris