Moving Objects: Modes of Conveyance & the Making of Global Asias
Schedule
Fri Apr 24 2026 at 10:00 am to 05:30 pm
UTC-04:00Location
Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU | New York, NY
About this Event
Presented by the Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU and Pennsylvania State University’s Global Asias Initiative.
The Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU and Pennsylvania State University’s Global Asias Initiative are pleased to present “Moving Objects: Modes of Conveyance & the Making of Global Asias,” a one-day symposium at NYU and a Convergence feature for a special issue of the journal Verge: Studies in Global Asias. “Moving Objects” examines the varied modes of conveyance and the material infrastructures that facilitate the movements of people, cultural objects, and materials, by which Global Asias come into existence.
What are the objects, vehicles, and vessels of migration, circulation, and exchange that connect Asians to one another and to others? What are the platforms and material environments through which Global Asias are built? How do cultural and political representations of such moving objects serve to make diasporic passages possible? How are such passages re-routed with the arrival of new modes and technologies of travel and transit? How do moving objects shape the national, ethnic, racial, and religious subjectivities of those who inhabit Global Asias? What cultural and political meanings attach to the objects of movement and the paths they take?
Symposium schedule
9:45 a.m. Registration
10:00-10:15 a.m. Opening Remarks
Crystal Parikh, Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU
Tina Chen, Penn State’s Global Asias Initiative
10:15 a.m.-12:05 p.m. Objects Moving People
Anel Rakhimzhanova, “Performing Transit: Mobility and the Spatial Imagination in Central Asia”
Ann Ngoc Tran, “Boat Materialities: The Maritime Objects of Vietnam’s Postwar Exodus”
Christopher Cappazola, “Trapik, or, How Manila Got Hooked on Cars”
Julia Lee, “Tracking Global Asias”
Moderated by Junyoung Verónica Kim, New York University
12:05-2:00 p.m. Break
2:00-3:40 p.m. People Moving Objects
Kyoungjin Bae, “The Crisis of Portable Infrastructure: Tea Chests between Nineteenth-Century China and India”
Eve Oishi, “Correspondences: Three Missing Letters, the Postal Service, and Global Asias”
Alisha Cherian, “Kavadis in Motion: Routes of Belonging across Tamil Singapore and Malaysia”
Moderated by Krishnendu Ray, New York University
3:45-4:00 p.m. Closing Remarks
Crystal Parikh, Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU
Tina Chen, Penn State’s Global Asias Initiative
4:30-5:30 p.m. Reception
NYU campus access guidelines: This is an in-person event, open to the public. Registration is required.
Non-NYU guests may be asked to present a government-issued photo ID. NYU guests must present their NYU ID.
Accessibility note: This venue has an elevator and is accessible for wheelchair users. There are single-stall, all gender restrooms and a lactation room available. If you have any access needs, please email [email protected].
Credit: “Kavadi Thaipusam” by hams37 is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
Where is it happening?
Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU, 20 Cooper Square, New York, United StatesEvent Location & Nearby Stays:
USD 0.00
