MONGOLIAN ROCK BAND "HU" CONTINUES THREE-MONTH NORTH AMERICAN CONCERT TOUR THROUGH FALL 2019

The Mongolian rock band "Hu" with millions of Spotify hits and a large following in Asia and Europe is making its North American debut this fall, starting on September 11 in Minneapolis and ending on December 7 in Las Vegas.

Other cities visited during this upcoming tour include Asbury Park (NJ), Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Brooklyn, Charlotte (NC), Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Colorado Springs, Columbus (OH), Denver, Detroit, El Paso, Indianapolis, Joshua Tree (CA), Los Angeles, Louisville, Milwaukee, New York, Omaha, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Pomona (CA), Portland, Richmond (VA), Sacramento, San Francisco, San Jose, Seattle, Toronto, Salt Lake City, San Diego, Santa Fe, Ventura (CA) and Washington, DC.

For more details and a music trailer, see the link here.

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UPCOMING MONGOLIA-RELATED LECTURES IN OCTOBER IN VARIOUS VENUES

Uranchimeg (Orna) Tsultem will speak on "Sky and Earth: Exploring the Non-Buddhist Religious Traditions of Mongolia" as part of the continuing Arts of Asia Lectures Series in San Francisco. The talk will take place at the University of California Hastings College of Law (Snodgrass Hall, 198 McAllister Street, San Francisco 94102) on Friday, October 4 beginning at 10:30 AM. Uranchimeg teaches at the Herron School of Art and Design in Indiana.

Oyungerel Tsedevdamba and Jeffrey Falt will speak on "Twentyfirst Century Mongolia: A Modern History of Changing Toilets in a Vast Nation" and "Tackling Pollution Issues in a Fast-Growing Capital" in Philadelphia. The talk will take place at the Chestnut Hill Friends Meeting Hall (20 East Mermaid Lane, Philadelphia 19118) on Wednesday, October 9 beginning at 7 PM.

Other talks during this fall visit to the United States include a presentation at Cornell University (Room 120 Physical Sciences), sponsored by the East Asia Program at the Department of Asian Studies. This talk, titled "An Insider's Look at Mongolia," will take place on Thursday, October 24, beginning at 4:45 PM. 

Oyungerel is a former Member of Parliament and Cabinet Minister in Mongolia. Her husband Jeffrey is a human rights lawyer. Both co-wrote the best-selling Mongolian novel Green-Eyed Lama, a dramatic portrayal of Mongolia during the 1930s when hundreds of monasteries were destroyed and thousands of lamas were killed.


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GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY HOSTS CENTRAL EURASIAN STUDIES SOCIETY (CESS) ANNUAL CONFERENCE (OCTOBER 10-13, 2019)

George Washington University will host the Central Eurasian Studies Society (CESS) annual conference, scheduled to take place during October 10-13, 2019 in Washington, DC. The annual conference regularly features up to 70 panels and attracts approximately 300 scholars from around the world.

This year's program will be hosted by the Institute  for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies at George Washington University's Elliott School.  The latest edition of the conference program is available here.

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UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA HOSTS CONFERENCE ON MIDDLE-PERIOD MONGOLIAN ARCHAEOLOGY (OCTOBER 26-27, 2019)

The University of Pennsylvania has announced a major conference on Middle-Period Mongolian Aracheology that will take place on October 26-27 in Philadelphia.

The conference is free and open to the public. However, advance registration is required.

DAY ONE (October 26) is tentatively scheduled to take place in the Ben Franklin Room at College Hall, featuring a program that includes:

Christopher Atwood (University of Pennsylvania) on Inner Asia History: Major Discoveries and Unsolved Problems in the Light of Archaeology

Wei Jian (Renmin University) on Most Important Discoveries and Unsolved Problems of Middle-Period Archaeology: The View from Beijing

Nikolai Kradin (Institute of History, Archaeology and Ethnology) on Most Important Discoveries and Unsolved Problems of Middle-Age Period Archaeology: The View from Vladivostok

Lkhagvasuren Erdenebold (Mongolian University of Science and Technology) on Most Important Discoveries and Unsolved Problems of Middle-Period Archaeology: The View from Ulaanbaatar

Concluding Round Table discussion led by Valerie Hansen (Yale University) and Nicola Di Cosmo (Institute for Advanced Study)

DAY TWO (October 27) will take place in the Widener Lecture Hall at the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, featuring a program that includes:

Jan Bemmann (University of Bonn) on Most Important Discoveries and Unsolved Problems of Middle-Period Archaeology: The View from Bonn

