Call for Papers: Researching Struggles over Natural Resource Control in Southeast Asia: Epistemological, Methodological and Ethical Challenges.
The Canadian Council for Southeast Asian Studies (CCSEAS) 2015 conference is being held in Ottawa, from Oct 15th-17th, 2015, at the University of Ottawa. The theme of the 2015 conference is ‘Tensions and Transformations: Southeast Asia in a changing world’ (https://ccseas2015.wordpress.com).
We are seeking additional papers for a panel that reflects on experiences of researching control over natural resources, particularly in contexts of conflict, violence, struggle and resistance. In Southeast Asia, capital frontiers, weak land tenure regimes coupled with high levels of corruption, strong state claims to land sometimes rooted in socialism, and related to this, a history of suspicion of researchers, along with the role of state and private security in struggles for resource control necessarily complicate research into land and green grabs. The goal of this panel is to consider how recent research into resource control in the region may face particular challenges related to the object of study that are unaccounted for in the larger literatures on these topics, and to discuss what kinds of knowledges can be produced in these charged settings. When actors and relationships are opaque and the threat of violence is ever-present, what is an ethical research practice? What kinds of research is possible in these murky contexts? What methodological interventions might we consider to build a deeper understanding of these phenomena? We invite papers that reflect on these questions and broader epistemological, methodological and ethical challenges.
Please send an abstract of no more than 200 words by 30th June to [log in to unmask], [log in to unmask], and [log in to unmask]
Panel Organizers:
Laura Schoenberger (York University), Hollie Grant (University of British Columbia), and Alice Beban (Cornell University)
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