KU News Release

Olympics in China inspires international conference at KU

LAWRENCE — The Center for East Asian Studies at the University of Kansas is sponsoring an international conference inspired by the upcoming Olympics in Beijing titled “Olympian Desires: Building Bodies and Nations in East Asia.”

The conference will kick off at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, April 10, at the Confucius Institute on the Edwards Campus in Overland Park with “ ‘Why Are They So Far Ahead of Us?’: The National Body, National Anxiety and the Olympics in China,” a talk by Andrew Morris of California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo.

Over the following two days, 12 speakers from three continents will consider the political, social, economic and cultural impacts of the Olympics on its East Asian host nations: Japan, Korea and China.

The sessions on Friday, April 11, will include presentations on modernity, international diplomacy, sexual anxieties and security issues of the Olympiads in Japan, and talks, such as “Faster, Higher and Stronger: Women and the Olympic Games in East Asia,” that examine the Olympic experience in East Asia more broadly. Sessions that day will take place from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

On Saturday, April 12, the spotlight will move to Korea with presentations on the cultural policy and aftermath of the 1988 Seoul Olympics. The conference will wrap up with two talks that focus on the immediate future: “The Olympics and China’s Internationalization” and “The Olympic City as Spectacle: Beijing.” Sessions that day take place from 9 a.m. to noon.

The programs Friday and Saturday take place at the Hall Center for the Humanities and are co-sponsored by the Hall Center, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Confucius Institute and the Kansas Consortium for Teaching about Asia, based in the Center for East Asian Studies.

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