Kang in Uk (Kyung Hee University) on New Discoveries in the Relationship Between Balhae and the Uighur Khanate, Based on the Koksharovka Archaeological Complex in the Far East Region of Russia

Alexandr Naymark (Hofstra University) on Gold Imitations of Western China and Bracteats from Mongolia and Their Connection to Finds in Western Central Asia

Annie Chan (Ludwig Maximillian University) on Corporeal Variability and Commemorative Rituals of Turkic Anthropomorphic Stelae from Xingjian, Tuva and Mongolia

Ah-Rim Park (Sookyong Women's University) on Steppe Statuary of the 7th-8th Centuries

Bryan Miller (University of Michigan) on Through the 'Dark Ages': An Archaeological Perspective on the (Re)Emergence of Steppe Empires in the Mid-First Millennium CE

Petya Andreeva (Parsons School of Design) on Portable Luxury: Metalwork of the Golden Horde Elite

Closing Discussion led by Nancy Steinhardt (University of Pennsylvania)

Funding for this conference is provided by the Penn Global Engagement Fund, University Research Foundation and the School of Arts and Science at the University of Pennsylvania.

For more details on the conference program including registration details, visit here.

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UNIVERSITY OF GRONINGEN (NETHERLANDS) HOSTS NOVEMBER CONFERENCE ON CONTEMPORARY MONGOLIA: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, MINING AND THE ENVIRONMENT

The Center for East Asian Studies Groningen (CEASG) along with the National Council for Mongolian Studies is sponsoring a conference on Mongolia, scheduled for November 29, 2019. The event will be held at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands.

Titled Contemporary Mongolia: International Relations, Mining and the Environment, the schedule includes three panels:

1. International Relations/International Cooperation, covering topics such as the Belt and Road Initiative, Third Neighbor Policy, foreign policy and foreign assistance;

2. Mining and Natural Resources, covering foreign direct investment, energy, security, taxation agreements and the political economy of natural resource development;

3. Environment and Climate, covering desertification, climate change and the impact of mining on the environment, among other topics.

The deadline for submitting proposals for a conference presentation was June 30, 2019, with presentations potentially available for publication in a conference volume published by Brill; additional details are available here.

For further information, contact Professor Tjalling Halbertsma (CEASG) at the following e-mail address: t.h.f.halbertsma@rug.nl; those interested in attending the event can also contact CEASG direclty at ceasg@rug.nl

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MIAMI UNIVERSITY LAUNCHES "PROJECT DRAGONFLY" FOR 2020

Miami University in Ohio announces that it is now accepting applications for its 2020 Earth Expeditions graduate courses, offering experiences in 16 countries throughout the world. The offerings this year include a program in Mongolia focusing on conservation work involving two key steppe species, Pallas cats and Przewalski horses. Students experience the open wilderness while also learning about participatory media, local knowledge and community-based conservation.

Participation in Earth Expeditions can build toward Miami University's Global Field Program (GFP), a Master's degree that combines summer field courses worldwide with web learning communities, allowing students to complete the GFP Master's part-time from anywhere in the US or abroad. Support from Miami Univesity also helps reduce the costs of tuition.

For more information, see here. 

RECENT ARTICLES ON MONGOLIA AVAILABLE ONLINE

Once again there were a number of interesting and informative posts related to Mongolia during the last month; notable examples include:

Transparency International posted on September 27, 2019: "Anti-Corruption Reforms in Mongolia Welcome, Should Meet International Standards"

Foreign Policy posted on September 26, 2019: "The United States Should Help Mongolia Stand Up to China"

Bloomberg Businessweek posted on September 26, 2019: "Mongolia's President is the Trump of East Asia"

Asian Development Bank posted on September 25, 2019: "Mongolia's Growth to Ease to More Sustainable Levels in 2019 and 2020"

Nature posted on September 24, 2019: "Landlocked Mongolia May Hold Clues to Underwater Volcanoes"

Global Mining Review posted on September 24, 2019: "Changing the Face of Mining in Mongolia"

PV Magazine posted on September 24, 2019: "Mongolia Tenders 10 MV Solar Plant"

The Conversation posted on September 23, 2019: "Mongolian Mining Boom Threatens Traditional Herding"

The Hindu posted on September 20, 2019: "India, Mongolia to Explore Space Together"

Deccan Chronicle posted on September 19, 2019: "Mongolia President Arrives in India to Boost Ties"

UPI News posted on September 19, 2019: "Mongolia Keeps the Dialogue Going on North Korea" 

