Asian Borderlands Research Network (ABRN)
The 8th ABRN Conference's Call for Proposals is NOW AVAILABLE!
Deadline to submit the proposals for Negotiating Asian Borders: Actors, Displacements, Multiplicities, Sovereignties is 1 November 2024.
Click Here for the Call for Proposals
The ABRN research network focuses in particular on the border regions between South Asia, Central/East and Southeast Asia. Its concerns are varied, ranging from migratory movements, transformations in cultural, linguistic and religious practices, to ethnic mobilization and conflict, marginalisation, and environmental concerns.
Its aim is to generate new knowledge and methodologies to better understand these transitional zones - and borderlands in general - by encouraging academic exchange between both local and foreign scholars from different backgrounds. For this purpose, ABRN organises a conference in one of these border regions every two years in co-operation with a local partner.
Scholarly and political boundaries divide Asia artificially into units, such as South Asia, Central Asia, Southeast Asia, East Asia, and so on. These divisions not only mask the many and varied commonalities that transcend such boundaries; they also reinforce the marginalisation of people who live in these so-called border areas. Yet a better appreciation of these ‘transitional zones' is, in fact, critical to our historical understanding of processes of social and cultural change in the states lying beyond them. Nonetheless, such a focus remains peripheral to area studies and the disciplines which feed into them.
The Asian Borderlands Research Network has been developed in order to recognise the links, both historical and contemporary, that connect people in these borderlands, focusing on the border regions between South Asia, Central Asia, East Asia, and Southeast Asia, where the prevailing notions of area studies have been particularly limiting.
The purpose of the network is to encourage academic exchange between both local and foreign scholars from a wide variety of disciplinary backgrounds in the arts, humanities and social sciences. Its concerns are varied, ranging from migratory movements, transformations in cultural, linguistic and religious practices, to ethnic mobilization and conflict, marginalisation, and environmental concerns.
Its aim is to generate new knowledge and methodologies in order to better understand these transitional zones and to contribute to a reconfiguration of theoretical and methodological approaches to borderlands in general.
We, in particular, invite scholars from any of the regions involved to participate in the network and its conferences and to contribute to the organisational effort. For more information, please contact asianborderlands@iias.nl
ABRN organises a conference in one of these border regions together with an Asian partner every two years.
Upcoming conference
2-4 September 2025
Negotiating Asian Borders: Actors, Displacements, Multiplicities, Sovereignties
Irbid, Jordan
Past conferences
2022
Borderland Futures: Technologies, Zones, Co-existences
Seoul, South Korea
2020
Borderland Futures
Online
2018
Borderland Spaces: Ruins, Revival(s) and Resources
Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan
2016
Dynamic Borderlands: Livelihoods, Communities and Flows
Kathmandu, Nepal, 12-14 December 2016
Co-organiser: Social Sciences Baha
2014
Activated Borders: Re-openings, Ruptures and Relationships
Hong Kong, 8-10 December 2014
Co-organiser: Southeast Asia Research Centre at City University of Hong Kong
2012
Connections, Corridors, and Communities
Singapore, 11-13 October 2012
Co-organisers: Asia Research Institute of the National University of Singapore and the Nalanda-Sriwijaya Centre of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS)
2010
Asian Borderlands: Enclosure, Interaction, and Transformation
Chiang Mai, Thailand, 5-7 November 2010
Co-organiser: Regional Center for Social Science and Sustainable Development (RCSD) at Chiang Mai University, Thailand
2008
First ABRN Conference
Guwahati, Assam, India, 16-18 January 2008
Co-organiser: Indian Institute of Technology in Guwahati, India.
Network partners:
- IIAS (secretariat)
- Leiden University
- University of Amsterdam
- Researchers from various institutions worldwide
Border Picks is a multi-media forum of the Asian Borderlands Research Network (ABRN) that picks your stories from different borderlands across Asia – stories from the field, in the news, on your mind. Border Picks invites creative pieces from borderland enthusiasts from diverse fields.
Contact us at asianborderlands@iias.nl to share your interest to contribute to one of the following blog categories, Border Speaks; Border Pics or Borderflix.
Click here to visit Border Picks
Contact
For more information, please contact us at asianborderlands@iias.nl
Stay informed
Stay informed about the ABRN activities via our ABRN Facebook page or by signing up for the IIAS Monthly Update.
Conference information
For detailed information about our next conference, see:
https://www.iias.asia/programmes/asian-borderlands-research-network