NYU Shanghai Center for Global Asia Receives Luce Foundation Grant as Part of NYU’s “Port Cities Environments in Global Asia” Project
The Center for Global Asia (CGA) at NYU Shanghai, together with NYU Global Asia faculty in New York and Abu Dhabi, has received a prestigious “Asia Program” grant from the Henry Luce Foundation.
The US$ 450,000 grant will support a three-year collaborative research project entitled “Port Cities Environments in Global Asia.” At the Center for Global Asia (CGA) in Shanghai, the research will focus on the Indian Ocean. Professors Duane Corpis, Tzu-Hui Celina Hung, Tansen Sen, and Lena Scheen are the main faculty members of this Indian Ocean research cluster. Their research will take place in collaboration with research clusters in Abu Dhabi and New York, as well as with the Martin Luther University in Germany.
According to Provost Joanna Waley-Cohen, the Luce grant will enable NYU Shanghai to implement the intellectual possibilities offered by NYU's presence in Shanghai, New York and Abu Dhabi for the transnational study of Asia and Asian populations.
Professor Tansen Sen, the Center’s director, said CGA will specifically examine the internal dynamics and the external connections of the Indian Ocean port cities through multidisciplinary approach. “Port cities, such as Guangzhou, Shanghai, Penang, and Mumbai, were important sites of cross-cultural interactions and vital links between the maritime spaces and the hinterland areas of Asia,” he said.
He also pointed out that CGA had already identified the Indian Ocean as one of the main areas of study and has organized summer schools on the theme with funding from the Volkswagen Foundation.
Following is the press release issued by NYU:
New York University has received a grant from the Henry Luce Foundation for a three-year project entitled “Port Cities Environments in Global Asia,” which is a collaborative research and education initiative involving NYU faculty in New York, Shanghai and Abu Dhabi.
“Asian Studies is no longer defined only by regionally specific research,” says David Ludden, chair and professor in NYU’s Department of History, who directs the New York Center for Global Asia, which will house the project. “Asia is an expansive space of connectivity formed by interactions of mobility and territoriality, embracing lands and peoples all around the Silk Roads and Indian Ocean, from ancient times, and weaving all continents together in today’s globalized world.”
“The Port Cities Environments project will help us to build a transnational scholarly network for Asian Studies, which only NYU could manage with our campuses in three Global Asia port cities, which bring people together in Asia and New York,” adds Ludden, who will direct the project, along with Tansen Sen and Mark Swislocki, who lead the NYU Global Asia faculty in Shanghai and Abu Dhabi, respectively.
The Port Cities project has begun with discussions about the formation of collaborative clusters including faculty and graduate students on all three NYU campuses, focusing initially on five themes with contemporary and historic significance:
- “Imperial Connections,” including trade networks, from ancient times to the present;
- “Local Environments,” including ecologies, material culture, and aesthetics;
- “Routes of Mobility,” over land and water, and transport and communication technology;
- “Mobile Cultural Forms,” such as politics, religion, art, science, and medicine; and
- “Temporality,” from ancient times, with long-term transformations and comparisons
The goal of NYU’s Port City Environments project is to build sustained collaboration among scholars on all three campuses, across many fields, to enrich faculty research, teaching, and graduate training, and, as a result, to improve knowledge production about Asia. The organizers aim to increase collaborative connectivity among faculty involved in Global Asia research and teaching at all three sites, with the goal of establishing “Global Asia” as dynamic field embedded in the curriculum and research agenda of NYU’s network of global campuses.
With support from the Luce Foundation—a three-year, $450,000 grant—and from the NYU administration on all three campuses, the project will host conferences on three campuses as well as symposia, distinguished lecturer visits, seminars, and workshops. It also seeks to bolster the Global Asia curriculum on all three campuses at the undergraduate and graduate levels.