IMF Staff Country Reports posted on September 17, 2019: "Mongolia Selected Issues"

South China Morning Post posted on September 15, 2019: "Are Mongolia's Lucrative Cashmere Goats Grazing Themselves Out of Existence"

AP News posted on September 11, 2019: "Inside Bolton's Exit: Mongolia, a Moustache, a Tweet"

Dwell posted on September 6, 2019: "Construction Diary: A Young Couple DIY a Lofted Yurt in Portland"

Global Research posted on September 4, 2019: "The Russia-Mongolia Strategic Partnership"

Moscow Times posted on September 4, 2019: "Mongolia Welcomes Putin with Military Pomp"

Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology posted on September 3, 2019: "Genes Reveal Kinship Between Three Victims of Mongol army in 1238 Massacre"

For details and access to a large collection of articles on China's "One Belt, One Road" initiative in a variety of publications including the Asian Journal of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies, Maritime Policy & Management and Journal of Contemporary East Asia Studies, see the link here.

Not included in an earlier edition of This Month in Mongolia Studies, this link is also fascinating: "Socialism on the Steppe: How Soviet Specialists Changed Life in Mongolia," posted on August 13, 2019 by the Higher School of Economics (National Research University) in Russia.

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OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS ANNOUNCES FORTHCOMING COLLECTION OF ESSAYS ON SOURCES OF MONGOLIAN BUDDHISM

Oxford University Press has announced a forthcoming book on Sources of Mongolian Buddhism, edited by Vesna Wallace; the hardcover version, available later this year, will cost $150.

According to advance publicity, the book "features original Mongolian Buddhist texts never translated into English, making available examples of literature from the seventeenth century onwards and "introducing a fresh approach to understanding Tibeto-Mongolian Buddhism through primary sources".

The same publisher's statement notes that "Despite Mongolia's centrality to East Asian history and culture, Mongols themselves have often been seen as passive subjects on the edge of the Qing formation or as obedient followers of so-called 'Tibetan Buddhism', peripheral to major literary, religious and political developments. But in fact Mongolian Buddhists produced multi-lingual and genre-bending scholastic and ritual works that profoundly shaped historical conciousness, community identification, religious knowledge and practices in Mongolian lands and beyond".

The table of contents also gives a sense of what to expect in this pioneering new volume, including multiple articles by a variety of leading Mongolian scholars including Brian Bauman ("The Stone Inscriptions of Covtu Talji"); Sangseraima Ujeed ("The Autobiography of the First Khalkha Zaya Pandita Lobsang Trinley"); Matthew W. King ("Miscellaneous Writings of Caqar Gebsi Luvsancultem," "Incense Offerings to the Lord Chingghis Khan" and "The Legand of Mother Tara the Green"); Vesna Wallace ("Teachings of the Pious Fat Pandita Tsevelvaanchigdorj" and "Ritual Texts of Prosperity and Purification"); Uranchimeg Ucheed ("Mergen Gegeen's Didactic Poetry" and "Ritual Texts of Murgeen Gegeen"); and Simon Wickham-Smith ("Buddhist Literature of Danzan Ravjaa", "Literary Treatments of Buddhism in the Period of Transition" and "Contemporary Buddhist Poetry and Fiction"), among many others.

Vesna A. Wallace is Professor of South Asian Religions and Inner Asia Buddhist Studies in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of California in Santa Barbara. She has authored and translated four books on Indian Buddhism. Her most recent book is an edited volume on Mongolian Buddhism titled Buddhism in Mongolia: Culture, History, and Society.

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THREE BOOKS ON MONGOLIAN ART PUBLISHED IN ULAANBAATAR

Art historian and critic Uranchimeg Tsultem, currently Assistant Professor in the Herron School of Art and Design at Indiana University, announces three books on various aspects of Mongolian art, all published in Mongolia during the last couple of years:

Primary Documents of Contemporary Mongolian Art Association (Ulaanbaatar: BCI, 2018). Richly illustrated, this is the first and only book that includes primary sources such as manifestos, resolutions, artist interviews, critical reviews, etc. that span a history of various art associations and societies related to contemporary Mongolian art from 1986 to the present. Most documents are in Mongolian but some interviews are in English.

Collection of Art Essays, 1993-2018 (UIaanbaatar: Admon, 2018). This volume includes Uranchimeg's essays on various topics, mostly involving modern and contemporary Mongolian art and artists during the period 1993-2018. The book has three sections, the first is focused on critically acclaimed essays from around 2000; the second includes essays appearing in English in the Mongol Messenger during the period 1993-2000; and the third provides recent scholarly articles in English, based partly on research and teaching at the University of California-Berkeley.

