Collaborative Research Event “Boundaries of Belonging”

Tokyo College's "Gender, Sexuality & Identity" and "Global History Collective" collaborative research groups will host a lecture on Thursday, June 26, 2025 10:30-12:00 JST on Zoom with Prof. Chie IKEYA, Associate Professor of History, Director of Institute for Research on Women, and Co-Director of Global Asias at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey. You can register for the event here.

Event Abstract:

Boundaries of Belonging: InterAsian Intimacies across Race, Religion, and Colonialism

This talk illuminates a history of belonging across boundaries that has been overshadowed by Eurocentric narratives of white colonial masters and native mistresses. Between 1840 and 1940, millions of people arrived in Burma, also known as Myanmar, from other parts of Asia, forging intimate connections with indigenous women and giving rise to Burmese Muslim, Sino-Burmese, Indo-Burmese, and other mixed communities with unruly ties and genealogies. Over the course of the twentieth century, these interAsian relationships became the target of political agitation, legislative activism, and collective violence aimed at subordinating minority Asians and regulating women’s rights. Out of these efforts emerged understandings of race, religion, and nation that continue to vex Burma and its neighbors today. Interweaving archival excavation, family history, and intergenerational storytelling, the talk highlights how people targeted by such movements made and remade their lives under the shifting circumstances of colonialism and nationalism. It shows that interAsian intimacy was—and remains—foundational to modern regimes of knowledge, power, and desire throughout Asia.