PhD Course

PhD Course

The conference will be combined with a PhD course where doctoral candidates will present and discuss their research projects with senior researchers as well as with fellow doctoral candidates. The first part of the course consists of active participation in the lectures and sessions that form the conference Nordic Asian Studies in the 21st Century – Stocktaking for the Future. The second part of the course will consist of individual written work, oral presentations and feedback from and discussion with teachers and course participants.
Also there will be session on “Doing Fieldwork” and “Getting Published”, as well as an introduction to the journal Asia in Focus which is published by NIAS.

The 2016 NNC PhD course will focus on the academic and societal relevance of Asian studies. Taking the questions, problems, dilemmas and decisions of the individual research project as the point of departure the focus will be on clarifying processes of knowledge production in an inter-disciplinary and cross-cultural setting.  

The course can be taken as a 7.5 ECTS credit course (to be approved by the individual student’s home university/institution). To receive the credits, doctoral students must attend the conference on November 7-9, the PhD course on November 10-11 (ECTS only given for full attendance!), submit and present a paper (max 10 pages) which draws relevant readings and theories, and give comments on a fellow PhD student’s paper. 

Commentators at the PhD Course

  • Eva Hansson, University of Stockholm
  • Cecilia Milwertz, NIAS - Nordic Institute of Asian Studies
  • Tansen Sen, City University New York (CUNY) and NYU Shanghai Campus
  • Lau Blaxekjær, University of Torshavn
  • Chunrong Liu, Fudan-European Centre for China Studies
  • Geir Helgesen, NIAS - Nordic Institute of Asian Studies
  • Stig Toft Madsen, NIAS - Nordic Institute of Asian Studies

 

Your presentation

You are expected to prepare and present a ten page text about your research in which you draw on and relate to the course readings. 

What you write will of course depend on where you are in the research process:

  1. If you are at the very beginning of defining your research question then you may choose to write about your considerations regarding the formulation of a researchable question. You might do this by drawing on the course texts as well as by drawing inspiration from a selection of monographs and reflecting on the authors’ problem formulation, theories and methods used and knowledge production in relation to the course texts.
  2. For those who have come a bit further and who are searching for funds for their project, or have recently started a PhD project, you can present your research proposal as well as further reflections on the proposal based on your reading of the course texts.
  3. If your project is well underway then you may choose to reflect on any aspects of the process of doing your project that you want to discuss at the course, preferably with a focus on its academic and societal relevance.

Regardless of where you are in the research process your text should relate to the overall theme of the conference and the current societal challenges in Asian studies.

Your text should not present and discuss your research findings in the format of a traditional academic text. The focus should be on reflections and discussions of the academic relevance of the project as well as its relevance for the wider society.

Importantly – the point is to discuss the aspects of your project that you find problematic and that you are struggling with, where you can benefit from a discussion. You may also have found interesting arguments in your project literature that you want to discuss, or perhaps you have found something that you want to contest or problematize based on your own research.

PhD candidates for whom the above does not apply or fit well with their current work, are invited to produce a more educational and academic jargon-free paper that would fit the expert column in a serious newspaper or magazine.  

Suggested issues for such “op-eds” or feature article texts:

  • Globalization promotes regionalization, how does it affect Asian Studies?
  • Economic globalization decreases the room for national political manoeuvring, Eastern and Western experiences in a comparative perspective.
  • The rise of Asia and the decline of the west: interconnected or mutually independent developments.
  • A Nordic approach to Asia? Positive or negative perspectives?
  • Asian studies and the public and private sectors: how to create synergies?
  • The NNC consortium, a unique regional academic cooperation with great potential: how do we further develop and utilize this option?  

 

Deadline for Conference and PhD Course

  •   3 Oct 2016: Deadline for submitting abstract (maximum 300 words)
  • 10 Oct 2016: Acceptance of abstracts by Academic Committee
  • 20 Oct 2016: Deadline for submitting the full paper and paying the conference fee

Fee and Accommodation for PhD Course

The fee for the conference and PhD course is 300 Euro, which includes conference fee, accommodation, reception, lunches and dinner (according to the programme). Accommodation is provided for 4 nights from 7-11 November. More information on this will follow on the conference website shortly.
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