For more about the Center for Global Asia and the Port Cities Environments in Global Asia project, please visit https://research.shanghai.nyu.edu/centers-and-institutes/cga/research-group
上海纽约大学环球亚洲研究中心联合研究项目获亨利·鲁斯基金会资助
4月14日，上海纽约大学环球亚洲研究中心（CGA）与纽约大学环球亚洲研究中心以及纽约大学阿布扎比环球亚洲研究中心共同获得来自亨利·鲁斯基金会的研究资助。
总额45万美元的研究资助，将用于开展为期三年的合作研究项目——“环球亚洲港口城市环境研究”。上海纽约大学环球亚洲研究中心将重点关注印度洋区域的研究，其主要师资和研究力量包括Duane Corpis教授、洪子惠教授、沈丹森教授以及Lena Scheen教授，并将与纽约和阿布扎比两地的研究中心以及德国的哈雷-维腾贝格马丁路德大学展开研究合作。
上海纽约大学教务长衞周安表示，此次获得亨利·鲁斯基金会的研究资助，将让上海纽约大学联动纽约大学全球教育体系位于上海、纽约和阿布扎比三地的研究力量与智识资源，共同拓展对亚洲的跨区域跨文化研究。
上海纽约大学环球亚洲研究中心主任沈丹森教授说，中心将以跨学科方式研究印度洋区域港口城市的内在活力及其与外界的关系，“像广州、上海、槟城、孟买这样连接海域与亚洲内陆的港口城市，是跨文化交流的重点地带。”沈丹森教授还表示，上海纽约大学环球亚洲研究中心的研究重点为印度洋区域，并借助大众汽车基金会提供的科研基金，开设了相应研究主题的国际暑期学校项目。
以下为纽约大学新闻稿：
纽约大学全球教育体系位于纽约、阿布扎比和上海三所门户校园的研究力量，合作发起的为期三年的研究教育项目“环球亚洲港口城市环境研究”，近日获得亨利·鲁斯基金会（Henry Luce Foundation）授予的研究资助。
“亚洲研究的范围不再局限于地理区域的划分，”纽约大学历史系主任David Ludden教授表示。他也是负责该项目的纽约环球亚洲研究中心主任，“亚洲是一个广阔的空间概念，从古代开始，便通过丝绸之路和印度洋打通不同区域间的流动交融，建立经济与人文交流，并在全球化时代的当下，让各大陆紧密相连。”
“港口城市环境研究项目可以帮助我们创建并完善亚洲研究的跨区域学术网络。纽约大学拥有得天独厚的资源条件，可以充分利用坐落于三座全球港口城市的门户校园，将纽约和亚洲的资源与科研力量打通，“Ludden教授说。他与上海纽约大学环球亚洲研究中心主任沈丹森教授（Tansen Sen），以及纽约大学阿布扎比环球亚洲研究中心的Mark Swislocki教授共同负责该项目。
经过三地相关领域教授和研究生的讨论，港口城市环境研究项目重点关注以下五个具有显著当代和历史意义的主题：
- “帝国间的连接”：包括从古至今的贸易网络；
- “本地环境”：包括生态学、物质文化与美学;
- “流动路径”：涉及土地与水系、交通和通讯技术;
- “文化形式的流变”：包括政治、宗教、艺术、科学和医药；
- “时间性”：研究古代以来长期的演变与对比。
港口城市环境研究项目旨在建立纽约、上海和阿布扎比三地之间长期稳定的跨领域研究合作，丰富科研方向、教学内容与研究生培养计划，促进全世界对亚洲的了解认知。项目组织者致力于加强三所环球亚洲研究中心之间的研究教学合作，让“环球亚洲”的概念深植于课程设置与研究议程。
该项目为期三年，将得到亨利·鲁斯基金会45万美元的研究资助。纽约大学全球教育体系将为项目提供行政支持。项目将在三所门户校园举行学术会议、专题讨论会、学者访问活动、研讨会以及工作坊，并强化三地本科生、研究生层次的“环球亚洲”相关课程。
了解更多关于上海纽约大学环球亚洲研究中心的信息，请前往：https://research.shanghai.nyu.edu/centers-and-institutes/cga/research-group