Buddhist Art and Architecture of Ikh Khuree (Ulaanbaatar: BCI, 2016). This monograph is largely based on Uranchimeg's PhD dissertation undertaken at the University of California-Berkeley.



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Anti-Social Contract: Injurious Talk and Dangerous Exchanges in Northern Mongolia by Lars Hojer (216 pages); hardcover, $120 (New York: Berghahn Books, 2019)

Danish anthropologist Lars Hojer introduces readers to a remote district in northern Mongolia inhabitated by villagers and nomad pastoralists "where social relationships are cast in witchcraft-like idioms of mistrust and suspicion". While often attributed to the breakdown in state socialism in the 1990s, "this enthnography reveals an everyday universe where uncertain relations are as much internally cultivated in indigenous Mongolian perceptions of social relatednes, as it is confronted in postsoviet surroundings of unemployment and diminished social security".

According to David Sneath at Cambridge University, "I found this to be a wonderfully rich, fascinating manuscript; an original piece of anthropological writing that was both thoughtful and carefully-observed. It has a firm observational basis and makes some important, and I think, unique ethnographic and analytical points".

Also, Katherine Swancutt at King's College in London describes this book as "a very important and vibrant ethnographic work", emphasizing as it does "the dynamics of distancing, suspicion and avoidance in anti-social relations". 

The five chapters in this volume include the following: (1) Centralisation and Dispersal: A District in the Market Era; (2) Dangerous Communications: Injurious Talk and the Perils of Standing Out; (3) Safe Communications: Formality and Hierarchy; (4) Morality and Danger: Religious Practices and Buddhist Directions; and (5) Concealed Agencies: Divination, Loss and Magical Objects.

Lars Hojer is an Associate Professor at the Center for Comparative Culture, Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies at the University of Copenhagen. He has carried out extensive fieldwork in Mongolia and Inner Asia. His previous anthropological work focused mainly on social, economic, religious and political aspects of transition processes in urban and rural post-Soviet Mongolia

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Transcending Patterns: Silk Road Cultural and Artistic Interactions through Central Asian Textile Images by Mariachiara Gasparini (312 pages; 20 color, 27 black and white illustrations; map); hardcover, $74 (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2019)

Deploying a transcultural framework that goes far beyond Mongolia, this book analyzes the material forms of silk in China and the various Himalayan Kingdoms including Ladakh. According to reviewer Sarah E. Fraser from Heidelberg University, "It may be too soon to say whether Gasparini has single-handedly engineered a field-changing, barrier-breaking analysis of the stuff that brought the 'Silk Road' trading routes into existence, but we can state with certainty that she has given researchers tools to fabricate concrete arguments for further study" 

Mariachiara Gasparini received a PhD in transcultural studies and global art history from Heidelberg University (Germany). Her research focuses on Central Asian material culture, wall-painting, artist's praxis, and Sino-Iranian and Turko-Mongol interactions. She has conducted extensive fieldwork in Asia. Since 2015 she has been teaching Asian art in the San Francisco Bay area.

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Inviting Happiness: Food Sharing in Post-Communist Mongolia by Sandrine Ruhlmann; hardcover; $126 (Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 2019)

With a publication date of September 26, this book will be welcomed by all those interested in the "anthropology and sociology of alimentation, food sharing and hospitality" as well as "ritual practices, shamanist and Buddhist conceptions" as they relate to the human soul, happiness and meritorious action.

As advance material related to this book points out, "For Mongols, sharing food is more than just eating meals. Through a process of 'opening' and 'closing,' on a daily basis or at events, in the family circle or with visitors, sharing food guarantees the proper order of social relations. It also ensures the seasons and cycles of human life. Through food sharing, humans thus invite happiness to their families and herds."

Starting from 2000, Sandrine Ruhlmann has spent long periods of time in Mongolia, living and observing in both rural and urban areas of the country. Based on this research, she "describes and analyzes in detail the contemporary food system and recognizes intertwined ideas and values inherited from shamanism, Buddhism and communist ideology. Through meat-on-the-bone, creamy milk skin, dumplings or sole-shaped cakes, she highlights a whole way of thinking and living".

Sandrine Ruhlmann is researcher of anthropology at the French National Center for Scientific Research. She has published many articles in both French and English on Mongolian food practices and animal diseases governance in a post Soviet context. During a visit to Mongolia, she participated in the ongoing ACMS Lecture Series. This book is the English translation of her earlier work, initially published in French in 2015.