Category: Weekly Wanderings
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Weekly Wanderings: May 5, 2024
No post from me this week, as the combination of work, travel, weak wifi, and a spring cold has left me with only the sketchiest idea of what’s going on in the world. I do have one link to share—an interview that I conducted for the Association for Asian Studies #AsiaNow blog with Amanda Lanzillo,…
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Weekly Wanderings: April 28, 2024
My brain felt chaotic and restless as I walked through the Toledo Museum of Art yesterday morning, taking in the works surrounding me in each room but not settling on anything long enough to fully consider it. Scuffed parquet floors creaked underneath my steps as I moved through rooms offering a special exhibit on African…
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Weekly Wanderings: April 22, 2024
Ann Arbor is not an especially large place. The city occupies just 29 square miles, and without football game traffic no point is more than 20 minutes away from another by car. Yet those 29 square miles contain 162 parks—some just tiny patches of grass squeezed in among rows of houses, others expansive nature areas…
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Weekly Wanderings: April 14, 2024
Even though I don’t work at a university, a lot of what I do still accords with the rhythms of the academic calendar. The end of the spring term is fast approaching, which means campus events are happening at a rapid pace: last week I gave one talk and attended two others, and the weeks…
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Weekly Wanderings: April 7, 2024
As Willy Wonka said, “We have to get on, we have to get on! We have so much time and so little to do—scratch that, reverse it. This way, please!” First, I’m giving a virtual talk on Tuesday afternoon (Eastern Time) as part of the CHINA Town Hall program organized by the National Committee on…
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Weekly Wanderings: March 31, 2024
Happy Easter to everyone who celebrates, and happy final day of March to anyone else who feels like this month has been extra-long. March is always weird for me because the AAS conference falls somewhere in its latter half, so I spend the first couple weeks preparing for that, speed through five high-adrenaline days on…
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Weekly Wanderings: March 24, 2024
I’m mostly punting on this week’s post because I’ve enjoyed having a very lazy weekend after returning from Seattle late Friday night and don’t feel like raising the energy level around here now. (Aside, that is, from dealing with two suitcases full of laundry.) But I did stay on top of stories about the new…
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Weekly Wanderings: March 18, 2024
The Association for Asian Studies Annual Conference has now come and gone, with over 3,000 participants traveling to join us in Seattle for four days of sessions and socializing. This is my eighth year as an AAS staff member, and I feel like I’ve finally figured out how to work at the conference without completely…
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Weekly Wanderings: March 10, 2024
It’s a short one this week—just some recent book reviews from me—because I’ve been in full-tilt AAS 2024 Annual Conference preparation mode for the past seven days. My suitcases are on the living-room floor, half packed; dry cleaning will be ready for pickup tomorrow; there are several dozen table tent cards in my office that…
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Weekly Wanderings: March 3, 2024
Signs of spring have arrived in southeast Michigan: there’s a pile of asparagus in my kitchen waiting to be trimmed for dinner, I can hear birds chirping through the porch door that I’ve cracked open, and I’m wearing flip-flops instead of fluffy slippers. I’m sure we’re due for at least one more bout of bitterly…
Maura Elizabeth Cunningham 